The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones)

[FtXCommando]

You won’t use them outside of your base for reclaim unless they’re so ridiculously cheap and fast that it breaks the game. Why would I ever make this unit to go get reclaim when it can die in a few seconds to an int? An engineer can die quickly too, but a new engie quickly takes its place since in late game reclaim fields you build factories near the reclaim piles and losing a few engies to a variety of game elements is irrelevant.

[Nex]

@veteranashe said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

If they are given fuel it needs to be spent only in travel time and not while building

I think the other way around would be better, so you don't lose the infinite range.

@blackyps said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

Having a fuel mechanic on the drones increases complexity, but I don't see what current problem that would solve?

I would have thought that adding a fuel mechanic allows for buffs in other areas to make the kennel more distinct.

If the drones for example were faster (like 10 which is apparently their ground speed) but could only build/reclaim for 10 minutes:

1. You could still use them anywhere on the map, but faster
2. they could switch faster between projects
3. you would only need to refuel for 10 seconds if you use them in your base, but it would take longer the farther away you want to use them.

Combine this with giving them some more hp and reduce their rebuild time/cost to like 20% and they could become somewhat useful.

@ftxcommando said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

You won’t use them outside of your base for reclaim unless they’re so ridiculously cheap and fast that it breaks the game. Why would I ever make this unit to go get reclaim when it can die in a few seconds to an int?

Why would it break the game if they were as cheap as a t1 engie?
against your engie spam your opponent could just send a stream of t1 bombers, which would do the same as inties would to your drones. Bombers are more expensive, but if the drones are build faster, move faster and reclaim faster, this could still be balanced out.

[FtXCommando]

Why would it break the game if they were as cheap as a t1 engie?
against your engie spam your opponent could just send a stream of t1 bombers, which would do the same as inties would to your drones. Bombers are more expensive, but if the drones are build faster, move faster and reclaim faster, this could still be balanced out.

A group of engineers can build AA. A few engineers dying in a reclaim field delays scale by nearly nothing. A few drones dying resets the situation to having to make drones all the way back in my base and then they need to travel back.

It would break the game because the engineering station needs to compete in cost with a land factory + engie spam. This means it would need to cost around 300 mass to be considered relative to the basic way of scooping reclaim all factions use. If they're not that cheap, they are forced to be made in base because they're too expensive to just randomly throw around comparable to a land fac spamming engies. This then requires them to zoom across the map in order to make it compete with the general safety/utility that comes from a simple fac spamming engies near a reclaim field.

All of this carries a large quantity of gameplay impacts that would make UEF incredibly broken at various stages of the game. If drones are super cheap, they need to be basically t1 engies in BP. If they're fast, they become oppressive tools in their own right to just float around and build TMLs or proxies.

I mean I don't care if drones can attack move reclaim, I'm just saying that it won't actually change anything about how you actually utilize the unit nor the fact that even UEF players will ask for a cyb engie for scaling.

[Nex]

@ftxcommando
The usecase i'd see for kennels would be smaller reclaim fields left from raids or strats/aircraft. Even later crashed T4 could be reclaimed by kennels if they crashed inside your territory. So for bigger reclaim field factories would be the option, but you could get reclaim inside your territory faster, than dropping/walking engies there.

@ftxcommando said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

If they're fast, they become oppressive tools in their own right to just float around and build TMLs or proxies.

They cannot build on their own tho, so you would still need to get an engie there first.
But supporting a proxy could be one of their jobs, but they are still easily shot down by inties.

Would also be interesting if instead of docking to refuel drones could automatically refuel while near their station. That way you could further limit their "outside base" timer without restricting normal base building. Not sure if something like that is possible tho.

[ComradeStryker]

@nex

Would also be interesting if instead of docking to refuel drones could automatically refuel while near their station. That way you could further limit their "outside base" timer without restricting normal base building. Not sure if something like that is possible tho.

Not sure if this is what you meant, but I just thought of something. What if a fuel bar is added in, but instead of needing to refill at its own station - it refills at the nearest station.

This would make it so you could still utilize the range of them but not having as limiting as a set range. Basically having them leapfrog between Kennel stages to refuel.

This would impose a range limit but not have it be a limiting factor in it's mobility. If you build a front-line Kennel, it would act as an extension to it's range.

