Some Suggestions from Benjen
Benjen
Member
So I put most of these on Discord, but I figure these are probably easier to see/find on here.
1- I would venture that since you can only spawn bricktrons as workers, I don't see a point in forcing the player to manually spawn each one; why not simply auto-spawn a bricktron when there are enough wisps(?) to spawn one.
2- As a mapmaker I would love a copy/paste function in World Editor! This would make maps a lot easier to make look nice, and a lot quicker to make in general.
3- Similarly, the ability to use debug-mode instant building in World Editor would be nice, as well as possibly things like instant tunnels? Many of the best maps go through all the hoops one has to jump through to get bricks and scattered ruins into their map, and a recent one I made features a good deal of tunnels and such, and I feel like I could have gone much further given the ability to do all of that through the World Editor directly. We'd get a lot of cooler maps out of that.
4- Coming back to the idea of copy/paste functions, I think it would be very helpful to be able to save small structures or sections of structures as 'blueprints.' For example, when building a wall, if you set a small segment of the wall as a blueprint, you could then place 5 of those 'wall segment' blueprints, instead of placing all 50 blocks in that segment one by one. (I'm imagining these blueprints placing just like blocks, you can rotate them around their center axis, and place them in a build task). This would allow those larger, repetitive parts of structures to stop taking up players' time and give us the ability to go and micromanage our crafting or armies and such without spending hours building each tower by hand.
-It would also be nice to be able to load our blueprints in other saves, perhaps designing towers for use in Conquest in Sandbox, and then when you enter a conquest map you can quickly paste your blueprint in at key chokepoints and be ready.
-blueprints could be saved to steam workshop and shared amongst other players
-blueprints could be used in the aforementioned world editor debug build mode, allowing mapmakers to quickly add varied constructions like bridges or towers to their maps.
-Landscape tasks would get a lot more use from players trying to fit their blueprints onto bad terrain!
-I'm getting a lot of these ideas from how blueprints work on Space Engineers, so that might be worth checking out?
-this is really the biggest suggestion on this post, I think it would be huge, game-changing, and really make the transition in Multiplayer from 'build a crappy, but functional wall and then Zerg rush the enemy' to 'take the (now much shorter) time to build a decent-looking castle and then attack with a more siege-style combat structure'
5- I would, personally, love the ability to choose your starting position, or choose to randomize it. (In multiplayer this would simply be solved by having the host choose starting positions). I often make maps that tailor different crystal locations to different play styles and while it can be fun to randomize, it would also be nice to be able to choose at times.
Now I'm getting into some more wishlist sort of items that wouldn't be huge changes to the gameplay, but would still be nice to have
6- Several people on discord have mentioned this, most notably Mobbstar and Michael_Mooshy here:
I think a portcullis, gate, or drawbridge (or all of the above) that could be built to different sizes and be stronger than your average door would be very valuable to the aesthetic and defensive qualities of any castle or structure.
7- The game could definitely use an experience/upgrade system for bricktrons in battle; they are hopelessly outclassed by higher level corruptrons.
8- Water would be a nice aesthetic addition, but IMO would probably take too much time and effort to be worth it, so if you add it, add it last.
9- The most valuable resource in the game is your bricktrons. Perhaps add a way to get more by completing something challenging, like assaulting a corruption-spawning crystal or something?
I'll keep responding to add suggestions as I think of them. If they belong to others I'll give credit, as I did above for Mobbstar and Michael_Mooshy.
1- I would venture that since you can only spawn bricktrons as workers, I don't see a point in forcing the player to manually spawn each one; why not simply auto-spawn a bricktron when there are enough wisps(?) to spawn one.
2- As a mapmaker I would love a copy/paste function in World Editor! This would make maps a lot easier to make look nice, and a lot quicker to make in general.
3- Similarly, the ability to use debug-mode instant building in World Editor would be nice, as well as possibly things like instant tunnels? Many of the best maps go through all the hoops one has to jump through to get bricks and scattered ruins into their map, and a recent one I made features a good deal of tunnels and such, and I feel like I could have gone much further given the ability to do all of that through the World Editor directly. We'd get a lot of cooler maps out of that.
4- Coming back to the idea of copy/paste functions, I think it would be very helpful to be able to save small structures or sections of structures as 'blueprints.' For example, when building a wall, if you set a small segment of the wall as a blueprint, you could then place 5 of those 'wall segment' blueprints, instead of placing all 50 blocks in that segment one by one. (I'm imagining these blueprints placing just like blocks, you can rotate them around their center axis, and place them in a build task). This would allow those larger, repetitive parts of structures to stop taking up players' time and give us the ability to go and micromanage our crafting or armies and such without spending hours building each tower by hand.
-It would also be nice to be able to load our blueprints in other saves, perhaps designing towers for use in Conquest in Sandbox, and then when you enter a conquest map you can quickly paste your blueprint in at key chokepoints and be ready.
-blueprints could be saved to steam workshop and shared amongst other players
-blueprints could be used in the aforementioned world editor debug build mode, allowing mapmakers to quickly add varied constructions like bridges or towers to their maps.
-Landscape tasks would get a lot more use from players trying to fit their blueprints onto bad terrain!
-I'm getting a lot of these ideas from how blueprints work on Space Engineers, so that might be worth checking out?
