[SS 1.2] Necron Warriors - The Crux of the Necron Problem

[Xanthian]

Most players are forced to get destroyers to keep up, because any race needs tanks if they want to survive, its just that Destroyers/heavy destroyers are definitly not the best tanks in the game.

And if you're using destroyers as tanks, you're doing it wrong. Necron warriors are your tanks. Destroyers are your tie-up and mobile anti-melee ranged unit.

Alternatively, if you're suggesting that every race actually needs durable vehicles to win (as opposed to durable units in general), I'd introduce you to orks and DE. A very large number of players don't build vehicles unless they need to counter heavy weapon masses or need a transport. And the destroyer fits the first category perfectly

Also the fact that Destroyers/Heavy Destroyers get tied up in melee is actually more of a disadvantage then an advantage, because they do far more damage in range then in melee. Unless you are using them to up ranged squads in melee combat (??????) the other races tanks are generally a lot better. It may do nice melee damage, but its a single unit and not a squad. In fact most inf squads could most likely out melee it, (apart from maybe obliterators)

Destroyers have a very respectable 41.3 dps across the board to all infantry, on a platform with 30 move speed, when *all* ranged infantry that can equip heavy weapons has in the ballpark of 1-2 dps against it in melee. Notice how the destroyer is the perfect tie-up for heavy weapons who are the only things I see people complaining about with necron warriors?

The relic wiki is borked, since it suggests tying up destroyers (which unit's going to be mobile enough to do that except maybe stormboys?), then in the very same paragraph tells you to be wary of your AV getting tied up and killed in melee by it.

The destroyer, for all intents and purposes is a wraith with brilliant shooting, faster move speed, way more durability, but no detection or decapping potential.

Any race can do the same, not just crons.

Orks get one teleport for one squad, SM gets the deep strike and a slow teleport on termies. Chaos gets a deep strike on some units and a teleport on oblits. Barring any lapses in memory, that's pretty much it. That's a far cry from an early-game deep-striking melee unit, a hugely teleporting hero, and all infantry being able to teleport back to base.

Yes, other races have mobility options such as transports, eldar scramjets, or IG tunneling, but these aren't an unstoppable retreat tactic that always works. They can still be countered and shut down. (Ok, maybe eldar scramjets are comparable.)

The one sentiment I can share is that the fotm issue certainly does affect destroyers a lot. Just as it affects pretty much every vehicle that doesn't have a flamer.

[PandaMine]

The wiki states that you need to be careful of SMALL AV squads getting tied up to it in melee, since the destroyer does large damage to single targets (in melee and range). When you are however up against 2-3 scourge/tankbuster etc etc squads then it will easily get outmeleed

Obviously Destroyers/Heavy Destroyers are not supposed to be used in the front line (when I mean tanks, Im talking about vechiles in general and not units that are soaking up all the damage). The issue is however, which you still haven't realised or rebutted against is that Destroyers/Heavy Destroyers are very expensive for the cost, and although they have nice mobility, as I said mobility without high FotM especially on units like Destroyers they are mediocre at the best

The only cron units that can Deepstrike is FO, which past T2 get obliterated with any ranged firepower. They also move slow as hell and can't catch up to anything. The fact that they can deepstrike is their only saving grace, and more often then not they are used to defend your immortals behind your mono or to temperarily tie up ranged squads (which they can't do for too long thanks to crappy movespeed). Yes FO are powerful in T1/T2, but thanks to the recent economy nerf's to Crons, you would be lucky to deepstrike them more then 2 times without killing your tech

Remember that just because a unit is used doesn't mean its balanced, cron players are basically forced to use FO/Destroyers/Heavy Destroyers in T3/T4 because they have no other options, crons have the least units available out of any race.

SM can also deepstrike Dreads, which are fuken nasty when you find them running around in your base. Chaos can deepstrike RANGED units that do massive AV damage, as well as deepstrike another one of the most powerful ranged squads (Obliterators).

The fact is, that currently necrons are completely reliant on Mono/NL to be of any use in T4 (and NL for pre T4). Any race that is reliant on relic units or their lord is not good at all.

Also up until T3.5/T4, transports are an unstoppable retreat tactic in most situations. Necron Summoning is obviously handy, but only works on your own base (and has a CD) where as transports take you everywhere.

Orks and DE still build tanks, just not as much as other races. Wartrukk spam with Bomb Chucker and AV is bloody nasty if you're orks, and DE do jetbike spam (doesn't help that their DIAS takes up 6 pop). You will rarely find a game where a race gets no vechiles in T4 (if they reach that).

As it stands Warriors with their horrible re-inforce time, pathetic movespeed and crappy range have more weakness then strengths (now their only strength is high HP). NL/Immortals are the only outstanding units that Crons have, a lot of their other units are seen as decent to shit (scarabs for example). Their only saving grace in T4 is mono, without it they get raped by any other race in T4, especially against massive ranged firepower

[Compeador]

the recent economy nerf's to Crons

What nerfs? All I saw were buffs.


Yes, other races are more mobile. Um, duh. We know that. What, you want more mobility or something? That's not the way cron plays.


