Combat Improvements

[jakecool19]

Hello, let me start off saying that I'm new to the forums and this is my first post so sorry if its very bad. I'll try to keep it as simple and open ended as possible.
Anyway I think that with the game being so close to completion, that combat really needs to be addressed and tweaked. Here are some of my thoughts to improve on the content already in the game.

Enemies

• -Biters, spitters, worms, and nests should all be elemental in order to pose more of a challenge to the player. Color will represent the type of element an enemy uses.For example a fiery biter deals fire damage and it has a higher resistant to fire damage.
  -Enemies should also have randomly generated speed, health, resistance, and damage stats. These should be put under restraints so that it doesn't get ridiculous. This would allow for interesting combinations such as a fast but weak biter or a tanky but slow spitter and more.
  -The elements and stats of the enemy will depend upon the seed of the base.
  -When a new base is formed it is given a new seed different from the parent base.

Scanners

• -As they are now scanners are somewhat useless energy hogs. Scanners should connect to each other similiar to roboports. Connecting them unifies and speeds up sector scanning, increases search range and allows turrets, combat robots, and vehicles, work together better.
  -Turrets can only work within search range of a scanner.
  -Combat robots can come to the aid of turrets as long as they are in the same network together.
  -A scanner interface can allow the player to learn more about the element types and stats of enemy bases, and allow the player to target and coordinate an automated vehicle attack on enemy bases.

Combat Robots

• -Combat robots should be built like construction/logistic robots
  -A special roboport and its personal roboport equivalent for combat robots
  -Combat robots are reusable, but have limited energy and in some cases, limited ammo that can both be replenished at the roboports.
  -Combat robots will defend activated turrets in the scanner network, and will protect the player or vehicle they are deployed from.

Vehicles

• -Tanks and cars have grids like power armor and be able to utilize modules.
  -Vehicles can work remotely and automatically as long as they are connected to a scanner and have a significantly further connection radius then combat robots and turrets.
  -Vehicles weapons can be swapped out with other weapons
  -Vehicles can connect to other vehicles to coordinate attacks against enemy bases.
  - Vehicles will slow down to a combat speed when approaching bases and will deploy combat robots when in range
  - During an attack if health,robot count,fuel, or ammo fall below a certain point the vehicle will retreat back to the scanner it is connected to. In a group of vehicles stronger vehicles will try to protect the weaker one, but if one is almost out of fuel or about to be destroyed then they will retreat.

Player, Weapons, And Shields

• -Player armor gets debuffed so that players aren't god.
  -Different elemental energy shields
  - A poison, acid, and laser weapon. We already have a gun and shotgun that deal physical damage, a rocket launcher that deals explosive damage type, and a flamethrower that deals fire damage.

Conclusion
The purpose of the changes I suggested above are just ways that think the game can be improved with out adding to much more new stuff or drastically changing the overall purpose of the game. It makes enemies and scanners more meaningful, combat robots reusable, vehicles more valuable, allows the player forces and the enemy forces to use all elements, and most importantly forces the player to think more about combat instead of running in blindly with a flame thrower and killing everything. Also this is good for more build orientated people b allowing them to clear out biters without interrupting their building. Any feedback about this or my formatting are very welcomed!

[Grossen]

Enemies: I think the suggestions in this group would be too much of a hassle in respect to the added benefit to the gameplay.

Scanners:
- Scanners do work together, in the area they cover they scan the tile that was not scanned the longest.
- I like the idea of scanners enabling turrets to target enemies, would make sense and it poses additional challenge and some limitations however that would nerf gun turrets further since their only advantage against laser turrets is that they do not depend on power.

Combat robots:
- Combat robots as they are are currently disposable, i would not fancy spending a frame on something that is temporary, maybe add a new type of combat robot?

Vehicles:
- Vehicles are already planned to have equipment grids.
- Vehicles are designed to be operated manually and i think it should stay that way, however i wouldn't say no to combat robots.
- I like the idea of mounting other types of weapons on your vehicles, like for example a rocket launcher on your tank.

