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Right now building an ultimate base can be as simple as placing some walls and few turrets next to lone entrance to the base. As it was well illustrated here: http://imageshack.us/a/img19/5613/9zb1.jpg
IMHO something like that is an exploit, cause very cheaply you can turn your base into indestructible fortress.

So here's an idea:
Add a Demolition Team Raid.

Basically - a group of pirates armed with short range but powerful weapons (shotguns / SMGs) and one demolition expert with explosives.
Team will try to find an approach to your base that's away from sentry guns - plant explosives on a wall or rock, and... boom! Break into the base bypassing security!

(say - arm them with 1 randomly picked type of explosives - regular charges will do 3x3 explosion (like Molotov), shape charges will do 1x5 line. 6 seconds timer. Player can manually plant them on his own if steals them from dead AI, but they're still limited to timer - no remotely controlled explosions (again - too exploitable)

It's needed because right now if you can afford 3-4 towers and some walls - almost nothing can become a threat to your base. And as game progresses you only build up stronger and stronger defences wiping enemy clean faster and faster. Sure, you can give enemy more health, but they're still limited to one approach into the base - which is like asking yourself for exploits.

I suppose writing AI for that might be a bit challenging. AI would need to protect the demolition guy on his way, hope he will demolish the walls quickly enough before other guys die, and than all raiders should run inside of the building wrecking havoc / stealing stuff as quickly as possible to retreat right after that ignoring fire from colonists (perhaps: run&gun escape).
But I think it will be worth adding it into the game as it'd make it much more interesting by forcing players to use colonists for defence more, not just exploit impenetrable walls of sentry guns.

Quote from: Sky_walker on November 05, 2013, 04:57:36 AM
Right now building an ultimate base can be as simple as placing some walls and few turrets next to lone entrance to the base. As it was well illustrated here: http://imageshack.us/a/img19/5613/9zb1.jpg
IMHO something like that is an exploit, cause very cheaply you can turn your base into indestructible fortress.

So here's an idea:
Add a Demolition Team Raid.

Basically - a group of pirates armed with short range but powerful weapons (shotguns / SMGs) and one demolition expert with explosives.
Team will try to find an approach to your base that's away from sentry guns - plant explosives on a wall or rock, and... boom! Break into the base bypassing security!

(say - arm them with 1 randomly picked type of explosives - regular charges will do 3x3 explosion (like Molotov), shape charges will do 1x5 line. 6 seconds timer. Player can manually plant them on his own if steals them from dead AI, but they're still limited to timer - no remotely controlled explosions (again - too exploitable)

It's needed because right now if you can afford 3-4 towers and some walls - almost nothing can become a threat to your base. And as game progresses you only build up stronger and stronger defences wiping enemy clean faster and faster. Sure, you can give enemy more health, but they're still limited to one approach into the base - which is like asking yourself for exploits.

I suppose writing AI for that might be a bit challenging. AI would need to protect the demolition guy on his way, hope he will demolish the walls quickly enough before other guys die, and than all raiders should run inside of the building wrecking havoc / stealing stuff as quickly as possible to retreat right after that ignoring fire from colonists (perhaps: run&gun escape).
But I think it will be worth adding it into the game as it'd make it much more interesting by forcing players to use colonists for defence more, not just exploit impenetrable walls of sentry guns.

I like the idea. I think 1/2 demolitions guys should be a standard of every raider team after the first few ones.
This is also one of the few things that DF does not have (wink, wink.....)

Quote from: starlight on November 05, 2013, 07:28:51 AM
I like the idea. I think 1/2 demolitions guys should be a standard of every raider team after the first few ones.
This is also one of the few things that DF does not have (wink, wink.....)

Hehe. :) DF, DF everywhere! ;P
TBH: I think that adding demo guys to every raid would be slightly annoying - not because of their potential, but because they'd need to change a behaviour of a whole group (otherwise they'd die before doing anything) leading to constant demolition of rocks / walls, and constant rebuild cycle.

This would lead to chaos and would still be exploitable. Double and triple walling your base to bog the demo team down, or turning the entire mountain into a waffle for their pinheaded AI to choose to blast into.