Aaaand no, they're not completely reliant on mono or lord, though a cron without a nec lord is a stupid cron indeed.

Nec warriors, slow and plodding as they are, are devastating when they get into range. They have massive HP. They can sorta kinda deepstrike due to spyders.

Destroyers always return their cost in enemy losses... they're like having 2 and a half land speeders, hence the high cost. Destros are gooooooooood vehicles.

Crons are fine. Very well balanced, nothing broken about them except wraiths.

[Rotlung]

As a Noob player, i say...

You see, that's why people don't listen to us...

The issue is however, which you still haven't realised or rebutted against is that Destroyers/Heavy Destroyers are very expensive for the cost, and although they have nice mobility, as I said mobility without high FotM especially on units like Destroyers they are mediocre at the best

Eh? Wasn't it supposed to be the other way round? Fast units can stop and shoot and all that (think Eldar). It's more imperative for slow units to get good FotM, which is exactly what Necron Warriors are (which is the main focus in this thread... by right). Because they are slow, their high FotM (relatively) would allow them to continue to walk and shoot and not stop. A very fast unit doesn't need FotM when it can easily just stop and shoot. Granted, they can be tied up, but Dark Reapers can be tied up too, have absolutely no FotM, and move slower than Destroyers even with FoF. It's only their improved range and damage that make sense for them.

Regarding HP and cost, let's talk about the Heavy Destroyer and compare it with a Dreadnought. Dreadnought has 4780 and Heavy Destroyer has 3000 for same armour type. Dreadnought costs 170 req and 305 power 3 support cap, Heavy Destroyer only costs 300 power and 3 support cap. The power cost difference is negligible. Dreadnought costs req (and the inevitable vehicle cap upgrade). It generally seems pretty fair to me, considering that the Heavy Destroyer has 30 speed, compared with the Dreadnought's 18. Even if speed isn't a factor, the Heavy Destroyer isn't a sloppy unit at all.

Let's not even begin talking about the Vehicle Low 1050 HP of the Land Speeder.

Hmm... is this thread still entitled "Necron Warriors - The Crux of the Necron Problem", or is it Destroyers now?

[Gannadene]

As far as Destroyers go, they're there to offset the plodding, short-ranged Necron army. They do that well, although they're incredibly expensive for the time you need them in most often. Like I said before, they're usually a big risk. If you see a single Sentinel, enemy Immortals, whatever, you might as well just forget about using your Destroyer for the time being - at least until you can field something to counter the counter, which may take a while, considering how slowly your reinforcements might arrive.

As far as Warriors go, most of what allows them to function are other units. They require a Lord or Destroyers, Wraiths, Pariahs - even FO if they can actually keep their targets still - to operate like they should. I don't agree that's NOT how a race should work. Necrons do get the shaft as far as options go, however. Most of their more reliable answers are either quite expensive or limited in number. It's not as though Warriors have a short term Phase Shifter or FoF built into the squad that they can use if your Lord finally kicks the bucket.

That's one reason why I disagree that T4 Necrons have it made. Greater numbers, possibly more strenuous resources, but limited means to counter large masses. Your Necron Lord, by that point, will be your answer. If he goes down for whatever reason (and his Solar Pulse or NS with him), you don't have much of a way to protect your forces against turret farms, artillery or heavy bolters. Everything revolves around the Lord (as it should). Warriors just need a way to offset this slightly in T4, when the Lord's range and abilities are no longer sufficient to counter a full army. The most obvious answer to me are Lord Destroyers' stasis field, just to counter infantry long enough to minimize damage. This isn't reliable or realistic in some situations, however.

Most of any problem T4 Necrons have is with assault, or defending against bombardment. With assault, I have less sympathy because the Lord should be around, and defenses should naturally be condensed. With bombardment (or long range griefing, whatever) there are fewer options. It can be said that as playing Cron, if you allow this scenerio to happen at all, you haven't been doing your job. I agree, but I feel like Warriors do need some minor compensation to make them more reliable in these kinds of situations.

Yes, Warriors do work fine now. Mostly. They don't need much, but they need something, whether you agree or not.

[edbop]

you might as well have written i'm right and you're wrong at the end of that post.

[Gannadene]

I actually noticed I was late for a class and had to leave it like that, heh. I was going to say, "I feel like they need something to help them over the hump in certain situations. If you disagree with that, I'll just have to agree to disagree." Just didn't have time to stop, backspace, think and type. (I ended up three minutes late, after driving like a madman.)

But anyway, my basic point was that Warriors are fine most of the time, but there are certain situations for Necrons that are next to impossible to deal with, at no fault to the player. Most of that comes from the lack of options that are readily available. There's a fine line between making them overpowered to compensate for those times, or adding content to accessorize them for those type of events.

The problem is that since Necrons are so unlike the other races, it's difficult to add a simple buff without further complicating things for everyone else.

[dreadlord]

I posted this already some time ago, but I think the problem of the warriors is that they scale so bad in higher tiers.

So my idea was that the Necron Warriors could gain health with the monolith upgrades like the flayed ones.
For every upgrade add 20 hp.
So with the usual 1 Monolith they will get fom 870 to 910.
But if the game takes longer and you stay a while in T4 it would be possible to get a max health of 990.

