Absolute Annihilation 2.11

Egarwaen · Post by **Egarwaen** » 29 Jun 2006, 17:00

Charlemagne wrote:I actually think air is too good. Arm flak resistant gunships are virtually unstoppable, if the player micros them a bit and takes out all enemy AA before he starts blasting other things.

With only ground-based AA? Maybe.

If you have even a handful of fighters, especially L2 fighters, backing up ground AA? Heh, GG Gunships.

Drone_Fragger wrote:Also, Fighters aren't much use if you own half the map. By the time your fighters get to the gunships, They've killed everything there, and if the brawlers have fighters with them, You are stuffed anyway.

1) If you own half the map, losing < 1 screen of stuff to a surprise brawler raid before your fighters can get there and rip them to itty bitty pieces is no big loss. And once they're gone, you know to expect them, so you can build more fighters. Fighters are cheap and very effective even in groups of ~10.

2) If the Brawlers have fighters with them, what the heck have you been doing? So now we have you owning half the map... And your enemy's had enough spare cash to get a Brawler swarm and an accompanying fighter swarm? Dude, learn about pressure sometime. Unless you're playing SimBase or doing some lame-ass tactic like a nuke/bertha/Krog-rush, your enemy should not have enough spare cash for that.

3) Scale defences to available resources. If you have more resources (say, half the map) you can afford more fighters (which are absurdly cheap) and can split them up into groups to cover your base more effectively. Tah-dah, problem solved.

Am I the only one that really wants to see a replay with Drone against a really good player so he can demonstrate all these overpowered units for us?

Pxtl wrote:So, how does the L2 fighter currently perform? I've never used (or even seen) it in game.

It's not bad but, as others have said, the L1 fighter is currently more cost-effective. The main advantage is the stealth.

NOiZE · Post by **NOiZE** » 29 Jun 2006, 17:12

Another idea to make Skeeter rushes less game dominating

Give the shipyard LLT's on it!

Day · Post by **Day** » 29 Jun 2006, 17:13

il happily 1v1 him

Sleksa · Post by **Sleksa** » 29 Jun 2006, 17:14

OR if llts sound too overkill, maybe skeeter's weapon?

Min3mat · Post by **Min3mat** » 29 Jun 2006, 17:15

make sure they are weak-ish though, just to hold off skeeter rushing. and give them specific arcs of fire so that there are still weak areas (only a small amount of the (very)LLTs reaching there)
i was thinking 4 skeeter lasers on the SY poles with weak areas to the north/south (only 1 LLT reaching there)

Cabbage · Post by **Cabbage** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:01

Egarwaen Wrote:

Am I the only one that really wants to see a replay with Drone against a really good player so he can demonstrate all these overpowered units for us?

I'll go get some popcorn!

KlavoHunter · Post by **KlavoHunter** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:28

No, DON'T nerf the skeeter rush.

ANY fool can counter a skeeter rush without much problem, by building a skeeter of his own. The transit time from one base to another GUARANTEES that the rush-ee will be able to build some form of defense in the time it takes to get there. With one skeeter.

OR, you can build a torpedo launcher. It's not that difficult. Between a torpedo launcher, and your commander in the water performing a capture/reclaim order (I prefer Capture, because it's not immediately obvious what's going on to your opponant), you can cover both sides of your shipyard easily. (Since any intelligent micro'ing opponant will move his skeeter to the other side of the shipyard, so that it blocks your torpedo launcher's fire.)

Shipyards don't NEED any form of anti-rush protection - if you do this, you may as well add an LLT to all your KBot Labs and Vehicle Plants. And then while we're at it, why not add Flea lasers to all your Wind Plants and Solar Panels?

Jeez. I've come back from being pushed ENTIRELY out of the water by an early Skeeter Rush. So have many of my opponants. Allow me to outline the steps needed.

1.) Walk Commander out of water, build LLT on shore.
2.) Build torpedo launcher on beach.
3.) Build torpedo launcher out further at sea.
4.) Repeat #3 until you can safely build a shipyard.

Caydr · Post by **Caydr** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:28

I'll get pizza.

I'm REALLY nervous about these L3 changes. They make sense on paper but may not make so much sense when compared to lesser units. ie, you can kill a krogoth if you've got enough of X L1 unit and probably spend less... that kind of thing.

The good news: Krogoth/Orcone's metal cost has been reduced and now requires less time to build. Many other L3 units have less metal costs as well.

As I was saying earlier, I'm trying to figure out a new formula for unit costs... this was working pretty well for Krog/Orco, but gave costs that way way out of order for the smaller L3 units. So... here's the idea I'm currently trying:

Rather than balance a unit based on its total cost, which is really a rather arbitrary idea, I've decided to try balancing units on the time required to build them and the energy and metal per tick that they cost.

As I said earlier, I'm trying to make "tech levels" within tech level 3. I'm doing this by making the most powerful units (krog, orcone, bantha) extremely expensive energy-wise. Like, 1600 energy a tick for a krogth, for instance. Also 50 metal per tick. So they'll be off-limits unless you're crazy-rich and it's a long game.

