Balance Candidates Pack

[rare orbit]

but not to the extent of preferring a new scout over an existing bomber

[dire cypress]

Will the missiles retarget?

[rustic dust]

theoretically, for a burst unit with not-exceptionally-fast projectiles, it makes sense that they'd prefer farther targets as those targets are more likely to be full hp, leading to less overkill

[wintry wasp]

Robert: no

If the AA always fired at next new target, you can layer it like an onion rather than spread it broad to provide significent defence in depth

[dire cypress]

That's an issue because of the reasons SilverSol said

[rustic dust]

only missiles that retarget midair are karg's g2g micromissiles, to my knowledge

[winged zephyr]

*farthest new targets, agree

[dire cypress]

So that's why the chainsaw targets the furthest new target. It "thinks" the old one is dead because of the missiles in the air anyways.

[wintry wasp]

Its not burst - it fires like a machine gun

its a really interesting behaviour - the inconsistency is an issue but i don't necessarily think its a bad thing

[rustic dust]

eradicator and chainsaw are both 4 round bursts

[rustic dust]

more, "it's really afraid of overkilling accidentally so it switches targets early just in case it might overkill"

[wintry wasp]

It switches targets between 4 round reloads

[dire cypress]

KK but these 1000 damage don't on shot T2 Bombers...

That's an issue.

[wintry wasp]

... neither will a single flak, you need more than 1 of either or ideally a combination of both

[rustic dust]

not necessarily. i'm seeing eradicator switch target mid-burst frequently

[dire cypress]

At the same time they are over killing figs... A T1 can't survive a single missile

Fast retarget?

[rare orbit]

that's not what you think it is, just means it notices when it dies
but missiles in flight still carry on

[dire cypress]

Flak has an insane projectile speed

[dire cypress]

It retargets while being in a burst, right? Perhaps even without turning the turret

[wintry wasp]

@rustic dust you are 100% bang on! 🙂

[rare orbit]

does that anyway

only difference is it updates the death of target more often

[rare orbit]

you can see the same thing with salamanders if you're really observant (or slow gamespeed right down)

[dire cypress]

KK, thx.

It looks so wrong that it damages so many Bombers but doesn't kill them.

So you need a multi layer of AA to get the value out of a chainsaw. That's insane.

[rare orbit]

I've tuned it to something better now

[wintry wasp]

it also has much larger range, so you can park one beind your flak to tidy up any small spills - hornet i am very interested 😄 does it fit with the bomb resistant unit type? - twice the hp of flak is very nice

[rare orbit]

new settings seem to -hate- liches and drops everything to shoot them
which seems optimal to me

[dire cypress]

Video?

[rare orbit]

look at the survivor totals

if the liche is already on top of them then they care less

[wintry wasp]

is that now selecting a plane and killing it before moving onto the next?

[rustic dust]

fun fact: since burst fire allows the non-first shots in a volley to ignore which direction a turret is facing, cerberus and despot have special "technically not burst-fire" scripts for their burst-fires, because it would be extremely abusable and visually off-putting for large units with very slow turret rotation like them if that bug was allowed to happen

[rare orbit]

the plants are building 1 of everything on repeat
several plants building in different orders

[rare orbit]

seems to be, I've not seen it drop anything unless a liche enters the chat

[wintry wasp]

Right, deffo mixing them into my ground aa mix now after that goes live, many thanks for that 🙂 it'd been bugging me for ages lol

[dire cypress]

Do they waste more of their shots, now?

[rare orbit]

less, they don't stop shooting to shoot something new & distant

it's like the things had ADD or something
'yep bored of that target now here's a new one'

[dire cypress]

KK.
I thought it might be that more missiles are in the air that fly into nothing because the target is already dead.

[rare orbit]

I can't economise targets like that, tried with the LRAAs before and it was rejected

-might- be able to here as these are infinite shots though, not limited ammo
no harm in trying

[dire cypress]

With this rate of fire you might think it must be ADHD... Don't miss the hyperactive 😉

[rustic dust]

imo more homing things should behave like karg micro-missiles, but i assume that would murder performance

[dire cypress]

Underused and underpowered AA. That might help with your request.

[rare orbit]

hoping so

[rustic dust]

underused, yes. underpowered...debatable

[dire cypress]

2 - 3 flaks kill an unlimited stream of Bombers if they fly in a line (which they tend to do near the AFUS

[rustic dust]

if the bombers are in a line, not split at all, yes

[dire cypress]

Or to put it another way: somewhat less effective than it makes sense. Because of the bad retargeting.

Let's see if the new targeting can pass the jury and perhaps we will see more chainsaws, then. I like the idea and the visuals 😉

[rare orbit]

seems to ignore the tag, might be controlled by a gadget somewhere

hm, either it changes nothing, or they run out of fuel so won't retarget
either way it's already more competent so not sure it's worth worrying about atm

[dire cypress]

Yeah, better might be good enough, here

[rustic dust]

"cheaper than static flak with much higher dps, a bit over double the area coverage, and well over double the hp in exchange for the lack of aoe and targetting issues"

granted, aoe is usually insanely valuable vs air, particularly if the air player doesn't bother to avoid stacking their units inside each other

but the "ew it's t1 porc and i'm t2" effect on players is too op

[dire cypress]

Btw.
I was thinking about flames and their AOE. I think all AOE is normally round. But I could easily code something that would check the area between the shooting unit and the impact point of the projectile. With a width of a certain amount. That would all units that run through the line of fire.
@rare orbit

[wintry wasp]

Silver having a few of the chainsaws to kill t2 air scouts at range, and the flak to cover likely bombing runs is gonna be lovely

[rustic dust]

nothing stopping you from doing it right now. eradicator/chainsaw can soften up tanky targets, flak kills the chaff and softened targets, chainsaws have enough range to then mop up the leftovers

[dire cypress]

Or a few at the front and baiting enemy fighters into them

Better targeting is just better 😉

[wintry wasp]

true, and they go up real fast

[rustic dust]

yeah, though focusing targets down with a bit of potential overkill = less enemy density for flaks to splash when they get into flak range

pros and cons

[dire cypress]

True.

[rustic dust]

generally speaking a bit of overkill will be worth killing things before they get a chance to get value, but it's not strictly an upgrade

[dire cypress]

In t1 phase I like it more when they kill. In front of a flak they may soften the targets.

[rustic dust]

so many toggles that'd be nice to have but would make the ui and/or keybinds a mess to include all of

[dire cypress]

Lol this game has it all! Insane tick spams, mass Sheldons, mass Mausers, mass starlights, mass snipers, a few Nukes, and a com running after a Thor. Most standard game of all time. (Os 10-25)
We could consider balancing these units 😉

https://youtu.be/VphN1gOW034?si=qxgGnQEJQYobjtCS

[wintry wasp]

Throwing another idea out there - could radar & jammer mobile units be given a fake gun, so you can issue them fight cmds and they keep some distance?

Discussed here: https://discord.com/channels/549281623154229250/1167183176385429514

[rustic dust]

I believe that's on hornet's to-do list

[dire cypress]

Is there anything thing NOT on hornets Todo list?

[astral gulch]

+1

[dire cypress]

Can we make it that Janus and Whistlers have a limited arc of fire? Like 180°?

[wintry wasp]

I think that would be far to much of a nerf, whistles esp need 360 for their AA role

[dire cypress]

Is it possible to make a different air and ground attack angle?

Or reduce their ground LoS a bit (air los stays the same) and give them 600 radar.

[wintry wasp]

What's the goal of the change?

[wintry wasp]

Technically i think yes, but it would look really janky as the missile casset launcher is a single unit

[rustic dust]

and it would allow them to fire at air+ground at same time

[dire cypress]

The goal is: Janus + Whistlers are great against anything.

And they can kite too good. And have huge vision

[wintry wasp]

Maybe i need to spec the rotato lobby for a while to see whats going on with those units, the games are just so dull tho, Whistler/Janus meta on isthmus is almost dead

[dire cypress]

Might be just me that I can't handle it.

[wintry wasp]

No not at all, its horrific to to deal with

[dire cypress]

But I like the idea of a soft break of vision. 500 ground LoS and 600 radar. Feels a bit sweeter

[wintry wasp]

its super micro intensive, and i usually have to slowly give up ground to prevent feeding it while i pray a t2 is coming to help

[dire cypress]

So that's why I recommend less kiting for Janus+Whistlers

[wintry wasp]

Well micro'ed rocket bots, and arty balls are also pretty horrible to deal with at t1 too

i think t1 just feels so oppressive because you have few answers to balls of units, and you know t2's coming to knock your door down

[dire cypress]

I can handle rockos and Arty better

[rare orbit]

I did that, iirc it was rejected as 'too easy to use'

[wintry wasp]

Thanks for coming back on it tho appreciate it 🙂

[rare orbit]

I also can't do it via tweak alone, needs real unit modification

[wintry wasp]

At a guess- because the unit doesn't have any kind of gun at all? Similar to how making anything into a builder is actually complicated, hence the nano glued on the printers head.

[rare orbit]

essentially, yes. it needs aiming code in the unit itself

the concern was that people could just afk rally say radar bots and sheldons into a front line on repeat and they'd be too powerful, with the bots always staying safe distance away

feels like an APM tax for its own sake to me though, I'd have liked to see how it handled in games first

[wintry wasp]

Yeah it woud certainly be a delicate balance to make it feel useful and not just auto-fighting; guess the line has to be drawn somewhere 🙂

[tired tinsel]

skater and herring 1k radar is too op

skater is already a broken unit, 1k radar is like a t2 radar bot
i think herring radar can be 800 optionally. supporter 600 los is a welcome change

[wintry wasp]

can you elaborate for those of us who don't play enough sea to know - but are interested? 🙂 (100% geniune query)

[tired tinsel]

skater is like a stealthy grunt with 93 speed and 760 aa range and 750 sight

basically map hacks with a partial sweeper hover aa bot tacked on
but overall it's fine cause core has the riptide

[wintry wasp]

I saw it as the skater supporting the dolphin's nimble raids, avoiding the core blob which will defeat it in a straight up fight

[tired tinsel]

basically skater is good because you can see opponent without being seen, and so the skater is not really vunerable to getting killed. herring is ez to randomly lose. skater also does great at killing enemy air scout and fighters

it gives your destroyers perfect los, fast enough to dodge enemy destroyer shots

basically it gives a lot of superiority in seeing sub wakes, killing enemy radar / scouts

the breakpoint means it 2-shots enemy fighters, making it great at killing them

1 skater also beats a supporter

it has longer aa range than the herring, and it's speed/stealth mean it's less likely to get killed randomly by frigate/destroyers

supporter 600 los means it can spot enemies before running into them, better at spotting radar

when you are searching for enemy radar without seeing them your ships are vunerable to getting intercepted if you aren't paying attention

killing radar / scout is important cause controlling the sea center has some importance. amphibs and com trans/walk go through there

if the enemy has radar in the center geo sea is very risky to go com bomb the island

[wintry wasp]

Thanks 🙂 i'd noticed some of those but not others - ngl, kinda like it; feels very underdog but understand why that's so powerful

[tired tinsel]

yeah subs/frigate intercept are dangerous if you don't know where they are
center vision makes the flank attack onto long beach stronger

against geo sea, could be your amphib or team amphib, both strong

radars although they give 2400 radar, both your radar and con ship are very vunerable

so safe undeniable radar/los is so good

[wintry wasp]

Sounds like the unit should be split in two (long term) tbh, it fills a lot of roles, likely too many

[tired tinsel]

yeah perhaps the vision/radar/stealth can be split from aa

[rare orbit]

skater is silly OP now, it kind of makes a bit of sense for arm though, for once. core navy more powerful, arm navy can pick better fights

[wintry wasp]

Thats why I kinda like it 😄 a well handled one will be so powerful

[tired tinsel]

like despite doing all it's stuff it still not embarassing for light skirmishes
1 can kill mexes or cons

[rare orbit]

it should probably lose the 'ground' attack
stealth sea grunt with mad vision is ... interesting

[tired tinsel]

and fast aa

[rare orbit]

more like the whistler AA would be prudent

I don't want to mess with it in the tweaks yet though, give things time to settle

[tired tinsel]

it's aa dps is same as herring but less overkill means it kills fighters faster
1.4 sec cd

[rare orbit]

indeed, and faster travel missile I think

[tired tinsel]

armada needs some buffs and more playtesting b4 changing skater agreed

[dire cypress]

well.... "there is a widget for that" ™️
I won't make it publicly available, though. It will stay on my PC because I it is insanely abusive.
It can do more stuff, too. like auto kiting. auto retreating. (great for afking sharpshooters). auto turning the arty 90° so it can retreat faster... all these little things.
but i am core so I am used to not use all the tool there are to win. 😛

[elfin frigate]

Amphib los?

It's actually so bad, a lot of them don't have as much LOS as their range. But they're primarily raiding units which go in alone. even the amphib AA you can bring don't have siffocent LOS for a turtle or poison arrow which means they effectively have less range a lot fo the time

[elfin frigate]

Arm Cloakable buildings should get the stealthy tag

Ferrit
Cloakable fusions
Pitbulls
Rattlesnake

Thoughts?

[old ivy]

They already have a cloakable jammer, they can make themselves near undetectable already

[elfin frigate]

Yeah, true. We were just theorycrafting on how to use them particuarly on spread out maps. Scouts would spot lone ones are radar blips a lot of the time even if you have them on hold fire for a sneaky attack. You could obviously build the cloakable jammer at more reasource plentiful stages of the game

[rustic dust]

ferret is the only one of those you can even build at a time when the price of a sneaky pete is semi-relevant

[elfin frigate]

Yeah that's the one we were theory crafting about. We were talking about how you might use it's cloaking to bait in a commander to fly into it or bait someone to fly bombers over it and the issue were came to was that typically people will scout you and reveal the radar blip

The other thing we thought of was having those cloakable units not leave a shadow on the map if revealed.

