Some background about me: been playing RTS games for 15 years, starting with Starcraft 1, Age of Empires 2, all the C&Cs, SupCom, Sins of a Solar Empire, Grey Goo. Reached Master level at SC2 on the NA ladder.
So far just played 2 games, beat the easy computer. These are my impressions so far - mainly negative things, but what I don't mention you can assume I like
- Don't like the "Empire Tree" anymore than in SoaSE. Just a wall of icons, gives me no useful information. Don't know where all those units are, how they're grouped, clicking on icons there just takes me to random spots on the map, it's pointless. And if I make numbered groups it doesn't help me to see them in the tree. Does anyone actually use this?
- I was expecting to be able to zoom out much more than this. Kinda frustrating to be able to see about half of the map but not the whole thing, and still rely on the minimap.
- Based on SupCom experience and the presence of engineers I was expecting to be able to tell an engineer to support another engineer, I hope this is in the plans. No icon for idle engineers. Unit response feels disconnected from orders.
- Units are exceptionally boring. Even worse than SoaSE so far. They all float above the ground with the same lame thrusters, they all look the same, they have no fun selection sounds or apparent personality, they all shoot the same boring lasers and missiles, they have no abilities. They don't seem very microable, responding slowly to orders, with significant acceleration/deceleration, turning radii... I don't mind some units being slow, but they all feel slow and controlling your army feels sluggish. Not saying this should be like SC2, but perhaps SoaSE is not a good point of reference as far as unit control. Even the basic units in Supreme Commander (which were criticized for looking bland) were more interesting, and SupCom had some really cool T3 and of course experimental units, and many T1 units had interesting micro despite the game being very macro and strategy oriented. Early game is boring if there's nothing interesting to do with the early units. It feels like the game designers decided nothing could be more interesting than a-moving a bunch of slow, unresponsive floating units all the time. I hope more variety and distinctiveness is added.
Perhaps this is in part due to the user interface being very rough around the edges too, and units would feel more responsive with better UI. I am not sure, but I am definitely not excited by the unit design so far.
- Upgrades are, well, as generic as could be. Increased damage for all units. Increased health for all units. Could hardly feel more like an excel spreadsheet rather than anything concrete, sci-fi. I don't know, "advanced lasers", "titanium hulls", that's some unoriginal names but at least it sounds like actual stuff rather than just incrementing a number the engine uses?
- Maps feel small and cramped, with corridors everywhere. I dunno, maybe I'm spoiled from SupCom but based on early descriptions of the game (thousands of units!) I was expecting a correspondingly large and open battlefield. Artillery units don't shoot very far for artillery units, perhaps because maps are too small. Would like to see large maps and really long-range artillery.
Anyway, there are some interesting ideas in there, like static defenses being actually good and useful, making map control really central and scattering resources everywhere.
I agree with much of what you said.
I do NOT like how every map is basically corridors and ''lanes''. I feel like I am playing a MOBA in that I am constantly streaming units in a single direction under a pre-determined path.Supreme Commander, so far, has done far better in their sandbox appeal. The Wide open maps, not forcing players to fight a certain way like Ashes (control nodes- which I do not like in their current form) the tech tree is much better, and you feel a true progression from TIER I to III.I do not like the short combat range in this game, almost all battles are just two blobs fighting it out from a very short distance away. It's absurd. Supreme Commander had long range engagements, which in itself forced players to not turtle, but even the artillery units in this game have pathetic range. I know they do not want to make a Supcom 3 or whatever - but, please take some notes on things that players LOVE about those games...if anything how the battles feel and 'flow'. Battles in supcom have character, battles in Ashes do not. Maybe it is the unit models as well, they are fairly bland and un-charismatic currently.
I want to focus on the unit part of the game.It is VERY important for a game like this to have simple units. You must be able to look at armies and instantly being able to see their strength, weaknesses etc. - For that part a different look for different units is useful. Micro destroys the ability to see strength and weaknesses in armies, because suddenly how fast your opponent can click will have a huge outcome of the fight. I dont think this is wanted in a macro game.
- Yes, slow armies and army control and long fights are going to be the essence for Ashes, because this is a grand strategy game, you need time to analyze the situation, and make decisions far in advance. When you lose some spots on the map because you didnt realize how important a fight was, then you shouldnt be able to get units there quickly. Maybe a closer look at games of the total war series is good here. The time the unit needs from A to B has a huge impact, because now it will maybe twice as long for said unit to get to C, if needet there. I think Ashes aims for something like that, just on a bigger scale. (Armies go from A to B etc. etc.)
