More Strategy: Trees

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

I would be all for trees blocking shots and movement. It'd add a little tactical depth to the game for sure.

Though of course no one will allow trees to exist if there is even a smidgen of mass in them.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

Mass? They used to contain energy. You know, after all wood burns quite well.

If you want cheap mass, you would rather go for rocks.

In SC and TA, going for trees was a legit tactic before building the first solar / T2 power plant.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

Trees in SupCom contained 1 m for every 10 e.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

I'm all for trees blocking shots - but being blown apart in the process. It would just add that extra bit of detail that ties my units to the terrain they are on.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

Yes, absolutely. This kind of stuff was great in TA.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

In one of the streams they showed an army moving through a forest under the trees. If trees blocked shots then armies couldn't really engage at all if they were both under the trees. That would just be kind of an odd scenario.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

Not really - we're talking, you're moving under the trees, suddenly an enemy is sighted and you OPEN FIRE! Pew pew ensued, and trees tumble left and right as your firepower tears through them into the enemy forces..

Or think.. your nimble scout is dodging between the trees when he detects THE ENEMY! Amid exploding trees and tumbling trunks, he races past the enemy and uses cover to make his escape!

And so on.

At least, that's what I think of when I think about trees blocking shots.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

This isn't cawadooty; trees aren't made of adamantium. You shoot them, they turn into fire and wood chips. It's a neat touch.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

They give you additional 10-15 seconds when stroke accidentally (until they burn down) and if you focus fire on them or try to move though with massive units, they are gone instantaneously.

Re: Trees: Can they block shots?

I think it was already stated that we'd be able to burn down forests a la TA. Can't see how you'd do that if trees are magically immune to weapons fire. The only option from there is to allow shots to blow through trees like they were nothing, which wouldn't be a great option. Let the trees take one for the team.

On the other hand, leaving the trees alone might be the best way to go: do we really want to commit suicide-by-Ent/have our forces decimated by a 300-foot mechanical Smokey the Bear?

"ONLY YOU! RAAAAAAGH!" *smash, squish*.

I don't really like the idea of trees blocking vehicles in any way. The vehicles are very large on scale and fire futuristic high energy rounds like said before. If the technology is upto a point where interplanetary warfare is possible, then minor things like forests should not be an issue.

Instead trees could provide a tactical advantage, such as providing concealment from enemy radar. And even that would be kind of silly when you think about the technology they have. In other words, trees are not obstacles for robots that are centuries ahead of our technology.

I'd rather go for trees hiding bots from radar and from LOS of units outside the forest, plus reducing LOS for bots inside the forest.
Also : Tanks roll over !

I don't think tree's can be reasonably expected to hold up to modern fire-power, or even that of the past century, but let alone the weapons wielded by walking von neumann berserkers.

Any ballistic weapon just needs to hit something solid enough to cause it to explode. Energy based weapons are a different matter.

My understanding is we probably won't have true LOS in the sense of Company of Heroes 2.

Of that I have no doubt, but in most respects a single shot of any tanks sized unit will one hit KO a tree so I don't really see what much will be accomplished.

If you intent is to create a kind of map generated 'wreckage' that has similar effects as wrecks in blocking mass moment, shots and providing resources when reclaimed then I get it.

As I would also like wrecks to generate is possible.

But otherwise cant infra-red see people through most forests and jungles? I don't see them being of much cover for gigantic tanks.

Yes that is the intention, like the Spring games that use the mechanic. I'm not sure they necessarily need to impede movement although I'm not opposed to it.

Yes, it probably doesn't make sense for forests to mask intel. I'm going on a tangent but it occurred to me being able to see a green/red outline of units underneath doodads/wreckage/trees would be very good for readability. Naturally the outline color could change depending on who owns the unit - or whether they are friend, neutral or foe.
Example:

It would be cool if trees would make vision a bit tricky. Ballistic shots break down trees and deal less damage than when hitting on a clear field. Auto-targeting doesn't work so you'd need to target units yourself (or you can select an area in the forest and tell the units to attack there).

Only when your units actually see the enemy tanks and stuff, they start auto-targeting (you can see occasional random blips but your units can't see ****- there should be an additional vision range indicator special for forest areas and similar)
This would be especially good for artillery since it has very long range and it would overpower any regular tank on the other side.

Or if trees are way too casual and normal then in case of a massive planetary fog or some fumes from the planet or something unusual, doesn't have to be trees.

I suppose it depends how they handle normal wreckage.

Currently wrecks can't take many hits so I have only got it to appear in high numbers by having a army die to a AI com death, and they seem to be ok, and are even target able for easy clearing, hopefully later wreaks will sustain a few hit before going away to make wreck clearing a more timely matter.

As for running down trees...I suppose it depends on the tank and the tree as redwoods and Amazon jungle trees would be kinda difficult to mow down.

Agree.

I suppose vision blocking could work, but there would need to be some serious foliage in the way, like France hedgerows foliage rather then something like a loan palm tree.

this is going to be a simuled projectile RTS.