Fuel isn’t fun and punishes the one interesting micro element of air gameplay, should be removed in general if anything.
What if? Experimentals end ASFs
Was just about to say that, fuel is a gimmick that feels out of place in this game and the only change that should be made regarding fuel is to remove it imo. Balancing around fuel is sketchy at best
Czar spam kinda ie 5+ does very well against asf. Sadly restorer spam kinda counters it. As for the soul ripper I agree that it still isn't very good. Asswasher is already really strong and doesn't need to beat asf. Also if 200 asf come at 3 czars and you have 10 sams in the area there will be 200 dead asf and 3 czars still alive.
Fun curtailed - Air is no longer about outmaneuvering enemy or forcing air into bad positions, you just sit it afk in 1 spot until game losing condition exists for you to respond to. You've done 0 to change the reality of how snowbally air fights are in nature nor changed incentives of snowballing, you just made sams even more of a necessity for anyone not an air player.
Beyond that, this change is strictly made for like 5v5+ games because this would be tedious as shit for anything like a 1v1 or 2v2 or honestly even a 3v3 on some maps.
@ftxcommando said in What if? Experimentals end ASFs:
outmaneuvering enemy or forcing air into bad positions
"Creating a situation where your aircraft have fuel and your opponent's do not" is an exact fit for these two categories.
@slicknixon said in What if? Experimentals end ASFs:
@ftxcommando said in What if? Experimentals end ASFs:
outmaneuvering enemy or forcing air into bad positions
"Creating a situation where your aircraft have fuel and your opponent's do not" is an exact fit for these two categories.
No it's not that's not even something you can realistically do.
@exselsior said in What if? Experimentals end ASFs:
No it's not that's not even something you can realistically do.
First, you've got two unrelated points here. "Planes without fuel facing planes with fuel" have been "outmaneuvered or forced into a bad position", point finale. It being realistic or not to achieve has no bearing on the truth of that statement.
Second, the realistic way to achieve it is "induce your opponent to fly their planes more than you fly your planes, in aggregate, in a localized time domain".
You won't do that because 80 vs 100 asf is an air win with 70 asf left for the 100 asf party. Fuel impacts everything so rather than risk an automatic game loss because you took a dumb fight, you just sit afk with your air and send a max of 5 around to deal with loose air that people are trying to bait you to do anything with. There is no outmaneuvering because it's a waste of your own time and resources to send your planes anywhere.
The best part is that the people REALLY spending their fuel are people trying to screen and micro in the middle of air aggression. So all this is actually likely to do is encourage lazy air gameplay of make 300 asf, go afk, make game ender.
@slicknixon said in What if? Experimentals end ASFs:
@exselsior said in What if? Experimentals end ASFs:
No it's not that's not even something you can realistically do.
First, you've got two unrelated points here. "Planes without fuel facing planes with fuel" have been "outmaneuvered or forced into a bad position", point finale. It being realistic or not to achieve has no bearing on the truth of that statement.
Second, the realistic way to achieve it is "induce your opponent to fly their planes more than you fly your planes, in aggregate, in a localized time domain".
I had a half written response but FTX covered what I was saying better than I was saying it, so I'll change it to something slightly different to add to what he said.
One of the biggest areas where fuel is cancer outside of discouraging air screening for long periods of time is inties in 1v1s and 2v2s. There's just no justifiable reason for inties to become useless after a few minutes of use, and is an indirect buff to transports and bombers before the t3 air stage for, again, no real reason. Bombers have fuel, but really when was the last time you actually saw an out of fuel t1 bomber?
Can we ideate on what your opponent might get up to while you're making 300 ASF and doing nothing with them?
Never said anything about inties. Specifically said reduce for some/all aircraft, and for you to use your imagination--"apply this idea to a different unit to show how it won't work" wasn't the kind of imagination I was talking about.
I'm talking about air and fuel in general. FTX covered ASF and T3 air interactions, I touched on lower level air.
Your opponent is most likely either also building 300+ asf or they're in the process of dying to air after losing it all to the dude who made more asf. Either or.
@exselsior said in What if? Experimentals end ASFs:
in the process of dying to air after losing it all to the dude who made more asf
I hate to grind you down like this but "killing your opponent's units and attacking their base" doesn't sound like doing nothing.
yes getting to make ur first proactive action min 25 when u scout if enemy made air or just straight rushed for game ender is certainly not doing nothing, but it damn sure feels like it
I again gotta ask you to unpack why any of what you just said would follow from ASF having to refuel more often.
Why would you be waiting until minute 25 to scout?
It's hyperbole. The change to fuel makes any air aggression attempt prior to a total air win cheese because there is zero room for maneuvering due to fuel being impactful. You either kill enemy air so you don't need to worry about doing anything beyond afking your big asf blob next to your damage dealers or you just don't do anything. For all intents and purposes air slots become game ender slots with an air cheese win condition if it's fully ignored.
Basically: you make high level air gameplay play the way low level air gameplay works.
and you dont wait min 25 to scout cuz they other team could be making drops or nukes or full monkey rush
Returning to the fuel debate it rarely comes up with t3 air just cuz you'd have to be attacking for over 10 min for asf to start to run out of fuel and at the high level people will always send all their asf back to an air staging ground after an air fight to repair everything. It is much more annoying when playing 1v1 or 2v2 and you are using t2 air to attack something because after about 4 min all your inties will be out of fuel and you cannot attack anymore. + it takes forever for inties to actually return to an air staging ground and by the time they do the game is either over or you have t3 air.
Let me highlight again that I'm only discussing a fuel change with regards to ASF. It doesn't follow that introducing a tempo to ASF--a fundamentally defensive unit, concerned entirely with destroying other air units--would reduce the room for maneuver or impact of said other units (it suggests the opposite, very obviously). Scouts, transports, and ground attack aircraft would retain their usefulness, and would receive an indirect buff as @Exselsior said.
Suggests there might be something interesting in switching those two states: reduce t3 fuel, increase t1/t2 fuel. Lower tier air units retain an advantage into the late game from a maneuver and availability standpoint but lose in a pitched battle.
