Spring RTS Engine

So one thing I frequently run into in TA is that when I'm trying to micro a unit (e.g. early harassment) by moving it around, dodging rockets, hiding behind buildings, etc. my unit will sometimes not shoot what I want it to shoot but rather some other random unit or building nearby. I'd like a way to assign an attack priority to some unit (or even area) so that while I'm giving my guy lots of movement orders, he will focus his attack on a particular unit (a mex or something).

Applications of this would be me tagging a few priority targets that I've got LOS to, then sending a couple of flanks of tanks around it and not having to worry about telling them to stop (i.e. be vulnerable) and shoot the correct thing.

On a related note, it'd be nice if movement orders didn't interfere with how units are shooting at all. Usually when you give a movement order, the guy will stop shooting, maybe turn his turret some, then realize there's an enemy nearby, and resume shooting, which usually involved him aiming his turret again. That kinda sucks. I can get around this with a single unit pretty effectively by going into first person mode (lol, I know) and holding right click so it fires freely... then no matter what movement patterns I use, it will fire continuously. Try it one day with a razorback or warrior.

And lastly, and this is sort of unrelated, it'd be nice if units would assign priority to targets automatically based on direction. I don't want my orcone or razorback turning all the way around to kill a single guy then turning back to kill the rest. Especially with easy-to-kill units, my guys should try to focus on some direction unless something with even higher priority happens (e.g. manual targetting).

A workaround for the moment (at least with some units) for the first thing is to fire at the ground in front of whatever you want to hit.

I don't understand what you mean. I can tell my guy to shoot at the enemy just fine, if I want him to stop, stand still, and shoot, but that's not what I want. I want to micromanage my two zippers or whatever to dodge and weave and hide behind buildings while shooting at that mex at every possible opportunity, not wasting time turning the turret and re-locking-on or targetting other things.

I'd rather be able to set the secondary command like the sub AI can do using a modifier key.

aka attack while doing this or move while doing that or repair while or reclaim while etc........

Of course with such things as move while moving there being filtered out.

Yeah that'd be neat.

This is another bloat option. It will make the code more complex, the game controlling more complex, and won't make anything really more fun.
Maybe the target selection can be made smarter, but moving this control to the user is just complicating things.

In your opinion, maybe. I feel that it would in fact make the game more fun. Any change will make the code more complex, unless it's just an optimization (but then again, the optimization could make the code complex). Obviously unit control would be made more complex, as that was the goal of the suggestion. It could be done elegantly (e.g. hold a modifier key and click on the unit to give it a standing order to do that whenever possible without moving) without "bloating".

I agree with jc, if anything, units should just "remember" their last user target and shoot that whenever possible.

That would be a fine way to do it. I suspect it'll be on the same level of "code complexity" as doing a full blown priority thing though.

Tobi wrote:I agree with jc, if anything, units should just "remember" their last user target and shoot that whenever possible.

+1

In your opinion, maybe. I feel that it would in fact make the game more fun. Any change will make the code more complex, unless it's just an optimization (but then again, the optimization could make the code complex). Obviously unit control would be made more complex, as that was the goal of the suggestion. It could be done elegantly (e.g. hold a modifier key and click on the unit to give it a standing order to do that whenever possible without moving) without "bloating".

It's not even so much about code complexity, it's about not adding optional features that 3% of the players will actually use, with the rest of the players wondering why their opponent beats them.

I'm totally in favor of improving automated unit behavior though, like what tobi suggested.

3%? Anyone who puts in the effort to micromanage would use this feature, really. Because it would give them an advantage. Like micromanagement. I don't see how this would be a little-used feature.

Tobi wrote:I agree with jc, if anything, units should just "remember" their last user target and shoot that whenever possible.

I completly agree, I "use" it often exepting that it will work :)
( Without succes of course )
At least, I find the solution very natural and intuitive.

krogothe wrote:

Tobi wrote:I agree with jc, if anything, units should just "remember" their last user target and shoot that whenever possible.

+1

+1

Simple and intuitive. But make it mod controlled.

edit: And make the unit "forget" the target when the user hits stop.

Don't worry, Vehementi, prioritizing targets by madly clicking on them is a SupCom feature, therefore, including that into Spring will be top priority.
(Ok, I'm just being mean, and of bad faith, sorry.)

Would also be nice if units didnt target based on a cost comparison.. but rather you could use some sort of othr method.. (cost has to be balanced for other purposes) So you could say possibly give units a modifier.. the standard being 1, a 1.5 would be more important than a 1.. and a .8 less.. as values for some tag.. just alter it from using the cost and use that scale.. would be more mod controllable..

Well, through clever use of Category and BadtargetcategoryX, you can roughly do that now. For example, in SWS we just put in a sniper unit: a rifle's a rifle, so you expect it to do damage to most everything, but obviously he should be shooting at infantry if they are available as targets. So we (and by "we" I mean "I forced Nemo") went in and gave every unit, except infantry, a "NOTINF" category, then made BadTargetCategory on the sniper "NOTINF" as well. Voila, now he'll fire at vehicles and troops, but if there's a mixed force he'll always pick the latter.

I'm not saying it's not a feature I wouldn't want, though, just noting that it is partially possible to prioritize targets from the modder's perspective. Perhaps you could assign a class "NOTMEX" to all non-mex units and give the Flash (or whatever raiding unit) that badtargetcat.

Fanger wrote:Would also be nice if units didnt target based on a cost comparison.. but rather you could use some sort of othr method.. (cost has to be balanced for other purposes) So you could say possibly give units a modifier.. the standard being 1, a 1.5 would be more important than a 1.. and a .8 less.. as values for some tag.. just alter it from using the cost and use that scale.. would be more mod controllable..

I thought they targetted by health... I'm pretty sure that units attack the lowest health thing they can... thats why its hard to build things under Guardian/Punisher fire... they target new construction, so you may need a mobile jammer...

I dont want a rough work around..

and no they target based on cost, trust me.. When I had my commander costing a 100000 metal (far more than any other unit) it would be targeted almost immediately.. however stuff targets new construction.. also.. we need another method...

I remember when working with the targeting code that there was a section designed to give greater priority to the unit that was just previously targeted manually. It looked like it should work, although I did not trace out the execution.