Stale Tactical Combat?

[Noble713]

Is it just me, or is tactical combat rather boring? Things got so bad that I went back to playing Rebellion. It's tactical engine's graphics are so bad it makes Doom look good. Why did I switch? Because it's EMERSIVE. SE4's isn't. Here's why:


1. The sounds...well, they suck. Check the dates on the files, and some of them are THREE YEARS old. I know Aaron is the only programmer and his hands are full, but what are the other guys (the artists) doing? How about adding some sound effects for ship movement?

2. Pace. Turn on fast combat, and individual actions (explosions, etc.) happen too fast. Turn it off, and combat takes too long. With either setting, you don't get the opportunity to enjoy the battle. If ships turned a lot slower, blew up a lot slower (with multiple explosions on the ship), and moved faster than regular combat but slower than fast combat, the flow of combat would be more interesting.

3. The I-go You-go setup. Maybe it's just me, but moving and firing all of my stuff while the other guy just gets to sit there just seems wrong. How about switching to plotted movement/fire orders? You would tell your ships where to move (one or more destination squares, like setting waypoints in an RTS) and what to shoot, but it wouldn't happen immediately. Instead, when you hit end turn, the AI does the same for all of its ships, and then both fleets carry out their orders, with ships selected in some random fashion. This could potentially solve the missile dance problem as well as add a little chaos back into combat (some ship you had a special purpose for get's bLasted before its turn).

4. Almost all battles fall into one of two categories:
-The Missile Exchange/Dance: One or more fleets hang at maximum range pumping missile salvos into the enemy. Move in, fire, move out. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
-The Slugging Match: Both fleets charge each other and blaze away at point blank range. The bigger, more advanced, and more experienced fleet wins.

5. The real problem is that there is no reward for maneuvere; there is no point in sending your fast ships to outflank the enemy and hit their vulnerable rear. Why? Because they don't HAVE a vulnerable rear, since all of the ships have 360-degree arcs of fire. It doesn't matter where you put your ships (other than the range), as it won't affect your ability to dish out damage and not receive it. Maximum efficiency is gained by pouring as much fire into the enemy as quickly as possible, resulting in the Slugging Match mentioned above. Unfortunately I see no way around this.

I'm not looking for tactical combat to have the graphics and gameplay of Homeworld, but there have got to be some ways to make choosing it a rewarding experience, other than knowing that you can handle your ships far better than the AI can.