Complete Annihilation News

[Tribulexrenamed]

The first and third images demonstrate that lack of consistent design theory in CA that I really hate so much.

Other than that they are fucking awesome.

Make us some models with consistent design plox.

Sure but they wont be textured and they have nothing to do with TA.

[Saktoth]

Sure but they wont be textured and they have nothing to do with TA.

In case you missed it this was me saying 'put up or shut up'.

We're working on it.

[Acidd_UK]

Making Fusions as big as an XBox would also help discourage people from spamming them. Want to spam fusions? Well, you'd better make sure you own half the map

Last time I checked, XBoxes were quite a lot smaller than fusion reactors / tanks / laser shooting robots...

[BaNa]

Hey guys, I'm not sure if this is the place for it, anyhoo, here are my impressions on CA recently. I'm totally out of touch with your design principles as of late and havent played competitively at all, so feel free to disregard it.

The super-fast build of solars and mexes (is this only at start?) : At first it felt really weird, but after a few games I've come to like it. Why waste time on the obvious things?

New(?) buildpics: These and some of the new models give CA a different feel from ota (i know, i know, that is the point). They make it seem more "game-like" (some may even use the phrase "toy-like"), I dunno if that is clear enough. The OTA buildpics are more serious, these drawings are well, drawings. However, they are well-usable, the borders make them easily identifiable, so all in all I'm ok with them.

Econ: Not fully used to the E structure yet, but I think your eco model is much better than it used to be (remember the eco center? :) ). I always forget that basic builders can make all structures, so i keep on spamming solars :D but thats me being stupid. E eco seems less important tho, you can win the game with a good handful of solars and winds if you take more mexes. I guess i like this, cause I'm more of a micro-er, but people can and will argue that this makes macro skills less important (then again, if you maek MONSTER ECO you can still overcome).

One thing i noticed in the gameplay is that units are more pronounced now. An arty really does die from like 2 shots, a tank really does have better damage and health, and so on. This is very good, but it takes getting used to coming from BA. Good job on making the units feel more different and thus, fun.

Cons making everything: Still not used to it. It makes me feel dirty.

T2 starts: Makes me feel even dirtier.

T3 starts: Ugh. Just leave the money on the bedstand and leave me.

Random things I like:
-Armed convech is win.
-Writing how fast things build is epic win.
-Mr D's and Cremuss's models are epic win.

[Google_Frog]

The econ is simpler but it still serves the same purpose. Basically it's there to throttle expansion and as a way to invest in the future. BA's econ takes more micro because of metal makers and mohos but the macro is the same, deciding how much to spend on the future. Most of the econ micro has been taken out of CA.

[CarRepairer]

Cons making everything: Still not used to it. It makes me feel dirty.

T2 starts: Makes me feel even dirtier.

T3 starts: Ugh. Just leave the money on the bedstand and leave me.

Haha. Just try it, it sounds so wrong but it feels so good.

Perhaps we should offer free counseling sessions to people with acute techtree-bypass guilt issues and neuroses associated with sudden exposure to flat balancing.

[El Capitano]

Last time I checked, XBoxes were quite a lot smaller than fusion reactors / tanks / laser shooting robots...

Your memory is faulty.

[Acidd_UK]

I use an armadillo as a mouse. Just don't ask where the cord goes.

[Gota]

The econ is simpler but it still serves the same purpose. Basically it's there to throttle expansion and as a way to invest in the future. BA's econ takes more micro because of metal makers and mohos but the macro is the same, deciding how much to spend on the future. Most of the econ micro has been taken out of CA.

You dared to change Chris Taylor's balance of econ micro and battle micro! now perish!

[Licho]

It was flawed, he fixed it in Supcom, play that?

[Acidd_UK]

Supcom is horrible

[Saktoth]

Thanks for the feedback Bana.

T2/T3 starts: Firstly, its hard to pull these off so good luck. Dont think of it as a 't2' start though. There is no t2. The factories are Light Vehicles, Heavy Tanks, Infantry Bots, Special Operations Walkers, Gunships, Aircraft and Mechs.

