Mechanics to reduce micro

I think cdrkf is getting what I'm saying. I know it isn't apparent now on the single planet games available so far, but when you have several planets to watch, the assistance of a basic AI to defend your bases against attack when you're not around will be invaluable.

I'm not, however, in favor of it being a building. I think the idea of subcommanders from SupCom was never really developed well enough and this sort of functionality is the logical conclusion of that idea. You could essentially have dual-control of units within an area you define with essentially a turtle AI. Base defenses could simply be rebuilt if they are destroyed, and some basic standing orders could be going for peacetime (Build this set of units and transports and ship them continuously to the front line).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating taking functionality that exists in other RTS titles away (Although some great games have been made by making things harder rather than easier). I do want things like unit formations, aggressive unit stances, auto targeting, and attack move to be part of the basic UI, I just want to add more on top. The technology is already there in the AI, it's just a matter of implementing it.

We're not dangling sausages over homeless people, we're selling steaks in a restaurant. You have to pay for it, but it's worth it.

Sounds very good.

If I remember correcly; Dune 2 actually had some of these features.
Automated Ferries for repair; Rally points of factories; and so on all seems great anyway.

I like this idea. Keep the ferry automation, unit stances, and whatnot part of the UI, but be able to delegate a base to a subcommander (that can be a building or a unit, it does the same thing either way). That way you can concentrate on actually fighting people and rely on your subcommander to keep shipping you fresh units for the meatgrinder. He wouldn't be much use in a prolonged fight against a real player, but he'd give you the time to come back to your base and handle the situation yourself. I think it would be a lot more fun to NOT have to micro every little thing on multiple worlds.

All you guys against every form of automation are way to used to playing smaller scale games where something like that is actually possible. How are you going to micro 5 bases on 5 separate planets with 2 of them under attack? Maybe the Korean Starcraft world champion could do it, but even he would get tired of it after a while. I want to play an RTS so I DON'T have to have the twitch reflexes of a pro FPS player. I want to relax a little, and plan a big counter-offensive that might take entire minutes to organize(gasp). But then again, if you're really afraid that the AI might do something that pisses you off, then just don't build a subcommander. Have all the micro you want, but leave us mere mortals with a way to handle such a gigantic game.

I'm in agreement with this, I don't understand why all our conservatives are getting anal about implementing AI, when they could just politely request a toggle button.

It seems I can't resist irrelevant misinformation on the internet. Here is the really irrelevant part: it's called Spring not TA:Spring and for the cost of the targeting facility I assume you mean BA, a game on the Spring engine. Slightly more relevant is how the targeting facility works in Spring (this is Spring as an engine, it has a radar system and it has some hardcoded behaviours). Units can always shoot at radar dots, the targeting facility just reduces radar wobble. I forget if radar wobble existed in TA but basically the position of units seen on radar is inaccurate so very accurate weapons have trouble hitting without the presence of a few targeting facilities.

Anyway, I'm strongly against ingame requirements for smart unit AI.

I was always wondering what the targeting facility did, it all felt a bit weird in BA. Thanks for telling me about that.

Play a game of BA Chickens and you'll find a use for the targeting facility

more automation for tedious redundant task management leaves more time to be used on the actual implementation of strategy such as coordinating huge armies of land, sea and air more correctly and building new bases/outposts without having the economy suffer or i.e finding out that all your units are stuck because the transport you assigned was destroyed.

I have to agree with OP on all accounts and I really hope this will be maxed out macro rts game and not a stressfull unit management game.

All of the Op's suggestions + build templates!

good thread

Very good thread indeed. I remember the KS where the scale was huge now if I'm involved in an epic game with someones in the same timezones as me, I don't want to stop because I have to be at work. If the map is big enough for an almightly game I'd love to carry on an epic game that says I've had to goto sleep if the other player wishes to let the AI carry on building instead of me they can carry on but if they want to save the game and carry the game against me to the next day. Where if I log in earlier the AI takes their place until they log in perhaps with an agreed set time for recommencement. So the AI only does the job until the human turns up I could sign up to that

So how does this ai know how good to play? So you playing a guy that's on an equal level as you, then sorians crazy good ai come along and easily kills your opponent, or a weaker Ai gets steamrolled. This seems like a good idea?

I think if the game gets to this stage it could be nice to say hey man I need to go this is a great game and I'd love to continue same time tomorrow. Then you press save game and he has 10 seconds to save also. If he doesn't agree you can just rage quit.

Onto the OP. I agree there will be some need for automation but some of these ideas just remove human error from the game. I agree with smallcpus first post about fabber automation completely. Exactly what I thought when I read op.

