Top 3 that would be surprising:
#1 Subterranean theater of war
#2 Weather & environmental effects
#3 5 minute setons lobbies

@TwitchyMofo said in Another Novax conversation:

@Printer this is why reducing damage to shields would be an effective balance.

btw, I think I was maybe wrong. I was talking about the shield structure- not the shield bubble. And I think its just shield structures are so weak- is why it appears the sats kill them so fast. So I might have been wrong about the 'bonus' damage.

@YraCore said in Another Novax conversation:

@Printer bro 4 stats and you are dead? are you sure?...

4 Sats is close to 1000 dps, it takes a bunch of engineers to overcome that. So you can maybe stop a huge flock of Sats in one place (plot twist, 22 is unstoppable), but they can just move to another spot.

Sats don't have that opportunity cost unlike every other unit. This why I think they're not polished. The devs in vanilla used SMDs to shoot them down (I vaguely still remember being a kid, and having a Novax center and no Novax satellite- and building a few more before I saw what was happening...)-

Anyway, IMO maybe microing around SDM's wouldn't hurt. Hoping there's something cooking on this issue.

Edited after finishing replay

Thanks Sheikah!

@Brutus5000 Just realized what you probably meant was to go to download the latest release .zip file from Git-hub, and extract to a local directory. 100% working thanks.

Perfect balance is checkers. Maybe the fact the pros don't use Novax much maybe means; its not majorly out of balance.

But for the sake of fun and the type of gameplay- I think it needs some upcoming adjustment. Remember:

• Old RAS SCUs?
• Vanilla Telemaeser?
• Vanilla, HARMS with destroyer range, better survivability and dps HARMs?

Those were all "balanced' by the numbers & opportunity cost originally- but because of the type of game-play they generated; they were changed.

Or how about some of the rules we have in the community; like "no building a factory under a dropping transport" - this works amazingly well against drops - but its bannable.

I'm just trying to highlight; from what's been done; its not only about balance & opportunity cost.

Simply put, and to quote another player @Cascade "Sats are Anti-Fun".

And that's why I really think they need a counter. Best of which, in my opinion is a:

• normally "disabled" player toggle
• on the smd to target the sats.

Thank you @Katharsas @Uveso and @Jip so far I've not had any crashes provided I have nothing else open. This probably confirms what Katharsas was saying in that maybe my computer can't handle FAF + x.

It's probably time for a new computer just holding on to the nostalgia tower abit longer.

@dorset said in Setons Opti Ballancing:

Wouldn't it be better for the lowest rank players to battle it out on air and have a slower building air game while the higher ranked players held the front line arc created by the other three positions?

It seems like that, but in actual fact- recovering a broken front is MUCH easier than a broken air.

I agee it seems odd that while all other factions have upgradable T2 -> T3 shields, Aeon does not. Seems a bit like a mistake and less of a unique faction trait.

Forgive my newness to the community, am I missing a past & lengthy balance decision here?

Also I was surprised to see the ACU Chronofield absent from @funkoff's list. I've tried it and is too expensive for early game, and late game, you've already lost if you're using it. It seems too situational and a false leg to stand on. Anyone have a replay where it was useful?

@LittleBoyBennis said in The Last Thread about RAS SACU Balance:

This is not dealing with their fundamental problem: the combination of power and mass generation which removes the need to protect either generation in lategame, and their overall currently underpriced value proposition, they are too good for their cost (the little bp nerf doesnt cut it)

Would introducing diminishing returns mechanic make this viable?
Say first (5) SACUs are 100%, next (1) 125%, next 150%, etc cost? The 10th SACU would be 225% more (15k mass) which would be very cost prohibitive. Lore wise, that also makes sense as it's supposedly a human in each one...

What of the Quantum gate? If SACUs are nerfed, kinda makes them useless. I saw one mod YEARS ago that turned them into Nydus Canal like structures or very rapid T3 factories... ...just saying if nerfed too much- what's the point of the QG?

Only 1100, sooo just some noob thoughts. Also...youtube vid of awesome gate mechanic

What about the suggestion about incorporating diminishing returns? Did I miss a response to that suggestion?

Seems like that would be easy to tune by the balance team and keeping RAS SCUs useful.

Sat scaling is the main thing that really makes them hard to manage.

What if they had a power drain as a limiting factor-? This isn't a major change, just a response to scaling.

Won't break the unit, won't make it unviable, just respond to scaling issue.

@Nomander said in Another Novax conversation:

Satellite isn't unbalanced, it's just annoying to play against.

This.

But serious question- how much do I need to donate to patron to get something done about this fun killing unit?

Just leaving it as it is, means there's more than a 25% chance, every game of an unblock-able, perfectly accurate, no power costing, invincible*, fast moving, weak-but scalable 'artillery' unit.

@snoog You hit on something I forgot. With (1) sat, an entire team, needs to shield up their base, near, and far mexs to 'counter'.

