Just some ideas for boosters

Ideas
1

Hi everyone! I’m Stardrone and in this topic I will show you some suggestions for the new booster feature, since it has a lot of potential and not enought people suggested new ones yet.

Just keep in mind that even tough I know boosters are supposed to boost your weapon (that’s why they are named that way in the first place); I think that if some boosters granted active abilities that aren’t fully related to weapons, then the customization and strategy aspect of the game may become even more in-depth and may give even more room for players to choose what fits their playstyle the best.

Some of my concepts will be more in line with IA’s vision, while others will be more extreme.

I’m not saying that the game designer’s idea is wrong; I’m simply saying that their idea have a lot of potential and I want to help them into reaching booster’s full potential as a mechanic.

The premise is done. Here the ideas:

  1. Melting ray

Double tap and keep pressed the shoot button to use.
While this booster is active, the spacecraft shoots with a secondary weapon in addition to the equipped one.
The Melting ray deals exponential damage based on how much time it is fired but uses food as its ammo. The more damage the weapon is dealing, the more food will be required to keep shooting.
Only food collected in-mission counts.

This ability is meant to be the best dps booster in the game, balanced by the fact that you can’t spam it and also because it hurts your income on the long run.

  1. Egg converter

Double tap the shoot button to place.
When this booster is activated, an Egg Converter will be placed on the same position your ship currently is.
The Converter has three times the hitbox size of your spacecraft and will block all the damage that hits it and will last for a limited time (a newly placed one will replace the old one).
When the Egg Converter disappears, it will unleash an explosion that will deal damage, scaled on the amount of bullets cancelled, to any nearby enemy.

A booster that isn’t a weapon boost but an utility item. It is meant to be used in particular on boss rushes and double teams.

  1. Sentencer shots

Double tap and keep pressed the shoot button to use.
While this booster is active, the bullets will mark the enemy but deal half damage and overheat twice as fast.
Marked enemies take triple damage from all the other damage sources.
I imagine the mark as a small picture of a broken heart, overlaid on top of the enemy sprite. The color of the marker is the same as the spacecraft shield or it could use the text UI color.
The marker lasts for a limited duration of time on bosses.

This is a booster that changes how you play with any weapon and is meant to be a viable alternative for overdrive and the discharge. Why the name? You are giving chickens a death sentence.

  1. Rage shots

Double tap and keep pressed the shoot button to use.
While this booster is active, the equipped weapon will get a damage boost based on the amount of enemies currently alive, but the boost lasts for very little time.
The more enemies are on-screen, the higher damage will be.
This booster have a 30 seconds cooldown before being usable again.
Bosses are worth as much as one normal enemy: this booster is meant to help the most during elite invasions rather than boss rushes.

  1. Overload

Double tap and keep pressed the shoot button to use.
While this booster is activated, most weapons won’t shoot; instead they will charge. Release the shoot button to unleash all the charged bullets at the same time. During the charge, the weapon will load an additional volley every 5 charged, in order to have its dps compete with overdrive and be a viable alternative.
If the weapon overheats during the charge, your spacecraft will explode (unless you have a coolant canister)
Beam weapons and Absolver don’t support overload.

This booster boosts weapons in a different manner than others. It may be useful as a formation breaker and would give an early multikill on most waves (charge between waves).

  1. Mirror clone

This booster cannot be used at the start of the mission: dealing damage to enemies fills a charge bar.
Double tap the shoot button to place.
When this booster is activated, a Mirror clone will be placed on the same position your ship currently is.
The clone will copy any movement (and rotation angle) your ship will do and will shoot whenever you shoot.
The player can freeze in place the clone by double tapping the shoot button agan.
Clone’s damage will be reduced the closer it is to the owner’s spacecraft.
The clone can’t be destroyed by enemy projectiles.
The clone will last a limited amount of time, based on how much charge was collected before the summoning.
Charge can’t be collected while the clone is active.

This booster doesn’t boost your weapon but your ability to deal with waves and will probably be one of the biggest skill cap in the game.

What boosters do you like?
  • Melting ray
  • Egg converter
  • Sentencer shots
  • Rage shots
  • Overload
  • Mirror clone

0 voters

Hope to start a good discussion

8 Likes
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so you need to have food to use this booster
it is not balanced, my dude

so it is a shield with health
sounds interesting

so it is like a damage booster for only 1 enemy at a time
I will just use the overdrive booster

that makes it unbalanced I can use it in huge enemy waves and it will be insane

so it is a cloning booster
doesn’t fit the boosters tbh

2 Likes
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what do you think about the idea ?
  • Nice
  • maybe
  • bad

0 voters

1 Like
4

it also needs 1 extra color bomb

2 Likes
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IA itself put this as a possibility. This is my take over their idea

You can apply the mark on more than one enemy. I tought it was an obvious thing

You need to give players a choice. That is its point

You are ok with the shield and not with this? Weird but I understand and expected this kind of feeling

As I stated at the start of the og post, in my opinion boosters have a lot of potential and I wanted to give my vision of the feature: Not weapon boosting abilities but activable abilities.

