Yun Hee Ryeon
Dead Six Initiative
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Posted - 2013.09.02 00:54:00 -
[1] - Quote
Neat idea.
It seems like both this and the MCC boarding mechanic are very interesting, doable possibilities ...
... when we get to the point where both the MCC and the NULL cannons are tools on a much larger battlefield.
At the moment, NULL cannons take center stage in Skirmish. Allowing them to be effectively suppressed would add a troublesome element: allowing those who can apply loads of force (kill the other side a bunch) but who don't have the tactical finesse to maintain control of the board to apply the simple solution of clubbing the other side's holdings into submission until they can be cloned.
In other words, you're creating a method for turning the focus of Skirmish into Ambush.
I don't say that this is necessarily a wholly bad thing, but it would change the nature of the match. Objectives become optional if you can effectively cripple them.
I can see this as an excellent thing when (I do expect it will eventually happen) unit commanders are purchasing and fitting MCC's, we're receiving orbital strikes from dreadnoughts as a matter of routine course, and defenders get to design their own defensive layouts-- of deployable resources, at least, if not entire structures.
In other words, it seems like a neat thing to have when DUST battles start being less like sporting events and more like a war.
At the moment, what you propose would be a radical change, and it's not one I think we need badly enough to go throwing the rulebook out the window. I, too, am impatient for us to move on from fair engagements on relatively equal terms, but I'm not in such a hurry as to start adding more war elements to what is still a sports arena.
In that arena, winning on clones is a long shot. That's for the best, I think. |
Yun Hee Ryeon
Dead Six Initiative
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215
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Posted - 2013.09.02 04:03:00 -
[2] - Quote
Jadek Menaheim wrote:The ability to win on clones is the ideal goal, especially in a PC context where you can roll into multiple matches if you meet the minimum clone requirement per match.
I will grant that the ability to win on clones is important. I see no particular reason to make it any easier to do so in Skirmish.
We are in a limited-option environment, presently. Certain options are necessarily favored, to one degree or another, over others. Resource expenditure has to be controlled in Skirmish, especially if one team (as in many PC matches) is at a clone disadvantage.
Let me be clear: I play a scout. I can hold my own, sometimes, in Ambush, usually by baiting hostile squads into traps, but Skirmish is my forte. The tactical game in Skirmish favors effective maneuvering over gunplay-- and it is the only game mode that does.
I'd rather not see Skirmish easily turned into "Ambush with an alternative form of timer"-- that is, virtually always won by whoever can wipe the other team out the most efficiently, a pattern that strongly favors direct tactics.
When the maps are large enough for scouts (and dropships, and other units that favor tactical flexibility over durability and firepower) to serve additional purposes, I'll be much more interested in adjusting gameplay in this manner. Until then, gunplay has its share of turf, and then some.
Allowing tactical assets to be degraded with the simple application of brute force (as by a rooftop forge sniper with a commanding view of NULL cannon assemblies, if not their control panels) degrades tactical warfare rather than expanding it, much the same as the introduction of a new, unbalanced weapon favors its own use even if it expands the total options available.
This being so, I much prefer that finesse (in this case, the ability to keep a majority of objectives hacked in spite of a hostile force with superior weapons, superior defenses, and at least equivalent aim) not be nerfed by introducing a trivially-exploitable vulnerability. |