Experimental Units

Yup! +1 on that. Just make their build times or resource costs appropriate. Having battlefield changing units is fun to both use and defend against and clearly the poll shows I'm in the majority.

Yup, I want a lazy solution as opposed to using the units in the game. One unit that I can build and manage instead of managing an army. Hey what do you know, its Dota.

Thankfully game design doesn't work by comitee.


Also, you know the saying about what flies like to eat and there being billions of flies... :mrgreen:

I get the feeling that you didn't read the whole sentence.

...

Which would confirm the first part of it nicely

"Experimental" units could be cool.

I would appreciate a big bot that can annihilate things and move and wreck havoc everywhere. Fun !
(sorry, it's my inner Timmy that is talking)(for those who do not know, i would recommand Movra's post, nice reading !)

However, what is less interesting is a race to the experimentals that make end-game result all the same, depending on one factor : who has the biggest one (i'm talking about economy, of course, leading to get more experimentals produced).

But, let's be honest, in the actual game (and in FA, SupComm, TA...), isn't it already this ?
Thoses who produce more build more destroy more then win.
It's just a "factor" problem, the 2-3 (whatever) experimentals are just switched for a big group of smaller bots.

So why not give a try to the Super Units ? You just change a cluster of bot for a bigger thing.
If properly done (and this is very important), could add some great fun into the game !
(calm down Timmy, shhh, it's okay, breath, breath)

And Uber's people know their stuff, and are clearly aware of the problems Super Units can cause (they stated this more than once in the MegaBot thread), so i'm confident that they could find some nice ideas

Yup. Macro > Micro. its what this game is all about!

Except when it's a kickstarter game lol.

Spot on neumeusis!

Even then we DONATED money so they could make the game THEY PROMISED and we wanted. We do have to trust their design decisions over most people who don't actually have a good sense of the big picture and how things intermingle. In the end they still get the final say, but they appreciate our input and feedback on things that are aspects that could make or break the game.

Moving an army isn't micro. If you want lower unit counts, this really isn't the game for you

Traditional combat experimentals are higher risk units - you pay more for them, but don't get anything back until they are completed. They also lack the versatility of large forces of smaller units.
To balance that, they have to be stronger. But this in fact un-balances them, as they become strictly better than units, leading to a snowball effect, which mostly ends in races towards whoever gets an experimental first wins, or the more boring scenario of normal units no longer being used once you get into a position to build experimentals.

tl;dr: Experimentals are either overpowered and un-fun, or under powered and never built.

One game i always think about when people talk about HUGE units, is Universe at war, not that good of a game, but man i loved FREAKING loved that faction that had those HUGE robots, never seen so big units in an RTS before

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... OJxU#t=71s

Would be scary and fun to see a big towering unit in that in PA.

it's macro because it all comes down to your economy. If you have a better macro (and thus, economy) you can afford experimental units. If your plan is to rush with smaller units before the enemy can get 1 that's a valid strategy too. Heck if you get a good eco and just pump out small units to overwhelm the experimental units that would work as well. They are siege breakers. Just like nukes or artillery or asteroids or any of the other options you have and all of these pose the same problems you list with experimental units. Just 1 more way you can win if that is the flavour of victory you enjoy most.

I think when people say experimental the first units come to mind is monkey Lord, fat boy colosuss & krogoth. Everyone wants to see at least one towering, powerful, bot that has massive artillery guns or a massive laser that disintegrates everything! I agree an asteroid with thrusters is more like a nuke than it is an actual super unit with sum sort of abilities. The fat boy had long range artillery and could go in water, monkey Lord has a giant laser, the colosus had a giant eye beam with gravity gun! Plus to actually balance an asteroid with engines that can destroy an entire planet sounds like it will be very expensive and thus never used.. So uber just give us a krogoth like unit and call it a day.

Or... not.

Your thought on asteroids being "never used" was amusing though.

I remember the unit scale screenshots, those had a huge robot in them that was like twice the size of the commander if not 3 times bigger.

Would be sad to not have something like this.

I agree rmj! But where did you see that bot!? Also if the asteroid with engines is more powerful than a nuke than it's going to be expensive thus not being built often...unless you can build one engine in a small asteroid and it could be half as powerful as a nuke..

That's why finding good niche roles is so important. Asteroids are the perfect example of a super unit: They're gigantic carrier/gun platforms that can be sacced as a super weapon. It's a very loaded and versatile support role that can absolutely define a game, but win one by itself.

While some may not have liked the TA Krogoth, TA didn't have multiple worlds. A Krogoth had to trawl across a map, creating huge problems such as vulnerable construction and slow attacks. Orbital drops completely change that. You can plant a Krogoth directly inside an enemy base! All of a sudden it's a planetary assault bot which uses it high firepower and nuclear death to clear the way for your standard units. The most effective downside is making the trip one-way(you can drop down but never leave), which means it can ONLY be constructed and transported by asteroid. It's more surgical than the rock, but still has the high lethality that you need to breach an enemy world.

Asteroids are soooo not just a SUPER powerful KEW, It could be a carrier for a planetary invasion force. (The devs might decide otherwise ) And a mobile asteroid could (maybe if the devs decide) be an orbital bombardier . Also I think an asteroid with an engine probably wouldn't be too expensive, the extra engines and all the bells and whistles would be the really expensive part
Just my understanding of PA I could/probably be wrong thoughts

I'm really hoping the final game allows you to do this. I wanna use thrusters to put an asteroid in orbit of an enemy controlled planet (rather than smashing it into the planet) and rain down an assault force from unit launchers as it orbits.

And sorry cause that was a little OT, but I spent a chunk of today trying to see if anyone had already suggested this

The battle nature of this game leads to less turtling as you can't easily defend ever part of your base - having big powerful units would probably be less fun than you think (when they're attacking) as defending will be very difficult

Yeah Nanolathe. It's one thing to be right, but it's quite another to remind others why they're wrong.

PA and TA are games about swarms of units. Any role that can be accomplished by a smaller unit, should be. If such a role is too potent for a small unit, then and only then should it be increased in size. Basically, 90% of the Supcom1/2 experimentals were pointless.

True enough bobucles. Your dry wit is appreciated.