The Whip

Skie

<div class="IPBDescription">Bombard needs some more thought</div>There is no one who uses the whip bombard at the moment. Not only is it buggy (bomb doesn't always spawn, sometimes you have to activate it each time separately, sometimes the bombard button is greyed out and you have to switch between buildings to see it appear again) but as it only does armor damage it's really... not even worth trying to micromanage. You can't see JP marines that are in the ceiling as a comm and the targeting with the bombard is hard because of map geometry.

Solution/Change proposals:
- Automatic marine targeting: Bombard marines that come into range automatically (same as hydra). Then it probably should be kept doing armor-only damage because it might be a bit OP, even though the projectile is slow. I think this would be the best solution at the moment because it's really hard to make it shoot the projectile where you want to, because you can't specify the target height at all when you click on the ground as a commander.
- Make it do damage to health as well, if kept manual targeting.
- Add some other useful effect, such as slow-down, stun, marine visor smudging in goo?

Obviously the bugs need to be hammered out, but even if they are, the bombard is quite useless as it is now. It's not worth the time to try and make them shoot at where the marines are, because you also have to go toggle the bombard off if you want the whip to do melee again (I think?).

Also: Differentiating a whip and a mature whip just by looking at it from the top view as a commander is really hard. It would also help if you could select all buildings of same type by doubleclicking one.

Other comments, ideas?

Nakorson

Trying it to use it for defense is ridiculous, even more when you try to use it against jetpackers.

They should aim 360° but the projectile should have the same speed as it has now. So the enemies can evade it. I'm not sure about doing only armor damage. The whips become useless as soon as the armor is down.

Skie

<!--quoteo(post=1905106:date=Feb 20 2012, 02:15 PM:name=Nakorson)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Nakorson @ Feb 20 2012, 02:15 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1905106"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Trying it to use it for defense is ridiculous, even more when you try to use it against jetpackers.

They should aim 360° but the projectile should have the same speed as it has now. So the enemies can evade it. I'm not sure about doing only armor damage. The whips become useless as soon as the armor is down.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
If they do damage to health as well, they might become overpowered, if aiming automatically. No one thing should be be-all-end-all thing for defense or offense, or anything else for that matter.
Exosuit marines will probably have a ton of armor but still only a little health, so I imagine the whip bombard would be decent against those.

Grissi

<!--quoteo(post=1905106:date=Feb 20 2012, 08:15 AM:name=Nakorson)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Nakorson @ Feb 20 2012, 08:15 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1905106"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Trying it to use it for defense is ridiculous, even more when you try to use it against jetpackers.

They should aim 360° but the projectile should have the same speed as it has now. So the enemies can evade it. I'm not sure about doing only armor damage. The whips become useless as soon as the armor is down.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Just taking down the armor of the marines is huge, it allows the alien lifeforms to take down the marines quite fast.

Nakorson

<!--quoteo(post=1905107:date=Feb 20 2012, 06:18 AM:name=Skie)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Skie @ Feb 20 2012, 06:18 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1905107"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->If they do damage to health as well, they might become overpowered, if aiming automatically. No one thing should be be-all-end-all thing for defense or offense, or anything else for that matter.
Exosuit marines will probably have a ton of armor but still only a little health, so I imagine the whip bombard would be decent against those.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

If the projectiles could be dodged it wouldnt be so overpowered. You cant dodge sentrys. The damage wouldnt needed to be high just so high that the marines still need to avoid the projectiles.

twiliteblue

Whip bombard needs to deal more damage, both against Marines armor as well as Structures. Their current DPS is way too low for them to deal meaningful damage, before they're shot down.

Argathor

<!--quoteo(post=1905117:date=Feb 20 2012, 01:18 PM:name=twiliteblue)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (twiliteblue @ Feb 20 2012, 01:18 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1905117"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Whip bombard needs to deal more damage, both against Marines armor as well as Structures. Their current DPS is way too low for them to deal meaningful damage, before they're shot down.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Agreed. The damage against marine armour is pitiful. It needs a significant change before it comes useful.

elodea

Personally, i would prefer they unnerf whip mobility. Get rid of the turning arc, remove slower movement up ramps/stairs, reduce rooting time slightly to allow alien comms to micro them better. I think it doesn't really matter how effective they tweak bombard, whips will always be vulnerable to mobile marine fire. They arn't healed by hives either and regen super slow which means i'd rather spend my 20 res elsewhere.

Skie

<!--quoteo(post=1905211:date=Feb 20 2012, 08:07 PM:name=elodea)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (elodea @ Feb 20 2012, 08:07 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1905211"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Personally, i would prefer they unnerf whip mobility. Get rid of the turning arc, remove slower movement up ramps/stairs, reduce rooting time slightly to allow alien comms to micro them better. I think it doesn't really matter how effective they tweak bombard, whips will always be vulnerable to mobile marine fire. They arn't healed by hives either and regen super slow which means i'd rather spend my 20 res elsewhere.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
True. 20 res on a whip is quite much unless the alien team is doing really well or it's in end-game. In the first 10-15 minutes of the game your team often shouldn't have any extra res to use on whips, if you're being efficient otherwise (and if the marine team is actually killing your RTs).