While commanding my units in battle, the tactics I want to employ are often a great deal more complicated than the tactics the games allow me to employ Of course, with sufficient micromanagement skills, amazing things become possible, but forcing players to learn such impressive skills simply because they want their units to do something other than charge in blindly seems ridiculous.
As I am wont to do, I got to pondering this dilemma, and came up with a solution which I think is rather elegant. Indeed many of the elements are features already employed in successful games. For lack of a better name, lets call the imaginary RTS which would use this system Age of Warcraft IV.
The first thing AoWC4 would need is the ability to assign units to Unit Groups. Ideally the number of unit groups would be unlimited, but it wouldn't be unreasonable to cap the number of active unit groups at 10. This should be a simple thing to do. As simple as, lets say, selecting a group of units, and hitting CTRL + 1 to assign them as Unit Group 1. These unit groups will then appear as buttons on the user interface, and clicking those buttons will select all the units in that unit group. This will save players from the hassle caused when two groups which they want to give separate instructions to are moving on top of each other.
Next, AoWC4 needs an Action Queue. This will serve as a bridge between micromanaging units individually, and simply allowing a unit's AI to do what it will. The player will be able to assign multiple actions at once, which will be executed in the order they are entered. Preferably the ability to cancel or add an action in the middle of the Action Queue would be simple, to avoid the need to cancel multiple actions when the player realizes they made a mistake several actions back. The Action Queue should be relatively large--I don't think I would want to see it allow anything less than 15 actions, and preferably it would allow 20 or more. There should also be an options to cancel all actions at once, in the event of a drastic change in the scenario. As well as an option to delay the start of the actions until the player gives some sort of signal. Action Queues would, of course, be assignable on a unit-by-unit basis, or something which could be assigned to entire Unit Groups. It would probably be an over-complication to allow a single unit in a unit group to have different orders than other units. This of course might cause problems when multiple units of a single type are in a single Unit Group, and is an area where consideration will need to be spent.
Now of course, a unit's individual abilities could be assigned in the Action Queue, but there are several special Action Queue specific actions which I think need to be included in AoWC4.
Time Delay is important. Players should be able to specify a certain amount of time (what sort of time units would be most appropriate is open to consideration,) which must pass between the action prior to it in the Action Queue, and the action after it in the Action Queue.
Similarly to Time Delay, Action Wait should allow players to tell units that they should wait until a particular event occurs before moving to the next action. I will be the first to admit that this may cross the line between acceptably complex, and too complex to include as part of the standard game interface. It may perhaps be better to simply have an action which amounts to 'wait for go-ahead from the player before moving to the next action,' rather than this, but I thought I might as well put the idea on the table.
Players also need to be able to specify alterations to AI Type in the Action Queue. Almost all RTS games have several variations on how units should act when they've not been given explicit instructions. Aggressive, Defensive, and Passive are the most familiar, though in adding this level of depth to unit management it may be wise to examine and expand or revise that list.
Available Auto-Use Abilities is also something which the player MUST be able to turn on and off via the Action Queue. Particularly if a specific ability has a limited amount of possible uses before it must be recharged.
Not only Movement, but Detailed Movement Paths should be something the player can add to the Action Queue. The shortest rout to a destination--the one a smart AI invariably selects--is not always the most tactically sound rout. Players should be able to set way-points which the units must arrive at first, before moving to the next way point, and the next, and eventually their destination.
I'm sure there are several more useful actions which could be included--and in fact I get the nagging feeling that I've thought of an essential one that I've forgotten to write down--but this list serves to illustrate the basic concept.
In conjunction with these features, I think it would be wise to allow an option in the single player mode of AoWC4 which would allow players to assign actions to the Action Queue while the game is paused. Obviously this is somewhat counter to the idea of a Real Time Strategy Game, so perhaps is should only be allowed in the lower third end of the single player difficulty modes.
By utilizing these simple features, the tactical strategy in Real Time Strategy games would be greatly increased. Rather than fumbling to make units of different types work together effectively, players could orchestrate and lay out entire battle plans prior to sending their forces in to attack--which is the same thing I do anyway. I just don't have the utterly impossible skills required to direct my units in battle one action at a time.
I must admit, of course, that I'm woefully out of touch with the Real Time Strategy genre. It's primarily a computer based genre, and the most recent game I've been able to play with any kind of dedication is Warcraft 3. So for all I know these features could have been implemented in a massive flop game that I never heard of. But it was an idea that I quite liked, so I wrote it down. A doodle using words, if you will.
Edit:
LS: I know I would be a *master of the Undead* if only they would implement it in WC3
Huxley: The Undead always felt so weird to me in WC3
Huxley: I guess because I probably went in with fairly typical expectations
Huxley: And found they're actually the quirkiest race to use xD
LS: I would start out by sending in a unit group of abominations, followed closely by a small unit group of banshees instructed to use their posession ability at will.
LS: after 30 seconds, a second wave of abominations would come in, followed closely by a large contingent of necromancers, instructed to use their raise dead ability at will
LS: 10 seconds after that the meatwagons would roll in.
Huxley: Oh ho ho ho ho
Huxley: Suddenly your ideas went from "Yeah these aren't bad, I could see they'd make a game a lot better" to "This has to be done TEN YEARS AGO so that it is standard practice by now"
LS: I considered including examples, but decided against it.
Huxley: I'd copypaste that example you just gave me in, just to highlight what you're thinking of. It did help clarify exactly what you mean for me.