It really wouldn't lead to fun, either. Frankly, if constant combat is going to feature into the finished game, then it is going to be a turret defense game, one way or another, and eventually the players will simply turn all the possible landing sites into massively-turreted killzones to wipe out raiders the moment they land.

I second the OP, it's all to easy to bait the A.I. into obvious traps like on I made with blasting charges, all it takes is 2 charges and I got 7 outta 9 raiders and the rest fled




(http://imgur.com/4vxNyiD)

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 06, 2013, 11:39:17 AM
This would lead to chaos and would still be exploitable. Double and triple walling your base to bog the demo team down, or turning the entire mountain into a waffle for their pinheaded AI to choose to blast into.

It really wouldn't lead to fun, either. Frankly, if constant combat is going to feature into the finished game, then it is going to be a turret defense game, one way or another, and eventually the players will simply turn all the possible landing sites into massively-turreted killzones to wipe out raiders the moment they land.

I definitely want to have my fun. It depends on what kind of fun we are talking about. Is it the "losing is fun" kind or........

On a more serious note, I think that the goal of the AI should not be to "beat" the player. Nobody outside or inside of a game has made a really good AI except in very specific situations.

So the objective should be to make that the player covers all ends. To this end, I propose the following:
1. Define raider types: Shooter, Demolisher, Sniper, Commander, Spy, etc.
i. Commander gives orders to other raiders. x% bonus to shooting accuracy.
ii. Spy is not seen on the map till "discovered"
A. Starting raids are simple.
B. Down the line, you are start getting multiple types.
C. You get intermittent spy type single raids who may not attack you. If you dont kill them, they will go back with a plan of your layout.
D. Medium / long term attacks involve all types being thrown at you.

Most important, note that in this setup, not all raiders can do everything. This increases belivability, and lets the player win. This is important in a game.

Balance the game by:
1. Giving the player a "must" reason to venture outside: solar generators need to be in the open, etc.
2. Giving him means to stay inside for some time: batteries are inside, etc.
3. Setting the AI to attack buildings, power conduits, etc. Hang around and wait for the guys to come outside.

I would also like to see moats implemented.

Also, create a reason for the player to venture outside

Ok so here's something that I thought of reading this.

what if you make it possible for any colonist that is acquired to be
a raider infiltrator.

for instance,
a slave ship comes by and you buy a slave from them that has some good stats
but other wise looks completely normal,
then a few days later raiders land, you aren't worried you have you turrets all ready to go,
but when the raiders get within range of your base suddenly your new colonist becomes a
raider and wreaks havoc in your base.

you could even add actions for an infiltrator while they were a colonist like planting a charge
on a generator or a wall, while appearing to repair or build, or destroying your food supply, etc...

now I realize this wouldn't work for colonies that were full and not adding more colonists,
but for colonies that were trying to grow it would add so much to the act of adding a new colonist
do you trust them with a gun? do you let them build, or repair, or grow?

anyway what do you think?

Quote from: a2omega on November 06, 2013, 09:41:56 PMOk so here's something that I thought of reading this.

what if you make it possible for any colonist that is acquired to be
a raider infiltrator.

...

anyway what do you think?

I think it's terrible, honestly. The constant pressure of attacks from without is bad enough without worrying that your own units are going to betray you on top of the risk of mental breaks. It'd also lead to a metagame strategy where new recruits are sealed into "The Cell" - a private bedroom with a table, a bed, and a nutrient processor until after the first raid has passed. If "The Cell" blows up during the raid, he gets killed and nothing particularly integral to the base gets destroyed

I think we need three kinds of squads in the raider team.
Demolition team, and the tunelers team and... the storm team,

demolition, will break through walls placing charges and pierce barricades.

tunelers, will dig down and come out in a certain place, making a direct connection between the entrance and the exit, which will allow the other riders to go across your defense lines.

storm, orbital drop units, will come down in groups of 3 in certain places, they will start an attack inmediately, they use shotguns and automatic weapons mostly.


and also a new type of unit.
the shield carriers, will carry a shield and walk in front of the others, they will protect them from the colonist fire, also will carry small demolition charges that they will use to destroy certain targets.

and one last adition.
the orbital artillery barrage: the riders will launch an attack over the area before starting an attack, mostly emp bombs and ion cannon impact over some defenses.

now... the riders seems to be way too bad ass now right?

we will have then some new defensive equipment.

the planet fortress, a large building used to weaken the rider units before they drop, it will consume lots of energy and have a long coldown, also it will requiere 4 colons to work, you may use it to save your ass from total anahilation.

the disruption shield, a machine that deploys a shield over a certain area, will absorve the damage of the impacts, althou it may consume all your energy or blow up because of an overcharge, it will not stop fire thou.

the mortar placement, an early defensive system, it will requiere two colons to work and ammo. will launch a barrage over a certain area.

the laser battery, an automatic weapon that will attack the rider pods before they land, they have a small impact chance, but may cause some damage over the storm units before landing.

and even thou with all this, combat will become more interesting, cause now you will need to manage your units and defense systems to survive.

as the times goes on, the time between rider attack will be longer, but, also stronger and longer, at some point you will get 3 rider groups at the same time.

units at this point will have armor and equipment to improve their performance in meele combat allowing them to survive even a bullet storm, combats will become more intense and tactical.

just think about it as a never ending challenge. and this will prevent the giant waffle and the mountain fortress strategy, first of all tunel troops will go through mountain walls and invade your rooms, usually following energy streams so they can deactivate your defense system.

demolition units, will run to your walls and place charges, finding the thinest point in your wall so they can open a breach.

Renham, if you do that kind of crap, then you're going to need to turn your colonists into goddamn space marines - the WH40K version - to stand any chance of surviving.

And I already own that game. It's called Dawn of War: Dark Crusade/Soulstorm.

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 06, 2013, 11:39:17 AM
This would lead to chaos and would still be exploitable. Double and triple walling your base to bog the demo team down, or turning the entire mountain into a waffle for their pinheaded AI to choose to blast into.

It really wouldn't lead to fun, either. Frankly, if constant combat is going to feature into the finished game, then it is going to be a turret defense game, one way or another, and eventually the players will simply turn all the possible landing sites into massively-turreted killzones to wipe out raiders the moment they land.

o_O I have no idea what do you want to say here.

First of all - the idea you suggest doesn't work even now.
Imagine you put towers to cover entire map - obviously you can't put them on every square because of limited metal on a map, but anyway - now the raiders land:
1. Granades blow nearest towers.
2. sniper rifles destroy towers out of range.
3. You just wasted tons of materials for no benefit.

Simple Doors & Guns trap works 10 times better.


And that's exactly what this idea tries to prevent - doors & guns / demo charges tactic.

Yes - you cannot build a perfect AI (or actually - in some types of games you can get near it, but not in this one), but in no way that's an excuse for allowing obvious exploit to be kept in the game. As that's pretty much what we have right now: An exploit.

Quote from: Renham on November 06, 2013, 11:13:45 PM
I think we need three kinds of squads in the raider team.
Demolition team, and the tunelers team and... the storm team,

demolition, will break through walls placing charges and pierce barricades.

tunelers, will dig down and come out in a certain place, making a direct connection between the entrance and the exit, which will allow the other riders to go across your defense lines.

storm, orbital drop units, will come down in groups of 3 in certain places, they will start an attack inmediately, they use shotguns and automatic weapons mostly.

Well, that might work too, assuming that they attack your base in stages, one right after another is done.

As for the other ideas you listed in that post - IMHO they go way over the board for what makes sense. Planet fortress? laser battery? disruption shield? How about we just pack everyone on a rocket and send them all back home? Will be cheaper and less struggle with raiders. ;)

I had some thoughts related to this - specifically, what sort of AI routine should a demolition squad, or indeed a regular squad with some explosives experts, follow?
I think this is closely related to the raiders AI in general situations.

