Creeper World 3

[4xC]

"The game has already undergone some revolutions in the single month that alpha videos have been released. (guppies being the most visible example.)" (quote by Lurkily)

Yeah, No doubt about that. I think it's because videos are more encouraging to do a good job on important aspects and change what can or must be changed.

As I say in the blog comments, videos are superior to pics, but pics are still good to look at when time is of the essence for everyone making the game.

I have to admit that I am amazed. I knew games in early production were good all the way, but I never felt THIS obsessed for anything to be released as soon as possible and still maintain high game quality at the same time. But in any case, I will wait as long as it takes for CW3 to hit the online shelves so it can be bought for keeps.  ;D

[Chawe800]

Personally I found Shields to be just a little over powered. It just feels like it's portrayed as a little too powerful. In the Marshlands mission I saw that 1 shield in the power zone was able to withstand 3 emitters baring down on it with no support. I understand Power zones are supposed to greatly amplify a Unit strength but It just felt a little too powerful to me. Maybe if the creeper would slowly crawl towards the emitter more after the initial blast. I understand Virgil is using these alpha maps for testing stuff but I just want to make sure especially in later missions that we get a hell of a ride.

[4xC]

Personally I found Shields to be just a little over powered. It just feels like it's portrayed as a little too powerful. In the Marshlands mission I saw that 1 shield in the power zone was able to withstand 3 emitters baring down on it with no support. I understand Power zones are supposed to greatly amplify a Unit strength but It just felt a little too powerful to me. Maybe if the creeper would slowly crawl towards the emitter more after the initial blast. I understand Virgil is using these alpha maps for testing stuff but I just want to make sure especially in later missions that we get a hell of a ride.

As to how powerful a shield can be, how powerful did you think the repulsors in CW2 were? They could hold back a good deal of creeper so why shouldn't the CW3 shield? After all, the shields of CW3 are NOTHING like the CW2 shields. At least now we can build and produce within the shield's protective influence instead of behind it.

[Mr.H]

I hope virgil takes his time. The longer it takes the more refined it is, the more epic features it has. After realese no real new game features will be added, so it should maximise epicness before that.

Also 4xC use the 'edit post' button please ;)

[4xC]

I hope virgil takes his time. The longer it takes the more refined it is, the more epic features it has. After realese no real new game features will be added, so it should maximise epicness before that.

Also 4xC use the 'edit post' button please ;)

To begin with, I agree that time taking in game development makes it more refined, and that is why I said long ago that I will wait as long as it takes to play this one. Second, why do you want me to use post editting? To respond to a particular post, it makes more sense to put the response after the post you are responding to. Or is some error you noticed?

[Chawe800]

As to how powerful a shield can be, how powerful did you think the repulsors in CW2 were? They could hold back a good deal of creeper so why shouldn't the CW3 shield? After all, the shields of CW3 are NOTHING like the CW2 shields. At least now we can build and produce within the shield's protective influence instead of behind it.

Yea I guess that Repulsor was pretty powerful but I always felt it was a more cheaper unit that didn't cost as much and use as much energy as the blaster and mortar. Also it kinda felt like the CW2 equivalent of the Drone bomber in the way it causes a small pushback against the creeper. I really just wanna make sure two shields can repel 4 creepers at a small fairly wide choke-point.

[4xC]

watch "The March" on the blog. The shield at its known peak is demonstrated there.

[Mr.H]

You made a double post at the top of this page 4xc, is what I meant ;) . I wonder if virgil will allow modding, since it is a singleplayer game?

[lurkily]

You made a double post at the top of this page 4xc, is what I meant ;) . I wonder if virgil will allow modding, since it is a singleplayer game?

I think the lack of modding was not a design choice in the other CW games, but more of a practical limitation.  Any aspect in which you permit modding is something that will require dev support to implement, and I think that's a bigger consideration than anything else in whether modding's permitted.

[Shrike30]

As long as there's some sort of drain on shields that increases with the amount of "pressure" they're receiving from creeper, they ought to scale well.  A single shield on it's own at a chokepoint should be overwhelmed eventually, unless you're able to keep it aggressively supplied with energy.  Otherwise, I envision "shield crawls" where players simply leapfrog shields forwards towards the enemy and force all the creeper back, terping the ground flat in front of them.  In theory, this would result in a massive wall of creeper on the far side of that shield wall, and so (hopefully) force the player to support this with a massive amount of energy.

[Chawe800]

Totally Shrike. The more you try to do with a shield the more energy it consumes. But then how would power zones work? Would it increase the amount of energy to operate the shield or decrease it?

[4xC]

Even if a shield absorbed the most energy it ever could given whatever circumstances, it would still be overpowered eventually like the CW2 repulsors were no matter how much power they had.

[nathanglevy]

I am definitely looking forward to that overwhelming feeling of a creeper wall rolling towards you and putting up your shields and it is JUST enough to keep the creeper from overtaking you :).

I was assuming the shields would act as a field which would give the creeper a bias in radial angles. Sort of like the "creeper in the wind" video, where the entire map had such a bias in one direction. It could probably work like an electric field emanating from an electric charge, repelling similar charges from it. Putting more energy into it would generate a stronger force by q/r^2, but since distance is cubed the payoff would not be too great and always weaken far out. The shields' fields would have to be strong enough to repel the creeper pressure, otherwise it would push to the equilibrium point where the force is still enough.

I can already see interesting maps where the map's creeper bias is so strong that even using shields would only cause the creeper spread to behave normally :).

[lurkily]

As long as there's some sort of drain on shields that increases with the amount of "pressure" they're receiving from creeper, they ought to scale well.  A single shield on it's own at a chokepoint should be overwhelmed eventually, unless you're able to keep it aggressively supplied with energy. 

This is the case now - too much creeper will overwhelm a shield.  Not through energy use, though.  It will overwhelm the shield by pushing through the field.

I like this solution, but it's more CPU-intensive as well, which is my only worry - the shield has to account for every bit of creeper within its radius, and overlapping shields, to calculate its energy use.

[Shrike30]

I'm imagining "shield tunneling" now; a three building wide "tunnel" of structures, with the center being alternating relays and shields, and the sides of these tunnels being lined with blasters or alternating blasters/mortars, terps hopping along the front of the line to make sure it stays paved, and creeper piled hundreds of meters high on either side of the shields.  The pressure from the creeper is massive, but since there's another shield every six cells, none of them has too much weight on it.  Not exactly energy efficient, but it's kind of an epic image for me.