[Gannadene]

I posted this already some time ago, but I think the problem of the warriors is that they scale so bad in higher tiers.

So my idea was that the Necron Warriors could gain health with the monolith upgrades like the flayed ones.
For every upgrade add 20 hp.
So with the usual 1 Monolith they will get fom 870 to 910.
But if the game takes longer and you stay a while in T4 it would be possible to get a max health of 990.

I think that'd actually help make Necrons a little more competitive, and a lot more interesting (and fluffy in terms of their gaining momentum)... but don't ever see it being added. Most people would freak out.

[PandaMine]

@Compeador

There are a lot of valid reasons why your NL would die in T4
1. He can't be attached to any squad (therefore he gets the majority of focus fire)
2. His tier 4 HP isn't that great
3. He has to TP right into the middle of the army
4. T4 often have so much firepower that it isn't uncommon for unattached commanders to die in a second

Even if NL does have phylacentry, the army would just aim for your warriors instead of NL, in which case your warriors get raped. NL also has TP to get away, odds are however that he will have such low health that he won't be able to contribute anymore unless you're army has won and you are just cleaning up with him

How are they not reliant on NL or mono? Seriously think about what you are saying. WTF are slow moving units with no firepower going to do? Imaging you have 4 warrior squads move up into your army, with a couple of immortals and maybe 2/3 destroyers AND/OR heavy destroyers, you are SM and have SMS raping them with heavy bolters, in which around 3-4 seconds most likely 2 warrior squads get raped. The cron player at this point would probably deepstrike FO to try and tie the SMS into melee and damage their morale, however they are so god damn slow that the SMS just dance away and can use rally squad to recover morale. Any AV would take care of the Destroyes/Heavy destroyers in seconds, hell a SMS squad of missile launchers could do it

Don't go on about wraiths because they do jackshit in big battles unless you are stupid enough to focus fire them. Versing crons without a lord or mono in T4 is like shooting fish in a barrel, they are so slow and none of their units have so much firepower (except for immortals AV) that they pose a threat.

Im not saying that they are supposed to have more mobility, they are supposed to slow and so we should leave it like that. However in TT, NW have more HP, more range and more damage so they can at least, in T4, survive against the massive firepower and more importantly ACTUALLY DEAL some damage. There is no point in being tanky and soaking up damage if you don't actually do anything, and currently in order for crons to do anything they need Mono and/or NL

[GrimDark]

*killed 4 players on FFA while playing Necs*

Heh, what? Necs underpowered? Tell me more.

Sure, NW die do CoW shees, warp spiders rape them (like just about everything), but isn't that true that necs get invisible army?
Or "I win" abilities?
Best turrets ever?
DP level NL after upgrading few monos?
The only indestructible unit in the game?
Most durable FREE troops early/late game?
Awesome elite CC unit?
Indestructible decappers?
DS'ing whole pop cap of troops only if a single obelisk is nearby?
Morale killing "OMGFLAYEDRUNRUN" always DS'ing CC unit?
Best fotm?
Ressurecting troops?
Possibility to recycle dead troops for free?
Ability to ignore point decay as a only race in the game?

Bad points:
They are slow. Most of them that is - finding those pesky eldar on a big map is annoying.
Only one NL.
NW can't outshoot plasma/HB's (well huh)
Mono will not win alone. Then again it's a mobile base.
So-so "walker". But it's not his primary function so who cares.
At least two tiers with one production building.

You guys are doing this wrong.

And hey - in DC I beat plenty of other necs - 'couse they blindly belived in their flayed rush/warrior mass. You could not do it then, so trying to return to "good old days" it will not help. Only few creative nec's got me, and they had Skills and some imagination.

And I don't mean full pop cap of flayed.

PandaMine - that situation you described is simple, but with wraiths. Only a fool will walk in to a ready enemy. Usually I use NL to distrupt enemy (lol flare/scream thing). But in this case wraith with it's ability on just fly's by (you can drop 2-3 squads of flayed now to move enemy out of cover - for 3-4 seconds they will be invincible and he will have to relocate heavy weapons, you can now get him with his pants around his ankles now) or continue with wraith to his base. Drop flayed near his gens - receive panicked opponent.

Most of his troops (if not all) should rush back to save his base ("he's doing flayed bomb on me!!!") while you just walk in on his position and kill what he left behind. Now HE has to walk in under your barrels. Fun eh? With added Deceiver/fake mono combo it's even more fun.

And I mostly play Chaos...

[Gannadene]

"Scream Thing"

It would seem your purported domination of Necrons would indicate there is a problem with the race. But I suppose you're just -that good,- right?

[slay2rr]

@PandaMine

NL don't have good hp? are you out of your mind? fully upgraded NL have 4500hp, name me another commander that tops thats?

"4. T4 often have so much firepower that it isn't uncommon for unattached commanders to die in a second"

So your saying that a daemon prince dies in a few second? why the hell would a chaos player bother with DP?

You should know that DP only have 500hp more than NL, also daemon high is not as good as commander.

