Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

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Caydr
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Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by Caydr »

Watched a few BA games, haven't seen one built. I've never built one except in testing, ever. Like since I ported to Spring, never in a regular game.

Don't recall ever having seen one get built, even in OTA.

Mines are lame, they just slow down the game artificially, and all it takes is one nanostall and they're visible for the whole world to see thanks to ghosting. Besides this, all you need to do is bombard an area with HT artillery for 20 seconds and they'll all be dead anyway.

Briefly tried to see if minelayer vehicles (MLVs) were viable as some kind of assist/engineer unit. Problem is, if there are already 4 different types of L1 constructor PLUS amphibious ones, the existing ones are being artificially crippled just so I have a reason to leave them in. That's bad design. Never have two units of the same type in the same factory, I say. Vehicle plants have THREE.

Mines and minelayers are something that's never been done really effectively in an RTS IMHO. Sins does a reasonably good job but they're still a hacky annoyance.

Mines are dangerous to have around since they might go off at the slightest provocation (exploding unit debris will do it). You don't want them anywhere near where you might have to travel since it means sending your units through an area which is extremely dangerous.

Honestly I just can't justify their continued existence. Any objections? Is there something I'm missing? Shut up Smoth.
babbles
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by babbles »

they work well in xta both early and late game
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TheFatController
Balanced Annihilation Developer
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by TheFatController »

Laying 6 on a mex spot and waiting for a com to walk into it :)

(only pulled this off once but it was epic)
pintle
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by pintle »

Iirc it was 3 heavy mines in ba to pop com?
Caydr go look at xta's experienced players using mines.
Also check out mines in EE.
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NOiZE
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by NOiZE »

Mines were a big hype in comet games like 2 years ago ~~ maybe ppl should try them again.
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Caydr
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by Caydr »

What about XTA's implementation makes them viable? I would just watch a game but there's no way of knowing if they'll be used in it, and my time is short.
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JohannesH
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by JohannesH »

I use mines sometimes in BA.

3 heavy mines can kill com, but only 1 is needed on a mex spot to kill a con.

And a few mines as a defense are good too if you dont overdo it and put them only in places you know the enemy will come from. Single mine kills a stumpy for example. Very good defense for cost compared to just building more statics, and the enemy doesnt know its there before attacking. Also mines build so fast, you can even build them when you see the enemy coming already. Also take into account the low m/high e cost, when its useful to make them.

Making dragons eyes can be sometimes nice too, but they take too long for the layer to build to be too good.

People just never see mines used, then think that they must suck so dont even try to use them...
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det
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by det »

BA mines are now useless, the light ones were mega nerfed (thanks to me spamming them on comet) and juno makes them more of a liability than a defense. This is a good thing though, when they were viable, the gameplay really suffered. Might as well remove them IMO.

XTA mines are annoying. I hate them. They are OP and make the game not fun.

In general, expensive mines used as traps can be interesting. Cheap mines used to blanket areas are just micro sinks and are bad for gameplay.

CA has a really cool concept that replaces mines. The bot factories have tick/roach. These are crawling bombs that burrow (cloak for free) when not in motion and essentially become mines. They are expensive enough where they can't be effectively blanketed (and AoE is another obstacle). But used as traps they can be really effective. The ability to move really helps to set up traps. Also, flea becomes a dragon's eye when it is immobile.
pintle
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by pintle »

XTA inherently favours a more troop-conservative approach to the game than BA, losing even a couple of units to mines in 1v1 can be devastating.

There are several variations of mines, distinquished by their damage, and aoe. The minelayers are much slower, relative to other units, than in ba, and consequently much harder to rush forwards (they are not radar invis in xta either, can't remember if they are in ba). Minelayers can, however, reclaim, assist, repair and restore. You can gib a com with 1 mine, or lay 1 medium damage huge aoe mine, and take out an entire wave of flash.

There is a t1 mineclearer bot, which self destructs with a large aoe, only doing effective damage to mine's armour class (but providing some lols with impulse).

It boils down to a potentially devastating, but difficult and high risk mine rush, and various related ways to exploit the surprise element, whilst providing a solid counter once the cat out the bag.

If you plan to invest heavily in mines as a solid defence, where surprise is irrelevant, you can use mt embedded in the field to pop the mineclearers, which have pathetic hp.

edit: disregard Det's crying about mine rape, he barely plays XTA
Last edited by pintle on 04 Aug 2009, 21:22, edited 1 time in total.
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JohannesH
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by JohannesH »

det wrote:BA mines are now useless, the light ones were mega nerfed (thanks to me spamming them on comet) and juno makes them more of a liability than a defense.
If you get your enemy to waste his resources on juno with making mines, then they paid for themselves quite nicely as far as i see. But agree about BA light mines now, make bigger mines all the way.
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Neddie
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by Neddie »

