This is Not for Single player Playing

[Jules]

Unfortunately this Demo has convinced me that it is based around Online Competitive Play. Despite all the Tech, Doctrines and Lore stuff etc. It comes down to a Major Click Fest, even in Skirmish against Bots. The AI (Normal/ Hard) is impossible for new and typical players to compete against. The Skirmish Bots expect you to be aggressive, build Lost of Refineries, Factories, and Spam as fast as you can. You End up in a tedious Spam fest, but will typically lose.

If you like Multiplayer, and one of those "Get Gud" guys you will love it. For the new and casual RTS Single player, this is not going to work out.

[nafcom]

Originally posted by Lotor13:

Originally posted by General Hawk:

As I am only interested in SP campaigns, this sounds disappointing. Hopefully they surprise us. Looks like better to wait until more people play and review.

There is solid SP campaign promissed

Do not take OP that seriously, his conclussion is nonsense.

there will be new demo available soon, so try it and make own opinion, do not blindly believe random "conclusions"

Correction: This demo is already out since 5 PM CET, get it on the Steam Store.

[Da Honey Badger]

Devs. Old school ts player here. Your doing fine. You could turn easy down for the casuals. You could turn hard and brutal up. I've had a chance to play three skirms and I wiped the floor with max level both team in about 17 min all three games. Only notes I have is airpower is too strong to be as effective as it is. Need more tempest spawning structures in the natural start position. If I don't expand by 9 min I'm out in natural. The micro is more like Dota then traditional rts. Might look at that as there is a trick to it that negates the moves the bots are trying. Most importantly tho is don't let the the weaker player dictate thier wishlist into your vision. Alot of guys in this thread have a belief that they will be the core of your player base. They won't. The comments here are being made by compstompers and norush rules "players". They might average 1 or 2 hours a day. If you by God do this right. Get a stronger ladder, team based and solo. Provide a toxic place for the talking of ♥♥♥♥ with no moral rules only sensible anti spam stuff. You might have a real banger. And none of this automatch ♥♥♥♥. A lobby, where games and thier types are open on the side. If you build it they will come.

[VonFIDDE]

Ithink it will be fun to play the whole campaign, not sure i will get the game right away but later down the line for sure. Found normal to be very relaxed and i use wsad so zero micro :D.

My only issue with the game is the pathfinding, sure you can do it with micro but i just wanna send stuff in and watch the action.

[Jules]

The Skirmish Mode, even at "Normal" is still just a click rush. Establish early fast eco, then build multiple Factories and Barracks. Expand. Spam Units as fast as you can click, to attempt to out click the AI Bots. Skirmish is now too focused on Aggressive Online Multiplayer I guess. Not a Skill issue, Just tedious competitive play. Not so much fun for Single players.

So we are just left with the SP Campaign, for us casual Single Players.

[Lotor13]

Originally posted by Jules:

The Skirmish Mode, even at "Normal" is still just a click rush. Establish early fast eco, then build multiple Factories and Barracks. Expand. Spam Units as fast as you can click, to attempt to out click the AI Bots. Skirmish is now too focused on Aggressive Online Multiplayer I guess. Not a Skill issue, Just tedious competitive play. Not so much fun for Single players.

So we are just left with the SP Campaign, for us casual Single Players.

You still do not realize, that this has nothing to do with Multiplayer competitive play.

Normal AI in skirmish mode is too effective.
AI difficulties are not balanced.
That is it.

Originally posted by Jules:

So we are just left with the SP Campaign, for us casual Single Players.

How about to play with easy AI in skirmish?

[Jules]

Originally posted by Da Honey Badger:

D .... . Alot of guys in this thread have a belief that they will be the core of your player base. They won't. The comments here are being made by compstompers and norush rules "players". They might average 1 or 2 hours a day. If you by God do this right. Get a stronger ladder, team based and solo.

That is great for competitive online players. But in business, you need to sell units. Single Players sales out number online Multiplayer buyers by more than 5 to 1. So unless you satisfy the Single players, you will not make the sales. You only sell the game ONCE, even if that customer plays 20+ hours a week LOL. It is dumb business sense to rely only upon online multiplayer community.

[PrexMP3]

Honestly, having played skirmish last night, the game really is just deathblob strategy. That isn't going to have "staying power" even among the most die hard of try hards.

To keep it with the "business aspects"...engagement and retention are vital. You may rely on nostalgia and cute little marketing tricks to sell the initial copy, but if they want expansions and sequels, the game needs real staying power and deathblob unit spam isn't going to generate that.

