Poll: Should we remove the anti-nuke launcher from the game?

this.

additionally the reason why we should stop randomly shooting down unit ideas and/or units to come announced by Uber.

More units = more diversity = more strategies = more gameplay.

and enough with the balance argument. Strictly speaking there is nothing that can't be balanced.

except maybe this:

Baby kittens

I call OP. nerf them.

LOL awesome! That's honestly the reaction I was looking for

I think someone mis-spelled it once and Mike thought it was hilarious so he started doing it everywhere and now its sort of an inside joke for PA forum goers.

Thats intentional. I think nucks should still be viable late game. You should still be able to center a strategy around them as well! I just don't think it should be as easy to do, especially early, and I think you shouldn't be able to do ONLY that and still win. No unit should be able to kill another skilled player 100% alone like that, not even nucks...

Yea, I think that just changing the anti nuke to use energy instead of ammo would be a better way to go.

I agree that everything can be balanced. 100% agree. This isn't a balance issue to me though. I think the fundimental way nukes and anti-nukes interact isn't fun gameplay, regardless of the stat values of either. Strictly speaking more units != more diversity in and of itself. We have tanks, but adding another unit called the "anti-tank" that only shoots tanks and nothing else would add nothing to the game, even though its another unit...

Here we go again.......
I vote no fab assist still!!!

wow that is so wildly misinformed.

that's the thing though, with balance it does.
people just gotta let it happen.

the worse alternative is having a game that's quickly stale because of how deja-vu everything is.

FAF never has that because people invent new winning strategies there daily and the casts just keep on being entertaining!

My mistake... Notice how I said "I think" instead of "It was"? maybe you could enlighten us instead of just bashing? That would be the constructive way to respond...

https://forums.uberent.com/threads/anti-nukes.53600/#post-819469

and obviously I was in on it since I'm an old supcom 1 player

Well Scathis voted no, so no real point in talking about it anymore I guess. If he doesn't like it, and can't be bothered to even address it, its not happening anyway. It would be nice if he could grace us with his reasons why, but since it's his design choice maybe he took the attack on his design personally. Just voting no without explaining is like saying "I don't like it because it wasn't my idea" or something like some ignorant parent on a power trip.

In retrospect, and with other recent changes, it's now obvious that yes, Umbrellas should also do the nuke intercept duty. I do think the post title might scare views away from this thread, which is a shame, because you totally nailed it, and the timing is now right for the change you've proposed.

The anti-nuke was always flawed, and shifting its only-reason-to-exist onto another existing structure is ideal. The Umbrella has steadily risen in importance (initially it didn't even really work, if i recall), and is set to do so even further in the next build(s). I agree, it is the clear selection now to protect against nukes. Prior suggestions such as a Phalanx(gatling-gun) or using the catapult or [at the time, still undeveloped] adv missile tower, were all "ok" ideas for their time - but the umbrella is just so much better of a fit!! Great call.


To underscore with an example... in a recent FFA game of mine where I retreated to one of the moons, the situation essentially demanded that I protect from both nukes and orbital attacks, and I had decent eco but limited intel or counter-strike ability at the ready. I faced the prospect of sprinkling both anti-nuke's and umbrellas, which became tedious to micro as my economic base steadily re-grew. What struck me was that I was effectively building the same pair of buildings at roughly the same spacing. Each to protect against only slightly different variants of "destruction from unknown threat, hurled at me from above". It was stupid to have to tell my fabbers to build both... and then come back later and click to load more anti-missles... yah, micro-intense and just kinda dumb. Building umbrellas and spacing them right should be enough.

[Along with ensuring adequate energy to run them at the critical time(s) they're needed. That's not in-game yet, is it? the energy required to fire? i know it's planned in any case]

The sentence structure the OP used indicates you don't have to rebuild ammo manually for the umbrella as you do with the ANL which he then said (rebuilding ANL ammo) is micro.

Poll states :
Should we remove the anti-nuke launcher from the game?

I vote no because, as knight said..... "
That in of it self is not a big problem, the problem is that the relationship is very binary in terms of the possible outcomes due to in large part the raw strength of the Nucks themselves, if their power was tuned down, different Nucks and anti-Nucks introduced it wouldn't really be a problem.

Mike"

I agree... The more important issue however is that it is a NUKE not a NUCK.....

