Obligatory navy thread

Discussion in 'Planetary Annihilation General Discussion' started by chrishaldor, August 31, 2012.

  1. chrishaldor

    chrishaldor Member

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    Well, we're well on our way to the 1st stretch goal now, so we should probably talk about naval warfare a bit

    I always found it a bit iffy in TA/SC to be honest, it tended to be a case of one player having ships and the other not, since it was generally a case of submarines being spammed until the enemy's naval production is dead, then building cruisers and shelling their base/resources. In this way, the naval feels a bit distant from the rest of the game, which is mostly a map control battle.

    Since warships HAVE to be big and dangerous (because otherwise they're just floating tanks which would be exceeding silly), they always outclass land units, and are often used to clear an entire coastline, because frankly they have nothing better to do. (Although they are very expensive)

    If a resource like oil in the middle of the sea was introduced, players would be defending this point with their fleet, leaving land forces to the land. Of course, the resource would have to be valuable enough to be worth defending, so deep crust metal extractors or high energy-yield oil refineries.

    Am I just rambling here or does that sound like a good way to "Fix" navy? =P
  2. FunkOff

    FunkOff Member

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    Navy in TA sucked because, yes, more subs ==> win.

    This is only a balance issue... navy can actually be one of the most interesting types of battles because of the sheer variety.

    The key is, of course, balance. Here are a few good balance triangles:

    frigates < Subs (hidden under-water) < destroyers (anti-torp) < frigates (faster, cheapter)

    Cruisers < Destroyers (can dodge cruise missiles) < battleships (armored/long range) < cruisers (longer range cruiser missile can hit big/slow targets)

    Cruisers < destroyers (can dodge missiles) < torpedo bombers (flies/can't be hit by destroyer) < cruiser (AA missile launcher)

    And those are only a few of the units. Carriers, bombardment ships, missile subs, etc can all add a lot more variability.
  3. nightnord

    nightnord New Member

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    Navy in SupCom, IMO, was rather good, but very dependant on map. My favorite choice was always Seton's Clutch map (symmetric, with small isthmus between land). It was just cool about all forces - it was vital to keep ground struggle in center, it was vital to keep air superiority in behind, and it was vital to keep navy superiority on sides (while helping center guy as possible).

    Navy was second most vital thing on that map. Air was actually vital only on later stages (T3). But without navy support center guy would be almost certainly crushed, so side players just haven't time to "keep spamming submarines". They needed to build-up some long-range powerful fleet and get enemy forces away from center (as breaching the center base was almost instant win).

    So, as supporting force, it was very fun and rather complex to get right (due to high cost). But as primary strike force it wasn't very cool, right - range was just too small for ground attacks and investing in it, just to get couple of mexes destroyed wasn't a good strategy.
  4. sal0x2328

    sal0x2328 Member

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    I think the big issue with submarines in TA was that aircraft had a hard time countering them, and most ships had lackluster or no ASW capacity. If we have effective ASW aircraft and/or good ASW ships then submarines would not be as deadly.
  5. galaxy366

    galaxy366 Member

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    Please god Uber don't put subs in it. I hate them and I want to see lasers and moving gun turrets, not just a missile under water.
  6. sal0x2328

    sal0x2328 Member

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    I think there should be submarines but there should be good ASW options including ASW aircraft, ASW ships, and submarines that specialize in hunting other submarines.

    The inclusion of things like sonar/senor buoys that can be dropped from aircraft, and missiles which deliver torpedoes at long range could allow submarines to be countered if one invests in it. (Though as most ASW options would/should not be good general options ASW stuff should not dominate)
  7. allot

    allot Member

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    I agree actually.
    Sea is nothing of value except its in the way. This is something that should change.
    High value could be one option.
  8. chrishaldor

    chrishaldor Member

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    I kinda agree with that, ships can deliver torpedoes too, and destroyers are meant to be fairly anti-naval too

    I can see the point of subs, I just never found them to be particularly interesting, i'd far prefer stealth ships ><
  9. floretazo

    floretazo New Member

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    Weren't there underwater mexes in TA?

