Natural events that hamper your strategy

Unless you can trigger natural events instead of being random then maybe yes. But I think it should be able to use such thing only once.

They might just be overpowered and annoying wich is really bad as you'd have to rush before your opponent builds one of those things or you are lost.

No, no, no, and more no. There is no place for random anything, ever, in an RTS.

Too extreme a view there. Shot variation/weapon inaccuracy is acceptable.

There's a mathematical reason why that is, and why a random comet impact or volcano isn't.

There's more than just law of averages. Getting shot by the enemy is fun, getting shot by the map isn't.

:lol:

Lets say something would happen every 10 mins. Like lava rises in some spring maps or like that mission from starcraft 2. Could be really fun and not be random.

I tip my hat to you, sir.

I'd forgotten all about the TA meteor showers and earthquakes. Huh.

Random hampering events are only fun if losing is also fun. Losing isn't as much fun in an RTS as it is in something like dwarf fortress or Kerbal Space Program, so I'm not sure if this is such a great idea.

Thats why you want a simulation which introduces random outcome if the same two units fight each other(not microed).

Overpowered like crashing an asteroid into a planet and completely destroying everything on it?

The thing is, you want to be destroyed by the strategic decisions made by the opponent, not by some random number generator deciding something bad happens.

The original comment was made with the assumption that players could trigger natural events. I suggest reading them before jumping in and commenting yourself.

I am sorry, I have read the whole thread, but everyone started talking about random things, so I assumed I had misread the first post.

Only if natural event will be implemented like this then it will be balanced. They should happen at a fixed time and all players should know it and what is gonna happen. Random **** is bad in a rts.

I agree with thefirstfish, I dont think there should be natural disasters that could introduce a large bias in a match.

Hahaha pretty much that ^

I DO think that there should be variation in on each planet that affect both sides equally. A planet could be prone to stormy weather and thus slow down aircraft or reduce the vision range of units. Also what rick104547 said would be awesome for some lava planets to have

I think at the very least there should be purely cosmetic weather events on planets - blizzards on a ice planet, storms and rain on tropical planets, etc. It would add to the AWESOME aesthetic of fighting across a planet if they had extreme environmental features/weather, even if they did nothing to the player.

This discussion reminds me of a flash game called Creeper Worlds where on some maps you'de get a regular map-wide meteor shower. The meteors could be shot down by AA missiles, so you had to make sure you had your air defense set up properly.

I think some elements can be cool, if implemented properly and present on only certain map or with only certain options. I don't see it as a priority, though, and the focus should still be on the core aspects of the game.

Do not want.

Random events that benefit or screw me have no place in a RTS, or really any form of competitive gaming.

visuals effects without game-play effects seem kind of redundant.

events can have impact without being game deciding (e.g. some speed/range reduction for bad weather); world destroying asteroids would be a bit overkill. some impact could be reduced by build-able countermeasures (depending on event).

dealing with events you have no influence over (random events, AI, map layout) is part of rts gaming , if it should be an absolutely mirrored game setup without any random influence I always can fall back to go or chess.

It could add an element of flexibility or robustness to strategy. i.e. for the next 5min air is slight disadvantaged, is your strategy robust enough to survive that, or are you flexible enough to take advantage of that?

I agree random game ending events are not helpful, but giving people opportunities to take I feel adds to the strategy.

It adds precisely nothing to the strategy other than to randomly distribute an advantage to one player and a disadvantage to another. How is there any strategy there?

"Oh look he's busy dealing with a Hurricane, now I'm free to do whatever for the next 5 minutes with drastically less chance of being punished or counterattacked."

There might be a glimmer of strategy if the event was triggered by players by fulfilling certain conditions on the map(like drilling a specific location to create an earthquake).

What RTS do you play? AI and map layouts are not random events. I can't think of any recent/popular RTS games that randomly screwed players with random events.