Foundations under attack (discussion)

[Yves]

In Reply to: http://www.wildfireg...77

As the fix for #1809 reintroduced the ability to construct damaged buildings (the finished building doesn't have full health) and there was no real consensus thus I am asking for a decision.

There are two possibilites on how to handle this:

• Include the ability to construct buildings in a damaged state (when the foundation was damaged during construction). (Currently implemented)
  
• Require builders to keep building until the foundation reaches 100% health.
  

I'd test the persian architecture tech now. I'm quite sure that it doesn't work as expected anymore after that patch.

The idea for increasing health by tech was to increase the health relatively. If your building had 100% before researching the tech you get 100% after that and your HP increased. If you got 50% health before researching the tech you'll get 50% after researching it.

Btw. I think it's a bad thing that we aren't able to post in the Design Committee thread.

It's unnecessary and confusing if people have to create separate threads to make a comment or tell their opinion.

[leper]

I'd test the persian architecture tech now. I'm quite sure that it doesn't work as expected anymore after that patch.

The idea for increasing health by tech was to increase the health relatively. If your building had 100% before researching the tech you get 100% after that and your HP increased. If you got 50% health before researching the tech you'll get 50% after researching it.

The health stays at the same percentage now, but it doesn't jump anymore if the building continues to be built (and it was attacked during construction).

[Yves]

The health stays at the same percentage now, but it doesn't jump anymore if the building continues to be built (and it was attacked during construction).

Hmm yes I think you are right (after checking the code more closely).

About the question my opinion is that a building should require the maximum health to be completed.

1. It's clear for the player when a building will be built.

2. It's more logical. It shouldn't be possible to complete the build after a herd of elefants has run over the construction site by just one hit of a hammer (to use an extreme example).

3. I think it's better for games with wonders like in AOK. If the enemy is close to completing the building of a wonder and you can damage it severely, it's a benefit for you even though you didn't completely destroy it.

[k776]

Quick note: The design committee is for decisions that the rest of us can't decide on. You don't go to them for every decision. Each design committee thread should be able to link back to a public discussion in the technical discussion forum (like this one) as proof that discussion took place, got no where, and that the design committee needs to get involved.

Back on subject, I think it could depend on the building type. Maybe we add the option into the XML. RequireFullConstruction or something. for e.g. a farm could be built damaged, and you'd only get the % of resources from the % of health it had when it finished building. Same for walls (they build with reduced health). However, some things like towers and wonders make sense to be 100% health.

Now, that said, the decision we'll probably go with I think is having 100% health, because eventually, when we add buildings rising up out of the ground during construction, we don't want a half risen building suddenly turn into a fully risen one. It also makes sense that if your enemies are able to keep hitting your construction, you shouldn't be able to complete it at all.

So my vote goes toward requiring 100% health to complete a building.

[historic_bruno]

About the question my opinion is that a building should require the maximum health to be completed.

1. It's clear for the player when a building will be built.

2. It's more logical. It shouldn't be possible to complete the build after a herd of elefants has run over the construction site by just one hit of a hammer (to use an extreme example).

3. I think it's better for games with wonders like in AOK. If the enemy is close to completing the building of a wonder and you can damage it severely, it's a benefit for you even though you didn't completely destroy it.

I don't like this solution because if enemies are damaging the foundation at very close to the rate you are building it, it will never be finished. Does it make sense in the real world? Yes, but in terms of gameplay it's a worse solution. At least give the player a chance to build it and train some units.

To make it clearer to the player what the construction progress is, we could display a floating completion percentage above the foundation (or the rising building preview which I'm working on in #1174). This percentage would always start at 0% and end at 100%, no matter how damaged the foundation might be.

[historic_bruno]

Now, that said, the decision we'll probably go with I think is having 100% health, because eventually, when we add buildings rising up out of the ground during construction, we don't want a half risen building suddenly turn into a fully risen one. It also makes sense that if your enemies are able to keep hitting your construction, you shouldn't be able to complete it at all.

FYI it doesn't work this way in my patch for #1174, the building rising is tied into building progress %, not health level.

[k776]

FYI it doesn't work this way in my patch for #1174, the building rising is tied into building progress %, not health level.

Ah, ok, interesting. Well, that in mind then, I'm fine with it going either way.

[Pureon]

I don't like it when 1 unit can finish building a fortress even though I've started attacking it with melee units at the other end, however I also wouldn't like it if I was unable to complete a build just because someone keeps shooting rocks at it from far away.

So I can't decide between the two options. Both have their merits.

[Yves]

If a building is so heavily under attack that you don't make any progress building it, you should consider attacking the attackers.

They will stop attacking it soon or they die.

I don't see what the problem is.

The only problem I see at the moment is if the foundation can get damaged and repaired endlessly without spending more resources.

That doesn't make sense.

[MoLAoS]

Many games don't charge money for repair, just on placement. Others like Warlords Battlecry have repair commands that cost res.

Glest games for instance don't have repair costs. When I was adding code for some of my more out there ideas I had to add a new set of commands that let you build over time but only if you had the resources which would get spent each hit. Placing the foundation didn't actually cost anything. I actually required the resources to be moved to the foundation but that was part of a Simmy supply line type game mechanic. 0 AD could implement a similar system that still drew from faction resources.

Ideally you would have build commands give units a build value score and calculate what % of the building you were working on's total health that was and then multiply that by the resource cost. This would be the same code used to repair a building. This is similar to the spend resource over time systems in older RTS games and in stuff like Total Annihilation and Zero-K.

