Suggested Changes

[Niobium]

As some of you know me and some others have been working on ideas for a new mod. What this post is about is sharing some of the small ideas for improvement we've had which we think could be put into Balanced Annihilation directly without changing any of its core mechanics or balance.

In no particular order:

Automatic terraforming of ground infront of labs
Addition of a gadget which would automatically smooth the terrain in front of labs such that units will always be able to get out.

Customizable unit costs
Addition of a gadget that allows the host to set metal, energy and build time costs of unit types so that they can tweak balance to their liking, great for 1v1 players.

Passive mode on every constructor
Self explanatory, the passive mode on nanos that prevents stalling should also be on constructors and labs.

Possible removal of napping enemy commanders
The only people who get their commander napped are new players, not good when trying to bring in new players.

Slasher/samson targeting fix
Slasher and samson targeting is currently bugged, such that in certain cases they will refuse to fire. (To replicate: Issue attack order on a unit, now issue a move order, observe how the units won't attack while executing the move order)

Samson fight command fix
Fight command doesn't work for samsons, yet it works for slashers, giving quite an advantage to micro.

Guardian high traj as default
Guardian high trajectory should be default mode, not low trajectory. Many new players build guardians, and aren't aware that high trajectory is the only mode that makes guardians useful.

T1 fighter automatic engagement fix
T1 fighters automatically engage ground targets which leads them into AA, making them extremely irritating to use, engagement should be changed to that of T2 fighters.

No energy cost to operate extractors
That mexes require energy to run brings in pointlesss tedium of repeatedly waiting/unwaiting units, or in the case of noobs, they sit at +0 metal. If mexes could be set to remain on when stalling this would also solve it, so would everything on passive mode.

Base storage
Addition of base metal and energy storage, i.e. 500/500, such that when you lose a large fraction of your units you are not trapped at 50 metal storage and 100 energy storage, unable to afford anything bigger than a wind.

Changing side ingame
In the same way that coop mode allows you to change side so should you be able to change sides in non-coop, especially important given that you choose side pre-gamestart while finding out start position post-gamestart.

Fix crashing mex upgrader gadget
Self explanatory.

Fix building cost disparity between sides
Main buildings where this is an issue is in the cost of advanced solars and advanced fusions, both of which cost much more energy for arm for no apparent reason.

Add indication of T1 arm MM on/off state
Self explanatory, currently it's impossible to tell if an arm T1 metalmaker is on or off.

Fix amphibious units speed underwater
Underwater speed of amphibious units is bugged, in that they go much much faster than they should (faster than on ground even), an example is the marauder which moves as fast a T1 sea scout boat when underwater.

Feel free to discuss what ones you like or don't like, and hopefully TFC will implement the popular ones

[UAF]

Automatic terraforming of ground infront of labs
Addition of a gadget which would automatically smooth the terrain in front of labs such that units will always be able to get out.

YES! I lost a game because of that one. It's very silly...

Customizable unit costs
Addition of a gadget that allows the host to set metal, energy and build time costs of unit types so that they can tweak balance to their liking, great for 1v1 players.

I don't care. I'll venture and say that most people won't care.
People join a game with lots of players on one of the autohosts, and play it. They don't change the settings.
Of course tt won't hurt anyone if the option will be there. And maybe some people will enjoy it.

Passive mode on every constructor
Self explanatory, the passive mode on nanos that prevents stalling should also be on constructors and labs.

Passive mode need a name change. I didn't understand what exactly it means until about yesterday. Be careful when adding it to everything - things under construction "decay" if nothing activly builds them, and how would you decide which nano/constructor/factory gets to build when M/E stalling?

Possible removal of napping enemy commanders
The only people who get their commander napped are new players, not good when trying to bring in new players.

Make anti-comnap widget a built-in part of the mode?

Slasher/samson targeting fix
Slasher and samson targeting is currently bugged, such that in certain cases they will refuse to fire. (To replicate: Issue attack order on a unit, now issue a move order, observe how the units won't attack while executing the move order)

Samson fight command fix
Fight command doesn't work for samsons, yet it works for slashers, giving quite an advantage to micro.

