From Jesters & Stingers

[Iszh]

Hey i ve been researching this topic a bit closer since i ve been jester sniped a few times now due to no scouting. Sometimes it is difficult to think while playing and get scout planes which would avoid such a stupid death in 95%. but thats not what i wanted to tell here. I ve been comparing a jester snipe to a stinger snipe and the "normal usage" of gunships.

A jester needs 50 seconds in a t1 factory with 20 built power to be produced. Every assisting engi drains 1 mass / s. The gunship costs 200 mass and has 48 dps and 550 hp.

The stinger needs 40 sedonds in a t2 factory with 40 built power to be produced. Every assisting engi drains 0,75 mass/s. The gunship costs 240 mass and has 60 dps and 880 hp.

Upgrading the factory costs 630 mass.

First i compare the Price cost relation in mass:
Jester: 0,24 dps/mass and 2,75hp/mass
Stinger: 0,25 dps/mass and 3,67 hp/mass

I would say the values are totally fine a t2 gunship has more hp for its cost.

Second i compare the Built time:
Jester: drains 1 mass/5bp
Stinger drains 0,75 mass/5bp
For dps per second calculation i will use 40 built power since stinger can be only produced in t2 fac. So we estimate that 4 engis assist the cybran t1 fac.
Jester 25s to be built -> 1,92 dps/s
Stinger 40s to be built -> 1,5 dps/s

You produce 33% more dps with a jester in same time compared to a stinger which is quite a big difference. Additional you need a t2 factory for the t2 gunships. Tho cost of the t2 air factory is not that important since it increases built power and providing ability for t2 engis and better planes. I think for a snipe it is important to produce as much dps as possible in short time. So jester is in fact 33% better for a snipe compared to t2 gunships if you dont even take care about the t2 factory.
I have been wondering about this since when i try t2 snipes while playing uef air positions i lose the hell of time and really use all my engis for getting a few gunships. jester snipes are done by land players with a few engis assisting.

2 Things i am asking here if that really should be:
1. Why has a t1 gunship exactly the same air physics like a t2 gunship (speed for example) when it has already all other values comparable to a t2 gunship
2. Why t2 gunships need more built power to produce dps compared to t1 gunships

Maybe to reduce its sniping ability a bit at least and increase built time. To use single t1 gunships for sucking enemy armies and engis in begin is ok but to produce more dangerous snipe weapons due to low built time which other factions have with the same unit at t2 level and even worse than this t1 thing thats a bad joke. 33% better is a lot! This faction has already corsair as a t2 snipe weapon. Another proposal is to reduce some t2 plane built times. I am not sure if such a strength, that a t1 unit of a faction is better than t2 units of others where those do not even have this unit at t1, can be explained with "faction diversity". I dont want to tell they are op because very sure they are not otherwise every game would end with jester snipe. But i beleave some minor changes should be done here and built time seems to be while comparing to other units.

Now waiting for the cybran hate

[ZLO_RD]

Usually when you spam jesters you crash on power, while when you spam t2 gunships you get low on mass.
Never really had a problem of not having enought build power to make t2 gunships, but if you think they could use a buff, maybe build time can be lowered but with engy mod it is not a problem to just make more t2 air facs.
I like massive t2 gunship snipes
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3NlterDCtzQ

[Iszh]

Idk how you usually do jester snipes? I expected something like a very early tactic. The same works for stingers. If you use mech marines you reach the same dps in the same time for same e cost. You simply spent 600 mass more because of t2 factory upgrade.

I tested now cybran t1 air fac with 4 engis spamming t1 gunships vs uef t1 air fac with first 2 engis later 4 engis

Result was for more or less same e and alike mass cost 8 stingers vs 11 jesters. But it is more mass intense and takes more time. T1 ghetto is useless to compare because you cant target them.

If you do the snipes a bit later in game i beleave you can reach nearly equal results with t2 gunships but it will always be more difficult. I made a second test with just a t1 air fac directly starting to produce jesters and a uef air fac directly upgrading to t2 without assist.
Jester 4 mass/s - 100 e/s
t2 Fac 7 mass/s - 130e/s
You get 1 Jester out until factory is upgraded and then
Jester 4 mass/s - 100 e/s
Stinger 6mass/s - 120 e/s
When second stinger is out you will have 3 jesters already:

Jester&Stinger.jpg (245.21 KiB) Viewed 4228 times

While watching this it simply costs more. With cybran you can assist to reach the same cost and then you get more gunships. But from cost side it looks like you can do this as well very early from start. Especially since t2 factory is always good to have. So maybe you re right it is just a question of ressources. Jesters cost in fact more e compared to stingers. Stingers cost 80e for 1 dps and jester 104e for 1 dps.

