Here is a scenario for you devs: Cortium nodes revamped: Cortium emerges out of the ground at "random" locations. By random, I mean a few of many locations that are safe for this to occur. Cortium is not respawnable. It comes in huge nodes of, let's say 10,000,000 units. Once it has been farmed out, it's gone until the continent is reset and unlocked. The position of the cortium models above the surface of the terrain is relative to how much cortium is accessible at that time. Cortium models will sink as they get depleted, until they are unreachable, but will steadily rise over time as long as they do not keep getting depleted. A cortium node that has not been farmed at all will sit at it's center, fully available and will sink as it is farmed. This is to make sure the farming does not happen at only one node. This will allow for aggressive counter-farming/defense and make cortium a more strategic variable. Player bases revamped: Snap functionality. If [button] is held down, new deployables will snap to nearest deployable. Show us what is getting in the way when something is blocking a deployable from being deployed. Make the obstacle red or something. Remove the floor of bunkers. Tighten the constraints to protect against gaps off terrain if desired. Raise the durability of structures. If pre-fab bases are indestructible, make player bases stronger. Specifically walls. Allow deployables to be tilted (to max 45 degrees), including skyshields. Pain spires are forced to be separated too far apart. Reduce it to at least a wall's length of distance. Ants should be able to withdraw cortium from silos. Cortium uses explored: Boost, cloak, shield, jet pack, resupply, repair, etc. functionality is recharged near any base terminal, including player bases. A small tank of nanites per vehicle/infantry unit is consumed when those features are used. Eventually it will empty out and can be refilled at a terminal. Cortium can power prefab complexes, providing an extra bonus. Empty objective nodes (the ones with no structures on them) should require a friendly base [with minimum requirements] for it to be capped.
" Cortium emerges out of the ground at "random" locations. By random, I mean a few of many locations that are safe for this to occur. Cortium is not respawnable. It comes in huge nodes of, let's say 10,000,000 units. Once it has been farmed out, it's gone until the continent is reset and unlocked. The position of the cortium models above the surface of the terrain is relative to how much cortium is accessible at that time. Cortium models will sink as they get depleted, until they are unreachable, but will steadily rise over time as long as they do not keep getting depleted. A cortium node that has not been farmed at all will sit at it's center, fully available and will sink as it is farmed. This is to make sure the farming does not happen at only one node. This will allow for aggressive counter-farming/defense and make cortium a more strategic variable." - Nah, cortium itself is fine the problem is mostly with construction itself. Some places could use more Cortium spawning, like Amerish. Snap functionality. If [button] is held down, new deployables will snap to nearest deployable. - Yes, this would be great Show us what is getting in the way when something is blocking a deployable from being deployed. Make the obstacle red or something. - Yes, but with the snapping functionality this shouldn't happen, right? Remove the floor of bunkers. Tighten the constraints to protect against gaps off terrain if desired. - Yes Raise the durability of structures. If pre-fab bases are indestructible, make player bases stronger. Specifically walls. - Yes, bases are absolute pathetic against armor/zerg. Allow deployables to be tilted (to max 45 degrees), including skyshields. - This would be great when building in angled terrain. Pain spires are forced to be separated too far apart. Reduce it to at least a wall's length of distance. - I don't know, Pain Spires can make a base inpenetrable by infantry when placed properly even with current limitations. Ants should be able to withdraw cortium from silos. - Sounds weird and also why? Cortium uses explored: Boost, cloak, shield, jet pack, resupply, repair, etc. functionality is recharged near any base terminal, including player bases. A small tank of nanites per vehicle/infantry unit is consumed when those features are used. Eventually it will empty out and can be refilled at a terminal. - Elaborate Cortium can power prefab complexes, providing an extra bonus. - Sounds interesting, but what bonuses? Cortium consumables? Empty objective nodes (the ones with no structures on them) should require a friendly base [with minimum requirements] for it to be capped. - Nope, this would make capping this bases awfuly grindy and slow.
