[SS 1.0] Whirlwind

[bman3k]

Is the 5 second setup time the whirlwind has really necessary? It's so long :(. The exorcist doesn't even have setup time!

Edit: By saying that the exorcist doesn't even have a setup time I am not saying that SM=SoB or WW=Exorcist, just comparing something slightly similar :).

[TheMiracul]

Hmmm, even a basilisk has just 1.5.... agree make it lower....

Edit: On the other hand, it has the lowest reload time in comparison to other artilery.... it is kinda realistic that the vehicle needs the same time for fiering its first misile alike the second, third, fourth......

[Cold_Crusader]

Refire rate isn't the why the set-up time is there, it's that neither the Exorcist nor Bassie are capable of dealing out the damage the WW can. Personally, I dislike the way the WW is balanced (it should come sooner, but hurt less, and shouldn't be hard-capped at 1), but it doesn't need a buff.

[KotCR]

I have to agree with Cold_Crusader, the Whirlwind right now is poorly represented in DoW.

Sure, it's a good unit, but a farcry from what it's supposed to be.

The Whirlwind, in the fluff, is a fast-moving, highly mobile, light artillery unit, designed for engaging opponents at moderate range - as a result, you'd think it would be faster moving and have a much shorter set-up time than other artillery like the Basilisk, with far less actual firepower than units like the Basilisk, but instead what we see in DoW is quite different.

The Basilisk acts more like the Whirlwind should act in some cases, and the Whirlwind acts more like the Basilisk should...but there you go...

[SpArTy]

Fluff + Dow STOP!

WW T3 again please. Compensation for those things we call 'Terminators'.

[KotCR]

Armed with the largest tin opener you have ever seen.
Everybody wants to be a Terminator, that way they too will not get hungry round the camp fire at night.
Though personally, as far as combat is concerned, I'd rather the regular Marines' knife. Those massive tin openers just ain't no good in a fight.

Make for good party tricks though.

[Hawillis]

WW has no FF and no missing.
Make it have the above (and hence some skill to use) and then you can have you buffs...

[mlai]

WWs were accurately represented in DOW.
Then came the WA/DC balance team.
"OMFG arty mechanics in this game interfere with my gosu micr0z! NERF!!"
Their idea of nerf is to push it into tiers 3/4 where "it doesn't matter" for 1v1. Then buffed to ridiculousness and made a max 1 unit to compensate.

[Pseudonymn]

LoL. It does seem that way, doesn't it? I kind of miss being able to build a small armada of WWs, some cloaked scouts/skulls and WTFPWN everything at long range.

All jest aside, I have to admit that I don't really like having most things hardcapped at one and only one unit. I find it limits my tactical options just a little too much. T3-T4 armies are even more cookie cutter than earlier tier builds in that sense.

[ImmortalChaos]

Buff the WW?! It still 1 hit kills much of the T1 infantry. Squads at a time.

[War-Reborn]

it could use friendly fire but other than that it's fine as it is, it may come late but it's a genuinly useful unit, unlike most of the other craptastic arty in the game

[Riotlung]

Friendly fire on a unit built to massacre very quickly doesn't sound too good to me. Not even the Basilisk could compare... (which makes it's FF more sensible)

[KotCR]

WWs were accurately represented in DOW.
Yeh, I liked the Whirlwinds in DoW, they seemed just about right. Now, well, they're all over the place and nowhere at all at the same time...

[Energizer Bunny]

No buffs for WW. Already bordering imba.

Doesn't seem to be a middle ground on this unit. They are pathetic in DoW vanilla. Don't know why anybody liked them back then - they never got used at all. Probably because all your vehicle cap went on the 4 Landraiders, but still... they were shit.

[mlai]

Think about what you could do back in DoW...

-As many Land Raiders as you want.
-As many Predators as you want.
-Deep Strike was so fast, you can do continuous drops of Dreads into enemy base.

So yeah, of course a balanced WW was shit compared to that. Nobody used the Rhino, either. Ever. But it's the exact same Rhino as now. Yet anybody worth a damn uses Rhinos now. So your example really doesn't say much.