So the disadvantage is 630 mass for t2 air fact:
-4 engis for 20 additional built power = 208 mass
-1,25 t1 pgens for additional 20 e cost = 85 mass
So lets say the additional costs for the t2 factory are partly paid back by disadvantages of t1 gunships. 300 mass remaining as additional cost. It looks more and more alike

[ZLO_RD]

In 1v1 jester snipes usually happen naturally, as you start loosing map controll you get less mass and more power so you can still spam air and jesters, opponent sees lack of spam and attacks and then you reveal jesters and attack acu.
Sometimes you can intentionally just go for jester spam early on. But for that better would be to have many air factories with maximum power adjustency and use less assist, it is a strong tactic but you need to be carefull and see how your opponent tryes to (he spams ton of air himslef or spams t2 flack)
I rarely see jester snipes in team games but they are ofc totally possible, especially if air player doing to much eco instead of air and scouts. Overflow from your team may really help with high power cost of jester.

Also jesters have normal gun on them while renegade has missiles. Not only renegade has less dps than other gunships, also often some missiles miss targets, so jesters are resonably good for snipes.
Jesters can sometimes dodge antiair shots if they are on the edge of antiair range (all gunships can do. i think even ripper can dodge t2 flack shots a bit )

I am not sure but, your point is that jester is to easy to obtain due to lack of build time? Well maybe you are right but most of the time power is limiting factor there.
Also cause of popularity of second air builds you no longer ever see blind second air jester rush.

[Iszh]

I didnt want to tell a lot so far i was about to find out more how other people think about it. I remember a series of teamgames where people funsniped with jesters. On different land maps in 1400+ teamgames a guy just spammed jesters and killed with 30 of them en enemy commander despite all inties arround. To me happened lately something. I ve been on attack and enemy had 10 jesters. I had lots of t1 inties but i was hardly able to select them until acu was already dead. Lag of scouting sure but here i explain the problem i have. There are several factors important for a sucessful snipe:

-It must be unrecognized for a long time
-The time from starting to built the snipe until go should be minimum

Cybran t1 gunships fulfil this perfect. You can built e storage and save ressources while playing normal. Then you start jester spam. You dont need to upgrade a factory so enemy cannot see it so easy. With aeon for example everybody is running once there is a t2 plane or factory because it is clear mercy can appear. The second thing once you stored enough ressources you can spam them like crazy which you cant do with t2 gunships. Jesters are not intended to be a dedicated snipe weapon which they are in fact nearly as good as mercy (of course not as good as mercy but you know what i mean). People discussed this topic before i beleave a lot. I didnt spent to much attention to it until i found out that you can get your dps 30% faster than with t2 gunships. I think this percent is to much or the other t2 gunships have to high built time. But as usual thats only my opinion and i wonder if you or other people would agree that a small change would not harm at this point. If you can explain me that they are completely fine like they are i also can accept this. I would like to hear the explanation for this easy dps increase. In my opinion t2 gunships should be better than t1 gunship.

[ZLO_RD]

1)Don't think energie storage will help alot here since jester power cost is 5000 so you spend 240 mass to bank power that ecuals to one jester.
2) argument about not being able to kill them fast enought with air sounds weird to me. mostly because t2 gunships have ~80% more hp for the same price

Apparently what is good about jesters is that you don't need to invest into t2 hq. And not having t2 hq will not trigger your opponent to scout you.

What is bad about jesters is that they cost alot of power but not THAT much, so in teamgames you can use overflow and be fine.

Basicly they are just as good as t2 gunships but have less hp (~500 for 200 mass vs 1000 for 240 mass) , and bigger power cost (5000 vs 4800)
But no need to get t2 hq, not exactly OP but very strong

[Plasma_Wolf]

Here's the last time I was using Jesters. Was purely because I was being pushed back. Otherwise I would've built bombers to deal with his land army or structures.

[Kalvirox]

EDIT: I'm being stupid... Ignore this

[Nepty]

I like Stingers because of the slight AOE on them. Nice for killing lots of engies fast, particularly when they are trying to rush up anti-air

Stingers have slight AOE? This is new to me. Good to know.

[CookieNoob]

I like Stingers because of the slight AOE on them. Nice for killing lots of engies fast, particularly when they are trying to rush up anti-air

Stingers have slight AOE? This is new to me. Good to know.

he's talking about renegades obviously...