[Pseudonymn]

The only indestructible unit in the game?

*Shakes head*

Sophistry. An "indestructible unit" implies that it would last for the remainder of the game once deployed. If you are referring to Essence of the C'Tan, as I believe you are, it only lasts for 60 seconds and can be disrupted by unit abilities (ever had him locked down by AssTermies?) before it literally self-destructs. While it doesn't take damage for those 60 seconds, it is far from being "indestructible". No other unit in the game has such a predictable lifeline - not including Tau Holograms, as they aren't true units by virtue of their doing no damage (though they can make equally good damage sponges).

[Orgad_E]

also daemon high is not as good as commander.

no quite true.

unless its a few anti deamon weapons like GK or commanders, deamon high is wayyyy better- check the regular troops damage vs it (like fw, GM,warpspider/reapers etc etc)

[Xanthian]

Check the destroyer's melee damage vs commanders and daemon_high.

Sorry, it begged to be comic-flamed.

[PandaMine]

@slayer

Yeah, crons really have the economy to create multiple monoliths in SS 1.2....... AND upgrade them fully .......

I mean we all have the money to build another 4 restored monoliths to bring NL up to 5000HP, because crons happen to be the worlds best bankers....

Give me break

[The_nuketrooper]

Alot of players are not using their NL to the max ,and then bitch about the crons being UP.Early game chronometron,phase shifter and solar pulse make the lord a real nightmare (after that you can delete the FA ,to get some power back). You can't kill the thing- and with phase shifter he(it?!) phases the rest of the troops ,not only making them invulenrable ,but actually healing them.When the enemy tries to run away ,chronometron gives your warriors a chance to catch up and do damage.

In T4 you usually need to get the essesnce of the C'tans first ,and then the monolith. Jump in, Decieve some of his troops , bug any attached commander (lol if you manage to perma-decieve a chappy),set anything that remains on hold fire ,then teleport the army to the fake monolith to murder the rest.
Lord destroyers can use stasis field to get the ubers out of the game and even t4 tanks - since most players will outright delete them if they see the LD trying to cap them. The bastards are really hard to spot in a tight fight and personally I tend to mistake them for regular distroyers and miss them ..needless to say that causes me alot of pain ;]

Bottom line - I don't think the crons are underpowered ..not after I had my ass handed to me yesterday 7 times by a cron player.

[PandaMine]

That is what I am exactly saying however, no decent player versing crons should let them get a relic, because currently they are pretty weak in earlier tiers (not as bad as SM but not that much better).

They are currently reliant on the lord and on a relic (for mono, deciever/nightbringer)

[The Deciever]

deciever\nightbringer doesnt require relic


EDIT: sorry didnt realise you said "necron lord AND relic"

[The_nuketrooper]

The essence requires no relic. Unless my info is outdated? I think crons are not more reliant on their lord than is let's say IG on their command squad (I recently haven't seen any complaints from people that they are forced to get the command squad in order to survive) . In the early tiers you can use the lord to give your troops time to close in . Just as the CS ties the enemy and harasses the base. So what's wrong with that ? The artifacts from the FA will help you stay on even grounds with the enemy in the early tiers .

When it comes to t4 ,few races do not need their uber units to win the fight

[edbop]

That is what I am exactly saying however, no decent player versing crons should let them get a relic, because currently they are pretty weak in earlier tiers (not as bad as SM but not that much better).

i think you must be playing a different game mate.

[PandaMine]

Have you play Necrons in SS at all? Necrons in DC are TOTALLY DIFFERENT to necrons in SS. Unless you are Tau or IG, you have no god damn excuse for raping necrons back to front. The fact that they have to build like 50 million gens, wait years to get their warriors running (before they get spyders) in order to get a decent army and the HP of the lord was nerfed so its worse then the FC.

On another note, how the hell are IG reliant on CC? They only need CC to survive early game, in T3/T4 when you have a zillion GM smashing at you with plasma and all morale immune thanks to commi, CC is going to do jack shit in that situation. IG are god damn powerful enough without their CC in later tiers

Look the I don't mind the whole each extra mono grants HP bonuses to flayed ones and NL, however in the current state the necro economy is in its like saying, "you're gonna get this big zappa gun that can obliterate everything" however "it will cost you 2 gazillion dollars"

Building extra mono's AND upgrading them not only takes a long time (and a hell of a lot of space considering the shit ZoC they have) and a LOT of energy. The problem is that Crons, UNLIKE other races, cannot get more then +150 energy unless they fill half the map with gens which will take like a year.

Mind you I can see potential with FO getting 10400 total HP in a squad with 2 extra engaged monoliths, however I don't really see them getting there

[The_nuketrooper]

First of all it's CS(command squad) ,second by the time you have fully kitted,priested,commied gms you will be behind in tech . And third -yeah, CS is very sucky in later tiers due to their crappy abilities - like the jack-shit-doing CotM,lighting arc,strafing run,fanaticism and the so useless detection.

