Upgradeable Hydro

[Legion Darrath]

You know just like the Q gate idea why not just test it... There's already at least one upgradable HC mod out there.

[Frozen_byte]

That mod is really buggy and imbalanced...
Played a few times with it and there was never made any balance changes.

[noobymcnoobcake]

That mod is really buggy and imbalanced...
Played a few times with it and there was never made any balance changes.

Yeah that mod is broken. Seras hydro dont even produce energy. As for balance well, Kinda not a strong point for that mod.

there is a mod for manufacturing plants. The model is still there as its civilian. But These cost 12k mass and can be built on hydrocarbon deposits. They are like T3 factories but have INSANE build power. ASF in about 3 seconds.

However I don't really want these changes put into the game. Just leave it as it is.

[Pavese]

GUYS GUYS!

We just take the useless t3 stationary artillery and make it into a t2 Hydro? ITS GOING TO BE AMAZING!

On serious thought i would endorse this idea in a thought out solution. Having a little extra e-boost before going for a tech would certainly help. But since this is actually balanced early game we are talking about, this needs to be extra balanced out. Don't f*** up "early game" for this.

[MushrooMars]

Is it just me or is this forum slightly more volatile than others? Not that internet forums aren't simmering at a standard.

Anyways, here's my two cents: I like this idea, but it would need to be perfect to be used.

The point of an upgradeable Hydrocarbon PGen would be to add more stress to map control. Suddenly, even in T3, hydrocarbon points become incredibly valueable, as they dish out more energy than T3 reactors for noteably less cost, and may even allow you to temporarily bypass building a T3 PGen to begin building T3 tech.

Overall, it's a good idea, but only if it REQUIRES map control and strategic planning to be effective, and it must be effective.

Otherwise, it's just a waste of work.

[noobymcnoobcake]

My fear is that it will allow you to skip t2 power or something. And those gunships, acu upgrades, and t3 land will come out much faster as less infastructure will be needed to support them.

[Crayfish]

I always liked this idea in theory, but besides the points people have already made, the major problem with this idea is that the Hydrocarbon spots are generaly in a safe area, very close to spawn points in your base, not on ground that has to be fought over. This means they would become basically a risk free energy boost, a bit like playing with x2 or the original Vanilla Sim City mass fabs. This in turn, as already noted, would upset the balance of alot of maps.
If all Hydro spots were in central / no mans land areas, like the wreckage on Setons and Isis, then I think upgradable hydros would be good, but as things stand, maybe not.

[Supreme321]

Because this seems to need clarification the hydro plant is actually more efficient then a t3 power plant so you should always build it, yet most of you call it useless in the late game.

[Kryo]

its not useless but its output is quite negligible compared to t3. But i dont think thats a problem. I dont think it needs a change either.

Its meant to be a "kick" starter for early game, nothing less and nothing more.

[AdmiralZeech]

Actually, here's an idea that will affect both Hydros and Massfabs. (I think TA had this in some form?)

What if map points (hydro and mass points) could be used for more than just resource generation?

Ideally we'd have some new structures to build on these points that do fancy things, but since we're nixing new units, instead we can give existing structures additional benefits when built on these points.


Factories could build more cheaply, missile silos could build faster, PDs gain increased damage, radar would gain omni, etc etc.

This makes things interesting especially when massfabs enter the picture - massfabs are inferior to mexes in terms of mass efficiency, but you might want to use them if you can build far more interesting things on mass points.

The hydro structure itself might be pretty quickly obsoleted in this scheme, tho. A solution might be - anything built adjacent to a hydro power plant, gains benefits as if it was build on the hydro point itself. So a hydro plant becomes a bit of a multiplier for hydro point bonuses.



I like the idea of map points becoming key strategic areas to fight over, even more important than merely economic structures. (especially hydro points, since they are so singular and rare.)