Unit Cannon: Design Vision

Not with area commands it isn't.

Area commands alleviate it to some extent, but there's still plenty of micro to be done unless you've got Astraeus coming out the wazoo. Ferry route logic would benefit Pelicans too when more planets with impassable terrain become common-place, which will probably happen more once Naval gets some spit and polish.

Teleporters seem balanced just fine to me.

So why on earth would I ever use a unit canon instead of a teleporter which is about 6 times cheaper and provides more units?

You may want to do small targeted sneaky hit to your oppononts mex fields or something like that.

That's a VERY expensive sneaky hit, when I could just kill their comm with an army through a teleporter...

Well that is true, but target doesnt have to be mex field, it could also be antinuke (or nuke) which often happens to be in place where teleportation is not really good option.

Do you guys just forget you can attack from anywhere in the solar system with pinpoint accuracy? Without having to build a receiving end?

No, just no to all the teleporter haters. There is nothing wrong with teles. Nerfing teles will just be a pain as you'll have to deal with so much more travel time with your units. Never once in any cast of any game have I heard "Oh teleporters are OP".
If something needs to change just give it an energy upkeep which will put a bit of a strain on early eco if someone wants to rush with teles.
Just because a new thing comes around that looks far less efficient on paper doesn't mean you should want to nerf everything else that does similar things to it. Once it's in game I'm sure they will tweak the numbers so it is viable when put side by side with the tele.

No the teleport works well as is. It's already easy to e stall and wind up stranded at a critical point. Making it cost loads of e to run will mean we have to build even larger amounts of energy.

The uc as proposed makes sense imo.

for when you cant get a teleporter on enemy ground .....
the uc is the last means of transportation for when everything else fails ...

Well that's only because the economy is silly.

i generally disagree to have the teleporter be run on a per unit basis .. this is rather something i expected for the unitcannon along with metalusage for the pods/capsules ...

So I did some basic calculations given the information @tvinita gave us.

Lets have a hypothetical situation. Two players, starting on different, but equal planets start off with the same build order of a bot factory followed by some fabricators (not saying this is a good strategy, but it's what happens), at this point player A decides to rush dox and invade via teleporter, while player B decides to rush via unit cannon. For the sake of this model, I assumed that both players managed to keep a 100% efficient economy at all times.

Player A's build order:
Bot factory, 3 bot fabbers, 3 more bot factories, all bot factories infinitely producing dox, orbital launcher, 3 orbital fabricators, teleporter in his base, transfer to other planet (takes 45 seconds in this system) build teleporter, invade.
At the point he is able to invade (at 367.5 seconds), player A has ~286 dox, has spent a total of ~24167 metal, and accumulated a drain of 15125 energy and 310 metal per second.

Player B's build order:
Bot factory, 6 bot fabbers, advanced factory, 2 advanced fabricators, unit cannon, slammers/dox. He finishes the unit cannon at 340 seconds, and begins producing slammers/dox. At the point of A's invasion, he has either, 5.5 slammers, or 73 dox. He has spent ~28493 metal, and accumulated a drain of 18750 energy, and 415 metal per second.

Even though this is a very simple model, ( you can see it here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ejtf5OGUupIMYuhFL9utmleG2uleScJESRNvR5otu4Y/edit?usp=sharing) it does show that the teleporter is in general a MUCH better method for assaulting planets, and effectively invalidates the unit cannon under almost all circumstances. Yes that is a pretty big logical leap, but that's taking into account that the teleporter ONLY COSTS 400 METAL can transport ANY ground unit to almost any planet, and can be build near instantly by orbital fabricators. The problem with this version of the unit cannon isn't so much that it's UP, (it is still, kinda it should be cheaper IMO, and possibly allow it to have pods of say, 4 dox rather than one, because honestly, why would you fire dox over slammers if you can only fire 12 pods at a time?) but it's more so that the teleporter is incredibly overpowered. It survives a lot of punishment, it's REALLY cheap to build, and doesn't require a beachhead because as soon as it is placed it can be connected, and then you can send an army through immediately to reinforce it. If it is destroyed, you can always build another one in 4 seconds or less.

This all deals with the assumption that the teleporter can be set up in the first place.

no one complains because it is our ONLY option. If you actually think about it, teles are incredibly OP. they cost 4oo metal, and have 9750 health. you can build one in four seconds with 3 orbital fabricators. If we're going to include a unit cannon and want to see it used, we're going to need to nerf the teleporter, because in comparison, it is incredibly OP.

the only time I'd not be able to easily build a teleporter is in the late game, at which point It's either already a nuking stalemate, in which case the unit cannon might help (this is the only time I can find a point for the unit cannon) or, I could send 10 orbital fabricators over to their planet, build a teleporter in less than a second, and then stream my army through before they can react.

let me say it again
teleporter= proxy ... it can be it's own beachhead
unitcannon = getting units somewhere in the first place without needing a specific transportmedium such as the teleportexit or transports ....
after using the unitcannon you can still built teleports ...
what is the big deal using them toghether ?
that assumes however that builders can be transported aswell .... which i totaly expect ...

it's way to cost-innefective to use the unit cannon they proposed. If there was a better ratio of efficiency, than it would be worth it. I don't care so much about the mechanics, I'm saying the cost is prohibitive untill you get to really late game, at which point it is usually still more efficient to build a teleporter.

So wait we agree teles need a real hard nerfing? Complete change in setup?

it would still be more efficient anyway considering the ammount of units you get through and the time you safe with it ...
however the teleporters direct weakness is that it needs always that second gate on the front ... if you cant build it/hold long enough then your army is still stuck ...