NOTA 1.82

[Umrug]

Nota Balance Notes, as for NOTA 1.60, by Umrug

1) I specifically tried to find any good use for crawling bombs, and i failed. Easy to kill (4 hammer shots), huge buildtime, once seen it remains seen on radar forever. So yeah, you have a useless unit there. Also, you can't use it as waking dragon eye, since even when it's set on "don't shoot" it still acts like a mine (explodes when enemy units are nearby). I don't know why its bothering me so much, but it does. So the only good thing in it is that its only all-terrain unit in t1, but realistically it doesn't give it any advantage - its too easy to kill. I suggest - not sure about that - make its buildtime twice less, and perhaps give it a bit (15%) more speed.

2) I like to airdrop, and if i play CORE, i have no question which unit to airdrop - its Pyro (95m iirc), with its crazy DPS vs buildings. ARM hasn't got anything nearly comparable to that. Please do not nerf Pyro as its a fun unit, but perhaps adjust one of ARMs t1 bots?


To discuss: I know 3 definite advantages of ARM:
- Box-of-Death
- Rocket ship costs 3k instead of 7m for core
- Flea
(also, railgun cruiser is a bit more efficient imo)

Advantages of CORE:
- Centurion is 50 times better then pods - by the time you got pods the map is full of long-range plasma stuff, and they are SO SLOW
- Sprinterus is better then Zipper (dunno how, but if you tried both you know)
- Leveller
- ZOMFG Dominator (Wtf is this OP unit?)
- T2 bots: sumo for drops, Crabes for pwn (arm has got raptor which is the only usable t2 bot. No, mavericks suck for t2)
- Napalm bomber
- ZOMFG Black Lilly (invisible strat bomber)
- AK is a bit OP imo (saw com killed just by rushing 35 AK at it. Doesn't work with peewee at all)

So yeah, discuss.

[overkill]

Well, check the stats for arm tanks vs core tanks (the ones they both have) arm's are better for no apparent reason. Sprinter is far worse than zipper, zippers can be mass produces, sprinters cannot, though they have more health and med armor iirc, still not worth it. Fido is the most OP think in the game i think, dominators are worse then fidos.

If anything arm is op. Mavericks may have been over nerfed, but in the past they were orgasmic for dealing with smaller units. Sumo is too slow to be useful outside of airdrop. Crabe is too clumsy and vulnerable to fido (so is sumo). every bot core has is countered cost affectively by fido.

And for the love of god, pyro and ak are not op. Zues is far more usefull in combat than pyro, and pyro is better for killing buildings. AK is better in fast combat than pewee (kiting) but pewee is the better choice for zerging tanks.

Napalm bombers are awesome at killing swarms, and flying wing is BETTER at killing specific things, but it can still deal with swarms. Black lily is a huge advantage, but arm has the OH MY CANT KILL IT spy plane. Centurions are very good, but not affective against intercepters (iirc 6 intercepters kill one). Pod could use some love though, i agree.

Also, core's special turret, the sabot is terrible. The immolator is too situational as well. Box of death is just awesome.

[momfreeek]

- AK is a bit OP imo (saw com killed just by rushing 35 AK at it. Doesn't work with peewee at all)

I can attest that ~20 peewees will do a fine job of killing a com in no time. 35 aks are not exactly hard to kill.. if you get caught with no defence its not AK balance thats the problem.

After being handed my ass by 123v so many times, my experience is that peewee is far better than ak, and in fact is one of Arm's major assets. Flash vs instigator seems exactly the same deal. Levellers work good vs this fast raider spam.. but levellers are slow to build, easy to kill and very slow moving. In a porcy game core can be awesome (levellers,vashps) but players who are constantly attacking from different angles and probing for weak spots seem to be better catered for by arm.

The best players I know that I've played against often (godde & 123) both prefer arm and they have no trouble winning with arm.

There will always be constant complaints about this or that unit making one side imbalanced due to the sides' variety. IMO, its a testament to the balance that these reports never seem to agree.