That way if someone scouts your base with air and a ferrit pops up to shoot it and you're not looking you can't mouse over the fog and know it's there.

I'm brimming with ideas today, I want to talk about mines, they're quite strong but as soon as you hit someone with them people often just build a juno and they are globally countered

Junos
Have a range insted of being global and/or Not kill mines

Introduce other alternative to deal with mines

Legion has a Juno Bomber, this adds another dynamic to using mines, you need air control to be able to remove a mine field
Cortex, Commando could be given some kind of anti mine capability to expand it's use cases.
Armada, Not exactly sure but since cortex and legion have air and bots a Vech that clears mines could fit.

Bearing in mine that mine layers themselves have an anti mine weapon and that scout spam counters mines very well too.

Nukes
Give a range, a LONG range but a range. What this does is make rushing a nuke harder because

1. You need to move your build power out of the back of your base or suboptimal nuke targets.
2. Allows said nuke to be an easier target to scouting/raiding/boming.
3. increase the time it takes to rush a nuke.
4. Opens up the idea of Nuke Ship/Sub as an option for sea.

Also in regards to nuke rushing, I get that using spy bots to stun Anti's can be countered in a number of ways, but it's a noob stomper and too easy to pull off. imo a good nerf to it would be for Anti's to require 2-3 spy bots to stun them for a long enough duration to land a nuke instead of 1.

This would make this play higher commitment and higher skill as you need

1. More spy bots
2. Higher risk as if you lose 1 you might not be able to pull it off
3. Gives a player some time to react if they are stunned and have units nearly because you'll need to wait a few seconds before exploding the second spy bot
4. If you succeed it's unlikely you can do it again or to another player.

[rustic dust]

if the 2 spybots need to be staggered in timing, it will literally never be allowed to be successfully executed in a high level lobby. if it just needs to be 2 at once...you're going from a trivial resource commitment to an also trivial resource commitment. The apm commitment is an order of magnitude higher than the resources for basically anything related to spybots

[rustic dust]

baiting a comm to fly over a specific spot is an insanely niche thing, and chances are, being stealthy likely won't be the deciding factor on whether it gets pulled off. also, in the bomber scenario, it will probably kill approximately 1-2 t1 bombers flying over max because it has the dps of 4 nettles

[elfin frigate]

I disagree, sometimes with stealth detectors people mess up stopping 1 of the 2-3 spies that are sent. It gives you people some level of reaction time and actions they can take instead just being dead.

[rustic dust]

The live version of emp rework literally just makes the timing on nuking off 1 spybot detonation AN tight and that's enough for nobody to ever bother trying

[elfin frigate]

Again I disagree, I see it all the time

[rustic dust]

On emp rework?

[elfin frigate]

Yes, It's not tight at all it stuns the anti for 15 seconds and even after that if it fires late enough it misses, it's still super easy

You don't even need to pre fire the nuke, for it run through the opening animation, if you hit with the bot you kill a player, often even you don't get right next to the anti, they deal like 50k emp damage and the AOE is massive.

[rustic dust]

/shrug i didn't see it happen a single time in the first multiple months of emp rework

I literally did the balancing of it. I know how it works. Nobody was willing to coordinate the timing in real matches for months, because an ally couldn't reactively tell the nuker "i got the stun off" followed by the nuker comfortably having time to react and aim the nuke

[elfin frigate]

The nukers get the spy bots, they just build them or pay for them

[rustic dust]

Man i'm just saying that they didn't until pretty recently. I've barely played any actual matches in the last 2 months, and apparently it's started happening since then. My assumption that people still weren't bothering was incorrect.

[elfin frigate]

That's with 89% emp res, still able to stun and nuke with 2 bots

Yeah, lol, it's super easy, it doesn't fire until it gets down to 50% stunned

Even when I launched just after I stunned it it was super easy.

[rustic dust]

I'm gonna take a break from repeating myself now. You should do the same.

[elfin frigate]

Sorry?

[rare orbit]

junos and mines are a huge other problem I will get to one day
miles out of the balance patch scope

[elfin frigate]

Fair

And fyi before I was just saying it's about functionally the same with or without the EMP rework emping nukes because they don't fire till they are at 50% emped so they're essentially stunned until them. I make this little tweak, if anyone else wants to play with it. Not pushing it for the balance pack. Two emp bots will stun an anti to 80% which is enough to get a nuke through where on strait IF you start the animation and stun the Anti right before your nuke launchers. IMO it makes the nuker need to commit more and risks moreif they lose even 1 spybot. If they take 3 and get them all in it's an easy nuke, 2, you can do it if you time it right, 1 can't do it. And requires some skill/timing to pull off.

{
    armamd = {
        customparams = {
        paralyzemultiplier = 0.0615,
        },
    },

    corfmd = {
        customparams = {
        paralyzemultiplier = 0.0615,
        },
    },
}

[rare orbit]

the timing window is closer depending on map size with rework. we spent a -very- long time tuning it

[elfin frigate]

Yeah very true, easier on small maps, harder on larger ones.

[rare orbit]

next version changes things a bit more so that window will probably be larger, however it was calibrated to allow even on neurope

[elfin frigate]

Is that a massive map?

[rare orbit]

biggest in the game

[elfin frigate]

idk, for a map like that imo you should need to build a nuke closer

[rare orbit]

you have to skillshot it but it is still possible
safer to build closer though yes

[elfin frigate]

I'm not sure this is true though, because it only fires at 50% emp (I haven't counted the seconds,) but the effectual stun time seems to be about 30 seconds, which is about the same as without the rework.

Has it ever fired when just not 100% stunned in the rework? Has something changed at some point?

[rare orbit]

the stun cap time was also different before in vanilla, it's related to a broken calculation/exception for antis and buildings that I fixed

[dire cypress]

I think this is such an insane building!
No way to detect it but to move very close to it and Juno is the only way to kill it long range...
There should be any kind of compensation for core for that...

[tired tinsel]

yeah sneaky pete + commander cloak is OP

[wintry wasp]

I was thinking about this recently, with Core's jammer being so cheap it can be built a lot earlier in specific spots - its powerful especially when you're zoning with a powerful force. I think the jammers are in a good spot.

I need to double check the cloaked-ghost out of LOS situation to see when exactly it occours

[tired tinsel]

i think like spybots and sneaky pete are annoying

[chilly shard]

on the topic of AA targeting, one problem the longe range AA towers have is they all fire at the same target
Is there any way to prevent the massive overkill and wasted shots without having to spread them out and hope the target is dead before the next one wastes a shot shooting when a missile is already about to kill it? A single cheap aircraft can just draw tons of fire and this behavior reduces their value significantly

[tired tinsel]

since they are OP to any strat that doesn't push spam

[chilly shard]

I think dealing with cloaking in general is a pain, particular for spy bots, because even the 'stealth detection' does nothing to actually reveal the unit

having stealth detection and seeing yourself about to die to a spybot+nuke incoming is annoying

[rare orbit]

I really want to apply better priority, or missile retargetting

[chilly shard]

and I have seen people use spybots+nuke somewhat recently, I think the emp rework was on, but it is a bit less common I think just because people got better at countering them in general so people don't try as much
I think that has more to do with the skill of the players than the EMP rework, given that you can fire a good chunk ahead of the nuke, but late, and still miss it, as it doesn't go straight towards the flying nuke when it shoots

[rare orbit]

but it seems the idea is it's a skill play to only manually target the bombers? which seems mad to me

[tired tinsel]

manually targeting bombers seems like a fair play for screamers, but for chainsaw seems like too much work
to expect someone to do

[chilly shard]

feeling relief that your nuke fired many seconds before a nuke was going to hit, but watching it totally whiff the nuke mid way is kind of saddening, lol

[rare orbit]

basically they will prefer bombers, but only if the fighters appeared in range same frame. so you have to turn them off, until bombers are in range too

[tired tinsel]

wym fire a good chunk ahead of it? emp bot can stun after antinuke fires?

won't they kill the first fighter then go to bombers?

[rare orbit]

depends how far ahead the screen is

and if they register the fighters as dead, before firing more missiles at it

[chilly shard]

I had a game where the nuke loaded just barely too late and antinuke failed to hit nuke mid air, flew past it and then back, but that would apply in the case of being emp-ed as well

[rare orbit]

screamers should either retarget, or cost less for what they are

an anti has a turning circle, so it IS possible for it to mislead the target if it fires too late
then it tries to chase it, and can't catch up

might be able to add LRAA retargetting via tweak, but I think there is a gadget involvement too
will look later

[chilly shard]

timing felt misleading because if multiple nukes are shot and it just pumps out antinukes it hits many before the last one lands, but if it shoots later because it loaded late or was stunned, then it misses at the same distance

at least, that's what it seemed like

would have to test that to confirm

[rare orbit]

it's all to do with the timing for the last anti missile in the chain, as if it can't lauch fast enough, for whatever reason (stunned or firing other antis) it misses the interception window

[chilly shard]

When you see a single antinuke firing at incoming missiles, you see the explosions happening progressively closer before one hits

but if it's stunned or late loading, it doesn't target in the same way it seemed, so it can't hit as close and will instead fail

or maybe I'm totally wrong on that, I should test that tomorrow when I have time

[wintry wasp]

This can dealt with by building them in lines away from the vector you are attacked from - its a solvable problem by the player with some thought & effort

[chilly shard]

although I don't know how to test such a thing in single player, is there a way to control enemy AI for such?

[wintry wasp]

Yes /cheats then /godmode3 or /team X

I think current EMP Spybot <> Antinuke with EMP Rework is in a good spot, I've seen a few people miss the window of opportunity and some more practiced people (Skyfire) nail it

[rare orbit]

might want to turn speed down while you watch what happens

[wintry wasp]

If an antinuke missile fires too late, it cannot intercept an already flying nuke - so causing the AN to fire later, even by a few seconds can cause a failure to intercept. You can see this really reliably by walking mobile anti's into an already flying nuke range

[chilly shard]

Just did a firing to see, looks like 2 seconds between each fire of an antinuke
I fired 8 nukes at a loaded antinuke and it shot 8 antinukes back, intercepted 6 of them and the remaining two antinukes both missed mid air
From from middle of back bases to eco spot, so at that distance you have about 12-13 second window to fire and then it's too late
looks like from command it takes about 7 seconds to fire the nuke, which then starts the window of opportunity for an antinuke to fire
with EMP rework on you stun for 15 seconds and then it takes another ~16 seconds to get to 50% when it could potentially fire, so that's about a 31 second stun, which I think is close to without the EMP rework
But that seems to suggest if you stun an antinuke, start the 31 second counter, then fire a nuke, the point of failure is after 7+13 seconds, leaving a pretty significant ~11 seconds to spare, not that tight at all

[rare orbit]

there are other options too that make it even more forgiving

try stunning it, waiting a bit too long, but then firing from two nuke silos

there's a third OP skill play too but I'm not going to spoil it

reminds me, I saw someone turn off a bastion in a game earlier
outstanding play, it let it tank rocket arty fire

[wintry wasp]

Don't see stuff like this often enough, but when you do - it really shows how much depth there is which is not being utilized

[rare orbit]

I remember I was talking ingame with someone with like 50OS a few months ago, they had no idea it was possible to turn off pulsars and bulwarks et al

woefully underutilised

[wintry wasp]

Almost every single day w/o fail, someone says "I hate it when..." and then someone points out a feature/option/technique which they didn't know which applies. game is complicated 😄

[rare orbit]

tbh we should actually document this stuff as developers can't test for things they don't know exist

eg queue ordering, there's a way to force buildings added to a queue, to take place along the route the con has to take to get there
and hardly anyone knew that was a thing

[wintry wasp]

I actually started something like that for my personal use, and its a real mess - i might try to tidy it up

advanced game mechanics codex or similar

[wintry wasp]

I use this all the time, and when Spreeezy wanted priority insert changed i argued the insert-in-between queue needed to be kept, i use it quite often

[rare orbit]

shift space isn't it?

[wintry wasp]

Yep, and it tries to insert it spatially between the two nearest orders, but its a bit janky at times

[rare orbit]

I use it erratically, probably should more often, but usually it's when placing defences and I want to spread them manually then

[wintry wasp]

It's insanely good in 1v1 maps

[tired tinsel]

Yeah priority queue and insert first are both good options

[wintry wasp]

where your expanding and have queued up mexs, then you can just drop some radar/llt's into the mix while keeping the mex queue

[rare orbit]

yup, that's the ideal usage really

[rustic dust]

90% of the time if i use shift+space, things get inserted at undesirable points in the queue, so i just use space or nothing

[wintry wasp]

Yeah, the jank hurts it a lot - but in principal and if you know how it behaves, its very strong

Speaking of queue mechanics/features - is there a specific reason click-drag doesn't build a line things by default and requires shift modifier? seems like shift is adding an unnecessary step

That would make

• click+drag+space > add a set of buildings infront of existing queue which would be very nice
• click+drag+shift > add set of buildings to end of queue
• click+drag+shift+space > add a set of buildings between orders spatially

Which might also unlock shift+space (split order between constructors) to be handled within the cmd queue system better

[dire cypress]

It would be OK, if ARM hadn't the Janus, too.

It is a good counter to cloak a Com and d-gun Janus. This is so much harder when the jammer can get spotted and killed as opposed to... Not...

