Posted: Tue Nov 18, 2014 8:01 pm Post subject:
[Discussion] Charge up/Power up SuperWeapon
Hello to everyone!
I want to discuss a feature for Ares with you. I talked about it with AlexB, but I was not sure, if it will be used so that I may request it for Ares x.x. I would like to see what you think about it.
So here it is:
A charge up SW (like the firestorm wall SW) but instead of just turning a wall to a working state (from power off to power on), it will power all buildings listed in the SW section.
For example:
If we take the Nod Stealth Generator and list it under the Charge UP SW, it will not cloak anything till the SW is activaded. Sort of like it is out of power and it will work only when the SW is activated.
You can think of using it for anything, I am sure that you guys will add much more useful examples than I did. Think of better base defence, super unit production, scanner building or speaker tower with attatch effect.
Joined: 05 Sep 2013 Location: LocationNotFoundException at RealLife.Location.find() at line: -1
Posted: Tue Nov 18, 2014 8:23 pm Post subject:
In my opinion it could help balance things like gap generators, if it had some option on how long the SW can be activated at a time, and how long it reloads when its depleted.
If it was active for a few frames and have some minutes reload, it could shroud the base only once by powering on gap generators, but making it scoutable until it recharges.
Also, if such a SW could work for vehicles as well, one could have special vehicles that can only be active for a certain period of time before needing to recharge(thinking mostly on a possible campaign mission, as it might have trouble in skirmish). QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Wed Nov 19, 2014 10:34 am Post subject:
So practically this would be an inverse TogglePower? Notsure if useful imo. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
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Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
=======================
WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
As RP said, for singleplayer/multiplayer missions, this can be achieved with map scripting (but even that has limits; you have very limited script control over a non-preplaced structure). For the generic battle, however, I can imagine this to be useful in a modder's arsenal.
Note though, I am not a modder, so I can't speak for the modders what they want.
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I am interpreting your idea as:
- A superweapon...
- ...that has a 'charge-up' and 'drain-down' like the Firestorm SW...
- ...but instead of being exclusive to (de-)activating Firestorm walls, it can be used to activate every instance of a specified building (or unit) belonging to the owner.
In other words, it sounds a bit like dehardcoding which buildings a Firestorm SW affects. Now, dehardcoding stuff almost always sound like good stuff.
You used the word 'power up'. I will use the word 'activate' (power is drawn but the structure cannot do anything, like it was EMPed/a sleeping Firestorm Wall). I have a reason for that - if power is not consumed from the very start, we can have a situation where activation brings low power, and cancel activation (which brings back the power and make activation possible again, repeating the cycle).
Discussion about charging/discharging is pretty moot since it is implemented already as UseChargeDrain=, but for the sake of discussion I'll use charging SWs. Can't really think that activating a set of buildings for less than a few frames would be useful. On the other hand... permanently activating buildings with an SW will be interesting.
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Features I can see in this that the current supply of superweapons cannot achieve may include:
- Simultaneous activation of several structures with a single click. Even structures half a map away. TogglePower requires several clicks, and if you already have that flexibility, why toggle off the power in the first place?
- Balance of certain structures by limiting their activity (rather than existence) in the field. Unlike SWs that spawn decaying structures, for your proposed SW the structure is always existent (and vulnerable) on map.
- Player can activate for 3 seconds (drain), rest for 4 seconds (recharge), and activate again for 5 seconds etc. Most other superweapons and self-firing AttachEffect will require waiting for the full cooldown time to fire the next round.
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Some foreseeable uses may include:
- Shield(IC)/EMP/Gap generator arrays.
- Base defense weapons (imagine super-long range artillery and missile strikes that can be active for, say, 20 seconds every 5 minutes. You can change targeting anytime during that 20 seconds. Changing targeting midstream is something few SWs can do. Granted, Particle Cannon does this in a way, but you can't really do Lightning Storm/Scud Storm/Artillery Barrage with the particle cannon 'unit'... or can you?)
- Structures with AttachEffects.
- Superweapon chains (SW1 allows SW2 in another building to charge... which then charges up SW3?)
- If this works with Ore Purifiers / Industrial Plants / Oil Derricks / Cloning Vats / other boosts, various short-term economic and production boosters may be available. ('And now I will call forth! My minions! Quit slacking for the past ten minutes and rush this Super Duper Crazy Tank design, pronto! *clicks SW to activate a special building to boost production speed by 500%, for up to 10 seconds at any one time*) or ('Oh, if I click this, it will cost me $2000 but everything will be free for 5 seconds!'). Decaying structure spawns can do the same thing, but what if you want that Fantastic Minions and Co. building to be an intergral (and permanent) part of your base, and not just a cheap-looking spawn that utterly destroys itself automatically and expose your empire to the menacing Minion Labour Union and confused commanders? (See Features, point 2)
- Good old Firestorm Walls (well...)
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Some foreseeable issues may include:
- Seperate 'activator' building may be required to house the SW (well, can the inactive building, being 'inactive', charge up its own SW?)
- Handling of factory queue when the factory is deactivated ('no! That Super Duper Crazy Tank was going to finish in 4 seconds! I haet this mod 1/10.').
- AI will not be able to handle it optimally, if at all. Don't count on the AI anyway.
- All instances of the same structure will be active/inactive at the same time, like a on-off switch, and nothing in between. Pairing this SW with TogglePower can help work around this.
- Might go bonkers or simply not work with structures which require constant supply of power to work (like YR Psychic Tower), depending on implementation.
- Might not work with certain structures (Ore Purifiers / Industrial Plants / Oil Derricks / Cloning Vats / features tied to existence rather than being powered/activated), depending on implementation.
- Activating 1 building probably drains the SW timer as much as activating 1000 buildings, unless the coder has accounted new code to scale that.
All lists are non-exhaustive.
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Conclusion:
I can see it as useful as an addition to the SW arsenal. It looks like a close sister to the Firestorm SW. I'll leave it to actual coders to implement it their way, if they want to implement it at all.
Well, further discussion is always welcome.
EDIT: Made the text more readable. _________________
AlexB wrote:
If this thread becomes the next FFA Insult thread, I'll just close it.
Firestorm is more than just buildings that are built like walls and turned on or off. I would not combine those things.
I like the idea of turning buildings on for a short duration, either by powering them up like the power toggle feature or by allowing them to target units for a while (while acting like EMPulseCannon=yes buildings when turned off), but I cannot currently estimate what it would take to support this. _________________ QUICK_EDIT
Joined: 22 Nov 2010 Location: Iszkaszentgyorgy, Hungary
Posted: Mon Dec 22, 2014 11:17 pm Post subject:
Maybe something like Advanced Rubble, it should be just two buildingtypes being changed back and forthy someway - that might be a way to implement this.
That would even be a finer control over the buildings anyway imo. _________________ "If you didn't get angry and mad and frustrated, that means you don't care about the end result, and are doing something wrong." - Greg Kroah-Hartman
=======================
Past C&C projects: Attacque Supérior (2010-2019); Valiant Shades (2019-2021)
=======================
WeiDU mods: Random Graion Tweaks | Graion's Soundsets
Maintainance: Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters! | BGEESpawn
Contributions: EE Fixpack | Enhanced Edition Trilogy | DSotSC (Trilogy) | UB_IWD | SotSC & a lot more... QUICK_EDIT
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[Discussion] Charge up/Power up SuperWeapon