Back to necrons.
Economy is something you need to build .Every race has to build their economy before they can mass their troops. Crons need generators.Only. Other races -need LPs and generators. If the map offers few SPs all other races eat dikksandwiches .
I agree that the building time for the gens could use some cut-cut and/or the time before the decay starts should be increased . That is open for discussion I think

But you are right - dc and ss crons are very different. DC crons were pretty much attack-move race. I don't want them back.

[Rotlung]

Hmm, if it matters, obelisks reduce build times, so plasma generators would get up quicker and generate a greater absolute quantity of power...

[PandaMine]

I just edited the post

The problem SPECIFICALLY with crons economy is that you will be luky to get +100 considering that its limited by only by how many gens you make, and after you make your 5th gen it takes like a year to build another one. Where as other players in T4 can get + 200 in power (or even more) if they do full research, have a slag or two and remember to destroyer and rebuild gens to bypass decay (and their economy exponentially grows with strategic points), the Necrons economy actually gets SLOWER later into the game and not FASTER

@nuketrooper

Strafing run is kinda useless (it only does 1/3 damage), im not saying that CS is useless, but compared to what the rest of IG can do, they are definitley NOT reliant on CS. BTW later in the game its recommended to remove that psycher in you're CS (i.e. don't rebuild him if you're CC dies) and instead attach him to one of you're GM squads hanging around, because late game CS needs to be fulled completely with priests and possibly a commisar (you only need psycher early because its cheaper and you don't have a meat shield then)

EDIT: I don't even think that obelisks reduce build time for gens (or if they do it seems to have minimal effect). It appears that after you're 5th gen, they take a hell of a lot of time to build (even if you have +100% for research, just tried it)

[Rotlung]

Or you can equip the CS with a priest and 3 psykers for ability spamming up to thrice a row, each.

That's 3x CotMS, 3x Lightning Arc and 3x Strip Soul. The Priest is for getting the group out of nasty situations when your micro makes a mistake. Of course, for lategame such a configuration would be on ranged stance...

And yeah, you're right. Obelisks affect unit building times, but not building building times.

When finished the Obelisk gives the following benefits (limit of 66% on all three):
Research Time is reduced by 10% (does not effect Monolith, Obelisk, or Gauss Turret upgrade times)
Reinforce Time is reduced by 10%
Build Time for Infantry and Vehicles is reduced by 10%
The time bonus displayed is the portion of the maximum 66% bonus achieved.

[GrimDark]

Tsk. I'm a hardcore CSM player, I only play other races only once per holidays.

And no, I'm not uber in necs, but since 90% players out there tries the same old thing time and time again winning with them is not that hard - no one expects you do something else.

Power - with 2 slags you can laugh at any other player. Last game (yes, I do play in SS. Everything costs a bit more and flayed are more squishy - everething else feels the same) with 2 slags and about 5 gens - had more but they were nuked every 20 seconds - I played all out fight with 3 players on three fronts. Only after several minutes my economy started to collapse. But then I built tomb spyders, started using res orb more and laughed at pathectic attempts of the enemy to match my output.

Free immortals/flayed? Yes please.

Oh, and ass termies getting busy with the nightbringer for 60 secs? While my pariahs rape his asscannon termies? And then asstermies from behind while they are still busy with NB?
Hell, it's the best scenario ever.

Also: commander>daemon high - AT weapons make DP cry.
Some numbers:
SM TW rocket turret:
Commander: 10.0
Daemon high: 61.5
Eldar D-Cannon:
Commander: 1.3
Daemon Prince: 52.5 (50x more! )

Most (if not all) walkers are dealing more damage to daemons too.

[The_nuketrooper]

On the side note -the strafing run is used to disrupt and break squads -not kill them . Get a gm squad for the HQ psychers and you will really fall back in tech and screw yourself with masses of soldiers who bump into one another creating pathing nighmare that hurts you more than it hurts the enemy

"if they do full research, have a slag or two" - the word "if" is should not be present in any discussion of balance .Also you make it look easy to get not one ,but even two slag deposits . Which is ofcourse not the case,besides not every map has a slag deposit. And weren't the NWs the core problem of the necrons ? Why are we discussing the economy ?

[simanos]

"Why are we discussing the economy ?"
Because how else can we say if NW reinforce cost is ok (or conversely NW dps, range and hitpoints (and other stats) are fine for cost?

"Ability to ignore point decay as a only race in the game?"
OK enough with all the Necron haters here. You guys are nearing the sucking level of Eldar haters (the ones I hate most are Chaos fanboys). Let us examine Necron economy:

The Necrons are hit the worst from decay. They only have one type of income, power. It is not unusual for other races requisition+power to equal twice the Necron power income. In fact it is quite common. Keep that in mind when comparing costs. When it comes to decay, Necron generators suffer from it. Points can change hands and reset decay, generators can be deleted and rebuilt rather easily EXCEPT Necron generators. You always pay the worst penalty (cost and time) for deleting and rebuilding a Necron generator. That's part of the reason they suck in long games and Tier 4. I think Necron Generators should not decay at all or their cost-plan should be normalized. I'm not sure but I think their build time is also wrongly computed. It should be 22% extra per gen meaning 220% extra build time (320% total) after 10 gens. However it is multiplicative ending in near 598% total build time cost after 10 gens. Your call.
Then there's the Big Gen (slag). The Necron one costs 250 power. This means it costs way more than for other races. It also gives +30 power and not +40 as other races' Big Gens. Normal gens are better than it till you have 4 built. For other races a slag is better than any gen (by around 240%). The income is better for the Necrons though (+30 doubled is better than +40 straight for others) so this balances out a bit.