[iron bronze]

Cor jammer has much less range. Arm 500=785k superficy. Cor 360=407k superficy. Cloak part for Arm is almost for free...

[wintry wasp]

I have used Arm Jammer + Cloak & Dgun to stop mauser pushes - it is very strong if you are patient

[chilly shard]

Just measured it more precisely, about 8 seconds to fire from command then 19 seconds to land, so 27 seconds total between issue of nuke order and impact
Antinukes start firing when the nuke fires, at the 19 seconds to impact time
This means the antinukes fire at these times from impact: 19, 17, 15, 13, 11, 9, 7, 5
The first 6 intercepted, the final two (at 7 and 5) failed to intercept
I then proceeded to EMP the antinuke and measure at 1 second intervals
An antinuke shot at 8 seconds from impact failed to intercept, but one shot 9 seconds from impact succeeded, so between 8-9 seconds from impact is when an antinuke needs to fire for it to be able to intercept, the timing with and without the EMP are in alignment, so my thinking there was a difference was wrong, I just didn't realize 8 seconds before impact was still too late as that seemed like a long time before impact to fire and still miss, but seems consistent between a late load and EMP in how they target

(first test was 8 nukes all shot at same time, and then I did 1 nuke at a time with EMP and used the time remaining, without rework, to get a precise time)

[elfin frigate]

Yeah I'd prefer all those cloaking structures to just have stealth and remove the cloaking from the sneaky pete. It makes cloaking a commander and degunning a rushed T2 unit way too easy.

[dire cypress]

Well Mauser OP...
And now sneaky Pete to stop Mausers, are ARM only, too...
Not a great thing in my head

[iron bronze]

Yeah, even in late t3, if you have 2 Juggernauts walking in, you can just set up couple of Arm t1 jammers, and leave your com underneath on cloak, you can probably avoid/dodge some scout streams, and get to use nice D-guns... Game winning move, and Arm jammer is not even really more expensive for jammed superficy than Cor one.

[elfin frigate]

It costs more to run/cloak

But it's so much better, just like the Arm T2 Trans... And early Arm T3.. And Arm T2 arty.. And Janus..

[wintry wasp]

A great point was raised that PvE "kill all buildings" is regularly played, stealthy & cloaked would need to be kept very limited for that purpose. I need to test some stuff, but I think the main issue is the building ghost rater than the radar dot

[elfin frigate]

Yeah, they don't know how to use spam

[rustic dust]

Can save upkeep by decloaking it and still have a better jammer than cor

[wintry wasp]

Spam cannot touch mountain tops, valleys, sea etc..

[elfin frigate]

Very good point.

[wintry wasp]

and having to cover the whole map to the proximty of cloak detection is a really shitty win condition

[rustic dust]

Was this from a specific distance? Distance between nuke silo and antinuke has a significant impact

[chilly shard]

Yes, I did 8 nukes from 8 adjacent silos for the initial test, which means they're not all exactly the same distance, but pretty close, and then I used the same silo every time for the single nuke tests and kept putting the antinuke silo back in the same spot after each time it blew up (and turned off deform to make it easier). And I just thought of another interesting test, to see the minimum travel time of a nuke and learning the thresholds of distance for each number of nukes a single antinuke can stop. Would need to test that on a flat map with no terrain to make it simple.

And my time measuring means were to the second as I didn't have a more precise way to easily measure time, using the stun timer and game time to note times.

[rustic dust]

Phone stopwatch+game running at half speed can help with precision in results

External timer only necessary if timer needs to start at the exact moment you input a command ingame, meaning you can't click start on a timer in another window

Only necessary for generally-unnecessary levels of precision, and there's potential for human error, but it's an option

[chilly shard]

Yeah, what I did was precise enough for me to get my answer

and easier to go at 0.1 speed at relevant times and just check timers and reduce need for input speed

[rare orbit]

0.6 now out; Naval, AA Bot & Thor edition

Remember this is a tweakunit patch. Please download to copy, don't try to paste from Discord, it can be error-prone.

Newest items added to top, new -this patch- in italics

Battleships: slight range increase. Arm now longer ranged.
Bulwark: main ATA gun range +100, so can shoot battleships.
T2 torp launchers: now underwater.
Thor: EMP cost increased, slight nerf to HP, alpha damage, boost to chaining.
Arm T2 AA bot: fires much faster. Cor T2 AA bot: increase to speed, range and damage, slight reload buff. Both now worth building.
Centurion: slight experimental buff, should be more compentent vs spam.
Gunslinger: general buffs & greater AoE, removed from consul
Commando: Can build AA, detect stealth units, has EMP resistance, and shoots air units
Sumo: less energy per shot
Janus: Handling nerfs, less commander damage
Shiva: better firing mechanics, has some missile tracking
HLT: build ~30% faster
Termites: +7 speed, +110 range, +85 damage (remember this is usually halved by dropoff)
Tremor: spread fire mode narrowed as above, thus damage density improved, and fire rate 20% increased

$welcome-message Battleships: slight range increase. Arm now longer ranged.$$T2 torp launchers: now underwater.$$Thor: EMP cost increased, slight nerf to HP, alpha damage, boost to chaining.$$Arm T2 AA bot: fires much faster. Cor T2 AA bot: increase to speed, range and damage, slight reload buff. Both now worth building.$$Gunslinger: general buffs & greater AoE, removed from consul$Commando: Can build AA, detect stealth units, has EMP resistance, and shoots air units$$Sumo: less energy per shot$$Janus: Handling nerfs, less commander damage$$Shiva: better firing mechanics, has some missile tracking$$HLT: build ~30% faster$$Termites: +7 speed, +110 range, +85 damage (remember this is usually halved by dropoff)$$Tremor: spread fire mode narrowed as above, thus damage density improved, and fire rate 20% increased

@astral gulch , @flat mason , @tired tinsel , et al

this one is more experimental, the battleship change is slight (and due to game mechanics, snipers still outrange both), but makes a solid difference to sea combat between the two. Depending how they play, Arm T2 sea might be slightly better for a given player now.
Torps being underwater makes them much more meaningful as a 1k metal T2 sea defence.

[tired tinsel]

NOICE

well if armada bship have longer range and higher speed that could be a little bit of a problem

[rare orbit]

slightly higher speed, they win if kiting on open sea, eventually
needs a lot to actually make that matter though

I very much want to see replays of this interaction in the wild to evaluate though

[tired tinsel]

yeah but broad side they also have 600 vs 333 dps

if very short rush distance with no place to run just make cruisers

[rare orbit]

basically despots still win (but not as hard) if they can get close, but with frigate support they still win a brawl

[rare orbit]

wp btw @tired tinsel , very good hold considering

[tired tinsel]

you could have killed me easily but you were cautious

[rare orbit]

combom OP

[tired tinsel]

i accidently rallied my workers to my front
so no bp, and i also sent 1 destroyer to mid

[rare orbit]

couldn't risk donating fleet, my com was pinned on island as I had no worker there

I saw early was weak, but didn't want to rush into a com without destroyer there

[tired tinsel]

mm, i think bot is easier to defend but top has more mex
ahh, makes sense

[rare orbit]

basically yes

[tired tinsel]

it seems easier than straits ngl

[rare orbit]

it's a fairer matchup but still a little wonky

[tired tinsel]

geo sea is not unfair mu
unless you playing in all welcome lobby where you can't get a trans in a timely fasion

[rare orbit]

however sea is more meaningful and harder for 9001 other people to jump in at you

[tired tinsel]

how is it more meaningful?

even though there's no center mex, any lost ships can be rezzed. vision affects amphib paths and air paths, as well as transporting and shooting down stuff going to island

[rare orbit]

cliff/cove abuse is really OP tbh, invincible conturrets are cheesy as heck
you can impact game more, sooner, can actually reach other players, or have a better front to assault than just a wall and a slot

[tired tinsel]

it seems pretty damn op if not disrupted, top

just develop build to defend land rushes, position your com on the land choke

once top is winning they don't have to push for the kill they can just siege mid and make them come to you

[rare orbit]

@fierce scaffold

[astral gulch]

Damn t2 torps look like worth trying out now

[simple spoke]

what was the centurion buff ?

i just dislike it freezing its firing when your tell it to go in diffrent dirrections a little auto heal wud be awsome

[tired tinsel]

t2 torp seems unbeatable lol
if battleships can't hit it

[astral gulch]

Can the battle subs outrange it?

[tired tinsel]

no, similiar range

[astral gulch]

Op, this is gonna be abused by the sea player thats behind

Should be fun to defend

[tired tinsel]

anti sub weapons are lower dps than above ground weps

and walls still block depth charge attacks against underwater buildings

[rare orbit]

handling mostly, I really want to see if it makes a difference

[rare orbit]

they do outtrade them though

[dire cypress]

Any ideas about the sneaky Pete?
It gives ARM a great advantage for all kinds of situations.
E.g.
Janus, Mauser and Thor...

[wintry wasp]

I don't think they are in a bad spot tbh, they are much more expensive than Cor's so you really have to use them more carefully

between unit spam & The Wizard Tower of Juno they rarely give arm a huge edge in being sneaky

[tired tinsel]

yeh but having the only push option being a ~30 speed battlesub is kinda mollasses
not to mention walls will make it invincible

the arm battleship longer range is good ig, encourage more regulars to try out armada sea

[dire cypress]

In every game phase they have a unique advantage.
Give T2 jammers of core the same? IDK. It feels so odd to have a nondetectable unit that has utility for other ones.

T1 wars are often about radar or no radar vision. Core builds a tower it gets shot down. Janus push and the commander can't hide. Arm has this commander killer and the ability to stop it. Core... Not so much

Might just be me but having such a mighty tool seems very valuable for the race itself.

[rare orbit]

walls might be a problem

not sure, will need to test in the wild

I think also I can put them s that oversea fire can still hit them
if manually fired, eg peopple are bunker hacking

[wintry wasp]

Core can jammer creep - arm cannot afford to do so, I rarely see jammers decide a battle

[elfin frigate]

Can't wait to try, Battleship change looks big to me

Thors didn't get HP nerf, they still have 56k in the tweak

[rare orbit]

balls, will update later

[dire cypress]

Kk then it's just me.

Nice idea with jam creeping

[violet geyser]

sneaky pete is a huge advantage because it makes commander WAY more powerful for obvious reasons. Anyone who has experienced it can relate.

[wintry wasp]

Yes, that is powerful, but it has plenty of regularly used counters - most commonly just some spam

I can't think of a single time I saw a Jammer and thought "That really turned the tide, glad it didn't get sniped!"

[violet geyser]

Well I watch somewhat high lobbies regularly and it's a very powerful move to completely hide a commander under a jammer just at maximum range. And if you can't see the jammer in the first place it's even better. I would say spam doesn't help because the jammer is build backwards. If an enemy unit can decloak it you probably have lost the lane already anyway.

[rare orbit]

there is a really OP play with petes

which I don't even want to talk about as it's gameturning and undetectable

[violet geyser]

Yes, it's possibly very very trong to have a stealthy jammer.
I can't even imagine having a t2 stealthy jammer lol

[iron bronze]

There is a big differents if you need 3 lines of spam to give vision on normal units( or Cor jammer), or you need 15 lines of spam to find cloaked Arm jammer, which with much bigger superficy can be further away by the way.

[violet geyser]

It's true that Juno solves that problem due to it's AOE its unlikely you ever miss a jammer when you suspect there might be one. But it's also true that Juno isn't an instant solution since it needs to have a charge so it's a build cost abd time constraint.
That side everyone knows Juno is OP since it's a jack of all trades, stupid unit in the first place. Bandaid.

[iron bronze]

Juno is too expensive early game, and even in later game, if against Arm you need to juno every square cm in front (and on side) of your armys path, it is much more expensive than against Cor, where you can only use it if necessity rises, oor not use it at all. Also if you are constantly juno'ing with multiple junos in front of your units, you cant use scout spam... And that is extra cost added too. If you need to scout with heavyer units or cant make enemy waste shots etc.

[wintry wasp]

I'm not quite sure what the 15 lines of spam here is meant to achieve, you don't need to find the jammer, you need to see the units under it to kill them - which is easily doable with the same 3 lines of spam and some arty to then punish the units - which are often sitting around since they are 'safe'

I'm not saying sneaky pete being cloakded isn't powerful - i just don't see it decide many games over cores jammer in the vast majority of times i see it

[wintry wasp]

Ponders

[iron bronze]

Lol, you are going to find cloaked commander that can move under jamming, by sending 3 lines of spam...

[wintry wasp]

If you're worried about a cloaked commander walking around zoning heavy units- you can probably afford a juno. If you can afford 3 lines of dense spam, or 15 for that matter, you can also very much afford a juno

[iron bronze]

This thing is turning in cirles here 🙂 It has been anwered already long and large.

[rare orbit]

it would probably be good for the game if petes couldn't mask cloaked coms radar signature

[iron bronze]

True, but to make exception for com might not be very intuitive, and if you see a single radar dot, and you know that it is commander... I mean they are well balanced in way that Arm jammer is more expensive and has much more range, covering more and being able to be built further back, more protected. Just removing the cloak part from Arm could be a solution, lower rated players wont even notice. I dont know, but yes, it seems much too strong as it is now.