[Havoc]

Its a demo we still have time to just stuff and honestly I did not feel the AI was to terrible in the little time I played sure tweaks need to be made, but you are definitely over reacting

[Jules]

I have just played with 2 GDF ( Myself and a AI GDF(Normal) vs DYN(Normal) so I could watch and learn the supposed AI Strategy in trying to defeat DYN Bot. I could easily outpace my AI partner GDF on initial build and unit production. But the DYN(Normal) AI Bot could still overwhelm us both in a large spam fest over twenty five minutes. So there is something seriously wrong with the Skirmish Balance. It just tedious game play if we are expected to Spam/ Attack Blobs from the get go. Very tedious for Casual Single players. We will not be buying any DLCs if this is the competitive experience they are going after.

[PrexMP3]

If I might? Jules, and others, too, when you guys were playing, did the A.I. really love to keep pulling it's forces back after 1 or 2 losses?

That was what happened when I fought the enemy. It gets just irritating knowing that the enemy is "banking up" force numbers until it feels confident it can steamroll me.

That's a big deal, because unit composition and battle location should matter. That's why I still have fond memories of some of my Age of Empires 3 and Rise of Legends matches, even two decades later.

Deathblobbing just turns fights into a numerical sumo match. Every game is the same, so I don't want to play.

[Selphea]

Originally posted by PrexMP3:

If I might? Jules, and others, too, when you guys were playing, did the A.I. really love to keep pulling it's forces back after 1 or 2 losses?

That was what happened when I fought the enemy. It gets just irritating knowing that the enemy is "banking up" force numbers until it feels confident it can steamroll me.

That's a big deal, because unit composition and battle location should matter. That's why I still have fond memories of some of my Age of Empires 3 and Rise of Legends matches, even two decades later.

Deathblobbing just turns fights into a numerical sumo match. Every game is the same, so I don't want to play.

If it's sending blobs, use AoEs like Trebuchets, Porcupines, Voltaic Turrets or Tempest Artillery. In one GDF game I went 100 of my units vs 1000 of theirs. I think it depends on your playstyle. If you harass them then they'll throw a lot of stuff at you, which can be a way to thin out their numbers before they get steamrolly. If they don't come for you then you take their expansion and slow down their resource gain which also a win.

It goes back to not being too passive. Take key parts of the map. A lot of the time it doesn't need much clicking or micro. Just send a Beacon or Salvage Van over, build some defenses and occupy garrisons near the chokes.

[PrexMP3]

I was able to deal with it, it's just that my problem was that's all it really was attempting; blobbing.

I would've loved to see these air rushes and engi rushes other people experienced. If the A.I. would surprise me, I'd be mush less keen on any given "monostrategy."

[Selphea]

They sometimes send engis too. But RTSes are ultimately about jostling over the map. The strategy is always to blow up the other player's base at the end. Engis and air are tactics not strategy. There's a time when they work well and if they end the game or make a big difference in early or mid game, great. But I think late game is always blobs. No one's going to harvest a pile of resources and not build anything that contributes towards winning.

But I will say I've only seen the AI use air very rarely. Maybe I'll try a more turtly game and see if they do it.

[PrexMP3]

I'm still cranking my way through this latest demo, too, so I'll keep looking for stuff.

If I might, though, I think map control is the most important aspect of any RTS. We only have one real resource, Tempest, so as long as you control the fields, you're golden.

If there were other things to make it more dynamic, that would also add to replay value. Short of adding more resources a la the Age franchise or a Blizz RTS...the only thing I can think of is more definition in terrain.

I don't really see much value, granted we only have like three maps, in strategic positions, while none of the "tech structures" are game changers. If I had something to fight over beyond Tempest fields, that would also go a long way for replayability.

[Urmanin]

Originally posted by PrexMP3:

I'm still cranking my way through this latest demo, too, so I'll keep looking for stuff.

If I might, though, I think map control is the most important aspect of any RTS. We only have one real resource, Tempest, so as long as you control the fields, you're golden.

If there were other things to make it more dynamic, that would also add to replay value. Short of adding more resources a la the Age franchise or a Blizz RTS...the only thing I can think of is more definition in terrain.

I don't really see much value, granted we only have like three maps, in strategic positions, while none of the "tech structures" are game changers. If I had something to fight over beyond Tempest fields, that would also go a long way for replayability.

If you watch any CNC matches, despite only having one resource the matches are very active, and at least with KW players usually fight to the bitter end. This game is pretty similar to CNC after all so the question of dynamism is up to the players entirely.