Random idea: special cheap ramp terraform?

[Pxtl]

I was watching a game on The Hunters and was surprised how horribly expensive a substantial ramp/bridge was.... workarounds involve making it horribly narrow, or raising the bare minimum (which is tedious micro to perfectly price out the most efficient bridge) Meanwhile, walling off your resource buildings with raises is cheap and quick, and produces some annoying gameplay.

So I was thinking, perhaps a special approach to bridge/ramps would be nice, allowing for cheap, wide bridges? Obviously, if the generic "ramp" function is inappropriate, since if you just tweaked the price on it players would use it for walls.

How about, unlike other terraform commands, a terraform that is tied to a built unit? A cut-price, fixed-width ramp command... but a "support" unit exists at regular intervals on the ramp (plus each endpoint), and when this "support" is destroyed, all the related supports self-D and the bridge restores. Thus, players can have a cheap-but-fragile version of the Ramp command that they can use to make connections within their base. Meanwhile, the true "ramp" command remains for hardened terraforming that can only be destroyed with "restore" actions.

[CarRepairer]

I was watching a game on The Hunters and was surprised how horribly expensive a substantial ramp/bridge was.... workarounds involve making it horribly narrow, or raising the bare minimum (which is tedious micro to perfectly price out the most efficient bridge) Meanwhile, walling off your resource buildings with raises is cheap and quick, and produces some annoying gameplay.

So I was thinking, perhaps a special approach to bridge/ramps would be nice, allowing for cheap, wide bridges? Obviously, if the generic "ramp" function is inappropriate, since if you just tweaked the price on it players would use it for walls.

How about, unlike other terraform commands, a terraform that is tied to a built unit? A cut-price, fixed-width ramp command... but a "support" unit exists at regular intervals on the ramp (plus each endpoint), and when this "support" is destroyed, all the related supports self-D and the bridge restores. Thus, players can have a cheap-but-fragile version of the Ramp command that they can use to make connections within their base. Meanwhile, the true "ramp" command remains for hardened terraforming that can only be destroyed with "restore" actions.

Good ideas, the support one sounds interesting (can give it a restore bomb )

[KaiserJ]

is there a reason why terraforming is so expensive in general?

in my eyes... building a solar takes about a second... if your com used that metal to build a ramp instead of terraforming... well i dunno im not a balance expert but it seems to me that it costs just a wee bit much currently.

[Pxtl]

is there a reason why terraforming is so expensive in general?

in my eyes... building a solar takes about a second... if your com used that metal to build a ramp instead of terraforming... well i dunno im not a balance expert but it seems to me that it costs just a wee bit much currently.

Because terraformed walls are extremely tedious to remove, and utterly indestructible to weapons.

[Google_Frog]

I probably won't implement this as the cost/elmo^3 would become inconsistent. Once that happens there are things like using the cheap stuff to make walls and spires, even if there is a destructible bit that bit can either be protected or not a worry depending on the application.

If anything I think terraform is too cheap.

Anyway Big Berthas and Crabe have luaed smooth to make them better against cliffs. AOE weapons like pillager are naturally good but rely on map hardness.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

terraform was interesting but not so great for asthetics or gameplay from what I have seen

[MidKnight]

I liked the cheaper terraform better. Just my opinion.

[Otherside]

cheaper terraform will be exploited.

Price is fine

[Pxtl]

cheaper terraform will be exploited.

Price is fine

That's why I was hoping for just some form of cheap ramp/bridge.... the problem, of course, with cheap ramp/bridge is that you need a drawback to it so it doesn't just get used in place of convenional terraforming. Hence the idea of having "supports" that make the bridge/ramp fragile.

[CarRepairer]

terraform was interesting but not so great for asthetics or gameplay from what I have seen

It's absolutely awesome for gameplay.

[Saktoth]

Supports, more smoothing on weapons or some other way to more easily tear down terraform than currently is probably needed. It would be nice if you could just fire into it and it would fall down.

1faction will have/has a siesmic missile at the missilo silo which smooths terrain dramatically around it (and causes units to tumble, falling off cliffs etc). The unit is in game but needs lua implementation.

An extra entrance into the back of someones base on hunters only costs 1k. This is really quite reasonable, how many ravagers will you save by walking in the back? The thinnest ramp possible on the shortest stretch possible is only 500. Thats nothing.

[Tribulex]

it used to be awesome when you could make stairways to heaven. I used to spend my whole game building as high as possible. One game I even managed a bertha up there in the sky before someone killed me for my stupidity.

[MidKnight]

it used to be awesome when you could make stairways to heaven. I used to spend my whole game building as high as possible. One game I even managed a bertha up there in the sky before someone killed me for my stupidity.

I remember that game.

[Dream Focus]

Repair bombed out areas cheaply, and everything else should cost a lot. Sometimes the hole destroys a necessary land crossing, or a large chunk of real estate you really needed to build on if the map is mostly water.

You could have a ramp, which units can go up and down on, which is cheaper, but counts as a unit, it able to be destroyed just as easily as a regular unit could be. If you wanted a way to get land units over terrain, without having to use an air unit to ferry them, this would be useful.

You don't want to be able to raise ground from the ocean too cheaply, and have people making a land bridge to cut off ships and submarines, and move their artillery closer to the enemy's continent/island.

Can you dig a moat on a land map, and surprise your enemy's units when they come riding towards you, by having a fleet of ships built there shooting at them? That'd be funny the first time it happened, and after that it'd just piss the other team off. That is if any large ships could outrange what they had, otherwise you'd just have them trapped in narrow waters, and it'd be shooting ducks in a barrel, or whatever the expression is. Personally I only hunt/fish with dynamite.

[Tribulex]

it used to be awesome when you could make stairways to heaven. I used to spend my whole game building as high as possible. One game I even managed a bertha up there in the sky before someone killed me for my stupidity.

I remember that game.

I kind of like to think of that ramp as a phallic monument of awesome.