[rare orbit]

the only other real alternative is remove pete cloaking entirely, which seems harsh, but it is highly problematic
don't get me started on snipers and petes

[wintry wasp]

Now that combo is very potent 😛 but i rarely see people actually do it well

[rare orbit]

completely broken

maybe pete cloaking should cost high energy, so turning it on is an econ choice

wouldn't stop it when snipers are around though

[wintry wasp]

Yeah, once your E rich its kinda moot, but then the Juno's are out anyway

[dire cypress]

For mid and late game it is still unfair

[rustic dust]

Most common use of sneaky pete i see is cloaked comm sitting at edge waiting for opponent to try to make a medium tank push during t1 so they can appear and dgun everything. At that point, the range alone is more than worth the price premium so it can be built out of sight, and neither juno nor streams of scouts are valid options

[wintry wasp]

Yeah, that's pretty much its best value specific play imo

[dire cypress]

Let CORE have an Coreverdrive...
Make it have +50%/+100% range for the same amount of energy as a ARM one can cloak.

It still is a big disadvantage for core.... But not as big.

[rare orbit]

might make the T2 ones a bit redundant, unsure

[dire cypress]

@rare orbit
True, but are there any better ideas?

I mean it is stupid. The core one costs half and covers half the area.

Let's see what advantages core has because of this?
Can be built faster.

What are the disadvantages?
You can't cloak it.
But at least you have to have them closer to the front and get it killed even easier.

[rare orbit]

if it can sort of be toggled into a T1.5 version that might work well
but that's impossible with tweaks alone

[dire cypress]

What is very odd is that the ARM one has both advantages. Sure it costs more but it costs the same per stealth area...
Perhaps just swap that.

Pete is unique anyways. Why does it need such a big area?

[rare orbit]

maybe smaller area for the cloaked pete, larger for uncloaked core
otherwise it's once again, somewhere arm gets best of both worlds

[rustic dust]

Or just make castro's radius disadvantage less extreme, and let the price discount balance out the rest?

[rare orbit]

maybe, yes, but the narrower area would also help offset the OP possibilities from hiding units entirely, by at least limiting the region per jammer moreso. also means it can't be built out of sight as easily

[tired tinsel]

Yeah when you notice jammer you can start looking for it

Sneaky Pete com is just op. Even high lv players get dgunned from it. You usually don't have the time to comb every single inch with spam

[rare orbit]

it basically sets up a situation where you cannot safely rush / push after a won battle, even though that's what you need to do to win the war, just in case there's something that might be there and will cost you the game, and you cannot sensibly detect, without wrecking your odds of success in the 98% of cases there's nothing there. it's just not good gameplay

[violet geyser]

this reminds me, does the game have a functionality to upgrade buildings, like how Cybran shields had 5 levels in SupCom ?

[rare orbit]

not directly, you can overlay with a builder though

[violet geyser]

but i dont think there is any building using that mechanic is there (stock) ?

[rare orbit]

aside from mexes and geos? no

[elfin frigate]

Switch the cloaking to the arm T2 jammer, that's a much more appropriate place for it

[rare orbit]

that would imply either it being a -huge- area stealthed, which would be OP even in T2, or a smaller radius jammed than the T1, which would be counterintuitive

possibly shrinking the T1 size a bit, removing cloak, then making the T2 radius slightly larger than the current Pete, but with cloak?
current Pete is 500 distance, T2 is 760
(cor T1 is 360, T2 700)
so new T1 jammer say 400, the cloaking T2, 600?

prices shuffling to account for such

[dire cypress]

The Janus makes the enemy Com MUCH less valuable. And the sneaky Pete makes the own Com MUCH more capable....

[rare orbit]

not even less valuable, it's a liability on the front once more than one janus appears

whereas arm com is turned via the pete into a magic invisible 'delete everything & maybe even free nuke' tool

[dire cypress]

Finally someone shares my opinion ♥️

[rare orbit]

if core had the janus I could see it working as a dynamic, lets the arm com hide from the damn things

[elfin frigate]

Oki

Can I talk about Dragon maws/claws these things are wild.

I think the Maws are actually okay but the Claws have a really high Alpha strike and no range falloff and 30 more range than the maws.

[rare orbit]

they also can't miss, and are excellent antispam, whereas fire lags

[elfin frigate]

And building like 3 dragons teeth infront of them makes them have like an 2 extra 2.8k HP

[rare orbit]

walls/bunkering things is an oddity of the game and not something we can touch here

[elfin frigate]

They are good anti spam but they are also too good at everything else. They are the most dreaded pork to go against if I've built gunslingers.

So yeah my thoughts on them is that A, the ranges should be the same or closer. 30 is a big difference for the varient that performs better in most situations.

And the Damage should be lowered but the Forking should be better, so they're more about being an Anti spam unit.

[rare orbit]

forking also effectively extends the range, and also means more hitscan attacks
eg they could just delete a line of ticks instantly

[tired tinsel]

just flat nerf it is best t1 defense by a country mile

[elfin frigate]

I don't mind about the extended range from forking personally, but the fact that is just blasts 210 damage at max range is crazy

[tired tinsel]

with t1 walls in front the effective hp is very good

[rare orbit]

IMO they should have probably less damage, but similar total dps spread through the chain, along with similar range (maybe even less than the maw, to account for the unmissable factor & chaining)

if the 'laser' logic were applied to the claws, they should have half the dps at max range compared to the fire option

and that is actually based in reality as you need exponentially more power to jump a spark the further from the source it is

whereas a laser is just dust scattering or bad focus/alignment

[elfin frigate]

Well the fire one can be really good to, it can over shoot a bit and if you funnel enemies with teeth 3 can deal with like a line of medium tanks very easily because they like, all do damage making their DPS like 900? to like 5-6 units at once

Way better than like 2 and bit HLTs

[rare orbit]

balance should usually be compared with the same setup, so while it 'can do X IF', you should compare it with default preparation / apm involvement

[elfin frigate]

Yeah definately, just saying they have their moments. I think I'd choose the lightning ones most of the time

[rare orbit]

one thing I did want to look into one day, and this would have to be a base game thing, is making the maws use a premixed / jet flame

[elfin frigate]

What's that do?

[rare orbit]

that would allow them to have a much faster projectile stream, only possible issue might be it has less spread

[elfin frigate]

Ooh, okay, so less missing fast units

[elfin frigate]

I see, so it almost has no travel time, it just jets out and is out there burning

[tired tinsel]

is that overlap with the twinguard?

[dire cypress]

Yes please!
And please give them less AOE. I know sounds stupid. But otherwise ppl will complain about: but you can kill the other defense with its splash damage...

Dragon maws would be a good counter to Janus if they had as much range as the arm variant. But of course more range and sparks to even further extend... It's Arm.

[dire cypress]

As are dragon claws with Beamer turrets.

[rare orbit]

@rustic dust are there any breakpoints for janus dps (or alpha damage) that it makes actual balance sense to keep default damage as it is?

eg maybe they're 'meant' to be able to 2 shot a fiend, or 99% kill an LLT

for a skirmisher, they have obnoxiously high damage output, might make some sense to either lower damage per shot, or increase reload time

the handling nerfs to janus make it less oppressive in small numbers now, but once enough pile up there's still a wall of high power missiles volleying at you, like rocket bots on steroids

alternatively cost should maybe be higher, keeping it as a powerful unit, but less spammable

[elfin frigate]

I think the worst part about it, is it's the burstiest T1 pork at it's max range. Nothing else even the maws come close because the maw's travel time
All the laser pork has damage falloff

[rare orbit]

indeed, lightning breaks the rules of dropoff for hitscan weapons, along with snipers, and once again, those 3/4 exceptions are all arm

I don't think it's possible to have a distance dropoff respected, certain via tweak, but I'll test it later just in case

[dire cypress]

Tbh. Claws have less single target damage. But there are many situations where it doesn't matter. E.g. rocket bots with low health... You don't want to walk into a claw with them.

Perhaps it could be a thing that the Januuuuus gets a higher RoF with the same DPS. That would make the initial brick wall of damage a lot less intimidating.

I am not saying it will be a solution but it could be.

[rare orbit]

might break the poke & run role though
too missile-truck-on-steroids

[rare orbit]

@gloomy raptor

[wintry wasp]

I really don't see the driver for these - the majority of times i've seen pete be a serious "made a difference" have been people making planned skilled plays, commander, also cloaked in jammer radius then dgun critical unit(s) etc.

I'd say that's the sort of strategic tactical play we want to encourage, not make impossible (remove cloak from t1) more expensive, difficult and not worth it

Right now core's jammer is 50% the cost and has 72% the range of Arms - pretty good deal if you ask me.

[rustic dust]

None i can think of off the top of my head, though a price tag nerf sounds good

[dire cypress]

72% of the range makes about 50% of the area.

And again. Having a unit that can cloak AND hide further behind the lines is very potent.

If the jammer would at least be closer to the front there would be any kind of possibility to find it.

[wintry wasp]

It needs to oneshot grunts / pawns it connects with - i'd call that a break point, the bots can dodge the aoe with good movement micro already, but if you can just run down a janus with 3 grunts w/o losing any it'll really not be in a good spot

[rustic dust]

Very important to point out that it's basically never 1 janus unsupported

[wintry wasp]

in niche circumstances - yes; but how often are those happening? I very rarely see jammers used in general gameplay already and by the time t2 ones are around Juno's just wreck everything, so again people don't bother.

I guess my point boils down to nerfing something which is infrequently used as is feels like a shame when radar jamming isn't used often anywya

The cloak on arms statics is rarely used - ferret, pop up, rattlesnake etc, i really need to test the out of LOS ghost mechanics on these tbh

[rustic dust]

Most janus breakpoints are wishy-washy due to potential of units to fall back and only take a variable amount of splash, chance of a janus only firing 1 rocket, etc. Micro tricks for entirely dodging janus damage in a lab setting also have very limited practicality in real matches. I haven't played current janus nerf so idk if i feel it needs more, just saying specific breakpoints are hard to nail down

[rustic dust]

I think they'll have a ghost if spotted when non-cloaked, but if you get los again while they're cloaked, ghost lost

[wintry wasp]

Yeah, i need to test with another player in a 1v1 environment, using /cheats and /team 1 to test or queuing up build/reclaim to test is confusing and hard

[fierce scaffold]

If you're free we can do it now

[wintry wasp]

Changing the alpha to cmders (-30% dmg) and reducing their turn speed was really nice

Confirmed - building ghosts remain after you seeing the area a cloaked building is in while it was cloaked after seeing it uncloaked once, unless you see it destroyed or its wreckage

I'd argue it should be assumed it has been destroyed, this would give a lot more value to cloak on buildings, which right now has only a one-time-surprise chance.

Except vs AI which doesn't see map ghosts as targets, which is why jammers are OP vs AI

[dire cypress]

Well if Pete stays cloaked there is no ghost for the enemy player.
In addition you can't "accidentally" kill it with stray shots. Because of its huge cover area. But I think we agree that we disagree on this one thing. On many many others we have very similar opinions 😉.

[rustic dust]

Btw i was apprently wrong about uncloaked sneaky pete having same upkeep as castro. Sneaky pete costs 25 e/s to cloak and 40 e/s to jam, while castro costs 25 e/s to jam

So 1 more point in favor of castro as far as pricing

[wintry wasp]

Yeah, core is substantially less expensive and you usually see 2 or 3 core ones, while arm has to be very selective on position else they just drain to much early

[dire cypress]

So Arm has a discount on jam cost/area.

In short:
Core has a 1-2 min time frame where it's jammer is better. But for that you pay premium per area.

[dire cypress]

Because you need 2 to cover the same area?

[wintry wasp]

Yes, which makes sense? core build more of them to cover an area but they cost less

[dire cypress]

Honestly there are more pressing problems than the sneaky Pete I guess...
I just dislike it, because it is so unique in its abilities.

[rustic dust]

Strictly looking at area coverage relative to price and upkeep leaves out too many factors both in favor of and in opposition to both sides. Best not to try to draw any conclusions directly from those numbers

[wintry wasp]

Hehe, I like it for its uniqueness and I think cloaking / jamming / radar / sonar and its ilk are all very interesting mechanics that should play a larger part 🙂

One for the chalk board to come back too over a 🍻 sometime!

[dire cypress]

Well I am a hard CORE player 😉
Because of that I am limiting myself to not have this ability.
I should consider doing what 75%+ of the players do in 8vs8 and play arm.

[wintry wasp]

I'd play both a lot tbh - know your enemy, playing Arm does not make you a Core deserter - they'll still love you too

[dire cypress]

True. It's a spiritual thing or something, I can't get over it.😂

[flat mason]

Sure you can, I bump into them all the time. :3c I've shot them dead by accident with Banishers before. They're not hard to kill if you overrun an area. Sneaky Petes are fine, guys. Jesus. You don't need to nerf EVERYTHING Arm has.

[dire cypress]

ARM Commanders are fine.... almost they can build ARM units... OP!😂

[flat mason]

I tried making them one time with a stolen arm con and I was like ", this is SO EXPENSIVE. Nvm Cor's are op, you can actually build them in t1."

t2 jammers are cheaper than Sneaky Petes.

[dire cypress]

Which is crazy, I know.

Petes are just very cool, when you set up a COM trap, to d-gun med tanks or something.

[flat mason]

I've done that with a Cor jammer too op. :3c it is a very satisfying feeling.

[dire cypress]

It's just a fair bit harder if the enemy has any scouts.

[flat mason]

One thing they don't tell you about Sneaky Petes is if they shut off because you're E stalling one time, they decloak and if they had eyes there at that moment, now they can see it forever. It's not that op. :3c

[rustic dust]

arm coms have more dgun range, so...

[dire cypress]

This is true. So the counter play is to hope for a mistake of the enemy.

But really, this threat should not be about this one unit, only.

[flat mason]

Faster dgun, too.

[dire cypress]

And more damage!