For this article, base = prefab complex; outpost = player-made bases. Show us what is getting in the way when something is blocking a deployable from being deployed. Make the obstacle red or something. - Yes, but with the snapping functionality this shouldn't happen, right? - rocks, trees, prefab structures Ants should be able to withdraw cortium from silos. - Sounds weird and also why? - outpost migration; off-site cortium storage Boost, cloak, shield, jet pack, resupply, repair, etc. functionality is recharged near any base terminal, including player bases. A small tank of nanites per vehicle/infantry unit is consumed when those features are used. Eventually it will empty out and can be refilled at a terminal. - Elaborate - This stemmed from the infinite supply of ammo/repair that sundies provide. Instead they would be limited, somewhat like ammo, requiring them to replenish their source of nanites. It could also be extended to other functionality like cloaks, shield etc. For example: a tank has a limited number of shield before its nanites run dry; an infiltrator would also need to replenish their cloak, etc. Cortium can power prefab complexes, providing an extra bonus. - Sounds interesting, but what bonuses? Cortium consumables? - This depends on what the devs see as a valuable contribution - what won't break current economies. * possibly minor services depending on the type of base the outpost is powering or one of the below * passive healing; * the ability to request tanks even without a tech plant; * a skyshield over the base; * empowered turrets * pain spires can be installed in base * etc. Empty objective nodes (the ones with no structures on them) should require a friendly base [with minimum requirements] for it to be capped. - Nope, this would make capping this bases awfuly grindy and slow. - It should put a damper on hard zergs, and provide meaningful direction for any interested outpost-builders. Remember, this would only be for objectives that are bare cap points (i.e. Esamir: Untapped Reservoir)
Cortium emerges out of the ground at "random" locations. By random, I mean a few of many locations that are safe for this to occur. --- No, because cortium spawning is already fine and function well, aside from as few spots that prevent harvesting of a node altogether (ie underground or inside another non-cortium object), and certain areas that could use some cortium spots Cortium is not respawnable. It comes in huge nodes of, let's say 10,000,000 units. Once it has been farmed out, it's gone until the continent is reset and unlocked. --- Have you seen the places people put silos, be it nowhere near anyplace usefull or let alone placing JUST a silo to farm cortium for the certs, be it by themselves or in a group? Because there's been hundreds of times I've seen that happen. The position of the cortium models above the surface of the terrain is relative to how much cortium is accessible at that time. Cortium models will sink as they get depleted, until they are unreachable, but will steadily rise over time as long as they do not keep getting depleted. A cortium node that has not been farmed at all will sit at it's center, fully available and will sink as it is farmed. This is to make sure the farming does not happen at only one node. --- again, the current cortium spawning methods are just fine, barring some buggy spots or a few areas that are cortium dead zones that shouldn't be. Snap functionality. If [button] is held down, new deployables will snap to nearest deployable. --- Hell yes, super useful Show us what is getting in the way when something is blocking a deployable from being deployed. Make the obstacle red or something. --- Hell yes, super useful Remove the floor of bunkers. Tighten the constraints to protect against gaps off terrain if desired. --- no, but instead have floorless version of them for free or reduce the cost of both by half if they have a non-free version Raise the durability of structures. If pre-fab bases are indestructible, make player bases stronger. Specifically walls. --- This has already been done, and a small or medium sized force can hold/repel a force that's a bit larger than them. The only thing that I find really annoying about construction durability is how ****** repair modules are with lower health construction, such as modules, towers, and spawn tubes. Repair rates for the repair modules should be enough to mean a single person shelling a base with/without vehicle has a much more difficult time destroying modules, and a very hard time killing towers, but without affecting larger and heavier things too much. Allow deployables to be tilted (to max 45 degrees), including skyshields. --- 15-30 degrees to help with less than even terrain, but definitely not 45. This creates way too many spots that are hard to assault or hard to make an assault from, especially with the sky shield, although it would be nice if we could lower the distance the shield is projected at a bit, not more than half. Pain spires are forced to be separated too far apart. Reduce it to at least a wall's length of distance. --- Agreed, they do need to be able to be placed closer together, but not enough that they can touch. They do make it very hard to attack with infantry if properly setup, but also hard to find a good spot to place a second or third with. Ants should be able to withdraw cortium from silos. --- would be nice for when you have a large squad base and want to have an extra reservoir nearby because of how fast cortium is consumed. Only by the creator of the silo should be able to withdraw cortium, unless the silo has been abandoned (aka 10-15 minutes with no modules), and when this function is used, it's in chunks of 3, 6, and 9 thousand by interacting with the silo's terminal to acquire "Compressed/Refined Cortium" that is placed nearby a silo for it to absorb, with no xp given for doing such as people already have the xp from harvesting and the initial delivery. Don't want to create cert loops. Boost, cloak, shield, jet pack, resupply, repair, etc. functionality is recharged near any base terminal, including player bases. A small tank of nanites per vehicle/infantry unit is consumed when those features are used. Eventually it will empty out and can be refilled at a terminal. --- If you mean a constant ability recharge/repair/heal/reshield for allied members of a base while they are nearby, then yeah, that could work. Nah, this itself would be really hard to balance if at all and could easily mean one or two people grant otherwise impossible and overpowered combinations, such has Cortium can power prefab complexes, providing an extra bonus. --- The only thing other than a mini-tech fabricator (so that bases without a tech plant can have a limited number of vehicles that need them for non-warpgate spawning can be down so with just normal nanite cost for the player) would be granting vehicles and MAXes pulled from that base the benefits of the automatic repair defense slot upgrade (or constant repair at the same rate instead) in addition to whatever defensive slot they have, stacking fully with the auto repair if they they do have it equipped. Just not cloaked sundies that also have a deployment shield under their cloak, a harasser with recharging overshield, or a liberator with an activatable overshield for panic measures. No one wants to have to face stuff like that. Empty objective nodes (the ones with no structures on them) should require a friendly base [with minimum requirements] for it to be capped. --- No, because it's a vehicle capture zone, not a construction capture zone and construction is meant to be supplemental, not a direct requirement. Other these suggestions, I've had an idea where ants are able to provide single target repair to allied vehicles or even constructions at a decent distance with their mining tools on top addition to their normal cortium mining/depositing function via the secondary fire/zoom key as it is currently unused. And to balance it this would be at a moderately greater rate than rate of repair sundies, but probably not more than the repair tool the engi gets, at least not without the target vehicle having been undamaged for 4-8 seconds or so (no upgrades), although the Howler and the maybe the Yellowjacket (the top mounted one) should have a much better repair rate in comparison to the standard Mandible due to it's much shorter use time. This would mean the driver can actually help out in a vehicle fight. Regardless the Howler (and maybe the YellowJacket too) definitely needs both a buff in the amount of cortium in can mine before it overheats (from 2k to 3k) by reducing heat buildup rate and increasing the cooldown rate a bit too, as well as increasing the damage rate against constructions as right now it's just better to use a basilisk than bother with a costly (should be cheaper too, 500 certs or so) and poorly performing mining laser.
