Xta unit stats and balance tweaks (input for next version)

[raaar]

How is it bad that cons have an opening sequance?why is it so disturbing?why does xta require this to be changed?u want cons to build and repair faster?why would that make xta better?

There is such a thing as too much differentiation, when many of the differentiations between units are hyper-trivial details like that. Unit X has a fast con opening, unit Y is instant, so you have to keep track of which unit you use for what construction operations. That isn't fun, that's tedious.

good point. Do aircraft builders or commander need to open up? And what i suggested isn't removing the open/close animation, it's just delaying the closing for a few seconds.

I did compare stats of some units that fit different roles. I was trying point out that some units just don't seem to provide enough "bang for the buck"(dps, speed, etc.) even if they slightly out-perform every other unit in same build tree in very specific roles (ex: can and zeus), at least when compared to other units (pyro, leveler, warrior).

I also compared units with similar roles (raven vs other artillery, heavy rocket hovercraft vs land heavy rocket units, flash vs instigator). The differences between the units aren't big enough for us to say that they have different roles.

The roles are something created by the players. They figure unit roles based on their stats (and some behaviour aspects). The different strong points (range, dps, hp, speed, etc.) should be priced consistently across the mod.

[raaar]

I already mentioned this in another thread: set a con to repeat, build a metal store, try and shoot the con through the nanoblock.


Now tell me removing unfold animation is a good idea.

that wouldn't be a problem unless someone automated the process. Anyway, keeping an animation delay that only applies to some cons is a bad way to address that problem.

[babbles]

Right.

Firstly, what Pintle is saying is putting the constructor on "repeat". With the nano taking longer to fold back up it makes it very hard to kill a constructor with a scout when then constructor can do that.

Now, you're comparing unit stats, yes, well done, but you're comparing them with units that have different roles. Yes, it may be true the players set these "roles" but they set them because they're the units which fit the role the best. These may be specific, but so what? Arm needs a slow but heavy Kbot, Core needs a cheap heavy kbot (compared to sumo). At later stages in the game 30 warriors just won't do as good a job at charing as 30 zeus. Maybe if you sneak the warriors around they will do. Same with cans, you can also bring the cans/zeus back to repair and with morties they rape as the morties can keep up. With pyros they're off, dead and gone. End of.

The Flash and the Gator also have different roles. Yes, they're both light assault tanks or whatever but the fact one is close range one is not exactly long ranged but meant to be used at its maximum range means they have different roles. With gators you can kite, same with aks, whereas peewees you can but it is very inefficent. You have to get close with the EMG weapons to do damage whereas with the lasers you can stay at a distance.

Raven vs Core Arty? Rapid moving, lightly armoured rocket Kbot which fires 6 rockets vs a slow moving, heavily armoured plasma firing vehcile? Yeah. So similar huh? They have different stats because they fit into the lab they go with. Sure Raven does a lot of damage and is pretty quick, but it takes one sniper/viper shot to kill it, not to mention the face you get a unit anywhere near it and it goes crazy and shoots itself. Compare that witht he core arty which can get itself out before the 2nd sniper shot. Also, remember the economy part. With Core Vehicles it's meant to be you make mini fusion -> build economy until you are rolling big ass tanks and arty out. Arm kbot? Well, you have no mini fusion, or mobile, so that 2k metal and even the Energy to fire the Raven is hefty. Now imagine if we removed the Zeus, or made it quicker but removed armour. Late game those tanks just gonna roll straight over them and kill that Raven.

Edit: In fact no, I want more text wall.

We appreciate you taking the time to post/look at stats etc and give your opinion but why not actually formulate a reason? If you started a thread "Can needs better X because of Y" we may take you more seriously. At the moment, all you're doing is taking a unit you think needs making stronger and comparing it to a unit which, in many situations is superior. You're not actually saying why it should be increased stats wise. Why should the Zeus be improved? The warrior is better at raiding? And? Why should a Can be improved? It loses to a microed Pyro? And? If I try properly I can micro a peewee to kill a Reaper doesn't mean a peewee is better than a Reaper.

