Reclaim Boost Myth confirmed

[Lionhardt]

A while ago I came across a few videos on YouTube claiming that you can maximize your reclaim of trees, if those are group props and you break down the groups before reclaiming them by driving through them with a LAB or something. I was kind of skeptical about this being true. Now I tested it myself. The results are that you indeed get a small boost of ~10 percent in mass and ~4.5 percent in power. But there is a huge tradeoff. The reclaiming will take much longer.

In the attachments there are two replays that document my experiment plus the map I used for it.

Tree model used: pine06_groupa_prop.bp

I have not tested if different props behave differently.

I did a control run to test if you get the same amount of reclaim every time. You do get the exact same amount.

If this has been discussed already I'm sorry...

[Crotalus]

Already been up to discussion and if I remember correctly the reclaim values of single trees were reduced, so right now the most effective way is to reclaim whole patches of trees without splitting them.

[Lionhardt]

I have tested it and attached the documenting replays... Breaking down the groups does give you a boost. Why do you say it's not like that if I say it is like that after thoroughly testing it and even giving you the replays.

[Eiserner_Sieg]

Already been up to discussion and if I remember correctly the reclaim values of single trees were reduced, so right now the most effective way is to reclaim whole patches of trees without splitting them.

Watch the replay you schnitzel!

[RoundTabler]

The reclaim bug fix has been confirmed not to work (I think).

[Ze_PilOt]

The reclaim bug fix has been confirmed not to work (I think).

viewtopic.php?f=57&t=4388&start=10#p48968

[Crotalus]

I have tested it and attached the documenting replays... Breaking down the groups does give you a boost. Why do you say it's not like that if I say it is like that after thoroughly testing it and even giving you the replays.

Read what I wrote:

"the most effective way"... yeah you get more total mass / energy with single trees but it's not as effective if you include time, you want as much mass as possible early on.

And as I also said, single trees gave even more mass/energy before it was fixed. Geez...

[stalewee]

At rock I used to give my first engineer an attack move order into the middle the nearest group of trees. He would go and collect them one at a time.

Now I give the attack order to a spot just next to the trees so that he doesn't walk over them. He collects them in big chunks, giving faster power, and lets me tech up a mex much earlier.

So on Seton's at least, it's generally better now to reclaim untouched trees.

[RoundTabler]

http://www.faforever.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=57&t=4388&start=10#p48968

Sorry Zep, but which post did you want me to read? There was another thread I thought where they said it didn't work. Can't find it now though.

[stalewee]

The following only really applies to Seton's.

Before the 'reclaim bug fix':
- split tree groups gave significantly more mass reclaim than untouched trees. slower reclaim, but more mass
- the best strategy was to split the trees with land scouts before reclaiming them with engineer hordes
- this gave you heaps of mass for upgrading mexes quickly from around 5 minutes onward
- tree splitters had a huge advantage over non-splitters, so you had to split if you wanted to compete

After the 'reclaim bug fix':
- split tree groups give only slightly more mass than untouched trees (10% according to OP, but it was intended to be 0% extra)
- this extra mass is not enough to compensate for the slower reclaim speed
- it's much better to quickly reclaim untouched trees as early as possible so you get heaps of power at the start (first 4 minutes or so)
- a small number of engineers reclaiming untouched trees can power your first mex upgrades very early

I suspect that the top Seton's players have now become adept at reclaiming trees with early engineers without walking over them.

I think the trees are fine at the moment.