--

I understand Umrug's point about pyros. 5 pyros bundled into an infantry transport and dropped next to a com and its dead in seconds for a very small cost. I'm not sure if this should just be filed under 'getting caught with your pants down' or whether it borders on exploit. Dunno if its that much harder with peewees tho (I'm pretty sure one load easily killed me before).

Wings, played well they can be extremely tough to deal with. Being good against any ground target and tough to shoot down, they can gradually encroach into enemy territory doing decent damage without putting themselves at risk. you need decent fighter cover to stop them at all and your fighters will get kited into enemy ground aa while the wings easily avoid or kill ground aa. wings force grows and doom approaches. Not sure.

[Umrug]

Sprinter is far worse than zipper, zippers can be mass produces, sprinters cannot, though

Zipper, as my experience tells so far, is just useless, regardless of it being cheaper. Its like peewee but more expensive, that's it. Chainexploding and all. Sprinterus is sexy and wins battles.

Fido is the most OP think in the game i think, dominators are worse then fidos.

Crabe kills Fido with (pay attention here) 2 shots. And its rof is in no means low (and its splash damage!). Its armor is huge compared to everything in t2 besides Sumo. Its DPS is very high. They are same buildtime, except Crabe is about twice more metal.

Maverick - 16k buildtime (iirc) = no mavericks in a game. Anyone saw them? Its one of the longest buidtime units in t2.

Arms T2 bots are long to build, too long to be competitive. Those spiders - yuck, so rarely they are used...

Zues is far more usefull in combat than pyro, and pyro is better for killing buildings.

NO. Zeus = slow+short range = noone uses it. I'll try to airdrop it next game, but cmon, with pyro i can burn entire base, and zeus is so slow.

Also, core's special turret, the sabot is terrible. The immolator is too situational as well. Box of death is just awesome.

True, true (unless you are playing spacebugs )

Also, overkill, by what nick do you go in games? I wanna see you play :)

Wings, played well they can be extremely tough to deal with.

Yes they are interesting unit, however with crazy buildtime and considering how much micro you need to invest, i do not find them OP. Compare to spamming 35 strat bombers and finishing enemy com.

Also, when asked, reason ppl play ARM is "I keep forgetting to change" - that's the only reason i heard so far.

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WIND! Is it intentional that wind is practically disabled in NOTA, or it's a bug? Anyone saw wind being built on any map? (By good player i mean)

[EDIT]
Crap I suddenly feel like I'm starting a useless discussion that will just make this thread 10 more pages longer. So someone needs to tell me when to STFU. Thanks :)

[Thor]

Zippers have better firepower/cost than sprinters. I like them more for that reason.

If the fido's are microed correctly the crabe won't ever get a chance to shoot back.

[momfreeek]

Fido rewards micro with supreme win. Oddity throws out far more firepower for your money than galacticus which has extra short ranged weapons and lots of HP. Core has no t2 aa bot and no fast t2 bot like the raptor. Apart from the sheer awesomeness of the crabe, arm has t2 bots hands down IMO.

Zeus is not comparable to the pyro. Zeus is purely defensive, pyro is purely offensive. Arm has other options for fast raiders where core is generally lacking. Talk to 123v. Ask him for a game. He can tell you why zeuses aren't useless (I've had that argument with him before), and show you how arm wins. Prepare yourself for the horrors of peewee rape.

[==Troy==]

I would like to see a high altitude ground AA. (non-flak based). Obviously expensive, with relatively slow missile, but in my opinion it would look spectacular to observe it starting off at the launch pad and then zooming into the bombers. Just my .02$ (missile launched only when the bombers flies directly over it)

[overkill]

Yeah, 1v1 123v. he insanely good with most of the units you consider sucky. I go by overkill in game, haven't played in ~5 months, but i am always in the lobby. I remember balance when i used to play, and i have been watching the patch notes.

Flying wings are better than napalm because there isnt anything on land the wings cannot kill quickly, napalm bombers cannot hurt anything that doesn't have light armor. often times your better off with vashps.

