Genesis should have long-range Sniper Lasers that can instantly kill Lynx and weaker vehicles, get rid of about half of a Panther's (and similar vehicles) HP, and a get rid of a fourth of Tiger/etc HP in one shot. It can kill weaker buildings quickly, too, but is less effective on more fortified structures. It starts with a long cooldown but research can decrease the cooldown dramatically.
Just as long as these can't be made into defense towers. Imagine if you had the research and lines of these protecting your base; they'd just pick off every assault unless superweapons or artillery were used.
Energy shields are also a must! Tigers are the bulk of offense and defense, and for such great expense, they should have a longer life in battle. Shields would give them this extra durability, as well as reflect incoming Sniper Lasers, destroying the attacking unit instead of the Tiger being attacked! Also, Tigers are horribly slow and should have some kind of speed boost that can only be used a certain number of times (like Vulture Spider Mines in Starcraft) unless the Tiger is re-equipped in a garage.
Or you could give 'em more armour. I suppose a magnetic/particle field would be possible in defensive terms, but it could play havoc with the Tiger's own systems... hm. Or you could just go for a generic scifi energy shield. <_<
As for speed, yes, those things are sluggish. That's what you get for using tracks though. :unsure:
Cloaking devices would be good too, because OP3 should have a greater stealth factor than its predecessor. Only light Combat Vehicles (Spiders, Scorpions, and Lynx) would have these.
Cloaked vehicles should also be limited to going slower (as if lights off in Op2) to avoid detection and should only be able to use lower-end weaponry. Alternately, allow them to equip higher end weapons, but only allow lower end weapons (lasers, microwaves) or low-power weapons (RPGs) to fire whilst the vehicle is cloaked, due to the cloak generator's power requirement, even if the weapon turrets are self-powered.
Genesis needs long-range artillery to help break through fortresses. Turtling just causes stalemates, and currently the only way to get around it is EMP Missiles, which Eden can't build. Artillery would do severe damage to most units and structures (if not destroy them instantly). However (building off the shield idea), there could be stationary shield generators to protect against artillery.
The artillery should be inaccurate, though. Stationary shield generators would help defend for a while, at least, but you would eventually have to rally troops or bombers out to take out the artillery.
Nukes and/or orbital weapons are a must too! It would be a great way for a battle to suddenly shift directions, giving an underdog who invested in technology the upper hand over someone who tried to win by mass producing vehicles and rushing their enemies.
Nukes I'm skeptical about because most games mislabel such weapons. A nuke on most maps would be a weapon of mutually assured destruction. Tactical nukes, on the other hand, and other high-end weaponry would be good so long as there were ample countermeasures, such as an SDI Satellite (deployed like any other) that had a x% chance of shooting down any attack missiles (be they Plymouth EMP or tacnukes) and possibly even SULVs/RLVs - though this may make it a prime deployment option for Space Race type games, as launching an SDI could seriously hinder any other player.
Perhaps Eden could get some kind of limited-life Blight ICBM?
Aircraft are a must-have, too! Flying units always look cool, and would be something very new to Outpost! All colonies should be able to build basic air units, but only Eden should get a large Battlecruiser-type thing with several weapons turrets and shields (if researched) due to their technological superiority. Of course this large aircraft would be a slower, easier target than its smaller, more agile counterparts. Additionally, it may require people to operate, so if it is destroyed, the people on-board will die, too.
Depending on the atmosphere of the planet of Genesis, aircraft could be very tricky. A good start point for aircraft technology might be ekranoplans (the bastard offspring of an aircraft and a hovercraft) or hovercraft. AA weaponry should not be too powerful or easy to massproduce unless aircraft were similarly cheap and effective.
Of course, aircraft need fuel, so some sort of new structure would be needed to "mine" the atmosphere for hydrogen or whatever the aircraft will use for fuel. Aircraft will occasionally have to dock with this structure or they will run out of fuel and crash (Eden's larger air unit will be able to get its own fuel from the air as it is big enough to hold an "air miner"). Fuel would, essentially, be a new metal class.
Scooping hydrogen from the atmosphere is entirely possible given the correct equipment and atmosphere composition, so we'll assume for sanity's sake that all aircraft units would use some kind of hydrogen fuel. There are a few sources of this; the atmosphere, and H2O. H2O can of course be broken down into 2 Hydrogen and 1 Oxygen, but the presence of it depends on the planet Genesis is on, and may need to be acquired from polar ice caps. Aircraft should not be relied on for assaults and to do this, they should be made powerful but extremely expensive, and the availability of hydrogen fuel should be low. Another option could be transports that can paradrop light units (Lynx, Scouts, Scorps, Spiders) behind enemy lines or manually unload heavier units (Tiger, Panther) by landing would help a lot.
Aircraft should also be able to land, reducing their fuel consumption to 0. That way aircraft still on the pad won't continue to eat fuel when idling.
Also, aircraft ammunition should be limited ala Warzone 2100. Whilst the lasers/etc. on fighters would recharge for dogfights (meaning only fuel would be an issue), fighters would be unable to hit ground targets. Bombers would have to return to reload and refuel between attacks.
Eden should be able to control the weather (create vortexes and electrical storms) while Plymouth should be able to create quakes, while the other colony might be able to cause meteor impacts (rocket boosters on asteroids maybe?).
More in the realms of fun superweaponry. :lol: Weather control is always a fun one, so long as all the potential outcomes are balanced. I mean it'd be no fun if your vortex or electrical storm suddenly wandered off or went in entirely the wrong direction; that would be terribly unfair, as Plymouth's quakes would be a lot more effective. The meteor impacts could be some kind of meteor shower attack. Very inaccurate but also quite powerful. The electrical storms could be several storms at lower damage that wander around the 'blast area' zapping things at random.
And for my final idea, you should be able to equip regular structures with an certain number of turrets (varies for each structure) for added defense. Let's face it, you can't always keep all your vehicles around for defending your base. Now, you would be able to send everything you have off to fight and your base would still be adequately protected!
Agreed, but installing turrets should not be instant, and should also increase the structure's power consumption. On this note, defensive turrets should have a greater range and more damage than their vehicular counterparts due to their emplaced nature.
