Air Leverage - Improving Air Gameplay (Mod v6 out now!)

[KD7BCH]

My thought on using air to counter Anti air is that even the most powerful air units are poorly suited to eliminating SAMs. I am completely ok with that. I think ground should be the counter to anti air. There is no long range Anti-Anti AIR A<>G unit like the HARM missile IRL. But there are effective counters, any land unit can do the job given protection, and where you can't get land units, for the most part you can setup TMLs fast enough to slap down Anti air an allow a significant strike.

The only reason I mention the A<>A capability of the restorers is that they are a pretty effective counter against ASFs in your mod, you should play a round with them and see just how effective they are. The MAA/transports we talked about used in conjunction with restorers would eliminate ASF supremacy so if we do make MAA shooting transports, then and only then we should probably work to nerf the Restorer A<>A capability.

[Korbah]

Most air units struggle with Sams. They have monster hp for their cost (compare them to t2/3 pd or arty if you're not convinced) and have brutal dps.

That's necessary as the current meta has no other viable air counter aside from asf. Is it good for gameplay? I'm not sure as more viable options would allow for more interesting gameplay.

We need to look hard first at where the current changes have shifted gameplay and then move forward.

[zeroAPM]

The monster Hp is because (gpg days, mind you) people were sniping CZARs with TML
Solution, multiply anything air related

[BrotherTerran]

On gunships don't the Seraphim seem a bit hosed on this? They have 1 gunship and it is just "ok" if we are being charitable. If it shot with a AOE(1-3) similar to Cybran(3), might be a balancing factor I think. Just seems a bit off if the T2 Gunship for Sera was great then it would make sense. I don't see the strategic balance of only having the 1 T2 Gunship? Am I just missing something obvious that is a balancing factor?

[KD7BCH]

On gunships don't the Seraphim seem a bit hosed on this? They have 1 gunship and it is just "ok" if we are being charitable. If it shot with a AOE(1-3) similar to Cybran(3), might be a balancing factor I think. Just seems a bit off if the T2 Gunship for Sera was great then it would make sense. I don't see the strategic balance of only having the 1 T2 Gunship? Am I just missing something obvious that is a balancing factor?

Seraphim has 2 really good strengths, Shields, and the Chicken EXP, they are pretty poor in T2 air against Cybran who have a the best FB, a decent gunship, and in T3 their only strength is their Air EXP, and ACU teleport with heavy DMG cannon. I don't think they are nearly as well suited now because they have been nerfed on both the air and ACU sides. The shields are great but they don't have a T3 gunship or T1 gunship and their transports simply can't survive a concerted air defense at all.

[BrotherTerran]

Yeah it seems a bit unbalanced on paper. I think they have a solid T2 land and navy I think, but air wise just got the short end of the stick. If they had an AOE and/or AA on the T2 gunship it I think help balance it out with a minor tweak or two. At T3 they are still a little at a disadvantage(no T3 gunship), but as you said they do have the T4 exp bomber which is great and fast. Shields are an advantage, but since they are static that doesn't help much on offense. T3 mobile shield help, but isn't much help mid game for land or navy, which I'm ok with since T2 mech is so good. They need the T3 shield to balance out the UEF & Cyrbran T3.5 units.

Just a thought on the T2 gunship to help balance out(at least what I see as an unbalance) on the gunship for the sera.

[yeager]

Honestly the bomber isn't that good, sure it amazing with micro, but it has the longest build time, is the most costly, and best of all doesn't allow you to do anything else while using it, not to mention it sucks on defense. I'd like to give the strat flares like the aeon one used to have so the bomber is alittle better, but that's just me

[Korbah]

Thematically I think Seraphim are underdone - I agree their air feels generic and limited by the small number of units. I've previously made an othuum mod (available in the vault - "othuum rework mod v1") to try and see if a generic unit could feel more interesting without making it blatantly OP - definitely you can achieve this without adding more units and just giving the existing ones some TLC.


I'd personally be very happy to take on seraphim for a racial overhaul to really bring out their theme and improve their gameplay. However, one step at a time! Lets get air working better first as it's certainly a greater issue. I'm yet to see many air leverage v4 games so get posting guys!

[Korbah]

So here's a replay of v4 in action

I'm in the air slot which is probably ill advised (as i'm dreadful) but w/e


Basically showing strong reductions in ASF spam. Again not the highest ranked game but it's on wonder rather than gap which is nice.

[Korbah]

Another wonder rep - v4 air leverage