Because of this economy, Necrons are too map dependent and impossible to balance. If a map has about 3-4 points per player Necrons might have the advantage economy-wise. But if it has like 5-7 it slowly becomes a slap in the face. How can this be combated? Other than making Obelisks affect Necron eco more than just being glorified WAAGGHH banners for robot-dudes there are many ideas that are too radical to make it in for a patch to a dying game. I'm open to suggestions on this issue guys.

So, now that we established that Necron power*2 = req+pow... hmm well not really. Necron economy starts growing fast and cheap, but quickly slows down to snail pace and damn expensive. At the start Necron power*1.5 might equal req+pow, but after 20 minutes it is more like *2.5, after half an hour it's more like *3. To top it off the Necron economy is the most vulnerable by FAR, easy to cripple with one strike.
Lets forget of that complication for a moment and re-compare Necron units. Someone said Dreadnought costs 170+305 while Heavy Destroyer "only" 300 power. Yeah, "only"... Destroyers and Heavy Destroyers need a pop cap of 2 not 3 and a cost decrease of 33% too (or a similar buff to hitpoints and dps if they remain pop 3 and cost 250/300). Tomb Spyders are far better as are Lord Destroyers. Those deserve pop 3 more, but then TS have to be buffed a bit, if not in dps or Health then in carrying capacity or efficiency. (It also makes it frustrating how you usually end up with 18/20 vehicle pop used currently). Scarabs are just LOL. 95 hitpoints for 20 power, a slow, melee flyer only attacker. Enough said.
And Necron turrets are not the best. They are the most expensive by far (125x2=250 vs 90+45=135) and their dps and hitpoints are the same. Only after the upgrade do they gain ground. They don't gain any hitpoint/cost though. The only thing going for them is the dps to inf (other upgraded turrets only harm vehicles much). BUT they also lack in range (35 vs 40) and knockback (for rockets, D-cannon has AoE).

So lets go on to the infantry at last. Let's look at speeds.
NW 10
FO 10
Immortals 12
Wraith 24
Pariah 14
NL 16
Wraith has barely FoF speed and 16 is the norm. FO at 10 are almost immobile for a melee unit. Their usability depends on skill level (more effective on lower skill levels). If the Monolith cost was more like 300->600 instead of 450->900 maybe FO would be imba with hi hitpoints... but it isn't.
Necron Warriors start off cheap, but that only serves to fuel antipathy against Necrons. One forgets the fact that other than a rush (good luck with 10 speed, 17 range), 6 squads of 3 NW are very slow to come out a single Monolith (another handicap) and won't do much alone. A Necron has to try and save every scrap of power he can, I think many are neglecting Tomb Spyders. Even so the easiest way to use TS is if you have 2 Monoliths and spam NW to defend your base so that the TS can gather corpses relatively unharassed. But the hi cost prohibits this. I think double Monolith strategy should be made more affordable with lower cost or higher starting power. Another sore issue is health regen. These NW only regen 1 hp/sec (0 in combat). They rise from death/0 health, but then go on for ever at low health. I think this is better than buffing the % of health they rise with. This could be synergized with researches or with "medic" units like the Spider or the Monolith or Lord.
If NW were single unit squads like Wraith I bet they would also be repairable like Wraiths (yes you can repair them). For Wraiths what I would like to see is a squad of 2 members OR pop cost 1 with hard cap of 3.

Obviously giving all this to Necrons might overpower them again.
My suggestion is to firstly buff Disruption Field (first upgrade) to also give +4 range for NW. 17/21/25 seems fair. Also add +1 health regen with each upgrade
Then remove decay from generators (Necron only or for every race, I don't care). This shouldn't affect 1v1 much, but more so long team games where Necron are claimed to suck more.
Then check balance.
If it wasn't enough then start adding other changes.

[Melonplant]

The Necrons are hit the worst from decay.

Yeah, late game crons are always DYING for more power. As their economy sinks to the lowest depths of numbers, their monolith lies silent as the player awaits for his +2 power income to give him the resources for his next destroyer.

Only thing limiting a cron player is the number of monoliths churning out the undead machines. Necrons aren't great, but their economy isn't touched by decay. If you can honestly be in t4 without 500+ power floating I'd say you're approaching pro levels of play!

[simanos]

Melonplant have you actually tried it?
I just proved with reasonable arguments that decay affects Necrons, but if you just say so, sure their economy isn't touched by decay.
Your first paragraph was sarcastic, but it happens to be true.
Heh this reminded me of George Carlin, so are you openly a Necron-hater or do you happen to be one

[MoschBoy]

This shouldn't affect 1v1 much, but more so long team games where Necron are claimed to suck more.

since when do necrons suck in team games? especially long ones? this somehow goes WAAAAY past my experience with them.

