umm so? it doesnt matter how many static defenses you have. one reaver/siege tank/guardian can take them all out. and since your enemy (hopefully) didnt spend all that money on defenses he can have more units than you and thus protecting the siege tanks/reavers/guardians will not be a problem.

oh and for the record. if you play moneymaps, dont ever diss the game in any way because you are not playing it the way it''s supposed to be played.

quote: Original post by joanusdmentia
Anyway, I was just surprised that Origin2052 rarely came across stalemates in StarCraft.

Probably because he and/or his opponents are more aggressive in the early game.

Which kind of proves my original point - the stalemates are not a symptom of RPS balancing, but a symptom of certain (usually defensive) play styles. Seriously, change your play style to a more aggressive one - in any RTS - and I'll bet you'll find these stalemates happen less often. (although depending on how good you are on the offensive, it may not be for the better )

Are there any ways we can cater for these play styles and avoid stalemates? If not, how can we discourage players from adopting these styles?

Also, BGH compstomps can be a good laugh, but don't expect them to be very strategic. I think it's pretty much accepted that most mortals have to turtle vs. the computer because of the AI's superhuman rushing skills.



[edited by - Sandman on September 11, 2003 9:30:18 AM]

A smart and effective way to end stalemates is to use createtive victory conditions that make sure that only one of the players wins in case of a stalemate. Age of Empires had wonder wins - once a player builds a wonder, the others are forced to attack and lose if their attack fails to destroy the wonder. In Panzer General all the maps were two player maps - one player was always on the defense - a stalemate would have brought his victory.

Another way to insure a non-stalemate ending is to add a very strong pozitive reaction towards the end-game (a slight advantage allows for a small victory which increases the advantage which allows for a larger victory etc.). In the really old Z for instance, the two players fight for the control of less than 25 teritories. But the production of each player is proportional to the square of the number of teritories he controls. Hence the slightest difference between the two players can ensure one player would win and the other would lose unless things change fast. The most on the edge game I''ve played actually.

I agree the many players wait to the end game before launching their first attack, why I remeber playing Age of empires back in the day with my friends, and they would say okay no attacking to to the final age.

Also the problem with attacking early in the game is that almost every RTS game I know makes starting units so weak that early attack are completely pointless since one fixed defense emplacement is usally enough to wipe out an early attack force.

I think one way to remove stalmeates would be with resource control, if resource where scattered around the map instead of placed at behind you base or othe nicely defendable clusters it would make the game much more challenging. Players would be forced to constuct small isolated resources camps, that would be easy targets for quick attacks.

Another idea that comes to mind is to make the diffrent sides diffrent! Not just giving them slightly diffrent versions of the same unit. But completely diffrent playing styles and capablities. Team 1 could be the turtle team big powerful, expensive units that can only built at end game. Team 2 has light, fast units that can take out buildings quickly. Both have advantages and disadvantages. For instance team 2 can win every game provide they get to team 1 before team 1 reaches end game tech. In which case team 1 will win every game.


Then there is superweapons.... Are they a good idea? My gut feeling is that most games they arn''t even powerful enough to be effective, If your going to give someone a nuke then that nuke should be powerful enough to destroy there entire base, not just weaken a few buildings. I remember playing C&C and the nod nuke couldn''t kill a tank with a direct hit.






-----------------------------------------------------
Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document

quote: Original post by TechnoGoth
I agree the many players wait to the end game before launching their first attack, why I remeber playing Age of empires back in the day with my friends, and they would say okay no attacking to to the final age.

Also the problem with attacking early in the game is that almost every RTS game I know makes starting units so weak that early attack are completely pointless since one fixed defense emplacement is usally enough to wipe out an early attack force.

I think one way to remove stalmeates would be with resource control, if resource where scattered around the map instead of placed at behind you base or othe nicely defendable clusters it would make the game much more challenging. Players would be forced to constuct small isolated resources camps, that would be easy targets for quick attacks.

Another idea that comes to mind is to make the diffrent sides diffrent! Not just giving them slightly diffrent versions of the same unit. But completely diffrent playing styles and capablities. Team 1 could be the turtle team big powerful, expensive units that can only built at end game. Team 2 has light, fast units that can take out buildings quickly. Both have advantages and disadvantages. For instance team 2 can win every game provide they get to team 1 before team 1 reaches end game tech. In which case team 1 will win every game.

Erm, you havent ever played Starcraft, no ? :/

quote: Original post by TechnoGoth
Then there is superweapons.... Are they a good idea? My gut feeling is that most games they arn''t even powerful enough to be effective, If your going to give someone a nuke then that nuke should be powerful enough to destroy there entire base, not just weaken a few buildings. I remember playing C&C and the nod nuke couldn''t kill a tank with a direct hit.

I absolutely hate Superweapons which have devastating effects, without them being directly counterable. (forcing the player to have some unit pretty close to his target, in order to use the superweapon works for example.)

joanusdmentia:
If you choose to play bunker-style, dont complain if you cant attack quickly. I played SC for ~4-5 years (paused 1 year) now and can say i did not get to see more than 5 stalemates (really no winner).
An example for this would be both players losing all workers and productions, player 1 having 1 supply depot, player 2 having a pylon and a cannon, but that really rarely happens.

About clearing a map of all resources, well that happens... once a 500 games or so if you play lots of 2on2/3on3.

btw I would let your game anywhere near my computer, even implementing just one of your ideas would most probably cause me to trash it after 30 mins :|

quote: Original post by TechnoGoth
Also the problem with attacking early in the game is that almost every RTS game I know makes starting units so weak that early attack are completely pointless since one fixed defense emplacement is usally enough to wipe out an early attack force.

