More bombers

[Eukanuba]

Hey, I'm really sorry for making this a new thread but I tried to PM pip and it didn't work. So this is what I was going to say to pip, please move or delete as appropriate, I just want to make sure he sees it.

Hey man, first of all I want to say thank you for all the effort you put in testing FA balance, it's much appreciated.

With regard to the above replay, the first thing that struck me was that the bomber was not the first unit produced. In fact it was the third unit produced. I appreciate that the effect was much the same as bomber first, but it seems to me to suggest a path where arbitrary restrictions will need to be enforced.

Years back when I first played Red Alert on a LAN, my friend and I agreed that we wouldn't attack for x amount of time. If the bomber is made third or fourth or fifth and you try to legislate against it, you have effectively the same situation: I'm not confident I can defend against you until certain criteria are met, so you aren't allowed to attack.

When is the bomber allowed, and how can you make it not arbitrary?

As an aside, I think that if the bomber is going back to having a higher cost than the Inty (and I think it should), could the bomber do with a buff? Maybe +10% damage to make up for the fact that unless your opponent doesn't contest the sky it's pretty much useless.

[pip]

Why would you message pip?!

I don't think the bomber is useless now.

335296-anaryl.fafreplay

As you can see in this replay. The bomber is still out early and it can still kill engys. On smaller maps such as this it can be costly to defend the sky with interceptors, and it still takes 2 - 3 mobile AA to bring down the bombers.

I'm not sure if the reversion was a little heavy handed, but lets at least for the moment wait and see before making any adjustments. It's not even been 24 hours yet.

I think an early bomber can still be (very) damaging, all the more since it'll be more a surprise now.
The problem with bombers in 3599 was rather that it was too cheap to counter them with inties masswise (bombers costing double mass compared to inties), i.e. their viabiliy a bit later at t1.
But now that players have become accustomed to actually use bombers in the first place, and are still 80 mass, they are probably not bad at all. Let's see how it goes.

As for buffing bombers rather than modifying their cost, it's an idea Zock wants or wanted to explore in order to enhance faction diversity (like less damage for UEF but lots of HP, lot of damage for Aeon but more expensive, transfer stun to cybran bomber and make the stun lasts a bit longer, this kind of things). He basically would like to give each bomber some different strength, but it's something he needs to test for some time, and I'm not sure he actually cares anymore (or have someone to efficiently tests his ideas with him). He doesn't want to provide half baked concept and execution.
I think it's something to keep in mind for later, and it's not a priority for now.

[Softly]

First bomber is a real no-go now, especially as you can see it coming from the scores.

[pip]

First bomber is a real no-go now, especially as you can see it coming from the scores.

It was precisely the point of reverting to 2250 energy cost: preventing first bomber, or making it much more risky... Early bomber is still possible, but not as the first unit, otherwise you will stall energy.