How to make turret creep less powerful but keep it fun

[opiemonster]

In response to the latest blog https://www.factorio.com/blog/post/fff-169 Twinsen mentioned that "So far I believe that we did not find a simple, fun and fair solution"

I would like to offer my solution,

Make a number of small changes that on their own, wont make a noticeable impact, but together, will reduce the effectiveness of turret creeping.
The impact will be enough to shift the path of least resistance from turret creeping, to the run-and-gun method.

Here are some ideas of those minor changes:
- Give turrets a slight setup animation, maybe 1-3 seconds depending on what doesn't feel clunky
- Worms will target the player if in range, even if currently locked onto a turret
- Worms have a damage bonus against buildings
- Worms and nests take less damage from turrets
- Nests have a large detection field around them which is only triggered by building in that field. This will trigger biters and spitters in the area to attack the buildings.
- Building in the nest radius will also increase the spawn rates of biters and spitters within that nest.
- Reduce turret effectiveness, but allow them to take speed modules to increase their attack speed, productivity to increase damage and efficiency to get more out of ammo/electricity (this will make it harder to setup turrets quickly)
- Move initial upgrades that can increase turret damage, further up the tech tree
- And finally, increase starting health of the player and damage of weapons

[Deadly-Bagel]

- Setup time won't affect much. It just means turret creeping will be slower.
- Reducing turret hp will have too big an effect on the normal game because of spitters, walls do nothing against them.
- Giving worms a damage bonus is more mitigating the tactic and would need to involve resistances etc, not sure how feasible to implement.
- Bases taking less damage will again just make turret creeping slower. I had to use it briefly in Bob's Mods and his Elemental Spawners are a real pain to take down, but didn't really affect the strategy any.
- Having building events check for biters, or biters constantly check for buildings, is more CPU time.

Sure, you could implement some of the above and make it a painful tactic to use, but how about we answer this question instead: Why is turret creeping a problem?

What do you care if I start walking turrets around in my game? You don't really, it has no effect on you. It's not like an MMO or MOBA where it gives me an unfair advantage. The biggest problem with it is the lack of alternatives. If there's a few worms, or even a single big worm, at a base you basically have no other way of dealing with that until you get your shields. Maybe the tank but that's somewhat circumstantial and the shells are a pain to make in bulk for no real payoff.

The devs have probably tested some or all of these ideas already, we know at least the setup time was tried, and they concluded the best way to address the problem was to address the actual problem.

[opiemonster]

- Setup time won't affect much. It just means turret creeping will be slower.

Thats the point

- Bases taking less damage will again just make turret creeping slower.

That's the point

- Having building events check for biters, or biters constantly check for buildings, is more CPU time
it's not because you would only check for building events that occur in a radius


- Reducing turret hp will have too big an effect on the normal game because of spitters, walls do nothing against them.

spitters cant even get close to turrets.... they need a nerf


- What do you care if I start walking turrets around in my game

why not just play peaceful if you want exploits?


- way to address the problem was to address the actual problem.
That's what i mean, make turret creeping less effective than killing nests normally, buffing the player is one of the ways to do that and by said changes to turrets.

[Frightning]

"spitters cant even get close to turrets.... they need a nerf"
They can in numbers, and those kinds of numbers are easy to see late game (and Behemoth spitters can definitely wreak havoc in even a sizable turret line, been losing Laser turrets sporadically despite it being a dense double-wall of them that are fully upgraded in a game I've played w/ my cousin; we are about 30 hours in, and only beginning to see Behemoths).

If anything, I feel like biter hp scales up far too dramatically (it's balanced around current turret power and capacity to spam at given points in the game). Because of the dramatic hp scaling, the player character becomes unable to produce enough firepower with man-portable weapons to keep up, and hence turret creep is king from midgame onward (only way to mass enough firepower to successfully assault larger biter bases due to biter repopulation and their high hp values).

