Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Ideas and suggestions for how to improve the Warzone 2100 base game only. Ideas for mods go in Mapping/Modding instead. Read sticky posts first!
BaBa
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by BaBa »

three words: Light Vehicle Transport :3
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by 3drts »

As I posted 2 years ago, I'd like vehicle transports that use constructed LZs.
The only acceptable move orders would be to another LZ, thus they would always fly in straight lines, and if spotted early, you could anticipate its flight path, and send fast hover AA to some point along its flight path, before it reaches the LZ.

This would be a vulnerability: easier to position AA to intercept the landings.
Now factor in the cost of 10 heavy tanks, vs 10 cyborgs...
Loosing one of these would be painful, and it would be limited/ balanced by the concept of it being a bad idea to "put all your eggs in one basket"
Vehicle transports would be a great way to quickly lose tanks - maybe you'd be better producing locally, or sending them by a slower land route...
I would make the vehicle transport have the same HP and armor as the Cyborg transport, but be slower (still faster than hover) - expanding a cargohold, and enlarging engines, shouldn't increase durability, especially if the transport chassis strains under its own weight+the weight of the tanks, and can't take as many G's as the smaller cyborg transport.


Another interesting idea, is if it doesn't matter who built the LZ- an enemy LZ would also function as a destination for the transport (ideally a single AA gun could tear up a transport before it lands) - this may require them to become an unowned terrain feature like the log cabins/trees once built (with high HP, or self repair?), so your transport doesn't drop units onto an enemy LZ, only to have the units destroy the LZ, such that the transport can't bring more re-enforcements.

Imagine a large map with a lot of space behind choke points/a defensive line (I'm thinking the map the great rift) - the enemy sets up some LZs behind his defensive line to be able to move tanks quickly - he is smart enough to put up AA guns near the LZ - you send in 2 vehicle transports, and a cyborg transport, the faster cyborg transport arrives first - as it can set down anywhere, it sets down outside the AA range, and 10 cyborgs disembark, and head straight for the LZ, they wipe out the AA guns, just before the Vehicle transports get within range.
You now have 20 heavy tanks past the main defensive line, ready to breach the final entrance to the base - your combined cyborg/tank assault has turned the enemies rapid reaction via an LZ network, into a nightmare.... (perhaps you took along some trucks to put AA up at the LZ *AND* anti-cyborg weapons).
The more mobile Cyborgs could be used to secure LZs so that tanks could be flown in.
Or you could just fly in 10 cyborg engineers, and try to set up an LZ quickly, then fly in the tanks...

Another possible limitation: each LZ can only be targetted/selected as a destination, by one transport as a time - so while you could have 10 cyb transports dump off a hundred cyborgs at once, a vehicle airlift of that magnitude would take much longer with only 1 LZ at the destination (or only 1 LZ to pick units up and carry them to the destination)

Btw, why the opposition to trucks being carried via vehicle transports, if cyborg engineers can be carried by cyborg transports?

This balance I think would be more "interesting" - cyborgs airlifts could be used to enhance vehicle utilization.
Currently many times it seems cyborgs are used in leu of vehicles.
Rarely is there a 2 pronged Tank push through the main defenses, and a cyborg drop.... its either the attack is a massive cyborg drop, or the attack is a massive tank push - with little incentive to use them together

For lore/backstory, you could say the thrust of the transport is too weak for vertical flight/for getting out of ground effect, and special landing pads that magnetically levitate/boost it into the air are needed (anti grav is too high tech for WZ) to get it vertically in the air and accelerating forward.
To attempt a vertical landing without a "magnetic cushion", would be to plummet into the ground.

Alternately, we could drop the 3x3 pads I initially favored, and go with a more asymmetric structure, perhaps a 2x5 or even 2x6 or 3x6 structure: a runway- and drop the Vertical flight component (but I'm guessing the in game flight model would still be like the VTOLs, but who cares).
As some suggested restricting possible LZs: such as adding special LZ areas in a map editor, and making them capturable - I think just making the structure large would suffice.
How many 3x6 flat areas are there on most maps? pretty much just the starting base areas, on some maps.

