Larian Studios Forums Dragon Commander Dragon Commander - General My Impressions and Suggestions!

Hello everybody! I have played Dragon Commander about 2 hours and I wanna tell you about impressions, bugs or just disadvatages

Well in technicall side the game goes without stuttering, lags or freezing but once I`ve crashed when tried to back to main menu.Of course there is almost no content in the game and I didin`t try to skirmish with my hostiles too deep because as LordCrash have already said balancing is INSANE even on Easy Mode I lose my battle for 3 minutes!!!First I thought about my strategy skills problem and about my reaction -to be honest I am bad in strategy!) but later I turned off AI at all and started to explore game mechanic.

As for me graphics is pretty cool but maybe engine needs some polishing I think because is just Early Beta version.
Now about disadvantages for which Beta was supposed to.

1)You can sell last building and then we lose battle it doesn`t have sense!
Introduce the veto to sell the last building because I think we can casually push the "Sell" button and we have Retreat button after all)

2)Fireballs go through some objects -There is no collisions on some objects))

3)You CONSTANTLY should click on the left-mouse-button to shoot fireball
I think this clicking is rather annoying if you wish continuous attack . I suggest to Hold button like Divinity 2 or work in option to choose between Clicking or Holding

4)There is twiched animation of Mortar Turret Shot

5)You cannot see decription of Dragon Skills thus these ones need to check manualy

6)Anti-Air and Anti-ground Turret Does`nt have "Halt" button but you can order it to Halt Fire by keyboard

7)Suggestion about bulding units-Let us build more than five units for a time .Horewer maybe it was done for better balancing I don`t know)

8)Suggestion-Passive Skills(icons I mean) should be rearranged to Statitic Unit window (like
Starcraft) IMHO

9)There is problem with Bomber Balloon when it attacking it`s rockets fly around target and don`t explode or explode but after several minutes!!

10)I cannot move flying units to another islands except Bomber Balloon,Zeppelin and Imp Fighter -On the Winter Islands map at least

11)Armour (ship) cannot upload more than 3 unit!

12)When I`ve played about 1,5 hour and decided to back to main menu,reaction of the game was quite long and then crashed(It`s my only crash)

13)Tutorial Mode doesn`t switch off correctly when I re-launch the game I need to switch off it manually

14)When I move the camera there appear graphic artefacts on the sky.

15)There is no difference between Fullscreen Mode and Fake Fullscreen Mode

16)Hints appear and disappear too quick then hard to read these

17)There is infinite mana

18)When Your units (in my case see ones -Juggernaut) have already destroyed any building they going on to attack this place

19)When you have out of fireballs(there is scale of overheat I don`t want how to say)
In this case you can change type of this to Acid fireball and the scale is reseting
I think is not suppose to be in balancing

Just now I won battle against 2 enemies` AI at insane setting!! with my ally bot in insane AI too
What I want to say I am BAD in strategy but I won the batlle!!! Below I`ll write the main reason

Actually AI is quite stupid, firstly I have a very strong pressing from enemy`s army they literaly intrude like swarm of locust but I used my dragon while my ally captures command post and builds the army .During the battle I didn`t use my own base to recruit or capture anything I`m SERIOUS!! .But I have to say once my ally stuck -It was`nt react to anything though it have quite a LOT of units I defeated another bot and then the last one was stuck of course it defending itself but I won only with my dragon .To be honest it was`nt so easy I died about 15 times))
So this a story

P.S-The voice of David Walgrave in Tutorial warms my heart))!

This probably should have been posted in the beta forum. Oh wait, maybe you haven't been added to it?

1) That's interesting, because for the AI, they can lose all their buildings and still it isn't victory until you destroy all their units capable of attacking.

3) That's probably a good idea to switch it to "Hold for continuous fire" instead of clicking constantly.

5) And by manually, we mean "pause the game and look it up in the manual."

11) You mean the War Factory produced Armour unit? That's probably intentional, because it is not that big a unit, it makes sense that it can only hold 3 units. That said, there's no reason why it should display a capacity of 15 units if it can hold only 3.