Also note that the arm interceptor is has more a lot more dps than the core interceptor, making the defense against flying fortresses fairly simple, if unsupported.

[momfreeek]

1) I specifically tried to find any good use for crawling bombs, and i failed

I didn't even know these existed in NOTA :p

Do they work like mobile mines? If they really are completely useless, perhaps they should be removed

[Thor]

yeah, it's a mobile mine. it burrows when it's not moving.

[JohannesH]

How does roach+atlas self d compare to proper bombers, any use?

[Decimator]

They aren't very effective mobile mines if they explode when so much as a solitary flea gets close to them.

[MasterZH]

Can i ask ... i dont have public IP so i cant host and i use other players to play(MP) or automatix_ip hosts but for nota there are no1. Is there some way to make them?

[Decimator]

If you use springlobby, you can use relayhosts to host.

[Achilla]

I'd like to discuss few balance things.

1) Arm battlecruiser seems a bit underhanded in naval fights compared to Core one. Is it fully intended to make him a bit better at bombarding land (heavier calibre guns) but deliberately worse in naval overall (way less hit points, similar speed)? I always looked at Arm BC as pocket battleship which by definition should have very long range, very good firepower, good speed and crap armour. Thus, I wouldn't mind nerfing range of Core BC or giving more range to Arm BC and increasing speed and turning rate speed of Arm BC by something marginal like 7-10%. Perhaps with this change would follow up slight range changes to both battleships, though primary task of them is to take the beating and bombard land, not not be naval supremacy units.

2) Anti-nuke mobile weapons. Too cheap and too easy to build. They should have at least 3x building time of stationary anti-nuke and 2x the cost of it. Shielding your incoming army with anti-nukes on land is too easy.

3) Lack of naval anti-nuke. Make aircraft carriers carry anti-nuke.

[momfreeek]

If you use springlobby, you can use relayhosts to host.

Yep, my mobile broadband doesn't accept any incoming connections so I can't host normally but relay host works great. Even if you can host, there are some nice advantages to using a relay host.

- check the 'relay' box (on tasclient this is on the initial dialogue after you click 'host', not in the battlescreen)
- set up the battleroom, boxes, etc just as if you were hosting normally (no bot commands)
- the battle will start automatically after a few seconds if teams are equal and everyone is ready (i assume this isn't a tasclient feature)
- some other server does the actual hosting of the game so everyone can connect regardless of your routers firewalls etc
- if the host (you) disconnects during the battle, the game continues and the battleroom closes once the game ends

or to put it another way: it just works

[Thor]

Spacebugs seems to work fine for me. Are you sure there is a problem with it?

[MasterZH]

Why there is no wreck in water after hovers?

[Decimator]

Hovers do leave corpses in the water. Hovers just tend to disintegrate when destroyed by heavy weapons, such as the cruiser and battlecruiser guns I was destroying your hovers with in our game.

I ought to upload the replay of that game, it was great.

[Edible]

I would say the battlecruiser balance is fine, I see far more arm ones out there, yes the core one wins if it can get close enough to turn all its guns on it, but the arm one murders smaller ships and can skirmish (as much as ships can) far better (not to mention bombard).

My current issues are:
1. T2 aa tanks being fairly average and generally a downgrade from flack truck spam.

2. Defensive wingspam being far too hard to stop (IE wings + fixed defenses)
due too the lack of strong and small mobile AA, (massive hordes of flacktrucks are unwieldy, and can not go anywhere near puns), leaving the only solution being spam more fighters than the opponents AA can handle, forcing you to have t2 air, and to devote most of your econ to it.

3. The general mediocrity of most arm t2 bots.

4. Core t1 fighters costing more than arm (Havent checked it recently, but seen nothing in changelogs regarding it).

5. Sabot turret sucking.

6. Lots of fancy t2 heavy assault units (sumo particularly) being vulnerable to thudspam.

I think thats about enough for now...