Being able to spam free units is fairly broken. Even if the Grunt Cannon Fodder units are super-weak, a player could just spam hundreds of them as you try to push and just grind your armies to a halt on piles of dead Unggoy bodies. Sure, splash damage and anti-infantry units clean them up easily, but if your opponent has good APM, they will never stop coming, especially if he has multiple bases.
It’s even worse when you consider the early-game impact of it. Sure, Cannon Fodders collect resources slowly and lose to every other unit in the game individually (well, almost every other unit), but if Yapyap takes the time to grab some early minibases he can flood you with infinite Cannon Fodders while you have to spend resources to get your own units out. That can be a real -Yoink!- to deal with.
I would recommend adding a small pricetag onto the Cannon Fodder, something like 10-20 supply each. This way, it DOES add up early on. However, I’d also give the Cannon Fodders an improvement to their collection rate, and also would improve one of their tech upgrades so that it also removes their supply cost once you research it. This way, by the time you can spam them for free, your opponent should have ample time to get out hard-counters like Kodiaks.
When it gets to the point where they have enough bases to literally drown you in corpses, if they’re smart, they’ll have enough production or resources to make any price tag but full grunt price negligible, if not pointless. When you have 20000 resources of everything, it doesn’t matter what the price of anything is unless you have to replace a full pop army of regular units.
> 2533274803523823;1:
> Being able to spam free units is fairly broken. Even if the Grunt Cannon Fodder units are super-weak, a player could just spam hundreds of them as you try to push and just grind your armies to a halt on piles of dead Unggoy bodies. Sure, splash damage and anti-infantry units clean them up easily, but if your opponent has good APM, they will never stop coming, especially if he has multiple bases.
>
> I would recommend adding a small pricetag onto the Cannon Fodder, something like 5-10 supply each. This way, it DOES add up.
A 5, 10, 20, price tag wouldn’t change anything you would need them to cost 40-50 for you to see a difference but its vary possible a change like that could make the unit useless.
It might be better to look for a more Similarly Simple option.
Edit:
Maybe they could lower there health as well as make them more susceptible to Small Arms fire,
Just a thought…
I’ve seen a few top players suggest simply making an upgrade to make them free, that way there is some need for a YapYap to spend his resources and power in the early game, rather than getting full pop for free while devoting all resources and power to further building your economy and taking map control.
They’re melee grunts. They take forever to make, they do pathetic damage, they take forever to gather resources. Making a full army of them would take ages.
They made it hard to spam them for a reason, adding a price tag would make them even more useless since they take so long to make.
> 2533274967376955;4:
> I’ve seen a few top players suggest simply making an upgrade to make them free, that way there is some need for a YapYap to spend his resources and power in the early game, rather than getting full pop for free while devoting all resources and power to further building your economy and taking map control.
This is the approach I think would be the most appropriate. Give them a cost early, but allow them to become free either via a tech or leader point. This would let you super-spam them later on, but keeps a player from drowning the early-game with them.
The problem with cannon fodder isn’t that they are spamable. It’s the fact that you can build free units to contest map recourse while other leaders have to put money into grabbing them. What’s the point of sending 200 supply of grunts to an energy bundle if the enemy can deny it to you for free. This gives yap yap an insane economic advantage in the early game as he can just grab everything on the map. I would say cannon fodder should get a DPS increase and a cost of 50 supply per unit. This way it will force yap yap players to build what they need as opposed to just queuing up 10 grunts at the start. The DPS increase is to keep the cannon fodder competitive with the new price tag.
> 2533274843762975;7:
> The problem with cannon fodder isn’t that they are spamable. It’s the fact that you can build free units to contest map recourse while other leaders have to put money into grabbing them. What’s the point of sending 200 supply of grunts to an energy bundle if the enemy can deny it to you for free. This gives yap yap an insane economic advantage in the early game as he can just grab everything on the map. I would say cannon fodder should get a DPS increase and a cost of 50 supply per unit. This way it will force yap yap players to build what they need as opposed to just queuing up 10 grunts at the start. The DPS increase is to keep the cannon fodder competitive with the new price tag.
