Thoughts on accessibility

[BLITZ_Molloy]

I notice a lot of the conversation around FAF revolves around getting people into the game and talks about how people are ultimately slightly put off by the complexity of certain aspects. I was just thinking has anybody thought about perhaps simplifying certain aspects of the game to make it less complex? I understand that this would be a bit of a hot potato because one persons mindless busy work is another mans satisfying micro.

To me the micro surrounding extractor upgrades is quite tedious. I learnt the upgrade them all and pause till they're assisted trick the other day but still. And what's the point of needing to put 4 mass storages around them? Couldn't there just be two levels of extractor and no adjacency bonus? Free up peoples time to micro their attack units instead. It's not going to make the game extra nooby because the pro's will find other areas to assert their superior attention to detail.

How about units not building at their full build range? The way you have to move the commander to a position within his build range before building an extractor to do an efficient queue is crazy to me. Maybe that's an engine limitation that can't be fixed but it feels kind of arbitrary coming from TA where he just did that kind of thing without having to be babysat.

I could go on but those are the two main ones really. And maybe the slight overemphasis on assisted building or build capacity as a resource. It's taking me a lot of practice to do those things quickly enough that I have time to reclaim and micro my battles. Units need a lot more micro because the engagements end so much more quickly. In TA your units would survive a lot longer for whatever reason. Lower attack ranges and dps perhaps. In this game you NEED to tweak your attack units or they'll get wiped out in 10 seconds by artillery if stationary, or anything else if moving and too spread out.

These are just the observations of a fairly nooby player. I admit as I spend more time playing I'm getting used to the quirks and I'm starting to learn to do stuff at the speed which you need to. Next step is making up some templates. Maybe there was as big a learning curve to TA and I'm just forgetting it because the fundamentals are etched into my brain as gospel.

[Wakke]

I think no one can argue about the build range thing: it's a useless extra compexity. So I would welcome a fix if it were possible.

Regarding the mass storage: I think it is fine it gives adjacency to mexes, but it should be made (way) less effecient, so you do not have to build them. At the same time mass storages can be made cheaper, since they will now be used primarily for, you know, storing mass.
Ideally, the rationale should be: 'I need mass storages for their storaging needs. I might as well build them around mass extractor for a small adjacency bonus.' Instead of: 'To hell with storing mass, I just want to boost my mass extractors output'.

[ZaphodX]

Ultimately all of these stumbling blocks are part of getting good at the game. Removing or simplifying any of them would be very detrimental to the game imo. I don't think any of those things are actually very complex at all and removing or changing them is not a good idea. Part of getting good is being able to understand and use all these features while still keeping up with the micro.

Surrounding mex with storage takes very little time to do. Surrounding mex is part of building your economy and your mass storage buffer. It is also an absolutely essential stage in-between t2 and t3 mex upgrades.

Moving units into range of building is just an important part of how you improve your opening build orders. It's only really needed a little bit during the first couple of minutes. How would you try to remove this feature? Give units huge build range?!? Trying to 'fix' or remove this feature seems utterly insane to me.

Build power is an important strategic part of the game to help with dynamic map control and reducing your opponents ability to react to (or create) change. Protecting your bp and attacking your opponent's bp is an important part of the game.

[discoverer2k4]

there is nothing to be said against to train against other players on your level on -1 or -2 game speed so you have more time to improve your micro.
Don't get me wrong sometimes I hate it as well that you have to micro some things in the game so much to be effective but on the other hand and thats very important - it makes every game so unique.
I had the same feelings as you as I began to play FA... take your time to improve and be patient - you will get better
and if not the rating system will take this into account so you will find everytime people who struggle with things like this as well...

[ColonelSheppard]

To me the micro surrounding extractor upgrades is quite tedious. I learnt the upgrade them all and pause till they're assisted trick the other day but still. And what's the point of needing to put 4 mass storages around them? Couldn't there just be two levels of extractor and no adjacency bonus? Free up peoples time to micro their attack units instead. It's not going to make the game extra nooby because the pro's will find other areas to assert their superior attention to detail.

it's more or less like upgrading them

I could go on but those are the two main ones really. And maybe the slight overemphasis on assisted building or build capacity as a resource. It's taking me a lot of practice to do those things quickly enough that I have time to reclaim and micro my battles. Units need a lot more micro because the engagements end so much more quickly. In TA your units would survive a lot longer for whatever reason. Lower attack ranges and dps perhaps. In this game you NEED to tweak your attack units or they'll get wiped out in 10 seconds by artillery if stationary, or anything else if moving and too spread out.

