Rhino/Obsidian buff? Also OC tweak

[Steel_Panther]

Hi, just wondering if anyone else thinks that rhinos and obsidians could use a buff? It seems to me that the overcharge rework a while back helped make most t2 units more viable, but rhinos and obsidians still seem like pretty bad choices in team games.

I don't really play ladder but if you tell me they are pretty balanced there I'll have to take your word for it. If they are only weak in team games, can anyone think of a way they can be rebalanced to be more viable in team games, without being overpowered in ladder? E.g. lower cost and lower hp/damage, to be more like pillars and less vulnerable to overcharge? I'd be open to other suggestions.

While we are talking about overcharge, I have another suggestion. It is my understanding that now OC does higher damage only for more energy, but the AOE to kill/damage nearby units still doesn't have any effect on the energy cost. So this makes overcharge extremely powerful vs clumped units (it always has been like this). There are pros and cons to this, like discouraging shift-g with spam to trap an ACU, which I always thought was very cheesy and didn't really like (though others may think otherwise). On the other hand, you have to be extremely careful if you are not going for a snipe to avoid clumping units and losing multiple units to a single overcharge, which is just kinda annoying to micro (to me anyway), and especially huge for t2 units (like rhinos, obsidians, and ilshavohs, so changing this might be a very helpful fix).

So, if anyone else agrees with me that the AOE damage of overcharge is a little bit overpowered, my suggestion would be to still allow it, but make it require more energy for the additional aoe damage it does. (AFAIK, it currently doesn't require any additional energy to damage multiple units)

So a small tweak to Overcharge could be either:

1) The same amount of extra energy is required for damage to spillover to the nearby units (so twice as much energy to kill 2 units with OC than currently, 3x the energy cost to hit 3 units, etc.),

OR:

2) The energy cost could be reduced, say only 50% of the original OC energy cost for each additional unit damaged by the OC.
I'd be fine with either:
A) 1.5x the energy to hit 2 units, 2x the energy to hit 3 units, 2.5x the energy to hit 4 units, etc. OR
B) 1.5x the energy cost to hit 2 units, 1.75x the energy cost to hit 3 units, 1.875x the cost to hit 4 units, etc.). (so only 50% of the energy cost of the last spillover damage OC).

It could be complicated if you are hitting both t2 and t1 units at the same time, and I'm not sure how a more complex calculation for that would have to work.

I suppose if there are say 3 units clumped together and you have only enough energy to overcharge 2, that it would randomly pick which one gets the spillover damage. Not really sure how else you might do it.

It seems to me like the increased energy cost would be a fairly small nerf to overcharge, because it might basically just mean building one or two more storages than you normally would, and maybe a little extra power. It seems to me just a bit of an extension of the previous OC nerf.

Anyway, I have no idea if the OC tweak is technically feasible, especially suggestion 2)B), but that is just an idea. Or you could go with option 2)A) but change it to 25% of the extra cost to keep it easy to calculate, but a smaller change. I think I'd be happy with any change that went in this direction to make the energy cost a bit more proportional do the damage done.

Thank you

[ThomasHiatt]

I think the current overcharge system is already too inconsistent and annoying. If you use auto overcharge or just overcharge too soon before your energy has built up enough then you won't kill some ilshavoh or t3 units and you die. As usual, I have some weird proposals I came up with after thinking about the problem. Overcharge could be a series of ACU upgrades. You would pay X mass and energy to get the tier one overcharge upgrade, and using a tier one overcharge costs a fixed amount of energy and does a fixed amount of damage. When you need to be overcharging t2 units then you upgrade to the 2nd tier overcharge upgrade on your ACU, then overcharge will cost a greater amount of power and do a greater amount of damage, but still a fixed amount. Extrapolate this system for a 3rd and 4th tier of overcharge. You could also have different splash damages for the different tiers of overcharge, or have additional overcharge upgrades which increase the splash damage. This system would be much more consistent but still be about as powerful. I also dislike that overcharging units with the current overcharge system does no overkill damage and leaves full reclaim, it actually makes overcharge more powerful since you get 1k mass from killing some percy or brick instead of whatever small amount you got before. My proposed system would solve that problem as well.

