Absolute Annihilation 1.5

[Egarwaen]

you dont seem to understand that building them only will severly stall everything!! all the metal spent on those armedmex (who get outranged by storms)they cost alot of E and BT for early game, by the time you can build them fast they were obsolete because of the rocko/thud swarms

I never said you should build only them. Please read my posts before spouting off garbage counterarguments like this.

They can very effectively protect your economy (not your front lines) from fast raider units. You do not need to build only armed mexes to do this. You only need a couple of armed mexes positioned properly to do this. Say, one armed mex for every two regular mexes at most. Likely significantly fewer.

Rockos, Crashers, and Thuds are not fast raider units, and cannot effectively attack your rear unless you've made a big mistake, or they've already broken through your lines.

edit: you keep saying they pwn raiders, right, they do, ever thought about attacking them with skirmish units?

Can skirmish units effectively slip/run past lines or quickly dart through a gap the same way Zippers/PWs/AKs can? IIRC, most are too slow.

[krogothe]

Egarwaen, i cant see your point. Exploiters are effective, yes, almost as effective as their price in just llts and they give metal, but theyre static, and due to the nature of mex spots they can be quickly and easily overwhelmed by any medium sized raid, which you can piece together 6 minutes into the game.
As much as i think the whole concept of giving units "anti-raider" armor is utterly stupid, i think they are fine as they are. I only ever use them on metalheck and then again only sometimes. Radar and a mobile force, with llts to slow them down makes for the best defense, and provided they dont dig too deep youre always better off after reclaiming his and your wrecks and quickly rebuilding the mexes.
And ever heard of artillery? Even rockos will do...

[Soulless1]

Okay, we should probably quit yelling about this mex versus that mex before cadyr gets confused, *tries* to give people what they want and accidently nerfs something everybody likes (cf: packo's/SAM/hllt/beamer )

I think the real problem here is simply that cloaked mexes still show up on the metal map (also maybe they could use some HP, but thats less of a major issue). I'm pretty sure that's an engine bug, but I haven't seen anyone request that it be fixed

The thing about exploiters is this: Core generally *have* to play using the 'brute force' expansion technique - whereas arm have tonnes of raiding units like fleas and flashes during early game, core units are generally slower. So they use more of a 'grinding forward' approach. And to do that effectively, they can't spend all their time building mex + llt + dragons teeth combos - it'd take forever. Instead they have a single armed mex that can effectively be built and left, but costs more than a normal mex. You can't afford to build them everywhere, but you can put them in positions that are likely to get assaulted, without having to spend a bunch of extra workertime to fortify them and then finding they're no longer at the front lines anyway.

To me, they do this job exactly as designed. They're tough and resistant to raiders (though 10 peewees will still take one down) but they have short range which means any kind of actual attack (ie, one that includes more than just peewees/fleas) is almost certain to win. Sounds about right tbh

Arm are supposed to play more of a fluid style, hence they get their cloaking mex which, if only it worked properly, would also be useful as they could just build it and move on, fighting past it rather than over it.
That would also be cool...all that needs doing is the F4 view fix, and like I said, maybe a bit of HP.

[Kixxe]

Aint the whole idea with exploiters to STOP fast raid units, Tbh?

[Pxtl]

Egarwaen, i cant see your point. Exploiters are effective, yes, almost as effective as their price in just llts and they give metal, but theyre static, and due to the nature of mex spots they can be quickly and easily overwhelmed by any medium sized raid, which you can piece together 6 minutes into the game.
As much as i think the whole concept of giving units "anti-raider" armor is utterly stupid, i think they are fine as they are. I only ever use them on metalheck and then again only sometimes. Radar and a mobile force, with llts to slow them down makes for the best defense, and provided they dont dig too deep youre always better off after reclaiming his and your wrecks and quickly rebuilding the mexes.
And ever heard of artillery? Even rockos will do...

Yeah, "anti-raider" armour, especially on a building does seem kinda silly. I've always figured the proper "anti-raider" armour was Dragon's Teeth.

[krogothe]

Yeah, "anti-raider" armour, especially on a building does seem kinda silly. I've always figured the proper "anti-raider" armour was Dragon's Teeth.

Yeah, unfortunately the con units except comm and planes unfold too freaking slow for them to be much use. semi-noobs use them effectively around defenses, but it hurts their expansion and the sheer hassle puts me off doing it.

[Machiosabre]

they're good vs rockos since their powerup.

[Egarwaen]

Fine, people don't care about Exploiters. Most people don't bother to raid, so I guess I see why.

So the other apparent weirdness in the tanks: the Demolisher. Has anyone found a use for this thing, or does it also need tweaking?

[MrSpontaneous]

this post is a bit late but I was busy

Min3mat Wrote:

THIS is what im talking about 'i have not played AA...in several versions...i've not tried using this unit...but you know...its alright! its good! and im not noob! no only PROS post on things before a) testing or even b) COMPREHENDING THE GAME

I played a game of AA 1.48 1 day ago, I have not been using vehicles much because Kbots are better at early expansion, which makes going vehicles on many maps far too slow. When I do use vehicles, I have not often had a situaltiong were I wanted to employ that tank.

Not using a unit does not mean not playing.

now I have said my piece, good day.

[Pxtl]

Yeah, "anti-raider" armour, especially on a building does seem kinda silly. I've always figured the proper "anti-raider" armour was Dragon's Teeth.

Yeah, unfortunately the con units except comm and planes unfold too freaking slow for them to be much use. semi-noobs use them effectively around defenses, but it hurts their expansion and the sheer hassle puts me off doing it.