Bugs should be fixed

Guardian high traj as default
Guardian high trajectory should be default mode, not low trajectory. Many new players build guardians, and aren't aware that high trajectory is the only mode that makes guardians useful.

T1 fighter automatic engagement fix
T1 fighters automatically engage ground targets which leads them into AA, making them extremely irritating to use, engagement should be changed to that of T2 fighters.

Yes please!

No energy cost to operate extractors
That mexes require energy to run brings in pointlesss tedium of repeatedly waiting/unwaiting units, or in the case of noobs, they sit at +0 metal. If mexes could be set to remain on when stalling this would also solve it, so would everything on passive mode.

Base storage
Addition of base metal and energy storage, i.e. 500/500, such that when you lose a large fraction of your units you are not trapped at 50 metal storage and 100 energy storage, unable to afford anything bigger than a wind.

Those are balance changes and should be regarded as such.
Personally I like them. Althogh maybe only T1 mexes shouldn't take energy.
FYI I AM a noob.

Changing side ingame
In the same way that coop mode allows you to change side so should you be able to change sides in non-coop, especially important given that you choose side pre-gamestart while finding out start position post-gamestart.

I don't care, again I think most people won't care. I'd prefer it to be impossible by default to avoid betraying team mates.
I don't know why but many Spring players are asshoels and I can see them doing it in game, and then "win".
Reading what you wrote again I'm not sure I understood you correctly. What is non-coop game?

Fix crashing mex upgrader gadget
Self explanatory.

Bugs shoudl be fixed.

Fix building cost disparity between sides
Main buildings where this is an issue is in the cost of advanced solars and advanced fusions, both of which cost much more energy for arm for no apparent reason.

Sounds like a balance change. But one that should be fixed unless there is a reason for it.

Add indication of T1 arm MM on/off state
Self explanatory, currently it's impossible to tell if an arm T1 metalmaker is on or off.

Not important if they don't require energy.
As a noob I'd say its generally not important to me.

Fix amphibious units speed underwater
Underwater speed of amphibious units is bugged, in that they go much much faster than they should (faster than on ground even), an example is the marauder which moves as fast a T1 sea scout boat when underwater.

Is this a bug or a feature? Amph units need to be able to get to the enemy, and many times they don't have any underwater weapons...




I want to suggest/ask one of my own:
I saw that rockets pass through shields, but I'm pretty sure missiles don't (samson can fire through a shield, Diplomat can't). Maybe missiles should also pass through shields?

[TheFatController]

Here's my thoughts..

Automatic terraforming of ground infront of labs
Addition of a gadget which would automatically smooth the terrain in front of labs such that units will always be able to get out.

I agree, there is a solution already to have a builder 'restore' the area infront of the lab with their com / a builder but that's a bit too much to expect for a new player so this would be a good change (I've had this happen to me a few times..)

Customizable unit costs
Addition of a gadget that allows the host to set metal, energy and build time costs of unit types so that they can tweak balance to their liking, great for 1v1 players.

Afaik this gadget already exists somewhere? It would have to come with big flashing text somewhere and the problem is there's no facility to do this in the lobby so players would only know at game start and then not necessarily have access to the changes (spring still crashes for me if I switch to another window hurr).

The problem i'd forsee is a player for fun or trolling to do something like buff the pelican with 5000% dps then spam them late game and ruin everything.

Passive mode on every constructor
Self explanatory, the passive mode on nanos that prevents stalling should also be on constructors and labs.

Shouldn't be a problem, i'd like any suggestions as to a better name for "Passive Mode" if anyone has one as UAF has pointed out the name could be about anything ("Passive Nanolathe"?)

Possible removal of napping enemy commanders
The only people who get their commander napped are new players, not good when trying to bring in new players.

A 'no loading enemy units' mod option could be possible, the problem I see here is that when this was turned off players may see it as the host giving permission for everyone to act like total jackasses and it would end up always being turned on.

As a new player I didn't find comnapping a frustrating feature that made me want to ragequit the game, I found it hilarious and couldn't wait to try it myself so I'm not sure it's true to say that it's something that drives players off exclusively.

