Incoming - Big feedback (TLDR WARNING)

First of all, my sincere thanks for creating this wonderful mod. I've been eyeing it for a while now, and upon upgrading my hardware to be able to handle such a game with ease, I purchased Homeworld as soon as I saw a good deal, just to play this mod. No buyers remorse here.

The amount of care and detail behind this project are mindblowing! Probably my favorite aspect is the early build game, where one can sit back and admire the models, while listening to a lovely Minmay concert... with Dogfighter queued up as the battle track, naturally. And I finally tried playing Zentradi last night, oh man, it was way more fun than I thought it would be... building up a massive fleet of warships then bombarding the enemy in true Zentradi fashion (When playing Zentradi I recommend the macross soundtrack with 5000000 year battle as the battle score.)

I've been wanting to make some gameplay videos to share this masterpiece across the various Macross groups but unfortunately my gamebar will not work with the game, try as I might.

Now on to the areas I think could use some work. I understand that this is a passion project and most likely you have feedback pulling in many directions, and to be honest most of my suggestions will be aesthetic ones. I will get my current game balance observations out of the way first:

Game balance feedback

-Since last week's patch, the AI opponents do... nothing. In the 6p Macross map one can mine and build all day long. When finally going on the attack you will notice that each opponent has nothing more than their mothership, starting carrier, and miners. Consequently, it is difficult to gauge where the combat balance is currently at.

-PRIOR to last week's patch, fighters were horribly weak, to the point of uselessness. I think Super VF-1A's had something like 500 health and would get wiped out instantly in a dogfight. After a whole lot of building you are just left with your hero pilots within seconds. I THINK this has been corrected, as I notice fighters having way more health now, but as stated it is not really possible to test currently.

-Formations seem to be problematic across the board, especially for larger ships. I was playing Zentradi last night and for the life of me could not get large groupings of frigates / capitols to form up and move together. Using some close range warps I could get them all in a general area, but they would still be flying weird (pickets flying sideways, frigates moving on odd angles, etc). When building lots of ships they sometimes drift off to some weird place on the Z axis and just refuse to move where you tell them to. I had also noticed this prior to the recent patch when playing UN SPACY.

-Certain units stop building before their listed cap. Furthermore some of the build caps should be reconsidered, for example, the iconic Regult battle pod caps at 50, while the rare VF-Orguss also caps at 50. Perhaps that latter part is more of a visual / lore concern, so on to those:


Visual and Lore stuff-

-The left handed Valkyries..... I'm the guy who recently asked about it on your youtube channel, so I've already seen your rationale to it... but no amount of advanced servomotors is changing the fact that most humans are right handed. Hence the pilots are thinking in right handed terms, and the machine is an extension of them. We never see left handed Valkyries in canon and it really stands out to me. Is it difficult to flip the model around or are you sticking to it as a personal choice?

-For me, all the variable mecha seem to transform only once. Reading comments I am unsure if this is intended or not.

For example, if I build a Super VF-1A, it launches in fighter mode. The first time it enters combat it will transform into Battroid mode... then remain there indefinitely, even when combat ends, even if it docks. So they all zip around at fighter speed while in Battroid form. Not the end of the world, but it does look rather off.

I don't know the complexity and limitations of the nuts and bolts you are working with, but is there a way to have more dynamic transformations of the variable craft? Like start in fighter mode, transform to battroid when making a turn, maybe utilize gerwalk when about to launch missiles... there must be markers in the fighter behavior / animation cycle that can be taken advantage of. The complexity of this animation cycle might vary based on the strength of the unit. For example a basic VF-1A might mostly use fighter mode, with a few moments in battroid mode, while Max might be a flurry of activity, transitioning between modes.

-The Queadluun-Rau appears too upright in flight, and needs a more "head first" flight animation. (Didnt get a close look at the Nousjadeul-Ger, but suspect the same might apply)

-Millia needs her custom red armor! (Slef correction, I forgot that her armor was the standard green in SDF Macross and the red suit was in DYRL)

-Ok, the new transforming Macross model is friggin amazing. Words can't event describe it.
But I am with others here who have mentioned that spawning it as a secondary ship to the Megaroad just doesn't feel right.

The main gun being overpowered could be addressed through requiring research, both for the gun and for the transformation.. heck, why not throw in a barrier system while we are at it :)

-What you actually already have the makings of here, and am sincerely hoping for, is multiple versions of each faction, which can each have their own balance of technology. For example:

UN SPACY (SDF)
UN SPACY (DYRL)
UN SPACY (Megaroad)
Zentradi (Zentran)
Zentradi (Meltran)

-The reaction missile units look really cool.. I particularly like the Minmay portraits painted on them (like old WWII bombers). I only wish they had a bit more... boom. At least visually. (Remember that reaction missiles are nukes. Part of the reason humans could put up such a fight vs zentradi in the space war is that they had these small, hard to hit fighters which packed enough firepower to take down a battlecruiser)

-I noticed with the recent update that the default homeworld races can no longer be selected, at least with the 6p macross map. I liked having them there... it allowed a bit of roleplay that you were encountering some other faction besides the main two.

-"ARMD-1" should be renamed "ARMD Carrier", since the number designation was not related to its class, but rather its order of production in the line. https://macross.fandom.com/wiki/ARMD-class
Subsequently, the current "ARMD-2" is redundant and unnecessary, especially since ARMD class are technically carriers. You can give whatever unique combat abilities to other ships, like the Oberth. (Personally, I don't think UN SPACY should be so capitol ship/cruiser centric anyway.... it should revolve around the macross and its variable fighters, while the Zentradi should be more geared toward fleets of larger ships)


Thanks once again for the great mod, I look forward to watching it grow!