Should we change something to encourage players to use airdrops more frequently？

I think its used enough. If anything needs improving its the interface/controls .. like ferry routes, and transport AI.

>I think its used enough. If anything needs improving its the interface/controls .. like ferry routes, and transport AI.

One of the problems is how messy the actual landing and drop process can be. It's very messy and requires to switch focus from units to transports a couple times. Some issues with it:

1)When you draw a landing circle, the transports will try to set the units on top of each other. One trans always ends up circling for 5-10 seconds while it looks for an empty space to drop the unit.

2)It's difficult to select all those landed units because the transports get in the way and generally piss you off.

3)You end up waiting too long to give orders to the units after they land because of problems 1 and 2, giving the enemy time to react.

Now what I want for ZK: You gather up your units, and preferably (though not required) put your transports close to the units. You select the units you want transported and give them a special move command that actually means "ferry me here", similar to the "Jump" command that some units have. This special move command can be used as a queued command, just like any other.

The advantage lies in that I can do a mixture of ferry, move, and fight commands all at once while ignoring the need to draw special ferry routes and such. When the units land they execute the queued commands instantly, saving valuable time. I also don't even have to SELECT the transports, not even once, so I don't have to keep switching my focus from units to transports and back.

An example: I gather my units and transports together. I give the units a "Ferry" command to the enemy base located on a cliff, followed by a "Fight" command on the other side of the enemy base, followed by a "Ferry" command to the next enemy base, followed by a "Fight" command through that enemy base as well. If all goes well, the units will be picked up, dropped, will kill the enemy base, be picked up again, dropped in 2nd enemy base, and will kill that base too, all without a single bit of input after the original queued command. This could solve all 3 of my problems listed above and streamline the entire process.

Ok, there's a widget in the Spring widget database that could be modified to do some of this. If you have the widget and you set a Trans to guard a unit, it automatically follows the unit and when the unit needs to travel a distance that would take, lets say, more than 10 seconds it picks the unit up and ferries it to the destination. The unit is put on "wait" just before the trans picks it up and then turns off "wait" after it drops the unit. It works seamlessly and is great for early com expansion. Also, you can continue to give orders to the units while in air so that when they land the orders are executed.

If Valkyries were cheaper, I might use them in large map team games simply for the ability to move my armies anywhere on the map quickly.
IE. strategic transport, not moving vehicles up cliffs into enemy area.

But they'll have to be really really spammy for that to work properly. Ideally, you set up a ferry route and for a 10% investment (compared to your army), you can move everything in one or two trips.

At 10% I might use it. More than that is too expensive.

EDIT: Simply by eyeballing it, I think I'll use it if it cost 40m... Maybe 50m. Costing same as 1 glaive to transport a rocko or a warrior around is way too expensive.
I'd rather just build more units and split my army if I need presence in multiple areas.

He wants it as part of an order queue. So you can define an arbitrary section of the journey to be made by airdrop, and queuable with other commands.

The Valk is actually massively OP. Huge HP, minimal cost, drop-when-dead, high speed, etc. It costs 10 more than a gnat. Seriously, people suicide gnat swarms but don't use this.

I'd say its mostly interface, and the culture of players. Giving a transport or two to each ally as a gunship player would allow everyone to use ferry routes from their factory (which is all automated). But oddly people just don't do this.

And yeah, the command you describe basically exists Antelope. You can move, embark, move, disembark and that section between the two orders will take place in a transport. I'd agree your system is superior, it is one button, so it is move, ferry to waypoint, move, but all your complaints about never having to select the transport, and being able to put these kinds of orders in a queue, are invalid.

If you want to do a deep offensive drop, you have to use something thats going to eco-snipe. The only time i've seen drops used successfully in the past while was outlaws on SSB. They do a lot of damage to every surrounding structure and can hide behind structures to kill enemies. Valks travel so fast that you simply cannot shoot them all down before they deliver their drops, even though this was done 4-5 times and we put up AA to try and stop it. They basically won the game, constantly taking out geos, winds, nanos, mexes and other eco.

"He wants it as part of an order queue. So you can define an arbitrary section of the journey to be made by airdrop, and queuable with other commands. "

You can do EXACTLY THAT
you can queue embark and disembark commands just like other commands..
even from factory..

just a thought (again from suppreme commander): if transports could have a larger carry capaticity, it would make more worth the micro to use it.

alsoin SP, you can create a "pick me up" zone and a "drop-down" zone. you can assign transports to that designated route(assign "guard" to the "start-zone-unit" which stay there on duty), move the start-end points (like if its a unit, and therefore easy modify the route) and delete it. you can send units to the start point (as it is with teleporter entry right now) and add commands after it.

i think i will also have to read the manual about the ferry-use of it ;), maybe it is already very comfortable, maybe it can be upgraded ;)

anyway i think i want to really use it now more often. i used it sometimes to "manually" drop sumos, reapers, golis, dantes or bigger special units behind enemy lines, but that was always lategame, and transports are a bit fragile to master the heavy AA at that point.

I have tried using ferry routes as you describe Licho. It doesn't work nicely and sometimes units just don't get ferried.

Of course, I'm just going off memory here since I last used it a year ago...

I'm pretty sure NeonStorm said he uses Valkyries for scouting without even carrying units since they have really good hp/cost.