Comeback mechanic via unit energy drain

[static birch]

The code below isn't working since most recent update. Refer to this thread where I posted an improved and complete mod for this concept: #1218405020547027034 message
Many games I see snowball pretty hard once one side gets a significant economic advantage.

To counteract this, I thought "why not have a constant energy drain for each mobile combat unit?" I made a Tweakdifs that demonstrates this.

 if ud.energycost and ud.maxacc~=0 and ud.energymake==nil then  
            if ud.energycost>0 then
    ud.energymake=ud.energycost*-1/1000    
    end
        end
end```

What this does is takes a tenth of each unit's energy cost, inverts it into a negative number and makes it a negative draw on energy in the same way that constuctor has a positive energy generation value.

What I imagine this doing:

The opponant who has more units and is winning engagements will have more units on the field, which costs them energy.
The guy whose units are being blown up and he's got almost nothing on the field is gonna be turtling up. Defenses don't cost energy to keep on the field, so it'll give him an economic edge to try to catch up to his economically advantaged opponant.


Here are some values from Armada of what some units draw for power:

Tick -.3
Centurion -3.1
Fatboy -11
sharpshooter -20
Hound -6.3
thor -240
vanguard -71
marauder -21
Titan - 286
liche -46
Banshee - 2.3
hornet -22
blizzard -13

If I knew how to make it so the units just stop being able to move AND shoot when you don't have enough energy, I would do that. doing this modification just slows down your construction and unit production. 

I provided a screenshot with an army comp to look at total energy drain.

Any input or suggestions for improvement welcome

Comeback mechanic via unit energy drain

[grand relic]

Sounds interesting, are you hosting a lobby with it ?

[static birch]

I could. I exclusively play COOP so I suck.

But I'll playtest it some if you wanna.

[wide bramble]

for me personally I think winning should not be punishing, you didn't get into the situation of having more eco by accident and you probably should win.

[ebon flint]

Making units is the most fun part of the game, why do you want to tax it ?
The snowball effect happens, as you pointed out, because of broken economy, which favors energy conversion in the back of the base instead of expanding through mexes. 
When you add the defending advantage of eating wreck you get punished for attacking which is even more snobally of an effect.
Another cause is the huge gap between t1 and t2 that you can't narrow with just skill.
In order to have a comeback mechanic you need a rock-papper-scissors situation where you always have cheap counters to a particular strategy or army composition.
The moment higher tech has better health, dps, range and speed there is no way to counter it.
I would much like to see conversion nerf, a t3 mex and some balance between tech, like making t2 units more expensive.
The lurker counters balls of marines directly, it's more expensive and highter tech. But just because 2 lurkers appear on the field doesn't mean it's insta gg, you can still micro around them.
In bar, you make a 7 thug push with rez bots and a few grunts, the enemy makes 2 jags and you lose the lane.

[static birch]

It's mex expansion that makes a lopsided map domination very, very difficult to turn around. If energy converters were, say, half as effective (which I can make a tweakdefs to do if you'd like, just give me some balancing values you think might work) then as you lose ground you simply won't have the metal enough to build the units to reclaim it. There comes a point where it doesn't matter how efficiently you can trade this unit for that unit. Make enough of even a bad matchup and you're gonna win.

Making units is fun. But, fighting a losing battle that's almost certainly going to result in defeat in 20 minutes because the enemy was able to sieze more territory than you earlier... That kinda bites.

The T1-T2 gap is also exacerbated by the fact that if you're at a metal disadvantage, you're also gonna choke on teching.

The comeback I'm imagining is where:
Enemy claims more mexes,
Your units blown up,
You throw down some static defenses
pour your extra energy from not having units into metal makers
Then use metal from metal makers to try to make a comeback.

Ideal balance would still have you at a disadvantage, but less of a significant snowball. One where good counter-play can still turn things around.

[static birch]

The emotional reason behind this idea is a concept from board games. You ever play a game of monopoly where you start to lose 20 minutes in, but won't completely lose for another 30 minutes? You're just there. Stuck there until the game's almost certain outcome of your defeat plays out.

Feels bad man.

Thought this energy cost might give people a little more of a chance to turn things around.

