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[1v0ry_k1ng]

most of the testing occouring at the moment is exclusively reb v reb because games are fast, furious and easily ended. bases can be over-run at any point in the game, whilst easily snipable rebel com means that one screw up is rewarded with a beating. the reb v reb game is unquestionably ace and generally all I want to play.

this is because, unfortunately, imps are not nearly as fun to fight as or against; games with one or more imperial players are invariably much longer, often reaching high techs even in small map 1v1s and taking a long time to finish. there is no base raiding vs an imp player- it is all out attacks or nothing. there is far less possbility of bypassing the frontlines with transports and wreaking havoc on the base, or an early bomber rush, or early gunships, or sneaking round the back with espos or any of these fun stratergies?

why?

The Royal Gaurd

I estimate the value of a Royal gaurd to be about 160 metal. They can individually beat 2-3 fleet troopers in a sterile test, but in practice 6 of them can shoot down many attacks from out of range of retaliation. their range is usually enough to cover most the imperial base, and they can snipe from behind buildings, at great distance, no worries. I estimate you need approx 16 fleet troopers to overcome the gaurd, not considering any other units being in the base, coming out off factories, or firepower wasted when units errantly target the com or other buildings instead.

The royal gaurd can also shoot down aircraft with ease. speeder bikes, v-wings, even bombers take heavy damage from their weapons, which makes a few early aircraft ineffective against an imperial base (where they would rightly decimate the undefended rebel base or com.

The effect of this is to make the imperial base a no-go zone until you have a huge army, and when you do attack the imperial base it must be in overwelming force or it is liable to fail. this isnt a fun mechanic. it means games that have tipped beyond salvage for the imp player (that would end instantly vs rebs) last maybe 5-10 minutes longer as the opponent has to amass forces sufficent to make the penetration.

so, problem:

Imp HQ has approx 960m of defence that can target air and ground in a fair radius. this makes the imperial base impossible to raid and makes games last a long time, as well as making bombers, v-wings etc much less useful vs bases. killing them is meaningless because they respawn for free.

suggested solution:

Make the imperial gaurd cost metal.

So, the imperial HQ has an icon for building royal gaurd. They cost a good discount of their true value- maybe 75m each. When you press the icon you instantly lose 75m and a royal gaurd is called down. the icon is greyed out when you have insufficent metal. you can call down a maximum of 6 at any given time.

This would be good because then the rebels have incentive to raid. if the imps dont make any gaurds, rebels raid and the imp player is tempted to shell out on gaurds- then the rebel player can push elsewhere on the map. If the imp gaurds are killed, they cost metal to replace.

I would also make their weapons no longer target dedicated VTOL because it looks wrong

[1v0ry_k1ng]

if the above sounds like alot of effort (although it would be ace), how about lowering the number you get with unupgraded hq, stopping them from targetting dedicated VTOLS and lowering their hitpoints?

[Warlord Zsinj]

The above could work; certainly lowering their effectiveness against VTOL's will be included in the next version.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

It might be a good idea to remove the energy costs for upgrading the imperial HQ

since the player is already losing the considerable energy production from HQ while it morphs (+110), the addition of a further morphing cost makes the upgrades disproportionately energy intensive. imp hq upgrades are somthing of a noobtrap since players assume they will be viable early game; they are not. this limits the use of these in most games. fluff wise, I should think the 110e the HQ generates would be probably sufficent for it to upgrade itself without outside help. this could also lead to alternate imperial builds since it would be morphable early on without penalty- early porc, HQ bax build etc

the mcost/bt of these upgrades might need adjusting accordingly in later builds, ofc

we got an eta on next version?

[Warlord Zsinj]

apologies for the slow responses, settling in to life here in delft. I'm going on a site visit to hamburg over the weekend, but will be back in town after that.

I wouldn't mind seeing imp comm upgrades being more viable, as they seem to only be occasionally used - however, I don't really think that noobs will figure that upgrading a commander is a viable early game strat - no more than upgrading a town centre in any of the AOK games might've been, for example (obviously there are issues of stored resources, etc, but I don't think it is a big trap)

If things just keep getting crazier instead of calming down, I intend to delegate some of the balancing work so that I can concentrate on the final pack balance.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

I don't really think that noobs will figure that upgrading a commander is a viable early game strat - no more than upgrading a town centre in any of the AOK games might've been, for example (obviously there are issues of stored resources, etc, but I don't think it is a big trap)

erm, well

the first time I built it, thinking the ecost would be modest/similar to rebels I only had a few solars. economy froze up, flags stopped making metal and I lost twenty seconds or so

first time pintle built it he bawwed and we had to restart

iirc maackey did somthing similar

also fairly sure overkill did this

there is no indication that building it is going to set you back over -150e/tick, which means most players do a huge fail the first time they try it out. not game breaking since thereon you know not to use it early game, but there is no reason for it to be so expensive.