Article: Foundations of a Successful RTS

Foundations of a Successful RTS

[Tom Cadwell, 1999]

In this interesting article, Tom analyzes some aspects that RTS games should be considered when designing a RTS game.

Principles of RTS Balance:

1. As a general rule, if race A builds up a unit mix and attcks race B, there should exist a cost/effective counter for B that is available around the same time and requires slightly less time to build. Also, versatile units should be less powerful compared to specialist units.
2. Balane should take the form between unit mixes, not individual units. This is to avoid the "just build a large number of the same unit" problem.
3. Consider maximum firepower conentration. Many super long range units is bad.
4. As the range of the unit increases, the firepower should be reduced. This is unrealistic, but balances the game.
5. Map lag. Don't allow units, especially early units, to cross the map too quickly.
6. Combat formulae and the various values units have need to be very flexible to be able to fix balance if problems are discovered later on.
7. Every attack should have a risk. There should always be some opportunity for you opponent to counter your attack and destroy your resources cos effectively.
8. Endgame driving forces must be in place. Attrition is the way to go. Bigger isn't necesarily better. Avoid getting to the point of players having to control hundreds of units. Also, static defenses need a way of being cracked so a player who suffers from attrition will be unable to continue.
9. The more a unit can move, the less powerful it should be, but some units that break this rule can be in the game to avoid map specific imbalances.

Design principles

1. If it isn't fun, it should't be in a game. Avoid tedious tasks. Avoid lots of administative stuff unless your game is designed around them. And always avoid AI that acts stupid, this will 100% of the time annoy the player.
2. Gameplay over realism. The game needs to "make sense" but that doesn't mean hyper realistic mechanics. If you need to sacrifice one or the other, sacrifice realism.
3. The aspects of a game that appeal the most to the hardcore gamer should tend to be in the hidden features (hotkeys not visible on the screen, combat bonuses for cover, etc). Don't try to make the game "complex" by cluttering the screen with buttons.
4. Sound effects and visual effects are extremely useful and don't affect play balance. Use them extensively.
5. Straegic wealth should always be sought after. This is accomplished by complex unit interactions or simple but elegant resource system. Chess is a great example of simple but elegant game.
6. Give units a "purijavascript:void(0)ty of purpose". Consider what do race X needs to flesh out its combat abilities in a unique way and come up with units that fit that feel. Also avoid giving units more than one purpose and having more than one unit per race that does the same.
7. Never let a unit become obsolete. This confuses players and leads to more imbalances.

To read the complete article, go to StrategyGamingOnline.

Tom Cadwell, 1999. Foundations of a Successful RTS. Obtained in Jul 19th, 2011 from Strategy Gaming Online: http://www.strategy-gaming.com/editorials/sucessful_rts.shtml

RTS example project in Unity

I just stumbled across a public project in Unity that can be extremely helpful when trying to make a RTS style game in this game engine.

The project's last official update(1.1) was on august 2009, but the community has been adding little bits of stuff and posting small updates on their own (a quick search through the post's replies is enough to find all the different updates). Someone even created a SVN for the project and someone created google docs for documentation. (Open source projects with a great community are amazing!)

This project is free for personal and commercial use which is great and it always helps not having to write everything from scratch.

The project can be found here.

An example of the project running (version 1.1) can be played here.

Paper: Random Map Generation for Strategy Games

Random Map Generation for Strategy Games

[Shawn Shoemaker, 2004]

This paper explains how to generate a random map for a RTS game using clumps.

One of the most important aspects to consider when creating random maps for these games is the balance. Every player must have a balanced amount of terrain near them and a balanced amount of resources.

This can be achieved with clumps which are pieces of land that iteratively grow untill the map is filled. Initially, the map contains an empty grid with a tile for every player. This initial tiles are equally separated from each other.

Then, each tile grows iteratively by one tile, creating a clump of land untill the maximum growth size is reached or there are not enough tiles to expand again.

This leaves us with a map grid of zones for each player with roughly the same space. After each player's space has been determined, terrain height details will be generated, trying to give each clump a balanced configuration. Finally, resources can be placed inside each of the clumps, ensuring that each player can obtain the same amount of resources in one way or another.

This technique is useful as a general map creation algorithm, for either simple or complicated maps for different types of games.

A more detailed explanation of the algorithm and some examples can be found in the book AI Game Programming Wisdom 2.

Shoemaker, Shawn (2004). Random Map Generation for Strategy Games. In Steve
Rabin (Ed.) AI Game Programming Wisdom 2. United States, Charles River Media
Inc.