SACU Rebalance

If auras in general are out, there are other options. With the Aeon, the heavy shield pack could help tank damage similar to a GC so that harbingers could do work. Seraphim is fine with Light Overcharge, if personal shields are out then maybe Nano1 and Nano2 like the commander?, UEF is good with the heavy shield dome, Cybran getting a light microwave laser would be interesting as a body slot, leaving them with less HP but high damage output.

I like how SACUs generally function now, but their cost and other balances need to be rebalanced.

Also, when I go to spawn in Cybran SACU, before it is placed it has a jetpack. What's up with that?

@chenbro101

Or, or, or a Cybran sacrifice module, but it captures instead of constructing.

Let me float another idea for an enhancement that interacts with wreck veterancy* as well, like it pulls whatever veterancy the dead unit had and applies it to the SACU, or stores and/or distributes it to nearby friendlies. (This also feels Cybran coded to me, but not too strongly.)

*Unit veterancy would need to be stored on the wreck on death.

@chenbro101 said in SACU Rebalance:

Ok, so how about an upgrade that increases capture range and speed? Call it hack module or something. So for cybran sacu they would have something like hack, emp gun and AA? Would that make a good enough support ACU?

Remove the gun and install a capture module that captures really fast at range. The thing with capture you have to put the unit on hold fire otherwise it might kill the unit.

@jip said in SACU Rebalance:

That's why we're here - to change the concept of SACUs .

Do you have an alternative function for RAS SACUs in mind that requires them to be more volatile? Just increasing the death explosion damage just hurts the beneficial aspects of an already inefficient unit. I also think the concept of RAS SACUs doesn't need to be changed, it fits the game fine.

I wasn't referring to stacking, I was referring to covering your army of Percivals with extremely strong shields. They don't need to be stacked on top of each other to be 'stacked', if you have 4 SACUs and 40 Percivals and line them up in a decent formation then you have 'stacked' the shields without them being on top of each other, or being vulnerable to (significant) overspill.

I don't understand your definition of "stacked" and how it aligns with the rework. For me stacking the effects means when a single unit (Percy) benefits from multiple different supports (bubble SACU), which is a behavior that promotes building multiple support SACU per group of units.

@tankenabard said in SACU Rebalance:

If auras in general are out

Auras aren't out, just very complicated area effects are. I think what @Jip meant was more of a warning about having area effects than to discard auras. Not sure what level of complexity is unacceptable.

@tankenabard said in SACU Rebalance:

With the Aeon, the heavy shield pack could help tank damage similar to a GC so that harbingers could do work.

A tank needs to be threatening in some capacity to help tank damage because target priorities exist. Currently Aeon SACU only has a 300 DPS long range AoE gun.

@tankenabard said in SACU Rebalance:

Seraphim is fine with Light Overcharge, if personal shields are out then maybe Nano1 and Nano2 like the commander?

If it's an upgrade then it makes an OP (or T4-tier) 50k hp + regen + 35 range OC SACU. Idk if that's actually overpowered so here's an alternative:

Honestly the only use of the shield right now is tele sacu, so you could just put the HP boost of the shield as a prerequisite upgrade for tele or integrate it into tele. Tele conflicts with OC so you won't get an OP OC SACU, and if it's a prerequisite then you can have a 50k hp 400 DPS gun SACU for some reason. Or a 30k HP engi SACU (this is bad going by the current ideology for engi SACU in the rework).

Also you could apply the same idea to Aeon SACU to make its tele relevant by adding HP to tele or making tele compatible with the shield upgrade. Otherwise Aeon tele SACU should be like 2-3x cheaper because it's 15k hp 300 DPS vs 30k/50k hp 400 DPS.

Sera shield has its uses outside of tele, it is most certainly a good upgrade, costing Less than half the mass cost of the unit for more than doubling its health. It is just held in obscurity by the unviability of SACUs themselves. The total removal of it without adequate compensation would greatly hurt the unit overall.
Seras SACUs are in a bit of a uniqe position currently as their higher base damage, no RAS and some of the strongest combat upgrades, both offensively and defensively, push them into being the most combat focused SACU of any faction, a feature that I do think would be worth keeping in mind for the rebalance.

Sera shield conflicts with gun range/sensors, I really doubt it's any good.

