Change to Arsonist

[Turnip2k]

I know arsonists have been complained about alot before due to their uselessness...but here is my attempt at a alternative.

How about change the arsonist into a unit that can efficently steal peoples seeds, plants and cash at the same time on the close tick. Obviously this is going to have to be set at a steal rate that doesn't make it stupidly good, but it will have to out perform its generic counterparts significantly. It would also overcome the problem of only being albe to develop the ability to steal 1 type of income - now you can steal all 3, but at the price of losing some killing ability due to the routes nature.

This unit would also fit nicely into the subroutes general aim in the game which is to be able to take more from people in attacks in terms of resources.

Allowing this unit to steal cash would be a niche use for it, so perhaps it could be made to steal cash only (although stealing all would be more sensible) - but this would still make it far more useful that it currently is. I was thinking 20-25k per unit, close firing only, stealing £1000 (or maybe more) or perhaps 60k per unit, firing on all 3 ticks, stealing £1000 ish up to a max of 15%?

This means that 1 million units could steal 1 billion in cash and would cost 20 billion to make. It would take 20 attacks before you got your money back from buying them in the first place, so it may be necessary to allow them to steal more - but this is up for discussion. I would reccomend allowing them to steal more than just cash of the enemy though, and this would probably make up for the lacking abilities.

 

[hawkes]

Re: Change to Arsonist

i just dont think it would work, stealing cash is just way 2 easy 2 abuse

 

[Turnip2k]

Re: Change to Arsonist

How exactly? It is essentially no different from stealing plants or seeds - you are stealing somthing that in the end will give you money - the only difference between this and stealing plants is that you dont have to sell all the plants once you have taken them. There is no 'extra' value being created anywhere since cash is just changing hands.

 

[Lupus]

Re: Change to Arsonist

i just dont think it would work, stealing cash is just way 2 easy 2 abuse

i agree with hawkes what stops ppl just 'giving' money to smaller players? but its true the arsonist is a fairly useless unit atm, but so is the chemical sprayer, so do you propose a change for that unit too?

 

[Turnip2k]

Re: Change to Arsonist

What stops people 'giving seeds' or 'giving plants' to smaller players now? This unit would work no differently.

The chem sprayer may be changed in the future, but I thought that this unit fits best into the thief route as it goes along the general trend.

 

[Scorpio]

Re: Change to Arsonist

i just dont think it would work, stealing cash is just way 2 easy 2 abuse

i agree with hawkes what stops ppl just 'giving' money to smaller players?

ID deletion?

I don't have anything against the suggestion but I still don't see people going that route after this "change" though

 

[Cyrus]

Re: Change to Arsonist

tbf the other unit you get for taking this side of the route makes up for the shiteness of the arsonist.

 

[cervantes]

Re: Change to Arsonist

I agree with Cyrus, the downside of having the shitty arsonist unit is balanced by having the most powerful stealing unit. And then you still got Bikers, Terrors and TLs, so this branch isnt that bad at all.

 

[No-Dachi]

Re: Change to Arsonist

That might be correct, Cervantes. At least from a end of the round view. However, the fact that you have no useful units 'till terrorists/bikers (due to the low efficiency of thiefs, they're hardly efficient at the beginning of the round), makes this route rather hard to start with. Unless you're in an alliance which carries you, but then you're practically useless to the alliance for quite some time.

This routes only viable option is to rush terrorists. I'm not sure Arsonist is the unit to improve,perhaps you should change it to a different unit instead?

 

[tobapopalos]

Re: Change to Arsonist

I think people need to stop looking at the negatives of the thief branch and look at the positives instead.

It's quick to develop.
You have a land-stealer that is more effective than geos.
You can send eta 3 land grabs with bikers, or eta 4 with TLs.
Arsonists make decent INN flak.
It's fun.

And as for the route being inefficient at the start of the round, I had my best start using thief route, and since I was rank 1 in effectiveness as well I don't think my alliance were carrying me.

 

[cervantes]

Re: Change to Arsonist

That might be correct, Cervantes. At least from a end of the round view. However, the fact that you have no useful units 'till terrorists/bikers (due to the low efficiency of thiefs, they're hardly efficient at the beginning of the round), makes this route rather hard to start with. Unless you're in an alliance which carries you, but then you're practically useless to the alliance for quite some time.

This routes only viable option is to rush terrorists. I'm not sure Arsonist is the unit to improve,perhaps you should change it to a different unit instead?

Isn't the fact that you can rush to TLs a benefit for the ally rather than a downside? And in the flak wars you still have the Heavy Thugs as flak eaters. I agree, in the middle section some serious fire power is missing, but maybe that is the intention The other benefits have to be balanced somehow. But well, I never played this route, so I am not the one to judge it anyway.

 

[Turnip2k]

Re: Change to Arsonist

Thieves are a great unit, dont get me wrong (although needing 1m of them to take 1000 land is a tad harsh, maybe 100000 pet 1000 land?).

However, to compliment thieves and to focus the route onto somthing that it is already aimed at wouldn't be a bad thing! The fact you can steal more land and seeds / plants / cash off people than other would make up for the fact that you have far less versatility in attacking and defending than most other routes. The arsonist seems to be a unit that was just thrown in there for the hell of it to make another step in the tech tree - may as well turn the unit into somthing useful and sensible. The fact its a fast tech to TL's would be facilitated by this change as well - I don't think it would overpower the route in any way, infact it would bring the route well into a far more favourable position in terms of game balance.

You will be changing the arsonist cervantes, into a powerful seed / plant / possibly cash thief all rolled into one. Nothing too crazy or powerful, but it will give the route a nice little kick.