One thing about the AI currently is that it always attacks in single file. This gives more firing time to the defenders and reduces the amount of fire the player faces at any one time. I believe it would make a big difference if the AI was able to move its units in a formation; for example, a line parallel to the player's defenses would allow them all to enter the player's range at approximately the same time.

Further, if the AI could handle formation movement then it would also be able to detect chokepoints! More specifically, anywhere the AI could not move its troops while remaining in formation is by definition a chokepoint of sorts. If the AI discovered a chokepoint, it could try to overcome it by attacking the surrounding terrain with its weapons.

Of course some flexibility would be required here so that the AI doesn't try to carve massive paths through mountains to get to the player. But this could be overcome by first having the AI attempt to change formation, or break up into smaller formations and have each formation advance in turn. Attacking the terrain could be made a last resort, so as to reduce the amount of cumulative damage to the terrain from successive raids.

Quote from: EtaBetaPi on November 07, 2013, 09:23:23 AM
I had some thoughts related to this - specifically, what sort of AI routine should a demolition squad, or indeed a regular squad with some explosives experts, follow?
I think this is closely related to the raiders AI in general situations.

Well, it is and it's not. Part of the reason for this type of squad to exist is that it'd have a different attack strategy than regular raider AI.

So here's an idea:

1. Mark all of the rooms with towers as "forbidden", as well as anything under 70% of tower maximum range if there is no cover, and under 50% if there is cover.
2. Assign targets - everything that's 2 or less squares in area. Lamps, batteries, chairs, whatever will be there in future.
3. Find 3 shortest paths to any of these elements that doesn't go into "forbidden" area. If they're below 10 squares (2 shape charges explosions) - pick one randomly and attack.
3a. If there is no path matching these conditions - don't send demo team on a planet. Regular raiders will do just fine.
4. After breaking through - raiders should all quickly move through the hole - gunners shooting any resistance, demo guy protected by them should try to obtain an item. If resistance is small (say: 1 colonist vs 2 guys shooting) - additional gunners might go to pick the items.
5. When they got items - they should run back through breakthrough and than find shortest path outside of the map avoiding forbidden areas and ignoring towers fire.


On higher difficulty (further on in the game) the range in step 3 can be increased from 2 shape charges explosions to 3 (it should take proporcionally more time to dig through that.

Quote from: EtaBetaPi on November 07, 2013, 09:23:23 AMOne thing about the AI currently is that it always attacks in single file. This gives more firing time to the defenders and reduces the amount of fire the player faces at any one time. I believe it would make a big difference if the AI was able to move its units in a formation; for example, a line parallel to the player's defenses would allow them all to enter the player's range at approximately the same time.

Formations don't help with door exploit (you still got that one narrow point which gathers all the raiders and sends them through into the turrets / blasting charges).

Quote from: Sky_walker on November 07, 2013, 09:41:56 AM
Well, it is and it's not. Part of the reason for this type of squad to exist is that it'd have a different attack strategy than regular raider AI.

Sure. I guess I was also thinking of having regular raiders with demolitions capability, which could deal with...

QuoteFormations don't help with door exploit (you still got that one narrow point which gathers all the raiders and sends them through into the turrets / blasting charges).

The point I'm trying to make later on in my previous post is that it *would* help. If there is one narrow point, the AI will realise that its formation cannot fit through the narrow point without breaking formation (i.e., bunching up together). This could be the trigger for it to try and avoid that narrow point - possibly following a routine like the one you suggest, or possibly just destroying some of the walls/terrain around the narrow point to make it bigger.

Quote from: EtaBetaPi on November 07, 2013, 09:52:51 AM

QuoteFormations don't help with door exploit (you still got that one narrow point which gathers all the raiders and sends them through into the turrets / blasting charges).

The point I'm trying to make later on in my previous post is that it *would* help. If there is one narrow point, the AI will realise that its formation cannot fit through the narrow point without breaking formation (i.e., bunching up together). This could be the trigger for it to try and avoid that narrow point - possibly following a routine like the one you suggest, or possibly just destroying some of the walls/terrain around the narrow point to make it bigger.

