Okay UBER, we should talk balance :D

OMG, me like.

no guys seriously I really like.

OMG I LIKE THIS IDEA!

@GalacticCow for president!

Don't for get Short Circuit! Johnny Five is alive!

It costs as much as a halley, no?

Also, their location is "definite", and spread, so you can't just build it center of your base, you must capture at least an entire half a planet and avoid snipes on locked locations.

Even if I were on another planet, all I would have to do is build a single SXX and land it atop of one of the control points. You can prevent laser activation easily from another planet. You would need to have your orbital presence destroyed to be vunerable.

I was shocked this wasn't the case. They definitely need to be one time use. Possibly the whole planet, but DEFINITELY the catalysts itself.

It needs to come with an energy cost, i.e. you need to use storage to build up your energy reserve before firing.

Does the commanders overcharge cost energy? And if it does then they should remove the call down on the overcharge and allow you to fire it as many times in a row as you like as long as you have the energy.

That might work also, as long as the charge was huge. Then again, that is too large a nerf for their metal cost. Really, rather just build new catalysts each firing.

Yes, energy costs do exist, and the Commanders overcharge is using that system, same goes for stationary artillery. It works slightly different though, as each unit using the energy charge system has a capacitor of its own which is filled gradually and can not be discharged by any other means. On the positive side, this also means that the energy recharge rate can be set per unit.

So it is perfectly possible to say "Catalysts each need a charge of 3 million energy to fire and they charge at a rate of 10k/s each". Resulting in a 300 seconds (5 minutes) charge up phase in which they put a 50k energy/s load on your eco.

So, as a result, you have to build the Catalysts AND wait another 5 minutes after construction has finished - no matter how much build power you had - until the Catalyst is fully charged for a single shot.

Have yet to try out the catalyst by curious to how it is to defend against.

Can you nuke right in the poll sk it is out of anti nuke range yet still damage all of them? Or is thus planet size dependable. Does the sxx laser still auto fire right at the location as it comes out of orbit?

Came in here to say make catalysts explode after each use, but someone already did

Me like

The charge up and limited planet size ideas are Also good, but you can make smaller ones just do planet smash levels of damage instead as well

I think the catalyst's should overload once the weapon is fired, explode and have to be rebuilt.

Edit: Damn Ninja's.

I'm not sure if he was on the previous page that that counts as a ninja.

but I'm glad to see this idea is catching steam.

You can smash in asteroid into one of the catalysts, creating a crater and rendering the planet completely worthless.

They ARE SUPER easy to destroy. Its like two hits from an sxx. Group of dox can take it out easy as well. So basically if you get killed by this you weren't paying attention or got out played.

Note you can see the Cats and halleys without any form of radar. So there really is no excuse for not doing something about it.

Edit: That said I agree they need a cool down or something in between shots.

Makes sense.. they can nerf it before sept 5th if that is their plan.

I was looking at the first post, so i think it does.

this thing should cost a ton of energy to use..

Have you tried that? If the planet is too far away, there is no way to effectively react in time. I tried it by launching a nuke as soon as I saw the first catalyst go up; by the time it got there, the other 4 were completed and my planet went the way of Alderaan.

Of course I have. But I try to keep scouts on my opponent. Also if there is a metal planet in your system you should assume someone will try to do this. Don't let them get it all by themselves.

I know I'm repeating myself, but forced 5 minute precharge sequence before the Catalyst is allowed to fire would be adequate.

5 minutes is a bit too much, in my opinion.

It was my first match (6p FFA) on the new build, so my strategy was a bit outdated. I guess rushing orbital is the only viable plan, now.

It all depends on how the system is setup.