Slasher/samson targeting fix
Slasher and samson targeting is currently bugged, such that in certain cases they will refuse to fire. (To replicate: Issue attack order on a unit, now issue a move order, observe how the units won't attack while executing the move order)

Samson fight command fix
Fight command doesn't work for samsons, yet it works for slashers, giving quite an advantage to micro.

Didn't know about these, it may be in the units scripts and may have been some old deliberate attempt to prevent firing while moving for whatever reason. Hopefully its not an engine bug but I'm happy to take a look.

Guardian high traj as default
Guardian high trajectory should be default mode, not low trajectory. Many new players build guardians, and aren't aware that high trajectory is the only mode that makes guardians useful.

Agree

T1 fighter automatic engagement fix
T1 fighters automatically engage ground targets which leads them into AA, making them extremely irritating to use, engagement should be changed to that of T2 fighters.

Agree

No energy cost to operate extractors
That mexes require energy to run brings in pointlesss tedium of repeatedly waiting/unwaiting units, or in the case of noobs, they sit at +0 metal. If mexes could be set to remain on when stalling this would also solve it, so would everything on passive mode.

Disagree, this is a penalty for stalling and part of the 'core' gameplay, adds more incentive to raid early and for people to learn how to manage their economy.

Base storage
Addition of base metal and energy storage, i.e. 500/500, such that when you lose a large fraction of your units you are not trapped at 50 metal storage and 100 energy storage, unable to afford anything bigger than a wind.

Disagree, this is an incentive to keep your commander alive and even then is not too bad if you have income it just means an extra 30 secs or so to build storage.

Changing side ingame
In the same way that coop mode allows you to change side so should you be able to change sides in non-coop, especially important given that you choose side pre-gamestart while finding out start position post-gamestart.

Can't see why this would be a problem and should be pretty easy to implement.

Fix crashing mex upgrader gadget
Self explanatory.

I haven't yet taken the time to trace the exact cause of these bugs, i've seen global errors in a few games, a fast fix would be to swamp the code in nil checks but may be nice to just rewrite the thing with better logic and no bugs (I don't use it cause I don't like finding one of my mex's reclaimed and no moho cause it was too close to a windmill or w/e)

Fix building cost disparity between sides
Main buildings where this is an issue is in the cost of advanced solars and advanced fusions, both of which cost much more energy for arm for no apparent reason.

Disagree, a lot of stats in BA make no sense but I feel it would be a foolish endeavour to try and standardise things, some players will feel these make a crazy kind of sense "Arm pays more for fus cause arm has stumpy!" and be upset by changes which at the end of the day are quite minor and for me fall under "If it aint broke don't fix it".

Add indication of T1 arm MM on/off state
Self explanatory, currently it's impossible to tell if an arm T1 metalmaker is on or off.

I thought there was a light on top of them?

Fix amphibious units speed underwater
Underwater speed of amphibious units is bugged, in that they go much much faster than they should (faster than on ground even), an example is the marauder which moves as fast a T1 sea scout boat when underwater.

These got broken by an engine change at some point then 'fixed', I do kinda agree with UAF here that underwater assaults are very hard to pull off if the units move slowly (I remember a long time ago losing something like 5 shivas to two t1 torpedo launchers) so this may be a good thing - open to debate.

[SirArtturi]

Here's my thoughts..

Possible removal of napping enemy commanders
The only people who get their commander napped are new players, not good when trying to bring in new players.

A 'no loading enemy units' mod option could be possible, the problem I see here is that when this was turned off players may see it as the host giving permission for everyone to act like total jackasses and it would end up always being turned on.

As a new player I didn't find comnapping a frustrating feature that made me want to ragequit the game, I found it hilarious and couldn't wait to try it myself so I'm not sure it's true to say that it's something that drives players off exclusively.

Niobium: I'm not a new player. I dont know whats the situation in FFA games, but I totally lost interest playing BA ffa's because every game I played, I got either combombed or comnapped.

UAF: Preventig this by making anti-comnap widget default is just idiocy, since you can actually fix the whole problem. I already gave two possible solutions: disable loading enemy units or enable units shoot while being in transport.