Wouldn't it just create slightly bigger hole with pretty much the same effect?
Besides - if AI would relay on fire to demolish something (like it does now) it'd help only of door-trap is made on open air with walls. But not if it's made in caves.
Any alternative I can think of would be to send `demoman` with every single team - might be an option, sure, but it'd minimalize potential of coping with regular threats (I don't know if it's good or bad)

(I'm also curious how would such AI cope with W-shaped walls. It'd try to breach them till there's one hole through which all of the towers will shoot raiders while they continue attempts to destroy the wall? Basically invalidating whole strategy?
And what about bases that just got narrow corridors and small rooms? Such AI would've try to explode everything? Just because it can't fit into any corridor?)

Creating a bigger hole is basically what I had in mind. It seems like all of these funnels and killboxes rely on getting the raiders into a small area where they can be blown up and/or shot at, right? At the very least, by attacking surrounding walls there would be a chance that the AI destroys some vital component of the player's trap. I had envisaged the AI using grenades to destroy structures; those work well against rock as well as constructed walls.

If the raiders got shot at while trying to demolish a structure, they could simply forget about demolition for a moment and return fire. Alternatively, as you suggested for the specialised team, the demoman could continue his work while the rest defend him and engage the player's forces. So as soon as they blew a hole in a wall which revealed a turret, they would shoot at the turret rather than trying to blow up more walls.

The narrow corridors thing is a really good point and I don't see a solution without the raiders having some sort of proper objective. As it stands, the raiders objectives seem to be "blow stuff up and kill anyone who gets in your way". And actually, turning an underground base into a large open cavern fits that objective remarkably well! ;)

Once they have proper objectives, then the demolition behaviour could be limited to when initially trying to breach the player's defenses - after that they could revert to their usual tactics.

EtaBetaPi: Well, I know how I'd sort those guys out, then.

I'd build a mucking great avenue into the mountain, large enough for them to not worry about blowing their way through anything else, and also keep about 3-4 tiles of unrevealed rock between me and the outside, so they wouldn't think to blast through solid stone. They'd run down the corridor to get to the crunchy bits of my base, I'd sell off the walls supporting the mountain and drop the dwarven atom smasher on their heads. Resetting is a simple matter of rebuilding the supports and mining it out.

It's difficult to think of a raiding team that could survive that sort of defense!

Having re-read Sky_walker's post and thought about it a bit more, I can see where he's coming from. Knowing which path raiders will try to take in advance makes defending much easier - chokepoint or no chokepoint. I also think the AI he laid out seems very reasonable and would make things more challenging, while still allowing the player to respond (by coming out and attacking the demolitions team before it's too late).

Quote from: EtaBetaPi on November 07, 2013, 11:26:30 AMIt's difficult to think of a raiding team that could survive that sort of defense!

One that takes one look at your fortress, decides that you're an even more maniacal bunch of murderous jackals than they are, goes "Nope!" and pulls an about-face, marching away.

Or one that just sits in orbit for awhile, chasing off traders, until they decide that you're not coming out to fight and there's no way in hell they're going to be able to crack your fortress without being slaughtered instantly like dogs and buggers off to find something more profitable/entertaining than camping out in the rain watching muffalo graze and cacti grow.

QuoteHaving re-read Sky_walker's post and thought about it a bit more, I can see where he's coming from. Knowing which path raiders will try to take in advance makes defending much easier - chokepoint or no chokepoint. I also think the AI he laid out seems very reasonable and would make things more challenging, while still allowing the player to respond (by coming out and attacking the demolitions team before it's too late).

Not really. That would just make the player design the entire interior of his base with a false wall sacrificial zone for the demo team to blast through while he's maneuvering his entire colony into a pillbox set up along the edge of the entire mountain. The demo team blasts through and comes immediately under heavy fire.

Also, he's probably planted blasting charges like, everywhere, so the demo team will be heavily injured before they get inside.

