Nerf Kodachi

Tank factory is now better at raiding than rovers.

quote: campaign

Lol.

GoogleFrog you could try joining some games yourself sometimes. Or just pick a random replay, every time it is used Kodachi is the dominant raider with even mildly skilled players. It has a massive retreat advantage, even against itself.

Historical Kodachi was barely usable against units and only really with a lot of micro or a widget. Current Kodachi can kill any other raider, including gunships with just decent micro, the only thing you really have to be careful of is to not run into a bolas before hitting it a few times first. And it is still Quite Strong vs buildings, you just don't kill them literally for free anymore. It can outrange rippers on the retreat due to having a retreat advantage that for most units was patched out of the game.

It might not be an issue if Welders weren't also Really Strong and capable of fighting almost their cost worth of raiders, but as it is you take losses killing the constructors, take losses killing the raiders, and have to micro everywhere all the time to prevent the Kodachis getting free stuff. It makes expanding vs tanks feel very oppressive because it is much easier for them to disrupt your economy than you theirs with the tax you have to pay to kill welders. BTW a few days ago I learned that if you put enough welders together you can kill a stardust with no losses :(

Don't chase Kodachi. It is intentionally retaining the old "kill three Glaives with one Glaive because your opponent was sleeping" gameplay but in a less subtle way, to make the retreat micro more of an intuitive mechanic.

quote: Current Kodachi can kill any other raider

I have trouble believing this against enemy raiders that are paying attention.

quote: Tank factory is now better at raiding than rovers.

Maybe Scorcher could do with a little more damage. Maybe Kodachi does need a small nerf. I don't think it needs the kind of nerf that would be needed to address "Kodachi can kill any other raider".

quote: I have trouble believing this against enemy raiders that are paying attention.

I was able to push a rover player's 3 scorchers into retreat with just 1 Kodachi yesterday.

Kodachi can engage Scorcher at the edge of Scorcher's range, which renders the return fire it takes negligible, while any attempts of Rover to close distance are met with retreat advantage kiting from outside of Scorcher's range. I do believe this is tunable on Scorcher's side though.

Darts don't exactly "work", at least IME. Got replays?

A Kodachi can kill a dart before it gets in range if you make sure to target the dart with T. So to make it work you need to be coming from a different angle than the Scorcher is coming from to give the Kodachi as little time to attack the dart is possible. Preferably from directly towards the Kodachi from the opposite side of a Scorcher.

I shouldn't have said "Kodachi can kill any raider" but rather there's nothing that is fast enough to overtake Kodachi that can get an even trade on it, and if there's too solid of a block of raiders for Kodachi to fight into in one place, it can go to another. If you defend strongly enough to prevent them from getting in and doing damage, the tank player gets to expand more quickly than you. You usually need riots (or enough fencers) to defeat Kodachis in a better than even trade, especially when they are playing defense.

PRO_rANDY's games look pretty crazy with lotus and solar walls everywhere, but that is about the level of defenses you need to keep Kodachis out, giving them a pretty meager expansion. You can also see Welders looking weirdly competent at fighting off the Kodachis of the other player.

It just doesn't seem right that the "slow, strong, expensive" fac has one of the best raiders.

Check how this Kodachi plays:

• Range 230 -> 210
• Weapon Velocity 240 -> 340

These changes run counter to Quant's Rule, but the predictive firing AI seems to have revealed that the old stats were too extreme. Kodachi will remain hard to chase, but with these parameters the window for turning and firing at an approaching Bandit or Scorcher is much smaller. I'm open to additional changes, but would rather get the range and retreat bonus behaviour feeling fair before making relatively simpler changes, such as to cost, health or speed.

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