Hi!

I am thinking about the (craziest and) not yet implemented unit abilities in RTS genre that people want but noone applied yet.

For those who know Company of Heroes and its mod BKrieg I wanted the sniper to be able to put mines and scope for heavy machine guns; mines for Rise of nations and so on. Not impossible but that is not very original. I was trying to figure what are the abilities that are not so ordinary - freezing the enemy, slowing, etc. One such abilities I tried is damaged units become crazy and moving around for a limited time and are useless. In COH that was "propaganda" when the German officer throws papers on the enemy and they are running away to their base.

I am really looking for new ideas.

Are we talking about:

- realistic abilities not implemented yet?

- as out there as possible abilities?

- as fun as possible abilities?

If we are talking about the first, there is so much that could still be done. Some of it might have been done by some games, but never became a staple:

- digging in tanks / hull down tanks.

- exotic squad weapons (automatic rifles, rifle grenades)

- weird inventions that did or did not really work (german remote controlled mines (goliath), remote controlled tanks, flying tanks)

- rare special equipment (steel body armour, special ammunition, field modifications, sticky bombs)

- special training (diving/swimming skills, mountaineers, pioneers)

If we talk about out there... well, the sky is the limit.

- having units teleport instead of being damaged when hit by a weapon (being teleported miles away, into attack range of another enemy unit, or miles into the air )

- transforming units into different units (into frogs, anyone?) when hit

- the ability to fuse units into superunits (very mecha-animestyle, but has it been done in a RTS yet?)

- Units that are affected by spontaneious combustion (so many cheesy references to the classical urban legends about the phenomen possible)

- Units that can move at light speed

- Using micro singularities as weapons (Sluuuuurp! LHC at Cern bringing the apocalypse to your doorstep! Made in switzerland! :))

If we talk about fun, well, that depends a lot on the implementation and the rest of the game obviously

Maybe 2 and 3. The idea for the frog is great :) Battles are with cannons, machineguns, etc, so I am interesting in something different. Better guns, shells, ranges, armor are standard and in use. Something stressing and unexpected is welcome. In Cossacks when the food is over units start dying and when the gold is 0 mercenaries becomes mutineers.

One of the feature I was planing was unqualified drivers which are crashing machines into trees and here is possible to train better driver but maybe not a good idea.

Just remember in Red Alert there was a tank which looks like a tree

"Using micro singularities as weapons" I am not sure I understand this well but looks like a superweapon. Hm, maybe such a generator could generate some devastating energy in some regions...

"Units that are affected by spontaneious combustion " Do you mean they are starting to burn suddenly with no reason? I have something similar, machines could brake at some point especially these with low levels.

The command and conquer series had tons of awesome unit ideas until it was slaughtered brutally.

Tick tanks (dig into the ground/lift themselves up to become turrets) - tiberian sun

Chrono tanks (Teleporting tanks) - Red alert

Giant squids (Pull boats under the water slowly, attacks against ships in this state hurt the ship and the squid. Dolphins can use sonar to blast them off safely (lol)) - red alert 2

Mind control (Can only control 1 unit at a time, can send units into a grinder to get resources back) - Red alert 2: Yuri's revenge

Crazy ivans (They plant timed C4 on any unit, allied or enemy. You can strap C4 onto your own attack dogs and send them at the enemy) - Red alert 2

Prism towers (Shoot each other to charge up a huge laser blast) - Red alert 2

Mirage tanks (Look like trees when not moving, can shoot while looking like a tree) - Red alert 2

M.A.D tank (Starts a timer when deployed, when timer finishes a huge earthquake damages all allied/enemy vehicles/building in a massive radius)

Desolator (Radiation cannon. Shoots it into the ground, irradiates nearby area which lasts a while, damages anything moving through it) - Red alert 2

Firestorm defense (Impossible to penetrate wall that takes a lot of energy) - Tiberian sun: Firestorm

Devil's tongue/Subterranian APC (Tunnels underground while moving, so you can transport units unsees) - Tiberian sun

Terror Drones (Mechanical spiders that jump into vehicles, damaging them over time until they go to a repair bay (removes them) or they die (They pop out unharmed) - Red alert 2

Chaos drones (Spray a chemical that makes everything it touches go berserk/attack allies/enemies) - Red alert 2: Yuri's revenge

There's probably more I can't think of.

For crazy micro managers, what about units that create a field between themselves, and an effect apply to all other units under that field? Easiest to make work if you limited it to three of these units, but just two as well could have a line between them that could be enough to apply the effect to larger units.
And with more than three you could have larger fields, although this could get silly.. :)

Maybe 2 and 3. The idea for the frog is great Battles are with cannons, machineguns, etc, so I am interesting in something different. Better guns, shells, ranges, armor are standard and in use. Something stressing and unexpected is welcome. In Cossacks when the food is over units start dying and when the gold is 0 mercenaries becomes mutineers.

One of the feature I was planing was unqualified drivers which are crashing machines into trees and here is possible to train better driver but maybe not a good idea.

Just remember in Red Alert there was a tank which looks like a tree

"Using micro singularities as weapons" I am not sure I understand this well but looks like a superweapon. Hm, maybe such a generator could generate some devastating energy in some regions...

"Units that are affected by spontaneious combustion " Do you mean they are starting to burn suddenly with no reason? I have something similar, machines could brake at some point especially these with low levels.

Unqualified drivers - weeeeeeh, I like that :) ... in military, especially when its a militia, this is leading to more accidents in peacetime than anything else. The amount of unnecessary accidents because an APC driver was going fullspeed over the offroad course he should have gone over at a reduced speed, or driving on a slope too step for the vehicle would have been hillarious... if the injuries to crew and infantry in the vehicle wouldn't have been so serious.

Another thing related to that is drunk driving... alcohol and drugs are a constant problem in most armies of the world, even in wartime (or especially in wartime)... maybe do something with that?

Singularity is the science poser term for a black hole... remember some years back when the large hadron collider was taken online for the first time at Cern? And tinfoil-hat wearers the world over though the world would end because of micro black holes created by the new massive particle accelerater beneath Cern?

That is what I mean, just with less science, and more black holes :)

Well, the spontaneious combustion references an urban legend of people bursting out in flames an burning to a cinder without any physical reason to do so. If you like urban legends, its one of the older ones (dating back to the 19th century) and makes for an interesting read... many mysterious deaths that cannot be completly explained by science to this very day... perfect for a creepy story...

Or an RTS with lots of dark humour and a love for random events.

Necromancy, which means "death magic". Basically the raising of corpses as slaves/soldiers. What would be cool is one faction that has no real unit production facilities and gets everything from raising corpses from victims or just laying around. Sort of a feast or famine thing.

How about realistic line-of-sight?

Examples:

A rifleman is on a cliff but can only shoot things at the bottom of the cliff if standing on the edge. The further away you are from the cliff, the less you can see towards the base of the cliff.

Projectiles have to have a direct line to its target otherwise it will hit whatever's in the way.

Add gravity and wind to the projectile path too. Projectiles do not fly in straight lines. Position of the moon may also be relevant.