For Backers Only: Metal Planet

So, you've all seen the metal planet in the planet editor. However, you guys haven't seen this metal planet yet. Enjoy! It's still very work in progress, with a lot more to come, but.. man, I cannot WAIT to play on one of these things.

Interesting!

Might we eventually see completely different style of Metal planets?

Mike

Neutrino posted this 5 minutes ago.

Old news, try again

(they look amazing - comparing it to my desktop background as we speak!)

That Neutrino, breaking my process. I tell you, training your boss is hard work.

lol

Question: As this planet is metal, does this mean that you can build extractors anywhere? And if so, do the extractors function at maximum efficiency everywhere, or partial efficiency everywhere except at certain special metal locations? Thanks!

Probably not going to do the build extractors anywhere thing, although it may be an option. It's just a little too extreme when you add in the mix of the other planets (I think, could be wrong).

Perhaps rather than metal spots, they could have metal veins, that extractors could be placed along.

Hmm... Or what if Metal Planets had no metal at all? I know it sounds sorta preposterous, but maybe, there could be an option to generate/play Metal Planets as an unharvestable death machine. Instead of the primary resource being metal, it might be a dormant power generator that produces excessive amounts of power.

I mean, a just-add-water Kill-Everything-Weapon is already a huge resource, what's to stop a player from just plopping down metal extractors all over it, hoisting his flag and labeling the metal planet as "MAH TURF". It has the potential to stall a game indefinitely.

Pretty much exactly exactly what I was thinking of myself actually, the Metal Planet being a giant weapon is already a pretty big deal.

Mike

That assumes all metal planets MUST be weapons of some kind though.

It'd be awesome to be able to fight over a shattered half moon floating in space..


I'm all for ditching the 'metal planets must produce metal everywhere' concept though. Or modifying it.. perhaps a specialist extractor that removes chunks of the planet while operating? Sort of a GREED crossover for metal planets ?

Maybe metal planets have lots of scrap to reclaim?

Maybe metal planets ARE reclaimable scrap?

Touche.

Maybe metal planets are UNICRON AND WILL EAT YOUR FACE.

Ahem. Apologies, carry on.

At least just the option to do so would be sufficient I think. I always liked the idea of being able to put metal extractor anywhere. I mean, the planet IS made of metal. You would think that you could just put a metal extractor anywhere on a planet made physically of metal and get a gain of metal. Otherwise...

I do agree that when it comes to multiple planets, metal ones will seem pretty overpowered, but I think this can be balanced by giving non-metal planets a bonus that would possibly equal the bonus of the metal planet?

I mean, look at it this way. Even if you had a full metal planet full of advanced extractors, you'd never be able to use that full income. I think a metal planet would be similar to how we may, in the future, harness the entirety of a gas giant for power. (Does this make gas giants overpowered?) What about being able to create a solar farm surrounding a local sun to capture 100% of the solar energy. Wouldn't this make having suns overpowered?

I think there's a bit more to the entirety of the solar system than you can break simply by including one metal planet. You guys are Uber. You've already got these ******* amazing ideas. Run with it! Be awesome!

Oh man. Instead of civilian bases that would cause us greif.. we possibly can have ENTIRE PLANETS that will eat our nearby forces with weaponry.. OR JUST NOMMAGE! If we don't have the firepower to take it on.... Good lord.

DO WANT

I don't see how you can 'balance' being able to build extractors on every square inch of a planet to be honest. It would pretty much get to the point where one would have to cover a great area in extractors to get a worthwhile income I would think.

Mike

The same could be said about having the extreme amounts of power for harnessing the entire solar power of the sun, or the same of a gas giant.

In that respect, I do think that when you get to larger scale galaxies with couple dozen or more players, a metal planet can possibly be slightly pivotal and give a large amount of income, but not completely necessary.

I just think covering the entirety of a metal planet with advanced extractors would cost a LOT of resources and time. I would think that the opposing team would know of the metal planet and make it a key play to at least scout it.

I simply think that capitalizing on an entire metal planet in advanced extractors is a good play, but I also sort of want it to be viewed as a.. possibly miniscule gain compared to say, solar farming a sun.

I do think you have a point that it will be hard to balance such a large source of metal. I could be wrong, but I personally think that just looking at an entire metal planet covered in extractors is WAY too small of a scale compared to the larger things I believe Uber have in mind for late-game galaxy-scale battles.

It's actually something I'm very curious about, but doubt we'll hear much about it till they get on the case. Late game galaxy-scale is probably just as much only ideas so far for them as it is for us.

Not even because there is no real time "Galaxy scale". Even the Galactic War is just a meta-game for the standard 'system scale' games.

Mike

Looks cool ^^