1. It isn't a doubling of HP because every Sera combat SACU gets nano which is 29500 HP, and the shield gives 20k HP (+66% HP). This isn't accounting for veterancy which gives 3k HP per level with nano.
   • The shield also has a very slow recharge of 165s (125 effective regen) and regen of 22, massively overshadowed by 265 regen of Nano and the DPS amounts you're dealing with at T3.5-T4 stage of the game.
2. Taking the shield upgrade over the gun range upgrade reduces the range of the gun and OC from 35 to 25, which basically means the SACU must run into enemy T3s which have obscene DPS compared to T4s and will totally get rid of the 20k HP shield. Bricks/Percies can also kite a 25 range SACU, having equal/greater speed + 10 more range.
   • T4s should never come without T3 support, so you can't even use shield OC SACU (it has to be multiple of them too) to tank damage to get in range and kill T4s.

Theory aside, I've also never seen it used in games outside of 2x commander move speed survivals with extreme eco/build range/build rate multipliers (SACU are unreclaimable and this one has the highest HP of them all).

I have read pretty much all the replies to this thread, and I am shocked that the priority isn't to address the two blatant broken mechanics with SACUs :

• virtually unkillable movable eco. (by far the worst)
• excessively hard to kill underwater reclaiming machines which makes them pay back for themselves in a few secs after they got dropped in the sea.

• Could we make Quantuum Gateway "unassistable" by engies or stations/hives ?

• or Could the Quantuum Gateway assist be made "high demand" like nuke/anti nuke ?

• RAS upgrade should be make significantly more expensive, if not removed at all

• Is it possible to reduce the HP of the unit while it is under water ? Or decrease his reclaiming BP to a marginal number under water ?

Aside, the sera tele TML mechanic is very OP. IMHO this should be looked into as it is very costly to defend key strctures against it, i.e. muuuch higher investment to defend against it "just in case".

Side note : The changes to the gateway costs will be transparent. At the stage where you can build gateway(s), those costs changes do not matter a single bit.

This thread isnt about the nature of SACUs, its about the changes to their upgrades and upgrade locations. If you want to rant about your SACU takes, create another threat instead of trying to derail this one. Thanks

@karl_marx said in SACU Rebalance:

This thread isnt about the nature of SACUs, its about the changes to their upgrades and upgrade locations. If you want to rant about your SACU takes, create another threat instead of trying to derail this one. Thanks

"The Balance team is working on we are currently in the process of reworking how all the SACU work"

This is the ideal time to discuss large scale changes to the whole plan of SACUs since that is literally what we are doing, and changes to eco and reclaiming can be a part of that.
But lets not turn this thread into a discussion on what can or cant be in this threat, lets just discuss SACU changes.

I do not agree with the removal of RAS entirely, RAS boi spam is already in many ways inferior to mas fab farms, and the base health of SACUs is getting heavily nerfed so that is an indirect nerf to RAS bois anyway.

Underwater reclaiming is in the same situation, the base health AND base build power of SACUs is getting nerfed so they will now die faster and reclaim slower.

I could see a movement speed penalty when underwater being applied, but then you run into the problem of why do SACUs have this penalty but not other things? The ACU is even bigger, should it not get slowed down even more?

As for giving gateways the nuke treatment (~10x the build power, ~10x the build time) that could be done, but feels kind of antithetical to the primary goal of this thread, to make them more common, not less common.

@elusive said in SACU Rebalance:

As for giving gateways the nuke treatment (~10x the build power, ~10x the build time) that could be done, but feels kind of antithetical to the primary goal of this thread, to make them more common, not less common.

That cannot be done in a way that works since you can obtain the SACU with upgrades via 2 ways. Make the preset using the gate or make a stock SACU and upgrade it. Even if we give the gateway nuke launcher treatment you could just make stock SACUs and upgrade them manually. And you can't give the SACUs the nuke launcher treatment for obvious reasons (they can use the insane BP to build things).

1 - Take away the ability to upgrade RAS on a SACU. That's something that can only be manufactured in a techworld and shipped through a gate

2 - Take away all ability to assist a gateway. They aren't really "building" much, they're opening a portal to ship items across the universe and drop the really expensive package into a little metal shell.