I use them pretty heavily, fought for their continued inclusion in CA and designed a number of other for CA which are not present ingame. I would be disappointed if you removed them, but as I don't really play *A much anymore, I won't fight too hard, beyond telling you it is a horrid idea.
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SinbadEV
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by SinbadEV »

maybe if they were less self-dangerous and could not be discovered on an e-stall... or at all for that matter(free stealth and cloak). Then you could make a special skill for their discovery (namely a unit, light enough on it's feet that it wouldn't trip them when it passed over one).
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Caydr
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by Caydr »

Currently minelayers are also minesweepers, they can wander through a minefield, setting them all off, and only take a small amount of damage. They're also immune to the impulse.
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CarRepairer
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by CarRepairer »

SinbadEV wrote:maybe if they were less self-dangerous and could not be discovered on an e-stall... or at all for that matter(free stealth and cloak). Then you could make a special skill for their discovery (namely a unit, light enough on it's feet that it wouldn't trip them when it passed over one).
I did this very thing in CA. Made mines free invisible, removed AoE so they only hurt one or two units at a time. Added a custom minesweeper gadget that you can apply to any con. Turn it on for an energy upkeep, mines explode in a radius with visual circles. Note that this con can still die from a mine if he doesn't have the sweeper on. It's there to trigger more distant mines.

Then CA removed all mines.

Here it is if anyone wants:

http://trac.caspring.org/browser/trunk/ ... _mines.lua
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Argh
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by Argh »

Watched a few BA games, haven't seen one built. I've never built one except in testing, ever. Like since I ported to Spring, never in a regular game.
I have mines that work well in P.U.R.E. and are actually pretty useful. They cover an area, have limited mines before they're finished, and eventually disappear. You might want to look at them.

The key is that mines need to be a field, not just one little mine. That makes them useful enough to actually matter.
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Forboding Angel
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by Forboding Angel »

For me to use them, the mines need to be powerful and build quickly with a decent build radius so the slow ass minelayer can lay a decent amount and a reasonable amount of time.
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Caydr
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by Caydr »

To summarize the objections so far:
-They are good in XTA, or depending on who you ask, annoying and hated.
-They are good for killing commanders.
-Junos are effective against them

My analysis:
-XTA apparently has a very different playstyle from AA/BA. Each unit has more perceived or actual worth and therefore the loss to a mine is more significant. This is a null point since even I at this moment do not know exactly what AA's new playstyle is going to be like, but in the past AA has usually been a mod about using a lot of units, where individual ones do not hold a lot of value.

-Killing commanders with a few mines suddenly going off would be very fun/funny for the killer. But at the same time, I would prefer that a person who loses their commander actually be making a serious mistake. Commanders are, by design, not units which can be killed by one single relatively minor mistake like not running a swarm of fleas over the area they intend to build over, repeatedly, until it can be certain there are no traps. They can withstand a bertha shell, an annihilator beam, a flurry of battleship fire, several hits from a sniper, a direct nuke strike... I enjoy playing chess, and I think of making an attack on a Commander as being put in "check". It immediately requires a response and signals a major shift in the flow of the game, but it does not actually signal its end. You must be entirely outplayed in order to lose your commander, to be put in checkmate. I do not support any idea which can signal an immediate destruction to the commander without any opportunity for recourse. Besides this, laying mines on good metal spots only serves to slow down the game - mines cannot be directly detected or attacked. Cloaking and stealth are abilities which I only give out very rarely and only to a few units, and only when I know it will directly benefit the game and add enjoyment. Mines seem only able to slow the game down.

-One person said, if you can force your opponent to build a Juno, it's worth it. So in other words, you build mines, your opponent build a Juno, your mines are cleared, the game resumes. This sounds like a delaying tactic more than anything, and people don't necessarily have an extra 10 minutes to spend on a game, doing nothing but waiting for a Juno to build, fire, micro some units to destroy the mines, then repeat until it's safe. It sounds pretty annoying, and just a time sink.

I have not yet seen any reason why mines should remain in the game, only reasons why they should be removed. The fact that a unit is useful does not necessarily mean that it is a good unit or that it is fun to use. Moving nuke bombers to level 1 and reducing their costs to 1/10 would make them extremely useful, but not at all fun.
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JohannesH
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by JohannesH »

Other kinds of static defense delay the game in similar manner too. If the players just wait for the juno to build for 10 minutes they must suck immensely.

Though it wouldnt be that terrible not to have them.
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KaiserJ
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by KaiserJ »

i always thought minelayers could be improved by giving them more things they could build; radar, llt, solar and metalmaker.... they would essentially be a t1 freaker / consul sort of role, decent BP but not able to start many constructions themselves. giving them the option to capture and stealth also might make them a lot more interesting.

armed minelayer also might be kinda cool.

currently i don't use them much, just because it never really springs to mind as "this is what i would do best to do right now." increase their gadgetry would increase their usefulness, which would in turn increase their use.
pintle
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Re: Removing mines/minelayers, any objections?

Post by pintle »

Mine com kill... especially in BA with its lolfail aoe on mines, its your own damn nooby fault for having inadequate scouting/not dgunning where you suspect mines to be (a standard play in XTA).
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