To be fair on a map like bananas, I think we should also be able to rotate structures orientation before building it - although currently this would only help in placing the cyborg factory, as every other structure is a square.
If structure rotation is hard to implement, make 2 versions of the runway structure, one horizontally and one vertically aligned.
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by Assault Gunner »

Rotation would be really useful, as would the ability to place buildings such as research centers, power plants, and the command center, right next to each other. But rotation would be nicer. It would let me stick things precisely where I want them, in addition to adding more options for base layout.
Last edited by Assault Gunner on 29 Jan 2010, 01:45, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by Dalton »

Yes, rotation would be nice for factories.
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GPolice
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by GPolice »

Daltx wrote:Yes, rotation would be nice for factories.
You can make a New Thread ;)
CAn anyone make a Mod pls for Test ;)

Unit transport - would mess with balance of cyborgs.
^^^Thats wrong. Cybogs are STRONG and useful
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GPolice
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by GPolice »

and....answers???

Is the Code now lighter?
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Zarel
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by Zarel »

What do you mean?
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GPolice
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by GPolice »

Zarel wrote:Yeah, the current cyborg transport functionality is hardcoded. I'm looking into changing that, but for now...
That...
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by Zarel »

GPolice wrote:That...
Yeah, I haven't done that yet. :/ Long-term, man. It would probably break savegame compatibility, so...
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Roux Le Corps
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by Roux Le Corps »

idea.... what if the transport could only LAND on an lz? i figure straight lines would make them way too vulnerable, so waypoint, and if end way point is not on an lz it just wont launch?
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XboxJosh
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by XboxJosh »

Roux Le Corps wrote:idea.... what if the transport could only LAND on an lz? i figure straight lines would make them way too vulnerable, so waypoint, and if end way point is not on an lz it just wont launch?
:...: isn't that exactly what 3Drts proposed...?

(By the way, I am an advocate of this)

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Rman Virgil
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by Rman Virgil »

.
Roux Le Corps wrote:idea.... what if the transport could only LAND on an lz? i figure straight lines would make them way too vulnerable, so waypoint, and if end way point is not on an lz it just wont launch?
XboxJosh wrote: :...: isn't that exactly what 3Drts proposed...?

(By the way, I am an advocate of this)
1.) Yup..... that's how I read it too.

2.) Yup.

IMHO, breaking save game compatibility is an acceptable trade-off for gains in non-trivial, fun, expanded game play - even if it is just left to modders / mappers and their mods / maps to explore these new possibilities (some of which I've managed to explore as work-arounds to this hard-coded lock-out since introducing a forked binary is not a good idea, IMO).

- RV :ninja:
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by XHero_of_ChaosX »

winsrp wrote:Yes... I would like to be able to make the Vehicle transport, I know... its huge... yes.. can we have a smaller version that looks exactly the same but with 50% size and 50% space too? Its great to be able to move little guys around on air transport, why cant we do the same with vehicles??
Im up for the idea. I believe it would make things interesting. maybe even bigger battlefields could be made to justify this.
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XboxJosh
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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by XboxJosh »

Rman Virgil wrote: IMHO, breaking save game compatibility is an acceptable trade-off for gains in non-trivial, fun, expanded game play - even if it is just left to modders / mappers and their mods / maps to explore these new possibilities (some of which I've managed to explore as work-arounds to this hard-coded lock-out since introducing a forked binary is not a good idea, IMO).
Plus when the devs finally break it, we can have bigger maps :D :D :D :lol2:
But I mean, really... it's just save games, how big of a deal is it really? At least have it in 3.0 or something... :augh:

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Re: Enable vehicle transport on multiplay/skirmish

Post by GPolice »

Hmm ok hope you do it later...


Offtopic: @XboxJosh: Cool F-35 VTOLs as your Picture ;)
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