Realistic Enhancements to DEFCON (bugs excluded)

[Ace Rimmer]

I usually don't post in this sub forum, but I thought I'd throw this out there. I apologize if I'm mentioning somebody's idea/s, but I'm not searching.

1. Player specific Orders control. Even in 2v2, it can be a pain as a spectator to try and use the Orders control to see exactly what a single player is doing. Take just the silos, if all four players give all six of their silos targets, who can tell what is being targeted by whom? (with ease) This kind of enhancement would add significant value to the game.
2. Private Diplomatic chat that can be viewed by spectators. Private talks in Diplomacy are very important, yet the spectators can't see which players are being devious. Having a new chat option would greatly enhance the entertainment value of this mode (and probably others).
3. Senator (trickster): Have all Defcons handshake after the game and exchange Score values (and territories). That way a modified dedcon version could catch it and /setscore would be obsolete.
4. Senator (trickster): A customizable variable mode would be great, amount of total credits, credits per unit.
5. xander: Additionally, more customization with regards to unit counts would be nifty. Allow the host to set, say, a limit of 5 silos and 4 battleships
6. sfericz: (from Chris) Better MOD support. Ability to load and unload mods from inside the game. Game servers would advertise their currently running mod. Automatic activation/deactivation of MODs when joining a server. Central database of all known mods. Designers could upload their latest mods to this database. Thought since Multiwinia might be using this task (With automatic downloading of the MODs). It would be easy to implement into Defcon.
7. sfericz: Hot keys to toggle radar, object trails, orders, or territories on and off.
8. Icy: player specific radar toggles in spectator mode, so you can see who can see what.
9. sfericz: A hot link to Defcon's fourm on the main menu. (Maybe close to the MOTD)
10. xander: Fix the retargeting delay bug (link)
11. Others that might be added

[trickser]

*Have all Defcons handshake after the game and exchange Score values (and territories and other stats). That way a modified dedcon version could catch it and /setscore would be obsolete.

*A customizable variable mode would be great, amount of total credits, credits per unit.

[xander]

*A customizable variable mode would be great, amount of total credits, credits per unit.

Additionally, more customization with regards to unit counts would be nifty. Allow the host to set, say, a limit of 5 silos and 4 battleships.

xander

[torq]

Radars and ships shouldn't see ground installations. They should be seen only from a plane.

[Ace Rimmer]

Radars and ships shouldn't see ground installations. They should be seen only from a plane.

That's not an enhancement, rather it's a suggestion for changing the game.

[sfericz]

Better MOD support
Ability to load and unload mods from inside the game
Game servers would advertise their currently running mod
Automatic activation/deactivation of MODs when joining a server
Central database of all known mods.
Designers could upload their latest mods to this database.

1: Thought since Multiwinia might be using this task (With automatic downloading of the MODs). It would be easy to implement into Defcon.

2: Hot keys to toggle radar, object trails, orders, or territories on and off.

[sfericz]

Bump, sticky bump bump

[Icy]

A spherical world rather than a cylindrical one?

[bert_the_turtle]

/me points at the important word 'realistic' in the thread title.

[Icy]

Oh, thought that meant ways to make the game more realistic.

@Topic, player specific radar toggles in spectator mode, so you can see who can see what.

[sfericz]

A hot link to Defcon's fourm on the main menu. (Maybe close to the MOTD)

That might bring about the "ALT-TAB character" bug though.

[Ace Rimmer]

We have some really great ideas that could boost the life and sales of Defcon if some/all were to be implemented and launched as a new and improved form of Defcon.

[xander]

Fix the retargeting delay bug

If you do micromanage, give the fighter the ability to auto-target first. That is, once the fighter has killed it's last target, don't wait for it to reach it's last known point of order, simply tell the fighter to fly where it is already and it will auto-target without the time delay (unless it's still counting down). Once it auto-targets, if it picks another fighter instead of a bomber (for example), you can then change it's orders. If you tell it to attack something directly, it must wait for the timer before it ever fires the first shot.

xander

[sfericz]

The ability to destruct units with a hot key. (Much like how you can blow up amours in Multiwinia with 'c')

This can be used for splash damage on subs and other units you absolutely need dead.

[trickser]

custom score modes: e.g. 5pt/kill , -3pt/death, -10pt/collateral

but xander mentioned somewhere, that you cant use very large populations, cause there is the danger, the score will flip over if it exceeds a certain value (signed integer range?). So maybe it wouldnt be so easy to implement as it seems. But maybe fractions can work, e.g. 1/2pt/kill, -1/3pt/death.