benzedreene wrote:Say someone sends 20 drillers to an outpost with 30 drillers + Altruist --> not gift, right ? So what happens if during the sub's course you remove 11+ drillers from the outpost ? Does the sub become a gift ?

--> it would be very good if it DIDN'T work, cause this way you can counter the Altruist with good attack timing

OOoooh yeah I see that now. I could see it not working if the sub could only be able to be turned into a gift at the sub's start of the journey, like right as the 15 minutes of dashed line ends. So in your situation, the attacking sub of drillers makes it as an attack.
I can see this affecting strategy quite a bit. The Altruist is strongest when its post has no drillers, but lets say someone has 30 drillers with an Altruist( we'll leave shields out this example) and you want to take a nearby base. You send 29 drillers there, knowing that even though you won't take the base, you just forced the player with the Altruist to keep those drillers there, or else they lose that base. Very useful if you want to take one of those nearby bases. You send a probe with just enough for the Altruist outpost to not be able to properly defend the outpost you are taking. Now no matter what he does you end up with one of this player's outposts.
I can see this becoming other players forcing a non-skilled Altruist to turtle up when they need to be expanding, or expanding when they need to turtle up.

zyxe wrote:I think this would easily be a other specialist. I think I found you a quote:
"Appeasement always works"
~Roadkiehl

I saw this quote somewhere. Memes or silly situations? I've had no life since the past few hours before my first post, so pretty much every thread has the same place in time for me. I like it though, and its take on altruism seems more generally scoped and more fitting than mine, which seems mostly to only fit the global anyway.

Just because i didnt know what an Altruist was, heres the definition:

Altruism or selflessness is the principle or practice of concern for the welfare of others. It is a traditional virtue in many cultures and a core aspect of various religious traditions and secular worldviews, though the concept of "others" toward whom concern should be directed can vary among cultures and religions.

I see a few problems with this specialist. It might need some rebalancing.

The local effect:
Let's say, your enemy about to win but has an abandoned mine with an Altruist chillin' there for defense. You have 3 outposts nearby, each packed with over 500 drillers, 5 kings and 4 admirals hangin' out with your queen in the back. Now, if I understand this right, even though you have an insane advantage, you cannot capture this mine? Seems way to overpowered.
How about the altruist only turning those subs into gifts that have less drillers than the altruist's outpost. That solves the 'just send 11 drillers away' issue and limits the altruist's power by binding it to the number of drillers a person can amass at that outpost. (It also better fits the flavor text you chose, as it's the small subs that are being gifted)

The global effect:
I love the idea of protecting your gifts from being intercepted, however, there is one possible exploit I see. When your enemy sends a massive attack to your outpost, you could counter it by sendind 1 driller gifts against it, each having shields that will destroy part of the attack. It will also prevent your ally from gaining early access to a gifted specialist by sending one driller in its direction.
Fortunately, both of these issues can be fixed by making the shields ineffective against any subs coming from the exact opposite direction.


Apart from these issues, I love the concept of the Alruist, forcing kindness onto your opponents and making sure yours goes to the right person.

As for what base level specialist to promote it from, I guess the martyr fits the theme . it also has a similar kind of use, scaring off players from sending attacks its way.

high commander jay wrote:The local effect:
Let's say, your enemy about to win but has an abandoned mine with an Altruist chillin' there for defense. You have 3 outposts nearby, each packed with over 500 drillers, 5 kings and 4 admirals hangin' out with your queen in the back. Now, if I understand this right, even though you have an insane advantage, you cannot capture this mine? Seems way to overpowered.
How about the altruist only turning those subs into gifts that have less drillers than the altruist's outpost. That solves the 'just send 11 drillers away' issue and limits the altruist's power by binding it to the number of drillers a person can amass at that outpost. (It also better fits the flavor text you chose, as it's the small subs that are being gifted)

[Edit: I'll answer you question directly. It is possible to capture his mine in that scenario. First, attack that mine with one driller. It will become a gift, and stay there.Wait until it arrives. Then, attack his mine with one driller. Boom, your generals' global effects take care of the driller that is now his, and your lone driller takes over the mine.]

I thought about that a little, as I made it, but I scrapped reversing the ability because it ended up feeling a lot like it is just outdoing the Inspector to me( the whole, you take me out completely or it takes forever type deal just became the you take me out completely or not at all type deal). It feels more forming its own niche when it is, wither me down, but you can't finish me off.

I can definitely see what you mean though, it does seem totally indestructible. However, when this one person is securing their mine with the Altruist though, there are other ways to take it. I'm thinking of the Assassin or the martyr for when there are no drillers and the Altruist is already at the outpost. If there is even one driller the lieutenant and general become viable, as well does the thief, since 15% of 1 rounded up is 1, and you can bring a driller, making two, and in this scenario, if we count the additional suggestion of the sub only being able to become a gift when you first send it, the outpost can't send that driller out as a sub to fight sub on sub, since the after the attacking sub wins the combat with the thief, it won't be eligible for being turned into a gift. If there are three drillers at an outpost with an Altruist the king becomes a possible solution too. Not to mention the completely bypassing use of the navigator, which takes advantage of the fact that a sub is only eligible to become gifted when it is first launched, and so launches to another outpost first, and then changes course.

In my head though, I think of the how likely you are to be able to win from keeping one mine. Or really even three mines, since you just spent six specialist hires on it, so you aren't really pulling off amazing maneuvers with other specialists, since you don't have many to make cool combos. Pretty much all your other bases are vulnerable like this. Anyone could swoop in and turn your now unprotected(specialist wise) regular outposts into their own mines(plus the ones they already had, and god forbid they turn up with an assassin or martyr when all you really put work into anyway was those three mines).
Also, this applies to the Neptunium way of winning. I am currently in a game where the way you win is to own 50 outposts. Nobody's winning that game mode with only one outpost protected. Nonetheless, being balanced in one game mode and overpowered in another is not the same as being balanced overall.

PAUSE... I just remembered, Okay,the first version was supposed to be the attacking sub becomes a gift if the drillers on it are more than the driller plus the shield of the outpost. A major thing about the Altruist was it was supposed to shift the meta-game so the Infiltrator got more love. So an outpost with 10 shields and no drillers and an Altruist could be taken if there was <10 drillers on the sub and an infiltrator.

TL;DR:The assassin, martyr, and navigator can take out an Altruist at an outpost with no drillers. Lieutenants, generals, thieves, kings, and (when I make this edit)infiltrators have circumstances where they become able to take out Altruists at posts. Keeping one outpost forever usually does not secure wins anyway.

high commander jay wrote:The global effect:
I love the idea of protecting your gifts from being intercepted, however, there is one possible exploit I see. When your enemy sends a massive attack to your outpost, you could counter it by sendind 1 driller gifts against it, each having shields that will destroy part of the attack. It will also prevent your ally from gaining early access to a gifted specialist by sending one driller in its direction.
Fortunately, both of these issues can be fixed by making the shields ineffective against any subs coming from the exact opposite direction.

I didn't see that but it would be unfair and game breaking. I like the solution and will put that in an edit. It solves that issue without making any conflict in any other scenarios.

high commander jay wrote:
The local effect:
As for what base level specialist to promote it from, I guess the martyr fits the theme . it also has a similar kind of use, scaring off players from sending attacks its way.

I like that idea.