The Leveler

As it stands the leveler tank is essentially just a heavy tank variant of the basic tank, more expensive, slower but still a improvement.

And that doesn't fit with the games Basic/Advanced dynamic of Generalists and Specialists, at least to me.

So I put it to you in a poll with a couple of ideas:

Leave the leveler as it is

Re-balance the leveler to be a specialist

Move the Leveler to the basic tier and create a new specialist to replace it

Just move the leveler to the basic tier


Thanks for your time!

Basically all the 'advanced' versions of other units are this.

Leviathan is to the Bluebottle what the Leveler is to the Ant.

Slammer is to the Dox.

Bumblebee is to the... whatever the T1 bomber is called.

Etc.

Yeah and we're all sitting here with our fingers crossed hoping this is just interim balance stuff to make the game playable but we're losing hope with every update.

Mike

I'm actually pretty fine with it.

no point really talking about this until they release the rest of the units and we can find out what we are missing, or what could be changed. The leveller is pretty strong though =_=

I won't vote because I am OK with any of the options except leaving it as is.

The existing advanced units are nothing like advanced units should be. If they're just bigger basic combat units, put them in the basic factory. Either change them or move them, and obviously more advanced units will be added either way.

The Advanced bomber is the Hornet, the Basic bomber is the bumblebee.

There's no point talking about this until we have a full unit roster.

Fair enough, although the same was said about discussing unit balance before beta, so I do want to make sure we aren't just going to keep brushing this under a rug.

I can appreciate this sentiment. However, they've stated multiple times that they're bouncing around ideas for specialist units - if that ends up being the case, I expect the Leveller will either have useful, interesting alternatives or be scrapped/split into a variety of specialists - such as a beefier, but not Leveller-grade amphibious tank (highly requested), the existing Sheller, and whatever else they can come up with.

IMO leave it as is, I'm sure more units will be added later.

I disagree - as KNight and igncom1 have said, it's more about the principle of 'Advanced > Basic' at this stage. The poll results thusfar greatly concern me, actually, as it seems plenty of people seem to be fine with Advanced units essentially making Basic units obsolete.

At present, there are really no downsides to building Levelers over Ants. They are general purpose, but better.

I can name one downside you have less map control even less if your base is spread out the best thing i can do with my ants when i see levelers is split them into groups and out maneuver them around the small group of levelers you would have levelers also can be focused on by bomber quite nicely... a mix of ants with some leveler support is really the best way to go, fighter support is also nice

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AhQLEzXxEMJfdFJycF9LXzJkNDNEdVgydUxEMEt5Y0E&usp=sharing

Quick conclusions from the above:

• You can build 1 Leveller in the time it would take you to build 2 Ants
• Assisting for Leveller building yields greater rewards due to the lower ratio of construction / rolloff time
• Both units have the same speed
• Levellers outrange Ants
• Levellers massively out-DPS Ants

If levellers had their speed reduced significantly, I could see the argument that they fulfil a different combat role to that currently occupied by Ants. As it is currently, they occupy the same role and are better at it in every conceivable way.

T1 is still very useful IMO... Me building 10 T2 factories close you is going ot take some time... me building 9T1 and 1 T2 however is not. I think the fact it's so easy to spam ants make it pretty even vs levelers. You need a booming ecom to use T2.. if you are going pure T2 and I take our your mexes with a Dox party.. it's going to be a very bad day for you.

This was posted in another similar topic, by me:

If you build 1 dox to one slammer, it takes the opponents slammer another second to kill your slammer.

If you build 5 doxes to one slammer, it takes the opponents slammer 5 seconds longer to kill your slammer.

It's just as expensive to deploy two advanced bot factories as deploying one advanced bot factory and 9 bot factories.

And it's just as expensive to deploy 6 bots and one slammer as it is two slammers. It takes those two slammers 1.5 seconds to kill all 6 bots, whereas they take 0.67 seconds to kill one slammer. It takes your slammer 1.5 seconds to kill one slammer. It means your slammer can take on two slammers and probably win. Especially if you micro and immediately switch targets to the undamaged slammer once the first is on 25% health. Let whatever doxes survived take on the other.

Plus, 9doxes vs 1 slammer - The slammer takes 4.5 seconds to kill them all. They only need 1.11 seconds to kill him if all 9 of them survive.

@stormingkiwi you're talking to someone who wants the cost of Advanced factories to be reduced

i have no problem with what you guys are asking for, with the leveller being more than just an upgrade to the ant, but its hard to judge what hole it should fill when we dont have the holes to fill.

really reduced??? the eco benefits of getting T2 extractors is huge this would make that happen even sooner thus stopping T1 game play quite early...

I also want Advanced extractors re-worked "SAY NO TO UPGRADES!"

https://forums.uberent.com/threads/the-mexes-must-be-upgradbles.53401/page-2#post-815328

'upgrades' dont necessarily mean upgrades =O i would prefer a supcom style of upgrading mexes, even if they upgrade to different kinds of structures like you suggest.