Vanguard Testing from Meta

Metabolical did some testing of Vanguards against certain units.







Does anyone else see what's wrong here?

All three of those are T2 – and Catapults didn't even do very well.

PA is supposed to be all units valid at all stages of the game, but that's not what we have. Quite clearly, T2 units are needed to counter T2 units.

This means PA centers around T2. If my opponent goes T2, I need to rush T2 and get there as quickly as possible or I'm dead.

I noticed, and quoted meta, in that thread. At this point i'm kind of hoping that once uber has all the mechanics in, they just go back and re-do every unit to be balanced with each other, no matter the tech level.

Vanguards are OP. It is as simple as that. Whoever gets them first wins. Or more correctly whoever gets them to the enemy base first wins should you and your opponent actually start fielding them at the same time. But then you both have t2 and a few t2 units can actually beat vanguards, but that is the problem. t2 is required to fight t2.

That is the crux of the matter.

All units are supposed to be valid at all stages of the game, and that's not what we have.

I feel strongly this way, but in retrospect, grenadiers at a turret actually do pretty well as I tried them in the bot challenge. They do considerable damage 20 strong, and are protected behind a wall with a double barrel at the ready. They aren't the best tactic, as standing them against an experienced opponent is difficult with raiding occuring and they can scout and use shellers instead which kill 6 bots a shot.

It has been said countless times and for a year or more, that t2 has always been as strong as a lot of t1. With high cost it is still stronger but t1 kills you before you get it, if left alone t2 would still beat t1 at a higher cost. Really, the best option, is to turn down the damages and or rates of fires and possibly speeds, of t2. Especially ones with range, range can definitely do without servere damage to boost. The tactical missiles could even be buffed if there was a t1 antimissile.

Bear in mind it's metal for metal, and 1500 metal buys a fair amount of T1 units. (Except for pelters.)

its all well and good if you test it in a controlled environment and comment about it, but in game things are much more scrappy and its much easier to miss buildings and armies because your attention cant be 100% everywhere, and the fact that vanguards have no support from AA or tanks in dealing with T2 bombers or the missile bots. or vice-versa where the units will be protected by tanks, and other units that deal with the sort

Careful, meta claimed that even Dox can beat Vanguards.

That is if you throw 20 Dox at a single Vanguard.

And wait a long time.

And micro the Dox for the whole time so the Vanguards don't catch up.

And there are no barriers in terrain which would hinder kiting.

And only if the Vanguards are entirely unassisted.

And hoping that the Vanguards don't wipe your entire base meanwhile.



But yeah, Vanguards can totally be beaten. At least there are Hornets which are performing quite acceptable at the job. But they have so many hard counters of their own which they can't defend against...
Just saying Sniper Bots, Spinners, Anchors, Fighters, Commanders, rouge AA tower creep and whatever else can target at the air layer or their rockets.

And metal for metal, T2 units are much more effective than T1 units.

Gil-e are what I feel to be the most OP atm, countered by the fact bots are badish. I think true power comes in t1 tank armies, a combat fabber thrown into wads of tanks somewhere, raiding with those, making impacts on early economy while going t2 bot, and focusing mainly on gil-e. That shuts down t2 air a lot better, t1 tanks can support anti-air if their missiles don't bug out and actually work, and gil-e really kite other tanks well including microing shellers and stopping vanguards very simply.

How many shots does it take to kill a vanguard for a gil-e? What is their rate of fire as well while I ask this? I want to make sure I don't quote server mod numbers which I know off the top my head.

Vanguards have 5,000 HP and Gil-Es deal 400 damage per shot, and 1 shot every 4 seconds. So it takes 1 Gil-E 12.5 shots to kill 1 Vanguard, or, 50 seconds to kill 1 Vanguard.

So it takes 13 Gil-Es to kill 1 Vanguard with one barrage.

And if there's other units mixed in with the Vanguards, they'll end up taking a lot of shots.

And don't forget about wrecks blocking Gil-E shots.

Getting ahold of 12-18 gil-e and not getting killed some stupid way is a trick.

however, they usually reliably disperse fire on many t1 and ordered attack they usually barrage reliably even when multiple targets.

for vehicles, id say levelers shine metal per vanguard kill. They just don't offend as well as vanguard or sheller so their use a partial waste.

don't get me wrong, I feel bothered by the choice of weapon for vanguard. I sorta wish they were back to old, even though that's also too much.

at least it only takes 20 or so boom to kill one, ordered at thick file. Infernos just can't, worse choice vs vanguard.

You know what, If Vanguards didn't do splash damage but did a huge amount of damage for a direct hit then they would suddenly be very balanced. They are basically building destroyers right? Why does a building destroyer need splash damage?

Without splash damage they can still take down buildings in almost no time at all but they'll take a lot longer to wipe out massive numbers of T1 units.

Say the vanguard could shoot once every 2 seconds but still deal the same amount of damage per shot. It'd take a vanguard up to 2 seconds to destroy a building as it drove through a base but it would take 60 seconds to destroy 30 Dox. I don't know the numbers off hand but 30 Dox could take out a vanguard in less that 60 seconds right?

I think a better option would be to have them keep the splash, but nerf the damage into the ground. make it good for crowd control, but not against single tanky targets, leave that to the levellers.

Either of those options could work. But you bring up a good point. Levelers already have a high damage per shot, so only one of them should have the high damage per shot role. Give Levelers a high rate of fire and remove the Vanguard splash, or keep the Vanguard splash and lower the damage per shot.

Of course, there's plenty of other solutions for this dilemma.

I think it would actually end up working pretty well if you weakened the vanguard's shots. Also, give it a slightly different effect, so that it doesn't look like a commander uber cannon and confuse new players.

Maybe this is a something that needs to be applied to all weapon types. Either, focused with no splash and higher DPS or splash damage only with direct hits dealing no extra damage and DPS low enough that it takes several hits from a weapon to bring down a unit. This would help to differentiate vanguards, artillery (I'm looking at you pelter) and possibly things like bombers from direct fire type units such as levellers, turrets, catapults, gun ships, etc.

Give this man a cookie!

Here you go:

Does it have eggs in it? I'm allergic to eggs