[Gannadene]

To say that Necron economy isn't hit hard by decay is... well, unbelieveable. If you stick with just 10 generators in T4, and you're on a map that will demand attrition (FFA of some kind) then your economy will be eating dirt if you've been under constant attack all game. I typically try to have at least 15 generators if I have to get into T4, and that's just a start. It'd be great to have all my scarabs in the field, decapping points and repairing units, and my Monolith, but I need them back at my base, spending 9 minutes to construct a single building. That said, I don't have a big problem with T4 economy unless I enter T4 in bad shape, which doesn't happen often.

As far as early economy... that's part of being a Necron. I won't ask for any buffs, as I think it works fairly well right now.

For instance, lately I've been experimenting on focusing on skipping my Lord so that I can push for a Summoning Core at my 125e generator limit, then immediately go for the first Disruption Field upgrade. Reinforcing a couple of units in the first 3 man squad isn't too demanding. Early game is high risk for Necrons. The first four minutes will win or lose you the game in many cases. Everything revolves around pushing your early economy as far as you can, which means really managing your units well so you don't clog up your Monolith or drain your own economy. This is how it should be. What should NOT be is later in the game, still having issues with your economy.

What many people fail to understand about Necrons is how heavy investments are. "Build a Destroyer." "Build another Monolith." "Invest in the C'Tan upgrade." As though that was actually reasonable. As though it'll just appear out of thin air. Necrons aren't like other races. They can't split their costs, and they don't get investments for upgrading their defenses. If you invest energy in one unit, you can't turn around and invest requisition in another kind of unit. If you're at 0 resources, you're at 0 resources. Necrons can't build a vehicle that costs 250 requisition and only costs 10 energy and then a unit that costs 10 resources and 250 energy. There's no offsetting costs. There's ONE resource pool, and it doesn't go up easily. When you invest energy in something, it's gone forever. And everything costs a lot of energy to make its use worthwhile. If you can't grasp the difficulty of not being able to halve your costs between multiple resource options, you don't have any business talking about investment returns in Necron economy.

But anyway. I have no issue with the 1.2 economy. My only issue is with the lack of counters for late game situations. Warrior health upgrade was just a quick fix for that. Extending their range would also help. Upgrading their economy will not. Having infinite resources does you no good when your units produce, reinforce and move slower than Christmas. That's not how Necrons work. Feast or famine.

[Melonplant]

I have my resentments from dark crusade, I'll admit, but I know that crons are reasonably balanced now and have some strategy built in to their game.

You started your "reasonable" wall of text argument with an extremely false statement. Necrons are affected LEAST by decay because

Decay affects late game only.
Necrons aren't eco starved late game
They can rebuild their plasma gens if it gets to the point of silliness, and pay the reduced cost as such.
Other races have to ask their enemy necron "plz decap my points!" to regenerate their decay (didn't even know that could happen!)
Time does not decay.

Maybe with some serious overwatch and some team mate donations of power you can drop the float, but necronomy has always been silly complicated to balance and frankly it's been all but abandoned at this point. Balance an army that has little restrictions on resources past minute 10 or 15 is the balancing game for necrons.

[GrimDark]

Necrons reset decay? Whoa. That changes a few things, and increases the chance that some enemy nec will grab by accident some of my points.

And yes. Too many necs want a return to DC days. Also, gen decay rarely kicks in if the opponent is worth a dime - often some/most gens are destroyed in enemy suicide raids in an attempt to slow down necs raise to power.

[PandaMine]

I actually had a "big" think about this, and I think the following would do quite a bit to fix nec's problems (combination of ideas)

1. Necron Generators no longer decay (their economy early is alright to mediocre, late game its just shit at the time they need to turtle). Also fix the build time for them, because as Simanos stated

I'm not sure but I think their build time is also wrongly computed. It should be 22% extra per gen meaning 220% extra build time (320% total) after 10 gens. However it is multiplicative ending in near 598% total build time cost after 10 gens. Your call.

I think I agree, because the build time for gens seems WAY too long after about 6-7 gens
2. Necron resurrection fixed - casting time improved, remove the range limit, possibly buff the revive health % to 40-50% and not 30% (would also make res orb more viable)
3. Increase ZoC for mono's, as it stands and considering how many gens you have to build, I have no idea why it is so bloody small compared to other races. Increase it to normal
4. Redistribute the additional monolith power. As it stands, I can see a problem with FO becoming way too strong, with just 2 extra upgraded monoliths you have 9200 Heavy Infantry morale immune + passive moral degen uncapped squads that do CC damage on par with other CC squads. Seeing as how the first change would improve their economy (and increase the chance of them actually getting multiple mono's) how about split the HP bonus between NW and Flayed ones. Currently (grabbed from the wiki) FO get 150/300 HP every unit for every awakened/enganged monolith. This means that when you upgrade your own monolith to enganged FO's have 6800 HP, another enganged monolith adds 2400 HP (making it 9200, thats already more then almost every other elite squad) and another adds 2400 making it 11600 HP.