TFC: I like the modoption idea, but I really dont get your 'on the other hand' argument. Personally, I'd do this without options, but I think making this modoption will improve the quality of FFA no matter what...

Wanted to do this although you all prolly figured it out already
the problem here comes from this formula:
commander + commander explosion + transport = cheap nuclear bomb
now lets add some more variables to make the model depict the current situation better:
commander + commander explosion + a newbie player/lazy veteran + transport + enemy nap = free nuclear bomb

You can prevent freeriders and abuse by getting rid of one of the variables.

[Jazcash]

And here's a list of minor bugs in BA:

• Sea/Hover trans gets stuck in the land really easily
• Sea/Hover trans isn't great at loading and unloading units, also its animation is very jerky and strange
• Certain units such as Janus, Banisher and the like will shoot the lab they're created in if they're created whilst a unit is within LOS and LOF
• Com will stall unit building if it is attacking or being attacked by another unit at the time of unit frame creation - This means you have to wait till you've finished attacking or finished being attacked until you can create the unit you want to
• Units spawn in land labs facing slightly to the side which means they take longer to leave the lab than they should do and it also sometimes causes them to get stuck
• In Coop mode, both Coms are labeled as the same player, would be nice if they showed the names of the players they actually belonged to
• In Coop mode, a lot of widget conflict like smartnanos which means when one player tries to reclaim something, the other players smartnanos widget will kick in and repair it
• Dragon Teeth can't be reclaimed with area reclaim
• When builders are set to repeat and given an order to make a wall of Dragon Teeth, they continuously reclaim and build over previous Dragon Teeth
• You can fly certain air units a fair way out the map by giving them a move command towards the edge of the map. This can be used to scout enemies bases whilst avoiding any AA or fighters on the frontline
• I'm still having trouble giving queues to units. Sometimes they just don't receive the commands at all and do nothing. Other times, when they're being build in the lab, they forget the queue as soon as they've finished being built
• (Not sure if this is BA's fault): Your Com still gets sent back to a random position if you place your start position on the very front edge of the startbox
• You can still send missiles flying a lot further than they should fly from units like Dominators if you FPS them and shoot a missile up into the sky
• If you FPS a Liche and shoot a missile from too high up in the air, the missile travels in a pretty much infinite loop in the middle of the air.
• Comwreck hitbox is completely off

They're most the bugs I can think of from the top of my head. I also have loads of suggestions and I agree with a lot of Niobium's but the bugs should be the main priority before suggestions If I can help in any way, just ask.

[aegis]

Many new players build guardians

more of a problem than the traj IMO

may be nice to just rewrite the thing with better logic and no bugs (I don't use it cause I don't like finding one of my mex's reclaimed and no moho cause it was too close to a windmill or w/e)

what about allowing us to place t2 mexes overlapping a t1 mex, which will reclaim (or even selfd for great win) the t1 mex when the builder is ready?

in fact I think I'll make a widget to do this while I'm waiting for my spring compile environment to build to fix my other widget

[Johannes]

Automatic terraforming of ground infront of labs
Addition of a gadget which would automatically smooth the terrain in front of labs such that units will always be able to get out.

Better fix I think, just make labs not deform ground. Also prevents seeing when enemy makes lab on maps with nonflat start positions.

Possible removal of napping enemy commanders
The only people who get their commander napped are new players, not good when trying to bring in new players.

But it's a smart and common practice to try nap the comm in order to force it to keep moving when under fire.

T1 fighter automatic engagement fix
T1 fighters automatically engage ground targets which leads them into AA, making them extremely irritating to use, engagement should be changed to that of T2 fighters.

Disagree, fighters attacking ground is good. When you have 10s of them they can do a somewhat significant damage to an attacking army. Rather allow t2 as well to attack ground by default. Just something to consider on where you put them, I don't think this negative side you bring up is so bad.

Or give them a switch to tell if they should attack just air or ground too.

Changing side ingame
In the same way that coop mode allows you to change side so should you be able to change sides in non-coop, especially important given that you choose side pre-gamestart while finding out start position post-gamestart.

