The Riftbraker - some ideas

I recently saw this game called The Riftbraker and there are quite some interesting ideas that we can take from it and implement into this game (if the devs like it and agree upon it).

• One aspect that I saw in the game was the energy/metal grid that looks nice and also brings some kind of realism to the game.
• The second one is the aliens and how they interact with your unit/structures. It could be nice if we would have something similar in terms of an idea to found PlanetWars.

PlanetWars Integration

• To expand a bit here about PlanetWars let's say each player will be given a starting planet from where he has to take control of the aliens (chickens). After that, he will gain the full planet resources per second/hour/day.
• Once the planet is capture we can have some kind of hive control ai (once Queen is dead) that will make chickens allies and will no longer spawn attack your units.
• After the conquest, you can make a special radar from where you will detect other planets in other solar systems from where you cand send invading armies/units and commanders and attack other players with their own planets.

Letting aside the PlanetWars ideas that I have what do you think about this game? From my perspective, if we can merge MechWarrior with Riftbraker and consolidate it with the complexity from Zero-K we will have something astonishing.

Just imagine each individual unit in Zero-k to be modular the same way MechWarrior system is. Or imagine the alien invasion waves that you have to defend your planet the same way Riftbraker has and also the graphics in the game look amazing...

Anyways I will wait for your input and it's clear that I am going to play Riftbraker once the game is up.

Sounds like a fun game. Like Factorio but with more dakka.

Not sure where you're going with this though. What aspect of Riftbreaker/Mechwarrior are you saying that Planetwars could use?

I haven't checked planetwars out in a while (in fact I'm not even sure if its active in any form currently), but it always struck me as something that couldn't work with the number of players we have. Maybe if it moved away from the PvP format towards PvE, by which I mean AI handles defense, with the planet controller... buying upgrades to make it suck less or somesuch.

I didn't say that Anarchid, I only specified that certain features that are awesome in other games could benefit this one too. Zero-K will still remain Zero-k no matter what. I told it many times that there is no other game in history that has so much complexity in terms of UI/Unit management/Economy/etc combined that Zero-K has. And I am telling this from a gamer's perspective. Some people here just tried out only RTS games or total annihilation style games but I, on the other hand, tried out most games on the market (at least those that are well known).

From my view, adding other stuff/ideas to Zero-K will make it even more amazing.

Senaven Zero-K is currently the world's best tower defense game because of Chicken mode combined with the Zero-K base flexibility. I don't see what the big deal would be if Zero-K was better at Riftbreaking than Riftbreaker and better at Mechwaring than MechWarrior.

Mechwarrior-style component customization is a balance nightmare which for example makes recent ZK balance changes look like nothing at all.

There's a reason why both tabletop and PC adaptations tend to stick to stock mech variants, and when they don't it results in degenerate optimized builds and months/years of balancing fixes.

I actually think Battletech has one of the most elegant component customization systems I have seen, at least as far as "not being terribly broken" goes. Then again I haven't played the tabletop, only the PC adaptions which generally offer less components.

That being said, there are definitely optimal builds. Unit customization isn't a silver bullet for creating variability in games, it merely allows players to fine-tune their units to their personal preference. Which is cool, but won't necessarily make the game as a whole better.

I think a TA-style game with custom units could work, would have to be designed that way from the start. Zero-K's custom commanders are already hard to balance as is.