As good as everyone's ideas are I just feel people are going to be pretty biased when suggesting less micro/more macro or vice versa. Clearly I'm on the more micro side cause I like the feel of a game when I'm playing at full speed. Hopefully a happy medium can be found.

I love the economy suggestions, especially the ones that give the fabbers a brain so they upgrade stuff, assist and reclaim automatically!

If you can't manage a few engineers and upgrading a few mex you don't belong playing an RTS. There is no reason for any unit combat automation or AI for combat. That is where the skill comes in any RTS. There is no reason any player with 400+ APM should do anything but utterly dominate someone with under 100. The Micro I would like to see gone is the way air fighters are currently handled in FA, where spinning a blob of a few hundred fighters can let it take on numbers much larger than the blobs.

What increase in fun or depth of gameplay is there when combat is taken over largely by AI?

I agree that transport should be streamlined, especially with que'd units, but seriously, dodging AA and other troops? That is ridiculous. Land that transport where you pointed it. Anything else will just be aggravating and people will EASILY be able to second guess the predictable AI and wipe transported troops with ease. Beyond that if you do a unarmored airdrop right on a turret you will just get deservedly shot down.

Auto reclaim/assist/repair is great. However if I am reclaiming mass and I max storage, I do NOT want every engineer on the planet to dive on the closest mass sink and begin to upgrade it.

Clearly I am primarily a FA player, and enjoy a level of micro in a game, but most of the suggestions seem beyond casual, and a crutch for poor players to be able to build and forget their units.

>Enjoy micro
>I put on my robe and wizard hat
>I cast Burning Hands

Micro does literally nothing but get in the way of true strategy. Okay, so you remembered to upgrade your T2 metal extractor at minute 12, GOOD JOB JOHNNY! Now what happens if you forget? You end up in an infinite pile of enemy tanks and Experimentals as your cries for help are drowned out by the jeers of your own team outshined by the beams of sunlight glinting off of your opponent's bare asses as they destroy you in a final, impenetrable tidal wave of nukes.

As far as I'm concerned, the moment I secure an area and build metal extractors there that's it. I don't have to do anything else but build defenses and plop down a few hundred more factories to utilize the extra metal. That way I can focus more on actually directing my forces and identifying weak points in the enemy defense, so I can CRUSH THEM like the INSIGNIFICANT PIGS THEY ARE.

I imagine it's worth restating at this point, that no one really wants a subcommander AI to attack for them. What I think we do want is an AI that holds and fortifies a position. Having said that, in a game that is almost infinitely scalable it would be, like KEWs, something that is implemented only in very large scale games and is an option that doubtless some players won't utilize.

The way I look at the upgrading of mexes, and why I think that T2 mexes being a straight upgrade should be the exception that proves the "t2 = specialized not upgrades" rule for this game: You can use them to get more metal, when a situation arises that you can't build any t1 mexes without great difficulty.

Something like the Command Center "upgrade your supply depot" thing in SC2. It's for when you find yourself supply blocked and maybe building more isn't the best option. Like if your depots get destroyed in a raid, but your economy is otherwise doing fine, but would be best spent on units for a counter attack, or fortification. Throw down some energy on them depots! It can also be used to minimize how many depots you need to build.

Mexes are sortof similar. You need mexes to run factories. Say you wanna take an area, but you just don't have the unit production to take AND hold it, and you need the areas metal to do that: Upgrade some of your T1 mexes to get more metal to build more factories to build more units to take AND hold the area to build more T1 mexes, and build more factories, etc.

A little off topic I guess, but if uber makes t2 a little more expensive for the extra metal you get, it could steer mexes in this direction, make the upgrading "micro" a strategic option, and make making more t1 mexes the more efficient option, keeping t1 relevant.

Quick Edit: As for automation, I think that assisting and patrol routes out of factories, hold ground commands and energy conserve modes should be enough to provide base automation and defense coverage, while still requiring some thought from the player as to placement of something.

Also, long build queues need some work for reliability (if I can successfully place a building ghost, it should get built) and an option, like factories, for inserting build commands after the current project, but without killing the whole chain.

My primary issue with mexes being micro-intensive is that it results in the bullshit exponential economy enocuntered in SupCom; whoever has the best eco management WINS!

I didn't come here to play EVE with a sprinkling of ground-based combat, I came here to BLOW UP ROBOTS.

I don't think micro-intensive made them exponential. Numbers made them exponentials, so you might be putting the cart before the horse.

If the metal in from t1 mexes doesn't feel like you have to have a lot to run a t2 factory, I think the situation where you upgrade becomes MORE of a choice than a requirement. And I think that's what mar's is getting at.

Basic economy for lots of robots > required upgrades for the same robots?