Main downsides of trenches are:
- they are bugged
- they are slow to build
- AI goes wild when inside the trench
I propose to make trenches a building, that could be placed like engineer buildings but with use of a shovel instead of a hammer. Thanks to that they will be pre-made (so no holes down to the hell), bots will be able to assist you and AI should act more normal in such object.
It might work like this:
You could chose the type of the trench you want to build (like we chose engineer buildings) that would include for example: Straight trench, T-shaped, L-shaped, foxhole, hull down position for tanks (?) etc. Those preset trenches would snap (except foxhole) to other trenches to connect and could be rotated just like buildings we have now.
Exception being the straight trench. It should be built by marking the start and end points of the trench. You would be able to adjust length and angle of it unlike other structures.
Imo it’s a good compromise between trenches being pre-made and allowing players to have some creativity.
Of course it will require quite a lot of fine tuning and QOL mechanics to make this work properly, but imo it’s worth the effort.
Ps.
To not completelly waste the effort that devs put into terrain deformation, there could be kind of animation of digging the trench. Like you “dig the building” and the ground is being removed like it is now. After the trench is finished, the hole is replaced by the pre-made building.
Althoigh it’s purley visual and tbh might be not worth the effort.