How can we make bots more useful?

Igncom, what I'm getting at is that a naval start right now is not a viable one. With the way our maps are procedurally generated, naval starts will be relatively common if maps contain sizable bodies of water.

As of right now, having a naval start is (for the most part) a detriment to your play.


Everyone eventually builds every type of factory, given the time. There is such a thing as a FOCUS on a certain unit type, however.

As it currently is, naval balance is bad, I agree, but that doesn't mean by release things are going to be the same.

By release id see all of the engineer starts have worth in their own ways, leading the player to use their individual factory's by supporting them with others to cover up the unit problems any single one has.

But really, we have no idea what the end result's are going to be, as it is what balance uber ultimately wants (At leas you are sooooo much better then that other guy who was claiming that this balance will ruin the game).

There is no reason to suggest that the current balance will have any baring on the balance to come, things will change.

Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
Too lazy to tech sideways.

Combat fabs are nice in the t2, most the bots are useless and really do need a little HP buff... and I want my little AA bot back

From my last few games, bomb bots and grenadiers are absolutely fine.

shuoldnt bots be more versatile and fill more roles while vehicles provide the role of....run through everything with massivness

They do, they fulfil the roles of a raiding and skirmishing force, as well as providing support and light artillery units.

Currently however it's hard to raid at all due to mex HP, even with tanks and bombers.

And due to bot range, vision, and DPS.

Only on the dox.

And, to a lesser extent, the boom.

Ehh, I mean, like, the boom doesn't really need it, as scouting isn't it's job.

Stinger / AA bot gone. I don't have to have that unit. I want like you said to have unit diversity. But I do think it would be good to have a way to protect against air even if I have to have 10-15 of them to make a difference.
If bots become cheap raiders this would make some sense.

I don't think bots are useless. I also don't think they should be removed from the game. I think some of them are very useful.

I think it is quite apparent that the dox needs some changes. And I think to keep the game more strategically neutral like someone was saying it would be nice to have a way to defend against air early on. Take away any other ability and I'd be fine.

I really like your vehicle changes. I also like your idea about bot costs. I think we need more ideas like these to fix the bot problems we currently have.

Hm.

It occurs to me that as they are currently designed, vehicles are the workhorses with direct applications whilst bots are all designed to be oddball units that provide utility.

Consequently, perhaps we are asking the wrong questions. Instead of, "Can I open with bots?" we should be asking, "Which is stronger, an army WITH bots or an army WITHOUT bots?"

So, if we include...

• Dox: The army is not stronger, but then, Dox is designed to operate independently of an army (see below for suggestions)
• Grenadier: The army is arguably stronger due to splash, range, and indirect fire (though if you have enough tier-1 tanks, the target is usually dead by the time the grenades land)
  
• Combat Fabber: The army is unquestionably stronger because it will be able to take more hits; might need a cost reduction given that this is all it does
  
• BOOM: The army is not stronger, but then, BOOM is designed to operate independently of an army
  
• Slammer: Questionable effect on the army; Slammer's range is short and the presence of a torpedo launcher doesn't help the army directly because none of the other units in the army can go underwater
• GIL-E: The army is unquestionably stronger because GIL-E provides direct stopping power at ranges longer than either a Leveler or tier-1 tank. It can also shoot down tactical missiles
• Bluehawk: Technically, yes; but the Bluehawk is outperformed by the Sheller in almost every way except for speed. Consequently, including Bluehawk in your army will give you siege capability whilst preserving your mobility in ways that you won't get if you have Sheller. At the same time, it has no splash, so you will need more Bluehawks for the same effect
• Combat Fabber (Advanced): The army is unquestionably stronger, because it will be able to take more hits -- but is it worth the cost of the fabber?

