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To airstart or not to airstart?

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9 years ago
Hello friends.
I come here today to talk about about air start, and how there is not much of a reason not to. It gives you map control for a good portion of time, letting you expand freely. Low weight units are the supposed counter, but as long as you build static defense and use your comm well, there is no way your opponent can mount a significant ground assault, because he has to invest so much metal into defending his base from mex snipes. Bombers don't even have to kill much, just a constructor or two, and the fear they generate (well founded), pays in terms of map control and mexes for you, rather than killing enemy metal. Ravens are low weight enough to be used viably vs raiders(with possibly exception of glaives - so make more defenders!).

The only reliable way to avoid this airstarting nonsense seems to be "play zion v2 and other small maps" where the distance is short enough that you can hit a timing where the bomber is still a significant part of your opponents metal, so he has not much in the way of ground defense.

Even if airstart is not "op", it is viable enough that it pushes out land factories. The air/land dynamic is not very fun(in my humble opinion) as it puts one player on a defensive that is very hard to break, while the air player is holding back from his temporary lack of ground. You have to get lucky and do something before the metal starts pouring in for the air player, and he can just out-metal you.

I present two replays as evidence:
Multiplayer B291037 2 on Red Comet
Multiplayer B286195 2 on Red Comet

The two games play out very similarly, even though me and lauri switch sides(air/land) and have stylistic differences. As the grounder, we both spam defenders and a few aa, try to raid but don't do well. Then the porc pushing comes, and eco wins the game. There was not much interaction, just the grounder defending, and the airer waiting to win.

It is important to note that I am not advocating for a raven nerf, just an early game usability nerf. I think bombers requiring a non-negligible amount of energy to re-arm would solve this problem. Early game energy is quite scarce, and the metal invested into extra energy structures would slow down the impending ground switch, giving the land player more time to establish air defence(and expansions with it) without having it being run over just as he is able to push out.

Thoughts? Rage posts? "l2p scrub" posts?
+7 / -0

9 years ago
I think airstart is really good when done properly, it has been for a long time but not many people can do it properly. I watched that first game, it was actually quite interesting, I think I'm going to go back to using eco com and the switch into blockade runners vs defenders was nice. Like Googlefrog commented though, Lauri made a lot of questionable choices, can hardly give air start all the credit when he was running scorchers into maces all game.

I don't think there needs to be any changes, it's nice that even air lab is viable as a start and it's also nice that there are high skill cap tactics that require good micro and concentration to pull off.
+1 / -0


9 years ago
That is not my experience with airstart on this type of open map.

The energy drain for rearm is an interesting idea. The order of rearm and repair could also change. Currently a plane is repaired and reloaded at the same time and this lead to strange energy fluctuation if reloading cost energy. Alternately it could be a requirement that a plane is repaired before it can start being reloaded. Or the order could be reversed.

Either method would keep a plane on the pad longer. I prefer reload before repair because then the player can still choose to launch their plane before it is fully repaired. Also with repair before reload there is a bit of an issue with planes taking damage on the pad during reloading.
+2 / -0
Airstart is a pro-gamer problem. Who cares about pro-gamer problems?

When you are a person who considers air-start a viable tactic, that simply means you are awesome at RTS gaming fundamentals.

Quit overestimating the playerbase when Zero-K has the much bigger problem of "needs more players!"
+0 / -0
quote:
Quit overestimating the playerbase when Zero-K has the much bigger problem of "needs more players!"

I don't see how tweaking the game for play at a high level is counterproductive in terms of attracting new players. At worst somebody is spending time on it which could have been spent on other things - but balancing the game is necessary to attract new players too. If a new player watches a 1v1 tournament and sees many ridiculous double-airstart games that may well be offputting.

With regard to the question at hand... I won't pretend to any great amount of knowledge about 1v1 in general or airstart in particular. I do suspect its viability on particular maps varies greatly based on how easy it is to defend your first few mex (are your first handful protectable by one set of defenders or not, for instance).

