Yes - if there are two power plants next to the same factory the factory will produce 5 units per step(0.2 seconds), or 25 units per second.
1 base unit + 2 units from the first factory + 2 units from the next factory
Interesting to see that this is still not fixed. It looks like the same class of error that some people on Mac clients were getting at this place of mine back when I first made it:
http://www.roblox.com/Inverse-Kinematic-Characters-Open-Source-place?id=167637083[/quote]
We have someone investigating why this specific game crashes so much.
Ok, so I’ve played a couple of games and I have some feedback.
First, I realized that this is basically an economic game. I haven’t figured out what the optimal mix of power plants is, but I think it’s around 50%. Once I get my engine going, I don’t even have time to conquer new territory, I’m so busy building power plants. I get so many guys and no one can beat me.
I think artillery and forts should have a build time. It’s cheap when I attack a city and the owner can build a fort in 2 seconds if they are paying attention.
The power plant minigame is annoying. I feel like power plant placement efficiency dominates every other aspect of the game. Having the most units is an unbeatable strategy, doubly with the Lancaster’s mechanic where 1000 guys beat 200 guys with almost no losses (I’m not saying this part is bad, but it is a double-win mechanic. Whoever starts to win wins more).
I feel like there is very little opportunity to come from behind to win. I feel like the map doesn’t matter enough (though I like the fact is it randomly generated). Here are some half-baked ideas for how to improve the balance in general:
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Make some cities have coal. You can only build power plants in coal cities.
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Make some cities have steel. For each city you control with steel, you can build 1 artillery. Artillery takes 10 seconds to build and is 200% more effective than it is now (good enough that an army of 5000 can wipe out 10000 in a fort).
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Make some cities have stone. For each city you control with stone, you can build 1 fort. Forts take 10 seconds to build and Forts can be built around any city without replacing the other buildings in that city.
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Add elevation to the map. Moving armies uphill is slower. Armies moving downhill get combat bonuses if they encounter armies coming uphill.
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Vary the number of connections each city has. Right now most have 4-5. This makes pathing the map too easy. I almost never care which path my units take when I give them orders. This doesn’t seem very strategic.
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I like the fog of war. How about adding a radio tower building that gives a specific city x2 sight?
I think a game mode where the point of the game is to capture the enemy capitals might be more fun. Once I get to 50% of the map, I know I’m going to win.
It also seems like there should be room for diplomacy to matter more, but I don’t have any specific ideas for what kinds of mechanics you could add.
Fun game though, I like playing it and will probably play it some more.
Diplomacy in this game could make it at least twice as cool! I honestly think adding more game modes to this game along with matchmaking improvements could put this game on the front page. It’s simple enough for everyone yet strategic enough to be fun for the elite!
-Diplomacy could consist of ceasefires that last a predetermined and agree on time.
-Gifting troops could become an added mechanic. Maybe gifting cites?
-Alliance game mode where teams battle. Violence between both alliances and competition among the alliance for strategic cities
Yes, having the most units will win the game, but if you find a player that is making lots of Powerplants, they will have spent a lot to buy them and can be more vulnerable. It is an interesting balance game that, I think, adds to beauty of the game mechanics. The same with the overwhelming forces not losing as many units. I’ve seen players who are losing dance their units around a larger force only to corner a part of the bigger force and wipe them out and turn the tide of the battle.
Overall, I find this to be a wonderful game. Perhaps build times on buildings might add something, and making forts and artillery stronger might make them more significant factors in a battle, but the game plays very well!
I lose connection right when the game starts getting fun. Every time
Artilleries are already pretty significant. Something a lot of people don’t seem to notice is that they stack; placing two artilleries around a city allows you to capture it with around half of the target’s units.
I had one of the best games yesterday. The map was a pretty average size, and it was shaped sort of like a drumstick/leg of lamb, and I was stuck in the small end. I was orange, and had expanded my borders so I was pushing up against red and yellow. By this time orange was obviously winning, but I had pretty good troop production so I wasn’t too worried. Over the course of the next few minutes, yellow and I both started building up our borders, and then I glanced up at the top and realized yellow had 68% of the land, so I thought, “Here goes nothing,” and sent started attacking him. Turns out it was a pretty even match, I must have had better production than him. The game took forever (with one of the spectators referring to the game as “Waiting Simulator”), and I slowly worked him down to 60%, 50%, and eventually gained the lead (and won).
I can confirm Janthran’s point, artilleries are pretty powerful. I had a battle where it was about 270k vs 250k - the guy had a fort, and I built two artilleries connected to it. It took ~10 seconds and I got out with 240k.
Did not know this. The UI of the game should indicate this is the case some how.
[quote] Yes, having the most units will win the game, but if you find a player that is making lots of Powerplants, they will have spent a lot to buy them and can be more vulnerable. It is an interesting balance game that, I think, adds to beauty of the game mechanics. The same with the overwhelming forces not losing as many units. I’ve seen players who are losing dance their units around a larger force only to corner a part of the bigger force and wipe them out and turn the tide of the battle.