A typical t3 shield is around 3000 mass and a typical 8 person map has 4-6 close mexes, 1-2 expos, and then whatever far mexes exist. By the time a Novax shows up, there's also probably a main t3 power grid; so conservatively a player has 3-4 places to shield.

That means the first Sat, can require an investment of 12-15k mass, and power drain of 1200-1600 per second; per player.

By the numbers then, to 'counter':

• a Setons team- if they're each only getting (4) more t3 shields, 48-60k mass.,

• a Dual Gap team - assuming there's some over lap, across 7 players, getting (2) that's 42k mass,

• a Random Map team - assuming 5 players getting (3) each, that's 45k mass

ofc, that's plus power drain, cost of engineers going around, and mass to build power. And, that's with NO DAMAGE DONE, and only assuming 2-3 shields a player. So just by existing, a SAT almost immediately pays for itself.

Artillery is slow firing and inaccurate. Bombers can get shot down. Sats cost nothing once built and scale as a flock better than anything else.

@FtXCommando said in Another Novax conversation:

SMDs have never shot down novaxes. Likewise adding this cost to novax with nothing else immediately puts it into unviable territory. It would make zero sense to be making it over a nuke in nearly all use cases.

No I'm sure they did once, and someone else recently reported the same. But this was before any patching. Like the super old days when a UEF player didn't have the Fletcher betrayal on the Overlord mission. Or I had a different game then you did years ago.

@Nomander said in Another Novax conversation:

A sat only needs 3-4 T3 engis and 40-60m/s of assistance depending on faction T2/T3 shield to be completely countered. ....

At first, what you said on paper is what I saw as well;

• T2 Cybran-TD1 (Weakest) with (3) T3 engineers assisting still breaks in a single Sat- with laser to spare.
• T2 Cybran-TD2 (first upgrade) with (3) T3 engineers it takes (4) shots
• T2 Sera (best) with (3) t3 engies, 1 sat is effectively countered.
  t3 more so ofcourse

Bring in a 2nd Sat, and I was surprised by how fast things died

• T2 Cybran-TD2 - with (3) engies = 1 shots
• T2 Sera - with (3) engies = 3 shots to break
  *t3 Cybran-TD4(Weakest), with (3) engies = 2 shots to break the bubble.
• t3 Sera (strongest) with (3) engies = 5 shots to break

(3) Sats and things die faster- even with a 2nd shield:

• (2) T3 Cybran, with (3) engies each takes (2-4) shot.
• (2) T3 Sera, with (3) engies each, takes (4-8) shots and kills the shields too if so qued.

The results show SATS quickly overcoming a few engies; and it depends if the sats are grouped up and focusing down 1 shield or spreading their damage which is why I saw (4-8) on the t3 Sera.

It's not a perfect test (could use more engineers) but I think the APM considered should be equal on both sides to do a good test. The sat takes a few clicks ONLY- stop/starting shields, re-targetting and building just-in-the-nick-of-time, shouldn't be compared to the relaxing, slow click of UEF sat "micro".

The damage type is entirely different. An artillery shell is likely to wipe out a shield but then not hit it again and has to wait a few key seconds before a 2nd one is inbound. You might be aiming for the SMD and the artillery shell broke the bubbles, but the next shot misses the SMD; and the a new bubble saves things on the 3rd. A sat would not have this problem; and a SAT also:

• gets Vet quickly compared to artillery,
• re-targets very fast
• would be useful vs killing things like mexs, and choking your enemy, while t3 arty is not

Comparing the UEF Sat to Artillery is unfair; they're totally different.

I don't get your expense argument - a T2 shield costs 500-700 mass; you could build 10 of them and it's still a fraction of the novax cost.

It's not just an expense argument. As the Novax moves, if means you need to move around engineers to counter it. Engineers are slower. Note more importantly to your point; a single Novax will ;

• over power and kill a Cybran T2-d1 in 1 shot, (4) Shots if Sera T2 - unassisted
• over power and kill a Cybran T3 in (4) shots, or (6) if Sera T3 - unassisted
• most mex's get surrounded by fabs, so it doesnt need to kill the mex, the fabs do that FOR the SAT
• Novax's do extra damage to shields, so as soon as the shield drops- ITS DEAD

So if you succeeded in shielding your base for 1 sat, you have to get more shields / engineer assist even after shielding. And so you make strongholds where shielding is better. But that only works up to (3) sats. At (4+) sats (around 1000 dps), you're fucked.

In the meantime, you basically get ripped apart on the edges. SATs are practically like the stereotypical American-Sitcom In-Laws. There's no defense, no escape, and they chip, and chip and chirp away at you unstoppably....

Which underlines the point of this thread- balance aside- its a very un-fun unit in its current state.

But, for instance if Sat players had to micro them around SMDs; that would be an elegant counter; already in game.