Let's Talk About Tanks (Or Rather, Kodachi)

Let's talk about Tanks. Or rather, lets talk about this wild Individuum:



Where do I even begin? This unit does it all for early to mid game. Outranges almost every raider, has kite advantage on everything, always makes cost at least twice over if micro'd and forces your opponent to respond with a option stronger than an LLT. This is nonsense. You can fight queue this unit at your opponents's base and it will play the early game for you.

Numbers time:



Other comparable units:





As you can see, we have some numbers issues to address here. Mainly:

- Why does Kodachi have the range (almost), dps, and more speed than a 220 unit?

- Why does Kodachi win almost every interaction with other raider units, especially in kite scenarios?

- Why is Kodachi literally so much of an early game threat that people either need to build double LLTs or have a plan for keeping units at base to deal with it?

I think Sigero said this in mumble VC recently, but I'll quote it here:

quote: Just surround the koda and kill it

So, you're telling me I need to micro my counter play in addition to LLTs to a early game raider unit?
Nah, no thanks. That's some nonsense.

Also, this unit's movement is just 3 units below scorcher. Why? Just Why? If it's a tank factory, should the unit at least be some semblance on "slow" and not so fast it can literally outrun other raiders that are on foot and can jump?

Taking this into account, it definitely would seem like "yeah Kodachi movement is busted but at least the gun doesn't do that much right? After the nerf?"

Well, you couldn't be more wrong.

Unit does 100DPS (counting afterburn), has 215 range, and for some reason has 48 AoE range? What? This unit has a projectile that is supposed to be a burn weapon but does default high DPS, low reload time, and it still has afterburn.

So, how do we make the game playable again make Kodachi not busted?

Here are my proposed number nerfs:

Movement Speed (elmo/s) 108 -> 98

Turn Rate (deg/s) 190 -> 180

Both of these nerfs should help make sure that Kodachi is acting more in a tank role instead of going all zoom-zoom.

Idle Regen (HP/s) 5 -> 0

Idle regen is nonsense for Kodachi. Never should've been added to it in the first place.

Damage 40 -> 25

Reload Time (s) 0.50 -> .65

Afterburn (s) 1 (15 DPS) -> 2 (30 DPS)

Range (elmo) 215 -> 200

Area of Effect (elmo) 48 -> 43

Projectile Speed 520 -> 480

Overall base numbers nerf. This should place a higher importance on the actual afterburn while giving other raiders a healthy amount of time to interact with the unit without dying. It should also allow for slightly more micro evasion of the actual projectile itself.

tell me when you test this, i am more than willing to help if i have time!

Guttering Kodachi's stats is not the best option for balancing Tanks / Kodachi.

Kodachi is just about the only unit used by the tank factory in many games, and is almost always the only early game unit used besides Welder.

In your stat analysis you glanced over its cost, 180 metal per unit. That's close to 3 glaives, and twice most other raiders. If it suddenly can't make cost against raiders, tank plopping is an instant loss. We can look at numbers in a vacuum but that won't be as insightful without comparing to its actual performance and interactions in-game. Your argument would be better supported with a replay backing up your statements.

Another note on afterburn: if I'm not mistaken, all burn was changed to do the same DPS at different durations to reduce confusion. Increasing Kodachi burn damage would be inconsistent with that.

Apparently I started my efforts to get Kodachi nerfed around 9 months ago. Wow. Since then we've had I think 3 or 4 rounds of nerfs. IMO this version of the Kodachi is about as well balanced as the current design allows, and might even be a bit underpowered in comparison to, say, scorcher.

PRO_Dregs - I would be a little worried about the interaction between kodachi and pyro given the proposed changes, and I can't begin to imagine how that would change every other matchup, but it'd be interesting to see what that would look like.

We played twice yesterday. You lost because I used some kodas. I wonder if you would have won would this post be made? #LeaveKodaAlone I think tanks just need another unit if koda gets nerfed

Could you share those replays?

PRO_Dregs

is there any way to talk to you on voice in the near future? it`s not that i would want to wait for you, but there is no use in simultaneously working on x new versions. As soon as my exams are over, i could do the physical work that you cannot atm.

quote: ok, this falls under the category of "kata is awake for 24 hours and intoxicated + doesn`t know what he is supposed to do" ( + insists on playing cloaky) but it might still be useful. https://zero-k.info/Battles/Detail/1052268 https://zero-k.info/Battles/Detail/1052273 https://zero-k.info/Battles/Detail/1052275 https://zero-k.info/Battles/Detail/1052281 i know i have to use ticks, but failure-tolerance is so low that i was not able to pull it of reliably at that state. tank-player seems to have it a lot easier in this matchup.

Looking at these games, a couple of things stand out to me. Firstly, playing while intoxicated doesn't seem like a good idea :P That aside, the map is pretty far from ideal for a cloaks vs tanks matchup. I wouldn't try to play cloaks on a flat map like this that doesn't have a naturally semi-safe base like Fairy/scaryland, that reduces the threat angles you're subject to in the early game. It definitely makes the game hard mode for you.

I would also like to recommend that you don't build so many early constructors vs tanks. 2 cons is too many that early, and 4 is O_O . I would recommend not building a constructor until after you have ~14 metal income, or at least have killed a kodachi. One Kodachi is nearly 3 glaives in price, and 3 glaives can technically kill a lone kodachi if you can catch it out. You have defender's advantage so you should be able to have at least 3 glaives to defend at all times. 4 is safer. One lotus defended by one glaive is also enough to defend a specific position from a single kodachi. You should hold off on trying to raid them until you at least have enough glaives at home to defend against a single kodachi. On less open maps you can make reavers to guard you as you expand and this helps a lot.

Bakuhatsu

still, isn`t it a nice showcase of how hard your life becomes if you insist on a non-viable fac for a map?
cons were because i was too busy to insert more raiders into the queue. normaly i would, but the kodachis kept me so busy that i had no time to NOT look at my units.

quote: Scorcher = Pyro weapon (Because it suits the light vehicles combat sturdiness nicely and has cool interactions with mirror fencer. It would have to be scaled down in terms of dps.)

I fear this may be destroying Scorcher/Dart synergy a bit too much, similar to how old Venom was antisynergetic with Flea owing to its AoE stunning them.