Red Alert: A Path Beyond PC game

3 comments by Category_5_Hurricane on Sep 19th, 2008 digg this super bookmark

From the latest blog posted at apathbeyond.com:

Written by Chronojam

Silo and Thief Plans

Since everybody flipped out regarding having the Thief not actually steal your credits, Jonwil actually reworked all the scripts for them and we're going to take some additional measures to firm everything up. The Silos now easily support being destroyed/created on demand, something we couldn't really do earlier and something that is key for when we allow you to build additional, or replace destroyed, minor structures. Minor structures include Turrets, Gap Generators, Walls, Siloes, and the like; basically things with BaseNormal=no in the old RA1 settings. These non-key structures won't be required for typical win-by-base-destruction, and will be freely (re)buildable. So, the Thief will steal 50% of the enemy's credits like before, once per purchase, and only if not inside a vehicle. This means that you cannot do an APC drive-by to snatch about 98% of the Soviet credits in one go anymore. In addition, the Silo will feature a bit of a raised base that should make it a little easier to defend because you cannot squish the people repairing it, and will also force any Thief who wants to steal to run in a complete circle around the Silo effectively (within sight of Soviet players, defenses, and AP mines). There you have it! The raised platform will be likely too narrow for a Longbow to attempt any kind of landing.

Friendly Fire and You

MAD Tanks presently will friendly-fire your own team's base defenses, which as you can see is a bit of a problem. They are being modified to no longer do this. Stolen MAD Tanks should still be able to freely damage enemy Tesla Coils, Silos, etc however, but will NOT level your own Gap Generators or Pillboxes etc. MAD Tanks will still deal a small amount of damage to standard friendly vehicles, however. Volkov will not be affected, nor will any other infantry; and nor will your team's own structures.Demolition trucks presently will friendly-fire your own teammates and vehicles when detonated, no matter who caused the detonation. For the time being this WILL include even base defenses, so think twice before you use a Demo Truck in your own base to clear out a pesky Tanya or Shock Trooper. In the future we might adjust it so that they do not, but for the time being they will continue to have this side effect. In the future (not 2.0.0) we will also be overhauling the a-bomb strikes to deal friendly fire damage, so any Volkovs/Tanyas around who were guarding the flare must sacrifice their lives to ensure the bomb hits. To combat abuse, you will not be able to deploy a flare around your own base. I'll have more words on the new a-bomb system later, which will be post-2.0.0 and might not even require you to walk a flare into the enemy base any more...

Pipelines and Palmtrees

Click for big. Fabian palmtrees on ChopBam Pipeline.
(Tree Placements were made up for the blog. Things will move in the future, as well as get more ground level detail around trees)

Fresh Exploit/Bug Fixes

AA/SAM defenses will no longer retaliate during low power. You can no longer bait an "offline" AA/SAM defense into attacking enemies by hiding behind them and hoping the opponent strikes one. Abusing this is considered an exploit. Helicopters can no longer "bob" above a helipad to constantly refill their ammunition as if they had freshly landed. This is currently considered an exploit.Instances where Service Depots would neither charge money for repairs or grant money upon a sale have been fixed. For the time being, however, on Seamist it is not considered an exploit to benefit from free repairs; it has been considered as part of the overall balancing for that map, although for uniformity in 2.0.0 you will always pay for repairs to main-line units.Enemy Missile Silo terminals will now display the typical "You lack the required security clearance" message."Ore Truck Bug" that sometimes blocks naval/air purchases should be resolved.You can no longer rejoin a map in progress to dodge the fact that your radar was disabled. Currently if you leave and come back, you regain your radar; this exploit is being removed. You can still rejoin, you just won't get the radar back as a result.Missile Sub weapon control hardware was given an upgrade; if you dive too deeply your missiles will not launch, instead of simply exploding right away on closed launch tubes. Additionally they can now fire missiles from deeper than before, however not from the same total range as before. If you are currently submerged and still able to fire, it is unfortunately an exploit.Mines make a planting sound when placed; no ninja-mining is possible anymore.Refinery elevators are no longer magical floating deathtraps that allow a Tanya to rape all defenders with reckless abandon. War Factory elevators are being fixed as well.Spies will be able to restore your radar by spying an active, unjammed enemy Radar Dome on all maps that have one; in some cases it won't let you, this will be fixed. You can bring down enemy radar by disabling the power to it on maps with a Power Plant, or using a Radar Jammer or Tesla Tank to get in close proximity to the Dome (but an MRJ only jams Soviet radar and a Tesla Tank only jams Allied radar).

Other Comments

Destroyers are likely going to start pinging sonar when a Sub gets too close.
Submarines will likely make a surfacing noise, too, when they come up high.
My cat Enny is turning 10 years old tomorrow :3: She got a chicken-and-bacon snack tonight and a nifty cat toy was ordered.
A mysterious new missile silo is being worked on.
Next week or the week after, we'll likely have a live Q&A session in IRC instead of a blog like normal. Now's a good time to learn how to join our IRC channel.
Many units will be getting secondary abilities/weapons, I'll tell you more when more's decided.

Category5: That's the end of the blog. For you moddb readers, much has been going on that hasn't been posted here. I'll be catching up on what's been missed over the next several days. About 30 images or so of updates that you may have missed. Stay tuned.