Hi everyone,
Last week I uploaded the new animations to the experimental branch (as well as some new materials for the new buildings), and I was able to put the majority of work in for the new units, which I will be talking about today.
With the change from 3 to 6 units, I was finally able to implement a real difference between melee and ranged units. Rather than the units in the stone (pistoleer) and metal (musketeer) tiers representing straightforward upgrades, each tier now has both a melee and a ranged unit, which both have their strengths and weaknesses. So let’s go through them.
All of the ranged units require ammo in order to shoot at range. They can hold up to 10 ammo at the moment (something that you will be able to upgrade with research in 0.9), and take about 10 seconds to go from idle to firing. Then they take another 8 seconds to reload. For the time being, I set all of their ranges to being the same - 60 metres - though that may change in the future. When they are out of ammo (or a melee opponent has gotten too close), they engage in melee combat, where all 3 tiers of ranged units do 20 damage every 3 seconds. Across all tiers, this is balanced to mean that if a ranged unit manages to get a shot off against their melee equivalent, they will win the fight - if they don't, they will lose the fight. So a ranged unit fighting a melee unit in open terrain will win, while a ranged unit fighting a melee unit in close range (e.g. the jungle,stationed around a bend, or in the city) will lose.
To make up for their otherwise slightly weaker nature, melee units do not need to be constantly supplied with ammo, and therefore need less production and logistics to be supported, especially further from the base. They hit their opponents once every 3 seconds (same as the melee combat for ranged units), but there is obviously no aim or reload time.
Wooden tier: At the wooden tier, we now have the axe wielder (melee), and the blunderbuss wielder (ranged). The Blunderbuss wielder does 60 ranged damage when shooting, while the axe wielder does 25 damage in melee. This means the axe wielder will defeat an opponent in 4 hits, while the Blunderbuss wielder needs one shot and 2 melee hits to defeat an opponent (assuming the opponent gets close).
Stone tier: At the stone tier, we now have the swordsman (melee), and the musketeer (ranged). The musketeer does 80 damage, meaning he will defeat an opponent with 1 shot and 1 melee hit, while the swordsman does 35 damage per hit, meaning he will defeat an opponent in 3 hits.
Metal tier: At the metal tier, the units are now the pikeman (melee), and the rifleman (ranged). The rifleman does 100 ranged damage, meaning he will currently defeat opponents in one shot, while the pikeman does 50 damage per hit, defeating an opponent in 2 hits.
Balance will of course be changed as we get feedback from you, and I am planning for many research aspects to affect this once 0.9 brings research into the game (higher damage, armour, quicker aim times, etc). As you may have noticed, the changes meant that the pistoleer was removed - so the pistol will now once again be the domain solely of the commander!
The three tiers currently have placeholder art (once again), but I tried to make them as distinguishable from each other as possible (see image). Beside some colour, the Tier 1 units have a regular, round hat, while tier 2 units have a tricorn hat, and tier 3 units have a tricorn with a feather. Pikemen still have a sword at this point, but the art should be upgraded with the units over the coming months.
There is still a bit of work to be done (e.g. making the barracks a bit more differentiated between melee and ranged and sorting out icons, etc), but I will try to get an upload of this build out onto the experimental branch over the next two week, so people can try the new units for themselves!
Until next week!