Poll: Aim the Nerfbat of Damocles: AI-side (II)

[Bognor]

Also in honor of being one of the winners of the "Aim the Nerfbat of Damocles: AI-side (II)" poll, the Zenith Bombard:

• Now "costs" the AI 50% as much to spawn in all contexts

Keith does your evil know no bounds?!

Or did you mean it costs the AI 50% *more*...

[Lancefighter]

i posted earlier a section of the special forces reinforce logs, showing how much the zbombard 'cost' for the AI to build - That number is now 50% higher.

Honestly, when faced with fighting 2k zbombards and 1.3k zbombards, ill take the 1.3k... :p

[keith.lamothe]

Also in honor of being one of the winners of the "Aim the Nerfbat of Damocles: AI-side (II)" poll, the Zenith Bombard:

• Now "costs" the AI 50% as much to spawn in all contexts

Keith does your evil know no bounds?!

Or did you mean it costs the AI 50% *more*...

Oops, that should say 150%.

I might be that mean, on some days, but I wouldn't do it while saying it was in response to a poll saying to nerf it

[TechSY730]

A .75 "AIUsefulnessInX" multiplier (for all X in AI mechanics that use ship caps to scale costs)? That seems a bit too harsh...

[KDR_11k]

I think the issue with the colony ships is a design one. They're fast warheads that get launched in volleys at random targets and you control the slowest and shortest ranged ship in the entire nebula. That alone means that your influence is extremely limited, you cannot respond, you can merely attack the stations and hope you finish before the colony missiles do their job. They also trigger a Hotline Miami-style* issue where ships won't respond fast enough to such extremely fast units. The champ has a tiny range in the nebula and the colony missile crosses that in a split second, too fast for the champion's guns to even realize that they can shoot now. If the defenders' weapons would actually fire on the approaching colony missiles (or spire blades) then those attacks would be significantly less dangerous and their nature as units would actually matter. As it is right now you could make the colony missiles into projectiles and the difference would be insignificant.

*) If you haven't played HM, the core mechanic in that game is that enemies take a split second to notice that they can attack you now. Most scenarios rely on your chief weapon being surprise, you need to rush in and kill everybody in a room before any of them manage to pull the trigger.

[Lancefighter]

I found that if you had invented the railgun weapon before entering this scenario, you actually had a weapon decent enough to provide an incredible amount of cover to nearby ships, on the assumption that your cannons were not reloading.

The problem there becomes that you are virtually required to have this one type of weapon (an instant-hit anti-light weapon, mostly. I think railclusters fill a similar role? I hesitate to put flak here, despite this possibly being their 'best' case) and If you didn't have it, it was indeed a race against the clock as it were.

Also, as this scales up (i did it a few times on a single hero, and once in a game with three), it gets weirder - If all 3 members work together and have good anti-base weapons, it can be incredibly easy(maybe one of them mounting anti-colonyship weapons). Without the cooperation, it became really difficult to operate properly against the increased strength of colonyships.

With all of that said - I really dont think this mission needed a nerf. I honestly dont. If anything, the ravenous shadow one needed looking at, for reasons of speed alone.

[Cinth]

With all of that said - I really dont think this mission needed a nerf. I honestly dont. If anything, the ravenous shadow one needed looking at, for reasons of speed alone.

Yeah. Originally it moved at 52 speed. Right now it is moving at 97(?) speed (normal combat rules).

Spire ships which should be the go to here can't keep up to keep weapons on it. Zenith ships do a little better (faster) job at keeping weapons in range. It's a pretty big speed buff for the RS.

[KDR_11k]

With all of that said - I really dont think this mission needed a nerf.

I don't think a nerf, i.e. keeping it the same but reducing the power of the colony missiles, is a good idea either, the last time I encountered it I simply wiped the floor with the enemy bases while shrugging the colony missile bombardment off. What it needs is a re-design to make the scenario interact more with the player. I have no suggestions on how to do that but without changes I don't think it's either strategic or fun. It's like Call of Duty or something, lots of explosions and panic but none of it really relevant to what you do.

[Atomikkrab]

I originally posted the nomination for that and also the devourer golem (keeps showing up way before I can take it down in time withe one champion.) The issue with the colony ships is that I indeed could stop them from killing me but not the allied bases, especially with the large numbers of enemy ships pouring out from theirs. Sadly I didn't get to vote because of Sandy.