[flat mason]

I don't think that one matters :3c

[dire cypress]

The other statements were false, too. So I figured I might as well 🥳

[rustic dust]

arm com has had more dgun range for animation reasons since before i started playing the game. it's only something like 12 range, but it's there

[flat mason]

It also doesn't have to be facing its target to fire unlike the Cor com. 3:

[wintry wasp]

t2 jammers are cheaper than Sneaky Petes... i never knew this facepalm

[wintry wasp]

I'm actually going to raise a bug/sugguestion about the ghost-buildings situation, as right now its pretty weird

[elfin frigate]

arm op

[rustic dust]

can't remember if this has been fixed, but: https://github.com/beyond-all-reason/Beyond-All-Reason/issues/2373#issuecomment-1848207825

i find this bug to be amusing to watch.

[dire cypress]

I see no difference

[wintry wasp]

its the firepoint in the model

not the unit or weapon def

[dire cypress]

But arm llts have 5 less range because their nozzle is longer

[dire cypress]

So it really has more range?

[wintry wasp]

I duno the details, just that core dgun is janky, there's also a hand raising animation which delays its first shot and stuff

[dire cypress]

Kk

[rustic dust]

arm com stretches its arm out for most of its animations, resulting in its dgun, which comes from the outstretched arm, travelling farther from the center of the model

[rare orbit]

not talking about nerfing as much as possibly changing where it is, so hidden coms with magic delete buttons aren't a thing you have to be paranoid about early on

it's not a definite plan, just a discussion

[pine nacelle]

Didn't you make commando a walking comm detector?

[rare orbit]

commandos aren't on field when this is possible, nor is waiting for a t2 cor botlab before moving any force out offensively
they also don't detect cloaked coms

[elfin frigate]

I've been considering rushing one with someone else rushing like a Tzar to provide that function
Need to get the balance on a lobby

If they could build T2 walls I think I'd really want a commando on a front line, someone suggested that as an idea to make them more useful on a front

[rare orbit]

I can see that working as a sapper capacity, unsure if would be OP with their 'behind the lines' usage though

could spam t2 wall nanoframes to block shots

[elfin frigate]

I can't think of how it would be abused, but I feel like it could be

[rare orbit]

you could drop a commando in, wall itself in immediately, then mine everything outside from within the fortress

[elfin frigate]

Can't Freakers like, already do that?

[pine nacelle]

Let me present to you: the combat engineer! He can build not only t2 walls, but also some t2 AND t1 pork, as well as con turrets and radars!

[elfin frigate]

Like Twitchers/freakers(OTA name) the unit i mentioned before

[elfin frigate]

That's the one

[wintry wasp]

Juzza, why haven't you dropped 4 commando's and a twitcher, and used the twitcher to build Fiends behind enemy lines already? 😛

[tired tinsel]

yikes

[placid ridge]

I don't think it's a good idea to have HLTs come up faster considering how strong they are against bot factories. Usually when I see a HLT in a position I can't contest as bots I'm forced to tech switch to veh.

Shuris being a part of countering commandos is critical to preventing them from tearing up a base..imo their vulnerability to air is a key part of their balance.
I think trying to cover their weaknesses will result in them being overtly strong especially considering their already unique toolset(do not die with transports, provide jamming and combat utility, amphib, build mines remotely, etc.). I'd rather polarize them further as saboteurs rather than make them self sufficient.
Preventing them dropping wrecks is a good start. One thing people miss about commandos is that they are kings of contesting wreck fields fast movement and jamming means they can get a headstart on reclaim(and also protect their escorts), they can defend themselves with their strong aoe cannon and also set up minefields to deter the first reaction to a wreck field.

You can even be cheeky by booby trapping wreck fields for an ambush

[rare orbit]

basically a handful of T1 anything is enough to counter them, or a non trivial number of shuriken, or an abductor/emp bomber

I haven't -yet- seen anything seemingly oppressive coming from commandos, that doesn't seem related to a bad response / poor vision
which will sort itself once people get into patterns

[violet geyser]

Huh ? One or two volleys of rocket bots kill them just like any other turret.

(HLT)

[placid ridge]

Just repair unless it is a horde of rockos the HLT will win out by attrition
Furthermore you can screen with LLTs with it's generous range or your own combat units

[violet geyser]

HLT have low damage. Their only upside if they slightly outrange rocket bots. Still not a good porc.

[rare orbit]

I mean, porc is meant to porc, and slightly faster build time doesn't make it suddenly oppressive, just not 99% irrelevant to most games

[violet geyser]

Another actually somewhat common way to deal with them is a dgun.

[rare orbit]

it's still 1 unit which makes it vulnerable, and it's a fixed location 500m investment early on

[violet geyser]

It's just not a cost efficient thingy which is why it's made often, unlike llts and especially AoE turrets.

[placid ridge]

Well I won't disagree with HLT being poor in the current state of the game but it strikes a better balance of porc investment compared to say the t1 static arty agitator/gauntlet

[rare orbit]

I'd argue dragon's claw vastly more oppressive tbh

[placid ridge]

T1 popups behind t1 walls are pretty much only defeated by t1 veh arty.

[rare orbit]

I'm not sure on the logic for gauntlets being bad, maybe to prevent infinite T1 arty creep wars

[violet geyser]

AoE turret deffo better but it's also because of the stupid stealth feature which just makes them so annoying to actually kill. Can't tell you how many rockets I have lost due to them just being stupid LOL

[placid ridge]

And bombings I guess

Also I am fine with the state of t1 static arty right now since you essentially forfeit t2 in the process

[violet geyser]

Anyway I think HLT just not good mostly. Fringe situation do exist. I like them to zone if you have one or two preemptively made repair nanos or so tho

[placid ridge]

Worser still an abductor can essentially donate a commando to the enemy

[rare orbit]

yeah, commandos are a risk to use

I sort of think of them as an eco greed check, in a way like marauders could be considered to be
they also give a micro unit for early T2, like gunslinger

[placid ridge]

It really is heavily dependent on the map

[rare orbit]

yup, but that is also good

if a unit is 'good' or 'too good' -always-, it's probably OP
everything ideally should have a time/place/situation

[violet geyser]

Commandos should be something like T2 marauder for core. Something like that. I dislike the amount of micro that you are supposed to spend to spent mines and blow them up, doesn't fit bar design philosophy at all.
Make them an actual combat unit. A t2 marauder kind of unit.

[placid ridge]

Tomruler showcases how strong a commando can be depending on the map in this replay although I would argue he definitely should have proxied some air scouts/cameras so the commando could prioritize targets.
#💾｜bar-replays message

[placid ridge]

Rejected. Another mara is just boring, the identity of the commando right now is what makes it so enthralling to use.

[violet geyser]

That's ur opinion, I'm free to have mine. As it is the commando is a joke unit that is very unintuitive to use and as long as that doesn't change, it stays a fringe unit. That's a fact.

[rare orbit]

it's like gunslingers, not often best option, but with micro can work well, I don't see it being a bad option to -have- as long as others exist

[violet geyser]

Frankly you have to ask why does core have a joke unit in the first place. There isn't a unit that is as unintuitive to use on arms side. Surprise.

Gunslingers aren't as much of a joke as a commando. Microing units is a good thing but running around, building mines and selfd ing them is on a complete different level. In that sense it's more like a hero from Warcraft and even more micro intensive that a commander and even a commander is already a huge standout unit.

[violet geyser]

I guess we figured out why people barely use him - because "right now he is so enthralling to use". 🤪

[placid ridge]

@jovial pagoda

[violet geyser]

I'm sure you can find a player that is using termites if you just look hard enough also 🙏🏻

[placid ridge]

Yep me and Hornet played with him and he won the game

That was fun remember Hornet it was on glacial gap and he killed the 40 OS

It was like last week I think

[rare orbit]

https://www.beyondallreason.info/replays?gameId=7f5aa265f75af7be3b0400167298233b you mean that one?

[tired tinsel]

t2 torp launcher should not be underwater, unit's underwater weps are so much weaker the only way to clear it is with kraken spam

[elfin frigate]

Will try it

[elfin frigate]

I think 50 m should counter a 1.2km unit, should a tick counter a pounder? Terrible take

[rare orbit]

doesn't need spam, just 1 with support, or a couple of cruisers flanking, or torp bombers/gunships. or my anti sub boat (admittedly not out yet)

[elfin frigate]

Go look at these replays, read the posts below and tell me with a strait face commandos are fine as they are #1182178047894503504 message

[rare orbit]

them being on top of the water for all to shoot for free though, almost negates the point of them. alternative buff ideas greatly appreciated, I do think there is scope for an underwater one though, perhaps should be a new T2.5 defence however

[placid ridge]

By that logic some ticks shouldn't be able to kill a t2 con. Yet here we are.

[rare orbit]

wondering if -just- below the water is viable, so manual shooting with battleship can eventually remove them too, but seems a bit too janky

[elfin frigate]

Comparing it a unit that only builds is a dumb comparsion

[tired tinsel]

t2 torps are already strong, the only predator is the battleship
and battleships are kinda slow and sluggish. if you put t1 walls in front of them they are tanky

[wintry wasp]

What result are you aiming for with the lamprey change?

[placid ridge]

Nice we are going into semantics over bickering already

Please lets be civil

[elfin frigate]

gees, calm your farm

[rare orbit]

wallhacking them is another discussion I think, as that might be something that needs balance adjustments. seawalls are broken as they currently are

[elfin frigate]

Believe me noodle, I've used commandos ALOT and if your air player has ANY idea what they are doing, they will stun your commandos that have dropped with 1 shuri each, nap them with a trans and eat them with their con turrets, free 1.2k m per commando

[tired tinsel]

i mean pincer and amphib have emp resist for the very same reason

[rare orbit]

not flat out removable by any hover that wants to, nor so vulnerable to over water ship fire. right now a handful of misc anything can just remove them

[tired tinsel]

i mean it's teh same behaviour as popup turrents on land, dunno what is problematic
naval walls are more expensive too

[rare orbit]

over a wide area of sea you need impossible numbers to actually lock sea down, then you find equal money in boats can just punch through a given area. on -narrow- chokes they are okay yes

[wintry wasp]

What if you could turn it off and it sank underwater like sea planes?

[fierce scaffold]

oooooooooh

hold lurker for navy?

[rare orbit]

not quite as your torps can sail under magically, whereas enemy ones cannot

[elfin frigate]

It's a joke how easy they are to deal with, it's not remotely ballaced, Go and read the arguments I linked to. I've argued this so much and no one has given me a remotely valid response.

Reason they could be too good) They're really good on some maps
OMG, like every unit? How bots are better on hilly maps and vechs are better on open maps, or missile ships are btter on maps where they can hit eco?
Reason they could be too good) I like being able to stop them with 100m (1 shuri 1 trans)
You might as well just not use them at point, they too counterable.

[tired tinsel]

yeah that could be changed ig
915 range is nothing to scoff at, 2 can cover your whole long beach. compare one of those to a cruiser, the performance difference is big
yeah their hp is low without walls ig

[rare orbit]

essentially a sea popup?

not sure possible with a tweak alone, but interesting idea

[wintry wasp]

You could also give it a small anti-spam weapon to punish super-light raids, but i prefer the pop-down approach as its micro-skill

[placid ridge]

Coordinate with your air. If you are hot dropping a commando you can ask for that much.

Also in Tomruler's replay he showcased how being amphibious allows you to negate a lot of pressure from air. However I do believe that is a map dependent basis.

I don't even understand what juzza wants. Going to drop this conversation. Nice talk.

[rare orbit]

T1 torps I am doing this with already

[wintry wasp]

The issue with naval defence is the rock-paper-scissors situation with subs vs surface, makes it very tricky

[elfin frigate]

No,

Look at what they had to do with other raiding units like the anphibs. They have to give them massive EMP resistance because shuri's counter them every single time.

if you can coordinate with your air you should have spend the metal on bombers, Commandos are supposed to be able to go places where you DON'T have control of the map

[placid ridge]

Cool didn't read very good

Over means over son

[elfin frigate]

Good engaging with an arguement. I'm watching the replay you posted to understand where you're coming from

[rare orbit]

that's the whole point of this. it allows a light T1 defence that actually defends from raids, of either type (still loses to air though)

[elfin frigate]

If you don't want to enagage with balance disscusions or have your opinons questioned you don't belong here anyway

[rare orbit]

an LLT on land will defend you against whatever at opening, pretty much, sea has to spam 3 different things for the same cover, at like 800m cost

[tired tinsel]

hovers are pretty taxed tho
supporters and dolphins mop up seekers, riptides laugh at caymans

against plat use naval wall, does the HLT buff include naval HLT

[rare orbit]

no

[tired tinsel]

the benefit of static is that you have rez subs
if they trade stuff into your static you just rez them both

[rare orbit]

if you move an armcrus into say a coratl, vanilla cruisers tbf, the torp gets out of it with about 400hp, from 2800 starting

with sonar support right behind it, 2 cruisers kill it and 1 survives with perfect health

given that you had to invest into a line of them, even say 3, that means less cost in boats can happily holepunch you

[placid ridge]

https://tenor.com/view/marine-vs-lurker-carbot-animations-starcrafts-starcraft-gif-15370959

[fierce scaffold]

that's a lurker but not hold

[rare orbit]

with the underwater version, 1 cruiser gets it to half HP (without supporting sonar)
2 cruisers will remove it but the second cruiser is variably damaged
with sonar support, they STILL kill it, but second cruiser gets to about 30% health

so this keeps cruisers relevant, while shielding from hover damage. note also that a kraken can outtrade a torp even if the torp has sonar support

it mostly means intel is more important, so you have to scout a bit more first. I suppose it's also a buff to hovertanks, indirectly

with full vision for both sides

[rare orbit]

the issue is early you need to defend your dock, while also being out on the map with your army, and sea radar is expensive so you can't spam it early
result is you can easily lose the rock paper scissors, so you slap down a torp at most to try to ward off boats - but a hover cheese will remove that for free and your whole start position. bonus if that doesn't even come from your lane opponent.

