3619 focus.

[Ze_PilOt]

The testing will start soon, and here are the focusing points :

- Making steath behavior better.

This will be done by introducing a grace period that will depend of the speed of the unit. So losing intel for a fraction of second (up to some seconds) won't make your order disappears. Only a more permanent loss of intel will.

There will MAYBE 3 additional UI mods that you can enable or not depending on your taste. These UI mod will either :
- Move the unit toward last known position
- Move the unit toward a computed interception point.
- Make your unit ground-attack the last known position.

If it's not enough, some others ideas will be tried.

- Shields.

Shields are too strong. Some ideas will be tested to reduce their efficiency. The main goal is to not change the cost or the HP stats of the units, but :
- Make them unable to recharge until depleted OR make them unable to recharge under attack (for some seconds).
- Increase the recharge time.
- make the shield consume more energy when recharging.

These are not cumulative. The final result could be a combination or these solution, or a single one.
Either way, the result will be implemented in a way that make it easy to disable by unit (an additional BP value probably).

The absolver may receive a slight range boost too (enough to be able to fire outside a ravager range).

- T3 Land.

- A slight reduction of build time will be tested.

- SCU.

THE big change. The first test will be based of Pip work (viewtopic.php?f=36&t=1389&start=40#p17765).

- ACU.

A veterancy change was tested and approve, but didn't make it in the final patch by mistake. They will be re-introduced and tested.
It's making the ACU veterancy exponential, like almost everything in the game. (won't change a lot for first two levels).

- Graphics.

The shaders from karottenRambo will be tested.


I think that's already a big amount of things to do. While pip tests are very valuable, we need to make smaller steps for testing them.

[Kryo]

sounds awesome

[pip]

This sounds very good indeed!

About shields, I think the easiest (not necessarily the best) way to nerf them is to increase their recharge time, because then the mod making overlapping shields less efficient works better.
I think a global increase of 10 seconds could be enough, except maybe for the t3 mobile Seraphim one that already has a very long recharge (45 seconds). And of course, the Fatboy shield should not be nerfed, or if it is, I believe there should be a transfer of 10k HP from the shield to the unit itself.
(and very good idea for the absolver)

About t3 land buildtimes : I thought 25% reduction would be a good value, but maybe around 20% is enough.

About SCU: thanks for using my work! The idea was to make SCU similar to what they were in vanilla supcom, but without spammable RAS and with worthwhile and affordable upgrades.

The only thing that I find very important about them but that I couldn't mod myself is adding an AOE fx for the EMP weapon of the Cybran SCU and of the AOE upgrade of the Aeon SCU (both have a huge AOE of 4, but it's invisible, whereas the UEF SCU has an AOE upgrade that displays a proper AOE fx that is not on the default weapon). If ever it's not too complicated to add such an AOE fx, that would be an important visual clue to show that the SCU have such weapon upgrades.

[Kryo]

@pip, could you post a complete changelog of what Zep will implement with your SCU changes?

[pip]

@Kryo: The goal is to make SCU more affordable to begin with (around 33% less cost) but also more vulnerable (50% previous HP), and slightly less good at building without the rapid fabricator upgrade (All SCU base buildpower = 40 instead of 60)to prevent their propension to faster reclaim units than kill them through weapons. That's how they were in Supcom Vanilla.
Then you can buff them through their various and powerful upgrades (some are adjusted).

All upgrades buildtimes have been adjusted but actually remain the same. It is so that the new SCU buildrate of 40 allow the upgrades to be buildable in the same amount of time when unassisted, so the upgrades are not faster to build. Some upgrades that are very powerful got slightly longer to build unassisted because of the cheaper cost of SCU (RAS, teleport, Shield Generator field for instance).

Aeon SCU:
Health = 15 000 HP (from 30 000)
Mass = 2900 (from 8700)
energy = 41 000 (from 123 000)
buildtime = 21600 (from 36 000)
buildpower = 40 (from 60)
Production = 2 mass / 200 energy (from 3 /300)
MaxBuildDistance = 10,
SacrificeEnergyMult = 0.9,
SacrificeMassMult = 0.9,

Rapid Fabricator:
Buildtime = 6000
NewBuildrate = 70

Ressource Allocation System :
Mass = 3500 (from 2500)
energy = 60 000 (from 30 000)
BuildTime = 6000

Sacrifice:
BuildTime = 500

Shield :
BuildTime = 4800

ShieldHeavy :
BuildTime = 6000

StabilitySuppressant (AOE weapon with new AOE fx):
BuildTime = 4800
New AOE = 3 (from 4)

SystemIntegrityCompensator (nano repair) :
BuildTime = 6000

Teleporter :
BuildTime = 15000

Cybran SCU:
Health = 19 000 HP (from 38 000)
Mass = 3000 (from 9000)
energy = 40 000 (from 120 000)
buildtime = 21600 (from 36 000)
buildpower = 40 (from 60)
Production = 1 mass / 125 energy (from 2 / 175)
MaxBuildDistance = 10,

EMPCharge (new AOE fx):
BuildTime = 6000
AOE = 2.5 (from3)
Stun duration = 3 (from 6)
Added SCU to the list of units it cannot stun (beside experimental and ACU)

