Bursters ruin this game

[Leo Major]

It's already micro intenseive enough.

I don't want to constantly keep an eye on my army clearing zombies on auto attack for bursters that wipe them out, while I'm base building and doing other things.

It makes the game too micro intensive and makes me unwilling to continue survival mode.

[Rhowin]

Bursters Ruin the Game

I love this game, and there are only a couple things that I don't like. My main one... Bursters. They FORCE you to run ranged only in the game. Melee is completely out of the window. During Death Nights that spawn them, have fun losing all your melee troops as they can't move out of the way because of minion or structure block.

Fully pimped out Melee unit tree, all pimped out death night rewards that increase health, armor, and other stats by 1.33... and they die the moment a burster gets through a wall. They need to be nerfed or straight up removed from the game.

I personally think they should just do siege damage to structures but minimal damage to troops. Completely makes melee troops pointless to make.

You can be scouting two sides of the map, and in one split second you lose half your army because of one burster. If there are two bursters then you even lose your hero cause they do that much damage. Id rather have the Giants on the map than bursters.

[Samseng Yik]

It is like the developer want this rts play like hades, or you pause the game issue command melee move away.
The worst part is they are worse than Zerg baneling

[Rhowin]

Originally posted by Samseng Yik:

It is like the developer want this rts play like hades, or you pause the game issue command melee move away.
The worst part is they are worse than Zerg baneling

Pause works fine during normal days. However, during Death Nights, half the time I can't even see the explosion radius coming from the bursters because of the other 3/4 types of explosions coming from the other types of Nightmares AS WELL as the hundreds all stacked up against the walls.

I've beaten survival multiple times, but only when I spam Arbalists. They actually do something. Sentinels are a joke. 1 Archer is better than 10 Sentinels when it comes to Death Night.

[Samseng Yik]

I am surprise this RTS follow real life war zone realism logic.
In many other games, developer will already give melee unit/hero a strong edge over range unit/hero.
Other games will at least balance the cost and unit survival as "balance"

[Hellhound]

Melee units are mostly just for clear speed. They're on average faster and possess greater built in shred to get by armor. Ranged units get around armor by camping a tower. Cultists are a great example. Absolutely useless on DN, and a single crusher will kill an infinite number of them. Used to clear though they straight up sweep the map with no resistance so long as you focus on rushing down Spitters.

[Socrates Jackson]

Yeah...
AOE monsters completely dictate the game and make melee almost meaningless(except for map clearance, to a point, as was mentioned). Still fun, but that part has always been frustrating.

[Coldzila]

Bursters are EZ, just select one individual melee unit to run near them to proc the explosion and then back off. I do it like this: attack ground towards the horde of nightmare, select the hero and Micro it to proc the burster explosions.

[Hellhound]

Originally posted by Coldzila:

Bursters are EZ, just select one individual melee unit to run near them to proc the explosion and then back off. I do it like this: attack ground towards the horde of nightmare, select the hero and Micro it to proc the burster explosions.

I imagine they're referring to Death Nights. When you have the ability to just run a melee unit near then back off they aren't a threat. Running them out during a Death Night is impossible without getting dragged down in the mass.

[yuuta]

Hey Rhowin, Samseng Yik, Hellhound, Socrates Jackson, and Coldzila,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on Bursters! We definitely hear your concerns about their impact on melee units, especially during Death Nights. It sounds like they're causing some serious frustration, and we appreciate you bringing it to our attention.

We're always looking for ways to improve the game and balance the different unit types, so your feedback is super valuable. We'll be sure to pass this along to the development team for consideration.

In the meantime, we encourage you to keep experimenting with different strategies and unit compositions. While Bursters can be tough, there might be ways to counter them or mitigate their impact.

We appreciate your passion for Age of Darkness: Final Stand and your dedication to finding the best ways to survive the night!

[Socrates Jackson]

Whoa, wait, what? The Devs are actually listening? Well, that's promising.

