why does this community hate defensive suggestions

i enjoy turteling in rts, but im really after just variation in the defences in this game

 

I think setting a team limit of 1 superwallturret wouldn't allow turtling but would add a strategic dimension

 

Quick! Build a vacuum imploder so that we can megaraep their comm!

 

The usual problem with making turtling viable is that it can result in trench warefare. I setup defenses over here, you setup defenses over there, and neither side wants to attack since they will probably fail to take the trench or take serious losses. Even if they do take the enemy trenches, the enemy probably has another layer just behind that they fall back to making territory acquisition slow, annoying, and painful.

Granted, It would be a welcome thing to see decent defensive structures (bunker, tank blockers from WW2, etc.), but allowing turtling strats to be a viable strat can slow down and create ugly tech ASAP to arty stalemates. So, most RTS games have since tried interesting ideas to get players to play aggressively.

Since Empires uses the resource capture point system, there is already a strong incentive to go out and claim territory. However, many maps can lend themselves to cap the 50% chokepoint and wall up, which can become extremely boring. FPS players tend to prefer dynamic battle lines instead of stagnant hold the walls gameplay in my experience. Granted, if stranger boundaries can be formed, you get a much more secure sense of territory control, which is rewarding in its own right, but only if you're a RTS player.

 

Turtling is bad, but right now there's no fun way to defend against overwhelming odds.

 

What makes you think defending against "overwhelming odds" is a good game design principle?

In my opinion, if the enemy is overpowering you sufficiently, no defensive brilliance should be able to save you. The only reason to have effective defensive structures is to potentially stave off a rush or to help cushion the defender, giving them a chance to recover.

See Sunken Colonies and Bunkers in StarCraft. They're very efficient at holding off a small Zergling rush, thus putting you ahead of your opponent since they spent all that res to rush you early and didn't develop their economy. However, get enough lings and no amount of Sunkens nor Bunkers will save you. In fact, after a point building more Sunkens hinders your own development.

 

That's not true, i once held off an entire army in StarCraft using just photon cannons, a lot of them sure, but it was well worth it.
I think that tank traps would be extremely useful. Seeing as they slow down vehicle movement, are hard to hit with artillery, since it's not just gonna be a few, and let a lot of infantry through. Not good cover either, so it's not too defensive, but it gives you a nice buffer from tanks. It really just lets you set up an offensive, which is what we're going for.

 

I would not mind a bunker..

a 3hp/sec heal for anyone inside shooting out in a bunker upgrade, but be a bit of a bitch for enemys trying to enter the bunker as well, there will be a place at the bunker where you can put a mg turret and the way the bunker is, make it hard for you to kill it, unless you rocket snipe it.

The bunker will be the most strongest of buildings..lets say 50% of the health of the command vehicle.

But this building will be costly at about 1000-1500

Turteling is a bit of a thrill, just like people playing defensive games against monsters or whatever

 

I think we need a definition of turtling, because playing defensively is not the same as tutling;

Turtling to me is holding down in your bunker, farming turrets and creating masses of walls to hinder the enemy attack - right up until they're able to get arty and shell the shit out of you. You make no effort to try and expand or turn onto the offensive until you have "uber tech" or some kind of advantage - which is unlikely since the enemy control all the res except for maybe a few that your ninjas were able to destroy or the ultimately lame goal of ninja'ing the enemy CV.

Defensive play is more like a combination of tutling and offensive play, where you were forced into a fortified position (or multiple ones) but continue to hold/expand territory or have territory/res constantly changing hands - this could be due to a clear advantage on the enemy team and is usually for only a period in the game, unlike turtling.

And we already have tank traps - walls. Sure they don't look quite as cool as the typical D-day star blockades, but why make more models for something that already exists and works pretty fine?

As for a rienforced armour bunker, why do you think you have infantry? to clear out defenses. Artillery is only to soften targets up. (or that's how real world works.)