Lol cannon fodder take ages to collect resources. Not only that but 1 squad of marines can probably take down 3-4 squads of cannon fodder by themselves.
I agree a 40 or 50 supply pricetag would be nice. Free units don’t have a place in a game like this. Super cheap units? Maybe. Free? No. Maybe give them a slight buff to make sure they don’t become in-viable. I would rather wait a bit longer before doing anything drastic. The leaderboards don’t include any YapYaps, so it’s hard to gauge how powerful he really is.
I agree they could have a cost attached, even if it’s only to prevent over spam in the early game. I was thinking maybe 25-50 supply while reducing their training time a small amount. Still dirt cheap, you can get them out fast, but you can’t just flood your enemy’s base with them.
I mean equipment isn’t free, stuff costs resources to fabricate. 5-10 supply per individual Grunt methane breather rig with the Grunt filling being free sounds fair to me.
> 2533274818651339;8:
> > 2533274843762975;7:
> > The problem with cannon fodder isn’t that they are spamable. It’s the fact that you can build free units to contest map recourse while other leaders have to put money into grabbing them. What’s the point of sending 200 supply of grunts to an energy bundle if the enemy can deny it to you for free. This gives yap yap an insane economic advantage in the early game as he can just grab everything on the map. I would say cannon fodder should get a DPS increase and a cost of 50 supply per unit. This way it will force yap yap players to build what they need as opposed to just queuing up 10 grunts at the start. The DPS increase is to keep the cannon fodder competitive with the new price tag.
>
> Lol cannon fodder take ages to collect resources. Not only that but 1 squad of marines can probably take down 3-4 squads of cannon fodder by themselves.
You can have 2 cannon fodder gather at the same time (and have 2 at every supply and energy bundle for free). marines cost 150 supplies. I could send 4 squads to a power bundle and take it from you. If you try to collect the power and ignore my units then all I have to do is focus the marine down and I get a free kill. If you really want that power bundle you could send 2 marines but then I can send 6 or 7 cannon fodder for free. It doesn’t matter what you do I can at the very least make you pay for what ever resource I want you to contest. Since the cannon fodder are free that also means I can be buying up mini bases and eco while my free units cause trouble around the map. I’m no expert with yap yap but I have played against very good yap yap players and it is insanely hard to cost effectively gather resources.
> 2533274843762975;11:
> > 2533274818651339;8:
> > > 2533274843762975;7:
> > > The problem with cannon fodder isn’t that they are spamable. It’s the fact that you can build free units to contest map recourse while other leaders have to put money into grabbing them. What’s the point of sending 200 supply of grunts to an energy bundle if the enemy can deny it to you for free. This gives yap yap an insane economic advantage in the early game as he can just grab everything on the map. I would say cannon fodder should get a DPS increase and a cost of 50 supply per unit. This way it will force yap yap players to build what they need as opposed to just queuing up 10 grunts at the start. The DPS increase is to keep the cannon fodder competitive with the new price tag.
> >
> > Lol cannon fodder take ages to collect resources. Not only that but 1 squad of marines can probably take down 3-4 squads of cannon fodder by themselves.
>
> You can have 2 cannon fodder gather at the same time (and have 2 at every supply and energy bundle for free). marines cost 150 supplies. I could send 4 squads to a power bundle and take it from you. If you try to collect the power and ignore my units then all I have to do is focus the marine down and I get a free kill. If you really want that power bundle you could send 2 marines but then I can send 6 or 7 cannon fodder for free. It doesn’t matter what you do I can at the very least make you pay for what ever resource I want you to contest. Since the cannon fodder are free that also means I can be buying up mini bases and eco while my free units cause trouble around the map. I’m no expert with yap yap but I have played against very good yap yap players and it is insanely hard to cost effectively gather resources.
Okay but adding a small price tag doesn’t really fix what you’re saying. If they’re like 10 supplies or 20 supplies it’s still an advantage of sending cheap troops to collect lots of resources.
As I said, they collect resources super slow. I usually send a squad of 3 marines to collect power supplies, those squads can easily take care of 6 or 7 cannon fodder squads. Early game, thats all yapyaps gonna have is 6-8 cannon fodder squads. So if someone wants to risk all their gatherers on one area that’s a risk they can take.