Though this would still be questionable in large navy maps as you can't build Kennels on water.

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Side note, what if they do become amphibious structures? Like AA or TMD?

Hmm, perhaps not useful currently as they can just fly everywhere but with the range limitations, it could be quite cool actually.

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~ Stryker

[veteranashe]

Fuel should not be added, sending drones on missions is already balenced due to:

Risk of losing drone
Apm required
Engies are better 90% of the time

The only time drones are used for mission reclaim when a easy path is blocked for a engine, and there is no action in the area, and reclaiming over a cliff. These are very nich missions, even with a buffed drone engies will still be used over drones, even with am and patrol unlocked.

Rebuild cost should be low or zero, or dead drone leaving a wreck

Hives are better, that's ok, that's how the game is supposed to be.

[Nex]

@veteranashe said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

Risk of losing drone
Apm required
Engies are better 90% of the time

Yeah but adding a fuel mechanic could allow for buffs in other regions.

@veteranashe said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

These are very nich missions, even with a buffed drone engies will still be used over drones, even with am and patrol unlocked.

If drones were twice as fast as engies this could change. And to allow such a huge buff, it would need to get some other limitations, such as a limited build reclaim time.
So if you have a reclaim field, that could be cleared with one trip from your drone, it would be better to send a drone, otherwise you send an engie or make a reclaim fac.

@comradestryker said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

Not sure if this is what you meant, but I just thought of something. What if a fuel bar is added in, but instead of needing to refill at its own station - it refills at the nearest station.

Also thought about that, but i'm not sure if this would get to strong.
What i thought about is, that the drone just needs to fly around it's own station (like having the station in its build range) to refuel. So it can still build in that area while refueling.

[ComradeStryker]

Just wanted to thank the Devs for fixing the wreckage issue.
851 mass left on wreckage after upgraded Kennel is destroyed.

Anything on the drone side, though?
Reduction in drone rebuild time and costs?
Or the T3 Variant?

Judging by the feedback, these also seemed like favored changes.

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~ Stryker

[ComradeStryker]

@comradestryker said in The Problems With The UEF - Part 6 (The Kennel & Drones):

Allow all drones to reclaim like standard engineers

Just an extension of that statement:

I've gone around and asked a few players for their thoughts on this specific topic and I've received conflicting answers.
Hence I want to expand on it further with you guys.

Would drones with this ability really be too strong? or would it be mainly a Quality-of-Life change?

Attack-moving and patrolling, currently, makes the drones move to the waypoint and back.

Having them act in this new manner would mean that they reclaim wreckages and enemy units like any other engineer. But... they fly.

I've been told that, with how they work, they'll suck up all the reclaim in seconds after a battle - making them too strong. I've also heard that with their low HP, even then, they are still easy to deal with. A frigate can one-shot them easily, and with how often they fire... it wouldn't take long for a whole group of them to be destroyed.

Thoughts on this?

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~ Stryker

[IndexLibrorum]

@comradestryker Drones die en-masse if a group of inties vaguely looks in their direction. I don't see a problem with this, provided their reclaim rate does not exceed the rate at which normal T1 engineers reclaim.

We'd have to see how balanced it is given that UEF is then the only faction with flying engineers, but you could argue that has always been the case and this only makes them genuinely viable.

I am slightly worried how this would tie in with the proposed increase in HP of the drones. There'll be some balancing required there.

[TaxesAreTheft]

So currently you have to pay 10.4 mass for 1 point of BP if you use engis.
The Hive has a mass/BP ratio of 14, which means BP-wise it is 74% efficient compared to building engis (no other decision factors included like pathfinding etc).
The Kennel: Mass/BP-ratio 22 and 47% after the patch 17,6 and 59%.
Conclusion for me: Kennel is shit and will be shit if used purely for build power.
The patch will be a placebo buff (elevation and rebuild are actually nice) but shit will be shit no matter what.
If the use changes towards flying reclaim this may be fine to give kennels a real use and identity. But this requires that their BP is not further degraded, because kennels are already a noob trap or a despair move BP-wise. Building them is mostly not beneficial for you. So you should either buff their mass per BP ratio towards the hive or bless their application with a real feature.