Now factories in TA & SupCom are usually static structures [exceptions being experimentals like the Fatboy]. However should planetary annihilation make amends in in the past restiction of movement of factories? Consider the fatboy in supcom as basically being a moving factory with armaments. Should all factories have the ability to move? Have a nomadic army roaming the plains? Maybe some factories could up sticks and shoot for the stars themselves. Would make scouting for enemy bases more important than ever and would make it harder to airstrike if the factories kept moving around. Could factories even come with their own defences without having to build a defence turret around one? Would factory rushes become an option? :lol: Possibly factories with in-built turrets is too easy, but there could be other kinds of defence for them such as a 30 second shield for a certain amount of energy until it reaches 0 or the shield is penetrated by mass firepower.
Something like the fatboy had in Supcom? A mobile factory/war machine. We don't know yet. Uber has said that there will be some experimental but that is all.
Honestly I wouldn't be a fan unless they were the exception, used for filling a niche rather than a broad purpose, there are just too many awkward things that come with it. Mike
movement I hope not, but add ons I think so, it would minimize space if you could build turrets onto the buildings and such.
Add ons I don't like, I think the space saving idea is moot when we have to consider we might end up with an entire planet to ourselves and when it might matter(moons/asteroids) the lack of add-ons make your choices matter, you CAN'T get a bit of everything so you need to focus on what you think is more important, do you just want as many unit cannons as possible to launch as many units as fast as possible before the asteroid gets blown up or do you favor a more balanced(but overall not as effective as a focus) approach? Mike
Generally speaking, buildings are units. They just don't move. This is, however, almost entirely by convention. How about this as an idea though- specific buildings that can be transported? They lack independent means of locomotion, but a large enough transport can pick them up and move them to another location. For example, a gun turret that can be moved using a transport. Fixed structures can be more durable, and feature larger systems. I also think it should be possible to drop immobile units from orbit, or by paradrop, or even tow them into place using a land unit. This would be especially cool for powerful but cheap mobile artillery batteries, where having them be independently mobile makes them too tactically flexible. Mobile units on a featureless board are actually quite dull, as large armies can be kept together and repositioned as needed. Having a wide spread over a large area of varying density is much more interesting. Immobile units involve a positive decision from the player regarding their positioning, and an opportunity cost where they could have been placed somewhere else. They are also useless if placed in the wrong location. This is a large contributing factor to why only weak players build large amounts of static defense, as it will never be useful apart from defensively. However, transportable units (not necessarily even defenses) with systems normally found on structures are possible to move, although it is a pain. This mitigates some of the problems of pure static units. Another possibility is to have rickshaw type units that are consumed to create a specific type of structure. The rickshaw is constructed in your base (inefficient compared to just building the structure), and either drives or is transported to wherever you want to construct the building, where it can very rapidly become a functional structure. This would be especially useful for establishing multiple forward factories quickly, if a dynamic territory land war with bases being built and destroyed is a desired gameplay dynamic. A significant number of rickshaws could be used to set up even a large base in a hurry. The saved time, in return for resource cost, allows more game-significant events to be packed into a game of the same duration, resources permitting. Once I capture the territory, I can have structures on it sooner rather than waiting for them to build there, and the strategic significance of controlling it manifests more quickly. Lastly, add-ons are a terrible idea. Independent units or structures, please. Although having an independent structure function as an add-on could work, as it does not hide that function from an opponent's view, and does not arbitrarily differentiate identical structures. Identical units and structures should always be exactly the same. However if there is a special structure next to another structure that always has the same effect on that structure when so placed, that is fine. Adjacency bonuses a la SupCom and FA were too small and ambiguous, though.
As long as it's a special building and not commonly occurring, I'm ok with it. I would not want every building in the base be mobile.
i could get behind a limited production "assault Support Structure", that could accompany an attack and build a limited range of lighter units to maintain an attack
I like add ons for factories so long as they're kept tasteful. Extra build power or maybe modules that allow the construction of specific higher-end units at tier 2 would be fine. I don't want to see factories that move or have guns. Radar and shields for factories I'm ambivalent about.
