Nominations for target of the Nerfbat of Damocles (I)

[TechSY730]

Couldn't we buff the AI golems in the Exo waves?

They just seem a bit too weak some of them. Especially if you have an artillery golem yourself, it's so trivial to just snipe the AI golem.

AI Golems in Exo-waves, except for the armored golem, are the same as the human versions except without the self-damage over time.

I think this is more of a sign of the Arty golem needing a nerf.

[chemical_art]

It's not that the artillery golem needs to be nerfed, its that its alpha cannot be countered.

In a standard fleet fight for me (1 - 2 minutes) The artillery golem fires how many times? 8 times? So it takes out 8 units.

Any other golem would kill closer to hundred.

It's just the artillery golem is boundless in its distruction, so you can not notice it at all or tear your hair out.

[Varone]

Couldn't we buff the AI golems in the Exo waves?

They just seem a bit too weak some of them. Especially if you have an artillery golem yourself, it's so trivial to just snipe the AI golem.

AI Golems in Exo-waves, except for the armored golem, are the same as the human versions except without the self-damage over time.

I think this is more of a sign of the Arty golem needing a nerf.

Are you sure they are the same? I was under the impression that AI golems were weaker, at least healthwise? Could be mistaken though.

[TechSY730]

Are you sure they are the same? I was under the impression that AI golems were weaker, at least healthwise? Could be mistaken though.

The Armored, Black-Widow, Artillery, and Regenerator Golems used in exogalactic strikeforces are now different than the "standard" AI golems (like those used by the Golemite AI Type). The main difference is that they lack the 1/10th-health-of-a-normal-golem rule (but the Armored variants still have a 1/2 health modifier, since they're so buff).

    Thanks to Shrugging Khan for continuing to provoke the golems.

Now, the golemite ones, IMO, have too little HP, which is why I already nominated them in the "worst ships" poll.

[rabican]

Written as:
Unit: suggested method of nerfing (if I have one in mind).

Botnets: zombie self-attrition, firing rate for golem.

Shield Bearers (human fleetship). Ideally just give them a regen time and make them immune to repair. This would preserve their role as survivablility-increasers but remove the invincibility factor you get when you add engineers.

Non-armored golems. All of them. Reduce health and damage.

Spirecraft jumpships. Give them a hop count instead of a time count, make them require high-level asteroids, or simply remove them.

Riot Control Starships. Keep the ships the same, but lower the cap while preserving k cost.

Spire Blade Spawners. Remove ff immunity.

Rebel Human Colonies. Have the cloak have a 5 min timer once captured, and lower the shipcap (maybe make it dynamic depending on the number of held colonies) or nerf the ships themselves.

Energy collecters: make energy a complete non-issue in their current incarnation (for almost all games).

Martyrs: We have warheads for that. High-level asteroids or remove.

Gravity guardians: Make transports immune.

Logistics command stations mkI. I rarely ever use econ or military, and I never see any reason to upgrade to mkII or III.

Gravity turrets. Limit the number of ships they can affect at once, or lower their cap.


Eyebots. These do not declare war on my empire, but directly on my sanity. They are coming. They are here. They are all around. Invisible. Waiting. They are coming. : remove one of their immunities (missile or sniper).

almost completly agree.

[Hearteater]

For Gravity Turrets there is already a mantis issue with some good discussion.  In particular:

I think the caps are just too high (currently 58 for each mark). There are at most 120 systems in a game, and how many do you need Gravity Turrets on? Even the 58 Mark I turrets are enough for most games. Once you have Mark III, Mark I are obsolete and so are Mark II are for all practical purposes.

Lowering Mark II and III caps is probably warranted. Heck, even Mark I might need a slight reduction. Maybe 48, 24, and 6.

And that's just for cap issues.  I could see Mark I and II getting a nerf to their speed reduction.

[TechSY730]

For Gravity Turrets there is already a mantis issue with some good discussion.  In particular:

I think the caps are just too high (currently 58 for each mark). There are at most 120 systems in a game, and how many do you need Gravity Turrets on? Even the 58 Mark I turrets are enough for most games. Once you have Mark III, Mark I are obsolete and so are Mark II are for all practical purposes.

Lowering Mark II and III caps is probably warranted. Heck, even Mark I might need a slight reduction. Maybe 48, 24, and 6.

And that's just for cap issues.  I could see Mark I and II getting a nerf to their speed reduction.

+1 To this. Summarizes what I am thinking about why grav turrets are ridiculous now.

[unclean]

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You kick ass at 10/10 so I'm sure you know what you're talking about, but what's wrong with stealth battleships and hive golems?

[Kahuna]

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You kick ass at 10/10 so I'm sure you know what you're talking about, but what's wrong with stealth battleships and hive golems?

I actually removed the Hive Golem from my list. They're very powerful. MAYBE a bit too powerful. 2 of them full of wasps (1000 wasps) can wipe out AI home planets almost entirely. But on the other hand I needed them. (Sure other Golems would have worked too but Hives are just rly good) 1 Wasp has 280000 dps. That's crazy. Sure it's very fragile but when there's 1k of them they destroy almost everything. Maybe reduce the dps to 250000. The cap dps would drop by 15 million but they would still be very powerful.