[tired tinsel]

naval llt is fine addition. otherwise like just skill issue. you scout hovers you make 3-4 supporters, and they guard you

[rare orbit]

unless your com lives in your dock for first 5 minutes solid, you're a bit stuffed

[rare orbit]

we can't add a naval LLT as people will just build that instead of a torp, then lose to a sudden sub
so light hybrid seems the way

[tired tinsel]

ships are advantaged when retreating backwards

[elfin frigate]

Ready to engage?

I watched this replay.

1. This is probably the best map for commandos. It's not very good to go sea so the sea surrounding the island are usually free for you to walk through even if you get shot down.
2. People build their Eco on the cliff making it vulnerable to the commando's large build range
3. The enemy team had no air, no fighters, no shuriken. Again, could have just used bombers and had about as free a time.
4. The enemy team had almost not AA, they could have dropped a Gunglsinger, they could have used bombers and gotten nearly the same effect.

You can't get a much better map or scenario, that is them at their BEST and the buffs to them wouldn't have a change them at all that game. No one even tried to shuri them.

[tired tinsel]

just make it cheap like a land llt

[rare orbit]

'if you scout' is the problem, you usually cannot, and air doesn't always

[tired tinsel]

then you play safe
make those supporters, ask for air scout

[rare orbit]

already exists but I can't get it in main game

[tired tinsel]

light hybrid defense is okay, but i thought sea's thing was strong but niche

make the nava HLT build faster and that'll be something, that shit builds so slow

[rare orbit]

can try and see what it changes, I might add the plasmas back too

$unit corgplat

[keen ice]

Unable to find a unit named 'corgplat'

[rare orbit]

https://www.beyondallreason.info/unit/corgplat USO DA

[tired tinsel]

yeah

[rare orbit]

I don't know if adding the frocks would help much

[tired tinsel]

if something can easily hit subs i think that would nullify them too much. although i think sub spam is slightly too strong

cor destroyers too vunerable to frigates, and expensive. for a unit that gives map control orcas are really strong when outnumbering

subs also are janky to control tho and they are weak when you are losing the fight and the enemy bulldozes over your subs

[rare orbit]

subs are more raiders than combat, they can't body block

eg dolphins beat subs, ridiculously

[tired tinsel]

have you seen outlaw's games? he crushing a lot with frigate sub

[rare orbit]

with support it's different

[tired tinsel]

it's impossible to push into them cause frigates build fast, subs give map control so can't split up army besides supporter poke
best answer is to turtle up and eco. one thing that comp can't do is fight into torp launcher + destroyer

[rare orbit]

same metal in T1 torps for comparison to before

had blue screen so had to reload/redo everything again

[tired tinsel]

what's the change?

[rare orbit]

nothing at all, this just compares efficiency to T2 torps

[tired tinsel]

the range means that you build 2 they will cover like 4 times the space with full power
that's why plp build t2 torps vs ducks not t1

[rare orbit]

alright, try to cover straight long beach with T2 torps and see what equal metal in cruisers does to any given point of it
it will pop straight through

[tired tinsel]

cause cruisers are like sumos you should see them a mile away
they trade on yourside of the map if you don't die that's reclaim

[rare orbit]

T2 torps are mostly okay but need something to make them better porc, to account for 'slot cost'

[tired tinsel]

i guess they are a bit weak without walls but like the t2 torps also cover against subs
is their main purpose

[rare orbit]

on eight horses though, or flooded entrenched, they're potent
(as are subs)

[tired tinsel]

i use them on straits they are worth it there too

[rare orbit]

if they stay surface they probably need either less cost, or more HP, or both

[tired tinsel]

naval walls

[rare orbit]

I kind of like the thematic of the T2 being subsurface though

[tired tinsel]

too much clokable underwater shit

[rare orbit]

that's post build addition, not the unit itself, and uses jank

naval wall behaviour should be fixed, it's silly it acting as it does

[tired tinsel]

naval walls blocking surface shots is like t1 popups block surface shots too
its the torp that is wierd

[rare orbit]

yes however that's the interaction in question

[tired tinsel]

you said cruisers vs t2 torps

[rare orbit]

walls either need to have a deeper hitbox, or torps shouldn't teleport to water top

on a side note I'm wondering if I can do anything with sea mines here to make them wall out subs, ducks, rauders too

not sure it's possible via tweak though

[tired tinsel]

naval walls can be knocked down with battleships i think

[rare orbit]

as just an example, as cruisers also hit underwater versions for similar trade value

[tired tinsel]

they do like half dps underwater

another issue is you can't scout the torp launchers
without a sea plane or t2 scout

[rare orbit]

the result is very much the same, 1 cruiser will survive but other is half dead to almost dead

seaplanes being more needed aren't a bad thing

[tired tinsel]

game changing t2 porc being invisible and 900 range is just ugh
naval is already hard to attack with on t2

[rare orbit]

as I said it mostly boils down to a scouting change in games so far

yeah, I'm not hard-set on this being THE buff to go for, this is experimental atm

[tired tinsel]

cause travel time is a lot and risk of dropping reclaim
slow t2 ships

[rare orbit]

but something aside from wall hackery should be the way to go

might be this is viable with the antisub ships being a thing, they'd happily remove these
hovertanks also completely fine with them

[tired tinsel]

are the antisub ships using drones that can be shot with aa?

[rare orbit]

yes, they're counterable, but do scout at the least, in that case

[wintry wasp]

this could be resolved by moving the aimpoint below the water level, but keeping some of the model above, that would also let you scout & ground attack them similar to dragon claw/maw pop ups

[rare orbit]

that's a thorny one, but is possible. would also allow battleships etc to attack it though, and in fact even weaker to cruisers

if model is over water the hitbox is too

so a cruiser next to it with manual fire will use both charges AND overwater guns, and hit with both

[jovial pagoda]

Alright, I have been summoned to the commando discussion

yeah, they really are weak to air, but that does just mean you need to treat them like bombers that can land rather than as just land units

also don't make more than 1 usually, since you can rarely micro or support that many

A single expenditure of 1250 m for psychological damage is pretty good; for actual damage commandos have problems unless people design their bases extremely badly

Commando drops really do best on lane maps without dedicated air players in the similar way an air transition does

In a recent replay I was able to use a commando to multiply the damage of a bombing run by several times on Bismuth Valley, a lane map

send air to bait out enemy air (there was none), scout, bomb bp etc, and force the enemies to start spending on AA. Send a secondary payload of a single commando to finish off high value targets like fusions, remaining cons and afus arrays that weren't completely destroyed

the main thing is that you shouldn't expect a commando to exist more than 10 seconds without air support or a sufficiently large distraction

I'm also not sure giving them emp resist would do much; at most it would just give them an extra 1-2 seconds which is maybe another mine cause if they're getting shuri'd that means you don't have enough air support to escort them

A different role I don't think I've seen people use commandos for is as an upgraded combat engineer

they have radar, a jamming field, one of the longest build ranges in the game for a unit, a gun, high speed and can lay mines

vulnerable to snipers, but if you're a front player you can build them out of a twitcher to use as a super maneuverable and reasonably tanky forward reclaimer

push up, grab reclaim that other things wouldn't have been able to, lay mines along temporarily taken areas, put down spycams/t1 popups etc. make a transport to go to other fronts where there's more reclaim and scoop that

have done this on Forge before and my commando boy paid for itself several times over with the contested metal it got and the units it killed by laying mines (until it got sniped)

[elfin frigate]

In this tweak they have 85% emp resist, their weapon can target air, (Only usually hits gunships/shuri's and trans trying to nap them) and can build T1 AA. And have a counter intrusion radious

[elfin frigate]

This sounds super sad to me, that you should require air control to use them, that makes them next to uselesss in so many games

[dire cypress]

@rare orbit
Is this the newest version?
Should it get pinned?
#1186850950770610207 message

[rare orbit]

I have a slight amendment soon but it can for now maybe. I've updated the pinned one to link to it
once 0.61 is updated I'll hassle Perfi :P

[elfin frigate]

Yeah the cents feel too strong, gotta nerf them

Gotta put the thor HP change in, where did you guys land on the T2 Torp launchers? The sea mains were telling me it felt too strong.

[rare orbit]

I've not seen enough games with it yet to be sure

they are still weak for the metal, and tbh it is mostly an intel problem, not a technical one

once people adjust they'll be fine I think
but I am open to other ideas

(as ever, replays are welcome, naval are hard to get data from as most lobbies try to nextmap sea maps)

[elfin frigate]

Supreme has tons of sea battles, and yeha it's supreme but the sea isn't 'that' different from any other sea

[rare orbit]

there's more asymmetry and many more things that aren't actually boats involved

it is useful data but I need a wider picture

[elfin frigate]

fair

[tired tinsel]

hmm maybe lamprey could use a tankyness increase i guess

600 more hp?

the thing about cloaked lamprey is that I cannot scout them, so i can't see that they are turtling --> greed
once you made the ships to attack you are not ecoing

[rare orbit]

seaplanes are your friend

[tired tinsel]

a side effect of higher battleship range is support ship is easier to scout

[rare orbit]

battleships also perfectly outtrade a lamprey unless it can ambush

[tired tinsel]

how can you hit it underwater?

ground fire?

[rare orbit]

vanilla one I mean, that's why it's underwater now (and preventing hovers/bombers having open season on it)

having it -just- under the water so arty fire can hit it is another possibility
but a bit janky

[tired tinsel]

i think just making it tankier ig, you can rez it too

[rare orbit]

so battleships just infinite trade value vs the only 'heavy' sea porc option?

[tired tinsel]

battleships lose to kraken line or torp bombers

[rare orbit]

have you played games with naval shields on btw

wondering how that affects lamprey interactions

[tired tinsel]

one thing about battleship range increase is it makes support ship even more snipeable
na haven't

[rare orbit]

hm

[tired tinsel]

prolly makes sense to ad

[rare orbit]

it changes dynamics a lot late game, but yes, I agree it should exist

issue is some disparity between arm/core in plasma vs laser weapons on boats

might be worth trying. another thing I considered was giving lampreys themselves a small shield (that only covers them)

but that might not be possible via tweak alone

[tired tinsel]

battleship has some weakness, subs and t2 air
and pulsar and titan do fine enough

2 nuke bomber one shot a arm battleship 🙂

oh the defensive porc you want vs ships is paralyzer
that shit is op

[rare orbit]

I'm primarily thinking sea vs sea atm, but yes that is nuts

[tired tinsel]

owns battleship wars pretty hard

[rare orbit]

yeah, it's why I'll never make a sea emp weapon

[tired tinsel]

yeah but virtually all maps have land main

[tired tinsel]

maybe lamprey can have open and close mode

25% damage recieved while not firing

actually that seems like a great solution 🙂

[rare orbit]

not possible with tweak alone

might imply some model work too, unsure

doable I think via just vertical height, water as the shield kind of thing

but would have to be main game

[violet geyser]

Is there a particular reason there is put so much energy into a completely messing up navy ? Navy is fine as it is, the only change that imo is warranted

• slight skater nerf
• slight hering buff
• adjust cruiser depth charge
• possibly adjust arm frigate so it's just very slightly better up front (=make front turret a bit stronger, aft turret a bit weaker so there is not that huge dropoff between frontal and broadside fights).

Anything else is fine, incl T2 Torp and battleships.

The way you are literally changing every t2 unit is just adding more second order problems

[tired tinsel]

they want t2 torps to be more study against battleships and hover threats
like land porc
I think making battleships 1k range is too much, arm battleship just needs more hp and a bit more range. too much range is uninteractive (1k is more than a jug), better to make them more durable so t3 doesn't vaporize them. give depth charge bonus damage vs amphib perhaps

cruiser having very small sonar range makes them really shit at patrolling the seas and cleaning up ducks. you still have to rely on radars and sonar stations

i guess that's what op support ship is for ig

[rare orbit]

navy hardly touched tbh. it's very experimental currently, replays very welcome

[rare orbit]

it's not that huge a buff, especially considering that it's measured mostly from middle of ship, eg a sniper with '900' range STILL outranges a 1000 range battleship

[tired tinsel]

rocket ships pretty reasonable against snipers, just have to be patient
spam juno

[rare orbit]

juggs and T3 /hovertanks are part of the issue, right now end stage land can just plonk whatever in sea, and even a solid fleet basically has to run away. range on battleships (which are basically T3 units) helps them handle that

[rare orbit]

snipers/starlights are part of the issue but at least are counterable by missile ships eventually yes

[tired tinsel]

sea has the op thing called rez sub
sea on the defence can soak up so much pressure

i know it feels terrible to lose battleships to snipers, but every unit heavier than a blitz also hurts getting shot by snipers

if they go too heavy into snipers you can just eco and flagship ig 😉
flagship kinda makes sniper spam feel bad

[rare orbit]

often you can't know until the buggers decloak and start popping you. snipers not really the point though

idea is to make battleships generally more competent, vs land in general, and feel more like a solid ship. they used to have 1200 range iirc

so +10% really isn't that huge

[tired tinsel]

they have better speed than all similiarly ranged units

if there isn't room to run yeah they get kinda ouched by hovers and titans
but so do other t3 against behemoth

maybe those map aren't so strong for sea

[rare orbit]

biasing turrets like that would massively disfavour retreat/kiting situations, if anything you want the rear turret buffed
the other points are valid, I've not gotten to looking into those properly yet, nor want to change too many things at same instant

[tired tinsel]

battleships already fuck up all t2 except starlights and snipers

you can have a solid tank of a unit but it has to be slow or t3 basically

[rare orbit]

battleships are honorary T3 balance wise, as are flags

[tired tinsel]

flagship have the t3 tax, battleships not really

[rare orbit]

they're more a 2.5, but 3k for a single unit is a very big commitment early

[tired tinsel]

like, why don't you give me a golden shield that blocks 1 shot for my bulls
muh poor bulls getting 2 shot by snipers

[rare orbit]

heavy units used to have sniper damage reduction
(not something a tweak can add back)

[tired tinsel]

so like relative to the rest of the bar state of balance (how they are handling things) battleship vs sniper isn't something that needs change (except arm needs more range and hp xD)

[tepid mortar]

I think its a good buff for battleships, you are forced to use rockets vs them ( rockets are underused currently due to price )

[tired tinsel]

i think buffing battleship hp is better than range
range just makes them more oppresive on kite maps and just as shit on cramped maps

it makes them more forgiving at most lvs of skil

maybe that screws up ship vs ship balance but... so does range

[tepid mortar]

Battleship to shot any building on land needs to come in range of snipers, you can submerge legs of bots in shallow water but you will not build anything there.