[Mythos_Ruler]

I see the construction % and "health" as the same thing.

[MoLAoS]

I see the construction % and "health" as the same thing.

Well assuming you don't want resources to correlate to health, that is you can repair indefinitely without expending more resources, then construction % can be looked at like health.

But if you need to spend resources to repair or build you have 2 choices:

One is that resources are all worth a certain amount of health. Then you can assign a cost based on that amount of health. Then its easy to create a repair value based on the ratio of resources in the structure. You don't care about what % of building health you repair.

The second method is to ignore cross building balance and give whatever health and resource costs you like and balance the resource value based on the % of the building health you repair/build with each hit.

[Mythos_Ruler]

Just make repairing "free" of cost. The real cost is time spent doing the repairing. I don't have a problem with something like that.

[Pureon]

Removing repair costs doesn't sound appealing to me. Whether you spend resources on repairs, or you use the resources on advancing/retreating is a strategic decision that shouldn't be removed imo.

However this discussion isn't about the repair costs themselves, but whether buildings should be completed damaged or always at 100% health.

[quantumstate]

I also favour the 100% health needed. If someone cannot build fast enough because the structure is taking damage then it shouldn't get completed.

[Mythos_Ruler]

I also favour the 100% health needed. If someone cannot build fast enough because the structure is taking damage then it shouldn't get completed.

This is what I agree with. I do not wish to see the health disconnected from percentage complete. To me they should be the same.

[Pureon]

So my vote goes toward requiring 100% health to complete a building.

If a building is so heavily under attack that you don't make any progress building it, you should consider attacking the attackers.

They will stop attacking it soon or they die.

I also favour the 100% health needed. If someone cannot build fast enough because the structure is taking damage then it shouldn't get completed.

This is what I agree with. I do not wish to see the health disconnected from percentage complete. To me they should be the same.

Looks like this is the most popular option. Lets go with it.

[zoot]

I have to admit, I'm leaning towards this:

I don't like this solution because if enemies are damaging the foundation at very close to the rate you are building it, it will never be finished. Does it make sense in the real world? Yes, but in terms of gameplay it's a worse solution. At least give the player a chance to build it and train some units.

To make it clearer to the player what the construction progress is, we could display a floating completion percentage above the foundation (or the rising building preview which I'm working on in #1174). This percentage would always start at 0% and end at 100%, no matter how damaged the foundation might be.

I experience it quite often with towers and civic centers in particular. Imagine you're 95% complete with the first tower in your base and it comes under attack from an early rush. Would it feel fair that you have a nearly complete tower, but never get the chance to use it to repel the attackers, because they keep hammering at it with their swords? Would it feel fun, would it feel realistic? IMO, no.

I can see the logic of the other option, but if you do decide to go with that, at least evaluate it honestly and consider if it really makes the gameplay better.

[idanwin]

To me it doesn't, certainly with military/defensive buildings. A tower just finishing when under attack, or a barracks can make a huge difference in deciding the outcome of a battle.

[feneur]

I think we should decide one thing before making this decision (as the gameplay impact varies quite a lot depending on how we do other things): Should non-siege units be able to attack foundations?

I could see arguments for doing things both ways, after all, if they can't the unit roles would be more clearly defined and the role of siege would be bigger. It would of course make it harder to raid though, and also a bit harder to claim as realistic. It would mean that the attacker would be forced to focus more on taking out the builders (especially early in the game), but again, that could be a good or a bad thing.

Removing the ability for non-siege to attack foundations would lessen/remove some of the concerns which have been raised against tying completion % and health together, after all a tower doesn't generally provide much of a challenge to siege engines.

[quantumstate]

I experience it quite often with towers and civic centers in particular. Imagine you're 95% complete with the first tower in your base and it comes under attack from an early rush. Would it feel fair that you have a nearly complete tower, but never get the chance to use it to repel the attackers, because they keep hammering at it with their swords? Would it feel fun, would it feel realistic? IMO, no.

this is exactly what I want. If I arrive at a construction site with a stronger force I want to be able to halt progress. I can't think of any particular justification for either decision though.

I think we should decide one thing before making this decision (as the gameplay impact varies quite a lot depending on how we do other things): Should non-siege units be able to attack foundations?

Are you suggesting that non siege units would never be able to take out a tower? I very strongly object to this because it is not possible to create siege until phase 3. This means if someone starts building a tower near my base it is impossible to stop the construction unless I keep guard over it and kill any units coming to do more construction work. So in my view this severely overpowers aggressive construction (which we deliberately weakened a while back by reducing armour and build rate with more workers).

[Enrique]

If I arrive at a construction site with a stronger force I want to be able to halt progress.

Are you suggesting that non siege units would never be able to take out a tower? I very strongly object to this because it is not possible to create siege until phase 3.

These to me are really strong arguments.

My vote goes to 100% health needed.

[zoot]

this is exactly what I want. If I arrive at a construction site with a stronger force I want to be able to halt progress.

Why not just attack the builders?

[greenknight32]

Why not just attack the builders?

That was addressed by quantumstate

This means if someone starts building a tower near my base it is impossible to stop the construction unless I keep guard over it and kill any units coming to do more construction work. So in my view this severely overpowers aggressive construction (which we deliberately weakened a while back by reducing armour and build rate with more workers).

Maybe it should be possible for attacking units to dismantle partially completed buildings after killing the builders - just reverse the construction process.

[MoLAoS]

That was addressed by quantumstate

Maybe it should be possible for attacking units to dismantle partially completed buildings after killing the builders - just reverse the construction process.

Maybe they could even get resources for doing it.