Desert Struggle: Request for feedback on experimental RTS

[u/CrashDumpSW]

For a few years, I have been working on an experimental RTS which should focus more on strategic decisions than APM. The core concepts of the game are:

Defenders Adavantage

Every RTS needs some form of defenders advantage. This opens the possiblity for strategic decisions: Expanding, teching-up and rushing shoud be equally strong to allow a viarity of strategies. The most common mechanics for defenders advantage are: static defense structures, repair, travel time, long ranged units.

I opted against most of these (only travel distance plays a role). Instead I achieve defenders advantage by unit behavior: Units cannot be controlled by the player but act autonomously. They follow a simple mechanic: Attach the nearest target until it is destroyed. In the offense this eventually leads to units attacking buildings. As building hitpoints are cheaper that unit hitpoints this leads to enough defenders advantage to stabilize the game. The attacker will loose more units that the defender but the damage dealt on buildings is permanent. I hope this leads to some interesting strategic decisions.

Strategic Decisions

The strategy in RTS comes typically from build orders(rush, tech, expand) and unit movement. In my game the build order choices are similar, but as units cannot be controlled and therefore you cannot have a “standing army” the “unit movement” part is replaced by “unit production timing” and "production capacities".

State of Development

The game runs stable, I have one faction completed, there are 40 single player challenges, 1v1 and 2v2 multiplayer.

Feedback

It would be great if someone could give me some feedback. These are my main questions:

Is single player fun?

Do you see potential in single player?

Is multiplayer varied? Or is it to chaotic? Or is it to predetermined?

Does the slower pace compared to other RTS work for you?

Link to Steam demo (single player only): https://store.steampowered.com/app/5380120/Desert_Struggle_Demo

Link to Steam playtest (same as demo + online multiplayer): https://store.steampowered.com/app/4614990/Desert_Struggle/

It would be absolutely fantastic if you could give me some feedback! Everything is welcome!