For the past few months, I have been listing strategies/gameplay for each S.A.D. race here, there, and everywhere.  That doesn't leave people with an easy method for determining what race he will want to play as and/or test.  So I listed general gameplay for each of the four races on this thread.  

As I update the gameplay rules, I will let people know, and place the updates on these strategies in bold.  Please note that the Cythid race is still being worked on, so there's not as much information available yet.


Humans
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The human race is perhaps the best faction for beginners, and is the most versatile faction in S.A.D.  However, versatile does not necessarily mean least-powerful.  As with all races, a player who uses the human races 100% efficiently will almost always beat a player who uses another race 90% efficiently.

Human Structures can be placed anywhere a player wants to place them.  This in turn means that a player can strategically place firebases, unit buildings, and defense anywhere on the map without having to worry about restrictions.

In addition, human units are considered "jack of all trades, master of none."  While each unit has its strength, most of the units are able to adapt to situations.  In addition, the human race has units with cloaking, teleportation, nuclear-capabilities, shields, almost anything you can find in another race's faction.

The three structures unique to Humans are the Shield Generator, the Watchtower, and the Universal Defense System.  The Watchtower will uncover a large portion of the game's nearby fog-of-war, as well as uncover and reveal an area chosen by the player.  The shield generator will block enemy shots (except shots from units inside the shield) until the shield is destroyed.  This shield is able to rebuild itself if the shield generator itself is not destroyed.  Finally, the Universal Defense System is so powerful and versatile, an enemy unit cannot face it without being sorely attacked.

If you enjoy playing as the Terran in Starcraft, you will most likely enjoy playing as the Human race in S.A.D.


Ptaloids
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If you enjoy playing as the Zerg in Starcraft, you will probably like the Ptaloid race in S.A.D.

The Ptaloids generally fight with swarms of cheaper units, although there are exceptions.  In addition, with the aid of Nurseries, a player can order a building to construct many Ptaloid units at the same time, rather than one at a time.  Although Ptaloid units can be repaired, they also regenerate their HP a little bit at a time.  Last but not least, three Ptaloid units are produced 2 units for each one qued, similar to Zerglings and Scourge.

The Ptaloids have perhaps the most specialized units in the game.  While each unit is important to the player's strategy, about 3 Ptaloid units are used for special purposes, and a Ptaloid player will waste money buying them without having some form of strategy. Similarily, the rest of the units generally can only be used for a specific goal, and once that goal is complete, a Ptaloid player should exchange his group of units for another.

Unlike the Starcraft Zerg, the Ptaloids are big on cloaking technology.  (This might be a good time to say that if you manually attack with a ship, you can attack cloaked units without a detector, if you aim correctly)  Almost half of their ships have some form of cloaking device.  The Ptaloid's only defensive building, the Javalin, is permanently cloaked.  And the Ptaloids have a building that can cloak all buildings underneath it.

Ptaloids require generators for all buildings, except for Javalins, Quarries, Nurseries, Celestial Temples and Warp Tunnels.  A building must be constructed immediately next to (or immediately diagonally from) a generator.  Furthermore, if all generators around a building have been destroyed, the building will cease to operate.

The Ptaloids have two unique buildings (besides the Nursery and the Generator): the Wall and the Cloaking Field.  The Wall, a very cheap unit, will block off areas of the map, and a land unit must destroy it before its weapons touch any buildings behind it.  In addition, when powered by a generator (or by a wall next to a generator, allowing you to build chains of walls), the wall will damage any units that run into it.  The Cloaking Field will cloak any buildings next to it, and the field itself is cloaked.


Tosonians
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If you enjoy playing as the Protoss in Starcraft, you will probably want to play as the Tosonians in S.A.D.

In general, Tosonians use powerful units with high HP, armor and weapon power.  Of course, this means Tosonian units are more expensive.  Also, Tosonians require a second resource in addition to Belthium Crystals: Oxygen.  Oxygen is gathered by Purifiers, which can be placed anywhere on the map.

Tosonian buildings must be chained together (except for Rcasises and Firestones), and the chain MUST start with a Purifier.  However, if said Purifier is destroyed, the buildings will still operate.