-this is really the biggest suggestion on this post, I think it would be huge, game-changing, and really make the transition in Multiplayer from 'build a crappy, but functional wall and then Zerg rush the enemy' to 'take the (now much shorter) time to build a decent-looking castle and then attack with a more siege-style combat structure'
5- I would, personally, love the ability to choose your starting position, or choose to randomize it. (In multiplayer this would simply be solved by having the host choose starting positions). I often make maps that tailor different crystal locations to different play styles and while it can be fun to randomize, it would also be nice to be able to choose at times.
Now I'm getting into some more wishlist sort of items that wouldn't be huge changes to the gameplay, but would still be nice to have
6- Several people on discord have mentioned this, most notably Mobbstar and Michael_Mooshy here:
I think a portcullis, gate, or drawbridge (or all of the above) that could be built to different sizes and be stronger than your average door would be very valuable to the aesthetic and defensive qualities of any castle or structure.
7- The game could definitely use an experience/upgrade system for bricktrons in battle; they are hopelessly outclassed by higher level corruptrons.
8- Water would be a nice aesthetic addition, but IMO would probably take too much time and effort to be worth it, so if you add it, add it last.
9- The most valuable resource in the game is your bricktrons. Perhaps add a way to get more by completing something challenging, like assaulting a corruption-spawning crystal or something?
I'll keep responding to add suggestions as I think of them. If they belong to others I'll give credit, as I did above for Mobbstar and Michael_Mooshy.
Comments
2 & 3) Yes, I agree, but I'm not sure how destroyed voxels would be restored. Maybe have a "placement mode" button to activate building/tunnels/etc. and "clear placement" brush?
4) Yes, I mostly agree. Building is a strong feature of this game and letting players properly share and use each other's constructions sounds great. However, it kind of sounds like an unfair advantage in PvP if the other person doesn't have any blueprints saved.
5) I don't agree on this. Most maps are balanced in this regard, so if one start point lets that player dominate the game, then your map is probably just unbalanced.
6) See my opinion above
7) I'm not keen on an upgrade system, but some balancing is certainly needed. Right now, sentinels seem to be the only viable late-game offence to my knowledge.
8) Water would be awfully complicated to implement, better not bother
9) I thought resource-shortage is part of the fun? Again, some balancing is needed, but I think it's mostly fine.
Also this would be a big deal for single player, where its not a question of balance at all
Reg 7: I agree, upgrades seem like a rather boring way of handling it but idk how else it would be done
Reg 8: I agree that was mostly a fit of whimsy on my part xD
Reg 9: Agreed. I'm reasonably happy with the way bricktrons are earned much faster than they used to, but I've just remembered WHY I wanted more bricktrons, and I feel I need to move to a second post for it.
10- What if we had a way of grouping bricktrons into combat groups or squads, or even forming them in prearranged formations, allowing for some more complex RTS style gameplay
Which, reg. #9 would involve much larger numbers of bricktrons
This is like... a wayyyy in the future sort of idea since I imagine it would be hard to implement and very laggy
11- Easier idea, though, to complement Mobbstar's portcullis; Mobile Catapults! Let us put catapults on wheels and use them to wreak havoc on enemy castles!
14 And I've changed the mobile catapult idea, I don't like it anymore; instead, let's have a wheeled platform that allows for some (limited) amount of structures to be built on it. Perhaps only wood structures, and catapults? (Are catapults still only able to be built on stone?)
I do have to admit I somewhat stole the platform idea from Ace002's 'some ideas' thread, but I thought it was an excellent way to implement mobile siege weapons without having to come up with the siege weapons on your own!
15 I wish catapults and corruptrons didn't go through stone walls so easily! I almost feel like building a castle is pointless because even the regular corruptrons can eat through blocks in no time, and if a catapult is in range of my walls (in MP obviously), then they may as well not be there! I feel like the point of stone castle walls is to be stronger and more durable than wood. Maybe if we made it difficult to get stone early on - like the dirt blocks not yielding quite so much, or perhaps forcing players to craft picks out of surface iron before mining any stone blocks - making it a valuable resource in early game and forcing players to start with wooden castles, which corruptrons rip their way through at the speed which they currently eat through stone, and then, later on, the player upgrades their castles to stone, which stops all but determined Biftrons from entering!
- doors remain weak points, but if the walls are actual obstacles then building towers to defend your walls makes sense, and its easier to make gatehouses and such.
15 (better walls): Stone is too easy to get from the ground to be a significantly stronger material. If quarries and tunnels took longer to yield stone (but same amount in the end), then fast wood fences would be a much more reasonable early-game strategy. In addition, it would encourage mining boulders for other reasons than just to be rid of them.
15 I agree with this too. I know 15 is a Wall of Text, so I'll pull out this quote quick from what I wrote:
"Maybe if we made it difficult to get stone early on - like the dirt blocks not yielding quite so much, or perhaps forcing players to craft picks out of surface iron before mining any stone blocks - making it a valuable resource in early game and forcing players to start with wooden castles, which corruptrons rip their way through at the speed which they currently eat through stone, and then, later on, the player upgrades their castles to stone, which stops all but determined Biftrons from entering!"
I absolutely believe we should make stone harvesting more difficult to motivate people to build with wood. Adding sideways (wall) planks might add to this as well, allowing cheaper wooden castles to be built.
@Mobbstar