The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger...

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

I like the idea of games resulting in a draw if both commanders die. So a commander cannot instantly kill another commander by exploding next to it or it will be very easy to force draws.

Yes the ACU death definitely needs to make a crater. A crater is just a graphical gimmick, no problem with that. But another ACU needs to be able to survive the creation of that crater.
I don't care if this is done by increasing ACU health or by specifying that ACU-deathnukes do a very small amount of damage to other ACUs and huge damage to everything else.

FA pretty much solved all these problems already: The explosion looks epic while damage is pretty balanced. I don't see why PA cannot just do the same.

EDIT:
Oh and about all this combombing in teamgames-stuff: Killing other ACUs with a combomb obviously needs to be prevented as well.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

say the less intense explosion does about 70 or 80% damage to a fully healed commander, and decreases in a radial fashion, with maybe a zone of 100% right near the center

that way you can't just waltz up and draw, and a commander that is significantly in better condition than another is very likely to survive such an encounter whereas a prolonged battle will surely end bad for both.

Encourages taking the initiative and discourages close battles with just commanders.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

But that sacrifices you "Artistic Vision" that the ComNuck should be 'devastating'?

At least you seem to agree that the ComNuck affects 1v1 and Team games differently, so that's something.

Mike

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

The integral part of it is that there is a large explosion on death. That is exactly what they've shown. The specifics of how and how much is up to interpretation.

Leaving a base unharmed and other such nonsense is not a reasonable interpretation of "large explosion" but the somewhat smaller but still powerful blast shown certainly is. And because it's a bit smaller it's not unreasonable that it would do less damage.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

Comm bombing is not not about Commanders making daring suicide runs. It's about a player rage quitting into his enemy's face. The ease of running into the enemy far surpasses any legitimate test of skill. Salvaging a loss is still a loss.

Build a single laser tower, or simply have more tanks because enemy Commanders don't just teleport across the map and demand tangible time for the trip.

Solved.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

Again, why is this the case? One transport is easier to stop than 30 bombers. Why do you assume it's easy to do this? If you do, isn't that a balance issue, not a limitation issue?

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

One transport is built in less time than 30 bombers. I 100% guarantee that you can get your Commander standing next to your enemy's in less than 3 minutes, including scouting.

I hope you were expecting a Commander to Transport just outside of your AA cover and walk in before the 3 minute mark. Got enough towers to defeat the Commander with a D-Gun?

What's that? No?
BOOM. Too bad. You're both dead.

Now our 2v2 game is 1v1. Of course their "lesser" player bombed your "better" player. So now we're stuck with the lesser player of one team vs the better player of the other.

Nice and "Fair", wouldn't you say?
[massive sarcasm] I can see this scenario being a fun thing to play [/massive sarcasm]

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

To add on to that, which is the reasoning behind why the damage was reduced against other ACUs in SupCom, here is a hypothetical for why the damage was reduced against buildings.

It's a 2v2, things are going okay, no early upsets, but then the enemy walks/transports a commander into your base, you take it out, but the core of your base is gutted, many of your factories, some of your Power Gens and Metal Extractors, you're not dead but you're hurt. Unfortunately for your team, the Combomber build up some Factories and Basic Eco, gave it to his ally, so although it's technically a 2v1, the ComBombing team still has almost the same infrastructure as 2 players would, whereas the team with 2 players has 1 untouched base, and one gutted base.

The Combomb doesn't end the game, but it does throw it onto a Tilt.

Mike

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

x)

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

If I don't spell it out people might interpret it as me endorsing Com-Bombing. Now it can't be taken out of context :lol:

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

I never played SupCom Multiplayer but, to me, it doesn’t sound fun to ComBomb, especially for the guy who is committing suicide. You’re out of the game… no longer playing… maybe just spectating or sitting in lobby waiting for your friend . IDK, I’d much rather be in the game, playing it. Even if your on the other team and you lose, hey you played the game while that other guy is surfing the internet looking for cats in hats or something :lol:.

I guess if it is some clan matches, for ranking purposes... I guess… but still it’s not like for money or anything of tangible worth. It kind-of defeats the whole purpose of “playing” the game, with emphasis on the word… play and the rank is... w/e. IDK, value in ranking is just not my cup of tea, although I understand others find value in it. :?:

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

Because it is available as the first action in the game. That's why I keep calling it the starting nuke, because you START with it.

A good number of factors went into buffing the Supcom Comm bomb.
- You have the 4 starting mexes, which are ALL in explosive range.
- You have the adjacency system, which endorses compact bases.
- Buildings in general were fairly small, especially low tech structures like T1 gens and PD.
- You have the upgrade system, which places greater importance on the earliest built structures (which are always going to be close to spawn).
- You have a T1 that is extremely weak against the Commander, making defense difficult.
- You have an average unit speed that is borderline catatonic, further reducing the ability to spread out.
- Free wreckage or auto unit transfer when your ally died.

