Pandt's musings
Pandt
Member
Points system for unit selection
So I was listening to the discussion going on on twitch and had an interesting idea on the unit selection. What I thought of was a points system for the units select so instead of only having 5 unit slots and then each of the units has its own limit on how many you can build you instead have the 5 unit slots and an allocation of points to spend; you can build as many units as you want. For example you are allocated 100 points to spend, and each Apocalyte costs 15, each Emberfiend 15 and each Devilkin 10. So having three Apocalytes and three Emberfiends means you can only have one Devilkin and no other units, but you can have 6 Apocalytes if you want. This would both be a very good tool for balancing units by limiting your breadth of units if you want to get a lot of some units. It would also allows for comps such as three Trebuchet and only basic units if Trebuchet's cost 30. I think this would allow for another tool for balancing as well as adding more diversity to unit selection. Some mercenaries may still need to be limited to 1 per comp but other than that I see no other major issues. It would make it slightly more complicated but it still feels intuitive to me.
Comments
Cheese
Also discussed was whether cheese is healthy for the game at this stage and if so how cheese can be successfully implemented. I personally am of the opinion that cheese is important for healthy game play and as a viewer can be one of the most interesting parts of many games. Cheese picks in league or seeing proxy gates in a Starcraft final can be some of the most exciting experiences for a viewer.
I think think the unit selection process is a great basis for cheese to be healthy in Atlas because it allows your opponent to prepare from the beginning of the game. For example a 6 Bramblethorn comp can be really strong but it can also be countered easily if you know what to do but if you have the wrong units you lose. This is a healthy state of the game because it is a strategy designed to counter the meta and also designed to force your opponent to play differently to how they would usually play in future games in order to counter it. Currently this does not exist too much in the game as there is one strategy which is so good that it can't really be cheesed out but it is something that I think will hopefully be seen more in the future.
However what needs to be avoided while implementing cheese into a game is that it is not easy to execute and it is not too specific what is required to counter it. If a player can do a build and it will only lose to a very specific comp this is a problem. Cheese is healthy when it is risky,hard to execute and not hard to defeat if you know what you are doing. It is unhealthy when it is safe, easy to execute, and requires a player to play perfectly to defend it. Cheese should be a mental game and not a tool for bad players to beat good ones.
I think the point system is an interesting idea but I personally wouldn't like it, agreeing on the cheese though, makes the game way more interesting.
Yeah I think the points system could be a terrible idea but it was something that I thought could be interesting to try.
The issue with Cheese is that so far it has been only early game and only viable for a short time.
You have to somehow make Cheese available in different stages of the game or have Cheese strategies be able to transition to another strategy.
The point system is great. However, I think the units are hard to balance with points, so eventually there will be limitations. In addition, no one wants to play a game in which they cannot transition, especially with a failed cheese strategy.
and then it's no longer cheese. This game does not need cheese anyway, it may have RTS gameplay but objectivewise it's a Moba.