[tired tinsel]

yeh true

maybe bad opponents is misleading me into battleship cost. one thing battleship has going for it is low bp and energy cost

[elfin frigate]

I kind of like Ships having high range

[tepid mortar]

Well, you can put much heavier guns on ship than on land.

[tired tinsel]

yeah it makes sense, there is some counterplay with emp launcher and lrpc

and t3 still does just fine into battleship

[tepid mortar]

dont nerf too much hp of thors, because stat wise demons would be better and they are not ultimate arm pushing unit

[rare orbit]

if I'd jumped the range to 1.2K again I'd understand the concern

but core one is small increase, and arm needed the competency as it's weak HP

[tired tinsel]

demons have 10k hp thors have 56k hp
how is that comparable

[tepid mortar]

20k

[rare orbit]

agree yes, it's only -6k, thors will still be OP I expect though

[elfin frigate]

Thor has higher HP to m ratio than titans and juggs

[rare orbit]

demon hp/metal ratio is worse than a razorback, which are often thought as fragile

[tepid mortar]

3 demons are worth 2 thors

[rare orbit]

no, the thor emp instantly shuts demons down

[tired tinsel]

to some extent that is okay cause thor is slower, but it also has multisplash (which has more effect in high econ maps with multiple t3)

[elfin frigate]

idk, i think it's how you use them, if you hit emp missiles or how they are sent in

[tepid mortar]

yes but they have 1,8k dps vs 936 so demons will start to kill thors if you nerf hp too much

[rare orbit]

demons CAN trade okay with thors in the right situation

[tired tinsel]

na thors are way better frontline and emp is free elo

[elfin frigate]

And I'd usually go for the thors if it was just a run into each other situation

[rare orbit]

but mostly thors will just rock up and do whatever they want

[tired tinsel]

demon just have a glass jaw to emp

[rare orbit]

do you feel that a -6k is too huge a nerf then?
eg would a cost increase be better?

[rare orbit]

as amphib they should be a little more resistant maybe, but something I need to see more replays of to dial in

[tired tinsel]

mostly abductor lel

[tepid mortar]

i need to some test do check, but 6k may be too much

[elfin frigate]

i think the problem is that the stunning units are broken, not that demons, commandos or amphibs need emp res

[rare orbit]

abductor is interesting as it misses most of the dps versus smaller units, demon is big enough that it will all hit

[tired tinsel]

6k what?

[tepid mortar]

HP

[tired tinsel]

make the emp missile expensive?

[elfin frigate]

6k HP from the thor, it would still like it with likt 5.# HP to M ratio, still on par with titan jug fyi

[tepid mortar]

Titan and Jug have Anti air and Amfib

[tired tinsel]

well a thor is a brawler more than titan
anti air on them is a joke tho

[rare orbit]

it has some increase, might need more later, I don't want to stack too much at once on one unit though

[tepid mortar]

thor is a breakthrough tank

[elfin frigate]

Thor has emp immune, emp missile and emp sponsons

[rare orbit]

it's an everything tank

[tired tinsel]

titans get used on hilly maps cause everything else dies to vanguards lol
and lrpcs

[tepid mortar]

and you can kill it with range and bombing, so its missing some tools :>

[tired tinsel]

you can kill any t3 with bombing, flak is a must

[elfin frigate]

All T3 die to bombing

[tired tinsel]

what would you rather have, token aa or 5k more hp

it's not like titans are good vs sniper/starlight it's that vanguard/catapult supress it's counters

[rare orbit]

someone should make an emp rework or something

[elfin frigate]

It doesn't do enough

[rare orbit]

next version does improve things tbf

but similarly, it has to be somewhat close to baseline game impact as vanilla, for A: balance, and B: acceptance

people have however now accepted that 'slowed and not firing' IS functionally a stun, which lets me calibrate more

[elfin frigate]

The EMP damages values are just bonkers, Spybots deal 50k on self d, Abductor deals 22.5k, these things essentially full stun whatever they hit

[rare orbit]

abductor is an outlier as it's a high damage continuous source - but until very recently it was never used offensively

spybots were an acceptance thing, and 'T3 control', usually maurauder rushes

short of nerfing them as part of emp rework, some form of 'oh no you don't' has to remain

out of scope of this thread though, but just to say, there are very real reasons why things are settings they are

[violet geyser]

Sorry,.can you expand on that ?
Right now arm frigates are horrible because you often only have 50 % dps u less you manage to broadside, but broadside is only possible when you're ahead in terms of how ship manovering and concave works.
By buffing front and nerfing aft, it means the frigate becomes closer to the riptide which is basically the main reason core > arm sea. This mean you attack front on and chase, which so far is often not a reasonable approach since u lose half ur dps.
don't quite understand ur line of reasoning just yet (might be there tho) in regards to ur reply.

[rare orbit]

you're mistaken about T1 arm ships, I think

a frigate will do full DPS shooting forwards, and sideways. it does half when retreating

a cor frigate does full dps whatever it's doing

dolphins on the other hand, and supporters, do act as you describe

arm T1 sea is also weird in that frigates don't even need to exist at all

differential balance isn't a bad thing in itself though, as long as there is overall lab balance, skater being OP now does actually help arm a lot T1, and the battleship buff in the pack helps T2. I want to change flagships later but that's probably a main game change, should be something I can get in without much fuss

so to make arm frigates more viable for kiting, I'd need to give rear turret 66% of the dps, front one 33%. that would shift their DPS range a little though, but nothing significant I suspect
(in fact the difference would be taken up by boat braking speeds so it won't have a functional change)

@tired tinsel , @tepid mortar , any strong opinions why the above would be a Terrible Idea?

otherwise I'll draft that into next edition and see what it brings

[tepid mortar]

right now, not, i will think about it

[wintry wasp]

Probably want markivs input if he's willing - since he's maining arm sea right now

[dire cypress]

sorry to say, but more range on the D-Gun is OP

it might be "only" 5%... but WHY the fuck?

[tepid mortar]

another reason to play ARM O_o

[rustic dust]

Because animation bs not something which can be fixed with numbers

[dire cypress]

It all came out when I said the ARM com is balanced... and then ppl told me that there is a difference in the D-gun range

so FIX IT

the sharpshooter got 100! more range because of such a animation issue

at least in the balance canditates pack

[rustic dust]

There are literally hundreds of things under the hood which change interactions in non-obvious ways

Nothing is straightforward, and nothing is easy

[dire cypress]

well this is obviously imbalanced.
the most powerful weapon is no joke

you have the power in the candidate pack

it is easy to fix

[wintry wasp]

Not necessarily, somethings are based on model animations and lots of stuff outside unit or weapon definitions

[rare orbit]

not for this, it's out of control of lua

I'd need to edit the arm commander model and that itself has other jank that fixing the extra range would create

[dire cypress]

i don't care for the reason, why there is a inbalance of the most powerful weapon in the game

there is an easy fix.

range = 238

[rare orbit]

I'm just looking at that atm

but I think it's disregarded somewhere by a gadget

[rustic dust]

You're saying "just fix how this game functions on a fundamental level". Everything related to dguns is arcane nonsense to try to parse.

[dire cypress]

so you are telling me this ONE weapon can't change the range because a gadget harcodes the advantage?

[rustic dust]

It's dgun

[fierce scaffold]

https://tenor.com/view/first-time-meme-first-time-the-ballad-of-buster-scruggs-gif-24656975

[dire cypress]

no, I am saying make a hot fix, just like with the sharpshooter

[fierce scaffold]

Robert, chill a bit, please

If this were easy it'd have been fixed ages ago

[dire cypress]

sounds crazy.

the behemoth has a d-gun with another range.

the termite got it's fire position fixed

[rare orbit]

actually ... I think I can fix this

[dire cypress]

sounds as if there are 3 ways approaches to tackle this

[rare orbit]

the behaviour of dgun IS altered but base range stat still respected

give me a few to test properly

[tepid mortar]

Arm battleship have same problem due to 2 turrets

[rare orbit]

battleships are an interesting one

[dire cypress]

i think this is the right range for the CORE D-Gun

[wintry wasp]

It should reach spawn to spawn, bring back CS1.6 AWP spawn kills with wallhacks

[dire cypress]

you are right I could increase it's speed and AOE

[rare orbit]

fixed on arm and decoy armcom without issue - will tidy and get it PR'd

if I'd realised range wasn't one of the overwritten ones then I'd have done it an age ago

[dire cypress]

THX, for solving the unsovable!

[rare orbit]

I do what I can (or can't, apparently)

[rare orbit]

sorry battleships, their interactions are asymmetrical. core one -always- loses a chunk of dps at full range, and close when kiting away. arm one has full dps full range front and sides, losing half when retreating

with the extra range in all cases for arm with the mod, I think it's in a good place balance wise tbh. arm better at range, core better close.

the half dps when kiting thing actually works in favour of balance here as it limits the poking you can do, which would be wildly OP for arm otherwise

[dire cypress]

well AOE isn't overritten, too

[wintry wasp]

now make it ricochet off commanders while total range is still respected 😉. Then we can finally have pin-ball gamemode

[dire cypress]

🙂

didn't know this map had water...
but back to topic THX @rare orbit

[rare orbit]

most do if you go deep enough

[tired tinsel]

markiv is prolly the best armada sea player atm
naturally he doesn't make any ellysaw 🤣

range is calculated from turret? wouldn't that make them significantly better at kiting backwards but slightly worse at charging?

[violet geyser]

That's weird. I always thought they can't both fire forward but the perspective clearly shows the aft turret has a higher z so it can fire forward ibdeed. My bad, sorry.

[tired tinsel]

the back turret is 360 right?

[violet geyser]

It looked like aft has higher elevation, so when ship is facing forward both can fire but when facing a target at the back, the aft turret blocks the front turret

I'm super bummed I got that totally wrong for some reason. Weird AF.

[rare orbit]

only if only front gun is in range, which would probably only be a factor in a very precisely positioned chase between two ellysaws

and difference would be 16% dps +- to each boat

[wintry wasp]

Is core frigates weapon range also calculated from is rear turret fire point? which would mean chasing is a disadvantage, range wise as well as projectile travel time etc?

[rustic dust]

I feel like at some point there was a colvol-related change which buffed one arm ship's turret's ability to fire over another of its turrets, but memory is too foggy to remember which and when. Might be a false memory entirely. Unsure.

[rare orbit]

very slightly, yes

eg here the pawn was behind it, took a couple of shots, but the boat span to face, then couldn't shoot it any more

range circle is drawn from unit centre

[rustic dust]

There are also engine reasons chasing units have a (very, very) slight range disadvantage, even with lasers and weapon at the center of a unit

[wintry wasp]

Makes sense, kiting is generally slightly stronger in most games for this and similar reasons

[pine nacelle]

Wait, Arm's decoy comms have a Dgun?

[wintry wasp]

both do, they do way less dmg

[pine nacelle]

Interesting

[dire cypress]

To make the perfect decoy.
They do literally no real damage.

[rustic dust]

If you spam the dgun enough it'll kill t1 things

[wintry wasp]

The key is to deliberately miss - so they think you're really, but bad at aiming

[placid ridge]

The real issue with adjusting naval is how it will affect the other theaters of warfare because if range steadily keeps increasing land will find themselves more oppressed and that's just negative feedback

Naval itself as a whole lacks an identity or clear purpose rn mostly because it is the least played out of the theaters of war

[rare orbit]

people don't understand naval (nor want to learn it) and strait is largely responsible

[rare orbit]

this is why bulwark matches the longest battleship range, and it's still much shorter (4-500 functionally) than a missile boat

people also don't like playing naval -because- it's oppressed by land, despite being a niche theatre

if something is optional to control, when another realm matters far more, why do it? it's second class warfare. a naval victory -should- be a feared thing that you should always have tried to prevent

it's also hard limited by water, for boats at least, so range to use that does matter, and to project power from that limit
(also battleships are stopped by shields, far moreso than flagships, and remember missile boats are not)

[placid ridge]

I think that depends on the map really. Maps with more than 50% water will generally have naval victories be more critical.
It's hard to push out updates for naval if it changes their power balance in fine tuned maps and most people being told to learn naval would rather quit the game ):

It's pretty terrible but nobody will complain if naval gets nerfed to the ground since it's minority but if it gets buffs it's more likely to get pushback as it encroaches on other theaters.