To be honest, there are many ways to devs could address the combat issues in this game, which is part of the problem: They don't know which way to go from where we are, and we as a playerbase have widely varying opinions on what we'd like to see. They literally will not be able to please everyone no matter what they do. But in my opinion, that's ok, and I actually look forward to seeing what the decide to do (please don't leave it as is all the way to 1.0, combat and endgame are the main things that need improvement at this point in my opinion, and frankly I see a lot of other people echoing those thoughts). It's possible that both problems could be addressed at once if they made robotic military units like walkers, tanks, and/or permanent hovering bots (get rid of the capsules and replace with actual permanent combat units and a system to control them). Alternatively, they could either improve player weapons enough that turret creeping is no longer the only efficient option for base clearing, especially during midgame (I find that its usual mid game where I feel my weapons and armor don't cut it, but my turrets are plenty, there's also the issue that base size negatively affects the player much worse than turrets because you can always place more turrets for more firepower but the player's firepower is fixed). Alternatively, they could try and make turret creeping less effective maybe along the lines of your suggestions, though this could perhaps make early Big worms incredibly hard to deal w/, or large bases in general, which could be a problem. Yet another option: decrease biter respawn rate so that you don't have to be able to constantly kill respawning biter to even be able to make progress killing the base itself, or make it so that the spawners 'run out' after a while and can no longer replace biters so fast after their stock is depleted.

[opiemonster]

playerbase have widely varying opinions on what we'd like to see

So make the changes unnoticeable

possible that both problems could be addressed at once if they made robotic military units like walkers, tanks, and/or permanent hovering bots

I've thought of that idea too, like in starwars, have a droid army, you could create droids and then give them any weapon+ammo like the player, and they can attack biter bases for you.
Automated droid army sounds awesome.

[Frightning]

playerbase have widely varying opinions on what we'd like to see

So make the changes unnoticeable

possible that both problems could be addressed at once if they made robotic military units like walkers, tanks, and/or permanent hovering bots

I've thought of that idea too, like in starwars, have a droid army, you could create droids and then give them any weapon+ammo like the player, and they can attack biter bases for you.
Automated droid army sounds awesome.

If the changes were unnoticeable, then they would necessarily also be unimpactful, meaning that the original problems would remain unresolved.

[opiemonster]

If the changes were unnoticeable, then they would necessarily also be unimpactful, meaning that the original problems would remain unresolved.

Together they would accomplish the intended goal but on their own they are unnoticeable.

[Mendel]

I still firmly believe turrets need no nerf at all. Turret creeping is tedious enough as it is. Problem is not that turret creeping is too powerful. The problem is that other means of attacking are not powerful enough. Believe me, if you can just run and gun the bugs and their nests, people will do that rather than go through with placing power poles and turrets all over the place.

Buff the tank (and its cannon), the power armor, grenades, flamethrower and the combat shotgun, keep turrets as they are. Problem solved.

[Koub]

The best thing I can imagine is that alien spawners generate some hind of slime/goo you can't build on, like the zerg hatcheries produce in Starcraft.

[opiemonster]

I still firmly believe turrets need no nerf at all. Turret creeping is tedious enough as it is. Problem is not that turret creeping is too powerful. The problem is that other means of attacking are not powerful enough. Believe me, if you can just run and gun the bugs and their nests, people will do that rather than go through with placing power poles and turrets all over the place.

Buff the tank (and its cannon), the power armor, grenades, flamethrower and the combat shotgun, keep turrets as they are. Problem solved.

That is entirely the point of my article, shift the balance of efficient base killing from turrets to running around with a gun.

I do think turrets (and the player) need a change because its too hard, especially in the early game, to kill bases and large worms without them.

The best thing I can imagine is that alien spawners generate some hind of slime/goo you can't build on, like the zerg hatcheries produce in Starcraft.

I do like the idea of creep, but it goes back to the article and he says that kind of solution makes the player feel cheated.