Most, but not all, Tosonian ships are air units.  In addition, most, but not all, Tosonian buildings are air buildings, and can only be destroyed by ground-to-air or air-to-air weapons.  The armor of these buildings will reduce the effect of these weapons on them by about 1/3.

The Tosonian faction is the only race that allows a player to exchange his group of units with another group of units "on-the-fly," meaning that the player does not need to be at a special building to change his unit to fit his strategy.  However, when done on the fly, a player cannot choose how many units to have in his new group--it must be the number of units he had in his previous group.  In addition, the transformation takes longer than at a building, leaving the Tosonian player more vulnerable to attack.  Tosonians can only transform air units on the fly, there can be no ground units involved.

Tosonian units are not as versatile as human units, but you can usually purchase a Tosonian unit and use it for more than one strategy.  Tosonians have no special-purpose-only units.

The Tosonians have three unique buildings besides the Purifier: The Firestone, the Fog Machine and the Vasheron Wormhole.  The Fog Machine will place permanent, uncoverable fog of war in a large radius, as well as place permanent fog of war in a small area of the player's choice.  The Vasheron Wormhole allows a Tosonian player to teleport to any explored area of the map, except an area covered by a player's chosen custom fog from a fog machine.  Enemy players, however, can use the entrance of the Vasheron Wormhole to enter a Tosonian base if they choose to.  The Firestone acts as a mine...if a player runs into it when controlling ships manually, damage will occur.  While Firestones are somewhat expensive, they have the advantage in that they can only be destroyed by Plasma Torpedoes or by a player running into them--and then only partial damage occurs to the firestone if the group of ships running into it is not large enough.


Cythids
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The Cythid faction generally has units ranging in all-around power.  Many are weak units that must be swarmed, similar to the Ptaloids but slightly more powerful.  However, the Cythid race does has 4 units that are so beefed up, they are the most powerful in the game--and these units CANNOT be grouped up, they can only be used one at a time.

Most Cythid units have two forms--a basic form, and a more-powerful form.  A player purchases the most basic form when he wants to buy units.    For a price, the Cythid player can, on-the-run, upgrade the units to become more powerful, with more HP, weapons power, armor, etc.  And for a refund, the Cythid player can downgrade the unit group to its previous form.

Although all races can buy upgrades and abilities for ships, only the Cythid race can purchase abilities and upgrades for structures.  And like the human race, Cythid structures can be built anywhere on the map.  

I especially looked at the cythid's description, there are some remarks I'd like to make.

1. I imagine the Cythid on-the-fly-upgrade-able units to be pretty weak but well-swarmable/groupable
2. If you ever played command & conquer (generals) then just take a look at the china faction, they have some weak units but in big masses and they are quickly produced and also have some very, very heavy units. It lacks any mediocre units.

Aside from those remarks, well done! 

Quote from: matthias1992 on September 20, 2010, 11:21:38 am

I especially looked at the cythid's description, there are some remarks I'd like to make.

1. I imagine the Cythid on-the-fly-upgrade-able units to be pretty weak but well-swarmable/groupable
2. If you ever played command & conquer (generals) then just take a look at the china faction, they have some weak units but in big masses and they are quickly produced and also have some very, very heavy units. It lacks any mediocre units.

Aside from those remarks, well done! 

Gotcha.  I made that remark in bold, see if you like it.  I at least imagine that War Drones, Battle Drones, etc. are more powerful than Ptaloids simply because the Ptaloids have units so weak that can spawn 2 at a time, but we can talk about that if you don't like it

I also made some comments that I forgot, in bold on the first post

I am fine with it, I just can´t comprehend why I didn´t see- overlooked that sentence...ooh well. It´s fine now

Wow, I want this game! What will support it? 83/84, nSpire? Or is it on the computer?

Cool that's good. This game sounds like a mixture of Star Craft and Red Alert. And that equals epic win.

I haven't played Red Alert much because I am now an online multiplayer fan when it comes to PC and Red Alert server shutted down when Westwood went under. I only played the Nintendo 64 C&C, which is a 3D remake of the 1995 original with new missions, back before I tried SC.

Oh right, I didn't knew those existed in Red Alert

Good idea. Also I am curious if you'll have a beta testing phase when this gets finished, to see if all races are well balanced near the end?

Also I don't remember, but was there some sort of lurker unit in the game?