12) I had something similar once. It hadn't crashed, but it was taking so long that I thought it had hung, Task Manager said it was not responding so I told it to "end task", and THEN it unfroze. But that was my only near-crash.

17) There is no mana usage as far as I know. It seems everything is cooldown based instead.

Hello Stabbey it`s good to see you)
Of course I`ve already written it on the Steam forum,but I couldn`t refuse my temptation to post my impressions here
About statements
11)Maybe you quite right it`s make sense

17)Ok but what about blue bar from the right of health bar?
It`s not armour bar

Yes, that bar seems pretty worthless. My suggestion was if it wasn't going to be used for anything else, turn it into an additional bar for the Jetpack's charge.

I REALLY like the idea of holding the LMB for continuous fire. If I want to stop firing, I can just let go. If I want to fire only a few shots, I can just click a few times.

I'd also like to propose a few camera adjustments. For the camera in build-mode, have some kind of standard height/angle which you can always return to.

Right now, if you move your camera up a mountain or something taller than your current view, your camera will be fixed in that position, I think it'd be better if it returned back to the camera you had before.

Also when you come from dragon form back to build, your camera should return back to standard instead of being the same location from where you transformed.

Also you should be able to change the camera angle with holding in rightclicking instead of using the middlemouse

And remove the "who vs who" bar on the left side, it's a huge area where you are unable to click on anything and it doesn't provide any useful information really.

Holding LMB makes it harder to stop firing right before it overheats though, and as far as I can tell, there's a longer waiting period if you overheat.

Moving passive skills is a real good idea though.

So? All that means is that you will have to learn to let go of the button sooner. If you're paying attention it's not a big deal, if you're not, you'll overheat anyway. I'm not saying to change the actual fire rate, I'd just prefer to not have to click every single time.

deleted.

I've not started playing the Beta yet(1 hour to go), but I'd prefer holding down the button to clicking constantly. Main reason that I never got into Diablo or Torchlight.

My Opinion without playing the game:If the continuous dragon fire has its limitations (IE limited fire per dragon transformation/mana/stamina based), an option(IE you can change it via options) of constant fire when the left mouse is clicked should be implemented. If you want to utilize the limitations of the weapon without degrading its accuracy, click by click basis should is advantageous over holding the left mouse in this kind of games. Otherwise, holding the left mouse should have been the norm.



(about the rightclicking thing and middlemouse) Aren't there any change controls option? It's easier to give the player the freedom to change their controls. Controls such as: Hotkeys, Camer angle change, camera rotation, super skills, quick slot skills, directional buttons, other relevant buttons.

(who vs who) I'm curious to what is that.

(Camera fix from dragon to build) If you meant standard, do you mean zooming out to a strategic point of view map? If it is, this is a good suggestion. It will create a routine to a player instead of throwing them up in the pit. They know that, after transforming into a dragon, they will return to building mode.

Since, from previous discussion, dragon transformation is limited, we are going to use more of strategic building rather than FPS.

Yeah button mashing along with trying to come up with a strategy and all, we are men, were not supposed to be able to multi task =)

The Dragon does have a limited ability to fire. Eventually, after too much firing (as indicated by a circle around the target reticule), it will overheat and have to slowly cooldown before you can fire again. The targeting is perfectly accurate, but it is not very effective at killing high HP targets.

Henry - the who vs who thing is a display on the left side of the screen showing the factions of all the players and which player is there. http://i.imgur.com/gAxAJi9.jpg It stays up all game long.

I see, if it is accurate, then click by click basis should be changed. I'm just curious, is that weapon homing or it varies from weapon to weapon?

On the who vs. who, I think it is better to show the factions when paused or in a break session. Knowing what color are your allies and what color are your enemies at the beginning of the game or during loading screen is sufficient to identify the parties involved.

No, there are no such camera options unfortunately. I just personally prefer to change the angle of the camera using rightclick+hold rather than middlemouse + hold.

About the Camera from dragon to build. The camera of which you end your session as a dragon, is the same camera you will use when you enter build mode. This will force you to spend time to resettle your camera to a more strategic point of view (and will create a few seconds of confusion on your part). This is why I want some kind of standard camera angle like company of heroes has it.