I am involved in Nuclear, engineering, weapons, reactors..... Short hand is NUKE....
I am 1 more misspell away from sterilizing the community :/

Totally joking... maybe

NO ASSIST!!!!! FTW!!!!! TA LIVES ON!!!!!

Hey, Chill out. Just because he said no doesn't mean he did not read your post.

I voted No because it hasn't even been balanced in his balance passes yet since the land army doesn't quite have the right feel just yet.

I do like the idea of a Soft counter to anti nukes. that doubles as an anti orbital weapon as well.

It would be cool if the orbital laser was a constant stream damage to nukes and depending where the nuke was incoming, the amount of damage done by the laser determines the nuke's blast size/effectivness till the orbital laser destroys it.

Honestly there probably needs to be nuke/ anti nuke types that can be installed in to the launchers. It doesn't even have to be a nuke and anti nuke. It can be a Anti orbital nuke/Fuel Air Bomb Nuke/ Crater maker nuke/EMP nuke (disables visual and radar coverage for a large area for both commanders) . for the anti side. Light Anti nuke missile(Increased range, lowers nuke detonation size)/ Counter intelligence anti nuke (changes trajectory of nuke but doesn't destroy it) / Regular Anti nuke.

I really like this idea.

This is a little off topic but, lasers are light weapons (one constant beam). However all the weapons labeled laser in this game seem to have a firing animation like that of a plasma / railgun or other projectile weapon. - Just a thought.. :/

Ok to me nukes because they are those powerfull long rangeweapons
requier that focused counter .... same with umbrellas for orbital
the problem is if you dont build the same stuff you often have a hard time reaching them ... thats why anukes are there they help stopping the nukes from impacting in your base as do umbrellas stop satalites hovering above your comm ... but the y dont stop the root from further producing that stuff and THAT's where your army and weapons have to come in play...
i also dont think it would be a good idea to divers the nukegame as mike proposed i personaly dont want too much of a slugfest with missiles this will be there already with catapults and holkins imo .. the focus should be on your surfacearmy

The title, the poll, and your post together make for a fairly confused issue.

No, I don't think antinuke should be removed from the game. It is necessary to create counterplay against nukes. Without a hard counter, nukes would have to be very prohibitively expensive to marginalize them from the game almost entirely.

Yes, I think antinukes should simply work without needing to construct missiles individually- other TA-derived games already do this, including Zero-K. The rate of fire of the antinuke should be its limitation of consequence, not its stockpile of missiles. For more nuke defense, simply build more antinuke structures.

No, I don't think the Umbrella (or other turrets intended to destroy orbital units) should always also be your antinuke defense. Ideally, orbital defenses will be more variable than the highly expensive and binary Umbrella. But even with the Umbrella as is, defending against orbital units and defending against nukes should involve two separate features, and therefore two separate costs to acquire them with the possibility of having one and not the other.

I fully support the continued existence of the anti nuke launcher. however, it needs to be re-buffed, because now building an actual nuke launcher is quicker by default (non-assisted).

though the "starts with 1 missile" is a slight relief in that sense".

regardless, without anti nukes, regular nukes would dominate. however, we DO have anti nukes. the only ones who should cry are the ones who did not prepare themselves for the inevitable hailstorm of moon-based nukes flying in by the dozens.

CATAPULTS, on the other hand......*shudders*

We should at least experiment with this in a patch and see if we like it. I am all for it on paper (suggested it myself a few weeks ago on one of the anti nuke threads in fact), but I'd love to see how it works in practice.

Removing anti-nukes isn't necessary, but I think it would be good to do so as a way of forcing a brainstorm on other less binary ways you can counter nukes, and how nukes could be changed to accentuate those alternatives.

Afterwards anti-nukes can be re-implemented, but as one of many options, rather than as a crutch.

Don't you think nukes are a bit too powerful? If nukes were a little weaker then it would not be such a tragedy when it hits. And then binary anti-nuke is pretty good solution because you cover important areas of your base with antinukes and then nukes can hit less meaningful targets and it's fine. But right now small hole in your expensive defences might mean loss in game.
The other idea would be the best to manipulate with range and cost of anti-nuke in order to create good balance of nuking and anti-nuking.
Current nuke system is well designed it's just matter of the very high cost of anti-nuke and low range.
So to sum up we can either nerf nukes or buff anti-nukes but redesigning I feel is unnecessary. Right now i feel balance is way off in favour of nukes.
Adding so called "micro" to make additional missiles is just adding mindless apm spam. Micro is when you add more depth in controling your units, not buildings.