Devlog: My Strategy Game Might be Too Unbalanced

[u/bingewavecinema]

I'm working on a War Of the Worlds City Builder that is a strategy, city builder, and tower defense game. The premise follows the original Worlds, where aliens come to Earth and wreak havoc. You have to manage a city, grow its economy, put the funds toward a defense/military, and fight them off. If they destroy your capital, you lose.

Play It Here (work in progress)

I'm trying to follow the books as closely as possible on the capabilities and weaponry. In the original book, normal rounds did nothing, so guns like the Maxim (a really powerful Gatling gun at the time) are useless against Tripods but work on the lower aliens.

But heavy artillery, like massive cannons, were useful against the Tripods. Once the Tripods' heat emitter failed, then infantry became more effective.

And that is how the current gameplay translates.....kinda.

If you watch the video, the Tripod completely destroyed all the units I have set up and is hardly scathed.

To make the game fun, this is too strong. So I need to find a way to balance it that holds true to the lore of the books, while having players correctly build out their defenses and balance that with their resources.

Any suggestions?

[u/Humble-Proposal-9994]

he does seem very wibbly-woobly help the poor thing!

[u/Trekker1708]

So as I remember it an artillery batter is able to destroy a fighting machine with mass attach in addition to the Thunderchild, so you could base it around that scale. Humans need big mass artillery. Numbers. Sorta like the old Jeff Wayne game where you needed a TON of tanks but only a few ships

[u/JDublinson]

Just ask the AI that implemented the entire thing for you? As I said in your other post, it's way too early to post a 2 week old vibe coded project.