The heavier, specialized facs are to be geared towards taking on entrenched positions rather than early raiding, so they tend to be more useful later in the game, but they dont make the lighter facs useless. Which factory you pick and when is due to situational appropriateness- the map, your playstyle, but mostly what the enemy is doing. The factories are balanced so that they can all be in play at the same time and filling a role on the battlefield.

So rather than 'little tank < medium tank < big tank' you have everything serving different functions on the battlefield.

Fast building: 'Boost' replaces your starting metal, typically 1k. You'll notice you start with your storage empty. Instead, the red ring around your commander represents your remaining boost. Boost builds at 2x (?) regular speed. Its to get you into the action faster, as you say.

Buildpics: BA doesnt use OTA buildpics. The OTA buildpics are really, really awful, you should see them some time, i think NOTA uses them. They're greyish indistinguishable blobby things that look nothing like the unit 90% of the time.

These new buildpics are auto-generated. They all use the same background (depending on where they can be built), angle and lighting etc. This cuts down on workload a little and ensures they're up-to-date and consistent.

Econ: Solars are now the same price as winds (40) and have very high HP for cost. You can use them as barriers and walls. This is to make them a bit more unique compared to fragile, unreliable winds, since they cost the same amount of energy now due to 1-1-1.

Energy is still very important, especially since it costs e to make e. If you lose all your energy, you cant just spam up some solars as long as you've got metal, so you need to plan much more carefully (though you have more storage than BA).

A little bit of overdrive also goes a long way, and while it gets less effecient if you whore e too much, you can double your mex output with ~8 energy to 1 metal. Thats equiv to an mm rate of about 80-1 in BA. For just 10% more metal, the conversion is ~3-1, 2x more effecient than BA metalmakers.

[Tribulexrenamed]

T2/T3 starts: Firstly, its hard to pull these off so good luck. Dont think of it as a 't2' start though. There is no t2. The factories are Light Vehicles, Heavy Tanks, Infantry Bots, Special Operations Walkers, Gunships, Aircraft and Mechs.

Okay....... tell me when its working......

[Pxtl]

Last time I played in Stable, the Arm windgen icon didn't match the model - it was the original-content spirally windgen in the icon, but the model was a re-make of the OTA windgen.

[Saktoth]

Icon generation is an automatic process, they just need to be rebuilt.

There will be a few quirks like this (and mismatched corpses too) as we change models.

[reivanen]

I must agree on the subject that something should be done to the buildpics, they are a bit blurry atm. As iceui is being implemented, could they be increased in width and height by 10 px or so, that would make them much crispier. Also the halo should be removed, they were crispier without it.

Other than that, i think these autogenerated ones are really nice.

About the mismatching buildpics: maybe they should get rebuilt in every stable release?

( i saw some nice cellshading type of wip shader from jk on these forums. Play around with it and you might get really nice blueprint styled buildpics, atleast it could be worth a shot (TA used blueprint styled icons first but decided to go with photo styled later on))

[Tribulexrenamed]

Icon generation is an automatic process, they just need to be rebuilt.

There will be a few quirks like this (and mismatched corpses too) as we change models.

AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED CORPSES

[Pressure Line]

Icon generation is an automatic process, they just need to be rebuilt.

There will be a few quirks like this (and mismatched corpses too) as we change models.

AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED CORPSES

yes, because that is totally possible

[Acidd_UK]

Take unit, remove random tris/polys, possibly using some sort of grouping algorithm, apply say a 10% random spatial morph, turn all colours into metal colours. Add smoke emitter in centre of model. Etc.

It's totally possible...

[Warlord Zsinj]

Nevermind that, I've been suggesting autogenerated corpses for ages. Take a unit, tell it to stop moving once it is killed, overlay a 'damaged' texture on it (preferably using something like a multiply filter rather then simple opacity).