Poll: Aim the Nerfbat of Damocles: Player-side (I)

[keith.lamothe]

Nominations from this thread.  Also look there if you want an explanation of what we're doing here.

So, who gets the bat?  3 votes per person this time, and I'll try to do something with the top 3 results, but probably not more than that because "processing" the results tends to significantly bog down if there's a ton of winners.

This is specifically just for the human units.  Obviously, nerfing some units will nerf them for both sides, but there's a separate poll from the specifically "nerf this for AI usage" nominations.

Thanks for the feedback

[Diazo]

Only voted for energy collector. It is simply too much energy for free at this point.

However, I was surprised to see the Zenith Bombard on this list.

Yes, it owns mid-game but late game against core worlds and homeworlds it's almost useless. Everything has Antimatter Bomb immunity.

I got them from an ARS last game, if I was doing it over I'd ship-hack to get something else, that's how bad they were for me in the end-game.

D.

[TechSY730]

Only voted for energy collector. It is simply too much energy for free at this point.

However, I was surprised to see the Zenith Bombard on this list.

Yes, it owns mid-game but late game against core worlds and homeworlds it's almost useless. Everything has Antimatter Bomb immunity.

I got them from an ARS last game, if I was doing it over I'd ship-hack to get something else, that's how bad they were for me in the end-game.

D.

Sure they can't help take out the core guard posts, the forcefields, and the home, but won't they pull their weight against the horde of Mk. V fleet ships and Mk. V guardians/starships the AI will send at you to try to stop you?

[Diazo]

I found they did not because they died before getting a second salvo off.

They are artillery units, when AI ships can close the range on them they just die (which I agree with for gameplay/balance reasons.)

Their intended targets all have Anti Matter immunity (or radar dampening) so they are hardly useful.

And so many of the AI ships are under forcefields anyway, as those are Anti-Matter immune, the bombards can't even attack them while the forcefield is still intact making them even less useful.

Did their powerful alpha-strike kill a lot of AI units? Yes.

They did not get a second shot off however and their construction costs were not worth that single salvo. (To me anyway).

Having said that, I can see where in mid-game these things are too powerful. Unless there is a force field in system, they can clear an AI system in 3 to 4 salvos, it's not until the core/homeworlds that their usefulness goes away.

(I will admit to only playing a single game recently with bombards, maybe my experience was an outlier?)

D.

edit: To clarify, after clearing the warp point with short-range ships (fighters/bombers/etc.) and warping my Bombards in, they got roughly 1 kill to every 10 or 15 my fleet ball got. And that was often clean up after my fleet ball had closed the range and knocked the force field/guard post down to allow the bombards to even attack.

I had wanted to use my bombards as my primary attack to take advantage of their range and use my fleet ball to protect it from mobile AI ships but sitting there taking fire from a Missile guard post and the wormhole guard posts without returning any fire forced me to use my fleet ball as my attack and the bombards for clean up.

[BobTheJanitor]

Can I vote for 'not my botnet golem!' by chance?

[keith.lamothe]

Can I vote for 'not my botnet golem!' by chance?

You could either vote for other things to decrease the botnet's relative lead or just use one vote on the "none" option and not use the other two.  None is getting more than I thought it would

[Martyn van Buren]

I'd really like to see some work done on the spirecraft; I've only really used martyrs, siege towers, and scouts, but martyrs and scouts made me feel so guilty that I pretty much stopped using asteroids altogether.  It does sound like the jumpships and penetrators may have a similar problem but I know from hearsay.

EDIT: On reflection, might it be worth removing the lower tiers of the best spirecraft entirely and making them something you get only from the rarest asteroids?  I'd feel a lot better about martyrs and scouts if in the course of the whole game I only got enough asteroids to build one cap of martyrs and building one scout would mean one less martyr?

[BobTheJanitor]

On a completely random note, reading the list quickly and seeing 'shield bearer' above the V of the word 'gravity' made my brain read 'shield beaver'. I would now like a Shield Beaver to be implemented immediately. I have no idea what it would do, but it would be awesome.

[keith.lamothe]

On a completely random note, reading the list quickly and seeing 'shield bearer' above the V of the word 'gravity' made my brain read 'shield beaver'. I would now like a Shield Beaver to be implemented immediately. I have no idea what it would do, but it would be awesome.

We never could figure out how it turned driftwood and leaves into a 10 GW forcefield generator...

[zoutzakje]

I voted for none. I'm happy with all of these as they are now. I don't get why botnet is being voted so much. If you think it's overpowered, play on moderate and see what +40 AIP can do to you. And zombie defense can have a bad impact on your game as well. I've seen them try and fail to take out massive threat. The result wasn't pretty.
I got a botnet in my current game and it's having a hard time doing anything, with all the spire fleet ships and hybrids flying around. There's a lot of stuff out there already that can't be zombified.

[Hearteater]

I don't get why botnet is being voted so much.

500,000,000 DPS

[keith.lamothe]

The Botnet didn't get very good grades in math, and it's been compensating ever since.

[Cyborg]

Don't touch the botnet…it's so much fun to use, and it's not breaking any games, is it?

[keith.lamothe]

Don't touch the botnet…it's so much fun to use, and it's not breaking any games, is it?

You mean aside from inhaling 2000+ ship waves on 10/10?

[TechSY730]

Don't touch the botnet…it's so much fun to use, and it's not breaking any games, is it?

IMHO, yes, it is.

Or at least on all but the highest of difficulties where the AIP cost of medium or the exo-waves of hard.

If nothing else, these things are great at scaring away threat forever, due to their ludicrous firepower.