Nerf Crabs and/or Buff Juggernauts

[digital lion]

it's not stalemate here but if I played more normally it could be

maybe not stalemate

[nimble trail]

Like again, I have no issue with flooding on drylands, just make it a real actual mechanic

[digital lion]

but it would take 20+ turns to finish the game off

aight I resign

going to bed soon

thanks for the game

games

all three

[nimble trail]

Yeah

Good night

[latent tapir]

I disagree with this take. Currently on live patch the most common way to lose as Aquarion against a human tribe is by human tribe rushing an early juggernaut and building scouts behind. You might be able to throw a lot of amphibians at the juggernauts, but ultimately the opponent ends up building up a lot of scouts behind that can kill your amphibians quite effectively combined with juggernaut splash

[nimble trail]

That's in the live build where your only options are amphibians and tridentions. Beta can play the early game better thanks to warriors being able to go on water, you have minimum sharks that can fight against scouts, and atolls exists. The live version has enough issues actually amassing the amphibians in the first place, but I don't really think there's an argument that if Aquarion didn't have the issues it does that it really is that big a deal to have the critical mass of amphibians that you need

Like, for any tribe, if you're worried about the unit limit then either you're just missing pop in general or you have a lot of units

[latent tapir]

I just explained to you why unit capacity matters in the case against juggernauts, I didnt question that the beta gives aquarion more tools

[nimble trail]

Ok, but the point is that these extra tools means that Aquarion isn't as worried about the unit limit

At least no more than any other non turn 0

[latent tapir]

no, the main problem is that tribes that aren't Aquarion and can't rush an early giant themselves always get obliterated by juggernaut rush

which is why I think that rammers should remain a viable unit against juggernauts

[nimble trail]

And again, I rarely notice the unit limit that hard for any tribe. Even when it starts to matter, it's not too difficult to have a unit that can freely die if need be

[latent tapir]

realistically it's the crab that needs a nerf

[nimble trail]

This is true regardless

[latent tapir]

it is, but maybe to a lesser extent?

sending a ton of rammers into a juggernaut is a viable way to take one down right now

[nimble trail]

This only affects rammers vs juggernauts in a more mid game scenario. Fast rushed juggernauts is going to kill you before rammers matters, regardless of retaliation

And hello? This is a super unit

Super units are typically this strong on land too

[latent tapir]

the difference is that it takes them longer to reach enemy cities on land in the early game

werent juggernauts originally introduced because giant battleships were too strong?

[nimble trail]

Roads aren't that difficult to get, dragons and centipedes have 2 move

[latent tapir]

if you think that they should be better later on, I could see aquatism removing stiff from certain units like the juggernaut be a good idea

[nimble trail]

Kinda. But even then, I have stated plenty of times that I think giant battleships were overrated

Strong units. Defines the naval game. But heavily, heavily overrated

[bright hound]

honestly I like the escape mechanic crabs have, its fun and I d be sad to see it go

however, I think reducing their hp to 30 and defense by 1 it would make them into a more mobile special unit, which can be fun

also, I do agree that juggernauts should be able to retaliate, it always felt weird to me

[tawny talon]

Just reducing defense by 1 already makes it palatable

[bright hound]

yea cuz even on poto update (I didnt play the beta) crabs with defense in water is stupid in terms of defensive abilities

[white salmon]

What are yall taking about it takes the same amount of rammer to kill a Crab and a Juggernaut when they have def bonus. Yall are acting like the Crab has fortify.

[bright hound]

maybe it takes the same amount, but in 1 case you end up with 9 damaged (or dead) rammers, while in the other casee they are fine 🤷‍♂️

[white salmon]

It would be like me saying the giant needs a nerf because it's damage is to high.

[white salmon]

Yeah that's the trade off for having being slightly tankier.

[bright hound]

whats the tradeoff here ?

[white salmon]

The same way a Crab will always loose one to one with the normal giant on land.

[bright hound]

giants on land are not the point here

[white salmon]

It would simply be silly to have the giant be better than the Crab on land and then make it equal or better than the Crab on water.

[bright hound]

did I mention making it better ?

[white salmon]

Nerfing the Crabs stats would automatically do this.

[white salmon]

The giant on land is apart of this conversation because it's supposed to incentivize players to get them back on land where they can excel rather than a unit akin to the old giant battleships wich the entire navy is centered around.

The Crab is also very weak against rangegd units. Like multiple bombers or scouts do to their lack of damage if you're a good player you can kill a Crab without losing any units so the whole idea when people say "but the Crab can retaliate" is only if you play like a bot and spam rammer. Just like how it would be silly to spam warriors to kill a centipede.

[compact mirage]

crab retaliates

that's the key difference xD

It's not that easy to take down

Atleast

from my experience from aquarion mirrors

a single crab is a menace

(They were the only way you could deal with tridention spam p much)

[compact mirage]

Gotta explain this

the crab itself doesn't defeat tridention spam

but rather it can work as a stalemate breaker w/ sharks once the game gets to that point

And vs normal tribes

it's simply a pain on the ass to deal with for them

esp w/ some decent supporting units

[white salmon]

I'm not really speaking about mirror matches I'm speaking in the context of non-special tribes.

[compact mirage]

It's just a pain in the ass

a crab siege is nearly impossible to remove

more than other giants cuz of the absurd defense

then I'm not a pro

[bright hound]

• mindbenders that can swim

[white salmon]

I cant argue with that I'm simply stating the fact that there's ways to kill crabs without retaliation it. Which is a unique weakness the Crab has.