It seems fair to me, the developers put a lot of thought into the cannon fodder troops and I personally think they are perfectly balanced.
> 2533274818651339;12:
> > 2533274843762975;11:
> > > 2533274818651339;8:
> > > > 2533274843762975;7:
> > > > The problem with cannon fodder isn’t that they are spamable. It’s the fact that you can build free units to contest map recourse while other leaders have to put money into grabbing them. What’s the point of sending 200 supply of grunts to an energy bundle if the enemy can deny it to you for free. This gives yap yap an insane economic advantage in the early game as he can just grab everything on the map. I would say cannon fodder should get a DPS increase and a cost of 50 supply per unit. This way it will force yap yap players to build what they need as opposed to just queuing up 10 grunts at the start. The DPS increase is to keep the cannon fodder competitive with the new price tag.
> > >
> > > Lol cannon fodder take ages to collect resources. Not only that but 1 squad of marines can probably take down 3-4 squads of cannon fodder by themselves.
> >
> > You can have 2 cannon fodder gather at the same time (and have 2 at every supply and energy bundle for free). marines cost 150 supplies. I could send 4 squads to a power bundle and take it from you. If you try to collect the power and ignore my units then all I have to do is focus the marine down and I get a free kill. If you really want that power bundle you could send 2 marines but then I can send 6 or 7 cannon fodder for free. It doesn’t matter what you do I can at the very least make you pay for what ever resource I want you to contest. Since the cannon fodder are free that also means I can be buying up mini bases and eco while my free units cause trouble around the map. I’m no expert with yap yap but I have played against very good yap yap players and it is insanely hard to cost effectively gather resources.
>
> Okay but adding a small price tag doesn’t really fix what you’re saying. If they’re like 10 supplies or 20 supplies it’s still an advantage of sending cheap troops to collect lots of resources.
>
> As I said, they collect resources super slow. I usually send a squad of 3 marines to collect power supplies, those squads can easily take care of 6 or 7 cannon fodder squads. Early game, thats all yapyaps gonna have is 6-8 cannon fodder squads. So if someone wants to risk all their gatherers on one area that’s a risk they can take.
>
> It seems fair to me, the developers put a lot of thought into the cannon fodder troops and I personally think they are perfectly balanced.
I don’t think you have played against a competent Yap.
> 2533274830489835;9:
> I agree a 40 or 50 supply pricetag would be nice. Free units don’t have a place in a game like this. Super cheap units? Maybe. Free? No. Maybe give them a slight buff to make sure they don’t become in-viable. I would rather wait a bit longer before doing anything drastic. The leaderboards don’t include any YapYaps, so it’s hard to gauge how powerful he really is.
>
> EDIT: Then again… Look at this.
Both savior and I are champ with yap god. A cost of 20 with a dmg buff vs sentinels would go a long way.
> 2533274821521504;13:
> > 2533274818651339;12:
> > > 2533274843762975;11:
> > > > 2533274818651339;8:
> > > > > 2533274843762975;7:
> > > > > The problem with cannon fodder isn’t that they are spamable. It’s the fact that you can build free units to contest map recourse while other leaders have to put money into grabbing them. What’s the point of sending 200 supply of grunts to an energy bundle if the enemy can deny it to you for free. This gives yap yap an insane economic advantage in the early game as he can just grab everything on the map. I would say cannon fodder should get a DPS increase and a cost of 50 supply per unit. This way it will force yap yap players to build what they need as opposed to just queuing up 10 grunts at the start. The DPS increase is to keep the cannon fodder competitive with the new price tag.
> > > >
> > > > Lol cannon fodder take ages to collect resources. Not only that but 1 squad of marines can probably take down 3-4 squads of cannon fodder by themselves.
> > >
> > > You can have 2 cannon fodder gather at the same time (and have 2 at every supply and energy bundle for free). marines cost 150 supplies. I could send 4 squads to a power bundle and take it from you. If you try to collect the power and ignore my units then all I have to do is focus the marine down and I get a free kill. If you really want that power bundle you could send 2 marines but then I can send 6 or 7 cannon fodder for free. It doesn’t matter what you do I can at the very least make you pay for what ever resource I want you to contest. Since the cannon fodder are free that also means I can be buying up mini bases and eco while my free units cause trouble around the map. I’m no expert with yap yap but I have played against very good yap yap players and it is insanely hard to cost effectively gather resources.