Taking an entrenched position requires an order of magnitude more resources than making it does. You know how a modern military would go about taking these mountainside forts? They'd drop a cruise missile or two on the killboxes, have choppers fly up to suppress the entrances and force the people inhabiting it back in. Then they'd come up with multiple raid teams to breach several points at once with overwhelming numerical advantage - not five or six more than I have colonists, try twice the number of hostiles they're expecting, and they all have an overwhelming equipment and training advantage.

A WWII army? Watch The Sands of Iwo Jima. Bring about three times as many guys as you're expecting hostiles and get dug in for a long siege. Bring artillery pieces to pound their defenses to rubble - and bub, it takes a long time to pound through a stone mountain face with an artillery gun. Once you're reasonably sure that there's nobody aiming out the gun-ports, send your minesweepers up to clear out the landmines and booby-traps they've left in their way. This is going to be a slow process, and you'd better expect a hell of a lot of casualties, so don't send anybody you like. In addition to the ones who get killed from missing or failing to disarm mines or traps, the rest are going to come under heavy sniper fire from the gun-ports you didn't see and suppress with your field guns (and you will not have seen them all.) Then when you've crawled your way to the cave mouth, which will likely have taken you a week, you have two options. 1: Use flamethrowers to kill everybody inside from fire and oxygen deprivation. 2: intense, hallway-by-hallway, chamber-by-chamber gun battles where the other guy has had a week to use every resource at his disposal and his knowledge of the terrain to erect traps (more splosives, yay!) fighting positions, fallback positions, etcetera, etcetera.

Frankly, anyone can design a game where the game just throws unfair challenges after impossible odds until it's game over. That's what you tend to do when you're trying to win a fight; make it impossible for the other guy to win. Nobody wants to fight a fair fight, they want to shoot all those guys over there without getting any of their friends killed and go home to call it a day. But it doesn't make it a fun game to play when it's the AI throwing that at you.

And that's what this is, currently: an Iwo Jima scenario, with the players as the defenders. The raiders don't have any objectives, they aren't out to steal, their only goal is to murder every single living thing in your colony.

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 07, 2013, 12:34:34 PM
Not really. That would just make the player design the entire interior of his base with a false wall sacrificial zone for the demo team to blast through while he's maneuvering his entire colony into a pillbox set up along the edge of the entire mountain. The demo team blasts through and comes immediately under heavy fire.

I would say that it's perfectly fine solution. If your base design and troops defenses predicted attacks from varied angles - than you are suppose to win.
You used your troops, you used cunning design - I see nothing wrong with that.

What you do right now though is just a simple switch & bait. Where bait is the only doors into your colony and 2 blasting charges do the job. If not - tower clean the remains. You never used your troops in combat, took any risks nor lost any notable force.

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 07, 2013, 12:34:34 PMAlso, he's probably planted blasting charges like, everywhere, so the demo team will be heavily injured before they get inside.

That's extremely unlikely to happen - costs of such enterprise would be prohibitive, while still being very inefficient.

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 07, 2013, 12:34:34 PMTaking an entrenched position requires an order of magnitude more resources than making it does. You know how a modern military would go about taking these mountainside forts? They'd drop a cruise missile or two on the killboxes, have choppers fly up to suppress the entrances and force the people inhabiting it back in.  Then they'd come up with multiple raid teams to breach several points at once with overwhelming numerical advantage - not five or six more than I have colonists, try twice the number of hostiles they're expecting, and they all have an overwhelming equipment and training advantage.

Noone would fly any choppers. Single bomb from F/A 18 solves the problem. Noone makes any raid teams nor anyone goes into caves. Yea, that bomb is expensive, but noone will risk lives for stuff like that.
Sorry, but this whole comparison to modern day real-world combat is total nonsense.

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 07, 2013, 12:34:34 PM
A WWII army? Watch The Sands of Iwo Jima. Bring about three times as many guys as you're expecting hostiles and get dug in for a long siege. Bring artillery pieces to pound their defenses to rubble - and bub, it takes a long time to pound through a stone mountain face with an artillery gun.

And in Rim Wold a single granade can break through mountain wall.
Again: comparison with real-world combat doesn't make any sense.

