Research & 'General' mini-legendary unit

edit: changed topic title to better reflect content & reworded post.



The supcom2 research system works decently well, minus the slightly chaotic and seemingly random research & pathways. The amount of research you can gain in combat and by using research stations can be quite silly at times, and it means that you can gain research by killing any random unit and/or sitting in base and turtling going for mass converters/research spam.



If you restrict research to killing a few classes of units, say Mini legendaries, Legendaries, and your opponent's king, you divert the emphasis from building structures and getting more kills than your opponent to precision strikes against the important units of your enemy, as the loss of a nation's king, general, or any kind of leader greatly reduced their effectiveness.



If you take a "General" class of unit, Noun, not adjective, make them the effective equivalent of a sub-commander mixed with mini-legendary stat's, becoming the effective replacement of mini-legendaries, and being the most common research-granting class of unit in the game. To make the General class of units more interesting to wield in armies and on the offence it should be given a gratuitous radius non-stacking buff, along with some some of the most powerful weapons and/or abilities in the game. Now you have one of the most powerful non-legendary units in your ranks that can turn the tide of a battle or war, but when he falls, your enemy will be given rare and precious research points to upgrade their armies. Only Legendaries and other Kings should provide research points when killed, due to them being the highest ranking units in the game.



This rarity of research points coincides with fewer research options but each one having a larger net effect on your army.



I would also co-suggest that there be a unit class restriction in the lobby with which you can restrict the maximum number of simultaneous generals, legendaries, or other classes of units in a game.





Summary:



Add General class of units Combining Mini-experimantal/SubCommander functionalities with area buffs. Reward the player that kills them with upgrade points. Combat should be the only way of earning upgrade points|||re1wind|||In general, yes i agree with the above. However, if the research points given through normal combat is extremely low and the main way of gaining RP's is by killing the Generals, which themselves would take 5-10 minutes to get, you get a situation where you need to plan around those General units, and "rush-RP-farming" becomes less viable.



As i said, if those General units have mini-experimental/sub commander abilities, they should be very effective in combat with the risk of giving your enemy a few research points. Giving them some passive area buffs, 5% regen, damage, etc. should, in theory, only encourage people to use them offensively.



IN short, they are like mobile research stations for your enemies when killed with mini experimental weapons and health.



Killing enemy legendaries could also be a source of research points.|||Bump. Reworded title and post to be more readable and understandable.