Spy

From here: http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/6531?page=2#120705

quote: GoogleFrog I think the Spy damage change was to make the target and health of the Spy more relevant. Most heavies require two Spies when on full health but perhaps one if damaged. Reaper is stunned for longer with two Spies. With 15k damage you could simply use one Spy vs most things in most situations, lacked nuance.

Makes sense from a design perspective, not sure it was needed for balance though. But at this point any reduction of cost, cloakcost, etc makes it better as an early commsniper (The abuse case). At 280 cost + 420 for the e, it doesn't compare very well against the Shockley at 30k EMP for 600 cost. They're mostly 1-shot, and neither of them have a guaranteed hit, though for different reasons.

I wasn't sure the lineup was really hurting from the lack of anti-heavy, but... the real need for having a strong spy in the lineup would have to be in Crabe vs Crabe wars though, where though I've seen use and it seems viable, looking at the stats, it's half the cost of a Crabe if you include the E, and you need two to stun a stationary Crabe for only 10s (not the full 30s). That looks terrible for the spy when you include the coordination required from the Spies, the splash from the Crabe, decloak by wandering/burrowed fleas + the metal costs of units to kill a still fully armoured Crabe: And even if you get it while moving for the full 30s stun with 1 spy, it stops and immediately armours up anyway.

Spider vs Spider climaxes into Crabe vs Crabe very easy, I'm not sure this looks good for the counter mechanics here.

I've said before that spies are the counter in this matchup:
http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/1126#8889

oh is this why Klon is spamming spies in every freaking game now

Puh-lease. "Infiltrator". :P

I think the answer to spiders not having a counter to Crabe is to add an unit of the class that counters Crabes.

That's "artillery".

I wouldnt mind seeing recluse get a very small buff, I've always felt they were ever so slightly underpowered

quote: If Crabe is the single unit the matchup climaxes to, perhaps the problem is the Crabe?

This

+1 for the following:

- Crabes being 3k HP with 4x armor. More for consistency than balance. Possibly reduce cost a little to compensate since Crabes are a large part of spiderfac power.

- Recluse is weak. I think more as a result of where they sit in cost relative to their counters, and how hard countered they are when the opponent does respond. They currently don't have enough of an impact to be that frail.

- If spies can stun moving crabes that seems to be working perfectly, though if the crabe then armors up that seems a little silly.

Nerf Crabe range? Or start experimenting with building recluse-ditches with Weavers?

edit: the Spider lab's heavy/anti-bomber AA is an argument for the drone-artillery unit.

Glad that people feel it's working quite well already with 1 spy and a moving Crabe, but I do feel that the fact they instantly close and get the armour bonus while stunned is a bit rich. For half the cost of the Crabe itself in spy+E? Steep. If it works in practice though, it works in practice, this is mostly just reflection and theorycraft by me.

As I said in the other thread I linked to, Crabe is just an interesting unit. It definitely is outside the standard counter mechanics, being a skirm range, assault HP unit with riot AoE. But the curling up mechanic adds really interesting counterplay with artillery, baiting, etc.

Several people including myself have wanted to add a drone spider for a while now. But Google has veto'd it until drones have better controls. Reasonable I think.

An artillery unit that sits safely in the hills and can bombard things with impunity feels nice to use, but is potentially really, unreasonably hard to counter on certain maps. The drone spider is a solution to that, we can give it plenty of range and let it stay safe in hills, but there are ways to mitigate it's damage (Make AA) other than spamming shields. The traditional response to artillery is (should be) to just attack it, so it's important to have another option for spider artillery. Another potential form for spider artillery is low enough damage that you can repair through it, with a ballistic projectile to get the range bonus from hills so it's not just a boring arty unit.

On recluse changes, I've been floating the idea of removing it's enforced missing (ATM it does not lead correctly) and slowing the projectile a little to compensate. That wont help vs Crabe, it might make recluse good enough to field on it's own merits, but that still means the Crabe is the factory climax since it's great vs recluses. We could massage both the ranges a little perhaps so that the Crabe needs to unpack to chase or needs to be somewhere high up to counter them, though. I think that's not a bad idea actually if we want to bring recluse balls back.

quote: Saktoth but I do feel that the fact they instantly close and get the armour bonus while stunned is a bit rich

this. used to be different, why was it changed?

quote: disable/emped should disallow changing armor state.

FTFY for precision.