As I understand it airstart has not been in the high-level 1v1 meta in the recent past. It might take some time for the metagame to evolve and for the best tactics to counter it to be found.
+1 / -0

9 years ago
I'm really glad this is being discussed. When I first started playing, air starts were by far the most frustrating part of the game. In super low elo games (<1500) they feel uncounterable. Once you build enough AA to keep the bombers at bay you invariably get punished by the ground switch (if you even live long enough to see it). It took almost a month before someone told me to build defenders. Even with defenders, you only get highly saturated defense in one small area. The air player just flies around and kills your expand once you have your base protected. Heaven help you if you're a nab, then you just get to watch as the air player snipes your mexes, then your comm, and finally your fac. Maybe you guys don't remember this experience, but it's pretty infuriating.

I don't know how to fix it, but I know that I almost ragequit ZK because of it. My two cents is that it would be nice for raiders to have a good swing at diving bombers.
+0 / -0
For what it's worth, an example of a lower-level game:
http://zero-k.info/Battles/Detail/291404

I did not use my ravens very well and got wrecked by a couple of fleas at the start, but I think he overbuilt AA which made him vulnerable to the ground switch. Neither of us played at all perfectly but it might be of interest.

It is worth noting that a single Razor doesn't kill a Raven unless you fly over it a lot, which is generally avoidable. Predicting where the mobile AA will be and avoiding it is considerably more difficult.
+0 / -0
9 years ago
everything is depends on terrain,map size,amount of mexes,and who is your opponent.
+0 / -0
quote:
everything is depends on terrain,map size,amount of mexes,and who is your opponent.

Of course - the point I was trying to make is that airstart is quite probably overpowered on at least a fraction of the map pool (for instance I think it's good on Quicksilver), and mostly unplayable on at least a fraction (Altair Crossing, for instance). It may not even be possible to balance airstart across all maps.

EDIT: A factory start or matchup not being balanced across all maps isn't necessarily a bad thing. If you play spiders on Comet Catcher, or tanks on Zion, you're going to have a bad time. That being said, air is significantly different to all other factories (including gunships) and I'm not sure I would want to see a game or map where air was the only (or even most) viable start. Your mileage may vary.
+2 / -1
from my experiance

air start get curb stomped by:

amphib (if(water=true) just resign, you lost, its like shields but with raiders that can group 1 shot shadows)
shield (why didnt you just resign after lab scout? level curb stomp)
jump (really severe curb stomp, but not as bad as shield)
cloaky (jethro abuse is nice)
lveh (crashers make you crash)

air start is even with:

Htank (unlimited welder ball defender spam)
Spider (fleas evrywhere)
more air start (duh)

air start will curb stomp:

ships (dont know why, but they really suck 1v1 vs planes)
hovers (same as ships)
+0 / -0
USrankkaen is the problem then that the counters to plane start are unintuitive or require some extra skill? I do not think it takes much mechanical skill to counter a plane start. Perhaps countering it requires you to know which units to build and when to try to expand. If you get a bit behind vs a plane start your opponent can just spam Ravens and win.

Those issues are unlikely to be affected by reload timing changes or extra raider vulnerability.


GBrankKyubey
What in particular does Shield do against Planes? Vandal is not particularly good and the constructors are snipable (if you dive properly). Is Dirtbag swarm really legit?

Not sure why Ships would be so bad vs planes. Presumably the plane player has to start on an island or just lose to Typhoons. Shredder is really really good AA so it should probably be made instead of Defender.

For Hovercraft vs Plane have you tried ignoring Dagger and using Halberd to raid? It takes forever for a Raven to kill a closed Halberd so with good timing you can snipe turrets and mex. Perhaps you can even snipe a comm.
+0 / -0
Shield cons are cheap, spammable and harder to bomb, pretty sure you can use their shield to cover mexes too, bandits are good for raiding and vandals are a decent AA unit, thug balls and anything else with shield is also not such an easy bomb target, I dunno if they take 2 or 3 bombs though, I know cons take 3.