 

although i do agree with some skill you can put up something nice with walls i also believe they are not suited as well as proper tanktraps would be

walls should be there to stop infantry, tanktraps should be there to stop tanks

so with the introduction of tank traps i would suggest a (small) nerf of normal walls against vehicles, and a resistance of tank traps against tanks to create a strategic choice or double placement of certain defences

 

blah blah blah, theory craft, blah blah

the reason why everyone is anti turtling is because turtling wins exactly 0% of games. the fact is you need to attack to take res superiority which is what wins 50% of the games out there (the other 50% is NF overpoweredness). The only times turtling ever works is if it's a tickets map like valley and your opponent refuses to research artillery.

you have no idea how much it makes me rage to see fucking engineers building turrets and walls everywhere at a base. it's worse than a team full of scouts (especially since 2.23). GO GET SOME RES OR ATTACK SOMETHING, YOU FUCKING MORONS. you should just watch some of these guys in cyclopean, when they get to the city.

in theory turtling would work well only once your team has secured res superiority, but at that point there's no reason to turtle as you have the res advantage and can throw tanks at the enemy until they start breaking. Not only that but turtling 60% of a map is nigh impossible unless it's a choke point map.... and even then a turtle is probably going to be constantly losing ground.

Quite frankly adding more defensive structures would just be a bigger noob trap for the newer commanders, and would give newer players an even bigger incentive to sit around at base and do nothing while they admire all of the cleverly constructed fortifications which have wasted so much time.

IMO the game paradigm should give the attacker the advantage, always. this gives people the incentive to attack early and attack often, which keeps combat fast paced. If you design a game to give the defender the advantage, nobody will want to attack. boooring.

That said, I think in the early game now grens need as much help as they can get. Right now grens simply can't hold a position against LTs (or even AFVs). therefore, I am in favor of modifying the existing armory designs and adding some murderholes for people to shoot out of while recieving minimal return fire. I don't think you need a new building for it though.

 

When did your opponent wise up and get siege tanks? =]

The point is that at the end of the day, defensive structures shouldn't win you the game. They should be a viable option to help cushion you while you tech/macro, but holing up so well that the enemy runs out of res attacking you is a bad game design choice.

If you ignore the game theory, you get stupid balance.

I would disagree on the point about turtling being OK once you have 60% of the map. If anything, that should be when turtling is the hardest. We're still close to the equilbrium and there should be a dynamic struggle at that point. This is the benefit of a capture point res system, the more map you have, the more territory you have to defend (larger front line). However, as you gain a large enough advantage, that frontline shrinks (encircling the enemy's base) allowing you to exploit your advantage and end the game.

I agree with your generalization that games need to incentivize attacking. Otherwise we end up with trench warefare. However, including defensive structures as a buffer system is also a good idea.



In regards to people enjoying Alamo games (hole up and fight to the death), that's all good and well. However, I see no point in making defenses so powerful that the Alamo can drain the enemy's tickets and result in a victory. Sure it might be fun to fight against horrible odds, but at the end of the day they should still lose against those horrible odds.

 

Defence is most useful when you want to hold one flank to focus your efforts on another.

Right now you can't do that really, other than turret and wall spamming the whole place and having tanks sit there and shell things.

 

WALLS and ARMORIES

enjoy your annoying ass wall

 

I love Alamo games.

But... for it to be fun, you have to have a chance of winning. Otherwise people will just start to go spectator, or just start doing stupid random stuff because they know they can't win. And even if you manage to drag it on, the attackers will just get annoyed, because it's boring for them to know they're going to win but to have nothing happening anyway.

Defenders should be able to win or turn the game around, but they have to be able to do it in a reasonable timeframe, too.

 

that was possible, but that was removed, because nobody likes losing teams winning

 

Actually it was just that nobody liked one person ending the game for everyone.

 

Wise man said: all things in moderation. It isn't turtling if there are only a few. Set super low limits on the number of new fixtures the commander can place.

 

If you've forced the enemy team to Alamo (wall up inside start base, little to no res income), then you're winning. You deserve to win. However, we can let the Alamo people have their fun, but at the end of the day it's gotta end and in the attacking team's favor.

If you're worried about people quitting the game because they're gonna lose, setup a server rule or just live with it. It's like resigning in chess. You don't always have to checkmate to show you've won.


Natural Selection even has an auto-concede value. If enough of one team leaves the game, it awards victory to the other team. However, most servers say you can't F4 and leave, so we just hunker down with big guns and enjoy the defeat handed to us by the other team.

If Empires had a Ready Room, it would be easier to concede. Granted, it has the Observer team, but it's not quite the same. Obs still get to see the action. Ready Room you're outside and have to join the game to see the carnage.

 

You ever used gauss bastions on warzone 2100?