FocusConvertor (damage upgrade):
BuildTime = 2400

Personal Cloak:
energy cost = 900k (from 1200 k)
mass = 6500 mass (from 9000)
Buildtime = 12000 (from 18000)
energy maintenance cost = 3625 (from 6000)

Personal Stealth:
Mass = 800 (from 3000)
energy = 24 000 (from 112500)
buildtime = 1600 (from 9000)
Maintenanceenergy cost = 225 (from 500)

Rapid Fabricator:
Buildtime = 6000
NewBuildrate = 70

Ressource Allocation System:
Mass = 3500 (from 2500)
energy = 60 000 (from 30 000)

NaniteMissileSystem (SAM upgrade) :
Buildtime = 3000
DPS buffed to 270 (from 166): damage = 300 (from 200); rate of fire = 0.3 (from 0.28)
improved weapon behaviour so that the AA weapon fires properly at units in front of the SCU :
firing tolerance = 50 (from 2); TurretPitchRange = 60 (from 40).

SelfRepairSystem :
BuildTime = 6000

UEF SCU:
Health = 16 000 (from 32 000)
Mass = 3200 (from 9600)
Energy = 38000 (from 114 000)
buildtime = 21600 (from 36 000)
buildpower = 40 (from 60)
Production =1 mass / 150 energy (from 2 / 200)
MaxBuildDistance = 10,

AdvancedCoolingUpgrade (rate of fire upgrade):
BuildTime = 2400

HighExplosiveOrdnance (AOE upgrade):
BuildCostEnergy = 45000,
BuildCostMass = 1000,
BuildTime = 2400,

UEF SCU engineering drone :
BuildCostEnergy = 9600 (from 2400)
BuildCostMass = 480 (from 120)
Buildrate = 20 (from 5)
T3 engineer build menu (instead of t1)

Radar Jammer:
Mass = 800 (from 1000)
energy = 24 000 (from 31 250)
buildtime = 1600 (from 7500)

Ressource Allocation System:
Mass = 3500 (from 2500)
energy = 60 000 (from 30 000)
Buildtime = 6000

Sensor System :
BuildTime = 2400
Omni radius = 80 (from 72)(Aeon ACU = 100)
Vision radius = 45 (from 40) (Aeon ACU = 50)

Shield :
BuildCostEnergy = 93750,
BuildCostMass = 2000,
BuildTime = 6000

ShieldGeneratorField :
BuildCostEnergy = 500000 (from 210000)
BuildCostMass = 4500 (from 3000)
BuildTime = 10000 (from 9000)
MaintenanceConsumptionPerSecondEnergy = 1150 (from 500)

Seraphim SCU:
Health = 15500 Hp (from 31 000)
Mass = 3100 (from 9300)
Energy = 39 000 (from 117 000)
Buildtime = 21600 (from 36 000)
buildpower = 40 (from 60)
Production = 3 mass / 300 energy (from 5 / 500)
MaxBuildDistance = 10,

Base weapon damage = 200 (from 100)

DamageStabilization (nano repair):
BuildTime = 4800

EngineeringThroughput (rapid fabricator):
BuildTime = 6000
NewBuildRate = 70

EnhancedSensors):
BuildTime = 2400,
Omni radius = 80 (from 72)(Aeon ACU = 100)
Vision radius = 45 (from 40) (Aeon ACU = 50)

Missile (Tac Missile) :
BuildTime = 3000

Overcharge :
BuildTime = 12000
rate of fire = 0.2 (from 0.3) => 5 seconds, like the ACU now.

Shield :
BuildTime = 4800

Teleporter :
BuildTime = 15000

[Kryo]

short question: is RAS of the SCUs better or worse than t3 pgen and t3 mass fab?

[pip]

If you take the best SCU for RAS, the Aeon SCU, it will cost you 6400 mass and 27600 buildtime to get + 13 mass and + 1100 energy (other SCU = around +11 mass and + 1050 energy, except Seraphim which don't have RAS at all but better default production value). Also, add 3000 mass for the Quantum Gateway.
A t3 power gen + t3 mass fab will cost 6240 mass but only 9150 buildtime for +12 mass (without adjacency, but it's easy to get at least +14 with a few mass storages). In my mod, the adjacency bonus to factories for mass fabricators make them more interesting than RAS.

So I'd say Aeon SCU may be a good investment for RAS, even though it requires quite some time and buildpower. It's a bit more situational for the other factions. In any case, it's much less interesting than t3 mexes.

[FunkOff]

SCUs are mobile, harder to kill, don't chain-react as much, and can help build additional SCUs. You should probably nerf their resource income to +1 and +20 m and e

[pip]

Their resource production is already reduced to +1 mass except Aeon (+2) and Seraphim (+3). Energy production is +125 at worst (Cybran), +300 at best (Seraphim). I kept the faction diversity for these values.

SCU still take long to produce (like a battleship) and an additional factory. It's not easy to spam them unless you don't build a t3 army or a t4 unit. +27 mass from t3 surrounded mex make RAS much less interesting than in Vanilla Supcom where Aeon RAS gave +20 mass and +2700 energy (now +13/+1100).

However, if they are now too easy to spam for RAS, it can be further adjusted later, of course. It requires testing.

[Icy]

Is it just the unit shaders, or is the terrain lighting included as well?