Regarding hover vs planes, see Multiplayer B291462 2 on Red Comet which I just played, demonstrating effectiveness of halberd vs planes
+0 / -0
I don't really that that is a good example. I was very flustered that game for some reason(tired I guess). I didn't use my bombers well, and even miss clicked making me miss killing drone's comm. The halberds didnt do any direct damage, just prevented my crane from expanding until they died.

The biggest mistake(among many) was going light vehicles - which just get stomped by hoovers(especially in small numbers). My hatred of mirror match ups got the best of me.
+0 / -0
After watching replay I do think the air start was not necessarily bad, could have been a lot more effective like you said but I still think it was a good demonstration of halberds strength. I didn't use the halberds particularly well either but you usually defend your base by spamming defenders when you go air, which halberds are great against and I wouldn't write off blocking expansion so much, every bomber that is forced to attack halberd is a mex/con saved. I only made a small amount of halberds but I think by slowing your expansion and killing a few base mexes, they had a lot of impact which is probably one of the reasons why your land switch seemed so slow.
+1 / -0
Repair before rearm is a very viable solution for fixing this, even if Air will need other buffs to keep it useful.

This would make damage a very real way to slow down Air DPS, even if it cannot kill. Right now you need to hit the thresholds of kill before strike or kill after strike to be useful.

It is worth also noting that Air Factory has the most economic power of any factory, which warps things a bit. Only Plane factory can repair units and build them at the same time. This is a very real advantage which disrupts the symmetry of starting factories.
+2 / -0
9 years ago
quote:
For Hovercraft vs Plane have you tried ignoring Dagger and using Halberd to raid? It takes forever for a Raven to kill a closed Halberd so with good timing you can snipe turrets and mex. Perhaps you can even snipe a comm.


i am not saying its imposible for hovers to win, its just harder then other labs
the mobile AA is quite easy to snipe, the cons are the easiest to bomb
evrything other then halberd dies to raven spam, then halberd dies to land swich

ships are weird... although technicaly they are good vs air start, you need 2 shredders to kill 1 raven, and the shreder costs 100m more then a raven
also since the air player will start on land, sea needs to lab switch to attack the air player
if the air player starts in the water a snake would be nesesary, and there is a 50/50 chance you make a typhoon instead of a snake pre-scout
and both will die to raven+torpedo

there are a few other issues like the normal layout of mex on a sea map being very wide, and only 1-2 mex being at the start position (forcing the com to abandon the lab), having to deal with amph/hover switches, the open ness of sea maps, there are a good number of things related to the meta/map design that add up to make life dificult for sea vs air start :P
+0 / -0
quote:
the cons are the easiest to bomb

How so? Raven bomb leaves Quill alive at less than 10 HP. That makes bombing them quite inefficient compared to bombing bot constructors which can be 1 bomb killed. Quill gives the second least metal value per Raven bomb of all cons.
+0 / -0

9 years ago
Im actually under the impression that hoovers have the best shot vs air start of all factories due to the halberd and hoovers tend to destroy lveh and ht in low numbers, ie 1-2 maces vs equal cost in levelers/wahtever.


AND WHY IS IT EVERY TIME I CLICK ON SOMETHING ON THIS WEBSITE A SEPARATE TAB OPENS TRYING TO GET ME TO DOWNLOAD A "PC FIXER". This happened just now...
+0 / -0
quote:
How so? Raven bomb leaves Quill alive at less than 10 HP. That makes bombing them quite inefficient compared to bombing bot constructors which can be 1 bomb killed. Quill gives the second least metal value per Raven bomb of all cons.


+1 avenger is all you need :P

quote:
AND WHY IS IT EVERY TIME I CLICK ON SOMETHING ON THIS WEBSITE A SEPARATE TAB OPENS TRYING TO GET ME TO DOWNLOAD A "PC FIXER". This happened just now...

you has a virus, not site problem
+1 / -0

9 years ago
Weird, it just stopped. It was only on this website.

+150 metal for an avenger will slow down your first bomber. Or if you build it after, the quill would have been busy building defenders in the 15 seconds it takes to make one.
+0 / -0
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