DropShips

[surr]

DO you think the dropship will get a cool upgrade because so far the protoss has warp it which is effectively better then the shuttles.. imagine reaver+plus colossus drops on workers lol.. but i think the terran should get a cool affect for their transporter
(second function like prism as pylons) maybe it could drop bombs... im rambling so you can comment on it :good:

[surr]

what about bomb dropping for bombardement

[generalrievous]

I think it should come with a drop pod (for an upgrade of course)

[surr]

undetectable dropships would be sort of rigged beside just cloaked is good

[tweakismyname]

i think the dropship sould be able 2 use combat units inside (Marines reapers and ghosts ONLY) that attack with normal fire at a decreased rate (harder 2 aim in dropship) so you could put like 6 marines in a dropship and attack like there is 3 but if you put a tank in it it does nothing (how do u fire a tank in a dropship? they got those ground anchors for a reason) that way your dropship could be defended.

[surr]

lets see how much damage would marines do?? around 6? so 6x6 is 36 wow that owns battlecruisers laser lol

[capthavic]

I think it should come with a drop pod (for an upgrade of course)

Yeah if the dropship gets destroyed the units inside are safely ejected (assuming over solid ground of course)

[paragon]

How about just a simple upgrade that increases the amount you can carry by 2 or 4.

[capthavic]

Thats boring.

[Dreadnought]

Boring but effective... i think they should get a speed boost.

[paragon]

how about the ability to be killed by one mutalisk attack like in the ghost trailer?

[capthavic]

heh heh its called artistic license

[10-Neon]

Once you get a glave wurm bouncing around in there there's no telling what'll happen.

--

I like the idea of a bunker-esque Dropship with reduced fire rates. 36 damage per "shot" is nasty if it is 2 shots per second, but if it is spread out over 2-4 seconds it would much more reasonable. Also, against armored enemies, since the shots would still be considered packets of 6 damage, the armor would stop a lot more firepower than it would the whole 36 in one blast. Perhaps, on top of the speed drop, you'd get an accuracy drop, with a chance-to-miss thing going on. All perfectly reasonable.

[Dreadnought]

how about the ability to be killed by one mutalisk attack like in the ghost trailer?
really good sense of balance paragon u get an -F

[marinepower]

It would be nice to be able to mount different types of weapons on the transport that auto-fire on various ground units. In terms of spead, perhaps the drop ship could have energy, and when it builds up to 150 or so you can launch the drop ship into outer space and make it fly to the specified location much like a nuke. This will effectively be a counter for the warp in the protoss have as well as the nydus worm the zerg have.
This ability should also have a drawn out animation so that the enemy has a chance to destroy the ship. First post =) hope I'm making sense.

[Meloku]

I like the idea of a speed boost, no energy cost, just a cooldown.

I really liked the drop pod ability! Though, I don't really think people would want to reseach a "just in case" ability. It should come standard with the new "drop ship" [you dont have to research warp in... right???]

[surr]

maybe mount a golitah so its not defenesless

[capthavic]

You don't have to research to use the Protoss warp in, but you need to upgrade a Gateway which I'm assuming costs resources.

[LJYLJ]

It would be nice to be able to mount different types of weapons on the transport that auto-fire on various ground units. In terms of spead, perhaps the drop ship could have energy, and when it builds up to 150 or so you can launch the drop ship into outer space and make it fly to the specified location much like a nuke.



id say it shouldnt be possible due to balance issues...imagine u have, say 12 dropships stuffed with tanks, and ur playing a toss..hes sitting around in hes base building **** and suddenly a ****ing squadron of dropships come crashing down like "zup"

nah i just dont see it happening, id rather see some sort of drop-pods that u could launch like..emh, drop-pods but would require something like a ghost targeting a specific area with a beacon so that ur enemy get a chance to see whats going on..

yep, thats my 2cent "running over to another post"

[Gah345]

Heres a picture of it from another forum

http://www.omegacraft.net/images/undropship.jpg

it looks like it do a bit more than move units around

[DKutrovsky]

Imo speed unload, like unload all units at the same time as opposed to one by one.

[Dreadnought]

That dropship is pulling a command center i bet...

[Remy]

I don't think giving the dropship any direct offensive capabilities would be good for balance. I think a speed upgrade would be fine.

My own suggestion is to have the dropship slowly repair onboard units. I don't think it should be for both bionic AND mechanic, but rather just one or the other. I think auto repair for mechanical units would be more valuable all things considered.

[AdmiralAckbar]

I dont think wraiths will return for starcraft 2 and the viking already has the transform ability so cloaking could go to the dropships

[Gah345]

REMY that is a really interesting idea, the ability to heal/repair units while inside the dropship
It makes sense

I too think it would be better for mechanical units such as seige tanks and vikings because you already have the medic to heal the marines and reapers. In SC1 the SCVs could repair things like goliaths and seige tanks. Great idea!