Any suggestions, Devs? I set all my big hitters (arbalests, ballista, etc) to target the strongest, but that's...kind of all I can do. Artillery can knock them back, but that's unreliable. I can throw my hero into their path, but not for long.
The problem is that bursters, spitters, and crushers hit so hard, and over such a large area, that nothing can stand against them. Period. That's it. The very nature of death nights (shooting hordes of monsters from behind walls) makes melee units mostly pointless, even during exploration.

As to possible tweaks that could make melee troops more viable: Maybe Sentinels have a big reduction to all forms of area damage, and give the same to anyone behind them? Spear dudes (or just all melee infantry) could have a much larger attack range (to represent them attacking over/past other troops/walls). Maybe all infantry could get some kind of big defensive bonus while standing anywhere near a wall? Even a few seconds after it falls?

Or just have the nightmares suffer friendly fire. That would make it all worthwhile.
I dunno, I'm just throwing stuff out here.

Anyway, thanks for listening.

[yuuta]

Originally posted by Socrates Jackson:

Whoa, wait, what? The Devs are actually listening? Well, that's promising.

Any suggestions, Devs? I set all my big hitters (arbalests, ballista, etc) to target the strongest, but that's...kind of all I can do. Artillery can knock them back, but that's unreliable. I can throw my hero into their path, but not for long.
The problem is that bursters, spitters, and crushers hit so hard, and over such a large area, that nothing can stand against them. Period. That's it. The very nature of death nights (shooting hordes of monsters from behind walls) makes melee units mostly pointless, even during exploration.

As to possible tweaks that could make melee troops more viable: Maybe Sentinels have a big reduction to all forms of area damage, and give the same to anyone behind them? Spear dudes (or just all melee infantry) could have a much larger attack range (to represent them attacking over/past other troops/walls). Maybe all infantry could get some kind of big defensive bonus while standing anywhere near a wall? Even a few seconds after it falls?

Or just have the nightmares suffer friendly fire. That would make it all worthwhile.
I dunno, I'm just throwing stuff out here.

Anyway, thanks for listening.

Hey Socrates Jackson,

Although I may not be the best player, I have sunk many hours playtesting and running Volatist Melee-only runs! Including observing many Streams and our Discord members strategizing.

My main recommendation is Pikemen, as they have a long reach and strong knockback. To the point where you don't need to micro and they also push Bursters back if you have enough of them! Additionally, there are some Blessings that boost Melee power, including damage, armor, health etc.. There are a lot others where if any Unit is horrified they heal to full health. Synergizing well with the Melee skill tree where when a melee unit kills a unit they can cleanse their horrification.

This is one specific example! Feel free to join our Discord https://discord.gg/uwZn5Cyh as there are many people willing to take some time to come up with alternative strategies!!

I hope this helps and gets you thinking of what ways you want to handle these dangerous Busters!

[Zethos]

Another idea would be to add Flamers to your army. Add one or two knockback upgrades and they should be able to keep Bursters at a distance. They are weak against Spitters though. A possible nerf to Bursters would be to make them vulnerable to fire, like triggering their explosion if they get hit with a certain amount of fire damage. Or reduce the damage they do and turn them more into armor shredders.

[Buntkreuz]

While i think its important that there are different enemy types, i ever think that enemies that just run into your units and blow up killing them arent good design wise EXCEPT they have a severe weakness.
In other games suicide units are incredibly squishy and have low hp.

My personal opinion is, that enemy designs feel a bit disappointing because theres a lack of unit upgrades.
Sure theres the skill tree where you can improve, but i still wished there were more upgrades that allowed my units to withstand stuff.
Maybe provice an upgrade that lowers AoE damage.

I cant say how to fix the balancing issue, as i think its a tough one.
Just removing the enemy types would make the game less deep, but keeping them the way they are makes it frustrating.

I think that the game needs improvements in terms of controlling your units (set target priorities and stances), visibility (can i more easily see and select special enemies), tower targeting settings (to focus specials) and more unit upgrades (evasion, more armor, AoE attacking, aoe defense), as well as being able to better retreat your units.


