Planet smashing dictating strategy

I've been thinking this for a while and wanted to gauge people's thoughts,

I really dislike playing on systems with smashables because it feels like it dictates strategy too much and forces you into a very narrow set of options. What I mean by this is when there are any smashables the only viable strategy is to rush to take as many of them as quickly as possible. If you don't have control of smashables then of course it is hard to get on them and control them, but also you're screwed and at the mercy of whoever does have them, with any planets you control likely to simply fall to a planet smash.

The only real solution I can think of is making smashables really quite expensive like maybe 5 Halleys as a bare minimum.

Thoughts? Are there other viable strategies than all-out rushing to grab the smashables, or any other potential solutions to make them less necessary?

I set 4 as a bare minimum, usually use 5 to 10 when I make a system.
I think if they were made smaller and kept the same price, people would instinctively set numbers as was seen in the kickstarter, where 7 were used to move a small asteroid.

As for strategies, I find taking over the main planet while others spend their resources to expand into space gives you a good eco boost if you can clear them out while they're trying to move off-planet. Then you can deny them from building as your eco is much better.
(doesn't apply to multi-planet starts though)

I definitely agree

The problem I think is that the first on the planet gets it. Once someone gets a foothold it's impossible to get them off. Also, while you can invade a planet(though it's WAY easier to defend), you still need to know which planet to attack in the first place.
Once the Halleys are built they wipe out EVERYTHING on a planet. That's OP like crazy.

Suggestion:
Multiply Halley cost by at least 5, show how many Halleys are built and where, smashing a small planet should clear part of the target planet(maybe not aimable). And ofc. not to mention have a viable invasion tool like the Unit cannon (yes, this again).

I think we need to do something a bit more "fundamental" and it's something I've somewhat talked about before(somewhat indirectly) and think that with the way Orbital is set up right now it's so easy to just spread out everywhere that if you don't you die as you described.

If the ability to expand to other planets was reigned in a bit and more limited it might become less of a race to get the most as it is to focus on better options. For example Taking a fresh planet over a small asteroid first gives you redundancy(can't smash 2 planets with 1 asteroid) and would allow your eco to ramp up more as well.

I think the lack of "easy" or "fully functional" interplanetary mechanics are secondary causes as well, invading a planet is really hard, whereas smashing it is easier.

Mike

All we need to do is wait.

In the future planet smashing won't be a guaranteed destroy entire planet. Planet smashing will be proportionate to the size of the smashing orbital body and the orbital body that is being smashed.

Once that's implemented and balanced, multi planet gameplay is going to have a HUGE improvement.

I recon it would be cool to have asteroids which are small but halleys on them would still be expensive to build, while the return on space and metal/energy is minimal on them AND once started and smashing, they would not be any more effective than, lets say 4-5 nukes spread out. so no complete wipe.of course you could still leave the option to mobilise bigger space chunks but then it would have to be appropriately more cost intensive...

With the Halley's current cost vs. its absolute destruction and lack of counters, it's currently very unbalanced. Once price per Halley goes up a lot (like 120K metal per or something), and different sizes of asteroids that don't automatically destroy the whole planet come in to play, things will be a lot closer to ideal.

I agree with brianpurkiss here - having gradations in the level of destruction caused by smashable bodies should
1. Make smashing *more* common.
2. Make it less game-ending.
3. Make it easier to assault heavily-defended planets.

No? At least, that's how I conceive of it. Also, while holding a smashable body hostage really limits creative strategy, as Zaphod says, I have to wonder: do we want to make planet-smashing even *less* accessible? Given the game's premise? I know that cool concepts can prove to be very difficult to execute as game mechanics, but I feel as though smashing planet ought to be a very regular part of gameplay. How to incorporate that without limiting strategic depth? I dunno'; see above, I guess. :-\

Playing with enough planetary bodies also helps when annihilating one planet isn't 30% of the playing field. They also come less binary as both sides will smash each other with no big divide on who gets or doesn't get to smash.

Surely by that point you really only need planets as a place to launch nukes from.
Just get fifty advanced fabbers in Astraeuses and go nomadic. Launch a planet to take a planet. Et cetera.

Don't get so attached to things proxy bases, man!

Personally, I'd like to see cheap smashables (aka < 5 Halleys) have no metal on the surface of the planet so if someone wanted to rush to the super weapons, they might find themselves at an economic disadvantage if they didn't stick around and claim any land on the main planets. In order to effectively claim, lock down, and use the asteroid or small planet, then you already need to have land elsewhere.

That would be nice to do once we get metal sliders, but you would still need to land and secure it to make sure you control the smashable rather than be at the mercy of someone else.

Waiting for less destructive planet smashing is of course an option, I think for now I'll just stick with a lot of halleys to make it more lategame.

Part of the problem is that we are very limited in how we can actually invade a planet. Going for halleys would be much slower and more difficult if you were under constant threat of a planetary invasion or strike force. As it is now once a planet is even lightly turtled landing a ground force is nigh impossible, leaving you free to pour all your resources into halleys with no defense or units. If you knew you had to trade the risk of the cost of halleys against them getting gibbed by a landed strike force of snipers, vanguards, etc, you would need to really defend them and it would be a much riskier option.

But planet smashing is the best bit

How about we improve planet invading first?

Also I assume zaphod is talking team games not 1v1?

https://forums.uberent.com/threads/planet-smashing-is-strategy-or-is-it.58175/

I like where planet smashing sits right now. I think a problem is the level of disconnect that orbital has with the other layers. I definitely think that the largest focus should be on ground based conflict, and all the other layers should be interacting with that layer.

I am still convinced that the problem is simply one of logistics.

Although I do not think I am happy with the design of Avengers and Anchors... thought Uber said no space battles.

The whole point of smashing a planet is to end the game.
Go out with a bang.

When you have 4-5 planets in a system, it becomes a strategic move. Which do you go to?

I like the way it is now. Going for halleys quick enough that someone won't notice is actually a very draining proposition for your economy. It also keeps the game moving, instead of a stalemate-y nuke spam war.

I like that. Add in proportional smashing and this system will work out pretty well, I think.

I'd think someone who likes sniping as much as you would enjoy planet smashing.

I would agree. While I don't think making smashables less important would be a good thing, they're not fun or interesting to fight over at the moment. The first person there gets access to a wide range of free metal and is incredibly hard to push off. Again, another reason why the unit canon seems so important to people right now, when the real issue is planet cracking and invading.

Smashables in general are supposed to be revamped so they smash based on proportionate size. A larger body should destroy a planet outright, but a smaller one shouldn't kill everything on it. Both the orbital revamp and smashable revamps should help with this. I'm going to keep pushing to playtest no air on moons to make defending smashables harder than covering everything with t2 Bombers.

Though metal sliders and a more metal dependent economy should change moons from being so resource rich and fueling the entire advanced economy that builds a halleyed planet. This would force someone to have to keep fighting over mass spots on a main planet. Simply getting there first won't help when you don't have the metal to do anything with it. Gas Giants and Metal Death Stars should hopefully create other end game options too.

If I make a smashable system, I typically try to have more smashables than there are players. That way if it does come to smashing, then it turns into a risk/reward system for all the players.

for example:
so if player1 smashes player2's smashable planet. player1 & player2 now have a smaller eco and players3 & 4 now can attack the weaker players 1 & 2 and are likely to win. Furthermore there is also that other smashable out there that all of them can now fight over.