[Agoniser]

But it's the exact same Rhino as now.
Except that it now has four times as much health and can transport more squads. :p

*runs away*

[KotCR]

Yeah, the Rhino was never used in DoW for the reasons mentioned above.

It had 500HP, vehicle_low armour, could only carry one squad, and the shitty boarding code (which is still in place in vanilla DoW last I checked, BTW) meant that loading one up with troops for transportation was just impractical anyway.

The reason the current Rhino sees far more use is obvious.

EDIT: Oh yeh, it also originally took 2 vehicle cap IIRC, though they patched it down to 1 vehicle cap at some point I believe.

Vanilla DoW Rhino or vanilla DoW Dreadnought? Not exactly a hard choice :p.

Particularly seems I can deepstrike 4 of those Dreads via a single-swoop in it....this new breed of deepstrike whiners (who still complain, despite SM deepstrike being underwhelming these days) don't realise how good they have it vs. SM now, quite sad really...

[mlai]

Oh right, I forgot how bad the old transport code was.
Okay, still doesn't excuse the nonsense of no FF from an arty. Even the Fire Prism has FF of a sort.

[ImmortalChaos]

Don't forget the smoke buffs :I

[Makenshi]

W-what? Smoke bombs give cover to vehicles?! WTF! O_O

I thought it worked like map cover (inf + walkers only)

[Zany Reaper]

I kinda like how whirlwinds are ATM. They can actually kill stuff now compared to their redundancy in vanilla - which made them really the most useful unit for your opponent as they literally would fling their troops actually towards your own army, whilst barely doing any damage.

Infact, the whirlwind was so pathetic that if it was still how it was in vanilla, then I'd be very happy that it'd be used against me, as it would effectively give my melee troops a speed buff. Combined with the knockback bug where a certain variety of units cannot be shot at whilst 'getting up,' let along being thrown, the current whirlwind is now a major improvement.

Whirlwinds back then probably killed dancing as well. If I had some melee units chasing a squad of gunny space marines, then the whirlwind would actually enable my melee units to flank the dancer, forcing them into melee.

I agree that the set-up time is a pest, but the fact that they have a good weapon range anyhow sorta makes the set-up time a mere annoyance.

[ImmortalChaos]

In vanilla the WW didnt hit reliably enough to do anything like that :p
It did, however, break squads near instantly, making it very useful in ranged stand-offs.

[MoschBoy]

artillery in DoW had a pure disruption role as infantry support - and to dig out turret farms in long games. they really didnt do much dmg, however, they were not intended to be dmg dealers but disrupption dealer back then. it was another game concept, so its not exactly fair to compare DoW ww with WA+ WW.

btw, rhinos got used - for their smoke launchers and to transport servitors to repair your 4 landraiders. and 4 LR were perfectly fine since they werent as strong as in WA+, on top of that you could get more (and cheaper) preds. you are starting to compare apples with melons.

i cant really see what is wrong with te current WW - he does high and accurate long range dmg and is the prime unit to support an infantry based penetration. yes, 5 sec setup time is a bit high, on the other hand you wont be exactly dancing it around, will you? normally he WW is set up bevore an attack is started.

[Hawillis]

1. Its too accurate.
2. Its no FF.

Fix the above plz. If you want increase its damage to compensate. I dont know about DOW w.e but I do know if you jump troops into SM base, WW instantly blows them all up with a direct hit. grr!

[God_Of_Scots]

Sm has it hard enough as it is in the game. By far the weakest race in the game due to its lack of good mu's. I would lower it for sure. It's not a very widely used unit anyways and as I see it, its t4, costs a ton for an artillery unit, and takes up 4 cap (if I'm correct). Basks are t2, fairly spendy, but have incredible range, a t3 ability, amazing artillery abilities and come with a total of 3 available basks in your army at one time.