Overall, I find this to be a wonderful game. Perhaps build times on buildings might add something, and making forts and artillery stronger might make them more significant factors in a battle, but the game plays very well! [/quote]
Since writing my original critique, I’ve played another 10 or so games.
I find the the numbers advantage is so huge that if I just simply focus on producing the most units, I nearly always win.
This means I spend way more time moving units to loci to build power plants than I do deciding when to attack.
As an experiment, I tried a couple games where I blitz my neighbor instead of building a power plant first thing. This should be a valid strategy, since if you can capture his plant, you should be able to crush him. However, the balance of the game is such at the moment that this is impossible. My strategically daring and interesting move is blocked by simply building a power plant.
In my opinion the most interesting part of the game, the part I want to focus on, is moving my armies around in and out of cover, feinting an attack, then flanking. I spend most of my time instead building up my economy, which I think it boring in comparison. It’s easy to formulate an algorithm for how to best lay out one’s plants to get the highest units per turn. There’s no strategy there.
In fact, the best use of the first 5 minutes of the game is building 2-3 factories and then waiting to get to 2500. This is boring. It’s more fun to build 5-6 factories and then build the powerplant, but it is suboptimal by a large degree in a game that is all about geometric growth.
I feel like this could be countered by a large degree if each additional power plant cost x2 the one before it.
And there you have it, legitimate game critique on the DevForums
well, I’ve successfully pulled that off multiple times before, so you’re probably just doing it wrong.
well, I’ve successfully pulled that off multiple times before, so you’re probably just doing it wrong.[/quote]
Depends on the skill level of the person that you’re attacking.
well, I’ve successfully pulled that off multiple times before, so you’re probably just doing it wrong.[/quote]
Depends on the skill level of the person that you’re attacking.[/quote]
I just timed it right. Just sit around and wait for them to build a factory and immediately capture it.
So you really need to fix artilleries and forts. I was playing a game where it looked like this:
O F F
\ | /
\ F /
|
A
F==Fort, A==Artillery, O==Other.
The 3 forts were mine, and the artillery was my opponent’s. Our forces were about the same (113k vs 113k). He attacked me from the artillery, and he won with more than half of his troops to spare. Why doesn’t having that many forts protect against a single artillery? 
[quote] So you really need to fix artilleries and forts. I was playing a game where it looked like this:
O F F
\ | /
\ F /
|
A
F==Fort, A==Artillery, O==Other.
The 3 forts were mine, and the artillery was my opponent’s. Our forces were about the same (113k vs 113k). He attacked me from the artillery, and he won with more than half of his troops to spare. Why doesn’t having that many forts protect against a single artillery? [/quote]
Artillery were created specifically to counter forts. Why should your fort that costs 400 units be able to hold up against an artillery that costed 4000?
Still playing this several times a week.
Great game.
I think I was wrong about the blitz strategy, I’ve been able to do it several times now.
I might also have been wrong about the power plants, though I still believe their huge bonus magnifies starting position inequity. I.e. getting a 7-fac pp location to start is huge. Getting forced to build your first pp in a 4-fac location means you are starting out behind the 8-ball.
Also, starting in the middle is death.
[quote] So you really need to fix artilleries and forts. I was playing a game where it looked like this:
O F F
\ | /
\ F /
|
A
F==Fort, A==Artillery, O==Other.
The 3 forts were mine, and the artillery was my opponent’s. Our forces were about the same (113k vs 113k). He attacked me from the artillery, and he won with more than half of his troops to spare. Why doesn’t having that many forts protect against a single artillery? [/quote]
Artillery were created specifically to counter forts. Why should your fort that costs 400 units be able to hold up against an artillery that costed 4000?[/quote]
Yeah, maybe you’re right. It just seems like 3 forts vs 1 artillery should have at least knocked out quite a few more of his men.
I’ve been playing this game for a while too. I’ll tell you now that the best strategy is to ally the first person you encounter. This is by far one of the best tactics, alliances are very important in this game.
However, this is still interesting gameplay because you can definitely lose the battle.
This game is quite good from a game design aspect (it’s very replayable).
If you end up in the middle your best bet is to spend a bit of time whining about starting in the middle. You can build up a nice starting base pretty easily in the middle, but then you need to pick a direction to “escape” in. I’ve won several games from the middle by exploiting massive exploration techniques and then concentrating all my fire power on a single player and taking over a corner.
The biggest thing in this game is that defense is so much harder than offense, but the best players are the ones that maximize the movement of troops forward to all fronts, almost to the point that the actual battles don’t matter because you have such an overwhelming force.
I think it’s more optimal to build more than 2-3 factories at the starting location, simply because the time it takes to wait for the 2.5k to accumulate is definitely a time when you’re vulnerable to blitz.