- This game is inspired by SupCom and soase. It tries not to be one of it. This game writes down its own rules. You cant imagine how much planetary annihilation got destroyed by people who wanted this game to be more like SupCom. From a fun game in the alpha to a desaster in release. This shall not happen to this game.
- i repeat, simplicity is Key. Its not always "more is more" - you need to be able to make quick long term strategies with huge armies, and wanting non-generic upgrades is a huge turnoff. What do you want instead of "+25% dmg"? "Archer now shoots a second missle at every second attack"?Think big.
Of course sometimes it is a fun experience to take a closer look at details - but having many complex units will add little to this game.However, i support a bigger pool of capital ships. Since they are the core of most armies, they could get a bigger role - with more support capital ships, armies will have different strategy by having a different combination of capital ships. (For example a capital ship that is actually quiet fast but rather weak for a capital ship, but gives a 30% speed bonus to units around it) - with something like that armies can be customized to fit a specific role, without complicating tech trees or weird t1 / t2 units. Your opponent can scout the capitalships and know what you are focusing on, and since capital ships are huge he doesnt have to guess what upgrades you made and what not, because your capital ships clearly shows him the strength and probably weakness of an army, if he scouts. Games like chess or Igo take their complexity from their simple form. Nothing is stuck in those games - it gives you a lot more freedom.
I use the tree to evaluate the power of my battle groups. I have to keep track in my head where the control groups are because I haven't yet formed the habit of hitting Space. I also use it to help form battle groups, since there's not really a more convienient method to group up stragglers. I'm sure familiarization with the icons would help with group composition and reinforcement decisions. It's less valuable compared to Sins because you can't compare your force to the enemy force.
As for the rest of your post, no comment. Some of these things are design decisions, and some are just not yet implemented.
I agree with the above posts I played a couple games.
Although the units are slow. The main problems I am finding grouping units and controlling them. I notice the units have problem moving through the terrain map does not seem fluid and they getting stuck. I also find units do not respond to orders from time to time.
In addition their is no unit information describing what units do and its research hierarchy before selecting the unit or research.
I also find zooming out does not zoom out so you can see the entire map and have to resort to mini map and select the area to view.
I also notice their seems to be no support for multi monitor support as sometime the game switches from one screen to another and occasionally crashes out. For example if I choose 1920x1050 I defaults to my centre monitor when not in full screen mode then when I am intense battle selecting grouped units it changes to my left hand monitor or crashes out of game. however game works fine when in full 5760x1050
Hi and ty for your feedback DrAsik.
Some aspects you mention are known, and will be solved .
The speed of the units and personality is something that is on the table.
In this Early Access Feedback and testing are critical for game development. literating trying out new ideas and we need players to help through that process in order to deliver the best game possible at release.
On Ashes of the Singularity Part of the benefit of Early Access is giving players the opportunity to develop the kind of game they’d like to see.
Ashes of the Singularity is not a finished game. It is buggy. It is incomplete.
The intention at this point is purely to be playable and receive critical ideas and good feedback for we all work together.
Agree with your points on unit artwork, map design and research. On maps, I'm going to assume that the final version will have more variety of maps that do not have corridors and are flatter. I'm personally fine with the slow speed - it was a bit odd when I first started playing, but on larger maps with multiple engagements I find the slower speed better.
About research, I think one way to solve the current issue of the generic upgrades is to have research upgrades that only target certain units. So one upgrade could increase rocket damage. Maybe another increases beam weapon damage. And maybe another increases damage of defensive structures. This will help make upgrade choice a strategic decision about which type of units to focus on, instead of the current generic upgrades.
Good feedback. Though most of it has been stated before it can help the developers see how many have a common view.
I love the idea of naming the research, much better immersion. The only problem is that apparently there is no limit to it so potentially you could improve your attack or defence etc. 100 times and still have no end in sight. To get around this I suppose they could have, say 10 different names and for each name have 10 levels. Like, "hey i just hit level 10 Titanium Hulls!", "that's nothing man, I'm on Super Diamond Hardened Quantum Steel Hull level 5 ".
Eventually when you have run out of names the level would just keep going up on the last one. Going past a 100 upgrade in one area seems impossible at this point but in the future with larger maps it could be possible I suppose.
I like the idea of more different Dreadnoughts too, like the one mentioned by OoohShiny. I did not actually like Sins and while I forget the main reasons I remember thinking they did not have enough of the Titans (or biggest ships if that is not what they are called). I think that game also felt a bit thin/shallow to me too, but I forget.