[MoschBoy]

Sm has it hard enough as it is in the game. By far the weakest race in the game due to its lack of good mu's. I would lower it for sure. It's not a very widely used unit anyways and as I see it, its t4, costs a ton for an artillery unit, and takes up 4 cap (if I'm correct). Basks are t2, fairly spendy, but have incredible range, a t3 ability, amazing artillery abilities and come with a total of 3 available basks in your army at one time.
what a pile of crap

1vs1, yes, there are some very troubeling MU (eldar, tau). they have one of the best tier 3 and lategames in the game. every SM worth anything gets the WW as soon as available - its always a good idea to get it.

[Hawillis]

^ LOL rofl
Best T3? Elf. Then probably IG/Ork with a good show from chaos. SM T3 is way way down there in power. But you have to blame terminators for this, because SM already get preds at T3. Thats enough new vehicles surely?

[ImmortalChaos]

Well SM T4 pwns the fuck out of every other T4 because of the WW.

[Arcinatus]

@ above

*cough* imbaavatarvehiclepopcapbonus *cough*

:P

[Jaimas]

People, give up. Relic has forbidden your precious "artillery" from ever being represented correctly on the grounds that it rapes the almighty force of FOF micro.

One of many bits of frozen stupid in this game, brought to you by the same mentality that brought you the FOTM fix that basically handed an IWIN button to the Eldar, self-breaking Psykers, and Fire Prism Spam.

[ImmortalChaos]

Technically this thread is a discussion as to why buffing the WW is retardation, not why we should fix it :p

[MoschBoy]

SM T3 is way way down there in power.
its not shining on its own like some other races, but combined with SM tier 2 its nothing to go over with ease; a full SM tier 3 force with tacs+HW, heroes, tier 3 infantry and vehicles has nothing to fear. the problem is more that it needs a solid tier 2 to shine, not like IG, chaos or elf, who all either get very good out of the box units or upgrades that make some tier 2 units wtfpwn in tier 3;

[Hawillis]

A full SM t3 has many things to fear. Mainly enemy vehicles, especially their T4 ones. However I would still fear 3x WS + support (platforms and such), 2xGitz + doks, etc.

But tisnt the point. SM T3 is like SM T2: it still takes ages. WoTE is great but you must have sac relic and time for the research, etc. and still in T3 SM has no real vehicle answer. Still the WW wouldnt provide one.

[ImmortalChaos]

Obviously a T3 SM has to fear T4 vehicles.

T4 SM has no problem with them.

[Jaimas]

Fair enough, just as long as we're clear. :p

[4Servant]

sm techs slower to t4 than other races so you gota fight t3 vs t4.

[ImmortalChaos]

Uh, it costs the same ammount and takes the same ammount of time as most T4's do...

[4Servant]

Stop comparing in ''relic news'' vacum, sm has worthless eco all their units cost alot so at best case you fight t3 vs t4.

In theory its all possible practical in a 1n1 its not possible to reach t4 at the same time as most other races.

[ImmortalChaos]

SM eco is pretty balls, and generally they spend a shitload on T2 so they are late to t3, but as far as my experiance goes, their T4 comes as fast as they want it to. If they KNOW they are going to need laspreds, they shouldnt be much slower than other races to come out...

[Hawillis]

:noway:

[KotCR]

btw, rhinos got used - for their smoke launchers and to transport servitors to repair your 4 landraiders. and 4 LR were perfectly fine since they werent as strong as in WA+, on top of that you could get more (and cheaper) preds. you are starting to compare apples with melons.
3 Land Raiders. 20 max vehicle cap. 5 cap per Land Raider. 1 cap per Rhino. 1 Rhino = 19 cap left. Only enough for 3 Land Raiders.

The Rhino wasn't reduced to 0 cap, max limit 3 until WA anyway, IIRC.

And why Transport the Servitors in the Rhinos when you could just transport them in the Land Raiders anyway? You weren't going to be loading anything else into the Land Raiders because of the retarded boarding code in vanilla. And you would just deepstrike your entire cap of Terminators to the location - because you could (albeit Termies had a high cap cost). Or you could deepstrike 6 Tactical Squads from the Orbital Relay if they were your preferred flavour, seems as the cap is used on Land Raiders in this case you wouldn't have needed the space to Deep Strike Dreads.