Dunno, it has its merits but I like to know which side I'm up against, it really affects what kind of build you can start with.

Also air factories should maybe have the "land at" defaulted to 0, it's annoying if you have an sea antinuke or possibly a ally who made the repairpad, to have your airunit fly to it and take control away of the unit, it once screwed a combomb i wanted to make with a t2 trans. Or just remove the repairpads, so near useless and the cases they might be worth considering don't really add anything to the game.

And revert crocs, panthers and golis a bit

[Kixu]

I think napping needs some serious discussion, as yes its only new players that really get napped and it just makes people rage at them which isn't likely to get them to stay. I would be up for removing napping all together as transports really don't need to be an offensive unit in that manner. Rest of the changes are just really good apart from maybe the underwater movement (works ok atm) and build costs; even if they don't make any sense, it gives a bit more personality to the sides. Also units like sumo's being able to be napped while moving really sucks. And juggernaught needs crush attack!

With regard to the move / attack, if you give an attack order then a move order a lot of units change target which sucks.

A more commutative effort would help solve a lot of these bugs I'm sure!


*Edit*
Labs not deforming the ground would only work if the units had no hit boxes while they were in it, otherwise they would get stuck. This may lead to abuse if they couldn't get damaged.

Guardians would be better if they actually did decent damage on low trajectory at close range. They do so little right now its almost worthless to have the setting, especially when enemy units are close which is when you would want it.

As for napping being good, no. I love dropping 6 riots around a commander and then telling them to nap it, as the commander dies if he keeps moving from the riots and gets napped if he stops to dgun, so only option is to fps which is rare to see. Doesn't make it something I consider worth keeping. It just leads to more com bombing which requires little skill and is really boring. Other fun tactics with napping including making a prison of t2 dragonteeth with HLT sentries if enemy tries to escape. Funny but hardly just cause to keep napping.

T1 fighters not attacking the ground by default is good, as you can still set them to attack ground units if you want.

Changing default energy storage to 500 is good, because if you are going to com bomb and have planned it you will most likely have an e-store. If you have been com bombed you are much less likely to, and it would facilitate coming back into the game much easier seeing as ping times don't allow you to use others excess E properly with the current 100.

[Godde]

T1 fighter automatic engagement fix
T1 fighters automatically engage ground targets which leads them into AA, making them extremely irritating to use, engagement should be changed to that of T2 fighters.

Disagree, fighters attacking ground is good. When you have 10s of them they can do a somewhat significant damage to an attacking army. Rather allow t2 as well to attack ground by default. Just something to consider on where you put them, I don't think this negative side you bring up is so bad.

Or give them a switch to tell if they should attack just air or ground too.

Fighter can have noChaseCategory on ground units. That way they don't attack ground units unless ordered to. Can t2 fighters attack ground targets?

Also, fighters are supposed to meet bombers to intercept them not just move along the same patrol lines getting shoot down by enemy flak as they advance or letting the enemy bomb the advancing units just because the fighters were too far back. I see that happen too often in BA.

[Johannes]

It's not same at all when you have to manually tell them to attack. All fighters trying to concentrate on 1 unit at a time brings the damage they do down by many times.

[Nixa]

It's not same at all when you have to manually tell them to attack. All fighters trying to concentrate on 1 unit at a time brings the damage they do down by many times.

Just a clarification

The point of the fighter change would be to give universal behaviour between T2 and T1 fighters, and to prevent baiting which is easy to do with T1 fighters because of their current behaviour.

They will still attack ground if it is in their direct path, but they won't vector to do so.

[Niobium]

Here's my thoughts..

Agree
Agree
...

So, what ones are you going to work on? And when can we expect a new version?

[Pxtl]

Is there a good e-stall management widget? IE - something that puts a 5-second wait on any construction other than energy structures if you're e-stalling? If so, bundling it into the mod would make the "mexes cost E is good gameplay" people happy and also fix the newbtrap.

[hoijui]

no way!
one of the few actually useful contributions of spring is, that it teaches kids to use resources carefully, and not more of them then are available (money in real live). with an auto-no-E-stall widget, that education would not happen anymore, and we would be partly responsible for the next "crisis".
save the kids!
(and their parents credit cards)

[TheFatController]

Here's my thoughts..

Agree
Agree
...

So, what ones are you going to work on? And when can we expect a new version?

I'll tell you what I may not work on:
1) Rewriting the mex upgrader gadget, it would be nice if someone keen on this feature could donate a non synced version of this (ideally with smarter behaviour thrown in). I will be looking at killing the lua errors on the existing version for now.

2) Customizable unit costs, if you or anyone else wants to write a version of this or import an existing version which works with cheat mode on I'll happily integrate it.

I have a list of changes made up of some of what you posted and jaz posted and other things i've been sent since last BA, I can't give an ETA yet but it's not going to be ages

[Johannes]

The point of the fighter change would be to give universal behaviour between T2 and T1 fighters, and to prevent baiting which is easy to do with T1 fighters because of their current behaviour.

Better universalise to the more interesting behaviour, make t2 fighters attack ground automatically too. Or if no other rework to fighters is being made, maybe just keep this distinction - the fighters maybe are too similar then, just have different speed and special damages to different units.

They will still attack ground if it is in their direct path, but they won't vector to do so.

ground units are practically never in their field of fire unless theyre landed or something.

[NOiZE]

Here's my thoughts..

Possible removal of napping enemy commanders
The only people who get their commander napped are new players, not good when trying to bring in new players.

A 'no loading enemy units' mod option could be possible, the problem I see here is that when this was turned off players may see it as the host giving permission for everyone to act like total jackasses and it would end up always being turned on.

As a new player I didn't find comnapping a frustrating feature that made me want to ragequit the game, I found it hilarious and couldn't wait to try it myself so I'm not sure it's true to say that it's something that drives players off exclusively.

Niobium: I'm not a new player. I dont know whats the situation in FFA games, but I totally lost interest playing BA ffa's because every game I played, I got either combombed or comnapped.

UAF: Preventig this by making anti-comnap widget default is just idiocy, since you can actually fix the whole problem. I already gave two possible solutions: disable loading enemy units or enable units shoot while being in transport.

TFC: I like the modoption idea, but I really dont get your 'on the other hand' argument. Personally, I'd do this without options, but I think making this modoption will improve the quality of FFA no matter what...

Wanted to do this although you all prolly figured it out already
the problem here comes from this formula:
commander + commander explosion + transport = cheap nuclear bomb
now lets add some more variables to make the model depict the current situation better:
commander + commander explosion + a newbie player/lazy veteran + transport + enemy nap = free nuclear bomb

You can prevent freeriders and abuse by getting rid of one of the variables.

Orrrr we give the commander a SAM on his backpack ~~

[Gota]

Orrrr we give the commander a SAM on his backpack ~~

YES!!
it needs to be almost the size of a core core t1 sam turret and it needs to be mounted on the coms back!! it owuld look so awesome.

[tacho]

Orrrr we give the commander a SAM on his backpack ~~

YES!!
it needs to be almost the size of a core core t1 sam turret and it needs to be mounted on the coms back!! it owuld look so awesome.

not SAM... A shortrange (about 3-5 of commanders body) but powerful AA weapon. As shotgun with small strike particles with large throwout angle. Single particle does not make a large damage, but hitting all together can kill transport in one shoot...

Or, can commander use DGun against air units?

And is it impossible to use regular units as ðÉðÉ protection of the Comm?

[HectorMeyer]

Some suggested changes:

• The X-ray shader looks pretty on units under construction. A widget to make X-ray shading always active for them.
• Diplomacy FFA mode.
• It would be really cool if there was someone feeling responsible for creating and maintaining a few hosts with Lichos ranking system. I understand TFC when he says this has to be done by autohost owners, but maybe he could commission some people to make some "official" hosts in his name, to make sure the system has an official feel, keeps going and stays reliable (e.g. TFC can look for new, reliable maintainers if old ones lose interest), and is accepted by the community.
  
  recent thread about this got surprisingly little response:
  http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=44&t=24044
  
  for a website something simple like
  http://springie.licho.eu/top50.php
  would be ok for the beginning

edit: also, planetwars