About unit simplicity: agree they should be simple, disagree that micro shouldn't have a place, disagree that it makes the game harder to understand. What makes the game hard to understand are non-visual abstract bonuses like +25% damage. An extra attack, blue lasers, longer range, faster speed, forcefields, those are things you see on the battlefield and immediately grasp their tactical importance. StarCraft 2 is a good example, but of course that requires more thought than generic bonuses.
Immersion: thanks for naming the idea I had in mind, that's exactly it. If there's one SupCom does right it's immersion. It feels like a serious, accurate simulation of an actual battlefield with varied, fascinating units. I spent a lot of time playing it just to play with the units and watching them behave. How the Monkeylord's microwave laser works as soon as it's out of water, letting the unit shoot its underwater torpedoes at the same time... How a T1 unit like the Mantis had superior agility with its 4 legs, could effectively surround and harass, but also support engineers.
Yeah you are indeed right that upgrades need to be visually visible. I just meant that upgrads need to be universal - too specific upgrades would become meaningless, like "archer deal 20% more dmg against capital ships, when the capital ship has no friendly unit around it" - well thats a bit over-the-top, but you guys get what im aiming at
are you absolutely certain you don't mean 1080 not 1050????
Should have read 1080 not 1050 wasn't wearing glasses lol
Agreed on all points!
Especially the fact that there is no tech tree makes scouting pointless. Just have your factory pump out a balanced mix of all units and hit repeat.
The likening to a MOBA is quite accurate. Except there is no interesting hero to micro manage.
Great discussion!
I'll try to respond to other posts when there's time. I'll start with the original:
ome background about me: been playing RTS games for 15 years, starting with Starcraft 1, Age of Empires 2, all the C&Cs, SupCom, Sins of a Solar Empire, Grey Goo. Reached Master level at SC2 on the NA ladder.
Good background. I'm still stuck in Diamond.
The primary purpose of the Empire tree is to allow players to get an idea of how powerful their control groups remain and whether they are engaged in combat and their general health. Ideally, we'd like to display what known oppponents are up against them. It is assumed players will create control groups (Ctrl #) which perhaps we should integrated into the UI more clearly since it's so crucial.
You can't zoom out in any of the other games you mentioned other than StarCraft. While we are looking at letting players zoom out further, our big concern there is that players will expect units to move faster. Once we have the heat maps in for friendly units, we'll start experimenting with further zoom outs.
Idle engineers will be in the next udpate. You will be able to order an engineer to support other engineers. Just not in yet.
There are no plans to add additional units before release. The visuals will change substantially between now and release. The units behave quite differently from one another. I think most games, when players first get into them, can have the same challenge. The Starcraft beta was similar "The Zerg are all just bugs that act the same", SupCom went through the same criticisms and Grey Goo certainly had that criticism. Each game has its own take on what matters and doesn't matter for unit disinctiveness.
Fair enough.
This is fair. But since the system is supposed to provide infinite upgrades, there's an obvoius limit. I think this is a good idea though that we should pursue.
The next batch of maps will be more open. There's one actually called "Open Range" coming out that should give a better view of open maps.
Thanks for the feedback.
I like the infinite research levels in concept. For generic boosts its makes sense (logistics, resource capacity, speed, health, damage). I would like for it to be easy and obvious to see what level me and my opponents have invested in them. But as others have said, with different wording, if you only have generic boost research, that's a little meh, strategy-wise. So I also recommend more varied research that is not necessarily infinitely upgradeable. Visual assets for quick identifiaction would be ideal, but since you may not have the money to make those assets you might consider adding them to your strategic icon design, whatever that may be.
The Civilization series is a good example of infinite research yet most techs are unique. When you reach the last tech you just repeat it over and over ("Future research" or something).
