Sky lanterns need a big change

[Zebulon Ecthelion]

They might be the single most useless unit in the game. Which is ironic, considering that they're supposed to make up the bulk of the Cathayan sky fleet in the lore with the sky-junks being a good deal rarer, but while the sky-junks are actually a good unit with a lot of utility worth taking in your armies, there's literally no reason to ever bring along sky lanterns.

However, whatever buff they get depends on what role CA and GW had in mind for them, which isn't exactly clear because sky lanterns don't do much.

If they're supposed to be a support unit for your armies, they need a better aura and some actual support abilities.

If they're supposed to be "flying crane gunners" to the sky-junks' "flying fire rain rockets," you either need to increase the number of sky lanterns from a single entity to roughly a third the number of the crane gunner weapons team, or drastically increase its fire rate, or make its shots explosive.

[dulany67]

I don't use them, they can be situationally useful, but also so vulnerable that they are not worth the increased micro.

[Zebulon Ecthelion]

Originally posted by dulany67:

I don't use them, they can be situationally useful, but also so vulnerable that they are not worth the increased micro.

Their only real use, to my knowledge, is giving vision in forests. Which is barely a use since the AI just ignores forests.

[Ashley]

Most of the flying missle units are useless

Cough gyrocopters

[Zebulon Ecthelion]

Originally posted by WALTUH:

Most of the flying missle units are useless

Cough gyrocopters

Yes, absolutely. They still have nothing on sky lanterns though. Gyrocopters might be able to badly damage a single unit if they use up all their ammunition. The same can't be said for sky lanterns.

[Fryskar]

Originally posted by Naram-Sin:

Which is ironic, considering that they're supposed to make up the bulk of the Cathayan sky fleet

No idea how you came to that conclusion.
They're flying support units, not damage dealers.

[Fryskar]

Originally posted by Naram-Sin:

Originally posted by WALTUH:

Most of the flying missle units are useless

Cough gyrocopters

Yes, absolutely. They still have nothing on sky lanterns though. Gyrocopters might be able to badly damage a single unit if they use up all their ammunition. The same can't be said for sky lanterns.

If you use gyros and only "might be able to badly damage" a single unit, you most likely sent them to fight the wrong type of unit. Regulars should easily kill infantry, brimstone easily kill large targets. Then there's their bombs.

[jonoliveira12]

Originally posted by WALTUH:

Most of the flying missle units are useless

Cough gyrocopters

Yes.

Flyers are just not worth it, unless they are cheap artillery harassment, or have Breat Attacks.
The only Sky Lantern you are supposed to use, is the one with Rockets anyway, the other ones are supposed to be defensive extra towers, for your city battles.

[Cacomistle]

Originally posted by WALTUH:

Most of the flying missle units are useless

Cough gyrocopters

I don't think gyrocopters are useless. The ai clumps a lot, and regular gyrocopters do a lot of damage to clumped units. The brimstone gun ones I think are worse but they still have bombs, or if you have an engineer in the army they can take a bunch of free shots without having to worry about ammo. They're not the best campaign unit, but that can be said of over half the roster of every faction in the game.

I also think the wood elf hawk riders are alright, but that's not because their missiles are good, its because they're a decent melee unit.

[Mania]

Originally posted by Fryskar:

Originally posted by Naram-Sin:

Which is ironic, considering that they're supposed to make up the bulk of the Cathayan sky fleet

No idea how you came to that conclusion.
They're flying support units, not damage dealers.

Agreed, and that’s what I also believe to be the main purpose of the Cathay sky fleet. They’re just hot air balloons, which were historically nothing more than a reconnaissance tool. Lorewise, unless Cathay has magical paper, they should be extremely fragile.

The Sky Junk is practically the same, except it serves the extra purpose of being a artillery piece with a superior vantage point. It’s good range adds on to the fact that it is still a vulnerable, sitting duck.

Cathay’s military might is in its infantry formations and ox hauled artillery guns, not it’s lanterns.

[SomeGuy1]

Lanterns are built from a tier 3 settlement, and cost... what, 850 each? They aren't elites. Their shots are very accurate, have decent penetration and AP, and fire in multiple directions at once. And they are a Harmony Amplifier, so they buff your melee stuff more than your usual ranged units do.

You bring one or two along and park it over your infantry line, or have it follow your cavalry around. It's a buff bot that melee units can't hit and does a bit of damage too. Particularly good if you have a decent number of Jade Lancers or Longma Riders in your army, they're going to be too far from your ranged lines to get harmony buffs from those. Honestly, I think one or two is pretty good value (they are decently cheap). But you don't mass them, they aren't damage dealers.

[Central]

sky lanterns are fine, they have:

Shieldbreaker - debuff which makes it easier to kill shielded enemies with ranged. very useful against things like dark elves. hit the target with a sky lantern and than a volley of archers.

Eye of the dragon +4 leadership map wide so your units fight longer before breaking (as well as forest spotting but the use of that is very very situational)

sky lanterns are faster than sky junks, which means they can activate cavalry harmony a little bit easier.

sky lanterns have both yin harmony as well as harmonic amplification. this means that they can both trigger as well as boost harmony for cavalry or allied armies.
this is very important especially for allied armies (which have no cathay lords or hero's), the harmony boosting units are all you have when recruiting cathay as an ally (sky junk, sky lanterns and war compass)

sky lanterns are pure support units, they can be micro intensive, but they really shine if you can make use of a few of the effects it provides.

but i think this unit truly shines when using allied recruitment, especially for a race like the dwarfs. although it can do well in any ranged focussed army.
its shieldbreaker shots can help your ranged units hit harder, the harmony trigger and boost can help a terracotta sentinel get stronger, since monsters are another thing which the dwarfs are lacking they can make good use of those sentinels.
by taking this combo of sky lanterns - terracotta sentinels you are enhancing 2 strong points of the dwarfs:
*survivability ( sentinels can take a beating against monsters, giving you time to shoot said monster)
*ranged warfare (sky lanterns give shieldbreaker which makes ranged warfare more effective, which is your primary way of dealing dmg)

it should be noted that when playing as cathay you can put your lord magistrate in a sky lantern as well, which is the superior option. in that case you dont need to bring sky lanterns anymore as they will basically do all the unit will do as well as providing the lord's effects.

[Enelith]

I like them.
If they get better, why not. (as long as it's not cheesy/overpowered...), but I'm ok with them being as they are right now.

[Aleera]

Originally posted by WALTUH:

Most of the flying missle units are useless

Cough gyrocopters

Your name has been added into the book. Gyrocopters are the Dawi's strongest unit in mp.
Less usefull in the campaign, but still ALOT better then Skylanterns.

[Zebulon Ecthelion]

Originally posted by Fryskar:

Originally posted by Naram-Sin:

Which is ironic, considering that they're supposed to make up the bulk of the Cathayan sky fleet

No idea how you came to that conclusion.
They're flying support units, not damage dealers.

That's what the blurb about them says.

[Central]

Originally posted by Naram-Sin:

Originally posted by Fryskar:

No idea how you came to that conclusion.
They're flying support units, not damage dealers.

That's what the blurb about them says.

if you have a thousand of them than those single shots can still do a lot of dmg.

just immagine how much upkeep there would be to making the majority of the skyfleet
consist of sky junks, they shoot a whole load of rockets with 1 volley, if you have a lot of sky junks than you would need to produce thousands of rockets just to recover from a single battle.