As for rhinos and obsidians, I certainly wouldn't want to see rhinos buffed in ladder, cybran is already extremely popular and pretty much all of their units, including rhinos, are very good. I don't really think that obsidians are that weak, but aeon is not very popular and obsidians are also not very popular so they could be buffed. I'd rather see some type of more interesting buffs for aeon though.

[Wesmania]

Rhinos are actually weakest T2 tanks if we ignore Obsidian's abysmal range, and they MISS HALF THEIR SHOTS. Fix this, and they're at least worth building over Wagners.

[ZeRen]

I think OC is OP and discourage using T2 units in maps like wonder, we have auto OC, increase cooldown would be nice

Rhino realy suck, they chnaged the fire from "laser shell" to "laser" to not miss, but it still missing if unit moves sideways (hope it is right word) pls give it back Cerberus fire, so it not suck as much

I would like to point out, that Rhino it self is not the biggest problem, the ACU is , Cyb midgame is terrible

you have weak ACU + suck Rhino vs Rambo coms + better T2 tanks, and if you pushed back you have terrible T2 PD, i am really only one who cares?

year ago when I asked why Cerberus suck so much, I was told cause Cyb's MML is OP, now rest MMLs got buff, yet Cyb's PD is the same, just make it cheaper

no, the not missing thingy is not good enough, you have T1 PD, if you cleverly possition Other faction's T2 PDs, they can be good vs spam as well, while being much stronger

balance team noticed that UEF nano sucked and changed it, why you dont see this? you nerfed telemazer without any compensation, Cyb's ACU becoming suck in all stages of game

[Farmsletje]

Rhinos are actually weakest T2 tanks if we ignore Obsidian's abysmal range, and they MISS HALF THEIR SHOTS. Fix this, and they're at least worth building over Wagners.

okay you take blazes while i take rhinos lets see how it will go

[Ithilis_Quo]

Sorry to say that but obsidian is by numbers best t2 tank, what should be changed is change energy consumption to -1. While its suck that one faction have the main tank that cost 400mass.
The problem of obsidians is that there is too many players = acus in most of the games, so it make no sense to build them when there is acu everywhere.

If buff it should be like some of this:
decrese energy drain to 1
increase speed by 0,1 or 0,05
change rof to 3sec (and adjust dmg of course)

[Evildrew]

Well the relative weakness of high cost units melting to OC in groups is improved by reducing the splash radius, T2 unit vs T2 unit is not the real problem from how I understand your post.
So it is rather simple for the issues mentioned here:
If you want to play with less OC splash damage to make units in formation not get gangbanged despite being miles apart - Play with FA RTS
If you want Rhinos that dont miss half the time - Play with FA RTS
If you prefer sticking with more of a sim city type game version where ecowhoring alone decides 95% of the game - Keep playing without FA RTS

[ZLO_RD]

OC is annoying cause it drains more than 5k power or something like that so you tend to stall power and lose radar

[Steel_Panther]

OC is annoying cause it drains more than 5k power or something like that so you tend to stall power and lose radar

Wouldn't that be solved by just having a single extra energy storage?

And yes, to be clear for everyone, I do think it is mostly an overcharge being OP in team games issue, not that rhinos or obsidians are bad vs other units. That's why my suggestion was to nerf OC, or else possibly rework them so they are better in team games where OC matters a lot more, but not worse in ladder where they are apparently still balanced.

[keyser]

OC is annoying cause it drains more than 5k power or something like that so you tend to stall power and lose radar

Wouldn't that be solved by just having a single extra energy storage?

And yes, to be clear for everyone, I do think it is mostly an overcharge being OP in team games issue, not that rhinos or obsidians are bad vs other units. That's why my suggestion was to nerf OC, or else possibly rework them so they are better in team games where OC matters a lot more, but not worse in ladder where they are apparently still balanced.

issue is that teamgames are often crowded (wonder, canis...) and that bad map design lead to issues. As we don't balance the game toward map like gap/thermo/astro where arty are the most effective weapons, i wouldn't balance the game toward classic teamgame maps (the one i listed for example). Nerfing oc on this maps would inevitably nerf it on ladder and on teamgame maps that are less crowded. As i think we should design the game toward more dynamics maps since they use the full diversity of tactics/strategy and requires the most skills.