Spring RTS Engine

Now, I'm no modder. Never really tried, probably wouldn't be that good at it.... don't have the patience, frankly...

But, it occured to me reading through the game lobby forum, that a mod, centrered around co-operation, might be an interesting idea.

Say a mod where there are 2 'forces' to choose from, or, if we want to make it more complex, 4.

In the simple mod, army type one is ALL energy and metal production and fast construction stuff. Army type 2 is all combat, sea, air, land, hover, etc...

Why, you ask? Because that way, it'd be a great 4 player mod, since 1 player would HAVE to play as army t1, while 1 player has to play as army t2, and they have to do the share resources thing. This means that you FORCE co-operation. Now, I know this wouldn't be a popular or anything mod, but it might be a nice experimental concept....

And what do I mean by 4 army types before? Uh... well, Air, Sea, Land, Resources, obviously.

And heres why I posted this, I want to see other concepts that could apply to this. I'm very paticuarly interested in hearing how our AI people would factor the whole idea....

that sounds interesting.

What's to prevent constructor trade?

KDR_11k wrote:What's to prevent constructor trade?

Valid... that'd have to be something in the engine itself. Perhaps a tag that says "NoTrade = 1" that the engine takes to mean this unit can't be traded. You'd attach it to all the units in this mod, or something... would also block .take and such...

It'd need some more tags in the engine, and probably support in AIs for resource trading first...

My discussions with you about CC Generals style specialized arm and core factions comes to mind.

Ive been thinking about this a lot. I dont see con sharing as such a big deal, as long as each factions role takes a fair amount of infrastructure (As it does in TA). The player who was doing it first is always going to have a headstart. Even if they do con share, that means they are working together anyway.

Another method is limiting the abilities of the constructors/factories, so that the commander is very important. Of course, that limits playstyles.

The system i came up with, though, was merely have each faction use a different resource. They would require small amounts of one anothers resources (which they can produce in a less effecient manner on their own), so that sharing still confers advantages.

The resources/factions ive come up with thus far.

Energy. Exponential economic growth. Think GF. Probably highly defensive team, perhaps even totally immobile. Porcy. Relies on teching up to increasingly more powerful and longer range weapons. Also has counters to those weapons (Antinuke, bomb shelters, plasma deflectors, etc).

Metal. Expansionistic economic growth. Think CC. Highly mobile, probably very spammy, perhaps with only 1 tech level to make it clear that porcing with this faction isnt an option.

Buildtime/Micromanagement. Takes time, rather than resources, to build things. The benefit you get out of the units relies on your micro though, as they are large powerful mechs with specific roles that benefit from experience. Think Gundams limited units or War Evo. Probably just has one factory that makes the mechs (The commander) with buildtimes/workertimes in a totally different league to the other factions.

There are a range of other economic models you could use. Splitting buildtime and Micromanagement into two factions. Using Unit limits. Capture/reclaim/res etc.

Commshares usually work somewhat like BlackLiger's concept. Often one players runs the base and the other takes care of offense. Mexing the land with con units and protecting those cons can be the third job, when manpower allows.

So, one runs the SimBase part, the other the expansion part, and the third the micro. Kind of like Saktoth's factions.

I know someone who was making a mod like this actually. He only had two sides, army/economy. He stopped for some reason.

My name is Strategia, and I endorse this message.

This concept rules.

Shame no-one but a limited few would actually play it, though...

yeah but you can tell 3 people would go resource and back one guy on land, assist all his factories etc and make him output an obsene amount of hardware. also com sharing is surely cooperation?

Making a spring mod is a labour of love, sadly. Just look how professional and well made EE and Gundam are, yet they are not played nearly as much as the TA based mods.

I think we need a publicity department (And some dedicated servers wouldnt hurt). If you want to get a mod played, it takes a lot more than just making it and making it well.