Commander Powers

Most RTS games I've played give points to the player who uses them to obtain powers and abilities.

I was recalling times where the game would be overly stacked and the one side would end defending for the whole time without a chance of winning. Despite how glorious it might seem, to fight to death without a chance of winning, it does provoke negative feelings to some players who later just want to the game to end. So I was thinking how it would be possible to help the winning team, win faster and if there is indeed a chance for the losing team, to counter attack and win faster. For the latter case, I would like to provide an example of how a counter attack would be feasible. Well, it's quite simple, if the kill per death ratio and the resources are in favour of the losing team, there is a time, under normal circumstances, for the losers to turn the tide. While we have all seen this happen, there are time when Empires balance just ruins it. In reality I am addressing to the issue of unskilled squads and teams with nuke heavies winning teams of vets that joined to counter stack and many other situations like this. In an attempt to give justice for the kewl team I make this suggestion. If the winning team deserves to win then it will faster with Commander Powers. If it doesn't The Losing Team Strikes Back.

Commander Powers. If you have played the following titles: Battle For The Middle Earth, Command and Conquer Generals and I suppose Tiberium series (Haven't played it) you know what I mean.

I don't know how it should be. Maybe there could be Power trees so that one would be able to focus on offensive powers, defensive, support or I don't know what else.

Some powers could reach their maximum effectiveness only when all tiers are purchased. Each could require different amounts of points depending on level. Numbers in parenthesis below indicate how many tiers a power has.

Some ideas are Artillery Barrage(3), Field Repairs(3) for buildings and structures, Magic small defensive bunker that spawns out of the ground, Mine Field, Many types of bombs like EMP Cluster, Bombs, HIT whatever fits best and does not ruin the innocent feelings of warfare in Empires. There could be Powers that increase a skill of infantry permanently, like give them 10 extra points; powers like these would not have a cooling time of course. I think it's obvious what powers would need a cooling time.

Finally, I though Commander Points would be all the points that have been gained through commanding by every player. Perhaps you can think of something better.

While I like the idea of Commander Powers very much, I don't know if Empires needs it, how it would really affect it or if it can even be implemented. Commander Powers are not required feature in RTS games. Two examples are Age of Empires and Total Annihilation which are both some top quality, classic RTS
games.

 

The problem with commander powers in an FPS/RTS is that they could very easily be over powered, making the game even more dependent on the experience of the commander.

I believe strongly that the RTS element needs more functionality to be interesting & that the commander needs more battlefield presence but they need to be passive. Commander powers could be a part of that but I dont like the idea of offensive point-click abilities. I think everything should fall into the existing commander framework...

Currently the Commander role can be broken down into 3 basic parts:

1. Planning, Situational Awareness, Communication & Orchestration (Research, Move orders, scan for targets)
2. Infrastructure (Building placement)
3. Support (forward placement of armories, turrets, walls)

I think that all 3 parts are weak at the moment. The most powerful tool the commander has is their microphone.

The commander should at no point have the power to do anything directly that a single player could not achieve.
There are a number of things however that could be implemented from other RTS, to add depth and from better bonds between the players, the commander and the battlefield environment...

Area buffs for troops
Supply drops
Promote players to "Hero units" for a cost
Recon scans of areas to reveal fog of war

Those are the kinds of thing that would improve the mechanic of the commander role and make it more interesting to play.
Another idea I like would be to give the commander a quad copter drone that can passively assist on the battlefield (perhaps by providing a mobile engineer camera function)

If AI were available then that would be a game changer and could completely change the complexion of the game.

TL;DR - Give the commander more Tools but not Powers that can kill.

 

In another way, Commander powers should enhance abilities of the team, rather than bypassing the team.
It would be much more interesting to see powers that have to go "through" the team, to be effective.
...In my opinion.

...also, dont see how anyone could vote "no" here

 

How about commander powers that require the team?

Air Bombing Run:
Commander hits a button and the bombing run takes X rez and counts up to ready status. Hit the button again and select your scunt to give him the bombing run lazor ability with his binox. The Scunt needs to laser a target area for a few seconds.

Overcharge:
Takes X rez once selected, choose your engy and for X seconds his calc runs at max efficiency and can not run out of juice. No in between use timer. (Extra Cookies for extra welding bolts and shit to let others know he is juiced up)

Care Package:
Crate drops that last 1/4 standard ammo crate time can be para-dropped in. A double sided crate that has Health one side and Ammo the other.

Little Helper:
Selected unit Tank or otherwise generates ammo for x seconds at X rate for selected weapons. (Thinking 5 bullets a second while rpg/cannon/missile every 3 seconds. except nuke 1 nuke for the whole thing)

 

Yes but, you can drop a care package behind a wall the enemy may be near. While an armory can only be dropped without enemy near and it can be destroyed before its even built up.

 

True and to be fair a decent infantry square can already decimate if they have a couple of hood engineers. Trouble is balancing against skill is s sucky way to go about things. Would maybe be good if the comm could dispatch builder bots or just have a build aura or something. Works in ns2 pretty well

 

Reminds me to play it more often. Haven't played it in a few months.