> >
> > Okay but adding a small price tag doesn’t really fix what you’re saying. If they’re like 10 supplies or 20 supplies it’s still an advantage of sending cheap troops to collect lots of resources.
> >
> > As I said, they collect resources super slow. I usually send a squad of 3 marines to collect power supplies, those squads can easily take care of 6 or 7 cannon fodder squads. Early game, thats all yapyaps gonna have is 6-8 cannon fodder squads. So if someone wants to risk all their gatherers on one area that’s a risk they can take.
> >
> > It seems fair to me, the developers put a lot of thought into the cannon fodder troops and I personally think they are perfectly balanced.
>
> I don’t think you have played against a competent Yap.
> 2533274818651339;5:
> They’re melee grunts. They take forever to make, they do pathetic damage, they take forever to gather resources. Making a full army of them would take ages.
>
> They made it hard to spam them for a reason, adding a price tag would make them even more useless since they take so long to make.
Strange that they do poor damage for melee considering they ripped out throats in Fall of Reach
> 2533274818651339;12:
> > 2533274843762975;11:
> > > 2533274818651339;8:
> > > > 2533274843762975;7:
> > > > The problem with cannon fodder isn’t that they are spamable. It’s the fact that you can build free units to contest map recourse while other leaders have to put money into grabbing them. What’s the point of sending 200 supply of grunts to an energy bundle if the enemy can deny it to you for free. This gives yap yap an insane economic advantage in the early game as he can just grab everything on the map. I would say cannon fodder should get a DPS increase and a cost of 50 supply per unit. This way it will force yap yap players to build what they need as opposed to just queuing up 10 grunts at the start. The DPS increase is to keep the cannon fodder competitive with the new price tag.
> > >
> > > Lol cannon fodder take ages to collect resources. Not only that but 1 squad of marines can probably take down 3-4 squads of cannon fodder by themselves.
> >
> > You can have 2 cannon fodder gather at the same time (and have 2 at every supply and energy bundle for free). marines cost 150 supplies. I could send 4 squads to a power bundle and take it from you. If you try to collect the power and ignore my units then all I have to do is focus the marine down and I get a free kill. If you really want that power bundle you could send 2 marines but then I can send 6 or 7 cannon fodder for free. It doesn’t matter what you do I can at the very least make you pay for what ever resource I want you to contest. Since the cannon fodder are free that also means I can be buying up mini bases and eco while my free units cause trouble around the map. I’m no expert with yap yap but I have played against very good yap yap players and it is insanely hard to cost effectively gather resources.
>
> Okay but adding a small price tag doesn’t really fix what you’re saying. If they’re like 10 supplies or 20 supplies it’s still an advantage of sending cheap troops to collect lots of resources.
>
> As I said, they collect resources super slow. I usually send a squad of 3 marines to collect power supplies, those squads can easily take care of 6 or 7 cannon fodder squads. Early game, thats all yapyaps gonna have is 6-8 cannon fodder squads. So if someone wants to risk all their gatherers on one area that’s a risk they can take.
>
> It seems fair to me, the developers put a lot of thought into the cannon fodder troops and I personally think they are perfectly balanced.
The canon fodder are not OP in a fight at all but then again that’s not the point. If you send 3 marines to 1 point then you have to pay 150 supply to do that. Meanwhile I could have cannon fodder at 5 points gathering at the same time for free and even more spawning to grab nodes. Individually they capture slow however when you have them gathering all of the resources at the same time for free you come out ahead economically every time. This allows yap yap to do crazy fast tech builds with no effort at all against other leaders. Keep in mind that the majority of yap yap players don’t always execute these builds properly or even attempt them at all so I get it if the majority of players haven’t caught on yet. However in the hands of a top tier player yap yap becomes absolutely broken. Thankfully I’ve only run into a couple of good yap yap players.