SupCom is not TA, buildpwer and assisting is one of the great things in SupCom, and one of the reason why many people (including me) said that SupCom2 is not SupCom, multi tasking is more important in supcom than in some other games, as you normally have multiple fights at the same time and often also multiple macro managment hot spots
and yes it takes a lot of pratice

Next step is making up some templates.

you shouldnt overestimate templates, only the basic ones (5xmx, Pd+wall, engeryplants) are really usefull in my opinion

also i always encourage new players to have a look here:
viewtopic.php?f=40&t=2879
viewtopic.php?f=40&t=2089
viewtopic.php?f=40&t=1614

[BLITZ_Molloy]

I can completely see it from the pro's point of view. Most of what I'm suggesting could potentially totally upend the balance and if you said we should change any of the fundamentals of TA's micro I'd probably declare it heresy. FAF is the only RTS example I can think of that tweaks the existing game balance marginally without ending up a completely new balance mod, pissing off all the vanilla players.

I'm looking forward to getting these fundamentals of playing down. I can already see how awareness of these factors (even if I'm a bit slow at executing them) can let me tear past the >800 rated players in ranked matches and grind through them quickly. Give me 50 more games of practice and I should be able to get up to a respectable rating.

I'm only suggesting that a few minor tweaks (not necessary sweeping changes) might give the game more of a learning curve and less of a cliff. One of the other topics on here at the moment demonstrates that the average player is about 800. They're not mastering the skills that would bump them into what people consider Average Joes in the youtube commentary sense ~1200. Maybe they could do with a helping hand so the 1st few minutes of economy management aren't quite so easy to f*** up? On the other hand maybe they'll just continue to play Battle of Thermopylae all day. I'll grant you the teching and economy management isn't nearly as big a feature of 1vs1 ranked matches.

FAF reminds me a lot of a mod called XTA created by the Swedish Yankspankers, creators of the Demo Recorder and TA Spring. It also had a very exponential economy where players who got ahead just took off completely. It was great fun but it really separated the men from the boys so new players absolutely hated it and it was only really popular with a handful of hardcore players. I think FAF goes a long way towards balancing that out nicely with so many game enders and opportunities to assassinate commanders should you fall behind in the early game.

Surely templates have more usefulness than that? Drawing penises is time consuming manually.

[ColonelSheppard]

no pro posted in this thread so far

The Community does the balance here, if you want to suggest balance changes you can do this in near future for the next season again.
However, without intending to get offensive: I think you are not qualified to do so already, i can only encourage you to play more games until you suggest to totally change the gameplay

the SupCom gameplay is unique, and that has to be kept, a not so good learning curve is no reason to change this (no reason at all)

[ZaphodX]

I can already see how awareness of these factors (even if I'm a bit slow at executing them) can let me tear past the >800 rated players in ranked matches and grind through them quickly. Give me 50 more games of practice and I should be able to get up to a respectable rating.

Then you already have reached a level of competitive understanding, practice makes perfect from now on

A lot of players are casual gamers who enjoy comp stomps, x2 resources, thermo etc and never intend to play this game at any competitive level and indeed have no interest in playing efficiently or to a decent standard.

[discoverer2k4]

I think you can also win games at <1000 rating if you give a f*** on mass storages and unit micro all you have to do is spam land, be aggressive with your commander and don't turtle too much in the mid except you wanna snipe acus or mexes ... and don't send your units into death if you think they gonna die without making so much damage on your opponent - better send them back, wait for some more units or build good counter units and try it again.
If you understand the economy, know that you shouldn't run out of energy and have to reclaim as much as you can you are on a good way to become an average player (where I am at the moment). If you wanna be more - you need to be as effective as you can and learn micro units

[ColonelSheppard]

I think you can also win games at <1000 rating if you give a f*** on mass storages and unit micro

thats true