[Suggestion] Countering lift blocking exploit

[Delian]

Some modders like providing player crafts with lifts. Some modders also like including melee-only enemies in the game. This creates an issue where, if the player puts units at the top of the lift, the melee enemy units cannot attack player's units.
This limits modding possibilities, because the crafts have to be designed without the lifts, or the modders have to diversify enemies in such a way that melee-only enemies are never present without an escort of ranged-attack enemies, but even then the player may still be able to block the lifts, while focus-firing on the ranged enemies.

Would it be possible to give modders some simpler means of countering this exploit?

[DSeyka]

I guess the problem is that melee attacks are not "targetable" - unit always attacks a predetermined tile in front of it. Allowing attacking "up" would probably require rewriting some of AI code as well.

[Dioxine]

Reactivate the goomba stomp and add mario punch?
I mean if enemy unit drops from up above, the player unit is pushed away to a neighboring tile. If you added the same for lifts (when AI unit tries to move up or down), and perhaps doors/curtains, you would have this problem solved, but imagine the outrage...

[Meridian]

For me this is a non-issue.

How many missions are melee-units only?

How many players camp in the craft? (Probably some... but it's their own fault and I think they punish themselves enough by playing like this... I don't feel the need to punish them even more).

A simple flying suit has the same impact. Just fly up one tile and no chryssalid will ever touch you. Again, I don't feel any need to "fix" that.


PS: melee-attack up/down is not a good idea IMHO either, even if it was doable

[Delian]

>For me this is a non-issue.
I'm not reporting a bug, so this isn't a request to fix anything. It's a suggestion for a togglable modding feature.

>How many missions are melee-units only?
In XPZ, it's all the monster hunting missions, most zombie missions, some underwater missions, some underground missions, and some other missions with mixed enemies.

>How many players camp in the craft?
Almost everyone when they have a craft with a lift available. It's pretty common when it comes to melee enemy missions. People buy crafts with lifts specifically for this reason.

>A simple flying suit has the same impact. Just fly up one tile and no chryssalid will ever touch you.
Flying armors aren't available in the early-mid game. Also, if enemies have a few ranged attackers mixed in you can't exactly fly out in the open.

>I don't feel any need to "fix" that
That's ok, can I implement it then? What would be a good solution for me to implement?

[Meridian]

>For me this is a non-issue.
I'm not reporting a bug, so this isn't a request to fix anything. It's a suggestion for a togglable modding feature.

Yes, I understood it this way.
Sorry if my reply hinted otherwise.

That's ok, can I implement it then? What would be a good solution for me to implement?

I cannot think of any engine solution (good or even bad) which would address this exploit.

Just mix in a few ranged attackers?