Single/limited use buildings

[Captain Jack]

Haven't had a chance to play the game for a few days thanks to work concerns, but while I've been catching up on user impressions an idea occurred to me. Single and limited use buildings. They'd be rapid constructions that cannot be repaired, but provide quick bonuses or abilities before popping.

Consider:

• A single use building that automatically scouts and provides sonar coverage of a large area.
• A building that creates a city center anywhere in your vision range. (this is the big one, I think)
• A single use weapon that hits multiple squares.
• This could be a solution to Chris's missile woes, if those are still ongoing. Missile structures could have a certain number of shots before they're exhausted.
• And then there's temporary defenses, buffs and the like that exist for a few turns and then break down. Good for fighting off saucers, or covering a wartime expansion.

I'm sure there's more that could be done in this vein, if there's interest. Thoughts?

Edit: Just realized that exploration camps would be good temporary structures as well, since they're supposed to be bulldozed as you expand towards them. Hardcoding that would make sense. Maybe you'd give them a 2hex range of sonar to make up for it? Or add that as a bonus once the tech is unlocked.

[Zebeast46]

I actually have to say I really like this idea, or parts of it. I think it could really help with the military aspect as it could help add diversity to the combat. Also if the AI could also use it then it could be another use for espionnage. Now that I think about it, instead of buildings, these could possibly be actual temporary resources. It could be good, butif you are thinking about mantising it should probably be refined a bit more.

[nas1m]

Seconded. This is a great idea in my book, not least with regard to exploration camps. The city center placement Issue is likely sufficiently solved by the recently teleporter changes, but especially the military/missle part is great. This would also open a desirable missle->laser upgrade path via techs if alleviating the ammo restrictions for lasers.

Care to mantis this?

[jerith]

Edit: Just realized that exploration camps would be good temporary structures as well, since they're supposed to be bulldozed as you expand towards them. Hardcoding that would make sense. Maybe you'd give them a 2hex range of sonar to make up for it? Or add that as a bonus once the tech is unlocked.

Really? I've always just built my city around them and continued to receive the cheap science and government SP from them. And rebuilt them when they got killed. Maybe having them self-destruct after a certain number of turns (or when you reach the max lander level) would make sense.

[crazyroosterman]

I'm personally quite looking forward to the racial changes that are going to happen farther down the patch line from here(maybe the zenith will stop being op who knows) but personally I cant say I like the idea of missiles getting nerfed more there already consuming enough to make and operate as it is maybe it would better to buff the other means of attack instead?(how exactly to do so eludes for the time being ill edit this when they come back)

[Captain Jack]

Edit: Just realized that exploration camps would be good temporary structures as well, since they're supposed to be bulldozed as you expand towards them. Hardcoding that would make sense. Maybe you'd give them a 2hex range of sonar to make up for it? Or add that as a bonus once the tech is unlocked.

Really? I've always just built my city around them and continued to receive the cheap science and government SP from them. And rebuilt them when they got killed. Maybe having them self-destruct after a certain number of turns (or when you reach the max lander level) would make sense.

That's pretty what I mean. Some temporary buildings would have a number of charges and are destroyed when you use them up. Others would self-destruct after a number of turns. Races could have abilities that modify those values, and upping those numbers would be a good social progress ability.

Care to mantis this?

As soon as mantis is working.

[ptarth]

One purpose behind removing units was to reduce micro-management, reintroducing it like this seems counter productive. Plus, what you are advocating is just going to require me to build more of them to combat the limited use, ignore them, or just keep rebuilding them. None of that sounds very fun.

[steelwing]

Mantis was working as of yesterday around 8PM (Eastern).