[golden elbow]

these values are too low to make such a comeback more middled
all this really does is punish success from a team and that isnt something bar attempts to do by design

[wide bramble]

yeah but the thing is monopoly is a random game where your choices don't matter nearly as much as dice rolls, it's a family friendly game even kids etc can win, this is a competitive RTS where you have complete agency in where you end up 20 minutes into a game. Punishing you for playing better effectively.

[golden elbow]

i find it odd to assign a value to the following units
centurion
it has very little late game potential
sharpshooter
its one of the highest E drain units in the game to begin with
banshee has no late game potential to my knowledge

[static birch]

Another good point you make.

The feeling's still a thing regardless of genre. But perhaps a more important feeling in this genre is feeling your victory is deserved, and your decisions matter. Seems like a decision of taste - do you want the game to have more comeback opportunity or be more deterministic? Above my paygrade prolly. Respect, brother.

[static birch]

I'm yet unfamiliar with the core design principals of BAR aside from my own observations. if that's the case, perhaps my case is moot.

[wide bramble]

I absolutely believe a competitive RTS game should be more deterministic than random, because it's determined wholly by the actions of the players.

[static birch]

Good points.

I'll admit what I made was more of a proof of concept. I could go through and tweak units on an individual basis to find what feels right. As it is, it's just a derivitive of the unit's base energy cost. For proof of concept purposes.

[wide bramble]

I think an RTS with random elements would be a fresh game concept than something we'd want in the BAR base game

[golden elbow]

i should point out that most if not all of the proposed comeback mechanics that have been proposed as a constant drain on unit count has been rejected in the past
one of the key reasons is that it makes the winning position harder to achieve and is entirely unneeded as bar istself has a number of ways of having comebacks without the need of economic penalties

[wide bramble]

^

[static birch]

What other forms of economic comeback mechanics have you seen proposed?

Mostly so I don't retread trodden ground.

[golden elbow]

the exact same as what you did here but it was done differently

[ebon flint]

buying t2 or buying transports, communism, boosting labs and all those things that I truly hate are a lot better comeback mechanics than taxing unit production

[twin rose]

Ye one issue is that once people secure front then even easier for them to just turtle up. The tax makes e production balance harder which is probably not good.

[static birch]

Well, inspired by the sticker beside your name, I'll set up some lobbies today and do some play testing.

Once front is broken, it appears very hard to regain it. It's usually another teammate that covers until you can recover.

Once the whole team is on the back foot, it's the steady march to defeat.

When I'm setting up these lobbies, I'm undecided if I want to increase energy production to 110% to help offset the drain.

[civic lily]

I see "reclaim" and rezbots as a comeback mechanic
As well as precision strikes which get through and take the AFUS farm out.

"once the whole team is on the backfoot"
they've lost a strategic advantage in some way. they failed to hold territory, lost mexes and units. at the core of the game however is expontential growing eco. if as a team your eco outsizes and outgrows the enemy team you'll probably win. there is a point where economies are more or less equal where it can go either way. somewhere between there and "double the enemy eco" is a point where economy wins.

the enemy leave piles of metal in wrecks; that's a comeback mechanic. you can reclaim that to get back into the fight or boost your own economy or you can get those units back into the fight on your side. you can maybe bring back some buildings if your base got hit

the come back mechanic is otherwise in terms of plays; breaking a stalemate, getting a nuke through, getting past flak or manveuring a fighter wall out of position to hit the explodium of AFUS at the rear.

[static birch]

I see you. I haven't yet developed the skills to utilize all those tools effectively. I see what you're saying about the sway over an equal-to-double range game.

From an emotional perspective, I feel it's less rewarding to gain an economic advantage and just completely overwhelm and stomp an enemy. it's the tug of war before that where it could go either way that's excillerating. It also feels kinda bad to have bleak comeback chances. I personally like more of the tug of war part and less of the snowballing part. I'm no longer convinced E drain is the best way to accomplish this. Thank you for your thoughtful post.

After this thread and another one here: #1212437711391039529 message I've come to believe that part of the core BAR experience is a direct correlation between choice and impact. Indirect things like economy drain will not ever become part of the core experience because it benefits you with no choice on your part.

I'm comfortable letting this exist as a TweakDef mod or a custom game option to help offset a lopsided game between players at different skill levels. I don't believe it should be part of the main game anymore.

That being said, this thread is a duplicate. If this topic is to be discussed further, I think it should be on the other one I linked above.