Because dox arn't cheap lol. If a tank shoots a dox, that is 90 metal damage per shot. If a tank shoots a tank, that is only 50 metal damage per shot If you want to buffer for gil-e's then you use boombots at 45 metal. Although why you're even building gil-e's and not just more tanks is kinda strange.
The REAL point is there are NO T1 bot main fighters. Having raiders are good and a useful role but unless you go vehicle first you have nothing that can stand a direct fight, at all. Also the metal difference between dox and tank is actually rather small.
Bots aren't supposed to be direct fighters, tanks are. If you want direct fighters, build a tank factory, otherwise don't play by your enemy's rules and don't fight a head on battle. People talk about the disadvantage of what factory they go first, when really if you are relying on one factory, then you really do deserve to lose. This isn't a game where you can afford to build one factory and use 1000's of engineers to assist it, you need to diversify.
So because bots are useless your saying don't build bot factories....Ok then. My point is you CAN'T go bots first at all, otherwise you will get wrecked by infernos faster than you can build a second factory. Also, why should I spend my time microing a couple of raiding bots when I could just build the equal amount of metal in tanks and say GO HERE! and watch them wreck everything. I feel bots should also have a unit with the role of a front line fighter just done in a different way than the tank. Even if you mass dox or other t1 bots they are still very useless because you can have them move at their full speed with air support anymore due to the lack of a t1 AA bot. They also get destroyed by t2 artillery, you can lost an entire army in seconds.
If you are getting killed by infernos before you can build a second factory, then either play on maps where you are not knife fighting in a closet, or actually build factory's like you are supposed to. Bots reward a player who micros, not a player who should just be building tanks. The lack of AA is not inductive to a front line fighting unit, and so doesn't matter in this debate, also build fighter craft. T2 artillery is way beyond the mid game, so if you don't have a second factory by the time your enemy has T2 artillery, then you really, really need to build more factory's. Artillery is supposed to counter unit blobs, so saying that you lose an entire army to your enemy's artillery just means that your enemy did the right thing and countered you.
Soo once again your saying bots HAVE to be micord, are incredibly weak, HAVE to be supported by fighters, and I meant t1 pelters not t2, my bad. So once again WHY should I ever build a bot factory where it forces me to micro, have weaker units, and get owned by artillary, when I could just spam vehicle factories and win by saying blob of infernos go here! All factories should be viable options, but bots just don't stand a chance. You can literally win a game by just making vehicle and air and never worry about bots because they are next to worthless.
Bot are only weaker without micro, with micro they compete. And the current deal with bots having no anti air is very likely not intended. And tanks don't all that well with artillery either.
Even with micro, bots lose, because ants plainly outrange them. you can't out-micro a unit that's just going to shoot you when you can't shoot back. The point is that there is currently no point in getting a T1 bot factory, other than getting the 1 fabber needed for a T2 bot factory, which you might as well pass up for a T2 vehicle factory since it won't force you to go bots. Micro doesn't do anything for bots currently, and they loose to an equal amount of metal in tanks. There is currently no point in building a bot factory of any kind, for any reason, since air and vehicles do it better in all regards.
The only time I build bot factories is to get access to T2 Slammers, those things are awesome. That and the bluehawks.