Ackbar... no as far as we know the wraith has been replaced by banshee or cobra or sumthing

[AdmiralAckbar]

the cobra is like the vulture and the banshee is for ground attack i was saying the cloak ability from wraiths which arent in sc2 could be for dropships

[Gah345]

ohhh ok i see, yeah a cloaked drop ship would be very interesting

speaking of cloaking, every team needs a mobile detector

the protoss have observers, the zerg have overlords, what will the terrans have?? its possible that the science vessel has been removed, maybe the dropship can be a detector. That sounds reasonable

[burkid]

that would make it less unique, as 2 races would have a troop transport/detector.
we have yet to see an aerial caster for terran, so i would assume that the would be the detectors.

[Remy]

It has been said that Banshee has cloaking, hasn't it? I'm pretty sure this was the case.

And about my dropship auto repair idea, I'm pretty sure SCVs will still be able to repair mechanical units and buildings in SC2. It is even quite possible for SCVs to have autocast repair. But either way, that's good back in your base or on the battlefield, you really don't have time or transport space to carry around SCVs to repair your drop units.

If dropships could slowly repair mechanical units onboard, it would allow a Terran player to stay more mobile and get more mileage out of drop strats. You could drop tanks or cobras and do some damage, then quickly load them back up to harass/assault another part of the base or a different expo. Since your damaged units will be slowly repaired, it will grant them overall better logevity, and in turn you'll be make a few more runs from the same batch of drop units as long as you micro them well.

I think this will also be good for gameplay as it would emphasize the importance of taking out dropships, even more so than before. A defending player would be faced with the decision of whether to focus on taking out the dropship as first priority or deal with the cobras running amuck. Better skilled players would also be rewarded by being able to overcome the situation with good micro.

[burkid]

wow. you've put a lot of thought in this. that auto repair looks better and better.

and with the autocasting repair for SCVs, i really hope that the incorporate it, since it was so useful in WC3.

[kehmdaddy]

Very interesting idea, Remy. If they do implement that feature, I would hope the Dropship would be the weakest of the three transport units health wise. And the Banshee has picked up the cloaking feature from the Wraith. Stealth bombers, anyone?

[Gah345]

BOMBS! No air unit, Terran or Protoss is a bomber, I like the idea... maybe it can have to build the bombs like a reaver or carrier did

good idea kehmdaddy :powerup:

[burkid]

umm... the banshee is a bomber. a cloak-able bomber.

[kehmdaddy]

Haha yeah that was kind of what I was getting at too burkid, but come to think of it, that is an interesting idea. Maybe allow it to be able to build and hold one or two bombs at a time like the Reaver. Not too powerful though, maybe similar to a Reaver's scarab damage. It would make them very useful at taking out specific structures or flying over and taking out a bunch of weaker units, especially workers. Since they can cloak, it would probably be most fair if the bombs were pretty expensive and they could only hold one at a time.

[burkid]

hmm... i thought it was a sort of missile volley to the ground.

[Gah345]

I think it should be able to hold more than 1 bomb at a time, look at the reaver!!

I was thinking maybe it can have two modes, stealth and bombing. In stealth mode, it is invisible, but cannot bomb. In bombing mode, it is visible but can drop its payload. I also thought maybe you can have it drop one bomb at a time, but as an ability it can drop 3 in quick succession to take out a heavily armored target quickly.

Just an idea

[burkid]

or maybe, it has cloak mode and visible mode, in cloak mode its invisible and can attack, and in visible mode it can be seen and attack. like every other unit that can cloak

[capthavic]

My own suggestion is to have the dropship slowly repair onboard units. I think auto repair for mechanical units would be more valuable all things considered.


I still think speed boost or faster unloading would be better. But if they do healing I think it would be better to have it be infantry only. The dropship is primarily a infanty transport and having an onboard medic makes more sense.

[Remy]

Actually tank drop would be right there at the top of the list of Terran drop strats. I would have to disagree that the dropship is primarily an infantry transport, not sure where you got that from.

Another reason why repair for mechanical instead of healing for infantry is that you would have medics with you anyway. Medics automatically heal your infantry so a healing dropship wouldn't be much needed. Infantry units also have very small HP pools compared to mechanical units, it is important that the healing happens during the fighting instead of after because how easy it is for infantry units to be killed off because of low max HP. Basically, the healing has to be for mechanical units to be meaningful if it's even there at all.

About speed boost, I feel that the dropship could us a very small increase in movement speed, right from the start without researching upgrades. But you can only boost speed of unit transports only so much to a certain point, basically not that much. Because gameplay wise, other air units have to be able to hunt them down without too much difficulty. For gameplay balance, unit transports can not be allowed to be able to outrun combat air units. Drop success, by design, comes from evading your opponent's recon efforts and surprising them, not from out-speeding anything.

[Heavyarms2050]

I have a great idea that would make the dropship survive longer in the battlefield, they should have side windows. Whenever a marine, ghost, or reapers board a dropship, they can shoot at enemies through the window. Armor units cannot shoot out of the side windows.

