Things that annoy you in RTS games

Agreed - I'd like to win, but I want to enjoy the game. That's the purpose of a game. If I have to hone my clicking to the microsecond it's no longer fun.

The idea that 'competitive play' = 'clicking really fast'.

Mechanics that exist to reinforce this idea.

Addendum: Claims that allowing players to automate repetitive tasks (i.e. make a companion AI that does the boring stuff like base building and repair for you) is "playing against an AI not a player".

Yes, I can see the argument, and even agree to it with the proviso that your intent is for a "humans only" league, but letting the game deal with boring stuff is part of the RTS genre, so we're talking about where the manual/automatic line gets drawn. Most players seem fine with combat units being able to do their own target aquisition and incoming fire avoidance, so refusing to allow construction units some AI leeway always seemed like an artificial restriction to me. I suspect I may be in the minority there though

See, this attitude is one I have a problem with right there. There is not one true way to win and everyone else is doing it wrong and you must insult their mothers for it. It's about fun, not making some e-sport for you to beat others over the head with. If that is what you're looking for, perhaps you should go back to Starcraft, and let us have a game like TA was, because last I checked, it had pretty good balance between defense and offense, instead of what seems to be desired by some which is offense is the one true defense and every possible defense should crumble before your mass horde of a single unit type because otherwise it would take longer than 15 seconds and their allies or maybe even the rest of their units might defeat you and that offends you in some way.

If there is only one way to win, then there is no depth, and you might as well be playing Tic Tac Toe.

I can't really remember any starcraft game I have had on lan parties, though we had alot, but I remember almost every game of C&C, TS, RA2, AOM, AOE, AC, SupCom and SWGB because the gameplay was not focused on micro but on macro, the game lasted usually more than 1h and nobody had a clear "build" to win because the game was more than just spamming one unit type. I really hope they make turtling a viable strategy, not that I like turtling, but I love fighting turtlers.

Things that annoy me are abilities that does not have autocast on them, or that requires more micro than just pressing "D" for deploy.

I'm too old to focus on my APM...

The illusion of choice.

Stuff not being to scale. I mean, take the battlecruiser in Sc2, in the HotS trailer it was bloody gigantic, and ingame you can probably 3 marines in it if you're lucky.

This is interesting but a bit vague. I can think of two interpretations but you could have meant something completely different.

Global interpretation
There are no RTS games which include choice, it is all an illusion. From a game theory point of view these games consist of a series of actions and if a player wants to win they will just carry out these actions. Choice of action is an illusion held by scrubs and it's annoying.

(Upon writing the above possibility I don't think it was what was meant but I've written it now so may as well leave it there).

Local interpretation
There can be situations in RTS games in which there appears to be a choice between many options but actually one of the options is always better than the others. These choices are not real choices and don't add anything worthwhile to the game. They are just traps to catch new players.

The second one.

...

Though sometimes I wonder about the first.

My interpretation of this stems from a personal theory about how challenges work in games. I wrote this in another thread a while ago:

I'm pretty sure that Nanolathe is irritated by challenges of calculation which masquerade as challenges of choice. When we are given an array of options, and are told to pick one as we wish, but really we always should have picked option number 1 if we want to succeed.

If that's the case, then I'm in agreement. I've nothing against challenges of calculation, and PA will (and already does) feature some of these examples. Where possible, i tend to find challenges of choice more engaging (and coming to this realisation has helped me avoid wasting money on games I will quickly become bored of), but challenges of calculation are still important when used well. However, they shouldn't be presented as challenges of choice.

Unless of course, there is a layered challenge of calculation in figuring out whether we are being presented with a challenge of choice or a challenge of calculation. Isn't meta fun...

This is the reason I am so against the perfectly symmetrical, to-the-microsecond build order style of some RTS games. I have always been drawn towards games where some form of randomness and unpredictability is inherent in the gameplay, whether that be procedurally generated maps, random events or imperfect aim. Yes, it means that there is an element of luck involved, but it forces you to make decisions and modify your strategy on the fly. It's not about whether things are going your way, but about how you use your current situation to your advantage.

The way I see it, life isn't fair. Sometimes I lose. Sometimes it's because I didn't play well enough. Sometimes I was just unlucky and was unable to use the situation to my advantage. It happens. That's what makes it interesting though, there is no one way to win. It all depends on the situation.

to use your terminology MadScientist, I do indeed dislike challenges of Calculation that have the facade of being an evenly weighted choice.

As long as they're telling me that this is a puzzle, with only one solution, then I'm fine. As soon as you cross the line of presenting me with several (outwardly benign) choices, only to find that all but one of them was a mousetrap snapping shut on my finger...

Well, I think you understand the type of person I am, and my probable reaction to such a farce.

Speaking of symmetry, I'm not a fan of the boring mirrored maps many RTS games seem to have. TA spoiled me with its beautiful hand-made asymmetric maps. Even when a TA map was symmetrical, it didn't look like it was, somehow.

Fully agree with you, this is what I like about PA so far you can decide on locations and they're unique do you want a large canyon on one side to protect against air etc etc but less metal nearby so you have to advance out in one direction. It makes the game more of a challenge

This discussion reminds me of this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg8fVtKyYxY

Be careful - Extra Credits is the game design equivalent of TVTropes.

Trust me, the opposite isn't that much better. Having many seemingly different choices, but in the end you have to realize, that they all originate from the very same equation (not formula, but actually equation). Complex formulas just to hide a very simple equation is really just as annoying, although you luckily won't see this that often in RTS games as turning the game into an equation is a lot harder.

Great thread. I agree with the majority: I hate clicky-clicky stress. If I want to show my skills with the mouse and keyboard I can play an FPS. As a benchmark, I like it when I can play an RTS game with little keyboard interaction and still be competitive.

I'd like to see something, similar to CaC, where I can just click together my build order. The commander etc. have to figure out the rest them self. Maybe assign some areas for unit and energy production like in Sim City?
I want to have good AI for my units. Automise as much as possible.

In the current version of PA, there is a lot of high level choice but also enough micro to make it stressful. Plus there is too much repetition. Even the developers said in the last live stream, that 'the start is probably the most boring part of the game'. So I hope they will make it less boring. An easy hack would be to start with a small, automatically created base. Or maybe, you can click together a small base at the start, after you picked your location but before the game runs in real time.

Btw, I think it would be a lot of fun to use PA as a platform for AI competitions. Not having an AI that does everything, but as much as possible. If you read Vernor Vinge you might know what I mean. You are a weapon programmer, developing all the automation. When it comes to the battle, all I want to do is making some high level choices.
I want to program how my artillery bots are attacking the enemy and run away again for instance. Or my units to run away from artillery incoming. Or to make sensible formations. And then just choose from a list of modes which I programmed before hand.

metal fatigue had this feature and it was great. the game starts in "time freez" for few min where u get instant build as long as u have the resrouces for it (within a limited area/raduis)

I see no harm is implementing this. it is a great feature that could easily be implemented

Yes, exactly. If not by Uber then by a mod.

Lol. I thought as Star Control would call it "cyborg", where you designate parameters like units but the ai maintains its constant production and use in attack, would be a good option in this game. You make small changes as you watch over your Ai making its own decisions what to build and how to attack.