Thats why one option for orbital layer would have been, to ditch direct control of satellites all together, make their orbits purely cosmetic and let players manage them via a list based interface while they focus on the planets surface where the main action is in progress. But no, someone at Uber decided that they would rather implement orbital units as a new movement layer (which has the very same effect as your graphic, just saying), treating them like "space submarines" in terms of movement and forcing them onto the surface of an invisible sphere.
Yeah, it's going to be a few iterations to get it right but it seems that people are pretty fond of some sort of orbits other than geosync being available.
Thats why one idea is to interact with them through their movement projection on the ground. The computer would handle orbit details and the orbit type itself would be defined through the satellite type. Well, the big difference is with what we have right now (which isn't final and imo can still change a lot) we can form deathballs, in space. With real orbits it gets much harder to form cohesive deathballs. But btw. you don't need to make it list based (lists are ugly UI features ). Just tie orbit type to unit type. A spy sat that covers a large part of the planet (and only shows large buildings like factories and t2 economy) would be geosynchronous by default. You build it, click on a point on the planet. If you click near the equator it would be geostationary, if you click more to the north of south it does a a tundra orbit and you can optionally deform it a bit to make it spend more time over some place (game engine handles the necessary elliptic orbit). A spy sat for discovering units on the other hand would have a low altitude orbit. You click on the planet which makes a polar orbit. You can drag and drop the orbit (always the projection on the ground btw) around and change its angle, but its always a low altitude circular orbit. This sat sees units and stuff but only in a semi-large circle under it. The typical killer-sat armed with a laser cannon would also use a low-orbit circular orbit. It could attack anything directly under it (it has a small arc of fire because that's its characteristic and balance, can't fire to the sides as James Bond killer satellites never could either). This is very different from an air layer in its most important aspect, movement type. You can move air everywhere all the time and it will work with the same efficiency everywhere (unless it gets shot down ofc). Orbital units would be constricted to their movement path. So a killer-satellite would maybe be hard to shoot down, but thats not that bad as you can avoid its path by going a bit to the left or to the right and suddenly it has nothing to fire at. Btw. you can still have sat-to-sat combat. For example an impact killsat. Build it, rightclick on the enemy sat you want to die (or its path on the ground), it goes its merry way until it eventually catches up to its target (fully simulated ofc) and destroys it. Or you give it a fire at will order and it attacks the nearest possible enemy target. Takes a while of course but that's the difference between ground-to-orbit defense and orbit-orbit combat. As for what satellite types we can have? Plenty that are way different then air units. - the mentioned spy sats - killer sats, again very different then bombers as bombers can fly everywhere - orbital factories (cheap way to get orbital-droppable units) builds them, packs them up and sends them on a trajectory to a target you've chosen and then a hard impact on the ground - orbital shipyard, builds the smaller t1 and t2 wet navy ships and drops them in any pond you want but are too cheap to build a shipyard in (ok, that one is not that serious) - nuke early warning, just looks out for and gives the position of nuclear weapons (easy to detect radiation from them) - air-denial sat, flies merrily over the planet in a low orbit, once its near an enemy air unit it dismantles automatically and sends a dozen anti-air missile on their way - anti-sat-sat, attacks a chosen target or else attacks the nearest one in its range and destroys it with a kinetic-impact (and itself) The theme of them is this: Orbital units are either just intel gathering (not better then a scout plane, but they stay alive much longer then one or are more specialized), one-shot weapons that give a nearly guaranteed kill (although a waste if they get used on cheap units) or powerful weapons that can easily be avoided. Basically you can do a lot of damage with them, if you get them to the right target, in time and it not simply gets sidestepped. You then can scale ground based weapons that deal with them much easier as they don't have to be destroyed instantly as they don't give such a humongous advantage.
A few things: On the planet sizes PA will be played on Geosync orbit is very very close to the planet, so reducing the detail the radar or spy Sat observes seems somewhat silly. -------- Note on reading @smallcpu's post above I see there are a fair number of similarities between what's below and that post. Biggest diff probably is I think the Geosync vs LEO orbits aren't that useful and orbital paths can be done with Patrol rather than needing there own mechanic. On a different note does this make any sense to any one as a possible Orbital play style or unit range? For T1/T2 Orbitals I think a suitable split may be: T1: Infowar/Spy Sats, geosync slow movement when changing position etc Sub Orbital Unit Transports, only takes small units like bots, travels fast to a single target no redirection or changing target once launched, maybe abit of spash damage on landing. (Though Unit Cannon may cover this already, if it's usable on a planet for moving around the planet) Anti Orbitals similar to infowar stuff but takes out other sats best for Sat denial over a small area like a base (needed for gas planets) Orbital Constructor: Allows you to build Satellite factories or Unit drop factories in orbit at a cheaper cost than building the orbital units on the ground. Possibly orbital land or Air unit factories might be alot slower or maybe just not a good idea? Should be fairly expensive and slow to produce, you need to invest in this Category to get a benefit & take a risk of having put less resources into your direct action forces. T2 Interplanetary Transports - Picking up constructors & small units moving them to another planet Large unit Orbital/Sub Orbital transport: Drops a large force or few bigger units not just a squad Anti-Asteroid Defenses: A chance to stop the Asteroid flattening your base Interplanetary Radar & Infowar: Ability to get info on another planet, if your going to attack someone elses planet you really don't want to go in blind. Remote Area denial: Bombardment platform that can sit over a very small area on the planet and hammer anything that tries to pass under it (except Aircraft unless it's an energy based weapon rather than kinetic) Interplanetary Constructors for things like Asteroid missions Maybe some of the ideas need to be switched between T1/T2. This would give you a mix of somewhat unique abilities that could add something to the strategic mix. More of a focus on additional abilities that affect Air, Land & Sea play & needed for interplanetary, rather than just being another battlefield. As: It would be needed to expand Interplanetary. Gives offensive options against reasonably against slow Land/Sea Units but can't really interfere with faster aircraft & can be avoided (it doesn't chase you). Provides expensive but very useful Intel both local planet & interplanetary. Orbital to Orbital combat is very slow paced & rather fragile so doesn't become another major battlefield. Provides defense against asteroid strikes. Weak against enemy bases, go near an enemy base and they'll be able to take you out if they've done anything at all to counter Orbitals, however if they haven't you've got slow moving massive extremely focused damage to there base which if they're quick and it doesn't find the ACU immediately they'll be able to take down by build ASAT.
