Okay UBER, we should talk balance :D

SO I tried the Death Laser™ (yes, it's going to be trademark from now on)

Apart the fact that this is some ungodly level of satisfying...

....it's kinda cheap that you can Shoop-da-whoop "à vonlonté"

Here's what I propose :
Cataclysts go boom after each use. you have to rebuild 'em to fire.

and increased build time and cost. (I mean is it me or is that thing even easier to build then a Hailley?). You get first shot out for no cost in time, however henceforth the cannon will have a cool-down. Applicable even if the gun switched hands (otherwise people could use it as a cheat).

Because right now the story is pretty much
>"hey I got gun"
>"BOOM go twelve planets"


ALSO (why didn't I think of this sooner?)


currently the Death Laser™ is available on even 500 radii metal planets.

that won't do. no, no.

way to easy to capture a small-*** planet like that.

at that stage I say the caps gotsta go!

MORE : https://forums.uberent.com/threads/okay-uber-we-should-talk-balance-d.63288/#post-985916


Thanks for the awesome, UBER.

I'm just gonna quote myself:
Pretty sure lasers are cheap to construct and fire only because they want to see whether the functionality itself is working fine. If it was high enough, they wouldn't manage to make enough people fire it enough times to cover enough edge cases to be sure it's working fine.

the thing is we have the same cheats they do. we can build them instantaneously to test them if we want to.

I disagree, 200,000 metal is a lot already, and I think it's too early to say they're over or under powered.

There's a bunch of other wonky balance that should be addressed instead.. hell not even actual balance, but stuff that effects balance. I mean stuff like the Dox being able to shoot at air and go underwater being really unintuitive and stupid. Those units that are going to be used A LOT need to be fine tuned more urgently than a crazy massive super weapon end-game thing that is going to be rarely used.

EDIT: Oh I think the Death Star laser needs a cooldown of 1-3 minutes, would help gameplay and make the effect seem even more impressive, and it would allow time for the "close" animation, and then another "open" and fire animation.

Catalysts and Halleys have the same metal cost.

I don't know how much it makes sense to nerf the planet laser though, I like it as an alternative to planet smash, which is a once off thing. I like your idea of having a cool-down rather than others' about having the planet laser be one-time-use-only.

no it's not.

was waiting for this.

should be fairly obvious.

on one end you have a planet that was partially or entirely nuked, either way, completely recolonisable. on the other you can never use the planet again and the action is done faster than planet smash.

Well yes but the fact they're the same cost is the issue. Think about it, for the same cost you can set these up, and fire them off as many times as you want, AND it destroys the whole planet! Halleys are a lot less cost effective, they're just as expensive and you might even need more of them to send a planet... And remember planets do damage over areas depending on the size of the smash... And you've now destroyed a whole thing of economy. Basically with halleys you lose so much to smash and you lose nothing when using a catalyst.

I see your argument, and have already thought over that myself (just be careful, your comment borders on being aggressive...)

I'm not saying I don't want changes, I just don't want this weapon to be a one-time use kind of thing. Sure, add a massive cool-down or have the weapon destroy all of the catalysts when it fires, something to that effect. If the planet laser is completely one-time use, then I would argue that it is too close to planet smashing.

Sure, there is a distinct difference because this weapon does destroy the target planet, but in most of the games that I've played, planet smash is such a late-game event that most people don't rush to recolonize anyways.

Just my two cents.

well I never said one-time.

Main critique with OP is why call it the "Death Laser"? Nothing in PA is alive.

>INB4 Trees.

crap.
So we got this big ol laser to destroy planets with trees on them.

it's really hard to eradicate all life on life-capable planets.

a single micro-organism and, voila, you have life. one less and you didn't but a single one counts.

So the laser is just scrubbing the system of microorganisms? In a Halo-esque operation?

Robots are people too.

I think this laser has life eradication covered; it atomizes the entire planet.

Also, commanders are sentient. So they're... technically alive.

yes, by many works of sci-fi's definition, Sentient beings are to be categorized as "alive"

I ROBOT
A.I.
GHOST IN THE SHELL
MATRIX
BLADE RUNNER

They have rights too!

It seems like the choices for nerfing it are A: put a cooldown on it, or B: Make it a one-time use.

But can I offer another possible solution ? C: When you use it, the Catalysts explode, and you have to rebuild them to fire it again. It would add a "cool-down", while also tying it into the economy, making it just as viable as any other equivalent option for annihilation.

After some more experience, I think this is pretty relevant/important. They can just chain kill off everybody, and Gas Giants aren't much of a refuge.