[Gasmaskguy]

i think the dropship sould be able 2 use combat units inside (Marines reapers and ghosts ONLY) that attack with normal fire at a decreased rate (harder 2 aim in dropship) so you could put like 6 marines in a dropship and attack like there is 3 but if you put a tank in it it does nothing (how do u fire a tank in a dropship? they got those ground anchors for a reason) that way your dropship could be defended.


It doesnt sound like your idea.

[Heavyarms2050]

too lazy to read all replies, but thanks for the heads up


This is an unnecessary post and has been flagged as spam. Please read the forum guidelines before posting.

[Gasmaskguy]

No problem. But since this thread only was 3 pages long, you should have read it. I basically read all pages in the threads I post in, but I suggest that you read thru all the threads that are less than 7-10 pages, pending on your interest.

*EDIT* This topic is old, but it would be fun to keep discussing ideas in it.

I prefered Paragons idea of simply giving them more slots.

[Joneagle_X]

I agree. It is extremely important to read the entire thread before posting. Otherwise you're just spamming on the topic that was suggested when your exact ideas may have been stated earlier in the thread.

Not to mention this is a necro-post (borrowing the term) which makes it even worse.

I think that not reading the thread is rude at the least and just plain spamming at the worst.

Even if a thread is 23 pages long, you should just avoid it rather than posting in it just to say that you didn't read it or to post your frivolous ideas without reading what anyone else had to say on the subject.

That's just selfish, and I will continue to penalize members for engaging in such behavior.

[Chax424]

Well I agree with you all, but that is a tad off topic.
To the question:
I think they are fine the way they are. The races aren't supposed to be identical. The Terran have the Ghosts Drop Pod Ability, which I think will do the trick.
If you watched the Protoss game play video, which I hope you all have...
(if not: http://www.starcraft2.com/movies.xml )
the Terran drop ships now touch down while unloading, which is just plain bad ass.
Like a few people have said, some speed might be nice.
But, to answer the question, no I don't think Dropships will have too many fancy new features, but I could easily be wrong.

[hillzagold]

crash landing, first unit in a dropship that blows up survives. probably shouldn't be for the units that take 4 slots though.

[Chax424]

Great idea!
I think the "survivors" should be determined differently.
Only infantry could survive, so yea no four slot units.
I don't know how it would be determined, random would be lame, something better
Thoughts?

[darkone]

have VIP slots that could be assigned to units you want to live

and welcome to the forum

[Gasmaskguy]

i think that all infantry should survive but loose 80% of their hp or so,(If this is implemented) so if one of them is a medic you´ll have em patched up in no-time.

[Heavyarms2050]

nah i think it should be random, it'll be cool to see some crashes from pure miracle that all your unit are unhurt and some crashes only one survives.

[BirdofPrey]

I think a afterburner would be a good upgrade but it should be a short distance say just Long enough to blast over a defensive line not cross the map.

Maybe either have a 2 second burn limit or a 1/2 to 1 screen distance limit before requiring recharge

[Gasmaskguy]

nah i think it should be random, it'll be cool to see some crashes from pure miracle that all your unit are unhurt and some crashes only one survives.


Starcraft does not go hand in hand with random you know. The Arguement "it'll be cool" only works if we are talking about the single player campaign of a FPS.

[BirdofPrey]

Well we could do 1/4 of the units will survive but which ones it is will be random

[Heavyarms2050]

but this is not starcraft, this is starcraft 2. You can do so much by just upgrading the graphics and adding new units or abilities. So it actually boils down to introducing new elements

[ItzaHexGor]

The Drop Ship doesn't really need any of the suggested upgrades. So far, each team has a way of basically teleporting in units, and a way of transporting units.
Protoss can 'teleport' units with their Warp In ability, and can transport units with their Phase Prism.
Terran can 'teleport' units with their Drop Pod ability, and can transport units with their Drop Ship.
Zerg can 'teleport' units with their Nydus Wyrm, and can transport units with their Overlord (most likely).
Each of the 'teleport abilities require sight of the area where you are spawning your units. the Protoss' Warp In will always have the sight of their Pylon or Phase Prism, because they are the things that supply the Power Grid to warp then units in. The Terran's Drop Pod will always have sight because they will always have the sight of the Ghost that is signaling the Drop Pods. Zerg will always require sight because you cannot order buildings to be built on For-of-War, just like how it was in StarCraft1. This means that another unit will have to scout to remove the Fog-of-War, before the other side of the Nydus Wyrm can be built.
All the transports would probably work the same as in StarCraft1. I would hate to see that vehicles cannot be placed in transport ships, because that would render them useless in certain scenarios.

[Ursawarrior]

the survivor idea is acceptable, it sucks in sc1 that you have your swarm of units in dropships then all of the sudden, wiped out and no one left behind, also with your tanks and goliaths