6

I like the idea of Overload, the rest are interesting as well, but they’re either too overpowered or unbalanced or gimmicky.
A simple damage booster would be a good idea as well

1 Like
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Any untested idea will sound unbalanced at first:

“An activable ability capable of making you immune to all damage while you can still shoot under its effect”

I have just described the dimensional phaseout and it kinda sound overpowered. Don’t you think?

Whenever I suggest an idea I give a concept to work with and not something I expect IA to copy 1:1. I care very little about stats numbers (those aren’t relevant while making an idea), istead I focus over something that I see being usable in the game.

About the gimmicky part: Rage and Converter were designed to be extrimely gimmicky since the very beginning.
Not everything must be viable everywhere, sometimes it is good to implement in a game a feature that is good only in few scenarios.

Think about how weapons are portrayed in Universe: You would never use plasma rifle in a comet chase or photon swarm aganst cowards

1 Like
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this is unbalanced

9

Please explain me why you think it is

10

Sure enough, tho I should’ve added more detail
When it comes to boosters I’d think of something of general use that can be used on most types of missions, for instance melting ray and egg converter won’t rly help on comet chase or meteor storm missions, same goes for sentencer shots which I like the idea of, it reminds me of the fan-o-war from tf2 as it works kinda the same way
Speaking of sentencer shots, I think it’ll help in more firepower demanding waves but it’ll prob make getting pecking orders even harder depending on the weapon used
And about the egg converter, it can’t be compared to the dimensional phaseout cuz it’s a special weapon, it’s meant to be overpowered, as it costs keys and using it will cause you to lose a medal or more, which means the egg converter will be a free shield
As for the mirror clone, it kinda sounds like controlling another ship at the same time, which doesn’t exactly sound like a booster, and it might be problematic in multiplayer games.
That’s just what I think tho, viewpoints differ.
More importantly, keep up the ideas, I’d like to see the overload booster in game.

1 Like
11

Some really interesting ideas here. What particularly caught my attention was sentencer and overload. Sentencer sounds interesting because it sounds like it’s supposed to synergize well with satellites because idk what else could be other damage sources(bombs? But I see no reason for you to use this just for bombs). It makes me wonder how effective this would be. Satellites are fairly limited in terms of ammo, so relying on them to carry you sounds…well, I dunno. Usually they’re there for support. But on the other hand, triple damage bird-flu sounds spicy for sure. And I always loved satellites so you know I’d surely try this as one of the first boosters.
Overload sounds sort of like what IA proposed as one of the options for the new spaceship on a poll, tho not the same.
Interesting idea regardless, tho I wonder why it has to blow your ship up when you overheat.

3 Likes
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These boosters seem really hard to balance and while I agree that the game could use experimental features that gets polished over time, the leaderboards on planetary missions would be heavily affected by a few overpowered boosters, and even though it’s really not that important in the grand scheme of things, there will be some who’ll object.

  1. Melting ray is probably the most balancable option out of here, as there’s the tradeoff between extra DPS and more consistent multikills against income. But I fear that such a booster would be too useful in comp missions and quickly become the norm. The very nature of the ray is a mystery, but if its another beam weapon like Plasma or Positron with insta hits and targeting cone, it would be too overpowered in comp missions. 7/10

  2. Egg converter seems like a discount dimensional phaseout, but there are some differences like the limited travel range while it is in effect, assuming the converter stays at the same place, along with the extra damage capability. This might end up being the new barbequer of boosters, as the single best defensive option out of a range of mostly offensive options. 6/10

  3. Sentencer shots would not work well in its current state as satellites, special weapons and items have limited ammo. In the future, if regen satellite ammo were to be added, this booster would have a broader place in the game, but sadly the game’s current state condemns it to being a gimmick, albeit a fun one. 4.5/10

  4. Rage shots would vary GREATLY in effectiveness, depending on the wave, making it harder to balance than the other options. Waves like Dazzling Coordination would be shredded apart, while fenced in, and energy fences would largely be the same. A potentially fun addition. 5.5/10

  5. Overload is basically Sky Force’s Main weapon supercharge, even having deadly consequences if not managed correctly. I’d like to see two variants of this booster, one with a hard cap limit on how much you can charge, and the second with deadly consequences if you overheat your weapon, this could make for interesting selections and gameplay. 7/10

  6. Mirror Clone is likely the weakest link here as it seems more like a special ability that a new family of ships would have, rather than a booster. It usefulness would also vary wildly from wave to wave. 3/10

Overall, I’d rate the entire collection as 5.5/10. Even if some of these boosters weren’t appreciated, I’d still like to see more efforts like this.

3 Likes
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