I''m afraid that that''s not quite true. (This was only the first page to come up on google; there look to be plenty of others.) While early units may not be that great at offense compared to later ones, they can be enough. Incidentally, these tactics are the main reason I don''t like playing RTS''s--far too often they devolve into "who can build the correct units fastest", not "who can use their units most strategically", which turns the term RTS into a bit of a misnomer, in my opinion.

quote: Original post by TechnoGoth
Another idea that comes to mind is to make the diffrent sides diffrent! Not just giving them slightly diffrent versions of the same unit. But completely diffrent playing styles and capablities. Team 1 could be the turtle team big powerful, expensive units that can only built at end game. Team 2 has light, fast units that can take out buildings quickly. Both have advantages and disadvantages. For instance team 2 can win every game provide they get to team 1 before team 1 reaches end game tech. In which case team 1 will win every game.

This was done (to some degree, at least) in Starcraft; the Zerg had cheap units that could be used fairly quickly, while the Protoss took forever to realize their full potential. Terrans fit somewhere in the middle (how cliche ).

-Odd the Hermit

I've been thinking about a solution to this problem(all aspects of balance in general0 that I don't think many have considered yet - instead of worry about balancing units, devise a system where players can create their own units and use them in the game versus other people using their own units. Then, instead of balancing units with various attributes, you can balance the attributes themselves. This would also make intelligence units actually valuable because you really don't know what kinds of things your enemy has. Also, you need to have diversity in the types you created to be able to respond to whatever they have.

Also, using an online database, it would be possible to track which attributes are used how often. If one is used 'too often', the 'master server' could automatically up the price and update all clients when they next play online. That would make balance a little easier to achieve theoretically, at least if the game was popular enough to get a good sample of attributes chosen.

Edit: After reading some of the posts linked to here, apparently its not so different an idea. I removed the psuedodetails for lack of relevence.

[edited by - extrarius on September 11, 2003 4:30:49 PM]

I am an avid player of Total Annihilation. Let me tell you, that game definately can run into stalemate. It''s too easy to defend your base and you can churn up our economy with Fusions and Moho makers without having to expand. However, this pretty much only goes for the original TA.

Everyone I know that plays TA plays one of the mods. XTA, UH and SUH all have super-weapons that are unblockable. In UH and SUH, the Vulcans/Buzzsaws can rain death from base into another, across the map. The only way to stop one is to never let one get built.

The balancing of the game is that Buzzsaws and Vulcans are last-ditch tie-breakers. They are extremely expensive and trying to build one before it''s time ensures defeat.

quote: Original post by Sandman
Are there any ways we can cater for these play styles and avoid stalemates? If not, how can we discourage players from adopting these styles?

I think, like you, that RTS-es are already catering rather heavily towards the static defensive player. (Of course, I shouldn''t really speak as if I''m eminent on the subject, since the last serious RTS I played was Dark Reign, so consider that I do not know much about Starcraft and the various games that followed it. I might be talking about things that already exist or have already disappeared.)

The problem then is that many inexperience or casual players seem to be drawn only to defensive play. I am one of those players (supremely guilty of playing the side with the best "superweapon", and digging in defensively until I can apply that superweapon at a good time to eradicate the enemy in ONE offensive strike).

As one of those problem players, I think I can shed some light on the situation: It''s just a hell of a lot easier in these games to be defensive.
Attacking on the other hand is a royal pain in the hind quarter. One static defensive structure can fend off a large number of your earlier units in the typical "mass wave of soldiers over the defensive line of the enemy" attack. However, doing anything more complicated than that is nigh impossible to execute well for the casual player. The artificial intelligence of your units seems to compel them to walk straight into the line of fire, or keep "running away" as soon as they are hit, to return straight back into the range of enemy fire at the first possible opportunity, while NEVER getting close enough to take a shot of their own. There are more of these problems: in Dark Reign, for instance, you could METICULOUSLY plan the route of your units to go to attack. But only TO the attack - some units had to go back to re-charge. So after spending precious time planning waypoints so that your mass of fighters avoids the defense structures of your enemy and passes through the holes that you''ve punched in his defense, they fire their shots, and walk back straight through the middle of the heaviest defenses, getting annihilated, and doing so in such a chaotic fashion that you have practically no chance of directing them to avoid it.

So, the bottom line: your defensive structures tend to do exactly what you expect them to do, without any intervention of the player. Defensive units can be set to patrol, and the AI for this is easy enough for them to do an "ok" job.
However, the offensive units are dumber than rocks, and require so much player intervention that the beginning/casual player simply does not bother, because he knows he''s likely to be unsuccessful against even the most pathetic static defense.

The solution has to be more advanced controls for offensive units, and definately better or at least more programmable AI, that is easy to use for even the introductory player.

The best counter to turtleing cant be direct attacking, this would render static defense useless.

The usual counters to bunkering are expanding/building up your economy and factories, allowing you to overpower your opponent 10:1 or even 20:1 in numbers and production capabilities as soon as he moves out of his base.

Building up a huge economy in just one base, should be discouraged or impossible, either by making it _very_ vulnerable to attacks/area of effect weapons or simply having finite resources per base.

The 2nd good counter to turtleing is ofc teching. Either to Siege Units (Arty, Trebuchets, Siege-Tanks) or units fast/mobile enough to avoid/pass static defenses, allowing you to kill his defense or harass your enemys economy and/or factories.

For this to work you sure have to avoid making static def the highest range units in the game, as this really encourages bunkering.