Can someone explain me why people delete the T2mex and power build the T3?

[kdrafa91]

It saves mass? or it is just built faster if you have enough mass storaged?

[FtXCommando]

4600 mass to build a t3 mex, 4600 mass to upgrade a t2 mex to t3. Reclaim gives 729 mass, but you lose 9 mass a second of generation. Build it fast enough and it is better to take the lump mass.

Noobs see strong players do it, assume it's always better, and end up losing efficiency since they're taking too long to build the mex as they don't have the necessary banked mass to make it in time to pay off.

[QuietJoy]

One of the youtube casters showed how this works and included an excel spreadsheet lol to show how it could be advantageous. I can't remember who unfortunately. Yeah as ftx says, under some conditions it is a faster way to get a mex from t2 to t3. You need to have plenty of build power with the mass cost ready to go.
In practice though I know I rarely use it as i need my apm focused elsewhere usually plus i'm scared I will ctrl-k the t2 mex and then have to immediately take my attention elsewhere. I did once double click the t2 and accidentally ctrl-k'ed all my t2 mexes lol so I usually just hit upgrade on the t2 and assign some engineers to push it to t3 asap as the safer option.

EDIT - Found the video by BRNKoINSANITY

[magge]

https://i.imgur.com/Esgi4Nv.png from the sheet

If you fast build with 1 t3 and 5 t2 you will have ~2800 more mass in the end. I never thought the numbers were that high - It is certainly a must-have for eco gap players

Edit: I just remembered, wasn't the upgrade from t2 to t3 a bit buffed with a patch in the last months?

The video could be outdated a bit, and the number is not that high anymore.

Edit2: Found it in the change log - will do the math later:

BuildTime: 3944 → 2875

Edit3: Should be around ~2041 (instead of 2800) saved mass with the 2875 build time

[kdrafa91]

I understand, thanks

[arma473]

@magge said in Can someone explain me why people delete the T2mex and power build the T3?:

If you fast build with 1 t3 and 5 t2 you will have ~2800 more mass in the end.

Impossible. The maximum benefit you can get is 729 mass, and that's if you had near-infinite build power. With less build power, you get less benefit.

[magge]

Well, then I have misread the info from the video.

https://i.imgur.com/QokWtSf.png

Edit: It is not about the reclaim mass from a t2 extractor which is indeed 729 it is the mass total difference for the same time it needs to get to t3 without support and with support.

[Deribus]

Mass extractors still produce mass while upgrading. Upgrading a mex takes the exact same amount of mass no matter how long it takes

[Permutation]

Is the upgrade cost of structures mod-able, or is it always fixed to the whole cost of the upgraded structure? Seems more intuitive to be the difference in costs of the two structures.

Of course, this would necessitate rebalancing many(most?) of the mass cost values in the game. I'm just curious.

[FtXCommando]

Upgrade cost can be whatever you want, I don’t see any gameplay benefit in changing t3 mex upgrade cost to eliminate the decision between reclaiming a mex and simply upgrading it. The current system rewards proper eco planning/making the correct decision based on your constraints. I do both ctrl+k and simple upgrades depending on the game situation.