But not with transports. After noticing this behavior I built 15 super transports just to see how far I could push it. I wiped out the entire map, eventually. Only 1 of the 5 other AI players in the skirmish had at some point built AA structures, and that base made short work of the transports rather quickly. This actually didn't take as long as you would think. Because the transports have heavy machineguns on them, they cut right through the base's defensive swarm of cyborgs, which leaves the base defenseless.
I probably could've done it with the smaller cyborg transports as well, but they don't have as high of a defensive capability.
I wasn't sure if this should've been filed as a bug, or put in another part of the forum where devs will see it.
But it seems to me like one of three solutions would solve this problem:
1: AI should recognize that a flying unit(VTOL/type, if you will) is what's attacking the base, and respond by building AA structures.
2: The cyborg/super transport units don't need to be re-loaded like other flying units do. Maybe it's time to add a shot limit to them?
3: Transport units are so massive(particularly the super) that tanks should be able to lock onto them, even when in flight. Normally, tanks don't target air units at all.(except the high velocity, it will target air units)
Because the super transport's defensive capability is so high, it wasn't even really necessary to keep flying around in circles around the base. I let them land, and units like tanks and others often times didn't even notice. They just sat there dumb while the transports pelted them into destruction. If a new tank did happen to get created by an enemy factory, it would recognize the transports sitting there and start firing, but(especially with the heavy tank) it would do greater damage to the base structures in close proximity than the transports.
If it matters, the map I did this on was the 6P critical-cycle map, technologies for armor and bullets both at max, auto-repair. I even had the AI set to insane. On the transport units, the defences are so high that the auto repair actually repairs the unit faster than most hardpoint structures can damage them.
In other words, your transports are practically invincible.