I would be careful with offensive units in the orbital layer, just as with "anti orbitals". Be careful not to turn the orbital layer into a game of it own, keep it simple so you don't distract from the warfare on the planets surface, especially don't enforce unnecessary micro by creating units with slow movement. If a unit would be become to strong if it had the ability to move fast, adjust rather the severity of the units effect than crippling the units movement speed. Also remember, if the units up their get to powerful, they will also suddenly call for hard counters. You can evade that issue by designing orbital issue in such way, that killing them off with a single catapult missile would already count as a waste of resources for the smaller ones and even the bigger ones only justify the use of a SINGLE nuclear missile at most.
The thing is doesn't it have to be a game of it's own on Gas planets? There it's possibly the only game. I think it just needs to be a less efficient game when there is Air, Land, Sea & Orbital vs when there is just orbital.
Why do gas planet do have to use the orbital mechanics only? It would be perfectly valid to give them an remotely air based set of units in addition to the REAL orbit based units, rather than polluting the orbital layer with all the possible drawbacks for balancing on other planet types.
@exterminans good point I guess it's a lay over from the Kickstater where the stretch goal was Orbital Units + Gas planets which kinda tied the two together in my mind. As you say if you stick in an orbital Air Factory and have it's units drop into the gas planet you could focus the Orbital units nearly entirely on orbital things.
smallcpu's last post is similar to my thoughts. Manually controlling the satellite layer will take too much attention regardless of their movement characteristics. We've already got combat layers in which you can tell units exactly where to go, manage concaves etc... Satellites should be completely different and fairly micro free (in the conventional sense). A satellite's orbit could be specified by manipulation a 'prediction line' which is traced on the planet. Orbit could even be specified on launch and impossible to change. Perhaps it would be possible to slowly modify orbits but this should not be done with a simple move order. For simplicities sake I think we only need two types of orbits; orbits along a great circle and orbits which oscillate around the equator (with specified magnitude). These orbits are only slightly unrealistic. The great circle orbit would be quite low and as such able to mostly ignore the rotation of the planet. These orbits are also very easy to specify and visualize.
My Favorite Theory for Gas Giants is that they will be pre-disposed to having above average numbers of Moons/Asteroids orbiting them which provides the 'land' needed for Gas Giant Gameplay while still providing an environment which is fairly unique compared to other planets and is home to fast paced dynamic gameplay. Mike
Realistic orbit is totally stupid, they should have a 2D layer where satellites orbit. Orbital should have orbital factories that can launch bots and tanks down in pods but only when the orbiting factory passes over the desired drop location. Orbital should be able to be attacked from ground launched missiles which have to slowly rotate out from their launchers (taking a few minutes to reach the orbital facility). Orbital should be fairly expensive and should have static defenses, such as you upgrade your orbital facilities with anti missile guns that can take out missiles, but building this would negate the advantage of reaching orbit first. Orbital Solar Power Orbital laser beam <<< mega expensive Satellite Nuke launcher Unit launcher (to asteroids also) I do think orbital should all be in a 2d plane on a totally seperate zoom layer in between planet and solar system zoom levels.
Stating that realistic orbits are "totally stupid" and not giving any reasoning behind that statement doesn't lend credence to your position. You also give no reason why orbital units should be expensive.
Totally stupid idea because it won't be implemented in time for beta, in fact imo n-body sim was a pretty stupid idea becuase, with regards to gameplay everything that would make the game functional and fun to play could of been achieved with preset orbits and scripts (ie not implementing actual orbit physics). I don't see what advantages n-body physics adds to the game. Orbital should be more expensive than ground/air/naval because it's going to be mid game unit, blasting to other planets and smashing asteroids will be late game and should cost even more. This way people on other planets will have chance to macro up in big multi planet games.
Says you based on what exactly?? Just your opinion, and not necessarily a coherent one. Orbital could easily be reasonably early, but interplanetary more mid-game...
If the actual "interplanetary" part of Planetary Annihilation is only for the late game I will be sorely disappointed.
OK then, so what is lategame? or are you suggesting their will be no late game? and secondly it won't be implemented in time for beta, at it's current state their is not a chance in hell that n-body orbital play will be ready for beta. If you think otherwise then I think you may be delusional, or beta will be pushed <<< imo a good idea OK then, so what is lategame? or are you suggesting their will be no late game? Or are we going to start hurtling suns at your suns suns and then maybe create a blackhole to another universe for late game?
Late game is moving Asteroids and Moons around. Actually getting to them, and fighting to control one, is mid-game. Building the engines to turn a Moon or Asteroid into a KEW should not be the work of a few minutes, no matter how good your economy is.
Late game is when you have all the tools available for usage. Not just a subset of better tools. That was tried in Supcom, and it didn't work out too well.