About the Who vs Who, I think it's ebtter explained with a screenshot. Or watch Tavorah's video, you'll notice it on the left side on the screen. I personally find it pretty redundant because you should already know who you are up against and allied with... And it's space you aren't able to click in so I'd get rid of it tbh.

I have to add about overheat when you have the overheat you could QUICKLY RESET it by using another type of fireball(in my case if I change Fireball to Acidball)

I think it`s leak of balance

Yeah, I guess so as well.

First off, epic music. Hats off Kirill.

Now, unto the gameplay. I won't be listing what was already addressed. I'll also add a few of my suggestions. The first poster should edit/compile the list of things we listed here so the issues won't be redundant and strike out those that was said to be fixed to test it out again if it was really fixed :P
Generally, my approach is on the details. You'll know what I mean after reading my report:

Game Issues:

• Leaving the Battle Zone as a dragon: If you die after 10 seconds, your screen is still black and white. The only remedy is to go back to dragon form again.
• You Lose: "Make haste, if your team doesn't respond in TWO seconds, you lose." I can only read the warning under 2 seconds :P

AI: (against AI Insane 1v1. This is a one time match)

• Dragon: Never saw them summoning a dragon.
• Ships: They build a lot of transport. 8 out of 10 are transports, never even utilizing most of it, and they only load one unit at a time in my case. The only possible strategy I could think of when they buy a lot of transport ships is to self destruct them.
• Unlimited resource/recruits: Well, it's a good advantage. It's a little bit unfair on my point of view though :P
• Moment of idleness: There was one moment in the game where I could literally do another activity keeping the battle open and the AI is not doing anything. When I attacked while it was idle, they became aggressive. Weird IMO. I lost though, I thought at first they had limited resources.
• Winter Islands:The initial transport ships were not being used by the AI because its pathfinding is literally on patrol (going sideways). They need to build another one to capture other islands.
• Default AI versus other difficulty AI. The default should have been a normal difficulty. It tends to confuse the player what difficulty it is, and it is redundant.

Balancing Issues:

• Self Destruct: The mechanic should be either time based (IE 10 seconds to detonate) or the attack function (right click/q then left click (the default)). I had one transport who used self destruct and it was blinking all through out the entire game. It should be a double edged sword, hurting both your allies and enemies if not used correctly rather than a kamikaze. Maybe it was intended to be a kamikaze in the first place...

Interface:

• Path lines: Path lines for flying units/all units, should be available. A short duration of it appearing when the unit is prompted so the player will recall his or her command to that unit.
• Unit support AOE: Specifically, the Zeppeline Fog of war. The 400 Radius is a blind guess. I don't even know if my units surrounding the zeppelin will get the benefits of the ability. Just by putting the mouse on the icon, the radius should appear on screen.
• Fog of war user icon= Arrows/triangle going to the right. Should have been smoke of cloud or other icon that tells cloaking. Just my suggestion so as not to confuse other people with the one below:
• Revelation= an "All seeing eye" icon should be nice. It is to avoid the confusion between Fog of War icon and this one.
• Research hotkey: research command in individual buildings should have a hotkey.
• Queue slots= Not really a useful suggestion, but it keeps the player aware if all the queue slots have been used (IE like starcraft with the numbers per available slots on the production queue).
• Description of skills in research bar: The description can only be seen on the units. It is really not helpful if you go and research it on the individual buildings if you don't even know what you are researching for.
• You Win screen = I only won once, based from it, I don't know how to exit the "You Win" screen. Pressed enter, space bar, mouse key, etc. Just to get out from it. The screen should have said how to exit from that screen like "press any button to exit"
• Scroll Sensitivity: Should be in game option. Scrolling is so slow. Adding the camera the controls during build mode is a chore.
• Formations: Pre made formations/custom made formations should be present. It's hard to micromanage everything on a case to case basis. For example, avoiding a kamikaze/suicide ship w/ its target in the center of a cluster of ships. The usual pattern is to click individual units on the right side of the cluster to separate its units. One short solution is to give them a formation. Pressing Alt+any letter should suffice. I haven't seen a game w/ formations hotkey except in shattered galaxy MMO.