I also have to say, that i dont like most of the units by design.
I think flamers are cool, but not the way the game does them as some sort of weird machine.
I prefer flamethrower soldiers or fire mages, maybe Dragons.
Same goes with the Sentinel being a cool tank, but only carrying a Shield and no weapon.
The rogue appears like a generic way to add a knife unit, it feels blant, uninspired and thus im not temptet to train it.
That means, the units that are properly able to deal with the above mentioned enemies, come later in the game and arent really fun to use.

[Rhowin]

Originally posted by Hellhound:

Melee units are mostly just for clear speed. They're on average faster and possess greater built in shred to get by armor. Ranged units get around armor by camping a tower. Cultists are a great example. Absolutely useless on DN, and a single crusher will kill an infinite number of them. Used to clear though they straight up sweep the map with no resistance so long as you focus on rushing down Spitters.

Even if they are just meant for clear speed, they lack any real purpose past the 2nd Death Night. Archers and Arbelists can clear faster and better than any Melee unit combination. The only negative I can think of is trying to move those Arbelists across the map if a crystal is revealed there or something.

Originally posted by yuuta:

Originally posted by Socrates Jackson:

Whoa, wait, what? The Devs are actually listening? Well, that's promising.

Any suggestions, Devs? I set all my big hitters (arbalests, ballista, etc) to target the strongest, but that's...kind of all I can do. Artillery can knock them back, but that's unreliable. I can throw my hero into their path, but not for long.
The problem is that bursters, spitters, and crushers hit so hard, and over such a large area, that nothing can stand against them. Period. That's it. The very nature of death nights (shooting hordes of monsters from behind walls) makes melee units mostly pointless, even during exploration.

As to possible tweaks that could make melee troops more viable: Maybe Sentinels have a big reduction to all forms of area damage, and give the same to anyone behind them? Spear dudes (or just all melee infantry) could have a much larger attack range (to represent them attacking over/past other troops/walls). Maybe all infantry could get some kind of big defensive bonus while standing anywhere near a wall? Even a few seconds after it falls?

Or just have the nightmares suffer friendly fire. That would make it all worthwhile.
I dunno, I'm just throwing stuff out here.

Anyway, thanks for listening.

Hey Socrates Jackson,

Although I may not be the best player, I have sunk many hours playtesting and running Volatist Melee-only runs! Including observing many Streams and our Discord members strategizing.

My main recommendation is Pikemen, as they have a long reach and strong knockback. To the point where you don't need to micro and they also push Bursters back if you have enough of them! Additionally, there are some Blessings that boost Melee power, including damage, armor, health etc.. There are a lot others where if any Unit is horrified they heal to full health. Synergizing well with the Melee skill tree where when a melee unit kills a unit they can cleanse their horrification.

This is one specific example! Feel free to join our Discord https://discord.gg/uwZn5Cyh as there are many people willing to take some time to come up with alternative strategies!!

I hope this helps and gets you thinking of what ways you want to handle these dangerous Busters!

I had 3 blessings to boost melee troops. The 1.33 one, the full health when horrified, ect. However, none of those matter when two bursters line up in a barrage of VFX and wipe out fully armored seninels.

My main problem here is that there just doesn't seem to be a reason to even put resources into melee troops. You can have 3 blessings, full armor, triage tent, and pumping out Arbeist is just do more when it actually matters: Death Nights. Keep in mind, the Melee troops wont even be able to do anything until the walls fall, while ranged units can attack from the get go.

[ganjou241]

Originally posted by Rhowin:

Originally posted by Hellhound:

Melee units are mostly just for clear speed. They're on average faster and possess greater built in shred to get by armor. Ranged units get around armor by camping a tower. Cultists are a great example. Absolutely useless on DN, and a single crusher will kill an infinite number of them. Used to clear though they straight up sweep the map with no resistance so long as you focus on rushing down Spitters.

Even if they are just meant for clear speed, they lack any real purpose past the 2nd Death Night.

I think melee's purpose would skyrocket if some kind of ammo logistics was implemented.