4.7 KiB
4.7 KiB
Squadron TD Clone — Game Design Document
Overview
A 1–8 player cooperative/competitive tower defense game inspired by Squadron Tower Defense (SC2 Arcade). Players choose a builder race, place towers that transform into fighters during combat, manage a worker economy, and optionally send bonus enemies at opponents. Survive 31 waves to win.
Core Loop
Pick builder race → Place towers → Wave combat → Collect income → Send enemies → Repeat
Each round:
- Build phase — players spend minerals to place/upgrade towers.
- Combat phase — towers transform into fighter units and engage the wave automatically.
- Income phase — mineral income is paid out based on cumulative sends and upgrades.
Player Count & Teams
- Solo (1): one lane, self-sends only.
- Co-op (2–4): shared team security system, each player holds their own lane.
- PvP (4v4): two teams; players send enemies across to opponents.
Lanes & Security System
- Each player defends a lane of creep pathing.
- All lanes converge on the Security System (shared HP pool per team).
- If the Security System reaches 0 HP, the team loses.
Builder Races
Each race has a unique tower roster, stats profile, and upgrade tree. All races are balanced around different timing windows.
| Race | Profile | Strengths |
|---|---|---|
| Ghost | High damage, low HP (glass cannon) | Early & late game |
| Fortress | Low damage, high HP + buffs/debuffs | Early & mid game |
| Phantom | Evasive, mixed melee/ranged | Mid & late game |
| Ancient | Slow, extremely high damage AoE | Late game |
Each race has roughly 8–12 towers in a tier tree:
- Tier 1: base units (cheap, unlocked immediately)
- Tier 2: upgrades from Tier 1 (requires minerals + sometimes gas)
- Tier 3: capstone units (high cost, powerful)
Upgrading a tower in place morphs the sprite and updates stats.
Towers / Fighters
Towers placed during build phase transform into fighter units during combat. Fighters are fully AI-controlled.
Tower Data Fields
| Field | Type | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| id | String | Unique identifier |
| race | String | Builder race |
| tier | Int | 1–3 |
| cost_minerals | Int | Build cost |
| cost_gas | Int | Upgrade cost (0 for tier 1) |
| hp | Int | Fighter HP |
| armor_type | Enum | Light / Medium / Heavy / Unarmored |
| attack_type | Enum | Normal / Explosive / Concussive / Chaos |
| damage | Int | Base damage per hit |
| attack_speed | Float | Attacks per second |
| range | Float | Attack range in tiles |
| move_speed | Float | Fighter move speed |
| upgrades_to | String? | Next tier tower ID |
| strong_vs_waves | [Int] | Wave numbers this unit excels at |
Armor/Attack Type Matrix (damage multipliers)
| Normal | Explosive | Concussive | Chaos | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Light | 100% | 75% | 150% | 100% |
| Medium | 100% | 100% | 75% | 100% |
| Heavy | 100% | 150% | 50% | 100% |
| Unarmored | 100% | 75% | 100% | 100% |
Economy
Minerals
- Passive income per round (base ~50, slight scaling).
- Bonus income earned cumulatively by sending units or upgrading the Security System.
- Spent on: building/upgrading towers.
Gas
- Generated by worker units each round.
- Spent on: sends, Security System upgrades, supply cap raises.
Workers
- Each player starts with a few workers.
- Build more workers early — aim for ~20 by wave 25.
- Workers cost minerals; balance worker vs. tower investment.
Sends
- Spend gas to send bonus creeps into an opponent's lane (or self in solo).
- Each send type adds a permanent per-round income bonus.
- Send income is cumulative — early sending snowballs economy.
Waves
31 total waves. Each wave definition:
| Field | Notes |
|---|---|
| wave_number | 1–31 |
| creep_type | Enum: Light, Armored, Mixed, Boss |
| creep_armor | Armor type |
| creep_count | Number of units |
| creep_hp | Base HP |
| creep_speed | Move speed |
| bounty | Minerals per kill |
- Waves 1–10: economy building phase, lighter creeps.
- Waves 11–20: increasing pressure.
- Waves 21–30: heavy creeps, economy should be near max.
- Wave 31: boss/final wave.
Security System
- Shared team HP pool (e.g. 20 HP per player slot).
- Creeps reaching the exit drain 1–5 HP depending on type.
- Can be upgraded for gas (increases max HP and/or armor).
Victory / Defeat
- Win: Survive all 31 waves with Security System HP > 0.
- Lose: Security System reaches 0 HP.
- Scored by: waves survived, sends sent, Security System HP remaining.
Stretch Features (post-MVP)
- Chaos Mode (random race each round)
- Spectator mode
- Replay system
- Persistent leaderboard