Uber devs and balancing.

Everybody in this thread keeps saying that building walls around your base isn't the correct way to play, they're right, but have you considered that that's how the devs want the game to be played?

As it stands walls are pretty useless.

That just can't be. Walls will always have a fixed metal cost, and this cost will always be balanced in respect to other stuff. That means that if you're "good", then you'll build units instead of walls + turrets that might or might not ever see an enemy unit.

Building walls in "hope" that they will be useful is not good strategy.
Building walls that you "know" will be useful is a different story.

Building walls at every edge of your base is rather the first than the latter.

It also means to me, that the devs have a predefined mindset of how big their base is going to be in the end. And they try to border that template of a base they have in their minds with those walls.

But top players don't do that. They build walls only where they're really necessary, and expand their base constantly, build forward bases, and try not to limit them where possible.

It seems to me that when the devs play, they always tend to have a really compact base with as few space used as possible. But if I'm playing for example Gunshin, then we both have structures all over the planet, and try not to put too much stuff on one spot. The battlefield is constantly changing in those games. Structures are getting destroyed, new ones built, and front lines move constantly. That's exciting gameplay. Not having all of your stuff in one spot and either lose nothing or everything.

Those two are really different mindsets.

Tbh, I just think the devs should play more 1v1s.

Why build a perimeter of walls when you can build a perimeter of missile turrets? Plus it keeps the scouts out.

Why build a perimeter of walls when you can build a perimeter of factories?

I wouldn't be surprised if we see a lot fewer Dev streams in the future if people are gonna criticize their play style like this. Maybe they wanted to test the effectiveness of walls? And now they know that walls need some work. You can't work on bot balance if you just build tanks. The point of these play-tests isn't to win as quickly as possible, but to test the game.

No, we love those streams. The devs shouldn't care of what we think about how good they are. Because they're not anticipated progamers, they're game developers. It's like saying to me that I'm an aweful soccer player. I couldn't care less

But my point is, that maybe the devs need to get some more advise of what the top players do, what strategies they use, what they like about the game, and what not. That's usually the most efficient way of determining imbalance.

I hate this as a more casual player.

But it's probably for the best to keep the better players from whining on the forums.

I think the devs need to do some regular training with some top players giving some pointers.
See metabolical playing with zaphodx, it improved his game massively which will improve balance issues earlier on.

Agreed. I mean the devs have the right ideas, definitely. But in the case of proxy factories, scathis didn't even know about them. And if you don't know all the strategies that out there at the moment, then how are you going to consider on how to balance best?

While the argument that everything is about to change, and that strategies that are used now might not be viable in the future may be true, it could mean that strategies that we actually like very much will go away too.

And that should be prevented imo.

This is not what I was getting at in the original post but curious as to why you wouldn't like a more balanced game? Casual player or not the more balanced a game, the more choices strategies and fun to be had. Or is that just my view?

I don't care who does it; good player/ bad player, but I'd like it to be a lot better than now.

This still holds true even when you have to build 10 mex and 10 pgens before you build your first factory. You always will have to build a first factory and you will always have to chose one of the different types.
It is a non-issue anyway, since usually players build more than 1 factory pretty early into the game and the initial factory rarely does more than maybe 1 or 2 bots before it starts to build an endless loop of engineers. So the distinction does not matter at all for this.

Having to build a few mex and pgens before your factory will not change anything in this regard. You won't be able to scout before you have units that are coming out of that factory anyway. Without scouting you cant make a better decision than you can while you select your spawn.

Actually...

...but that's what happens in everything brought to the extreme. In F1 isn't the mechanic or the engineer to know how tune the car, even if they built it and are supposed to know everything about.

It's the pilot to give the final touch, the one who effectively can bring it to the limit. And sometimes beyond.

Depends on what you have available at the start Colin. What's to stop you starting with the ability to scout?

It could be the function (or at least one of them) of the Egg, for example.

Anyway, in the end they seem to have had quite a fun. And that is very important

If we are going that route ofc a lot changes. Like the player would actually have something to do (use the egg to do whatever it does) while building up the economy. The point of the initial factory is not to have a factory asap, but it is to get a distinct game asap. Currently in 90% of all games people do their default build at the start and the game only starts to look distinct from other games a bit after the first factory is build. If you provide something else that is meaningful and does not have a simple perfect bo that players just mindlessly execute that would be an equally good solution to "factory first". Factory first just happens to be a simple solution that is proven to work from FA.
Even so the type of the first factory won't matter that much, assuming reasonable spawns. You can always just build 10 more factories of any other type and use the first factory to spam engineers or the like.

True if factories remain as cheap and as powerful with regards to their buildpower as they are currently... which I also disagree with. But that's for a different thread methinks.

I'd prefer to give players something to do that doesn't include making (what could potentially be) a significant decision with (potentially) major strategic implications as the first action.

If the type of factory doesn't really matter that much then you run the risk of making an illusion of choice between two factories, when in actuality there's very little distinction between the two in terms of play.

He's saying that because the 'pro's' are the ones that are driving the balance of the game, not that he wants an imba game.

I fully agree that the player should not be forced to do an important decision before he his the ability to gather intel on what might be a good thing to do. However from the current game (and also from how FA and how I generally think it should be) the first factory matters only little in this regard. What upsets me is the selection of the spawn without even knowing potential spawn points of your opponent.

The type of 1 factory does not matter. The type of the 20 factories I spam afterwards do matter. If I build 20 vehicle factories I have committed a lot into them, if I make 1 it does not matter as much. I think that's a generally good thing that has no downsides. Higher prices for factories means people will start to build a bazillion supporting engineers again, I think we had a lot of threads about that already. I like the current state of factories a lot.

I've never been much of a fan of 'spam' unless in very specific, fringe case scenarios. That the entire game is currently designed around the concept of spam as a good thing is an attitude I hope gets balanced out and tuned into less of a focus, and more of a choice.

I also don't see supporting engineers as evil, as long as you don't go to SupCom's ridiculous levels of engineer spam. Again, I'm against spam in general and in all forms unless it it warranted.

So we must agree to disagree on that point Colin.

I like spam. A lot It makes PA one of the most epic to play 1v1 games already.