Definitely interesting ideas to say the least. MOBAs are an interesting genre but it will need to be incorporated subtly because the genre seems to be quite overbearing; the game would become a MOBAFPS rather than an FPSMOBA if that makes any sense. Its hard for creeps to not "steal the spotlight" or become "the core-mechanic" to the game when you decide to include them into a game. Definitely worth more deliberation.
Another thing to consider is pacing the game around creeps. FPS pace is very interesting because it can either go from, for lack of better terminology, 0 to 100 really fast or be very fast paced all the time. This can be observed in popular FPS games like CSGO (and Tremulous), where you can poke at an enemy with grenades and burst firing before starting a bomb site take. A lot of other more traditional shooters (Red Eclipse, Quake, Half-Life, Call of Duty) always have a speed that dictates the flow of the game but is generally very fast paced, immersive, and intense. Adding creep waves worries me in this because, by the way you make it sound, I find it hard to imagine humans or aliens rushing without their creep wave pushed forward. So that would almost forcefully create a simple flow to a dynamic game which could make players feel like they have no control when they lose or make players feel like they're slowed down when they win. I play MOBAs occasionally and one of the things I hate much is having to wait for creeps to go to a tower so I can kill it when Im super far ahead; I want to be able to just attack and end it. We should also consider the average time of a MOBA-like game. Often times 20-60 minutes is the average which is not desirable for an FPS.
We have talked in the past, many times, about having builders be a more aggressive class. Allowing offensive structures will hinder camping and bring the average time of games far down because you could take a lead and run away with it. In the pre-alpha 44 build, taking a lead and using it to win was really hard in two conditions:
- You don't have enough players to destroy a base
- You aren't incredibly better and miles ahead of your opponent
Reasons why I like offensive structures:
- The offensive team has to sacrifice possible defensive structures to go fully aggressive meaning that once the structures are destroyed by the defending team, it is likely that a comeback will still be possible.
Viech wrote: At the same time, the swarmhost in particular can also achieve quite the opposite and slow games down by forcing the defender to invest a lot into defense at any given time. Swarmhost vs. siege tank equlibirium is boring to watch.
Offensive structures shouldn't be a threat alone. StarCraft and Unvy are two almost entirely different games and I see stalemates caused by offensive structures rare. Defensive structures should be balanced to the point where they will beat out offensive structures in all respects. Offensive structures should be used to synergize with an alien or human attack to make it to where the defending team no longer has defender's advantage unless they go out and kill the structure(s).
- Granger will be a lean, mean aggro-machine
Lastly I've thought of an offensive structure for both teams that will give you some insight as to the direction that I am thinking of taking these offensive structures:
H: A Telepathy disruptor. This fragile-looking, repurposed satellite dish is mounted to a base that projects sound on a similar frequency that the Overmind uses to talk to its aliens. The disruption of communication is different for every alien.
Affects all aliens structures within range of Overmind
-Overmind no longer displays message "Overmind is under attack!"
-Barricades recede
-Booster no longer provides poison or healing bonus
-Acid tubes iteration rate decreased by half
-Communication disruption only lasts 20 seconds before the Overmind switches frequency and takes 2 minutes to obtain the new frequency that the Overmind switched to.
-When alien communication is jammed a message will appear on screen notifying humans and aliens
A: Sacrificial Pod. This strange looking egg sends larvae before they hatch into battle with only one instruction; attack!
Structure sends in waves of 3 larvae every 5-10 seconds
-Larvae have toxic spittle that will temporarily disable turrets that they get close to
-Larvae ignore humans and only go for structures
-Larvae are small with very low movement speed and have 15 hit points
-Aliens can use LMB (Left Mouse Button) to chomp on the Larvae, eating them and regaining 50 HP instantly