Jigs are so broken

I hardly think this is news, but it really does deserve its own front page thread

Jigs are broken. Hilariously so. They cost slightly more than a t2 power gen, provide equivalent power AND throw in a full 36 metal each. And they are so small in terms of orbital layer usage, you can just keep on building them

Before anyone goes "but your just mad because you didn't get to orbital first"; it's not about that at all. It's far too easy to accelerate ahead of everyone; each jig powers another 2 orbital fabbers, which build more jigs, which support more fabbers, and so on exponentially

My last match, I was sitting by end game on coming up to 1400 jigs over 3 Gas giants. 600 orbital fabbers and something like 200 orbital factories going full pelt could not make a dent on the income. 200 nukes with hundreds of assisting fabbers could not put a mark into the income, and even if they had, they'd have to consume some 1o million metal (conveniently stored) before I would worry.

The worse part is you can spam anchors inbetween each jig. Seriously, you set a few groups building anchor blankets on slightly different templates, you can fit like 5 anchors in each gap between anchors

I'm not a fan of 1 vs 1, I'm too old for that kind of rapid click fest. No, I love PA for the super-scale strategy

But somewhere, there needs to be a balance, and jigs are just game-breakers.

Please, Uber, Raise the cost (dramatically), reduce their benefits, impose a hard-limit, increase their physical size so you can't pack them so densely, all of the above. No one player should be able to get so far ahead so easily

They're far easier to destroy than any other form of eco structure.

Being fragile doesn't make them balanced; their cost is far lower than their planet bound equivalents

I agree they can become overpowered when the enemy has free reign over orbital; but I can't help but say that's a mistake on your part. Or a teammates.

it isn't you can't get to the planet in the time it takes him to build 5 of them.

That depends entirely on the design of the system your playing in. Really any decent map should be built so all planets in play orbit each other (e.g. put gas giant in middle with other stuff orbiting)- as otherwise having orbital paths via the sun greatly increases transit time and thus makes things like gas giants *much* stronger....

it shouldn't be the question.

it's not "oh jigs aren't so imba if you make your system like thiiiis "

making systems is what makes strategic variety ... and this is were people have to adapt to ... i can understand that it is not realy fun to easily lose to a rapid high economic lead but that is simply most of the time due to wrong strategic decisions .. ignoring gas giants from the beginning can be such a strategic mistake ..
they are another reason why you should build deepspace radar for instance ... i think it shouldn't be such a suprise that the makeup of a system can and does dictate the optimal general strategy ...
if that is not your thing play different systems ... else adapt aqap ...

@MrTBSC there is not strategy in lack of choice.

that's what's called strategy vs meta. here you are very clearly exposing how there is no single other meta viable other than "rush gaz giants".

I'm sure you can see how all that is in direct correlation with poor balance...

also you advocated adaptation, variety... as I did. sadly you are on the wrong side of the argument for those two.

As with the Anni-laser, the gas Giants job is a stalemate preventer.
The Anni-laser prevents stalemates by being the primary target and/or ending the game regardless of defense.
The Gas Giant does it's job by providing tons of resources, so one side has a clear lead.
I detailed how to avoid interplanetary stalemates (and the resulting lag fests) in this thread:
https://forums.uberent.com/threads/lets-talk-system-design-or-how-to-avoid-stalemates.65331/

If you are in a orbital game (much less an orbital game with gas giant) it is your job to keep tabs on what is going on there.

Unlike planets gas giants are highly vulnerable to attacks.
They can be nuked without any defense.
There is no Umbrellas helping with orbital superiority.
The attacker can just drop into the group of Jigs and the enemy only has the orbital cooldown to do something about it.

If you make the map wrong, you can hardly claim the game is broken. The System editor is a tool. Even a 5 Million Dollar Screwdriver does not make you a Dr. Who or a master handiman.

https://forums.uberent.com/threads/wip-server-orbital-warfare-overhaul.62878/

guys (not just you I've seen heaps of people post this) what the hell is it with you guys and biased witch hunts?

just exactly what stalemeate? where have you seen a stalemate?

even without gaz giants or metal planets or even KEWs it's WAY EASY to end a game. late game weapons are powerful enough.

and EVEN IF you think it's not going fast enough, you're not supposed to fix "stamemates" by introducing diceroll mechanics. That's so crazy I have no words for it. To me it's like if a person chose to holster his gun in his pants and sadly this led to him accidentally shooting his testicles off (E.G. bad balance for starters, here’s the metaphor's version of coping with by introducing metal and gaz giant...) then as the ambulance arrives he shoots and kills the people supposed to take him to the hospital.

I'm talking THAT amount of backwardedness.

so ....just for a second.... why not imagine ...that instead of attempting a fix to a first mechanic by introducing another mechanic ...you just softly tinker with the first? How 'bout that? isn't it wild to consider this never heard-of before possibility?

you just advocated "all systems with planets not orbiting the gaz giant are void, null, bad, should not be made or played on" ......you do realise that argument isn't gonna hold up?

we don't get map making tools to use them mechanically and making absolutely certain to strip ourselves of our creativity. Maybe it's my bad habits kicking in from other games here but I'm rather used to being unconstrained in map creativity with other games. Is this game any different? I was not made aware : P

surely you can see how my solution is capable of killing two birds with one stone? would you rather not the balance simultaneously allow for variety in gameplay as well as in systems?

ultimately it is always about rush x ..
when do you not rush something?
rush mexexpansion rush tech2 rush smashtoids rush laser, nukes beamsat, unitcompositon x, unit x snipe ... number of unit x ... etc. etc. ...
you rush so long as there is anything left to rush anymore ...
by that basis there is/was never a well ballanced rtsgame ...

no it isn't. not if you know what "rush" means.

that's called looser's strategy in most RTSes.

The feel of strategy in a general sense is that you should be immediately punished for neglecting a front of the battle. so If you go all in bots for example, or rush first to gaz, in say StarCraft II, or supcom or the battle of waterloo, you immediately loose to something completely different because you were neglecting that front entirely.

do you see how it works?

not to mention jigs fill all 4 roles of producing mass and power, and storing mass and power....give us some variety, we already have the solar array, give us strategic options to build jigs on a gas giant and have them just produce mass

then we both have different definitions of rush ..
obviously it is all a matter of preparing a move and/or reacting to the enemies movement ..
that doest exclude rush to x being viable that mostly is a matter of if and when .. it doesn't matter if it is simple .. you use the moves that work .. and if gasgiantrush works there is no reason not to use it .. simple as that ..

being the better strategist is never "simple" the whole point is that you have to be smarter than your opponent.

building the best unit.... going to the best planet....

I'm sorry but F** that! that's not what I came for.

then you are not a good strategist and should stop playing the game ... and any other strategygame ...
being smarter means to use the right equipment, the right territory AND the right moves at the right time .. the stepts themselves are what is simple ... combining them succesfully toghether is the tricky part ...

did you not read what I just said?

single choice, is much less strategy than multiple choice. ...Rather single choice isn't strategy at all.

it's funny because you're using arguments that work in the direction of what I'm saying: "right stuff at right time" to defend the opposite of themselves....

you said it yourself..... there is no "time" for going to gas giants you're supposed to go there peridod :

right from the getgo:

am I to take it we both agree, and that the game should be different and not limit your choices this way through better balance namely of the Jigs?

well dropping orbital fighters right on them works decently well