units barely within the area of effect of the com-nuke should take way less damage than units hugging the comm's buttplate. also, light units hiding behind heavyier units or anything behind structures should receive less damage, too. all in all, I'm talking off a shielding effect here.
Combomb is a legitimate tactic, whether or not it is a good tactic can depend on certain situations. It only becomes detrimental to the enemy if the game mode is not on assasination and the commander nukes himself in the middle of the enemy's base. If this gives the Kamikaze commander enough advantage to overcome the enemy...well, then I guess he has won and it has proved to be a liable tactic. Though I can see why such a tactic is many times stupid because it is not implemented well. I would assume that in later versions Uber will at least give the option to restrict other players on your team to control your own commander and therefore foolishly trying to implement such a strategy as the one above by sacrificing their teammate's commanders. It can be rather frustrating when another team player is trying to utilize your commander for something else other than what you want it for. However, it is advantageous if that player is not utilizing their commander effectively. So it is a give and take. I think it would be prudent for Uber to give a player the option of resigning control of their commander to another player. This would make for some interesting strategies.
Commanders exploding when they die has been part of the series since Total Annihilation, I don't think it's going anywhere. It's a last resort to do damage when the invasion fails. I think if we made Commanders more valuable, players would be less willing to throw them away at the beginning of the match.
Sulotion to the commanders.. Dont build your base like a Cluster f**k Spread it out a bit... I see far to many bases where all Metal prod is centered within one nuke. Personnely i place 4 extractors together with 1 powerplant and then move to another location it dont have to be huge distance but some.. It also helps the movement of your units to go from one side to the other side of the base. Didnt anyone place any of the red alert games or Generals? Nuke + Close base = Doom but NUke + Spread out base = Small damage easy to survive.. Disclaimer.. All Spelling and Grammar errors are Copy righted, Any attempt in pointing them out or be an smart@ss will solely fail at making any good.
This is a blast from the past I tell ye! Supcom 1 beta combombing was a serious issue, you could even put him in a transport and blow him up over the enemy base, never used that tactic myself apart from once by mistake. This was eventually changed due to so many people just using the com as a bomb if they were getting beat. The current team set up may change though, preferably so each player has to control and protect their own com, this would stop the com bombing issue in most cases.
I say again, Com bombing is balanced by the fact that they can't be replaced. If you com rush early game (which assumes you found them before either of you could build a real army, which in my experience does happen, but is relatively uncommon) that means you have one less commander on your team. If it's 2v2 then your team is 100% more likely to be sniped. This is especially true because a com-bomb is unlikely to take out the other commander if he is smart and runs away rather than trying to fight you. A full health commander can survive a com bomb with about half his hit points. You might punch a hole in his defensive line (assuming you don't also nuke your own troops), destabilize his economy, or wipe out an attacking army (Hopefully before they get to your base) but you are giving up something that can't be replaced, and will lose you the game when you run out. As for everyone who says the player should be booted from the game when there commander dies, **** you, just **** you, that's such a terrible idea. If they get put into spectator mode that just gives them incentive to cheat and spy on the enemy using vent or teamspeak to talk to there teammate. And if they get booted all the way to the lobby it's unfair to just kick somebody out of an unfinished game. Really what's happening is a few players got hit with a tactic that they didn't expect, and instead of adapting to it, they complain and ask for it to be taken away. That's a scrub's position, and the suggestion that players with destroyed commanders should be made to sit out the rest of the game is petty mean-ness.
If you are evenly matched then losing a portion of eco, factories or units means you get a huge advantage you can easily push for the win.
Yeah but if you're evenly matched then you still have a commander to suicide to take out his army with.
Suiciding the most expensive piece of technology you have is not a valid tactic, it's probably going to change (I hope), I really don't want it to come down to who got the com bomb in first wins. The sudden some players/teams smell they are losing even slightly they will go for a com bomb in team matches, it will be pretty crappy if you ask me.
If you still have a commander..... The problem is not that a Commander is important, it is, the problem is that the Commander REALLY comes into it's own later in the game when you start expanding to other planets/moons/asteroids. So it idea of losing a Commander(whose long term advantage we can't use yet) in exchange for a chunk of the opponents infrastructure(factories) and possibly thier Commander is pretty valid, especially if you use the time before the Combomb setting up a few factories(prolly air Facs to more quickly scout them out) and resources building can pretty easily give the combomber a good exchange in the end. Yes the enemy team lost some commanders, but in the end they could be the ones with more factories, and while your team might still have all/most of your commanders, they can have more factories and that can be a problem. Obviously the Alpha still has a long way to go, and the Beta as well, but I think it's shortsighted to dismiss it as a problem when it's something we've had to deal with in EVERY TA-type RTS, PA will be no different. Mike
As long as it's not as powerful as an actual commander. The whole thing that makes Com-bombing interesting form a meta level is that you are trading a permanent resource for a temporary gain.
If it was expensive enough then it could balance that issue out, you would be wasting a lot of resource on this chance to do a lot of damage, I like risks like that in RTS's but I think using the com is silly.
there still needs to be some damage or other effect to attackers or they're just facerolling over everything.
Just to test it out, i would try making only the last commander in the team explodes. The other one dies normally. Later, space can prevent this and they can make commanders explode again. Right now, i think the first idea would enhance alpha gameplay while alpha gameplay is locked into close range short sighted gameplay. The commander later will be more useful as a base starter on new planets than a bomb later.
I'm sure this is what happened in SC beta, the commanders explosion was nerfed so it wasn't worth using as a bomb but it still wiped out any smaller units too close to him. (correct me if I'm wrong)
It's the solution I've been championing all around because it makes sense, nerfing the damage has NO effect in 1v1s because the game is decided before the damage would do anything(and even if ti did the only effect it MIGHT have is creating a Draw, which is not ideal in any way) and it greatly reduces the benefits to using your commander as a bomb in team games. Fun Fact: ACU Deathnuke is one of the only 2 uses of any kind of armor system, the other one is Overcharge. Mike
Why does the commander explode at all? As in how does it serve gameplay? It has very little effect in 1v1 and just causes problems in teamgames.