[bright hound]

need to be taken into account now

[compact mirage]

are sirens even good?

on paper they should be pretty decent

[digital lion]

i just played today and crab isn't that big of an issue to deal if you go tridents

but it kinda depends what your opponent is doing

my opponent spammed crabs

so it was pretty easy

sharks wouldn't really be a good choice I guess because my crab had zone of control

jelly belly against crab not that good either

idk i feel like the only answer to crab + tridents is crabs + tridents

maybe pufferfish, but then you are outranged by your opponent

[digital lion]

why should they be good on paper?

[compact mirage]

water mindbender

[digital lion]

how is that reason for them to be good?

[compact mirage]

water mindbender

juggernauts can't do anything vs it

can convert units that just embarked

[digital lion]

except move next to them and finish one off with scout?

[compact mirage]

I don't want to have to deal with you again

have agood day

got no time to argue today

i'm sorry

we can do this later

[tawny talon]

They are probably not that useful either way

[compact mirage]

@ me in 1-2 hrs

[compact mirage]

ye but they should be more decent than normal mindbenders

cya and sry

but i'm busy

[tawny talon]

Bye

[digital lion]

me too actually

thank you for that

xD

u saved us both

[nimble trail]

Sounds way too slow

[compact mirage]

I'm back

[compact mirage]

ye, defo too slow

but it shouldn't be terrible

could see some v niche situations where it's good

[bright hound]

if they still can heal, why wouldnt they be ?

[compact mirage]

they can ye

[bright hound]

like, mindbenders are already very strong to me in poto patch

I use them as healing towers in my island cities to heal up my injured crabs

now they can float, so I can make literal healing stations

you need to consider this in the equation of fights, crabs can be healed in middle of ocean

[compact mirage]

True

That's true

[nimble trail]

While I do think mindbenders are maybe underrated, I think y'all are arguing niche scenarios for a unit that still is tier 3 on a tech branch that's not leading to yellys or pop

[bright hound]

I aint arguing anything since I do agree with you

[safe fossil]

Keep them the exact same 🗿 give them some vengance for being bad for so long

[compact mirage]

Yk what

Fuck balance

[safe fossil]

YEAH

[compact mirage]

Let crabs be broken

[safe fossil]

KEEP EM BROKEN

[compact mirage]

They deserve it

YES

CRAB BEST GIANT FOREVER

[safe fossil]

ONG

🗿

[compact mirage]

We aren't beating T0s anyways

Let crab be busted

End of the story

[vestal moon]

We are. We are definitely beating t0's with the current aq build

[compact mirage]

Is it that strong?

I kinda suck at poly so idk

[vestal moon]

In my games: yes

[compact mirage]

It looked pretty good but not busted af

[compact mirage]

Vs good or bad players tho

And how did you do it

[vestal moon]

Against myself in a pass and play and against some good players

A pretty standard broad exploration with warriors then amphibians. Using atolls to get a strong economy going while still primarily focussing on expansion.

Especially sharks feel busted. As the player on the other side, I feel like there isn't a single unit I can put forward to try to stop them

Add to that that sharks are much easier to make than defender rammers (2 techs vs 4 and no port needed) while also having surprise...

[compact mirage]

Fair enuff

[vestal moon]

The 10/3/3/3 shark was a bit boring, but it was pretty spot on when it comes to naval powerlevel

[compact mirage]

Current shark shouldn't have 15 imo

[ivory oar]

What stats does the current shark has?

[compact mirage]

3/2/3/15

Surprise

Creep

[safe fossil]

just take its health back to 10

thats all they need

how they were before was boring, having surprise is nice, but the 15 health isn't necessary

[bright hound]

I agree having 15 + surprise isnt necessary, better return them to 10

[normal salmon]

What good is juggernaut having stiff anyway. Makes them weaker to rammers, that seems like the only relevant interaction for base tribes

I can see a really strong juggernaut being problematic but letting it retaliate doesn’t seem like too much sure

[tawny talon]

What if they got halved retaliation instead
Would be a compromise

[ivory oar]

They do sound pretty strong

[white salmon]

See the issue is that if you take stiff away from the juggernaut it becomes way to powerful, especially since it can already attack using stomp which means it doesn't take retaliation damage and it has a very lethal melee attack.

It would basically just become a beefed up yelly belly that has 40 health and can also attack.

[normal salmon]

Uhh nah I think it’s fine

[nimble trail]

The fact that people play Kickoo vs Aquarion without immediately complaining about how much stronger Kickoo is says otherwise

[compact mirage]

We're beating t0s

[digital lion]

i mean we played that matchup and i feel like kickoo is destroyed by aquarion most of the time

only reason I could win that game was that greedy ruin play

and you still would have won imo if you hadn't moved your crab away from the capital

kickoo can put some pressure on aquarion early and that's pretty much the only moment he seems to have a chance

[digital lion]

and that's pretty sad considering that it was a dream kickoo spawn

how did you feel about their strength?

[rain spire]

I actually gave it escape because it made it move a bit more like a crab, in real life I mean, they move sideways

[turbid hemlock]

🌚

[nimble trail]

Real game, replay isn't compatible for server reasons, but it just finished a few minutes ago

[turbid hemlock]

Gotta get some yellys on that coast

[digital lion]

Not to be picky, but that's 2 water tiles access. It's suprising he went for sailing at all and it doesn't even matter since he is losing already.

[boreal tiger]

Not much need for yellys here. Aquarion already has quite the stranglehold

Crabs force a lot of attention in the east, while the west is easily defended by cheap units so juggs can’t do much

Construction for more crabs or strat -> diplo seems like an easy conversion from here

[digital lion]

Yeah diplo here is lethal

[nimble trail]

Why use diplo?

Wasn't even necessary

Just throw a couple tridents and nuke all of the riders that way

[digital lion]

Probably you can finish him off earlier but with cloaks pretty much no matter what tech gymantics he does he can't defend