Showing Supply Cap on tab screen instead of Opponent Upgrades

tedstertedster Member
in Feedback

Millea and I were talking about the difficulties of responding to a tech rush in Atlas. I'll try to break down the issues we've seen, because tech rushing feels very strong right now:

Tech rushing is super hard to react to

  1. The answer to tech rushing is jamming low-tier units and playing aggressive/timing attacks
  2. But there's no way to scout a tech rush is happening

    • There are no tech buildings to scout
    • Most armies are primarily Tier 1 for long stretches anyway so it's impossible to tell if someone is rushing high-tech
    • The player that is tech rushing can trade armies aggressively at the start of the game, keeping unit counts low which both masks a tech rush and makes its high-tier units higher-impact on average (harder to snipe/surround etc)
  3. Tier 1.5 feels extremely weak and insufficient to close out games versus players relying on T1 and suicide teching

    • There are few early-midgame scrap sinks that help grind out a win if the opponent ignores early-midgame units

Supply cap limits how much time you have to react to a tech rush

  1. Supply cap is raised at a static rate
  2. Your ability to jam Tier 1 down someone's throat is based on your supply cap
  3. You can't simply slam down half a dozen depots and build 40 marines
  4. If you don't react to a tech rush early, you can't react at all

Showing supply cap on the tab screen gives people more time to make good decisions

  1. Currently shows upgrades for opponents

    • This gives no time to react since by the time upgrades exist for a unit that unit is in play
    • By the time Tier 3 upgrade hits the board it's too late to raise supply cap in response
  2. By showing Supply Cap, you have less total information on your opponent's capabilities but more actionable information for fighting cheese

    • Can gain info on upgrades through fighting, or maybe tooltips from clicking on a unit
    • See someone at 40 supply cap 5 minutes in? Better start reacting!
    • This gives similar information to scouting a base in RTS

Corollary: Tier 1.5 units feel weak and bad at closing out games

  1. Tier 1.5 units often compose the meat of armies in RTS games, or at least share the role with Tier 1
  2. They are often more resilient and sustainable, and tend to force responses from the opponent

    • If you just make Tier 1 and try to tech without any support, my Tier 1.5 should probably be able to win fights cleanly
    • This helps make the midgame more dynamic and provides a tug-of-war to squeaking by on mostly Tier 1 vs. gaining map control/pressuring a base with Tier 1.5
  3. In Atlas, T1.5 are scrap sinks with few advantages over T1

    • In most cases they are weaker overall and more specialized
    • But their specialized roles are often worse than other heroes' Basic Units that do the same thing cheaper/better
    • If you'd just picked another hero with a basic unit that did that role, you'd have way more scrap and another deck slot
  4. Spending a deck slot on T1.5 feels like it should give you a much stronger early-midgame than someone who doesn't
  5. If this was the case, closing out games versus someone who was tech rushing with minimal Tier 1 would be much more practical without having to have perfect team-wide reaction to their low-supply cap
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