Greetings!
Welcome to all the new founders! Thank you for joining us!
Today's discussion has to do with resources.
The current plan is for the game to have these resources:
However, there's an argument to be had that we have too many. So let me present one of many possible alternatives:
Abilities instead use Radioactives. Power is simply eliminated.
What are your thoughts on different methods (for those of you who have played).
Using Radioactives for global abilities is consistent and logical gameplay. But I think, for various reasons, you might have to get rid of the "global abilities cost more each time they are used" mechanic if you do this. An alternative might be that you can research increasingly powerful tiers of global abilities which cost more to use. When the player uses an ability they can choose what tier of ability they want to use. For example, they might choose a very powerful Sensor sweep and use up a lot of radioactives, or perhaps they'll choose a lower tier sensor sweep, leaving radioactives left over to make a T3 unit. The global abilities would have to be sufficiently beneficial so that the choice between using a global ability and building a T3 unit is not a trivial one.
Unlimited buildings? My gut tells me this could be exploitable but I'm having trouble coming up with a concrete example. How about "Sensor array walls"? Could mess with pathing. What if buildings also use logistics, do you think that can be reasonably balanced with units also using logistics? Maybe the first research building (or all of them) wouldn't cost logistics so a player doesn't get stuck at the logistics cap with no research facilities.
I may ahve misspoiek. Global abilities won't cost more each time you use them.
Rather, the tech tree is going to be stackable.
So you can research say better armor over and over but each time it costs more.
yes you do have a lot of different Resources in the game.
I do like the last option.
Take out power and use Radioactives for global abilities but i think the best way to do it is:
I just became a founder and took a first look at the game. I do like the general direction this is going.
Regarding the topic of resources I have the following to say:
I do not like the concept of indestructible resource extractors and taking territories at all. I would very much like that to be an option that can be disabled so that we can build those buildings ourselves and have them destroyed.
I really enjoyed it in supreme commander that you could do raids behind enemy lines using bombers or air drops and destroy the resource extractors if they were not guarded.
In general I never liked games where you had to think in terms of territory grids and had arbitrary borders it just felt very artifical in an RTS that was not turn based. For turn based games its ok for Sins of a Solar Empire it worked because the territory was a star and it felt sort of natural but the borders in Ashes as they are defined right now feel similar to what was done back in the day from the first Empire Earth game to the second where they introduced borders on the land and limited the number of buildings you could build in any territory. For some reason it worked rather well in Rise of Nations and Rise of Legends due to the fact that you had cities as nucleus points but in those games I also didn't really like it that much.
I personally am very much against limiting the number of defensive buildings as a very hard defensive play should be a valid strategy as it is in supreme commander. Pure turtlers are not unbeatable and their should be advantages for map control such as more resources which lead to stronger units (experimentals) that allow a breach of the defensive position. But imposing again arbitrary limits on that just feels so wrong.
As I understand Ashes it wants to feel like a war. A war needs to flow naturally to me though and placing restrictions on number of buildings or type of buildings on me just feels like an unnecessary restraint.
As for the number of resources I liked the model of Supreme Commander a lot where you had a substantial resource that was drained while building things and an immaterial resource which was used to power things including but not limited to building stuff. One could introduce another resource for special operations that is accumulated slowly and then unleashes strong effects that would be a valid resource.
Making the unit limit dependent on research is valid as is making it dependent on buildings in my opinion but I think that to get big epic battles the idea of supcom to have a big unit limit which is basically available from the start is also not a bad idea and should definitely be an option when creating games.
I personally do not like the concept of victory points at all. I second the motion to make that a disableable option. Winning by points was never a valid strategy for me as it only shows that one can hold certain points for a certain amount of time not whether one is in general winning the match. It might be fun for a lot of people which makes it a valid concept to be in the game for sure.
Tl;dr
Please make territories completely optional, make resource extractors destructible and non auto capturable, don't restrict buildings by type, focus on two maybe 3 resources, make victory points optional
Edit:
I hope this doesn't sound too much like a rant when it isn't meant to be one. I honestly think this game has a lot of potential which is why I definitely want it to be a game I love to play when it is finished. Similar to supcom which I still enjoy a lot to play today FAF for the win!
