assaulting planets

As far as I am aware no spaceships are going to be in the game so how are planetary assaults meant to be conducted against a well dug in opponent, when you can only dump troops on the planet, and not launch missiles/shells against said positions.

I think more options will come soon enough, I saw a transport ship so we'll most probably be able to transport our units from planet to planet after reaching a certain tier most probably. Not too much is known though (apart it being awesome).

Do we even know if there are missiles/artillery yet?

There are orbital units, which are basically spaceships as far as anyone knows. And if the trailer has an artillery installation that can shoot troops at another world it seems likely enough that there will likely be a version that can fire shells.

I wouldn't worry about it. We know nothing about units at the moment. If it's too hard to attack from space that will become apparent in alpha/beta and fixed.

They both feature pretty heavily in the trailer and are a staple of TA/FA, so most people are assuming that means yes.

Ok good. That's what I thought. I was wondering why he said there wouldn't be any

Drop Pods ala Space Marine Style dropped from Mobile Orbital stations = Awesome.

I think we need some sort of assault barge to transport units, or a unit cannon, like in the trailer. Mobile Space stations would look cool, but i still think assault barges would look/feel better in the role. Think like a upsized T2 air transport from SupCom1, with some guns for protection, that then drop pods troops to the surface.

I'd like to see at least some satellites that can transfer orbits. Essentially, a planetary assault would start from the outside (orbital layer) in. But yes, some way to transfer units would also be needed.

Also we mustn't forget that if an opponent is so dug in that orbital unit drops and orbital artillery bombardment and so on is ineffective in establishing a beachhead on that planet (which I think would be a relatively rare occurrence) the player still has the option of dropping asteroids.

Dropping asteroids should be a final resort to take a planet. Dropping/landing elsewhere would work. So you could, y'know, not wipe out all the awesome resources on the planet, and build a base somewhere else. If its a planet wide base though, spam asteroids at it til there is no planet left.

that was my intention yes, if you are talking about a planet which is so well defended that a player can't get a foothold necessitating an asteroid drop then that to me is the definition of last resort.

I'm hoping for some kind of spaceship catapult a la Mass Effect. I think that would be a balanced way to handle things. Plus a space elevator for transporting land units off the planet.

The defender is always going to have some kind of economic advantage due to his infrastructure. In other games, the defender got an advantage through high ground, bonus stats, or more efficient defense structures. In PA, the defender has an entire world to his advantage, while the attacker has none. That's a pretty damn big hurdle to overcome!

The problem with assaulting planets is one of economy. It makes sense to fortify a world if and only if it provides best monetary returns. Likewise, it only makes sense to invade IFF it can pay off.

So for example, a purely local economy would end up disastrous. Every uncontested planet would be flooded with defenders and end up unbreakable. If a secure planet loses economic value, there is no incentive to keep pumping resources into it. If expansion is critical players will spread far and thin, allowing more chances for raids. If a late game economy is deliberately vulnerable, then fortified worlds can still be wounded without a full scale invasion. No single tool will really take care of all those needs, so it'll take some tough choices on what works and what can't.


Sure, you can say that a planetary assault needs dropships or line breakers or some such. All those things can definitely make invasions possible and fun. But the dirty bottom line behind an invasion is based around money. The ultimate goal is to increase your income as fast as possible, while denying enemy growth as much as possible. Invasion has to make strategic sense, so the macro economic model needs to encourage it by punishing turtles, rewarding risk, and encouraging conflict.

My thoughts on Planetary Assault/Inter-Planetary Unit Transport(plus some stuff on the Orbital Layer);

viewtopic.php?p=561417#p561417

Mike

This is the wrong thread to be discussing that. There's a big long thread somewhere else about diminishing returns. If we discuss that here it will go off-topic fast.

Indeed, that sort of stuff goes deep into metagame territory. I've seen diminishing returns defined and used in 3 completely different ways, so that's a terrible term to use on these forums anyway. Ah well, thought it was worth a mention at least. So, what sort of tools should a planetary assault have? Well, the most obvious concerns are transporting units and establishing a forward base.

Transport costs money and takes time. The basic answer is to have actual transport ships that bring units across space. For short distance travel, this can work great. Over long distance it may end up being rather slow and easy to anticipate. Transports tend to be vulnerable targets, so it will probably need some kind of air support. So... I guess air units need to come with the transports as well. Chances are this invasion is a one way trip, as the invading base is a long distance away, so it has to count. It's expensive, it's powerful, it's slow but long distance. It's pretty much a full scale invasion. I think everyone is going to want this option.

The PA video shows a unit cannon launching assault bots from an asteroid directly to the front line. That's sweet. You don't need air support or vulnerable transports, so the investment is much lower. However it seems to bring much fewer units into battle, and it depends on having some kind of nearby base. It's cheaper, it's fast, it's precise, but it lacks raw power. Sounds like a great option for raiding or "drop pod" reinforcements.

A forward base implies some kind of viable front line economy. So, lets just assume there is. This kind of attack is really the biggest one of all. Your main invasion wasn't enough to clear a world, and surgical strikes can only do so much. The only choice is to slug it out the old fashioned way. So what sort of tools do you need?

Well, the first thing your enemy can do is launch nukes and stop your invasion cold. That means you need a way to knock out the nuke launchers and get anti-nukes up quick. Raiding units would help, maybe stealth units or suicide bombs to take out your first critical targets. Teleporters would be amazing for these kind of surgical strikes. Next, you have to deal with a base that has been well established. Hopefully it's not overly developed and has some weak points, but that's a different topic. KEWs are likely going to be the best option for softening up a world, and with the nuke launchers down they will be extremely effective.

So now that you've KEW'ed a world and made it ripe for invasion, it's time to bring all the other options to bear. Send in the main invasion, build a base behind it, and drop in units from high above. Maybe even get the Commander involved, isn't his purpose to get a good base going? Eventually you'll win. Or lose. But lets say you win, because it feels good.

Congrats! You have now captured a... uhm... dead ball of rubble and lava, with no more resources and nothing left to fight over. Uh. Crap. Well... uh... Victory!

I think 'transports' like the air based ones might be a little silly in my opinion.

But 1 use transport rockets (Carrying about 10 small or 4 big) would look cooler to me, even have it look like SC transports with the units on one o the sides, but for returning thats asking a little much (It would just be a spaceship).

But thats just what I think.

Not realy, build a infrastructure on a moon, use engines to transport it into orbit around a target planet, use unit cannons from the moon to invade (while you keep building units at your moon that allredy has infrastructure.

You can also use smaller astroids to destroy areas of the planet (for example aiming at the enemies main base) without wiping the whole planet.

It's still a situation where the invader starts with less, and has to spend the time preparing his attack. Keep in mind that a planet isn't going to just sit there, helpless. He can build a counter attack, and likely has infrastructure already suited to the task. Hence, he has a defending advantage.

Don't get me wrong. An attacker can always throw more money at the problem. Eventually something will work. The tricky part is making an attack worthwhile, which isn't so easy if the defender has the same tools at his disposal.

If both sides have infrastructure how do he have a advantage?

He will have to destroy or conquer your moon to drive you away, you have to conquer or destroy his planet to drive him away. Both of you will be in the exact same situation (he will most likely have defense and offensive weapons on the planet, you will likely have the same on your moon), only that his planet will most likely be a bit bigger then your moon, but that dosent mean that he can spread a base over the whole planet (Unit limit, if he focuses on defense on one world that much you can just take the rest of the system and send a astroid).