Metamorphosis IMPLEMENTED

[Midonik]

Idea by @samuelch

Unlock new building that can produce pupas. Pupa costs only 2 turn. Pupa can move 1 tile per turn and is rather fragile. Pupa has choices of units it can transformed to, out of insectoid flesh and blood units that cost over 2 (perhaps excluding some more elite/expensive, we'll see). All the transform ability will start with cooldown equal to the cost of that unit normally - 2 turns pupa's cost.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pupa
Example:
Normally:
6 turns unit done in 6 turns from a factory
With pupa tech:
2 turns for a pupa that will wait for 4 turns again to get the 6 turns unit
The factory in the meantime produce one extra pupa that is done in turn 4 and another pupa in turn 6

This would give insectoids another way to make more of their higher cost flesh and blood units, compensating for their lower stats. It doesn't seem to op, however, as the gain is low - around a turn or two. It also gives more flexibility to production, and you theoretically move the produced unit in form of pupa a little close the the front. The cons is the fact that pupas can be destroyed before transformation. And also you need a separate building for them too, meaning you will probably need some changes to your buildings after researching this, consuming your work force and possibly eating some production, definitely slowing down the conversion to pupas a bit more as well. We do need some name for that building btw.


Images by Noaharts:

[warlock]

I have looked at the comparative population dynamics here. Let T be the number of turns, and K the unit cost. A factory produces floor( T/K ) units in time T. The pupas produce floor( ( T - K + 2 ) / 2 ) units in the same time.

For K = 4, a factory will build 4 units in 16 turns. The pupas will produce 7.

For k = 6, a factory will build 3 units in 18 turns. The pupas will build 7.

More generally, if P is the pupa production time, then pupas produce floor ( ( T - K + P ) / P ) units in time T.

Returning to the previous cases, a pupa cost of 3 would mean the pupas produce 5 units in both cases instead of 7.

[Midonik]

The most expensive unit that can transform into costs 5, it's only insectoid infantry.