The issue with Automatons (For me)

[Sasha Mason]

inb4 people flooding in saying skill issue, but hear me out for a second.

Why is it that you have to get fairly close to bots before they spot you, but once they do (or any other player for the matter), they can seemingly fire at you from literally across the map? Like I'm talking 300-400m range rocket barrages and assault rifle fire. It seems a bit excessive, especially when they just snap onto you because you were somewhere in their distant line of sight because of another player that aggro'd them. Rockets and cannon shots might just be flying at you from through the fog when you couldn't even see them.

Next, mortars. Why is it that Mortars can fire at you even when you are stealthing?
Like you can be outside of combat, behind a hill, no enemies around, but that mortar is going to just know you are there and fire at you and potentially aggro other enemies towards you. Why does it completely disregard the stealth mechanics in this game and fire away the moment you get anywhere in its firing range? Nothing else in here works like that.

And lastly, Detector Towers.
Why is it that I can't place a Hellbomb next to it? It always bounces off of the floor and I have to place it like way further away. Oddly enough, other Stratagems can be placed right on top of it just fine, so I just use my 120mm Orbital for it now but it feels pretty stupid how it is practically required to do that or else you will just not be able to take it down.



(Honorable mention, but I swear the bots intentionally shoot those damn puffy plants that send you flying, they somehow always hit them)

[Buntkreuz]

All true, and thats why you need a completely different attitude, skill and playstyle with them.
Which is what makes them interesting compared.
Bugs are basically just melee enemies with different speed and armor.
But Bots are all very different, even their standard infantry is very special in every way and needs you to change attitude towards them.
A single one of them can completely trash you in a second if you ignore him, but they can also sometimes go full Stormtrooper.

In the recent days since the Automaton Objective started, i saw many coming over who obviously never played against them for longer than a few missions.
They come into a mission with Dog Rover, which is just a dumb idea and totally deadly.
They pick the Breaker Shotgun, which is just a bad pick vs Automatons, but ignore Diligence, which is a premium pick.
They use fire weapons or support weapons, they use Grenade Launchers and stuff like Cluster Strike and 500KG Bomb.

All the stuff that works well against Bugs, is just awful vs Automatons. (well not all, theres a few generally good picks like the Orbital Laser)
And all the stuff that doesnt work so well with Bugs, works incredibly well with Automatons.

People hated on stuff like Mortar, because 90% of the Bugs go into melee range. But against Automatons its a prime pick.

Change the attitude. Forget what you knew about the game if you mainly played Bugs, accept that the Automatons betray and twist the rules in their favor.
Understand that a single projectile from your weapon into any direction of the map, will trigger all enemies in that direction.
It will attract Patrols, will get Automatons start to shoot in your general direction and so on.

They can also oneshot with rockets, no matter your armor, they get consistently better aim the higher the difficulty AND the longer you ignore them (if you ignore an RPG Infantry Bot, he will start shooting around wildly, but at his 3rd shot he will headshot you 360 noscope from 600 metres while you duck behind a stone).

Bots are a faction where you cant go well into melee range, cant stay in the open and shouldnt attack Patrols.
Get the Scout Armor, it makes it far easier and is kind of prime pick on any difficulty.



Hellbomb on Detector is just a known and dumb bug though.
Its annoying and regarding Automatons a lot doesnt make much sense.
However, i found that getting used to their quirks and their specialities, they are far more fun.
They are far more fun, because you can play with their quirks.
They are far more fun, because they create that battlefield moment, where everything explodes, shots go around like crazy and they even start fighting themselves because they hit each other (yes they can aggro themselves).

The Bugs are cool for that Starship Trooper feeling.
But the Automatons are the "what the heck is going on, i need to lay into the mudd while shots go over my head ITS VIETNAM" feeling.
And thats where it becomes fun when Mortars are shooting in your direction, stuff explodes and they snipe at you from across the map.


Core Rule: NOTHING with Automatons seems to follow a logic at first.
But you will get to the point where you notice patterns and quirks that repeat.
Which makes them the most interesting faction up to the point where people started the conspiracy, that they control our Stratagems, because stuff like Lasers would somehow ignore enemies and aim for players.
And thats true.

[Sasha Mason]

Yeaaah, most of this is actually why I prefer fighting bots over bugs, they just seem overall more interesting. Just certain bugs and things that make no sense is what hinders that fun.

Why can enemy mortars see and fire at me when I'm completely stealthy? How does it know? Why do shot down dropships often leave so many survivors? What even is the point of the SAM Site if shooting down dropships is often for nothing? Detector Tower, needs a fix ASAP, its frustrating not getting the hellbomb anywhere near it when you are required to place it as close as possible.

But fully agreed with the standard infantry. You get anything from the double sword melee fighters, regular troopers, and those dreaded Commisars that will literally chase you down across the map just to deal 50% damage to your health in a single shot because they just straight up execute you. I never get this much variety with the bugs, they're all fairly slow. Hunters are the only ones that I really struggle with but that's less so due to their speed and more so because of their stunlock.

Running away from bugs is both easier and harder. It's much easier to kite them around the map since they're all melee and usually not very fast, but Hunters, Chargers and Bile Titans simply WILL not leave you be. At the same time, running away from something has never been as stressful against bugs as with bots, when you have to leave your cover and run while an endless barrage of gunfire and rockets are flying your way. Most don't chase you much but I find myself getting pinned down in unsurvivable situations a lot more frequently with the bots. Not really a bad thing, it's just what makes them different from bugs and what I prefer.

That being said, I do hope they tweak some of the things. Mortars shouldnt magically know where you are at if nothing else has actually spotted you, Detector Towers shouldnt bounce off the hellbombs, shooting down Dropships should actually kill most, if not all of the units it was carrying or get crushed under it, and rocket devestators could use a brief cooldown for their rockets. There was that one time where one fired a barrage, and literally 2 seconds later, he fired again. That's not even enough time for me to pull out my support weapon and aim at it.

[Buntkreuz]

Agreed. I think Mordor should have to actually spot you to call dropships, Mortars should at least have a patrol spot you and call reinforcements (use flare) or have the actual Mortar base detect you and killing Mordor should finally become possible without having the ground bounce of any stratagem pokeball.