I still don't see why you would use Rhinos in vanilla then, at least not once you had Land Raiders. Spend your 20 cap on 4 Land Raiders, each carrying their own Servitor. Don't bother with Rhinos. You wouldn't have needed the smokes because of the Land Raider's Machine Spirit power anyway, and your troops had WotE (complete with Librarian invincibility despite the description) and stacking Apothecary Healing to keep them alive...

[Energizer Bunny]

Nobody built rhino's in vanilla. Nobody.

[MaddoxX]

SM can fight T3 vs T4 if you know what to build to counter your opponent and when or how to strike, for example to use an assualt SM as bait to attract enemy while deep striking in his base.

[MoschBoy]

and nobody gets a full cap of termies in vanilla. nobody.

[D-coy]

And how your posts are relevant to the discussion, may I dare asking?

My suggestion (some same as most people's):

*Give it friendly fire
*Decrease accuracy a bit (like 10%) or increase offset a bit, so it won't hit 100%
*Maybe give it an ability with which it shoots once, Exorcist style (it has a missile battery for a reason)
*Maybe reduce pop cost to 4 (I don't know if it's really needed)
*Maybe increase speed by 2-3 (if you want to compensate somehow for the minor accuracy nerf and friendly fire)

Cheers

[fs_xyz]

Ehh... current one already cost 4 pop.
I only agree on friendly fire part.
Since SM can only get one, each of its shot should worth something.
Let's say it is its unique trait.
Beside it if retain 100% accuracy, a SM player can prevent that thing to injure their own infantries.... in short, learn to control whirlwind better rather attack move command.

[MaddoxX]

Why not slow effect on attack also.

[bman3k]

Why not slow effect on attack also.
i c wut u did thar

The WW is pretty good at what it does, but I just feel having to wait 5 damn seconds to shoot is a long time, lower it to like 3.5 and I'll be happy. Also I think it is pretty good the way it is other wise, it does decent damage and has good accuracy, but its T4 so it's not quite as damaging.

[Jaimas]

At least the Whirlwind can do something. The Bassie is feces when not dropping Earthshakers or fielded en masse and consuming about 50% of your support cap.

[D-coy]

It has a slowing effect. AFAIK 50% reduction.

Cheers

[MaddoxX]

Hum didn't know, maybe because of the strong knockback.

[ImmortalChaos]

At least the Whirlwind can do something. The Bassie is feces when not dropping Earthshakers or fielded en masse and consuming about 50% of your support cap.
Boo-fucking-hoo. Keep the whines to the IG threads please.

[Zany Reaper]

An interesting twist would just be to take away the Whirlwind's anti-infantry capability & make it demolish buildings more effectively instead. Giving them Friendly fire would still distrupt your own troops, but at least it wouldn't kill them in like, 2 shots.

[D-coy]

Interesting idea, but I think that would only lead to serious base-bashing with the WW and deepstriking while the whole SM army camps outside the base with Heavy Weapons (might not be the case in 1v1, though).

Cheers

[ImmortalChaos]

Could always make the WW fire 2 projectiles, the current one and a second one that does no damage, only knockback, and does that knockback against friendly units as well.

[MaddoxX]

If you did that then SM player would argue to relic to make the second projectile does damage as well.

[Energizer Bunny]

Why would they do that?

[ImmortalChaos]

The second projectile would be sneaky and invisible and land in the exact same place as the first one anyways. No one would know it was there, it would just make the WW knock your own troops around.

[fuggles]

Pretty much identical to the fire prism basically?

[ImmortalChaos]

Exactly identical.

[MaddoxX]

Agree with you but SM player argue more about their setup time.

[Zany Reaper]

Yeah. That long set-up time is rather annoying.

[MaddoxX]

Do you think that giving him a heavy bolter that fire only during the setup time would be good.