[Mendel]

In response to the latest blog https://www.factorio.com/blog/post/fff-169 Twinsen mentioned that "So far I believe that we did not find a simple, fun and fair solution"

The impact will be enough to shift the path of least resistance from turret creeping, to the run-and-gun method.

Here are some ideas of those minor changes:
- And finally, increase starting health of the player and damage of weapons

Quoted parts of your original post are what I agree with, other stuff not so much

[Deadly-Bagel]

- Having building events check for biters, or biters constantly check for buildings, is more CPU time
it's not because you would only check for building events that occur in a radius

That's... not how it works. It would tie in to ALL building events which would then have to determine its location and whether it's within radius of anything. Granted, building isn't the most prolific of events but I don't see why it's necessary.

- What do you care if I start walking turrets around in my game

why not just play peaceful if you want exploits?

It's not an exploit, it's a strategy. Just a really cheap and somewhat tedious strategy that we're forced into using because there's no alternatives.

- way to address the problem was to address the actual problem.
That's what i mean, make turret creeping less effective than killing nests normally, buffing the player is one of the ways to do that and by said changes to turrets.

Oh? And how do you kill nests "normally"? Walk in with your Heavy Armour and Combat Shotgun (half damage and speed researches) to get instakilled by a few worms? Have fun with that.

[aka13]

There are literally 2 ways you EVER kill nests - early-midgame you creep up with turrets, because you have nowhere near enough HP to tank anything, 2 shots from a worm and you are more or less dead. Also you have nowhere the firepower to damage alien buildings AND shoot the constantly spawning critters. Lategame you just run in with 6xExoskeleton and shitton of shields, shoot everything with the autoshotgun, and run back to your base, leaving your outer defense to deal with the wave that follows you. Unless combat is changed significantly, nerfing turret creep in any way will only slow player expansion until lategame, while making nothing out of the endgame run-and-gun strategy, which still remains.

Combat needs an overhaul, not "turret creep".

[Mendel]

There are literally 2 ways you EVER kill nests - early-midgame you creep up with turrets, because you have nowhere near enough HP to tank anything, 2 shots from a worm and you are more or less dead. Also you have nowhere the firepower to damage alien buildings AND shoot the constantly spawning critters. Lategame you just run in with 6xExoskeleton and shitton of shields, shoot everything with the autoshotgun, and run back to your base, leaving your outer defense to deal with the wave that follows you. Unless combat is changed significantly, nerfing turret creep in any way will only slow player expansion until lategame, while making nothing out of the endgame run-and-gun strategy, which still remains.

Try firestorm! Run with shitton of shields and 2-3 exo through and closely around a nest area with flamethrower equipped. move your mouse cursor quickly around your character with a circular motion while holding the fire button (while running, do not stop). retreat while keeping the fire moving over enemies that follow, return and repeat. This is very nearly good enough, flamethrower and power armor with shields only needs a slight buff. on smaller nest-bases this is much, much faster and more fun than turret creeping already.

[aka13]

There are literally 2 ways you EVER kill nests - early-midgame you creep up with turrets, because you have nowhere near enough HP to tank anything, 2 shots from a worm and you are more or less dead. Also you have nowhere the firepower to damage alien buildings AND shoot the constantly spawning critters. Lategame you just run in with 6xExoskeleton and shitton of shields, shoot everything with the autoshotgun, and run back to your base, leaving your outer defense to deal with the wave that follows you. Unless combat is changed significantly, nerfing turret creep in any way will only slow player expansion until lategame, while making nothing out of the endgame run-and-gun strategy, which still remains.

Try firestorm! Run with shitton of shields and 2-3 exo through and closely around a nest area with flamethrower equipped. move your mouse cursor quickly around your character with a circular motion while holding the fire button (while running, do not stop). retreat while keeping the fire moving over enemies that follow, return and repeat. This is very nearly good enough, flamethrower and power armor with shields only needs a slight buff. on smaller nesbases this is much, much faster and more fun than turret creeping already.