On the subject of Dox, here are my suggestions:

• Short-range radar (out to 200 meters, which is equivalent to the vision radius on a Skitter); would help Dox blobs avoid encounters sooner
  
• Allow Dox to target air units, thereby increasing their ability to operate independently (due to their slow projectile speed and low DPS, they will probably not be as effective as Spinners)
  
• If necessary, tweak damage and health numbers to ensure that Dox remains a capable raider without threatening the role of vehicles

My suggestions regarding the rest of the bots:

• Grenadier: Might need some tweaking (with regard to range, projectile velocity, and splash damage) to make sure it can do damage to things when mixed in with a ball of tanks
  
• Combat Fabbers: Might need a significant cost reduction
• Slammer: Might need a role revision:
  • If designed to add meat to the army, it probably needs more health
  • If designed for close-range DPS, it probably needs more DPS
  • If designed for independent operations, it needs more speed and the ability to target air

Discuss?

No. The question SHOULD be (and needs to be) "How do I open with bots". It's not an equal factory and shouldn't cost anywhere near the same as a vehicle factory if it's not a viable option to open with as is.

I think you hit the nail on the head.

Scathis is asking us to use bots with tanks, but that simply is not a good idea. The main benefit of bots is their speed. They lose their primary role when slowed down by vehicles.

So with that, we have two trains of thought.

Should bots be mixed with vehicles, or should bots be use separately?

I vote that bots shouldn't really be used along with vehicles because the primary feature of bots is their speed. Again, you lose the main reason to build bots when you mix them with vehicles.

With that, bots need a buff. Bots should still be weaker than vehicles in a direction confrontation, but they shouldn't be so incredibly useless like they are now. They should also be able to destroy defensive structures, but not with great effectiveness.

Doxes need a vision and range buff. Simply bring their vision and range back to where they were. As it stands now, Doxes die before they even see the threat. They should also probably be given an ever so slight dps increase, and/or the HP of factories and economy buildings need to be brought back down to where they were. The health decrease will also give credence to T1 armies once again.

As for Combat Fabbers, all units need a roughly 2x health increase. This makes gameplay more exciting (try the realm balance mod) and gives validity to Combat Fabbers. As it currently stands, units tend to die before combat fabbers can repair them.

We also need the Stinger back. Let's make the Spinner a high DPS burst fire unit with an ammo clip. It fires a lot of shots really quickly, and then has to reload. And then lets make the Stinger a long range firing lower DPS unit. The Stinger will be less effective than the Spinner, but main benefit of the Stinger will be in its speed and range. It's designed to be a quick response unit, create general no-fly zones, and to keep up with raiding bots since they're completely vulnerable to air, making them rather ineffective raiders.

In my mind, if bots are going to be slower and weaker than mech then they should fill the role of jack-of-all-trades infantry. To fill that role I'd like to see some additions:

1) Transports, which you can load bots into. An APC which can be built at the mech factory, a jumpship from the air factory, landing boat from the naval factory. They should be cheap, unarmed and fast, just used to get your bots where you want them.

2) Combat fabbers should have some additional build options, rather than just mines:
2a) Bunker - load 4 doxes into it. Or grenadiers or snipers.
2b) AA gun - load 2 doxes into it. They now shoot air instead of ground.
2c) Trench - doxes travel single-file from one end to the other.

... you load 'em up with bots who are then protected until the structure is destroyed. The structures shouldn't be detected by radar but LOS works fine. Once your static defenses are up or your mech rolls in, reclaim the structures, load up into your transport and move on to the next location.

I don't se the point of the bunkers.

We already have defensive structures. Why do we need Doxes for defensive structures?

Besides, this game is all about aggression. If you build a bunch of defensive structures, I'll just go around them.

What if instead of changing everything else, we drop bot factory cost 10%? Going bot first would still be risky but you'd have a significant lead over someone who went air first.

Then the game kinda turns into a coin toss.

If I go bots first and my opponent goes vehicles first, then I have a huge advantage due to faster growth.

If I go bots first and my opponent goes air first, then I have no bomber defense and have a huge disadvantage.

I don't like that.