Turret changes are the only bad thing in the DLC

Lazer blazers are pointless now. Damage against pros is poor, damage against bots is fine but a lvl 1 rock-it can do the same job. Most importantly reduced pro damage means the enemy can almost instantly juice from them so building them helps you lose.

The Rock-its are still too expensive for what they are. At least one level 3 is always going to get smashed if a juiced enemy knows what he's doing. That's the cash for two potential juice runs or lots of annihilator/hazards gone.

I've not played much support since DLC, so maybe there are some good 3.3 rock-it, shave ice, firebase defensive setups that are effective. And two skilled defensive supports would be hard to deal with I'm sure. But in terms of normal pub games, throwing down anything more than a level 1 rock-it to slow down bots, and accepting that it will be destroyed soon, seems like a waste of money better spent on other things.

Suggestions for improvement:

• Remove the juice building for deployed tank/taunting
• Increase the armour of rock-its or further reduce their price
• Possibly make both turrets the same price and have one effective against only pros and the other effective against only bots, making turret choice more tactical so teams have to adapt to their opponent's turret layout
• Add the ability to pay to heal turrets. All players can then help after a base attack. Support would still have a role in overhealing and hacking.
• For turret kills reward all players who built the turret, along with the support if it's hacked, to encourage building of turrets.
• Let support spawn repair bots that heal your turrets and give gap shots to the gunner.
• Add a very small cash reward to players who built a shave ice if a bot/player is killed while slowed.

Something that I've brought up in the past is that another game I love uses a different pricing scheme for turret upgrades. Say a level 1 turret costs 100. The level 2 upgrade is 200. In most tower defense games (MNC included), the level 3 upgrade is 400. In Defense Grid though, the level 3 upgrade is 300. It's a scheme that works well IMO. Low cost turrets are hardly effected by it, and high cost turrets aren't as prohibitively expensive for their final upgrade.

Turrets do self-repair, but only if they haven't been damaged over X amount of time (I don't know the duration), and the self-repair is rather slow as well. The idea of letting any pro buy a quick repair for turrets might sound nice, but if it were implemented, it would need a cooldown or it would be easily spamable by those who have excess cash. It would also give the Support less to do.

I do like these ideas though. Perhaps a kill for the one who last upgraded it, and an assist for those who invested in its build and/or hack.

I personally never had a problem with the level 3 lazer turrets, I liked that they were like a sniper turret made to help keep enemy pros down. Right now there's essentially no point in creating them, for $100 less you can make a level one rockit which is tougher and won't easily feed a tank his juice.

Don't get me wrong I've been juicing like crazy off of them, but I think it's a bit much.

I don't know about you but the rockit changes were great.

Agreed on the LB's now...useless after DLC...hurts your team to make them and they were the backbone of my pre-DLC support defence....now its all Rockets and Shaveices...I miss my 3.3 LB Turrents....

Getting (better) rewards for healing would be badass as well as assists for hacked turrets...

I disagree, the turret changes are one of the best things.
The Rocket decrease is great, now I see more people building turrets than ever.

Essentially lazer blazers are now fillers between rocket turrets.
They do still have something over rockets though, and that is their fire rate.
A fast juicer can weave around and still dodge some rockets, but blazers are constantly pegging them.
For what they are, they are still cost effective in my book.

I like the rock-it changes just fine. Building lazer blazer turrets of any kind could almost be considered griefing at this point though. People now get ANGRY when their team members destroy enemy lazer blazers. I know I'm pissed when my team builds them. Does this sound right to you?

additionally- shave ice are still very nice at times and long shots are decent though I wish the devs would clarify whats up with the not shooting.(as per my thread about longshots)

I'm saying the decrease is good but it's not quite enough.

Having said that, I spent some time playing a purely defensive support earlier and two 3.3 rock-its plus a .3 firebase make for a great defense with your firebase properly placed, providing you're there to babysit them. The only juiced player that managed to kill a turret was an assassin who I was slow to react to.

Maybe a further rock-it price reduction would make it too easy to turtle.

Lazer Blazers are only useful with level 3 and level 3 hack.. other than that they are completly worthless.

The fact that rocket's cost less now still doesnt stop people from building lazer blazors, which is quite annoying.

Was on steel peel today, Oh I have enough for a rocket! I find a Shave Ice and 3 lazer blazors.... seriously?

Lazor Blazors shouldn't be dismissed yet. Sure, the ability to juice off of them is absurd, but if they are put in the correct places, they are still highly effective. I use them a lot to guard against Assassins sneaking into the bot spawn in Spunky, or to guard my Rock It Turrets against juiced Assassins.

What nobody thinks about (and pretty much exactly what Manouso said) is that Lazor Blazors are much more accurate than RockIt turrets. They will hit whatever they are aiming at 95% of the time. Lazor Blazors have their place, you just have to be smarter about where you put them.

i know that since the dlc, i have seen more lv 3 rocket turrets than i have before the dlc. price is fine, what needs to start happening is that everyone needs to realize that it is EVERYONES job to build turrets, not just the supports.

Lazer blazer accuracy seems like a fairly obtuse angle of justification. Bots don't dodge and pros either don't care if they're hit or want to be hit. I've witnessed more than one example of a non juiced assassin simply meleeing down a lb3 without even smokebombing it. As it stands putting them up in the "right place" is still a huge risk with little reward. Sure it might pester one of the lighter classes if they aren't running armor, but if you stop watching it for even 5 seconds the pain train will board and leave the station making express stops at all your turrets.

:lol:

Truths

A support can still use a LB3.3 like a FB and keep it alive/protected for a very long time. Only problem with that is really 1) A tank can still walk up and take it out like a hot knife through butter.. and get waaaay to much juice for it 2) Assassin and Assaults can literally just stand back forever repeatedly shooting your turret for free juice.

Thing is tho... Laser3's are crazy crazy cheap. Their lack of shields/health is the reason for that, and it should really remain that way. Their power nerf seems maybe a bit much but I dont care so much about that... what I consider the only true problem with them is how much juice they give out. It's insane really.. might as well have big ol straws stickin out of a juicebox as their graphix. lol...

Agreed.

And agreed.

I disagree. A lazer blazer anywhere on the map is instant juice to a tank who knows what he's doing and takes the time to glance at the map when he dies, which conveniently shows all enemy turret types and positions.

I don't disagree with the benefits Manuoso and Billy mention, I just can't think of place on any map where I'd consider it safe to place one. Maybe in the back right corner on Spunky to cover people coming from the bot spawn to your base, providing your have a 3.3 rock-it and firebase covering it too.

The only reason you get away with placing one for now is that not everyone knows how to exploit them.

I only build Lazer Blazers if the enemy team has no tanks. I'm not in the habit of giving free juice to tanks so they can wreck up my base. Rockets are less accurate, but they don't run the risk of juicing up tanks.

Or if I'm the only guy buying base turrets and I'm short on cash. It's actually quite funny how many times I hear my team mates say: "Oh, I've got so much $$$$"
Me: "Great, buy some turrets" :roll: