The Drama-Free "Doxen are... almost... Completely Fine" Thread.

Thanks for testing this. I wish it were easier to test these scenarios in a 1 player game. I'd like to try out various configurations of equivalent cost ground defense vs units.

Personally I like the dox the way the are, the problem I have is why build a skitter now? I want skitters and every unit really to have relevance and strategic value. That said I think the game is a whole lot of fun right now.

Also air needs a buff. I don't really see a lot of reason to build it at the moment. Its all bots and vehicles now.
Lastly naval is almost worthless, but I think everyone agrees about this.

Look up cheats, specifically create-unit and change-control. They are in the server tab of PAMM. Giving an AI 0 econ will keep it from doing things and let you control the units without interference.

ctrl+c and ctrl+v let you copy and paste units (they are pasted as the player you currently control) Instead of copy, there is a unit toolbox that doesn't get turned on by default - you'll want to run the game with --devmode, or with with a Sandbox Unit mod; other mods are quite useful:

- https://forums.uberent.com/threads/rel-bulk-create-units.62492/
- https://forums.uberent.com/threads/rel-improved-player-control.62472/
- https://forums.uberent.com/threads/rel-instant-sandbox-2-0-0-67523-68331.56920/
- https://forums.uberent.com/threads/rel-sandbox-unit-organizer.62310/

Skitters are still useful if you choose to start with a vehicle factory. Which is probably a bad idea, but who knows when you might need to crank a scout out of a vehicle factory?

^^ This.

Although there's really no reason for underwater buildings; a torpedo buoy should do the job just fine. (mod support would be nice though)

Edit: Also, amphibious vehicles are way cooler if they float. Just sayin.

Skitters have longer range.

Personally, Dox now accomplish something. What they need, is tuned to only do what they need.

I wouldn't say AA is necesary. Maybe. Except too many have too good a chance to land a lot of shots on air, much too many. Would have to have a huge deviation to make them balanced. Just get rid of it?

Naval, they don't stand much a chance against actual navy and turrets, but they still do their job and can take advantage of naval pathing to land attacks. Keep that.

Their speed and damage and even range is fine. Their vision can go back down though, to give a skitter that much more an edge, maybe even to make skitters and dox play along better. (dox shoot slightly farther than vision allows). That also allows skitters to forewarn for dox to prevent them from running random losses from walking into danger.

Tweaks, not shifts. I am talking 80 range, 80 vision, naval but not air, and keep their speed and maybe increase their cost to 50?

I watched some high level 1v1 play yesterday and that isn't what happened. I love your tone as well, like this is so obvious and the meta established in stone even though the patch isn't even 48 hours old yet.

1000 Dox = 6000 factory-seconds
75 Infernos and 187 Rippers = 4043 factory-seconds

All else being equal, you wouldn't have 1000 Dox when your opponent has equal metal worth of tanks; you'd have only slightly over 2/3 that. But I'll leave others to figure out the real significance of that.

What you have done sounds significant, but it really doesn't mean much. If you have excess metal due to a slower average build rate, then you just build more factories.

Yes, you do. But you have to spend time doing so (and time building energy to support the extra factories), and time is ultimately significant, especially in high-level play. I just don't know how significant. That's where real-life testing comes in.

In between having 250 Dox left after an equal match-up, and 330 fewer Dox with same production time and number of factories, I figure the reality of the situation is somewhere in between and might put it roughly equal in the end.

I guess two people will just have to do a clinical race and see how close it is.

Yeah was ninja'd but either way if you build 700 or 1000 dox and send then in for a head to head fight you are playing badly.

If used to constantly raid all sides of your opponent properly he will not have the income to be able to build the ants and infernos.

Map metal density is a key figure too. I reckon ants have the edge on maps with a lot of metal in tight spaces.

Obviously the real strength of the dox is raiding. If they come out ahead in a metal-by-metal comparison, maybe roughly equal in reality, they still have the strength of speed and now huge vision (+ anti-air, + amphibious), which is nothing but a huge advantage. They can put up a fight in a head-on confrontation, but if this is the worst possible use of dox with a still-favorable outcome for the bot player, it's all advantage from there on. And that means the dox is hugely powerful if used even remotely right.

I'd have been interested to see Rippers on the metal planet yesterday. There limited routes to Matiz's base, I feel if Rippers were going to work ever it was on that map.

One more thing I'd like to add: If we have to look at these subtleties, then the unit is balanced. Yeah, one unit might have an advantage based on circumstances, but that's exactly the sort of thing that is up to the player. That's not OP, that's strategy.