Player Equipment:
- I do agree that the last level of the power armor can make you invulnerable and needs to be nerfed a bit.
- Damage type should indeed count more, for example rockets should deal devastating damage to heavily armored targets.

[<NO_NAME>]

- Vehicles are designed to be operated manually and i think it should stay that way, however i wouldn't say no to combat robots.

I absolutely disagree. When evolution factor is over 0.9 and I am destroying a big group of spawners, I have to be very careful to not drain my whole shield. There can be over 20 Big Worms at once in a bad case and they have assistance of Behemot Bitters and Behemot Spitters. I would like to have even better armor for this.

[jakecool19]

Enemies: I think the suggestions in this group would be too much of a hassle in respect to the added benefit to the gameplay.

Scanners:
- Scanners do work together, in the area they cover they scan the tile that was not scanned the longest.
- I like the idea of scanners enabling turrets to target enemies, would make sense and it poses additional challenge and some limitations however that would nerf gun turrets further since their only advantage against laser turrets is that they do not depend on power.

Combat robots:
- Combat robots as they are are currently disposable, i would not fancy spending a frame on something that is temporary, maybe add a new type of combat robot?

Vehicles:
- Vehicles are already planned to have equipment grids.
- Vehicles are designed to be operated manually and i think it should stay that way, however i wouldn't say no to combat robots.
- I like the idea of mounting other types of weapons on your vehicles, like for example a rocket launcher on your tank.

Player Equipment:
- I do agree that the last level of the power armor can make you invulnerable and needs to be nerfed a bit.
- Damage type should indeed count more, for example rockets should deal devastating damage to heavily armored targets.

The combat robots wouldn't be disposable and the reason tanks and would be automated is because they are somuch stronger then robots. Basically I want something that kinda resembles the Robot Army mod or the Combat unit mod, were combat can be completely automated and the player could concentrate more on building and expansion rather then combat which in its current state can become very tedious late game. Also the reason for variation in biters and weapons was more or less to utilize all the damage types in the game(physical,poison,acid,fire,explosion, and laser) by both the player forces and the enemy forces.

- Vehicles are designed to be operated manually and i think it should stay that way, however i wouldn't say no to combat robots.

I absolutely disagree. When evolution factor is over 0.9 and I am destroying a big group of spawners, I have to be very careful to not drain my whole shield. There can be over 20 Big Worms at once in a bad case and they have assistance of Behemot Bitters and Behemot Spitters. I would like to have even better armor for this.

I do think Behemoth biters could be nerfed a little. Their incredibly large health pool, and their ridiciuolsy fast regeneration rate makes any weapon other then the flamethrower useless. Anyway thank you both for your feedback!

[ssilk]

Added to viewtopic.php?f=80&t=14640 New Weapons / New Defenses & Armor / Combat / Turrets

[drmason13]

Following FFF #169 Combat Revisited 2 viewtopic.php?f=38&t=38683 https://www.factorio.com/blog/post/fff-169 since it is a little crowded there.
TL;DR
I propose a significant damage nerf to laser turrets so that we have

• a more interesting turret ecosystem: Gun, Laser, Flame on a more equal footing with strengths/weaknesses to each
• increased viability of explosive/flame damage used for base defence (mines, flame turrets, oh and a rocket turret wouldn't hurt!)

I further the idea for "combat robots as logistic entities", i.e. permanent combat robots that live in your logistics network!

Why are laser turrets so powerful?

Consider

• They are a convenient, zero ammo consuming alternative to gun turrets
• They are much stronger in terms of damage output, especially with biters' growing resistance to "physical damage" (bullets)
• They are much stronger in terms of HP

It seems obvious to many players that ultimately they offer no disadvantage compared to gun turrets, so much so that it is a popular challenge to choose not to use them.

Would it be more interesting to consider laser turrets a trade off between firepower and convenience at scale?