This is a good discussion and I appreciate Frogboy answering our questions and concerns, also our ideas!1. I am curious to why we need a infinite upgrade system? I can understand that you wish for the player to feel constant progression through the game by upgrading his units - but, my only fear is after awhile it becomes repetitive and in a way a nuisance? I would prefer there to be a finite upgrade list, maybe up to tier V - but, you make the upgrades far more expensive and more substantial in health/weapon damage. That way a player can just look at the enemy team's units and see what upgrade level the enemies units are at. For example: * Click on enemy Brute unit* " Enemy Brute. Weapons: II Health: IV" Something like that, an easy way for a person to quickly understand how far ahead he or the enemy is in comparison to one another.2. I do like that we can zoom at a good bit, but I am also of the older crowd that's use to Supreme Commander's map. I think the primary thing that player's like about it is that player's can easily distinguish what is going on immediately. On the current size maps the zoom out mechanism may be okay, but what about once Huge or Epic size maps are in? You'll have to be panning around the map to get half an idea of what's going on. If some sort of system can be implemented that allows players to easily tell what's going on anywhere, then that is good. Maybe if a player is getting attacked around a particular node on the map it will flash on the mini-map? 3. I am glad to hear that there will be more "open" maps coming! I also appreciate the large open field maps, with some jagged mountains and some water there. Not every map needs to be funnels and corridors I believe. Open maps provide players with more of a sandbox feel, we can actually flank and maneuver and utilize our entire forces. Currently units just ''mesh'' into giant blobs when fighting, there is no real flow to the battle; and because of the map designs you'll have units blobbed up and it looks like a train. In any case, bigger and more open maps are my favorite.
I fear infinite upgrades will lead to situations where the teams just spend all their upgrades on damage/health in a neverending race. At some point it's more interesting to reach a cap, and then spend your tech resources in more interesting ways.
I remember playing some custom Starcraft maps with infinite upgrades, and it was always a chore to keep up with that one opponent who had 15 attack power upgrades.
Stat tweak upgrades should be used sparingly IMO. They're of course cheap to implement, but they make it harder to grasp the ratio of forces at a glance. In Starcraft 2, a hydralisk loses to a battlecruiser. If you could have 100 dps hydras with 50 times the HP after enough stat tweak upgrades, now a hydralisk beats a battlecruiser; that would make the game very confusing. If you have to click on units to see their current stats and run some math in your head I don't think that's fun.
SupCom has this concept of unit tiers where each tier essentially obsoletes the previous one, that leads to lots of units going unused after a while but it sure is fun to use and watch.
I think comparing sc2 (a game people loved for its visual distinctiveness) to sup com (a game that some might claim lacked visual distinctiveness) on the same level seems odd to me, when sc2 clearly does better in that regard. It's not just different, more people enjoyed that aspect of the game. I think that by having units look samey (even if they make good gameplay distinctions) just makes it harder for people that aren't hardcore rts players to really get into and enjoy the game.
1) i dont think Ashes aims for casual player, and even if it would, it probably wouldnt work. SupCom and SC2 were not appealing to casuals.
2) in the DOes and DONTs list it is especially said that people should avoid to comparing Ashes to SupCom and SC2, because it is its own game. Taking what is good might be a good idea, you know, getting some inspiration, but...
3) the size of the game doesnt really allow for easy viewable visual distinction when upgradet. It might be nice (Like, dunno, the units start with reddish laser, and the laser gets more blue the more dmg upgrades one did), but something like "Archer gets a second missle launcher on its back" will just go down as detailish, at least i dont want slowscroll my opponents army n check his units.
4) It would make more sense that i can personally just see which upgrades my opponent did. Like for example: We have 5 upgrades: Dmg, armor, speed, Special (the power of special abilities) and Eco (an upgrade that gives a small boost to metal n radioactive produce)
I would see it like this:Dmg: 3 (7)
armor: 1 (7)
speed: 12 (2)
Special: 0 (10)
Eco: 10 (4)
The normal numbers show my upgradelevel, and the numbers in the ( ) show the upgradelevel of my opponent.
The main difference is though, that sc2 LOOKED appealing to casuals. It sold MANY copies to many players that weren't hardcore sc fans. It's failure to keep the casual crowd invested in the game was entirely because of poor decisions made by the devs.
I like both ideas. There could be games where a cap could make things more interesting. Even games like Sup Com allow a "cap" of sorts since you can play with no experimentals or remove all but Tier 1 units from the game. Perhaps the upgrade can be a gameplay setting, with infinite as the default. Then people who want to cap it can do so at 3 or 5 or what have you.
I haven't played much AotS yet but I was under the impression that the dreadnought units, with their very long build times and limited resources on the map, were essentially complementary to the early factory units rather than a technological upgrade over them. In any case, with infinite upgrades, basic factory units could easily become more powerful than opposing dreadnoughts.
Indeed.
In SupCom, broadly speaking, each tier was designed to replace the previous tier. Part of the fun of the game was that race aspect. Can you get to the tier 3 units faster than your opponent?
This was a bit different than TA where the Flash tank and Samson complemented their tier 2 units.
Ashes is more like TA in this respect. You are expected to build Brutes and Archers throughout the game.
Yeh, units get stuck in the terrain. It becomes really annoying.
It is hard to group them as well.
They seem to have a mind of their own.
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