    Whether a source of metal, oil, or otherwise (hydroelectric power? Offshore windfarms?), I think it's vital that the water be a strategic space worth possessing for it's own sake, rather than simply another space from which to contest control of the land.
  10. nlspeed911

    nlspeed911 Member

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    So... Why not expand the naval game?

    What if you can build defences, air factories, mass extractors (or oil depots, or whatever idea you come up with) and energy generators on the water? Basically, everything except for land factories obviously (unless they produce amphibious units).
  11. floretazo

    floretazo New Member

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    I agree mostly, but I think there is a danger in making nearly everything work equally well on the water and on land. The trick is to make sure that you can do a lot on the water, while still making it sufficiently distinct from the ground game. I'm not sure exactly what it should be like though. In some cases this is a small distinction; aircraft carriers instead of air factories and such; weaker and more expensive than a factory, but mobile and carrying weapons.
  12. al3xtec

    al3xtec Member

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    yess, I would love this. Make water planets a whole new yet similar experience without much limitation.
  13. conqueringfools

    conqueringfools Member

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    One major request I had always made in SupCom was that the amphibious Cybran destroyer (can't remember the name offhand) be added to the tech 2 land factory. The idea being that it would be a valid way to take back naval superiority if your opponent spammed subs and kept you from building a naval factory in the first place.
  14. floretazo

    floretazo New Member

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    One thing that was lacking from SC was naval scouts. Not all ships need to be giant lumbering behemoths; it would be nice to have a small, fast moving, intelligence boat.
  15. nateious

    nateious Active Member

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    Yep, If I remember correctly they added them in in core contingency so while the original maps lacked underwater metal deposits the newer maps had them.

    I like this idea. I'd like to see some unique features that make terrain control of the ocean more valuable. Underwater geo-thermal spots, underwater metal deposits, that kind of thing.
  16. archer6110

    archer6110 Member

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    So what exactly would be wrong with them working equally well? The stretch goal is adding water planets, meaning it's entirely possible your starting world will ONLY BE WATER! I think it's important that you're able to do most everything you need in land or water. Of course limit some structures and obviously most units won't function well on water, but the basic factories/extractors/generators/defenses and of course interplanetary travel structures should all function in water.
  17. floretazo

    floretazo New Member

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    Excellent point; you're quite right that you need to be able to do just about everything on the water.

    In generally, I'm not against things working "equally well" on the water, but I think they need to be distinct, other wise the water game becomes like the ground game but with blue ground.

    One example of a balance issue that could be created if things in water and on land work exactly the same: underwater resources. While it's possible to attack land bound mexes from offshore, one can't generally attack underwater ones with land based firepower. Thus, the underwater resources need to have some disadvantage compared to their land based counterparts in order to compensate for being vulnerable to only one type of attack (barring planet killing impacts).
  18. archer6110

    archer6110 Member

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    Agree, Water units will need diversity and neat trinkets to keep them fresh and not land copies, the easiest of which is larger hulls and bigger guns (typical of warships vs tanks anyways) and any structure built on/in water should be able to be destroyed from above the surface. Metal extractors would be oil rigs, whatever form of energy you produce from/on water should have a surface facility.

    I think the distiction brainstorm is gonna be the hardest though... how do you keep naval combat from simply being who has the biggest di... I mean guns? :lol:
  19. chrishaldor

    chrishaldor Member

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    Quite right, navy still needs to be able to be killed by land arty/torp bombers =P
  20. pantsburgh

    pantsburgh Active Member

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    I'm gonna be honest, I'd much prefer to have lots of options for using the same units I'm using on land in water also than to have an exclusive set of water units alongside an exclusive set of land units. Floating tanks are not silly - they're efficient. Robots don't need air; why can't they go in/under water?

    Having dedicated naval units isn't something I'm against, I'd just really like to see the line between land and water units blurred a whole lot more than it usually is to help the game flow better.

    Also, yes, add resources and genuine value to going in the water. Maybe doing/building stuff could require having water nearby - turn it into an unofficial sort of real estate resource.

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