Suggestion: Cyberwarfare units

[bold turtle]

I wondered why for such an advanced tech level, there are basically no cyberwarfare units in the game. Like hacking enemy units. Maybe taking over controll over them for some time. BrightworksTV said I should suggest it here. So here I am. 😉

[tiny thicket]

You know I have actually considered that a few times and I’m only guessing that from as basic a logical standpoint could be for the units, their ai is unable to be accessed from outside inputs. Except that as a commander we logically move them at our whims so it cancels them out.

Considering that, I guess the artificial intelligence without the ability to be hacked would be… beyond…all…reason.

Legit though I love the idea of it. The devs have a weapon like this in Zero-K which requires a set amount of time to convert a unit. Notably the unit returns back to control if the hacking unit is destroyed.

I can see the hacking being very fun but I also see that if you can hack anything, you have to determine what could counter it, what tech level the hacker is built(likely T3 or late T2 structure), and if you can deleted a whole base by hacking an AFUS and self destructing

[flat sonnet]

Maybe a core part of the AI is present in each unit such that they can function independently but they can predict how other units will act. Being able to recieve data input does not mean that you can hack something.

[tiny thicket]

Yeah I was leaning into that thought too. Only logic being that we are the controller over it but that could be shrugged off too

Although who knows if the players are actually gonna be a part of the deep BAR lore, then it’s not so impossible after all

[bold turtle]

I am too little of a game designer and too new to BAR to talk about balancing and the details. 😄

I have just some random ideas.

[tiny thicket]

Well best part of a community means access to a plethora of individuals who know the game, so the balancing thing is able to be worked around. I'd enjoy hearing the ideas regardless; hearing them at all means to find which ones are great and which ones can either be discarded altogether, or improved upon.

[fierce osprey]

you actually can capture units using either the Commander or the Decoy Commander, but this is not usually practical to do

[tiny thicket]

How is this done? And got any ideas in pvp that would be useful?

[fierce osprey]

you give them the Capture command- but unless it's an undefended mex or they're paralyzed or just completely asleep at the switch they will run away or shoot at you while you try to capture them

if you want to meme very hard it is possible to abduct an enemy unit and then capture it

such as building an Abductor aircraft, picking up an enemy unit, carrying it over to a decoy commander, and waiting for it to be captured while it is floating helplessly carried by the transport

[tiny thicket]

as I recall, heavy tanks can get picked up right? Stuff like Tigers can get converted arguably for free

[torpid sierra]

You can capture while cloaked, though they need to have no radar or you have a jammer out of sight. It also takes a long time for more expensive stuff (like 4 and a half minutes for an afus, though multiple decoy commanders do it faster). I pulled this off in a game (and also learned at the same time expensive buildings take a long time having only ever captured a couple of random cheap units with my com which didn't take much time). I got a cool screenshot but we lost the game and there were better things I could have done with that decoy com I snuck into their base (also that guys base was spread out so I couldn't even kill it all with that fus I captured).

[tiny thicket]

Haha, hilarious! And good to know about the cloaking too

Also could’ve self destructed the reactor to damage nearby stuff

[bold turtle]

What about needing two units for it. One cloaked unit within range of the victim. and one in the base doing the hacking? Basically everything in range of unit 1 does some weird stuff to it. like random shooting at allies, being stunned, walking forward but stop shooting at all. randomly determined.