Age of Strategy Forums

We are approaching to a point where we need to decide how we make unit upgrading

options to vote from please

two questions:

Q1: produced units change or not on unit upgrading (eg: M36 Jackson early -> M36 Jackson late version):
a) unit upgrades updates existing (produced) units
b) unit upgrades DOES NOT updates existing (produced) units, you can build the new one only.

Q2: upgrading techs are (eg: M36 Jackson early -> M36 Jackson late version):
a) all unit types have their individual upgrade techs
- DISADV: we will have very very many techs,
- DISADV: tech will not be stealable,
- ADV: clear logic for player
b) all upgrading will happen in a common upgrade tech by category like ADVANCED LIGHT TANKS TECH, resulting upgrading all light tanks to their next level.
- DISADV: only one upgrade can be for all units (unless we make a next level of this tech)
- ADV: tech is stealable
- ADV: fewer techs to invent
- DISADV: not so clear logic for player
(we can also have other similar techs like ADVANCED_MEDIUM_TANKS, ADVANCED_HEAVY_TANKS and so on - working similarly)
c) all upgrading will happen in a common upgrade tech by property like UPGRADED TURRETS, resulting upgrading tanks that have upgrade that inproves only turrets (eg. two light tanks, and one medium tank, and some other).
- DISADV: not easy to clearly set up which unit fits the condition (i think mostly more things are update in a version change eg. armors. engine, turret and so on)
- ADV: tech is stealable
- ADV: fewer techs to invent
- DISADV: very not clear logic for player
(naturally we would have a UPGRADED_ARMOR tech and so on - this one is similar to current AOF techs at eg. humans)
d) all units gets upgraded immediately on "ERA" tech change
- DISADV: tech is not stealable
- DISADV: least techs to invent (practically none, apart from the era "tech")
- DISADV: not so challenging to upgrade them - so practically all gets upgraded very soon (we lost the strategy of deciding which unit types to upgrade)

A 1) b.
A 2) a., I like complex tech trees.

I would go for b and b, individual upgrades for every unit seems like too much paaaain.

1)b
2)a - But i also cosider b if we could have both individual upgrades and lineage upgrades at same time (In other words A and B). At least for me, both can work together at same time, individual being fast/cheap upgrades to the units while the lineage slow ones. So if both aren't possible, i stay with A.

I don't think that the possibility of having many, many techs/upgrades is bad, that's actually a good thing... Gives a lot of ideas to keep things fresh, and ofc, lots of new possibilities.

sure mixed a and b is possible

I don't think that the possibility of having many, many techs/upgrades is bad, that's actually a good thing... Gives a lot of ideas to keep things fresh, and ofc, lots of new possibilities.

i ment there would be many never invented techs imho

That's nice!

I see, btw, i don't think that, it will be always the user who will decide what is in on his strategy, so leaving plenty options will be nice to make it harder to his foe to figure out what is his plan.

Here is my vote. A few of the options listed on the ballet are too complex for the game we have right now. We also have some issues with the implementation of some of the fallowing ideas because none of them come with a UI change. Especially for idea 2.
The first option listed is more realistic. You can't instantly upgrade a tank in the middle of a battle. Yet on the other hand this game is not focused on the details and nitty bitty stuff so I do not think it is appropriate for this game. The second option has the same problem in that the game becomes to detailed and complex. Say for instance, if there is an upgrade for the turret armor of a light tank and suppose it adds +1 armor to the unit, we could have (as stated before) hundreds of upgrades. Regardless of their affects, it will not change the course of battle in a way worth considering. Besides this, any game play would become longer and tiring. So I vote for B because of its grouping techs. I mean we could simply have "Infantry to lv1" as opposed to "Upgrade gun barrel metal" or "larger magizeean capacity."