Unknown Issue:

• Devestator blowing itself up: When I tried bombarding the devestator to itself, A shaman was healing that unit, and put an aegis on it. Then, I tried transforming into a dragon. First dragon of the three, healing the unit with restoration spell and putting another aegis on it. It died with half health still remaining and replenishing.

The list below are inconsequential/trivial to the game experience
Game options:

• Drag down button: For example, Try dragging down the texture quality under graphics option and part of the dragged down option is not seen. You need to scroll down to see the rest.
• Description of option interface: When putting your mouse on the option, the game should tell the effects on the performance and graphics option. One thing that interest me is the God Ray option. I don't even know what that is for.
• Under Combat Phase: "Command hold position" is a little bit overshadowed by the size of the list.

Trivial matters:

• Boat are sometimes moving sidewards.

Response to henryv

• I don't think any AI summons a dragon. The manual has some very specific wording when it comes to what is Strong or Weak against Dragons, it always says "Player Dragon". That suggests to me that there may never be any AI Dragons.
• I agree that the AI when it comes to ships is terrible, they only seem to make transports, never any attack ships, and they use the transports mostly as attack ships, pretty much never as actual transports. The naval AI needs a lot of work.
• I think 35 Recruits is already an exorbitant, too high price for spawning as a Dragon, and you think it should be even higher if you die?
  
  If you penalize the player even more for dying, you will force the players into always picking a skill loadout that includes self-healing and the shield or worse, discourage them from spawning as the Dragon at all, which would be a crime.
  
  Even worse is justifying it with appeals to "realism". It's a Dragon with a Jetpack! What part of that seems "realistic" to you? Arguments should be based on "how will this make the game more fun in general". Fun is a billion times more important than realism.

Balancing
- All three types of mines seem underpowered.

• The upgrades that let you plant mines are more expensive than the ones which reveal them (and that upgrade has a secondary use of revealing cloaked units!)
• They take 20 seconds between plantings - too long to sit around and wait, too short to do much with the rest of your army.
• They require a lot of micro to plant effectively, and that's just for one very small area! The maps are huge. The game's pace is too fast to make planting mines worthwhile.
• They don't even do much damage. Two direct hits on an unupgraded Imp fighter were not enough to kill it. Transports can hit one or two and keep going (and that's if they don't have the minesweeper upgrade to let them ignore them), and an entire army waltzing mindlessly through a carefully planted field will still be in good shape to fight at the end.

I just played another game. The dragon suggestion there was a last minute addition. I'll delete that portion. I didn't account for the HP of the dreadnaught, so the 35 recruit seems reasonable. Also, I haven't experienced dying more than 5 times in my play through when I suggested it even when I was battling an insane AI. Maybe because it was due to the lack of dragons on the AI part. I'm not those realism peeps btw.

Unto some issues I encountered:

Game Issues:

• "You Lose make haste...": appeared upon starting a game. This was 2 games after the 2 seconds "You lose" prompt (see post above). After the first encounter with it, I played another game, then exited to the desktop. Upon starting a game after opening the application again, the "You lose" prompt appeared.
  
  Now, it was 13 seconds. I'm assuming the prompt was for 15 seconds. It is TOO SHORT to even take action. Maybe adjusting it to 30 seconds to a minute could suffice. Except of course when the defeated faction has no units at all for him to take action.

AI:

• AI Priority: It seems the priority of taking out the dragon is low, or I'm imagining things? I'll test this out sometime.

Just a quick reminder; respawning the dragon does not cost more recruits if he died. It is the same amount in the current balancing, which is 35. Also, if you manage to unsummon your Dragon before he dies and then resummon him he does not cost any recruits.
Thus, the dragon will only cost recruits again if he dies in combat.

Resource cost of "anything" is still under balancing so this might change over time.

Mines might be too low on the "effort vs efficiency" ratio.
Reveal skill for the Dragon is intended to have a low cost, otherwise a lot of people will not bother using this skill. Keep in mind all of these skills cost Research in the campaigns and thus people will make decisions (which you currently do not, since beta is only skirmish as of now) on what to research.

Cheers for the feedback.