How to transition / use slow units?

I find that on fairly open maps, it's pretty hard to actually tech to slow units, especially as something like rovers or cloak bots. Riot units are usually very slow and really suck at responding to threats while also not being strong enough to push. Skirmishers are usually not able to reliably force kills on anything, other than static defense. Many times it seems that I get trapped into making lots of raiders because I literally don't know what else to make, in which the enemy makes literally like 3-4 riots and pushes or something, and I instantly have to lose or take significant damage because I cannot deal with the riot.

I suppose the path is somewhere around raiders -> skirmishers -> riots. The problem is though that usually, you need a lot of money in skirmishers for them to actually do anything, and such an investment on such niche units can leave me open to a flank, especially if the defense I'm trying to break is pretty far on an open map. However, I seem to die a lot to surprise riot pushes, in which making skirmishers is too late since I cant possibly get critical mass before the riot army appears in my base.

Perhaps then, the other option would be to go raiders -> riots -> skirmishers, but it seems like when I make riots, they tend to not do anything and lock me in base with inferior map control. Using the riots to perhaps push the enemy I feel isn't a viable strategy, because if my push fails, that's a lot of riots gone + metal donation left in the enemy domain, which would leave me open to a counter-attack and an instant loss.

Even if I do end up getting to the midgame, and somehow make a slow army, managing it is an entirely new problem. Keeping all of my reavers in position is pretty difficult and expensive. It is very hard to match the movement of a fast army with slow units, I must spend much more metal than the raider player to match their fast army at every important location. on top of this, I must have riots in my skirmisher army to prevent them from dying. Decisionmaking with a slow army is hard, as you have to commit to the location you attack too. And if you get attacked, you must take your out-of-position attacking army and pray it makes it back to your base in time to intercept the enemy push.

I think what is most frustrating about this all is that I frequently die to opponents who can use slow units. It feels like when I make some reavers, my map control is fucked, and I need to spend a lot to protect everything at once, but when the opponent makes reavers, they get to push my overproduced raider army and win instantly.

Can anyone give some insight?

@therxyy I know you are a much higher rank than I am, and I don't really go for cloakbots most of the time, but usually I will make a few scouts or raiders first, than make a constructor, then make some more raiders, and then I usually put a repeat queue of like 2 raiders, a riot, and a skirmisher, and then make a plate, and if I need guys other than those ones I just mentioned, I'll make them in the plate (like more constructors). (I know this definitely works well with spiders, cause it's my main factory, because venom+redback+recluse works really well, but I find it works pretty well in most other factories as well) The map control thing is very hard to do, but usually I'll just split my army up and have "patrol groups" that all have at least 1-2 raiders, 1 riot, and 1 skrimisher, and then I'll just keep them all over the place, and make a lotus next to each mex and it usually works pretty well. The problem with that is that you have to control a lot of things at once, so it gets a little tricky, but usually (I haven't seen this happen yet), hopefully, the enemy won't be attacking all your flanks at once, so that shouldn't be too much of a problem.

I guess you could just queue up riot+skirmisher and then do the raider in the plate, which could organize your units a little better, so you could do raider strikes when you need them (that's what I usually do with fleas)? I am not sure, I would have to test that one some more.

You can think of riots as something like mobile lotuses. They create a zone of raider denial around them, and need to be protected from things that outrange them or from being completely overrun. Riots usually are strong enough to push, especially in a pair or more (venoms are not normal riots, normal rules do not apply). But they need raiders or skirmishers to protect them from things that outrange them. A typical slow army is mostly skirmishers with some riots. Riots protect the skirmishers as they move forward, slowly clearing the path of things that annoy riots. Fencer/ripper is a good example of an easy to use slowarmy.

Usually a good time to consider switching to slowarmy when the enemy has a stable frontline. Anywhere your raiders go, they have something waiting for them, a strong line of lotus with no free pickoffs, etc. When you get your slow army going, it is pretty efficient at doing its job and you don't usually need as much metal worth of riot as you do raider to defend your skirmish force. This allows you to either go back to building up a strong raider force that can surprise bust into a flank and open up a new angle of attack, allow you to start spamming artyporc nonsense, factory switch (perhaps to deal with their skirmishers/arty that's opposing your own), or make assault units depending on factories and compositions involved.

Since you can't keep up with fastarmy with slowarmy, don't try to. Instead try to create threats that they are forced to respond to, where they either lose economy or they take bad fights. Meanwhile try to lean on your own defender's advantage and let new production fill the gaps. Conserving a raider force to deal with your opponent's raiders is a good idea. Or you porc up where you don't want to see raids.

Don't try to make an entire army of nothing but slow units unless you have a good grip on the map and are sure you can deal with the backline. In the earlyish game, a single riot plus 4-5 skirmishers can get a lot of work done. Try not to get trapped into any one composition, and always try to ask yourself if there's a factory switch that would make your life easier in the m/u.