Seriously, if you made a thread for all your concerns and formulted proper arguments for your wishes then people wouldn't be so sarcastic and dismissive towards you. Yes, I used exaggerated with examples when mocking you but it was only to try and get you to realise comparing different units is dangerous. Fair enough, if you compare the AK vs Peewee balance, but not if you say they have the same role. Fair enough if you say Bulldog vs Reaper as they are essentially the same unit just slightly different stats. But when you compare a Can with a Pyro? Seriously? Don't forget a Pyro has to get in close as well. With 2 Cans you can easily kite, where as with Pyros you do jack all damage if you kyte.

You also do not seem to take in the concept of circumstance. Porc wars, warriors are not very good, they get raped by everything late game. Zeus, at least you can march them forward and they take all the damage while your long range units pick them off. Same with Cans. You use the shock troops to take the damage, maybe break the porc, use the support units (morty/dominator and raven/sniper) to kill the defence, which works better with zeus/can. And then you send in the Pyros/Warriors once there is a hole to kill the eco.

You also have to take into account the amount of micro it takes. I mean come on, you have to micro warriors/pyros around units dodging shots/getting close. Both when attacking and defending. With Cans/Zeus the need for this micro is pretty much irrelevant unless dodging D Guns. yes you may say they are too slow for micro but they have the armour to compensate. You pretty much have to just set them in a line and charge or simply hold position. Can't do that with pyros/warriors, can you? Even late game you can just keep a constant stream of them from your lab to the enemy base and it'll keep them busy. Warriors/Pyros? Die before they do any real damage. And even if they get close you then have to micro them effectivly.

[pintle]

Delaying unfold has the same effect as removing it in the context of nanoblocking, it would be BAD imho.

Direct unit comparisons are useful, but in XTA, I find the majority of unit confrontations to be highly context sensitive, with a lot of emergent dynamics coming out of the lab match up combined with the map/terrain.

Some unit's statline can make them look terrible (crasher) but they can dominate when combined with another unit's easily looked characteristics (com los/heal).

While, according to your interpretation, the stats suggest that a pyro is a superior straight up combat unit for cost than the can, they rarely survive a confrontation with anything more than an insignificant number of dedicated unit vs unit combat units (eg storms), whereas cans are much more capable in this role. Pyros are quite specialised, and excel in their role, but are far less flexible than Cans.

The value of a particular variable is completely relative to its operational context, and while statistical comparison is integral to any basic notion of balance, I think you have to accept that some things are very hard to quantify (how do you price generalisation/flexibility?).

At some point empirical feedback from experienced players has to interact with the mathematical model, and around here experienced generally means having played for 2+ years.
sorry for epic ramble i am rather high!

[raaar]

thank you for taking more time to explain.

What's the purpose of that repeat function on the constructors (besides the exploit)?

It's good that units have different roles. The problem is identifying units that are a bit weaker than they should if you can't compare them directly.

Do cans and zeus have advantages over pyros and warriors, yes. Do they make up for their disadvantages to make them cost-effective, no. When players have an estabilished economy, might as well invest in either sumos or tier2 vehicles to tank than in cans or zeuses. Compare their tanking potential to cheap tier2 amphibious tanks, for example. And speed is also very important to ensure survivability, you need it to get away from the front line. Should cans and zeus also be efective and clearing masses of short range raiders (flashes)? I think so.

If the can is meant to be a resistant med-range unit with reasonably low dps, then it needs more range (400 -> 500?), if it's meant to stop raiders, it needs more firepower (double the firepower but reduce the range to 300-350), or give it something in between. Imo sumo is too powerful, reduce its speed a bit (0.8 -> 0.6). As for the zeus, just upgrade its firepower and hp a bit.

If flashes and instigators have different roles, their stat differences should be deeper. As it is now, it just takes too much micro to make any use of the instigators and ak's minimal range advantage over their arm counterparts(it's so low than it gets crossed in a second unless units are moving in the same direction)

A light fusion doesn't give that much extra energy compared to a row of solar/wind generators.

[babbles]

thank you for taking more time to explain.

No problem, here we go again.

