Warlords and Merchants Discussion

[IskatuMesk]

And so, to recap some thoughts.

Zerg Regen defenses should give a small amount of armor. What is it, a 5 level upgrade? Maybe like 0.5 or 0.6 armor...

... Meanwhile the perdition turret's 10-11 armor is utterly ridiculous.

For the Atomic Crusader, we already went over that. I wouldn't over-nerf it, but offensively it's currently the most powerful unit in the air. See game 1 and how badly yggdrasils and devourers contended with them...

[Mucky]

My own thoughts on the AC:

Lower the radius on the explosion. There's simply no defense against these units when any anti-air force you have will die to the explosion. In game 2 I had 30 devourers, all of which died instantly to a chain reaction from ACs dying and exploding. Had I not tried to deal with them, they would have killed my base... but losing my entire air force allowed HKS to kill me anyway.

I mean, when it comes down to it, you can kite them, prison them, ram your own ACs into them; no matter how you try to counter them, the explosion ensures that even if you win, you still lose.

I think it should be brought down to at least half, although personally I'd take it down to a fourth of its current radius. As much as Mesk warns against over-nerfing, the radius truly is ludicrous. It's almost more than double the range of most air units. Also, if they ever manage to fly into your main base, it's pretty much a death sentence for you, not unlike having a sea of butter in your base. In addition to nerfing the radius, I think it should not deal not damage to structures. They have their own weapons to deal with defenses anyway.

Speaking of their weapons, the DPS on them is pretty insane. I've calculated the AC's DPS in total to be 150 fully upgraded, 160 on armored targets (i.e. all structures). Barring armor of course. At the same time, they cost as much supply as the Yggdrasil/Odin/Omegalisk. Yggdrasils should be able to win against the ACs... but again, their explosion makes them a pain in the ass to deal with even if you have overwhelming numbers. Plus, Yggdrasils cost more upfront and have a hefty maintenance with locusts.

It's hard to say what specifically should be nerfed, since it's the combination of all of their strengths that make ACs so strong. Even if the radius on their explosion is nerfed, I can see it still being powerful because of their ability to boost their speed and move on top of whatever's attacking them. But if you remove/nerf the speed boost on top of a nerf to the explosion radius and a nerf to weapon range, then Vikings could probably just kite them to death. Didn't Battlecruisers get a buff to range specifically because of this? It's something to think about when designing them for end-game situations.

[Mucky]

P.S. AA Hellions should have their speed brought down to that of the regular Hellion and lose it's attack-on-the-move. They are way too good at clearing expansions and running away before you can kill them.

[EVWeb]

P.S. AA Hellions should have their speed brought down to that of the regular Hellion and lose it's attack-on-the-move. They are way too good at clearing expansions and running away before you can kill them.

You just need to bother blocking your expansions.

As for the AC, I think the nuke explosion needs to be halved in range (maybe slightly reduced dmg vs structures). The attack rate of the rockets needs to be 0.9 and the armor should be 3.

Possibly 7 range on the main weapon, but that might be overkill. And it needs increased cost.

[IskatuMesk]

I find it funny the AA hellion is used 95% of the time as a unit to clear the entire map of workers instead of AA purposes, in which it really doesn't do that well at.

Remove its land attack entirely or do as mucky suggests.

[Mucky]

P.S. AA Hellions should have their speed brought down to that of the regular Hellion and lose it's attack-on-the-move. They are way too good at clearing expansions and running away before you can kill them.

You just need to bother blocking your expansions.

I lose a drone for every spine/spore crawler I make. Drones which I am dependent on for recovering and getting back into the game. To do this for even one base is a huge investment. To expect me to do this for all of the bases I had is completely unreasonable. What's more, even if I do bother to build all of those defenses, the AA Hellions could still roll in, kill all of the drones, and roll out before taking any real damage from the spine crawlers. What's more is that even if you take losses, AA Hellions are a joke to replace.

Also, that particular game had everyone running around with AC fleets, which melted bases whether they were defended or not. If an expansion was discovered it was as good as dead. So really, there was no point whatsoever in building defense.

[Vetraeus]

I don't know anything about what is going on, but I still think AA Hellions need their collision size increased from 1x2 to 2x3.

