How about Civilian Structures have abilities? So capturing becomes an option
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So i thought instead of just always reclaiming Civilian Building you could also capture them and get something. Like Factories produce 2+ Mass and Science Centers 100+ Energy or something. nothing game breaking but still an worthwile option. And maybe Residential buildings will give you Mass and /or Energy Storage
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so basically massfabs and pgens in different models?
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Yeah, but then without the consequences such as a power drain (on the factory). I like the idea a lot
. I do wonder how this would change the balance in certain maps. As an example: Loki -
If there was some kind of "civilian-model" power plant (let's say it's more expensive and less efficient than the ones your engineers can build) it could fit in thematically with the game and it wouldn't seem out of place to have near other civilian structures. In fact, each faction might have separate structures of that nature.
They would have to have very low power costs to make capturing them viable. If their mass cost was too high, it would imbalance things if you tried to repair the civilian power plant later. It would be silly to create a "trap" for inexperienced players where the power plant is very expensive to repair. But if their mass cost is too low, there is little value in killing it and scooping it for reclaim. Maybe the game could be tweaked to have lower mass cost to repair such civilian structures.
There could be, similarly, some kind of civilian mass fabricator. It would be bigger than the "military" ones so it wouldn't damage nearby structures with a death explosion (because it's meant to be safe to put near civilian buildings) and perhaps it doesn't give adjacency bonuses. That wouldn't be out of place if the "civilian" buildings were supposed to represent a research station or something.
Or, without creating new structures: just tweak the game so that it's cheaper to capture civilian power plants. The t2 pgens in the middle of Daroza's would be a lot more useful if they didn't cost 2x as much power as just building your own t2 pgen safe in your base. It makes sense that civilian structures would be less protected against hacking compared to military buildings. I don't think t1/t2 pgens and mass fabs look particularly out-of-place next to "civilian" buildings. If they do, maybe the solution is to make civilian buildings that look more like military stuff. It would be nice if there were some "civilian" buildings, with zero military purpose, that had the same style as UEF factories.
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Interesting idea.
A lot of maps have been made already without taking this into account, so it might break balance on some maps. But my guess is that it's not too much of an issue.
