Attacking Bases feels Too Strong
There seems to be a sharp rise in games decided by weird base-killing mechanics that either feel too strong, too hard to react to, or too good to not do every single game. Here's the thoughts I've collected after talking with several other testers:
There is no Town Portal in Atlas
- Breaking bases in Atlas feels way easier to do (and just as powerful) compared to other MOBAs
- On top of this observation, there are no Town Portal abilities to counteract the ease of destruction
- ...so any issues with base racing feel magnified
- I don't think there should be a town portal in Atlas, but I'm pointing this out for the sake of comparison
Inner buildings are not protected by outer buildings
- This feels confusing and makes me feel bad because I feel like my base is meaningless
- Having your towers still standing does not provide insurance or give you map control
- Momentum feels less meaningful because important buildings can be killed before you can react
- Playing from "ahead" often means playing incredibly safe and turtly rather than aggressively which drags out matches
Nexus diving feels very problematic
- Nexuses have very few HP
- Shield batteries give very few HP now
- It's much faster to just kill a nexus than to kill shield batteries and then the Nexus
- This feels confusing and bad because it rewards diving the Nexus which often results in losses when you had momentum
- Diving the Nexus without killing anything else is common
- It is common to be "winning" and then realize the opponents all dove past your base and are killing your Nexus
- Nexuses die to even 1-2 players so fast that you often don't have time to get back to base
- This feels really bad and makes me angry when I was winning
- This also fosters annoyance among team members - did someone forget to ward a single time? You might instantly lose the game despite being way ahead
Towers feel anemic
- Why don't you have to kill towers to kill inner buildings?
- This contributes enormously toward having no time to defend your base
- Towers do little damage so diving past them feels trivial
- What are towers for if they don't guard buildings?
- Inner Towers feel extremely weak
- Can be almost completely ignored
- This makes diving buildings even more prevalent and appealing
- Why not have them deal AOE damage or multiattack?
Warp Spires encourage T1 Suicide Rushes every game
- Warp Spires give 75 energy
- It takes much less than 75 energy worth of T1 troops to knock over a warp spire in a few seconds
- There is no downside to rushing Warp Spires with a T1 army every single game
- This feels bad because it's extremely difficult to stop and the only correct response seems to be to do it yourself
- It also feels very bad because you have to react because otherwise they will keep destroying your base, but reacting still wastes time while the opponent is getting an advantage anyway
Comments
feelsbadman ;(
I realized one other thing that makes attacking bases feel so strong: Without creep waves you have no forward incidental vision. Because of this, even if you're on your side of the map you are often "out of position" to stop a game-ending dive because the opponent is on top of the nexus by the time you can even turn around and start running home.
I really am starting to wonder if things would feel better with Town Portal abilities or the like. Diving just ends game so quickly and it can feel so impossible to stop it sometimes.
Here's a good replay of a game that was super tense and exciting and featured some cool lategame lead changes and then - oh yeah you're doing Titans like you are supposed to and not taking particular risks? Wups, gg!
G6cde05ff82554f1fa838a6e55a16c80a
Town Portals
Having played builds of Atlas where there was an equivalent to "Town Portal" for your army, I think the removal of such a thing from the current build was a sharp improvement to the game. Its existence reduced the impact of positioning errors on the map, greatly reduced backdoors, counterattacks, and split forces, and made closing games out feel extremely difficult.
This is not to say it didn't have benefits. At the time, the central map for the game was vastly larger than the current iteration, so it was entirely possible to be halfway on the map, see two teams attacking your base, and conclude that the game was over as you couldn't return to your base in time... so the existence of Town Portal was a blessing. Additionally, this feature allowed teams that were losing or had lost map control maintain some semblance of pressure on the map and exert their forces. It was possible to push for an objective and then teleport back home.
Outer Buildings Defending Inner Buildings
I'd like to get on your second point about the Towers still standing not providing map control or meaningful defense and how it relates to the third point in the section. On principle, I feel the Towers make idle pokes in the beginning of the game very difficult and do defend the inner buildings by defending their own location as the gateway to the inner buildings. However, I agree that there are varying degrees to which this is effective.
For illustration, imagine that you're playing as the top team. The middle entrance to your base is covered by three Towers, and this feels meaningful. It peels back in layers, it lasts a bit longer into the game, and the number of Hit Points the enemy team has to bring down means you will be aware of it and able to react against it in a timely fashion. You might not be able to dislodge them... that varies from game to game... but you know it's happening and I feel as if I have a choice in the matter.
The entrances up the ramp from the top-left and bottom-right Titan spawn locations, however, are lightly defended. One Watchtower tends to go down after a significant pre-first-Titan fight, or the first Titan will take it out in short order. This reduces map vision and grants the other team more mobility without feeling like it's really defensible.
I feel that adding a second Outer Tower to those points (four total Towers on the top-left ramps to total 2 per ramp, and two total Outer Towers on the ramp to the bottom-right) would give more of the feeling that you can react without being overly punished for a poor fight in the first 5 minutes. I feel this change has the added benefit of being an extension of existing systems and is more internally consistent / elegant with the current version.
As for playing ahead, I feel that holding on to an advantage until it turns into victory is a smart way to play in general in a multitude of competitive games and that this does not reflect negatively on Atlas but positively on the players in a stronger position.
Nexus Diving
I think it's important to note that diving strictly for the Nexus has its own costs to the attacking team. They have made the determination that it's better to go strictly for the Nexus than to attack the defending team at all. If they are successful, this proves that their move was the correct one as it results in their victory. If they made the wrong choice and didn't control well enough to complete their objective, they have granted their opponents an UNBELIEVABLY large advantage and ceded ground in terms of fighting potential and positioning.
As I have not read the figures for Shield Batteries vs the HP they provide, I have no informed opinion on that topic.
Towers
If the change were made such that Towers had to be killed before you could attack inner buildings or the Nexus, then why not remove Shield Batteries entirely and grant Towers minor Shielding for the Nexus? Actually, I really, really like this idea.
Everything Else
I don't have strong feelings or experiences on the other topics stated above, so I'll hold off on my opinion until it's more well-formed.