The question is: Does it dominate in too many, or just about all circumstances (bad)? Or does it have a slight to medium advantage in some of them (good)?

I always think of dox as something like sand, water or rice. No matter howmuch i just call them dox.

Huh, I just call them Scampers.

That was the best name ever.

The way I would classify a unit as OP, is if it's being used too often. If the average game has a disproportionally high amount of time/metal spent on a single unit type, then I would say it's too good.

Fabricators, OP.

Only kidding.

Nope they are not fine.

I won the last 11 games using ONLY Dox spam.

Let me break it down for you:

- Against almost any unit, the Doxen will die, if you charge head on.
- Against any base, the Doxen will die, if you charge head on.

However, the key benefit to Doxen lie not in their swarming abilities and cheapness. In lies in their tactical usage:

- The best use of Doxen is to out-maneuver enemies. Against ANY group of Infernos and/or Vanguards, the Doxen will ALWAYS lose if charged against them, but will ALWAYS win if macroed correctly since they are far faster than those 2 units, and have the benefit of range and sight.

- They won't kill Levelers, or Rippers up-close, but they WILL whompa-stomp them quite significantly if macroed correctly. Why? Because Levelers and Rippers have a slow turn-rate, and if you flank them from the sites or the back, which you can, using their superior speed, you can lay waste to a lot by catching them off-guard. This is also do-able if you surround them, since it will take more time for their turrets to turn. Also, they will kill any Dox in one hit, which means that Levelers, with their slow rate of fire, will have seriously disadvantaged since most of their damage is lost.

- Against tactical missile users or the currently nerfed Sheller, since every hit still kills 1 Dozen with little splash, and with a rate of fire of 1 rocket per 4 secs, the Dozen will win very easily.

- Against Bumblebees, the Dozen can easily evade the bombs since they are fast enough, if you macro them such they spread out enough (a good player can do this).

- Doxen cannot kill any base head on. But, they will eventually destroy any base given enough numbers, which is made possible by the next point:

- Doxen are the best units to raid Metal Extractors in the whole game now, since they are so cheap and fast, and can be used to area patrol, or macroed to quickly wipe out the enemy's economy. Now, this is the single greatest strength of the Doxen: Killing MEXs. In all my last 11 games won, it is due to this single most important factor that I won, because I forced the enemy to retreat to a very small base, while everyone of their external MEXs were wiped out, resulting in a 20-25% efficiency while my air fabs take over all the metals and can maintain a 100% efficiency to spam Doxen non-stop using 50 - 80 factories. Eventually you wil out-build the enemy using your larger eco, and the mighty Doxen, regardless of how many defences they have. I did this and won versus bases of 200+ turrets and 200+ tanks. The cost? 7000 - 8000 Doxen in total over 15 - 20 mins, but the enemy can't expand outside or outbuild me using defences. Without MEXes, regardless of how many power plants one has, it will become a severe bottleneck. And no one is humanely capable of sending enough units to all places to defend against Doxen, who can simply bypass them if needed.

- Doxen are the best units to wipe out any fab by sneaking into the base, which is related to the next point.

- Doxen are fast and small enough to squeeze into an enemy base through all holes and gaps, to wipe out important fabs, MEXes, and power plants. In fact, once a Dozen gets through a portal to flood a planet that is moderately protected, it is all over. The 50 Vanguards there cannot possibly rush to defend all metal extractors and other important structures when there are 1000 Doxen.

- And since Doxen are so expendable and fast, one can easily make them be at all places at once. By that I mean, you can send 100 Doxes to the north of the base, then 100 in the south to distract, then send a main force of 300 Doxen to the west to attack their key structures when their units are busily moving up and down. This is the second most important reason why Dozen are so good: Never has Doxen been so useful in the tactic of diversion.

- The Doxen can also be used to attack and harass early, which forces the enemy to a defensive, while you remain on the offensive. This is the 3rd most important reason why I won the last 11 games. No one would dare to leave their base completely when the Dozen may return any time.

- Not to forget that they can fire at air, are amphibious, and SHOOT UNDERWATER (I can confirm this when my 1000 Dozen annihilated a naval planet completely.

- That said, the Doxen does have a weakness: Versus fast-firing units like the Slammer or Kestrel, which can out-range them and out-maneuver them.

Summary:

That said, the whole is larger than the sum of its parts. The OPness of Dozen lay not in its puny attributes, but rather, in both its strategic and tactical use, primarily in having the benefit of mobility and numbers to harass MEXes, flood planets, and flank/out-maneuver enemies.

this man has spoken the truth

Verily.
I could be for a 50 Metal Dox at least, and making some Air units faster to avoid potshots.