What's the purpose of that repeat function on the constructors (besides the exploit)?

All units have it. You may want to constantly reclaim a given area, and your constructor will keep that order even if there is no wreckage there?

Do cans and zeus have advantages over pyros and warriors, yes. Do they make up for their disadvantages to make them cost-effective, no.

Zeus are actuall very cheap for what they give and rape in numbers/lines. So yeah, I'd say they do.

When players have an estabilished economy, might as well invest in either sumos or tier2 vehicles to tank than in cans or zeuses.

And if it's a Kbot map, what should the Arm player do? And if they cannot afford a Sumo, but need constant LoS for Morties/Domis? They can get many Cans for the same price and they're not as easily D Gun'd.

Compare their tanking potential to cheap tier2 amphibious tanks, for example.

Yeah, they're cheap and not very good at all. What's your point? Amphib tanks die very easily and are only used when you have little resources or want to do an amphib attack. Seriously, zeus/can >>> amphib tank in that respect.

And speed is also very important to ensure survivability, you need it to get away from the front line. Should cans and zeus also be efective and clearing masses of short range raiders (flashes)? I think so.

Zeus are, actually. And don't forget these are T2 units, so why there'd be that many circumstances with mass Flash I don't know. Zeus are actually very good at this if you put them in a line and walk them backwards. And you don't need to be that quick to micro cans back from the can line to the comm/decoy morty line. Espcially if the others are rolling forward.

If the can is meant to be a resistant med-range unit with reasonably low dps, then it needs more range (400 -> 500?), if it's meant to stop raiders, it needs more firepower (double the firepower but reduce the range to 300-350), or give it something in between.

It's not meant to "stop raiders" it's meant as an assault kbot. It can still kite and its armour means it can get into range of defence or at least, with numbers it can.

Imo sumo is too powerful, reduce its speed a bit (0.8 -> 0.6).

It's meant to be fecking powerful. Seen the cost of it? If it was slower than it would be an easy D Gun target, it's already pretty easy to D Gun and the units you back it up with (morties) would have to keep stopping as they'd overtake it.

As for the zeus, just upgrade its firepower and hp a bit.

Have you actually used them in some battles? It is very cheap, and does a lot of damage to the enemy for its cost, if used correctly. Maybe we could look to test this with a, well, test version. But I think they're fine to be honest. As long as there's no Commander and no mines Zeus honestly do rape.

If flashes and instigators have different roles, their stat differences should be deeper. As it is now, it just takes too much micro to make any use of the instigators and ak's minimal range advantage over their arm counterparts(it's so low than it gets crossed in a second unless units are moving in the same direction)

It's tech 1. There isn't meant to be that much difference. If AK was made stronger than people would cry that it rapes peewees. Think of the 1v1 scenario where microed AKs beat microed Peewees. Now make AKs stronger and it all gets screwed up. And moving in the same direction? That's the point of micro, you keep moving out of their range!

A light fusion doesn't give that much extra energy compared to a row of solar/wind generators.

It's meant to be a steady growth. I'm sure you know that:

Wind/Solar -> Mobile/Light Fusion -> Cloakable Fusion -> Heavy Fusion

If we made Mobile/Light more efficent then we'd have to make the latter ones more efficent, otherwise why build them in the first place? Why have 1 Heavy Fusion, a big ticking time bomb when you can have 6 Light Fusions that are just as efficent, less explosive, cost less and are spread out.

Also, don't forget the reduction in space taken up. yes, I know I said spread out can be better, but I'd rather have 1 fusion that 12 solars cluttering up my base.

[Spawn_Retard]

8 pages of people trolling raar, i mean come on.

[JohannesH]

8 pages of people trolling raar, i mean come on.

Or maybe its 8 pages of raaar trolling people

[Gota]

I am amazed raar gets so much respect and patiance while suggestions of better players get ignored or trolled much faster.

you cant be saying a unit is oped or uped if ur not a good player youll just get L2P and rightfully so,even if your are actually correct.
About being consistent.This is not true at all.
sacrificing complexity for easy learning is not the way to go.
Good and accessible video tutorials and single player campaigns is the way to go.
Consistancy is good for balance reasons but if balance has been achieved it would be silly to simplify the game,and personal ideas of what is "unnecessary complexity" do not matter since they are not a good reason to suddenly change a game/mod.

