More variety in Tech 3 units
CydeWeys and I have been thinking about this for some time, and have alluded to it in several posts, but I think it is about time we just came out and said it. SupCom could really use some more variety in the Tech III unit selection, especially in the units produced by the land factory. Right now, there is only the t3 engineer, siege bot, and t3 mobile artillery. Because there are so few units to choose from, late game army composition is boring and over-simplistic. In fact, it is currently viable and in many cases advantageous to build nothing but siege bots once your land factories hit Tech III.
As it stands, siege bots fulfill too many roles. They fire accurately, quickly, and do a lot of damage. They also move very quickly and have a great many hitpoints. Instead of this all-purpose t3 unit, there should be several different units. There could be a relatively fast and hard hitting t3 attack bot, but with fewer hitpoints. A super heavy tank could be introduced. It would be slow moving, hard to kill, and devastating against slow or stationary targets. Of course, to protect this unit from being swarmed, a t3 unit tailored to take down fast targets could be introduced.
In addition to ground to ground combat units, there should be some sort of t3 mobile AA. It shouldn’t be as powerful as the t3 stationary SAM site, but could still be very useful. A more powerful / larger radius shield or stealth generator would also be nice. In addition to these relatively obvious ideas, there are a wealth of other possibilities. How about a rocket bot that fires salvos of many rockets at once, but only very infrequently (maybe once every 10 seconds)? A mobile missile defense system would also be a worthwhile investment in many situations.
These few ideas only scratch the surface of what is possible. In time, I hope there will be modded in a wealth of advanced units, similar to the selection that is available in Total Annihilation. With a variety of different units, there would be a variety of tactics employed in late game battles, and the focus might be shifted away from overpowering experimental units and hundreds of siege bots to diverse, balanced armies.
March 26th, 2007 at 5:00 am
The problem with most of us old TA’ers is that our memories are failing. The TA we remember so fondly was actually the product of an expansion pack, tons of 3rd party and post-release content, and a whole lot of time. Give Supreme Commander time and I think it will become as great as you want it to be.
March 26th, 2007 at 8:27 am
So basically you want the TA selection and variety back? :D
Yes, having several hundred units to choose from was pretty awesome and I hope eventually someone does a faithful recreation of TA in SupCom’s engine.
That said, as far as what to add to Tier3: Why not make things more diverse among the races for starters. Give the Cybrans (the supposedly mechanical computer type race) the current selection of a very useful if generic Siege Bot and the Arty bot. Give the UEF different T3 units and the Aeon different T3 units. Maybe the Aeon units can focus on hover tech and stealth and the UEF can focus on speed and shields.
Cybran: Stronger, slower (like Core from TA)
UEF: Faster, shielded (like Arm from TA)
Aeon: Hover, stealth
That will require a bit more time to balance, but hey they’ve had several years and the best they can come up with are nearly identical T3 units? COME ON NOW. lol.
March 26th, 2007 at 11:03 am
The main problem isnt that there is very few t3 units to chose from. The main problem is that t1 and t2 become obsolete when t3 starts fighting. Hopefully the next patch will see this fixed :)