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 07, 2013, 12:34:34 PMFrankly, anyone can design a game where the game just throws unfair challenges after impossible odds until it's game over. That's what you tend to do when you're trying to win a fight; make it impossible for the other guy to win. Nobody wants to fight a fair fight, they want to shoot all those guys over there without getting any of their friends killed and go home to call it a day. But it doesn't make it a fun game to play when it's the AI throwing that at you.

Noone says about AI throwing unfair challenges.

As you didn't noticed - I suggested a demo team with one very specific weakness - long-range combat and timer-based explosives. This means that any team armed with any long-range weapons will be able to dispose them before they manage to destroy anything in the base.
Secondly - I also suggested these teams to be rather small (1+2 or 1+3 raiders in most cases) to ensure they are weaker than regular raid forcing your colonists to step out of the base but at the same time NOT being in as much of a threat as they would be if faced regular raiding party. Player should feel encouraged to attack them, not discouraged.
Also third thing you haven't noticed is that these teams were suppose to be sent bit later in the game - when player already got chance to obtain some equipment and he either already build the doom-door trap exploit, or is building it right now.
And finally - to make sure your argument is totally invalid - I also suggested that these raiders are more of hit, steal, and run kind of thing. So even if you decide to ignore them - they won't wipe out your entire base. Rather: make enough damage to make it worthwhile to defend against them, but not enough to ruin the game if you loose.

Quote from: ShadowDragon8685 on November 07, 2013, 12:34:34 PM

QuoteHaving re-read Sky_walker's post and thought about it a bit more, I can see where he's coming from. Knowing which path raiders will try to take in advance makes defending much easier - chokepoint or no chokepoint. I also think the AI he laid out seems very reasonable and would make things more challenging, while still allowing the player to respond (by coming out and attacking the demolitions team before it's too late).

Not really. That would just make the player design the entire interior of his base with a false wall sacrificial zone for the demo team to blast through while he's maneuvering his entire colony into a pillbox set up along the edge of the entire mountain. The demo team blasts through and comes immediately under heavy fire.

Also, he's probably planted blasting charges like, everywhere, so the demo team will be heavily injured before they get inside.

Taking an entrenched position requires an order of magnitude more resources than making it does. You know how a modern military would go about taking these mountainside forts? They'd drop a cruise missile or two on the killboxes, have choppers fly up to suppress the entrances and force the people inhabiting it back in. Then they'd come up with multiple raid teams to breach several points at once with overwhelming numerical advantage - not five or six more than I have colonists, try twice the number of hostiles they're expecting, and they all have an overwhelming equipment and training advantage.

A WWII army? Watch The Sands of Iwo Jima. Bring about three times as many guys as you're expecting hostiles and get dug in for a long siege. Bring artillery pieces to pound their defenses to rubble - and bub, it takes a long time to pound through a stone mountain face with an artillery gun. Once you're reasonably sure that there's nobody aiming out the gun-ports, send your minesweepers up to clear out the landmines and booby-traps they've left in their way. This is going to be a slow process, and you'd better expect a hell of a lot of casualties, so don't send anybody you like. In addition to the ones who get killed from missing or failing to disarm mines or traps, the rest are going to come under heavy sniper fire from the gun-ports you didn't see and suppress with your field guns (and you will not have seen them all.) Then when you've crawled your way to the cave mouth, which will likely have taken you a week, you have two options. 1: Use flamethrowers to kill everybody inside from fire and oxygen deprivation. 2: intense, hallway-by-hallway, chamber-by-chamber gun battles where the other guy has had a week to use every resource at his disposal and his knowledge of the terrain to erect traps (more splosives, yay!) fighting positions, fallback positions, etcetera, etcetera.

Actually the modern millitary wouldn't send in the raid teams so quickly. They'd block of all the entrances they can see(making the mountain crush it shut, heavy sandbag walling or something similar), exept for one entrance. Roll in a thermobaric bomb, creating a massive fireball depriving the inside from all oxigen, suffocating those who survived the destructive blastwave and the incinerating heat. Then after some time has passed they send in raid teams carrying oxygen supplies to mop up.