I'm trying to figure out if they need a buff as a result of this, but I don't really think so... the reason they cost so much per tick is because they now require only 10 minutes to build (was about 17 before, if memory serves).

10 minutes for a krogoth??! CRAZY, right? I don't think so, not so much... compare with how long it would take to build a high-level T2 unit, such as a Sumo or a Goliath. I think that all "high end" units should take the same amount of time to build, regardless of tech level, but their prices should be increasing quickly.

Ok, so there's one example, the krogoth. Here's another. the arm Marauder will take only 1:30 to build, and will cost 9 metal and 250 energy the whole time, assuming it's unassisted. This isn't much of a change from how it already is, actually, besides the high energy cost.

All L3 units, from the least expensive to the most, will cost far, far more energy now than ever before. But, in many cases, their metal cost has been decreased by a percentage as well. The idea here is to make L3 impossible to rush to without building a real economy first. No more of this, "one guy takes the pounding holding off everyone while the other guy builds a krogoth" - without even one constructor assisting, it will cost far too much per tick to rush any tech level 3 stuff.

I want it to be a good idea to at least have a few L3 units because they are economically sensible to build. Like, no more of this 500 L1/L2 units are more powerful, have more hp, and cost the same as a krogoth.

I don't want L3 to just be the only thing worth building once you have it though. They'll still be highly vulnerable to most aircraft and also anything equipped with a BLoD. If your opponent goes all L3, you just mass some of the proper defenses and his attack forces will be at a disadvantage. I want ALL tech level to have their place, even in the end-game.

Drone_Fragger · Post by **Drone_Fragger** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:34

Egarwaen · Post by **Egarwaen** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:39

Caydr wrote:I'm REALLY nervous about these L3 changes. They make sense on paper but may not make so much sense when compared to lesser units. ie, you can kill a krogoth if you've got enough of X L1 unit and probably spend less... that kind of thing.

Playtest.

The thing to keep in mind here is the "battleship factor". There's a couple of things that come into play:

1) The Krogoth has a slight edge over the mob of L1 units because it remains at full efficiency until it's dead. This means that if a Krogoth and a mob of X units have about the same total DPS and health, the Krogoth needs to be more expensive, or it's effectively uneconomical to counter it with anything but another Krogoth.

2) The L1 mob has a slight edge over the Krogoth because it can be in many places at once. However, it's also much less effective at concentrating force.

Cheesecan · Post by **Cheesecan** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:40

Well on say Green fields you can have +1600 e and +50 m within approximately 35 minutes if you're industrious, and that map doesn't even have any metal patches.

I don't know about you but I'd rather not see any krogoths/orcones being built before at least 45 minutes into a regular game.
So about +90 m and +3000 e would be optimal imho. Expensive L3 should be end-game.

Caydr · Post by **Caydr** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:43

Would anyone like to volunteer to playtest 2.11 with me then? Post your MSN address or PM it to me. If you haven't got MSN, that's just a shame ain't it...

Cheesecan · Post by **Cheesecan** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:43

Caydr wrote:Would anyone like to volunteer to playtest 2.11 with me then?

Sure!

Pxtl · Post by **Pxtl** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:46

Egarwaen wrote:
Playtest.

The thing to keep in mind here is the "battleship factor". There's a couple of things that come into play:

1) The Krogoth has a slight edge over the mob of L1 units because it remains at full efficiency until it's dead. This means that if a Krogoth and a mob of X units have about the same total DPS and health, the Krogoth needs to be more expensive, or it's effectively uneconomical to counter it with anything but another Krogoth.

2) The L1 mob has a slight edge over the Krogoth because it can be in many places at once. However, it's also much less effective at concentrating force.

Imho, even more important than point 1 is the effect blast radiuses have. 1 krog can only be hit once by each shot, however a corresponding horde of Hammers can have 5-10 units harmed by a single shot. The reverse is also true for high-damage, low-blast-radius, low rate-of-fire weapons which overkill their targets. A lone annihilator will do a number on a Goli, but the Goli's equivalent in cheaper units will bring down the annihilator quite easily because it overkills one unit and then takes a long time before it fires at the next.

Caydr · Post by **Caydr** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:52

Also I'm going to probably set krogoth to be cloakable.

Just testing you

Pxtl · Post by **Pxtl** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:53

Caydr wrote:Also I'm going to probably set krogoth to be cloakable.

Just testing you

You know, this would probably be funnier if you weren't the man who invented cloakable sumos.

Mars Keeper · Post by **Mars Keeper** » 29 Jun 2006, 18:54

Caydr wrote:Also I'm going to probably set krogoth to be cloakable.

Just testing you

Why just not have krogoths appear in nuclear blasts?

Also joking...

Drone_Fragger · Post by **Drone_Fragger** » 29 Jun 2006, 19:01

Cloakable krogoths?? Shock!

Cheesecan · Post by **Cheesecan** » 29 Jun 2006, 19:02

Epochs could upon reaching shore transform into krogoths.

*drool*

Day · Post by **Day** » 29 Jun 2006, 19:02

Spring RTS Engine

Absolute Annihilation 2.11