Suggestions: Pilots & A Bit Of Advice
Greetings. I am TheRexYo. I have been playing this game for a while now, though I am by no means a veteran. Anyhow, recently there was an in-app poll asking for feedback on a potential "pilots" feature. I think in my response I mentioned the core issues with adding features that "improve" a player's assets (weapons, robots, etc.). I also believe that I forgot to provide any example alternatives. So here I am.
If I recall correctly, the goals of the pilots feature are to (A) provide players with an incentive to continue optimizing their hangar to suit their playstyle even after they max out their robots and (B) provide further options to make gameplay interesting. To help reach this, I'm presenting a list of concepts that can be mixed around to come up with a potential implementation. The core assumption of these ideas is that pilots will provide player's robots with various effects and boosts (some of which may trigger under special circumstances), but will have drawbacks to prevent things from getting out of hand.
- Pilots will provide bonuses, but only under certain conditions (for example, when at low HP or while on top of a point).*
- Pilots will provide bonuses, but only to specific equipment and/or robots.*
- Pilots will provide bonuses, but will cost energy.
- Pilots will provide bonuses, but will have a tradeoff. For example, gaining HP at the cost of your ability, or increased damage but with less HP. The bonuses can be higher than the drawbacks, provided the drawbacks are significant enough to merit playing without pilots.
* Ideas that are marked with an asterisk do not count as drawbacks, since they don't actually prevent power creep. They may, however, allow the bonuses a pilot provides to be stronger without making them too unbalanced. It is still highly recommended to add a drawback of some form as well.
With all that out of the way, I'd just like to say that I really enjoy this game, and I hope you guys stay on the right path and gain the popularity you deserve for such a fun game. Thanks for reading, and have an epic day!