Nukes in TA are mostly a question of whether to build them, and their primary consideration is resources and build time. The position of silos on both sides, and to some extent the position and disposition of antinuke, are irrelevant. Compared to a game like Defcon, where position and strategy can be applied to the otherwise simple affair of firing ze missiles, I think PA can implement a more strategically interesting nuke system. We can do better than the system in TA and SupCom. Cheap Silos My first recommendation regarding making nukes a more dynamic gameplay dimension would be to make nuclear silos, and other nuclear launch apparatus, cheaper. This may require increasing the cost of the missiles themselves appropriately, although cheaper nukes is not necessarily undesirable. Reducing the cost of silos makes acquiring nuclear infrastructure in multiple locations achievable. Not all of them will be live, but you will have the option to construct missiles if desired. Having cheap silos also reduces the need for the player to actively defend their silos. Silos should also have a strictly limited capacity to store missiles. Two, four, perhaps as many as eight or even ten. I am leaning towards four as a nice, round number. Silos should launch promptly when ordered, but have a very lengthy period before they are ready to fire another missile. If you want more missile storage, or more immediate launch capability, then you must construct additional silos. Complex Missile Defense Missile defense can be made more interesting than a simple area of effect where a targeted nuke will be ineffective. It is too binary in its effect, and not strategically interesting. For this feature I would suggest a more or less direct ripoff of the game Defcon. Missile defense should be a long range targeted weapon, like anti-air, that deals damage to missiles passing through its area of effect. Missiles are destroyed when they run out of HP, much like units. Stacking multiple overlapping missile defense systems results in a more robust strategic defense grid, capable of intercepting more nukes. However, launching many missiles into multiple missile defense systems can actually result in some missiles slipping through. Due to the long cooldown of firing from a silo, if you wanted to fire such a large salvo of nukes, you will need to use many silos firing simultaneously. Missile defense could even be incorporated into the missile silo, although not necessarily. A strategic missile defense structure standing independently is also viable. The side effects of the fusion are interesting, however. For example, when one player constructs nukes, the other player constructs silos in a purely defensive capacity, and now has the ability to construct nukes of their own if desired. Furthermore, much as in Defcon, adding a limitation stipulating that silos which are firing nukes, or on cooldown from firing, cannot act as strategic missile defense creates a variety of interesting strategic considerations. The ideal time to nuke an opponent is when their silos are inoperative because they are nuking you. Use of strategic missile submarines to get in close to exploit a window of vulnerability in the enemy strategic missile defense is very possible. Intelligence Warfare Nuclear war should primarily be about knowing where the targets are, and finding enemy silos and missile defense. Simply having antinuke should not dispel worry about being nuked- an enemy with nukes is always dangerous. Conversely, having nukes ready should be stressful, because burning them on empty space, or into enemy missile defense, is a very expensive mistake. Omni sensors are absolute no-no's. They destroy any kind of intelligence gameplay, as both players have far too much information once they are on the board. A solid scout of valuable intelligence should be a big score for the player (for many dimensions, not just nukes), that should not just be handed to the player for some resource cost. This becomes increasingly important when players are constructing silos in faraway sections of a big map, with the expectation that the opponent is simply not going to find them. Building large amounts of defense is expensive, and should be unnecessary, as hiding assets should not require extraordinary measures by the hider. Intelligence should be poor, and solid intel consequently very valuable. Scout units getting visual creates a more compelling intelligence game than having a tower that tells you all you need to know, unless your opponent goes to very extraordinary lengths. Cold War UI Some additional nuke management tools would be excellent to allow for ease of controlling a large nuclear arsenal. One of the biggest issues is having to assign orders individually to the silos. Due to vastly disparate locations, and potentially being numerous, this could be a chore. A smarter way to solve this problem is with Orders as First Class Entities- allow the player to designate points as "Nuke Targets" or other custom designation. Then, with a single global command like "Fire Ze Missiles" all of that player's nuclear silos pick their targets, one missile per target point, and distribute their fire automatically. Being able to set policies regarding the construction of missiles would also be desirable. For example, designating that silos should build and maintain a supply of 2 missiles automatically, and replenish automatically if ordered to fire. Special designations might also be applied, or replaced, to give some silos different behaviors from others. For example, a different designation might be applied to a big base's silo to direct it to construct the maximum number of missiles.
The only result I can see from this, is people build antinuke everywhere. Why would this be fun? *edit* Which isn't actually that different from the current system in FA. I'm not against tampering with the nuke system, but i'm not sure how this one would be any better. Another point i'd like to make is that omni sensors didn't actually help you identify anything without a visual, so how are they relevant to your discussion?
Just one antinuke everywhere? What if I build multiple silos and nuke the same place multiple times? Or what if I air strike one or more of your antinukes that you put everywhere? Or just invade?
The fundamentals are largely unchanged. The original systems in TA/SupCom, the implementation in Defcon, and this thread's OP are all attempting to capture a similar gameplay mechanic. Some of the details, like how antinuke stacking works, and the incentive to make multiple silos rather than one big, expensive, valuable silo, are minor changes.
I dont think we should put that much effort into warheads, and if we consider the "lore", all weaponry is already the best available. I do agree that silos should be cheap to build and nukes expensive, delay between launches is a good idea too. Not too fond of having to build multiple antinukes for a single missile, if anything I rather have anti-nuke kamikaze interceptors.
So from that wall of text you want to: Move the cost from launcher to missile Add long delays between launches (which is largely irrelevant if you have cheap silos) Maybe combine silos with anti-nukes And for anti-nukes to behave more like TMD rather than firing missiles That last point is actually about the only difference between what you've described and supcom anti-nukes. They fired a missile which did one point of damage to the nuke, normal nukes had one health, Yolona Oss missiles had two. They had a targeting range where they would fire, and were quite capable of firing on a nuke which would detonate before being destroyed. They could very much be overwhelmed by volleying nukes. Oh, and you hate good intel.
I want this interface to be an exception from the rest, in that the targets are not just giant red circles on the ground, but that they also show a visualization of all the ballistic trajectories going at once.
The best idea here is the nuke overlay idea, and I would suggest that it be expanded to cover ALL long range attack units. A well designed way to zoom out, identify your long range weaponry, and give them targets would be highly beneficial.
I consider nukes to be an entirely late game affair, and I don't really think it's that bad if nukes are OP. That's actually one of the reasons I really liked the OP experimentals, they were these things that would bring the long slog of a tutling match to an abrupt end. I have had several way too long FA matches that ended in two people launching nukes at one another shooting them down with anti nukes until one guy got out resourced and couldn't build anti nukes fast enough. As long as anti nukes are equally as expensive as nukes or slightly cheaper it should be fine. One thing I would have wanted in FA was when you select multiple nuke silos and start launching nukes, have them launch one at a time from each silo in sequence rather than simultaneously launching one nuke from every silo you have selected.
One wrench I feel I need to throw in here, sorry. It was pointed out that moons and asteroids are "The High Ground". In other words, it costs less resources to launch attacks from a low gravity airless moon, than it does from a planet. It's an important strategic advantage, that the developers have said they are actually including in their design. You may want to keep that detail in mind when thinking about how to make a better nuke/anti-nuke system for PA.
You do realize that the year was "2012". The game had just been started/kickstarting at this time. Look at the dates to find a relevant thread, within the last few months, not years.
Yeah because the devs arent currently focussing on getting the roster done and general ballancing comming later ...
