Title probably isn't that clear, so i'll explain. Normally rts games follow a certain gameplay style, the most common being expand, build , and conquer. Planetary annihilation like a number of its predecessors have offered a different gameplay style that does not involve having to destroy every single building. I would like to call this type of gameplay, an assassination style RTS. Not entirely sure if others have noticed, but once you figure out its about assassinating the enemy commander and preventing yours from being killed. People change their style of play, which more professional people call the meta, I could be wrong, not used to using such words. Such changes in this style that I have noticed result in, people not expanding since its not a goal. You obtain as much as u need to be able to kill the commander at which point, expanding becomes mute. Take the t2 bomber rush, when people first discovered u could snipe commander so easily, it became an obvious strategy. There was an earlier one, which to some extent is still used now involving the laser sats. Possibly the most fun way is dropping a moon on the planet where the enemy commander is. Tad overkill still fun. One of the benefits of this playstyle, that I have noticed, is a weaker economy can still kill of a stronger bigger army, if they find a weak spot. This tends to happen a lot in FFA's. Less so that I've noticed in 1v1. Imagine its still possible. Since the commander is the weak link in your chain, most people tend to build a giant fort around him, or hide him on another planet, anything to get him out of the way. I recently tried a roaming commander playstyle in a game, it didn't work very well, pretty obvious commander is not meant to be on the front lines, but I often feel he becomes obsolete very early on. Still the most important unit u have but obsolete in how u use it. Don't plan on giving suggestions, since there are alot's of ideas and suggestions floating around the forum. I'm actually interested in what you think of the gameplay and how it effects the choices you make in the game. How you decide to play it, do you focus solely on killing the commander? I wanted to open up a discussion about this type of assassination gameplay and what type of stuff would be suited to this type of gameplay. For example, If its assassination, should we have more commando style type units? Rather than generic type units. Should the commander always be weak throughout the game? OR should there be tricks or stuff u can do to hide him, make him harder to kill(which are not direct upgrades to the commander, I think Uber doesn't want that). Rather have a game based on expansion and conquering, its a hunt and kill. Do you feel that Uber should focus on giving us tools to hunt and kill and hide the commanders? Give that stuff more priority over the generic stuff like eco, kill bots, boom nukes? More shadowry, commando type stuff, tricks you can play on your opponent? Anyway its open discussion, generally about the gameplay of the style of game we got. Any thoughts you have on that. Also which direction do you feel Uber should be taking this game. Any thoughts?
Supcom dealt with the problem by making him a really good frontline unit. So long as he was properly supported he was almost impossible to take down except with overwhelming force. After the T3 upgrades I'd say a commander was the most powerful unit in the game. Uber seems more opposed to this idea. In fact I'm pretty sure the hide and seek thing is exactly what Mavor wants.
Imagine this is a game of chess. Your King is your Commander. He has a limited number of powerful moves that only come into effect when the enemy oversteps his bounds, just like Chess. It's the same concept, different genre. I like it. However, there will be an option for destroy everything later down the line - this has been confirmed.
Yup, they will add other modes than assassination. Also not expanding is huge mistake, on small area its easier to find commander. If enemy is certain that your commander is in your base all he needs to do is keep pushing. Either keep nuking faster than your eco can build antinukes, or by making more factories that produce stream of units. Or why not every possible way that puts more stress on you defending. This game is a war simulation while most other RTS games are battle simulations. Here one with better economy wins (if he can hide commander) there one that uses his units better. More on your topic: I had idea of Commander Backup system, bunker style building that only commander can build (and can be build once or some defined, finite number of times) . it has one t1 laser turret, radar cloakable as long as it has power (so cannot be easily sniped by artilery) . Its function is to store commander AI, as long as this building exists any fabber can rebuild commander near this building (or maybe only this building itself can start making commander after first one is lost).