 

[cervantes]

Re: Change to Arsonist

Turntip, might be true, you would increase the attractiveness of the route with your changes, but I think I still wouldn't choose to go this sub-route.
For me the only reason why I might consider to chose this branch is the fact being able to send out ETA3 attacks. That is the only valid reason at least from my very subjective perspective. See, I dont even develop Seed Thieves or money launderes etc.

I think this route is just a route for a very specialized kind of player, not for the "average player". It is the same with the Violent Demonstrator sub-route. Both are not routes to satisfy a "standard" playstyle, but for people who want to use something different than the standard playstyle. And both routes are very justified in that matter and an enrichment to the "standard" bushtarion routes.

If I am not mistaken, you intention is to change the route into something more appealing to the averge playerbase. Fair enough, but I doubt that by tweaking the Arsonsist in the proposed manner you will make the route so attractive to be competitive with Rob, SA or military. And besides, the route's purpose is to be something not everyone wants to choose

EDIT: I just read the initial post again and realized you just want to tweak the Arsonist because it is basically a useless unit as it is. I was arguing more about the pros of this route in general, so i was a bit off topic.
Anyway, I have to agree that the Arsonsists are useless somehow, their only purpose might be to serve as flak. And maybe by tweaking it a little you could add a little usage to them besides being flak.
I was just searching the tech trees for units that are similarly useless as a counter example, but to be honest, I didnt find any besides maybe the Nutters. Most units that are of not greater use once fully teched are at least usefull when they come out. But I have to say you are right, when looking at the big picture, basically all units have their purpose except the Arsonists (and maybe nutters). So I have to agree, you are right, they ARE useless.

 

[Turnip2k]

Re: Change to Arsonist

The point was to really give someone who decided they needed the benefits that route gives them a additional bonus. You could set the eta of the new units to 3 or 4 to allow low ETA attacks a with the benefit of steaing seeds / plants too. This change will certainly make the route more appealing to everyone, but thats not the intention - it is to make use of the waste of space which is the arsonist and model it into somthing that give this route qualities which are already in line with what the route gives those people that want low eta high steal abilities. I don't think this change will unbalance anything at all, and it can only improve the gameplay for someone who decides to go this route (which will be for the same reasons people play the route now, so it will attract players with the same requirements).

 

[cervantes]

Re: Change to Arsonist

damn, you are fast, see edit above :lol:

 

[Turnip2k]

Re: Change to Arsonist

Sorry about that, bad timing The only other unit I can see that is as useless is the chem sprayer, but that isn't a required tech, you can aviod it if you wish and still tech out the route. Most people seem to have only said either 'omg no its abuseable' without giving any reasons or 'thief is a powerful unit', neither of which are relevant to my arguement, but meh, I suppose you have to expect people not to read posts really at all and skim them.

Cheers for making a proper effort

 

[cervantes]

Re: Change to Arsonist

Oh, I totally missed the chemical sprayer. Agreed, similarly useless. The fact, that you can chose better options as alternatives, makes it even more useless in my opinion. I can see people developping Arsonsits because they wanna benefit from the Thieves or rush to TLs (which still doesnt justify the uselesness of Arsonists), but who the heck would ever choose to develop Chemical sprayer? Because it is a tiny bit cheaper/faster than the spike traps? I dont know...

But back to the original discussion: As i already said above, almost each and every unit in the game has there justification to be there. Almost all of them are usefull to some extent, some are powerful when they come out (like Ninjas), others are being used throughout the rout (Bikers e.g.). Looking from it from that perspective, I can understand where you are coming from. Arsonsit and Chem. Sprayer have no real use at all. Nobody "uses" them in any kind of strategy, at least not that i heard of. So why not tweak them a little, to add at least some usage to them. even the sucky Privates are useful, as sweepers. So why not, by adding a bit more stealing capability, no one is really harmed. And tbh honest I cannot see it being more abusable than any other stealing strategy around.

Or is the fact, that you can rush to TLs much faster justification enough? Then why not increase the development costs and time of Thieves and get rid of Arsonists comletely So you can still have the TLs much faster, without having the useless Arsonsit. Same isfor the sprayers, get rid of them.

 

[atsanjose]

Re: Change to Arsonist

i use chemical sprayers

i love to see something green popping up on middle tick

its like giving the finger only then not to abusive.... \o/

and..... its really faster to go chemical instead of spikes
i think it saved me arround 16 hours orso.

 

[Cyrus]

Re: Change to Arsonist

well again chem sprayer is a quicker way through the route, ofc its useless its abit of fun and gets you through to ninja faster.

if you change arsonists into something alot better than what it is then everyone will be going that route, psssh!

 

[mrmongo]

Re: Change to Arsonist

omg the thief unit is aboslutely *****... some people saying its more effective than geo's.... wow you get 3% more land but

Geo-Phys Thief INN Steals Land [15%] [close] 900 5 £60,000 ** * 0.1 land

Thief INN Steals Land [18%] [close] 930 3 £30,000 * * 0.001 land
It fires after the geo and .001 is a lot freakin different than .1 so you need like 3x+ more and wow eta 3 attakcs with bikers.... thats pretty crappy how many units do bikers kill, and eta 4 with TL so you get -1 eta.... tbh i think thief and arsonist should both be removed and an alternative 2 units made. How many people use that route?!? i bet about 10 in the whole game at most!

A thief that steals seeds aswell maybe, and how about an nld firing unit to go with the biker or something? or a suicide bomber close tick unit that kills itself to do mass damage or something? fires on inn all or something. Might get more people using it.