Return ACU death to full nuke - Other ways to stop draws

[FunkOff]

As we all know, in the Supreme Commander beta, the ACU death nuke did full-nuke damage (70,000) to all units, friend and foe alike. This death weapon was nuked first to make draws in 1v1 matches much harder (by reducing damage to ACUs), and second to reduce the utility to "comm bombing" in team games (by reducing damage to structures). This nerfing of the death nuke undermines Supreme Commander's broader goal of being a simulation.

Therefore, I propose we return the ACU death nuke to 70,000 damage to all units, friend and foe, and instead employ other means of countering comm bombs and intentional draws.

Potential solutions:
1-Recall defeat: In the campaign, some enemies recall when defeated rather than dying with an ACU death nuke. This is a "perfect" solution in that it totally eliminated comm bombs and draws. However, Chris Taylor, creator of Supreme Commander, always emphasized that ending a game with an ACU death nuke is an important part of the experience, so we should entertain other ideas.

2- Recall re-deploy: When an ACU's health is brought to zero for the first time, he doesn't die, instead he recalls, teleporting away from his current location and teleporting somewhere else. ACU recall/re-deploy should be limited to once per game and should occur automatically. (It should be noted that Ctrl+K should be disabled for ACUs at all times with re-deploy enable.)
2-A- The simplest re-deploy location is the player's original spawn location. Ideally, the ACU would retain invulnerability for a few moments (perhaps 5-10 seconds) upon re-deploy, but would again be vulnerable to attack and death.
2-B- Re-deploy could be at the player's original location. IE, teleport the ACU away for a few seconds before re-deploying the ACU at his last location.
2-C- Re-deploy at another location - such as his largest concentration of units, or structures, or next to his most valuable existing unit. (This method would be the most challenging to employ.)

3- Protection shield: When the ACU hp reaches zero the first time, it immediately deploys a shield that blocks all damage and lasts for a short time, perhaps 5-10 seconds.

Discussion:
Option 2-B and option 3 would likely be similar in practice and likely would work the best, overall. It would stop most comm bombs and draw attempts from killing an opposing player. The only downside is that the comm bomb would remain effective against bases if the ACU was able to make it there. Option 2-A is the best option for defeating comm bombs against bases because an ACU must first be defeated once before it can be used to comm-bomb.

Generally, all of the ideas reduce the effectiveness of single-strike assassination tactics, which can be seen as either a positive or a negative. A nuke hitting an ACU would not score a kill if it had a shield or recall/redeploy available, nor would a mavor shell, or et cetera.

Note: Years ago, I already programmed a "recall/redploy" mod for GW. This sort of thing is very easy to implement.

[ThomasHiatt]

Ruining the gameplay to adhere to imaginary physics and simulation rules undermines Supreme Commander's primary goal of being a video game that is actually good and enjoyable to play.

[UnorthodoxBox]

Probably should make OC do full damage to ACUs while we are at it, since in a simulation there is no reason why an sacu takes full damage and an acu doesn't.