[rare orbit]

it's more likely to see map selection bias if that becomes the case

but really, +100 range for 1 boat, which is still miles less than a cheaper boat in the same price range (that also ignores shields) is a lot of fuss

remember also this is still experimental, if it has a huge unexpected effect it gets changed

[wintry wasp]

it is however a boat you build to fight with on the sea - which is also useful in the transition to land, vs missile ship which has very little use in the main sea-battle in most games I've seen (mostly ithmus naval)

Yeah I really just want to keep seeing these in action

[rare orbit]

it amounts to a slight buff to arm in T2 versus land, yes, but it's still less than snipers

(if it exceeded snipers I'd be more understanding of the panic)

[wintry wasp]

Yeah I really just want to see it in action, see how much more it zones etc..

[rare orbit]

I'll do a lobby with them tonight, but busy calibrating something atm

[wintry wasp]

Saw a game the other day with the tweak on, then no one built any >.<

[elfin frigate]

I watched some games with the tweak on where people didn't notice the range changes on battleships

[tepid mortar]

I respectfully disagree, most of top players play sea on strait due to additional mexes and how important it is. When rotation map lobsters ( they should have sea map in it, right? ) come and play sea, a lot of them die to strait water main players ( around with 35 os ). I agree that people have problem to learn how to play navy, only 40 os + are actually using advantage of won sea, like shore bombardment.

[rustic dust]

Both strait navy sides play massively differently than other maps' navy, so why would map rotation players be good at strait navy?

[tepid mortar]

because you have same ships, same micro, only bit different eco placement.

[rustic dust]

There's a lot more different than that

[placid geyser]

I think you’re both right. There’s an absolute ton that is entirely similar. And then there is the importance of timings that comes with experience and is map specific and often determine lane outcome

[rare orbit]

lobsters are not most people though, by definition

[tepid mortar]

If you wanna nerf thors i would take off those little emp lasers, it would let enemy flank them. Right now they are just easy to use because flank weakness for big units is covered by emp lasers. This gives a more micro intensive battles vs them.

[tired tinsel]

yeah the emp lasers are like anti interactive

[tired tinsel]

discourages the enemy from trying to get flank attacks and just dgun / kill it at range
so makes gameplay binary.

[dire cypress]

Isn't their EMP immunity combined with their speed, high health and speed a problem.
Thors arrive like 5-10 min earlier at the front/in the base of the enemy (than any other emp immune unit). In addition to that they are huge for their cost and as such 30k of metal are hard to D-gun.
Sounds like a big disbalance in T3. Demons get EMPed by 1 or 2 shots of an abductor. That just feels wrong. Speed + EMP immunity + health... They are the ultimate "I don't care. I click at the enemy base, and fire EMP missiles" unit.

[tepid mortar]

Right now, they are like that. If you try flank with demons you will get emp passively. Thor cost 13k metal demon 7,5k so if you play 5 demons vs 3 thors (37,5k vs 39k) , 9k dmg vs 2,9k dmg, 100k hp vs 168k. You see diffrence? 3x more dps vs less than 2x more hp? If Demons could flank that would do even more dmg and you could just stop thors using demons. Right now you can do reckless push due to additional passive emp. Demon is not a frontline breakthrough unit. Its a amphibious dps like marauder. Demons are faster and have AA.

[elfin frigate]

Are those costs effective metal costs after considering Energy conversion?

[tepid mortar]

yes

[elfin frigate]

I think you're only right if the EMP missile wasn't a thing, one emp missile hits the thors trade massively favourably

[tepid mortar]

thats why i prefer a bit more skill based unit not just a "right click, emp lasers will do a job"

[elfin frigate]

Interestingly, I was just playing around with thors vs demons and demons, if point blank with a thor and the thor isn't moving will move around it faster than the turret can move 🤣

[dire cypress]

did you consider the spark damage? Because I think including the spark damage a Thor has more or less 2200dps. And 100% of the damage will be applied and 0% will be friendly fire. I guess that needs to be considered as well.

the thing is:
the missiles exist. so it should trade badly if it doesn't use it. but the exact opposite is the case.
It is a special ability unit that trades insanely well.
Look at infestors in SC2... you better protect those...

[tepid mortar]

i dont wanna nerf them because alternative is even worse ... Behemoth spam ... i am aware that mutlihit exist, on small scale spread should be ok ...

[dire cypress]

well then this unit needs to be looked at as well.
A bit faster would be nice but therefore it shouldn't just be as oppressive.

A bit more interactive 😉
Because now if you want to kill it you need
a) a TON of ARM high damage high range stuff or
b) D-gun.
That's a bit boring, too. (but at least you have 5 min until it reaches your base to kill it)

[placid ridge]

Behemoths can be walking forts imo just give them aa capability, radar, maybe even nano sponsoons to act as a walking repair idk just make it utilitarian if it's going to crawl across the map

[dire cypress]

lol another thing, that just doesn't make sense.
#1195124345182355597 message
rovers cost less E to shoot. just, because.... I guess

[toxic fog]

putting in complaint cor demon is too op

i think being able to shoot over cliffs and stuff kinda ridic and it feels like better razorback and super fast

alot of units cant actually hit it cuz it kites like a raider but hits like a brute

also it has AA?

[old ivy]

I believe the thread you want is this one: https://discord.com/channels/549281623154229250/1165607954611961938
This should probably be renamed to community balance patch or something

[rare orbit]

demon I'm keeping an eye on, it's in an odd place, but people do forget that it is slower to target than razorbacks, has worse hp/metal, and is a lot worse vs air than razorbacks are. they also do friendly fire to other units in front of them, and with too many, each other, so you cannot have too many of them in a line.

but as said, wrong thread

[toxic fog]

Oop srry

[elfin frigate]

Why do the devs hate cortex so much, Pounders are so crap compared to Janus. Their speed, acceleration, turn rate and range are all dogshit compare to janus. Can we please give them like 20 more range so they can kind of fight janus and Coms?

I'm going to make a whole thread on this, it's beyond all reason how bad cortex has it compared to armada.

[sharp spire]

How do I find the latest version of the tweakunits?

[elfin frigate]

#1186850950770610207 message

Should update the pin

[rustic dust]

Pounders counter mass infantry/mass scout, which was nerfed out of the meta in t1 of large team games, leaving pounder unemployed

Fighting janus + comms isn't its role

[elfin frigate]

They shouldn't be com killers, but right now they are just prey to commanders, commanders are not threaterned by them AT ALL because they at most take 1 hit before they dgun the slow dunces.

And Janus are just > with what, more speed, turning, 70 odd more range. I'm litterally asking for 20 range so they are usable, 20 range would mean when a com tries to chase them down they actually threatern a bit of damage and might deter a com from murdering them for 500 E

[rustic dust]

There're a lot of units coms aren't threatened by at all

Technically you can extend their range by ~70 by targetting the ground at max range to utilize its massive aoe, it just sucks to micro

[elfin frigate]

I disagree, pounders need to be on the front to be useful, they're already vulnerable to janus, missile trucks and t1 arty, don't charge prok lines that well and if a com walks on them when they are facing forward they are dead

You can't reasonable do that because you can't make them Target the ground AND turn/move, if you are standing still and attacking the ground you're vulnable to everywhere I listed before.

They are F tier grabage. Only time I've had them be useful is later in the game vs tick/pawn/grunt spam

20 range would change this

[rustic dust]

You can, it's just impractical if you don't have insane apm

Constantly settarget behind them

[elfin frigate]

While armada get a free pass to move, unload all their dps and fck off, sounds fair and balanced

[rustic dust]

Yes, they're 2 unrelated units with 2 unrelated roles, and janus's role is far more relevant in 8v8 after infantry nerf and comupdate

[elfin frigate]

Fair point they are different units with different roles, but right now the pounders role is to die for free against commanders

[rustic dust]

Because nobody spams scouts, light tanks, or infantry in 8v8 anymore

[elfin frigate]

You can't they die to everything

[rustic dust]

Now they will. In the past they didn't. If that flips again, any pounder buff done now will need to be reverted

[elfin frigate]

No, they're still commander food

[rustic dust]

Because comms are op relative to the things pounder counters in the current 8v8 environment, yes

When, like, 7 pawns could fairly reliably solo dive a comm and get a 2.5k metal wreck, things were pretty different

[elfin frigate]

I'll be convinced when I see people building pounders as much as people build janus, till then, F tier, needs help

[dire cypress]

What T1 fills this role for CORE?

[rustic dust]

Sadness

[dire cypress]

At least CORE commanders now get the same D-gun range to defend itself against the Janus as "easily" as an ARM Com can... Except sneaky Pete....

But we are getting there.

[elfin frigate]

20 range

[dire cypress]

20? Thought 12...

[elfin frigate]

20 would help pounder not be bad

[dire cypress]

Ahhh.

[dire cypress]

In 1v1 it is better, Raghna says, I won't argue with him about this.
So in high tier 1v1s this change might not be too good of an idea. But for the average Joe like us it feels wrong.

[elfin frigate]

That tracks because you can have them fighting and not be against commanders

[prisma bane]

Pounder these days is mainly to stop tank rushes. They trade ridiculously well against brutes/stouts, and can punish janus mismicro really hard with the impulse. I do agree a little extra range would be good, just so janus can't shoot them for free so easily.

Have to be careful with it though, because they beat anything t1 that they actually get to shoot.

[elfin frigate]

This is how I'd change up spies btw, they are completely lopsided towards armada atm. The comments are the standard values

{
    armspy = {
        energycost = 10000, -- 8800
        metalcost = 135, -- 135
        buildtime = 17600, -- 17600
        speed = 65.4, -- 65.4
        health = 300, -- 300
    },

    corspy = {
        energycost = 8800, -- 12500
        metalcost = 165, -- 165
        buildtime = 17600, -- 22200
        speed = 62.099, -- 62.099
        health = 600, -- 380
    },
}

[knotty sparrow]

@rare orbit

[rare orbit]

many such cases

look at buildpower for naval hlt too, even though it's almost identical to arm, buildpower is wildly cranked

(already fixed in next draft)

[dire cypress]

Look at the skuttle cloaking cost vs the gremlin one... And the sight range...
Gremlins are insanely cheap for their insane scouting abilities.

I played 2 games with arm... I won a golden cow... Even though there was a 51 OS player and I barely know that faction. It flet sooooo easy

I want to have a T2 tank scout for CORE

[rare orbit]

skuttles and gremlins are an odd one, in theory damage potential from a skuttle is worse ... but a couple of gremlins can do just as much damage in reality

gremlins should probably have less sight range, and skuttles a bit more

cloak cost for skuttles is bonkers, but stops spam of them early

[dire cypress]

Well nothing stops you from building a gremlin or two. And letting them sit 450 range from the front line...

5!!!!! Energy cost for an undetectable and unjunoable tank.

[rare orbit]

which cons have notable differences between the two factions btw?

[wintry wasp]

Their needs to be a strong cloak & stealth scout for both teams to prevent increased passiveness

[rare orbit]

generally it's more metal for tiny hp buff, and slower speed, in cor

[wintry wasp]

Which for a scout infront of enemy lines is actually a good set of things to differ on

[dire cypress]

Core cons move slower and as a compensation for this they have less BP/metal.
Makes sense.

[dire cypress]

The countermeasures are always cheaper than the attacker. Except for gremlins... They are 1/4 the cost. And they cost less than 1/2 to cloak than a spy cam. Because....

[wintry wasp]

In principal I agree - and i'm not advocating for no adjustments to be made or balanced; but I'd like to keep the uniqueness between factions rather than equalize everything.

I suspect lot of these numbers are likely inherited, not some grand conspiracy against Core, the sarcasm is getting a little old.

[rare orbit]

gremlin cloak cost has always felt to me as a 'we'll balance it later', and nobody ever did

[wintry wasp]

Certainly needs it, 4 or 5 are devastating if they get in

[rare orbit]

IMO with cons, the speed/cost/tank is fine, but core should have more buildpower too

[wintry wasp]

Yeah the overal time it takes to move X distance and build Y structure should be equalized

[rare orbit]

main reason you build cons after all is to build or boost stuff

[wintry wasp]

So core can have the heavier higher bp, and arm the more nimble lower bp - but it balances out when done over distance & time etc

[rare orbit]

that will vary by distance, map, and what was built, but buildpower increase percentage should be same as metal increase percentage

[wintry wasp]

Sure, but some arbitary number and structure can be chosen to balance around doesn't need to be exact

[rare orbit]

maybe a tiny bit more to account for slower speed

yup, just saying time to build a win turbine a mile away, and a t2 lab a stone's throw away, will be different between the two cons even with balance

[wintry wasp]

I've been doing a lot of cost vs stat ratio type exploring to see what things stick out and those are the units which usually people have made threads one way or another about

[wintry wasp]

Sorry I think i didn't explain well what I meant by that was:

You tell an arm and core con to walk 100 units and build a windmill
The arm con should arrive first, but the cor com build it faster so they finish at roughly the same time.

The distance and built unit can be chosen as and the time it takes a stat to take into consideration for balancing them

[rare orbit]

that breaks when it becomes 'walk X and build 100 mills'

[dire cypress]

I opened a topic. I was told that it was balanced... I was like fuuuuu....

[rare orbit]

buildpower for metal should be the point it's balanced to, with a small bit to account for the speed decrease

it will still be a bit lopsided each way in 'some cases' but balanced overall, especially considering the current state of full lopsided to arm always

[rustic dust]

Both veh cons are better damage sponges than brutes, so any hp difference is relevant as far as that goes, and part of the cor con price is offset by cor cheaper labs, so there's that

[rare orbit]

arm T1 econvs are 1150 E, core 1250

not -that- notable in itself, but is odd given the wind advantage
I'd have expected the opposite if anything