That sounds so fun I I almost tempted to stop the creep

[ssilk]

I also think that's the right way: Make other strategies more fun, than turret creep.

[Deadly-Bagel]

Would just like to throw in another two cents here.

Currently playing Bob's Mods, and Laser Towers aren't exactly amazing anymore. There are extra tiers I haven't been able to upgrade to yet for several reasons and the evolution factor is ahead of my current military power as I've been faffing around quite a lot.

Basically I can still run into a nest, take out a few spawners and run out, but it's risky. I die a fair bit due to the power of the enemies Bob's added and the sheer number of them. It's similar to playing vanilla with heavy armour or maybe modular / MK1 Power Armour using a few shields, or the tank. However, turret creep is useless. Laser towers are barely strong enough to repel a wave when there is a solid line of them behind a wall, they can't stand up to a constant stream of biters as well as take out the nests, I've tried.

And I can't particularly say I'm having a great time. I effectively feel like the early to mid game in vanilla except without turret creep, pretty much what you want right? Well it sucks. The biters keep migrating closer and I have to prune them back every time I want to build anything, and it's a real chore. I don't have weapons capable of dealing with the infinite swarm that appears whenever I approach a nest, so I just have to kite them and focus on the worms and spawners. When a wave starts becoming unmanageable, I have to kite it back to my defences (ideally through trees) and let the laser towers take care of it because my weapons take too long. Then I can approach the nest again and chip away a few more worms and spawners.

This isn't how Bob's Mods is supposed to be played, I'm waaaaay behind, need to start making Destroyers or a MK3 tank with all the bells and whistles, but my biggest problem is I don't have the room to expand because I'm constantly fighting for every tile. And if I leave to do something else, they've moved back in by the time I come back.

So speaking from experience, no, nerfing turret creep is the wrong way to go. Fixing combat (and ideally the infinite horde of biters when you approach their spawners) is what's needed.

[golfmiketango]

Would just like to throw in another two cents here.

Currently playing Bob's Mods, and Laser Towers aren't exactly amazing anymore. There are extra tiers I haven't been able to upgrade to yet for several reasons and the evolution factor is ahead of my current military power as I've been faffing around quite a lot.

I had a big Bob's campaign where I found myself in exactly this position for exactly the same reason.

If your situation is like mine was, you will have access to the MK2 and maybe even MK3 bullet-firing turrets, but no personal roboport? Those MK2/3 turrets are pretty powerful machines.

Prep your toolbelt with ammo and turrets, go somewhere safe, and practice getting a quarter-stack of ammo into a turret as quickly as possible. You should then be able to creep with impunity.

[Deadly-Bagel]

Big worms outrange even laser turrets (had problems with them spawning close to my walls and wiping out my defences without resistance) and I can only get close enough to kill one of them with a laser rifle with basic ammo, or the Combat Shotgun. There's one type of worm, I think it's the Piercing Worm, that seems more resistant to physical damage too which is really annoying. Anyway unless these turrets are made of... uh... diamonds? Trying to think of a material in the game that these worms don't shred but there isn't one. Well at any rate nothing lives very long close to these worms and they outrange everything I've got.

Finally got some military production up and running, diamond laser rifle ammo is a big help but Laser Robots are a bit meh. Threw down 20, they were all killed in about ten seconds, and that wasn't even a big base. Don't think turrets are going to help. For reference my evolution factor is about 90%.

[orzelek]

In Bob's mods you don't go turret creeping without decent stack of sniper turrets of highest grade that you can produce

As for turret creep in general - I think any fiddling with it is trying to solve wrong problem.
Let as arm/protect player enough so that we can fight on foot/tank and we will do that. Currently quite often thi is not possible due to some biter funcitonalities like infinite spawning or some pretty good worms that you might need proper power armor to survive long enough to kill.