3 - Then you can make it take less time to gate in a regular SACU (or a combat SACU) compared to a RAS sacu

This would also make it easy to completely separate the upgrade trees for regular SACUs vs RAS SACUs, they would be different unit types with different base costs

What is the point of removing gateway assistance?
It's not like rushing any type of SACU is a giant issue like nukes:

• The counter is way easier to build in the form of PD or a T4 or T3 units you already have. On the other hand, SMD is going to take 2.5 minutes to load with assistance, and you can't do anything about it.
• SACU is way less impactful, you don't instantly lose your entire base once an SACU starts attacking if you were unprepared. You also don't lose economically if your opponent makes RAS SACU, you can beat them with mass fabs.
• SACU is way easier to scout because they have to walk to the front where there are less sams blocking spy planes.

Buffing combat SACU cost relative to RAS SACU can be done easily by shifting the costs from the base SACU to the RAS upgrade.

For underwater reclaim, I don't see why it's so unbalanced (especially as to make gateways unassistable), every faction has access to SACUs and should use them underwater when engis can't get to the front and there is lots of reclaim in a dead zone because of shifting frontlines. It creates new decisions around when to build SACU, how to kill the SACU with subs/torps, how to keep them safe, possibilities of building stuff with the SACU, and so on.
UEF SACU will be hurt by the base bp nerf in this rework because of random naval AA killing the engineering drones though.

@nomander said in SACU Rebalance:

What is the point of removing gateway assistance?

1 - to be lore-accurate. They are opening a portal to another planet. How is some t1 engineer with a dinky little engineering beam going to help with that?

2 - it makes it harder to pivot between SACU production and spending resources on other things. There's a reason Yudi likes to make 2 gates + 20 hives. He can quickly spend excess resources on RAS boys to get max return on his investment, and when he wants to make a T4 or something else, he can just pause it all

If players had to make multiple gateways in order to spam RAS boys, they would have to invest more resources to get it going and they'd have a bigger cost to pausing investment in RAS boys (total idleness instead of having hives that could be used to make something quickly)

@arma473 said in SACU Rebalance:

There's a reason Yudi likes to make 2 gates + 20 hives.

I've heard that Yudi doesn't make RAS SACU in serious tournament games, and only does it on Setons because he's way ahead (way better than others) and playing a chill game. RAS SACU + Hives is an extremely chill way to secure your already won game through more eco. So I don't think he actually likes to make RAS SACU because they're a competitive decision.

He can quickly spend excess resources on RAS boys to get max return on his investment

The max return on his investment would be T3 engis + mass fabs or T3 engis + whatever unit actually kills his opponent. The T3 Engis can shift production just as easily as gateway assistance.

The conclusion of the balance argument is null because the premise is incorrect.

to be lore-accurate. They are opening a portal to another planet. How is some t1 engineer with a dinky little engineering beam going to help with that?

Supcom lore waves away logic with the word "quantum" among others, so you can make up pretty much anything. For example if you wanted to be lore accurate you wouldn't have presets (you'd have to upgrade the SACU outside) and gateways would only consume energy. Or you say you need mass to create exotic matter (is that even gpg lore?). Or you say that engis can provide additional mass/energy for stabilizing/streamlining/optimizing the connection so it goes faster. Also why does teleportation take less energy than manufacturing aircraft? Why is the cost of presets exactly the same as manually upgrading? The lore simply makes little sense for technical details, especially for a balance perspective.

@nomander said in SACU Rebalance:

The max return on his investment would be T3 engis + mass fabs or T3 engis + whatever unit actually kills his opponent. The T3 Engis can shift production just as easily as gateway assistance.

My main point is that 1-2 assisted gateways is far better than having 4-10 unassisted gateways.

Mass fab farms are only a better investment if you ignore their vulnerability. They're easy to kill with strat bombers, T3 arty, Novax, Telemazor, etc. Every time you expand the grid, you increase the vulnerability and you'd need to make more shields to protect it.

If you spam SACUs, they're capable of doing things like hiding in the water or building shields as needed.

Even if you want to make a few mass fab farms, it doesn't take long before RAS boys become a better choice. The more farms you have, the more attractive RAS boys are.

Supcom lore waves away logic

Lore is not actually scientific or perfectly logical, but that doesn't mean we should give it zero heed. Being lore-accurate should be a small plus factor to a balance decision and being lore-inaccurate should be a small minus factor.

Being able to assist any building project with any unit of build power is a fundamental part of the game. You can't just disregard it for one structure arbitrarily. Well, you can, but it just becomes arbitrary bullshit that will confuse people and make them think the game is poorly designed.