Yep. I do it still on SmallDivide and similar maps chokepoint maps, but never elsewhere. There's a keycombo to surround a building with another building, but it builds the surroundings in a square, rather than the smallest-possible layout of DTs (like a hex for LLTs).

[Soulless1]

no, what he meant was that construction units other than aircraft take ages to build DTs because they fold/unfold after each one.

And yeah, the demolisher probably does need some attention...

[Konane]

Talking about redundant units, I can't remember the last time I saw mines used. I like minefields well enough, but right now its just not efficent to build them. They need to be changed somehow, prerhaps buildtime, cloaking cost decrease or something like that?

[Min3mat]

So in that case you think the Core Doomsday should be made into an Annihilator clone?

Pxtl i told you already! GTFO OUT OF MY MOD ;P
FFS
its bad for gameplay
reffering to units that stop raiding VERY efficiently
OBVIOUSLY its about ARM/CORE imbalance ISN'T IT. I mean at work today this guy asked me for a sandwich, so OBVIOUSLY he was talking about the DENSITY of CHEESE right?
NO!!!! DIE!!!!!!!!
I think that Exploiters slow down gameplay as they are too able to stop t1 raiding in its tracks. I think that this SLOWING of gameplay is bad...christ >.<

No matter what you say a exploiter DOES NOT go down easy. It can destroy a thud or two from a 4 unit raiding pary. it can stop 8ish PW. If rockos arent kept far from it and pput on hold pos and insanely microed you will lose a LOT to a LONE METAL EXTRACTOR. it stops raiding in its tracks because by killing the mex you have lost HALF or so of your 4-6 unit raiding party trying to slow their expansion, that probably pays enough metal to rebuild the damn thing!

[Egarwaen]

And yeah, the demolisher probably does need some attention...

Definitely. Right now, it's worse than a Bulldog, Penetrator, or Luger in practically every way. Sure, it does kind of hit a middle ground between a Bulldog and a Penetrator, but that just makes it kind of useless, as it has the weaknesses of both and the strengths of neither.

[BigSteve]

I think the demolishers problem is its shockingly bad mobility, it packs a fair pucnh with decent armour, its just so sloooooww to move and turn
It is rather expensive too

[Aun]

I think the demolishers problem is its shockingly bad mobility, it packs a fair pucnh with decent armour, its just so sloooooww to move and turn
It is rather expensive too

Yeah, it does about 500 damage per shot, with pretty nice range. Good for backing up defence lines...

[krogothe]

No, they suck ass, bulldogs do the exact same job better.
Remove them or change them completely...

[FireCrack]

Hmmm... the demolisher seems as if it should be arms awnser to the goliath, packs a mean punch and good armour, but quite slow. Too slow to be good at skirishing and general combat like the bulldog but better at assaulting fixed defences. IOW, a heavy duty vehicle version of he zeus. Or atleast that's what it should be.


And speaking of zeuses, the zeus/mav balance seems off right now, as it is the zeus has a tad more armour, but no autorepair, less damage, less speed, and less range. This needs to be fixed, sure the mav costs more, but the roles seem reversed as to what they should be, the zeus is nothing more than a cheap mav right now.


Oh, and the description of the advanced construction vehicle shouldnt read tech 3.

[MR.D]

The lvl1 Exploiter isn't really much of a problem, its reasonably easy to take down, it gives less metal than a normal mex and costs alot to build.

My bitch is with the LVL2 Moho-Exploiter, the firepower is fair concidering the cost involved in making one vs the metal income, but it is way over armored for what it needs to be.

Knocking the hell outta Lvl1 units doesn't bother me that much, as a lvl2 defence it is as effective as other units of its cost if not more, but once you start striking it with lvl2 units such as Bulldog and it can destroy up to 4 incoming Heavy tanks even if its mixed with some light units to get ur heavy units in range.

For me that seems silly to be able to stop a full scale assault with a moho mine that has so much survivability..

I know that artillery units are quite capable of handling this role, although its not my preference to use it as often as I should.

I'm stuck in a dilemma with the unit, I love this moho exploiter because if I build one, I rarely ever need to put more than that for an awesome defence, and at the same time even when I use them it seems overpowered because it out performs defence units that cost alot more to do the same thing.

If it was able to turn at the same rate regardless of ground metal, I would never build anything except moho exploiters as my main ground defensive line.

[Aun]

The lvl1 Exploiter isn't really much of a problem, its reasonably easy to take down, it gives less metal than a normal mex and costs alot to build.

My bitch is with the LVL2 Moho-Exploiter, the firepower is fair concidering the cost involved in making one vs the metal income, but it is way over armored for what it needs to be.

Knocking the hell outta Lvl1 units doesn't bother me that much, as a lvl2 defence it is as effective as other units of its cost if not more, but once you start striking it with lvl2 units such as Bulldog and it can destroy up to 4 incoming Heavy tanks even if its mixed with some light units to get ur heavy units in range.

For me that seems silly to be able to stop a full scale assault with a moho mine that has so much survivability..

I know that artillery units are quite capable of handling this role, although its not my preference to use it as often as I should.

I'm stuck in a dilemma with the unit, I love this moho exploiter because if I build one, I rarely ever need to put more than that for an awesome defence, and at the same time even when I use them it seems overpowered because it out performs defence units that cost alot more to do the same thing.

If it was able to turn at the same rate regardless of ground metal, I would never build anything except moho exploiters as my main ground defensive line.

And that's their main weakness, if the metal spots are spread out far enough, you can just bypass them.