About Stealth Battleships.. Now that I looked at the numbers (cap dps and health etc) they're OK for humans. For humans the ship cap is only 5. But the AI sends dozens of them just to destroy your "not so well protected command centers". I need few hundred ships to destroy the attacking SSBs. Maybe increase their cost for the AI? Reinforcement points cost or whatever they're called. That's just my opinion. Maybe I just should find a better way to deal with them. Research few extra turrets or something.. MarkII Basic Turrets just to protect the "not so well protected CCs" from the SSBs.

[TechSY730]

About Stealth Battleships.. Now that I looked at the numbers (cap dps and health etc) they're OK for humans. For humans the ship cap is only 5. But the AI sends dozens of them just to destroy your "not so well protected command centers". I need few hundred ships to destroy the attacking SSBs. Maybe increase their cost for the AI? Reinforcement points cost or whatever they're called. That's just my opinion. Maybe I just should find a better way to deal with them. Research few extra turrets or something.. MarkII Basic Turrets just to protect the "not so well protected CCs" from the SSBs.

Maybe they can get a <1 "Usefulness in AI waves multiplier" (which would decrease their numbers in waves), since they become so much more powerful than their stats would suggest if you are allowed to go past cap. So much so that the large amount of opportunity cost the AI has to pay to get them (due to their low ship cap) is often not enough.

[Toranth]

I actually removed the Hive Golem from my list. They're very powerful. MAYBE a bit too powerful. 2 of them full of wasps (1000 wasps) can wipe out AI home planets almost entirely. But on the other hand I needed them. (Sure other Golems would have worked too but Hives are just rly good) 1 Wasp has 280000 dps. That's crazy. Sure it's very fragile but when there's 1k of them they destroy almost everything. Maybe reduce the dps to 250000. The cap dps would drop by 15 million but they would still be very powerful.

Wasps take significant time and resources to build, and have a simple, near-perfect counter:  Gravity.  Gravity Guardians, Gravity Drills, or Spire Gravity Drainers will render your 1000 Wasps into 1000 helpless targets. 

Really, I thought the point of ALL Golems was that they were unique superweapons that could turn the course of the campaign by themselves.  Why nerf them?

The Spire Martyr, on the other hand, still feels like cheese, even to me.

[rabican]

snip

You kick ass at 10/10 so I'm sure you know what you're talking about, but what's wrong with stealth battleships and hive golems?

I actually removed the Hive Golem from my list. They're very powerful. MAYBE a bit too powerful. 2 of them full of wasps (1000 wasps) can wipe out AI home planets almost entirely. But on the other hand I needed them. (Sure other Golems would have worked too but Hives are just rly good) 1 Wasp has 280000 dps. That's crazy. Sure it's very fragile but when there's 1k of them they destroy almost everything. Maybe reduce the dps to 250000. The cap dps would drop by 15 million but they would still be very powerful.

About Stealth Battleships.. Now that I looked at the numbers (cap dps and health etc) they're OK for humans. For humans the ship cap is only 5. But the AI sends dozens of them just to destroy your "not so well protected command centers". I need few hundred ships to destroy the attacking SSBs. Maybe increase their cost for the AI? Reinforcement points cost or whatever they're called. That's just my opinion. Maybe I just should find a better way to deal with them. Research few extra turrets or something.. MarkII Basic Turrets just to protect the "not so well protected CCs" from the SSBs.

Did you see really high numbers in regular waves or cpas/border agression? from what i remember the ai doesn't send that much more of them in regular waves but in cpas you  might face hundreds. Reinforcement/SF logic seems to heavily favor low caps ships and get them almost as much as high cap ones.  This wouldn't be that bad but the difficulty changes more with bonus ship types than actual difficulty.  I wouldn't mind couple of hundred SBSS as long as i get at least couple of autocannons to go with em

[chemical_art]

Wasps take significant time and resources to build, and have a simple, near-perfect counter:  Gravity.  Gravity Guardians, Gravity Drills, or Spire Gravity Drainers will render your 1000 Wasps into 1000 helpless targets. 

Really, I thought the point of ALL Golems was that they were unique superweapons that could turn the course of the campaign by themselves.  Why nerf them?

The Spire Martyr, on the other hand, still feels like cheese, even to me.

This. Why is it now time to nerf golems after they have been around forever? The AI and the player have gotten stronger while they (aside from a few like the black widow and artillery) have remained the same. They drain your economy even if you don't lose them, they cost signicant resources to build, and there is further resources lost in either AIP gained (medium) or extra waves of enemies (hard).

I don't see why something meant to be strong in the player is supposed to be nerfed. Might as well nerf the whole spire campaign next, since they can change the tide of battle.

[keith.lamothe]

The botnet needs a nerf, I think.  The Arty and Widow probably need some degree of nerf too, since when I buffed them semi-recently it was intentionally making-certain-they-were-good, and not really trying to nail the balance exactly.

But golems in general?  Yea, superweapons   The AI's retaliation for them (on hard) could stand to be more intense, but the weapons themselves are supposed to be pretty hardcore.

[chemical_art]

That's understandable. Black widow could tractor less units, Artillery golem can fire more slowly (but pleaase don't nerf the range, otherwise you got an inefficent cursed golem.)

I've never had the joy of a botnet, so they don't even come up on my radar.