I just remember a lot of my most memorable moments from supcom to be from surprise attacks or hidden bases behind the enemy or up on hills and that also seems like something that would be impossible given the static seed and territory mechanic as it wouldn't allow a secret base behind enemy lines or something of that order.
Whew too many ideas and comments coming to me too fast I might have to open a thread at some point just to give my idea of a perfect RTS which might very well not be the one for the majority of people.
Please give us a game mode without Turinium. as it is right now me and my buddies are completely avoiding capturing these silly things. Nobody wants to win/lose a match by holding one if these and waiting for the countdown.
About tatsubj's thing with tech. I politely disagree. Tech enhances choice. Choice leads to strategic decisions. Do I build more units or do I make my units stronger? Do I build stronger turrets, or do I unlock the "reveal" global ability? The only case where tech does not enhance strategy is if players do not have to make hard choices. The draconian measure would be to make techs exclusive. A less draconian measure would be to make researching expensive. Right now you can research without making a dent in your economy.
Turinium offers a second victory condition, a natural fight for control of a highly valued resource, a reason to expand quickly. It also ends games prematurely and creates "lanes" and "hot zones" where battles are more likely to occur. It's to the point where Turinium is more important than domination. I guess that fits the lore. Is it fun? It seems to be a major shift in RTS objective gameplay. Now it's not about destorying the enemy, it's about controlling key map regions.
We are going to have a setup option to disable Victory points.
Deciding what you do with your finite resources is a key part of any strategy game.
Broadly speaking, we want to encourage players to have to make the choice between instant gratification (I have the stuff now, let's build it) and having to invest it for later rewards. Techs and buildings for unlocking special abilities are key to that second strategy.
We don't want the game to turn into who can set up the most factories and best automation master to stream endless units to the front with a slow, predictable build up to ever bigger, more powerful units.
There is no "optimal" way. The best way to win will vary by opponent and map.
i think its a given that there are infinitely poor strategies. At the same time, there is no single perfect strategy either. it depends on what your opponent is doing and what map they're playing on.
Some players will play greesy and try to capture as much as they can right away but at the cost of being spread thin. Other players will capture and fortify. so e players will try to spam out lots of units early. Others will invest in teaching up fast.
As for design, it is important to look at many different games. faf is one game. Company of heroes, starcraft, kohan, TA, etc. all have brought a lot of richness to the genre.
I have fond memories of my old Herzog Zwei Genesis game....any similarities ?
Tat, seriously dude, you need to get a grip on your FAF thing.
Also, there is not a "best" way to play Starcraft. As a high diamond player, I think I have some insight into this as well.
Clearly, Starcraft isn't dominating our thinking. But Ashes won't be a FAF clone.
We have decades of RTSs to look at and consider them all. FAF is one of many things we're looking at.
Over the months, we'll no doubt make many design choices that we'll have to rollback. 1.0 games are tough.
Just picking up on one or two points here, I think victory points are a bad idea, and agree that it should definitely be an option. Also the current capture territory, based on resource extraction points is not suited to this type of game, it adds nothing to it. Fighting over resources does... IMHO. Unit cap is a tricky one two, the logistics buildings are interesting, building more allows more units, so adds some strategy to the game as a player could target logistics to limit enemy units.
I'd definitely like to see a game setup options menu, where players could disable certain units or games enders, like "no nukes" and "no artillery units"
I'd also like to see super (experimental) units and shield generators, these are so much fun.
i'm also not sure that grouping the smaller units is sets of 3 is a good idea, why not just single units and let the player decide how many to group?
Love the idea of Turinium being a super resource, to accelerate built times, it would indeed create conflict points on the map.
I'd also like to see less symmetry in the maps, may have a go of the map designer on that front. If the landscape could somehow be brought into the mix of the strategy too!
Lastly,are there to be more in the way of base defenses? One of the great things abut SC and later FAF was the vast number of units, including the classic experimental both mobile and static.
anyway, some fab ideas in here and such a promising game, so looking forwards to the finished product, plus its great that we, the community, have an input to the game as it develops!
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