I thought on a gateway that the sacu is built onsite and the human is ported in

@arma473 said in SACU Rebalance:

My main point is that 1-2 assisted gateways is far better than having 4-10 unassisted gateways.

That's your idea for how to nerf RAS SACU. Your main point is that RAS SACU are too powerful due to their survivability (HP, mobility, size, buildpower, farms mentioned DPS).

Mass fab farms are only a better investment if you ignore their vulnerability. They're easy to kill with strat bombers, T3 arty, Novax, Telemazor, etc. Every time you expand the grid, you increase the vulnerability and you'd need to make more shields to protect it.

You make it sound like fabs are way too easy to kill so they're a bad investment compared to RAS SACU, but I don't see any good examples to back this up. In theory maps where fabs are made are huge:

• strats take too much time being spotted before they can drop on your fabs (with a competent air player). A cheap emergency t2 shield will also stop them if you have your bp is arranged well.
• T3 Arty and game enders are way too expensive to not be spotted and give you time to build shields then start your own game enders. You can also spread out fabs without a huge loss in efficiency relative to RAS SACU which makes them survive more against arty and be a worse target in general.
• Novax is cheap but it's still slow going across the map and can't do something like one shotting your t3 fabs. That gives you time to have mobile shields if you're a land player or just to build shields with engis. For t2 fabs the HP is a downside but they are more efficient eco.
• Tele is still unstoppable for large targets I have to agree. At least you can kill it with tmls + gunships but you're guaranteed to lose everything volatile near the teleport location. It's like 35k mass in tele+mazor+pgens/storages and you can't do anything to stop it from dealing damage without ridiculous investments in PD to instakill it. Except UEF/Sera TML tele which get blocked by TMD/T2 shields cheaply.

Even if you want to make a few mass fab farms, it doesn't take long before RAS boys become a better choice.

Maybe the meta just hasn't shifted to punish mass fabs enough, but at the moment their ~5:30 payback time compared to SACU's ~8:00 payback time makes fabs more lucrative than SACUs for quite a while into a game, despite the super late game vulnerabilities.
To understand the effects of that payback time, you can consider that the earliest you can get a structure built is when you put your entire (expendable) income into it and finish it before your next eco option pays itself back.
Let's say we want to build a Paragon with 130 engis needed for salvation spam (this is the fastest way to get multiple salvations out) with shields and teledef (310k mass):

• This means that with fabs you build at 820 income and finish in 6 min. Total time of fabs + para is 12 min.
• With RAS SACU you build at 511 income (very little, might as well go off only t3 mex + reclaim) and finish in 10 minutes (8 minute payback for SACU is only achieved if you somehow use all their energy instead of T3 pgens the entire time). Total time is 14:15.

The total time is not very important, the important part is at what income it is better to just start a full game ender build instead of making new eco, and you can see that if you are ever unable to keep building fabs it is better to simply start your Paragon than to make RAS SACU.
I used a complex calculator that includes the buildpower and energy costs for the entire eco build order then game ender build order, and includes generated mass every time the eco is built, so the payback times and build times are a bit longer than you would expect.
If you want to consider reclaim, then the SACU have an even lower income until you want to start your game ender (mass/paybackTime, and mass cost just got reduced), so it isn't helpful there. You can easily spare some random t3 pgens scattered around.
I think that this analysis conclusively determines that RAS SACU are terrible, and some mass fabs into T3 arty or game ender (you'd choose game ender because there are places where T3 Arty doesn't reach, which is a safe place for your extra fabs) is way better.

Addendum: The only efficient way to use RAS SACU is to send them out to reclaim as if they're normal SACU, where you can consider the RAS upgrade as independent of the SACU cost and paying back in 5:20, which is pretty much equal to T3 fabs, but that scenario is situational (underwater reclaim is the best use for SACU, and then frontline engineering is a decent one if T3 engis just die for some reason).

Coming back to your main point that RAS SACU are too versatile and durable, don't you think it's enough that they're getting large nerfs to HP (around -20%), BP (-28%, maybe further), and DPS (-66%) in the rework?

I also agree with Thomas that violating the rule that everything that builds can be assisted is going terribly against the game's fundamentals, and is certainly not worth the "small minus factor" from lore.