Total Annihilation had a VASTLY superior bomb, and it didn't gut bases half as well as it did in Supcom. So it clearly did something better than Supcom when it comes to Comm bombs.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

I voted for more violently and bigger and here is why.

We are going to be on planets much bigger than the one seen in the May 3rd livestream. And even more, we are going to be on more planets! How will you combomb rush when you aren't even on the same planet?

Other points that relate to previous games are also suspect. As was mentioned by bobucles, the way the game environment was set up: adjacency bonus, slow speed, upgrading had a huge impact on how effective the combomb was. This means that we are discussing a rather complex issue with regards to balancing in relatively simple terms.

While the effectiveness of the combomb in a team game as a huge cheese tactic has also been brought up as an issue, I don't know how much you want to nerf the explosion due to that. Isn't the biggest issue the combined resources that are left over to the team that initiated the attack? Why not consider the option of rendering the dead commanders' assets inert? This would severely hamper this tactic from the outset and also make the loss of a teammate all the more dangerous.

Lets discuss this topic in terms of the environment that PA will have and not necessarily the environments native to TA and SC.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

Okay, so what happens then when you're on the same planet? Being ABLE to start on separate planets is not the same as ALWAYS starting on separate planets.

Also this caught my eye;

What leads you to say this? The planet from the April22nd LS was about a quarter of the way on the size slider, and while I'm sure bigger planets are plausible, what makes you say there will ONLY be bigger planets?

Mike

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

Yes, this is true. However starting on the same planet will probably be a rarer occurrence in the case where team play is prevalent. Regardless, my point is that the issues around combomb and the impact on ranking, ties, etc should concentrate on multiple planets and/or large planets as more common and the small single planet as an edge case.

I probably should have said we "are most likely to be" rather than "are going to be". Like I stated above, I consider the case of one planet at 1/4 the slider scale in size to be more of an edge case and a very poor target to base balance on.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

Gameplay has to be well balanced at all planetary levels... maybe not perfect, but 1/4 slider scale is not an "outside" case. Remember that's a fraction.

One out of every four planets will be that size or smaller given an even distribution along that slider.

Is Uber weighting that slider to hang in the middle though... that's the real question.
How random is the "Random" button?

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

Teradyne, I think you're making some very detailed assumptions based on a game that isn't even into alpha yet. For the record I fully expect the range of the slider to change, but we don't know what the change will entail, who knows, we could end up with a smaller maximum planet size for all we know, until we see more how the game's pace and progression until we can start making claims like yours.

Combombing has zero effect of 1v1 ranked so long as it doesn't lead to a draw, the damage it does, it's area of effect, it doesn't matter because the game was already over.

Admittedly that is if it's handled correctly, it could be executed in such a way that it's totally bogus, but that shouldn't be hard to avoid.

Combombing is only really an issue in team games, and as important as good 1v1 balance is, we don't want to end up like Starcraft 2 where the 1v1 Balance is great, but it can really break down in Team games, if you want an example I can tell you how to play a 4v4 and make your spawning pool at the 24 second mark. This is doubly important for PA as I get the feeling that Team Games, even more so than Ranked, is what is really going to give PA it's longevity, so nailing the Team Game Balance is just as important as solid 1v1 balance.

but we're lucky in regards to Combombing in that it doesn't have an effect in 1v1, so we can focus efforts specifically making sure it works in team games.

Mike

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

I don't think it will be a rare occurrence. If you start on a different planets, you basically cut 80% of the game out, leaving only interplanetary stuff and maybe a bit of orbital.

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

That mostly depends on what kind of a role Orbital will play, and part of the reason I hope it plays more of a supporting role, that way you still need "feet on the ground" to accomplish anything on an enemy planet. Especially as you get into bigger games, fitting up to 40 people on a single planet might not be the ideal setup.

Mike

Re: The Commander Should Explode More Violently and Bigger..

I tend to agree with you Mike, based on what I have seen and read so far in relation to the role of space in this game. The everyone starting on the same planet scenario will probably be more common in smaller games in terms of players.

It needs to remembered though, we are discussing a multi-dimensional issue here as a team game could occur with multiple planets and the teams could be all starting on the same planet or it could be random.

I don't even think combombing is even the first problem you will have to worry about in that scenario :twisted: . Having a 2 team game with 4 players for each team with random placement across planets and you end up on a planet with 3 enemy team players... Let's just say, PA will have interesting possibilities that complicate scenarios quite beyond simple cheese tactic mitigation.

I, for one, welcome the complications, though.