If laser turrets were much less powerful, you would struggle to defeat high-physical resistance biters:

• Players would want alternative means to defeat these biters => they would want to use flame turrets and/or mines
• Players would want rocket turrets (I want rocket turrets, who doesn't want rocket turrets?)

If laser turrets were much less powerful, would anyone still bother to research and build them at great expense?
Alarmingly, no possibly not. What else would need to change?

• Their power consumption could be considerably reduced, making them incredibly efficient (solar panels of the turret world)
• They could have an increased range compared to gun turrets, making them more specialised at killing spitters
• Their firing mechanism could change.
  • What if they focus on one biter and gradually increase damage over time
  • They would be more effective against small numbers of large targets
  • They would be less effective against hordes of weak enemies
  • The damage increase over time might persist between biters, making them more effective for larger waves of enemies, but relatively weak at the start of combat?

Perhaps these could persuade players to invest?
I would also like there to be a "heavy gun turret", requiring steel that has a similar amount of hp as a laser turrets. Then the trade off is batteries for long-term efficiency and you would still have gun turrets as your "starter turret" in terms of research, useful for staying alive early on.


Why are combat robots temporary and fired like weapons?

Combat Robots
-Combat robots should be built like construction/logistic robots
-A special roboport and its personal roboport equivalent for combat robots
-Combat robots are reusable, but have limited energy and in some cases, limited ammo that can both be replenished at the roboports.
-Combat robots will defend activated turrets in the scanner network, and will protect the player or vehicle they are deployed from.

I have so much love for this idea!
We wouldn't neccesarily need new types of ammo for the combat robots. Bullets or electricity would work fine. In fact charging hundreds of laser powered combat robots would be a challenge for electricity production worthy of nuclear power!

I would only suggest that instead of a new "combat roboport" they simply integrate into the existing roboport.
You could have seperate slots within each roboport for combat / construction / logistic bots with the option to manually filter.
That way same object, but have the player choose its purpose

I was impressed by this comment: viewtopic.php?f=38&t=38683&start=120#p231926

You only have immobile base defense, entrenched base defense, and one mobile player to patrol it. The game design can not require the player to intervene against all attacks because that requires all base defenses to be essentially useless. The only other option is to have the player NOT required to intervene against all attacks. Players solve this by placing MAXIMUM turret firepower at all points along the perimeter. If the perimeter defense solves everything, there's no reason to ever build a second layer.

I think a combat roboport option would dramatically change things for the better. Roboports create the option for a mobile defense, which allows firepower to be concentrated where it is needed most. A mobile defense option means you longer need to counter "500 biters" of danger by building "500 firepower" along every single sq. foot of perimeter defense. (The total defense ends up much higher so you could have over 100K firepower total on the perimeter!) You can instead engage "500 biters" with "500 firepower of bots", and if another attack comes along then you need more bots to directly deal with that.
I hope that makes sense.

There is good simple logic behind this. We should attempt to make it happen.
The major challenge as I see it is managing the combat robots' "orders" - the combat equivalent of the system used by logistics and construction bots to decide what to do.
I'm sure such ideas have been discussed many times by fans of "robot army" viewtopic.php?f=97&t=23543&hilit=robot+army but a quick few ideas:

• Combat Requester: A small 1x1 tower that requests a selectable number of combat robots.
  This would work somewhat like a requester chest, only it requests the robots themselves.
  If there are more robots than are requested in total at requesters, the rest are considered "spare" and distribute evenly amongst roboports with combat slots free.
• Beacon: An ephemeral object that attracts a large number of combat drones. Used like a grenade and is consumable.
  The exact mechanics to be determined, but something like: All "spare" robots are immediately tasked to this location.
  As long as they have charge they stay and guard that location unless the player is within a certain distance, in which case they follow the player.
  This would be used for combat much like combat robots are now (only you don't need to fire two stacks full of items with the mouse, just one every now and then.
  Names in progress
  
  Oh and combat robots could charge / refill with ammo from personal roboport. Obvs. I imagine it would be a big drain on your battery so you might want to hide in a tank. Or augment your tank with huge battery and roboport modules, but that's another story!