Regarding the Fatboy, it's very rare to see one used as a factory in FA. Possibly the limiting factor is that it can't move and build at the same time? Of the ground experimentals in FA I would say that the Fatboy is the least “game-breaking”, inasmuch as the others (GC, ML & Ythotha) are designed to charge straight at the enemy all guns blazing, and often it is impossible to stop them even with good intel. By contrast the Fatboy is slow, weak and long-ranged: excellent for long range bombardment but has a number of weaknesses and so numerous options to stop it. To stop one of the direct-assault exps you need either a good-sized airforce, lots of fixed turrets or your own experimental. Massed heavy T3 units will do at a pinch, but if the assault exp has been rushed (as is common), you simply won't have enough T3. TLR; if PA has experimentals, they should be more like the Fatboy than the GC. And there should be more incentive to use it as a factory.
No, the obvious reason why it was never used as a factory is that all the units it could build were obsolete by the time you could afford a Fatboy.
Not strictly true, flak and shields are often a good thing to build if you don't want to send the Fatboy in straight away. But I do see your point. With a bit of tweaking and no assault experimentals the Fatboy could still be a worthy unit to put in PA though.
Playing the FA campaign the Fatboy factory was important to me. I created armies of Percivals under the water and then stormed the enemy islands with them. Also, because the Fatboy was submersible it was very important to build AA once you created a beach head with them and your percivals storming the island. As far as competitive play. I couldn't say, but I still feel that the fatboy was one of my biggest disappointments of Supreme Commander 2. I mean there was a lot of strategic depth missing in v2 that included the new Seton's map. I want oceans I can drive on. Maybe none of that was important in competitive play, but have heard that experimentals don't get into competitive play anyway, so I don't know how much theoretical competitive play is important. The other experimentals in FA were less exciting to me. I am ambivalent towards moving buildings. I do not want moving towers with transports. Towers are intended to be powerful at the sacrifice of being stationary. If a tower is intended to move it needs to cost more and therefor isn't a tower. The Sumo would be a good mobile heavy weapon platform, because it's expensive and is intended to be moved into place; possibly with a transport.
Has anyone else think of the PA equivalent of the old C&C mobile command center/mobile factory when they saw the thread title? I told myself I wasn't going to post anymore but I just couldn't resist.
I don't have a lot of competive experience but I remember Warcraft 3 having buildings that could move. Though they were hardly used, I think. I don't really see a benefit in having them being able to move, other than providing a strange way to look at your base.
how about units that can turn into buildings/placements like a tank that can turn into a turret ( have a line of this and three small repair bots patrolling behind the line keeping the tank/turrets in shape while they defend an area) some of those tanks could be usefull. These sort of tanks have been seen in TA and Supreme Commander / Forged Alliance mods and are quite usefull also some of the standard units the ARTILLERY units have some folding out mode for their models. NOW imagine a unt wich turns into a mortar station or artillery station or a Direct- line of fire heavy turret. Imagine a smaller BAsilisk with only one function or make it level three units as the heavy units /defense stations I also see a role for a transformable experimental if there are only gonna be a few experimentals ( also dont forget missiles or plasma bombardment) < a favo unit of Kane's wrath for C&C 3 was the stealth tank and the Avatar, the stealth tank had a armenent of homing missiles able to hit ground targets as well air units and it had a stealth field there was also an other stealth unit a medium artillery vehicle with a stealth field making it invisible it had to deploy to fire. The Stealth units where my favorite but the Avatar a mech could rip a Stealth tank apart and take its stealth generator it also did that with a laser fire unit on wheel and ripped out a condensator(or something ) and lastly it ripped out a FLamer from a FLAME tank < hope we see back those FLame UNIts > end of storytelling )........... having a whole line of these units at different level might make the game complete different that way you could eassily make choke points or forward assault bases excuse me for this formatting but i 'm having problems wit this as of this posting ........probably shouldent **ink so early .. Cheerio