[Ricky_Honejasi]

Latest Changes for next FFS:

1) Weapon/Armor/Shields upg. cap is Lv5 (from Lv6)
2) Elite - Atomic Crusader was considerably nerfed. Mostly 40% less life and -2 armor as main nerfs.
3) Carriers costs +100 minerals but comes with 8 interceptors.
4) Carriers auto-rebuild interceptors by default.
5) Yggdrasil comes with 18 Locusts instead of 12 (out of 24 max).
6) Multiple Zerg Kerrigans no longer possible by burrowing Kerrigans.
7) Different hotkeys for Merchant's Scourges and Devourers
8) Adv.R Titanium Def.'s armor gain is now +1.5 from +2.
9) Adv.R Regen Def. gains less regen/level but +0.5 armor
10) Combo - Giant Baneling's cost to 200/200 (from 250/250)
11) Elite - Scantolisk +1 range vs Air.
12) Hellion BFF now only gives +5 vs Light but reduced costs.
13) Reworked Combo Hellions.
14) Zerg - Princess's Ensnare have 3 AoE (from 2).
15) Ensnare also no longer affect allied units.
16) Princess' Spawn Broodling costs 100 and have 5 cooldown.
17) Princess costs +50 more gas.

Extra Details :

*) Made Merchants' units trains at 500 range max instead of mass slapping the Flying Mover. The Flying Mover was to prevent merchant buildings from being unable to train ground units in hard spots such as water.

Hopefully this will give the same effect without ground units moving and giggling like madmen during Sandbox mode.

Atomic Crusader
Still Elite Tier 4.
Costs 900/600 (from 1000/700)
Life : 600 (from 1000)
Armor : 2 (from 4)
First weapon has 7 range and 0.75 AS (from 8r and 0.60 AS)
Second weapon has 5 range and 0.25 AS (from 6r and 0.20 AS)
Nuke effect range to 8 at 100%. Was 16 50% + 8 at 100%.
Still takes 3x damage from nuke effect (around 200)

Note : I still intend to keep the Atomic Crusader as a high DPS unit but with the fatal flaw that you can't spam them due to relatively low HP and the nuke effect if you have too many. Probably you can only have 3 (or maybe 4) before more of them just get lost if you manage to blow up 3-4 of the whole pack.

Combo Hellions

Do check attentively the changes

Remainder : Hellion BFF now only gives +5 vs Light but reduced costs.

Before (All 3 combo hellions in order) :

Quick Hellions
-> 100m/0g/30t, Combo Lv1
-> Bonuses : +1 speed

Strafing Hellions
-> 125m/0g/30t, Combo Lv3
-> Bonuses : +1 speed, attack on the move

AA Hellions
-> 125m/20g/30t, Combo Lv4
-> Bonuses : +1 speed, attack on the move, AA attack (with on the Move)

After (All 3 combo hellions in order) :

Quick Hellions (unchanged)

AA Hellions
-> 100m/15g/30t, Combo Lv3
-> Bonuses : +1 speed, AA attack (NOT with on the Move effect)

AA Strafing Hellions
-> 125m/40g/45t, Combo Lv5 (not Lv4)
-> Bonuses : +1 speed, AA attack, Attack on the Move (both AA and Ground)

[Xenon]

I don't know anything about what is going on, but I still think AA Hellions need their collision size increased from 1x2 to 2x3.

Uh... collision shapes of mobile units and basic AOE spells in SC2 are always circular.

[IskatuMesk]

The lack of a supreme death hellion obliterator fortress extreme is depressing.

[Ricky_Honejasi]

Just to be sure, I would like to know any of you guys had issues when training merchant units. To be precise, the one case when over water or other blocking stuff like that.

Since I did remove the Flyer mover triggers for the merchant trainable units and I put 500 training range instead. All to try to avoid the Sandbox issue where all units had the Flyer and can't seem to stop "giggling" at a same spot with enough units.

[IskatuMesk]

GIGGLING

[Xenon]

Yes, the ground units could not be placed over water or under a Planetary Fortress. I think the buildings are required to have the "fly" mover and no footprint. Placement footprints are fine. If doing that doesn't help, I may have to look into other factors affecting this.

I'm guessing the merchant buildings have a footprint. Treating the building as a ground unit or immobile structure seems to force the placement to path to a placement point regardless of the range setting.

[IskatuMesk]

Flyers now have to giggle when made by a merchant. Make it happen.

[Ricky_Honejasi]

Yes, the ground units could not be placed over water or under a Planetary Fortress. I think the buildings are required to have the "fly" mover and no footprint. Placement footprints are fine. If doing that doesn't help, I may have to look into other factors affecting this.

I'm guessing the merchant buildings have a footprint. Treating the building as a ground unit or immobile structure seems to force the placement to path to a placement point regardless of the range setting.

Guess ill just go the safe route for now and just re-enable my Flyer mover triggers for merchant units.