[TheMightyOne]

+1 @ babbs
+1 @ basic

I think we played this game for so long that we developed a "feel" for it along with our experience. That is what raar lacks atm. Or we're just ignorant, conservative, noob-haters who polished the balance for way too long to allow a low rank to come over and say us how we should make it better But more like its a bit of both. So stick around. Play more, eventually you'll see the sense in many of our balance descisions. Gota tried to do the same like half a year ago, he came over with suggestions for improvement but they didn't appeal to our "feel" of the game, so they got dismissed. I suppose there aren't a lot of XTA games atm so it's difficult to base your opinion about balance on those very few games. Big team battles have a different pace than 1v1 or 2v2. Late game is actually almost a different game. Thats where you actually see how cans and zeuses perform vs other units and how and when they are used. Stick around. Play more games. GL n HF.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

I lol @ anyone who thinks cans suck

[Pxtl]

Personally, I'd see about standardizing the open/close thing such that all units other than the Comm and nanotowers take the same amount of time to prepare. Then there's no confusion about balance - no wondering how the nanolathe open-close time affects the choice of units X vs Y.

[Gota]

Well than why not standerdize laser dmg?that way no one will have to wonder how different a laser weapon of one of the units is from another and so on.

If your gonna go "oh that's completely different" please explain why.

[Pxtl]

Because DPS is documented and well-known, and is actually an _interesting_ differentiation between units instead of a tedious one.

This is more like altering the brake-rate of a Hawk depending on what day of the week it is.

[Gota]

Because DPS is documented and well-known, and is actually an _interesting_ differentiation between units instead of a tedious one.

About being consistent.This is not true at all.
sacrificing complexity for easy learning is not the way to go.
Good and accessible video tutorials and single player campaigns is the way to go.
Consistancy is good for balance reasons but if balance has been achieved it would be silly to simplify the game,and personal ideas of what is "unnecessary complexity" do not matter since they are not a good reason to suddenly change a game/mod.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVCtkzIXYzQ

[Pxtl]

If you want to play an RTS version of trivial pursuit, more power to you. I prefer a game where the differences between units focuses on _important_ things instead of tedium.

[Gota]

I dont consider that a tedious difference.
Perhaps it also needs to be documented..or better yet be mentioned in some advanced tutorial...

Small stuff like that is what keeps players interested for a long time.
Just that the more complex a game is the more it requires correct introduction to the player and good VIDEO tutorials.

Take the mod that constantly hovers at the background of your comments,
,CA,where buildings and units have the same build time E and M ratio....that is one factor where there will be no differentiation.
If a unit costs a lot of e but less m while another is the opposite but aside form that all stats are equal they will both have a niche,one on very high e maps,and another on very high m maps...
That is one interesting differentiation that does not exist in CA because of its very conservative definition of what is tedious and what isn't or maybe a desire to automate and simplify the balance process?

[JohannesH]

Its good to have more small variables imo. Unless you're really good, you shouldnt worry about such things, your time is better spent on just improving your basic understanding and skill. But when you start to reach a point where its getting harder to improve, it might be useful to look into all these little things, and think of ways to exploit them to just get a little bit more edge. It would be much duller if there is less things to consider, it alows people to have different playstyles and keeps the gameplay less stagnant.

And if theres something I dislike with SA, its how all units have the so similar m/e/bt cost ratios :D

[Gota]

And if theres something I dislike with SA, its how all units have the so similar m/e/bt cost ratios :D

that would be a fair point if it was true.

[JohannesH]

Oo what, its true... I tested it now too to be sure. Every arm t1 ground unit, besides warrior and shellshocker (which had ~10% change, warrior built faster, shellshocker slower) built at same speed.
Factory drained 6.2 m and 50 e when building every other units, with only a decimal or 2 changing.
The turrets and t2 ground units I tried, also have the same ratio. Sure econ buildings build at different speeds but I didnt mean them.