In my opinion thats a bit much, I propose that along with the range upgrade (which can be slightly upgraded through DF) that each awakened/enganged mono will increase the HP for FO by 100/200 and NW by 50/100 (along with the economy fix this should be crons playable.

What you guys think?

[Pseudonymn]

Agree. Gen build time progression needs an upper limit; long enough to penalize gen spam (resources tied up in non-productive buildings + returns over time for the investment) but no so long that it takes the same amount of time to complete one as it takes for most people to complete a single skirmish round. These 15 minute build times are pretty ridiculous.

With #3, OR, move the frickin TS corpses out of the damned way! I hate how on some maps a poorly placed gen can mean a trapped TS. RAWR!

[slay2rr]

Only crons gens decayed in DC1.0, relic later thought that all gens should decay, and thats why we have decay for other races.

Why the hell shouldn't necron have decay, do you want to bring back their uber economy back like in DC?

[PandaMine]

Maybe because in late game they are lucky to get +150 or more for power where as every other race gets like +250/100

Maybe you should read simanos post, crons are hugely disadvantaged right now in terms of economy, not only are they totally reliant on power, which gets exponentially WORSE as you progress into T4, they are also the only race that can't solve the decay problem by rebuilding gens, and their SOLE income comes from gens

On another note, decay was added in to slow turtling tactics in general, we are also trying to distance ourselves as much as possible from DC crons. SS crons are no way near as imbalanced in DC crons, in fact the necromony went from being the strongest economy in the game to the weakest in SS

EDIT: And on a further point, the crons economy was rigged in DC at T1-T2, (it was probably rigged in T3-T4, but no one lasted that long against them). Now the fact that the cost per gen has increased and their build time is insane, they really need something to help them survive with their econ in T4. Also the powerbonus from the energy grid researches have been decreased from DC

[Dexter099]

If we really wanted to make Necrons like TT, we'd give them the same amount of armor like SM tacticals, with maybe a bit more health. Then, we'd give immortals more firepower and hitpoints. Destroyers wouldn't get + hitpoints, just + a lot of damage. And the flayed ones would move at normal speed (I4) yet be only as good at combat as an assualt squad.

That would make 'crons more like TT.

[Melonplant]

No that would make crons more like SM :-P

[PandaMine]

@MelonPlant

I seriously do not see how you can rebuild gens with crons to prevent delay considering that after 10 gens (which is usually when decay starts kicking in) it costs like 300-400 energy and 10 minutes to build a single gen

[Compeador]

bc if you delete all your gens and rebuild them, you start fresh with a new economy and with the starting build speeds.


I can't believe people actually think necrons need any help whatsoever. Name me one matchup that necs have a horrid time trying to win. None, they have a decent chance vs all the races which is something that can't be said for the rest of the 8 races.

[MoschBoy]

Maybe because in late game they are lucky to get +150 or more for power where as every other race gets like +250/100

first of all, thats just plain bullshit. if you keep an eye on your gen building and your eco upgrades. you will have at least 250, 300 energy income lategame. and if the decay starts, delete the gens and rebuid them. i have played god knows how many team games with necrons, and not a SINGLE time i had ressource problems. NOT A SINGLE TIME. and i am sure as hell only a medicore necron player.

i detect serious no-skill players here, not a balance problems. "huhu, necron isnt free win anymore and i need to think and know my race.... BUFF BUFF BUFF, whinewhinewhine.".

[Melonplant]

They decay to a minimum of +2 I believe. Just delete your +2's every now and then.

And get the universal upgrade. You're gimping yourself if you don't.

I had to ignore the post with the guy saying he had a minimum of 15 generators. You have to at least check your bs before you make it up. Freaking 5 minute build time if you have massive map control.

[Danustar]

Back to the point of Warriors - specifically their scaling into later tiers - I've had a brain explosion:

Reduce Pariah's squad cap from 4 to 3.

This would give just that extra bit of breathing room in the infantry cap mid-late game where individual Necron troops don't quite stack up. Instead of overbuffing a very capable unit, depending on army composition, this could simply mean an extra squad to bolster the ranks at a time in the game when that doesn't mean insta-win.
It would also bring Pariahs more in line with other elites cap-wise, eg Ogryn, Warp beasts, PSM, Terminators etc.

I realise that this disregards any resurrection pop advantages but I really don't believe that resurrection abilities are as beneficial as they might seem.

Just a thought.

[simanos]

LOL@Moschboy ork fanboy
300 income for Necrons lategame means like 20 gens (with upgrades). That's 500 power cost for the last gen(20th) and 44 times build time or near 2000 seconds that's like half an hour.
SHUT UP ABOUT US BEING NOOBS PEOPLE!
My race?! I don't even play Necrons (I think you are projecting fanboy ). I consider them the newbie race. Less units than ALL other races, no leaders for squads, less active abilities, less researches (by far), 1 producing building (doh) AND 1 FREAKING RESOURCE INSTEAD OF 2!

The decay issue is only solved if you delete ALL your gens and start rebuilding from scratch. If you do that you lose the game. Since the gens have longer buildtimes it also means they are in different states of decay. This just isn't working right.

My proposition of no decay for Necron gens is something I propose for all races. It doesn't make any sense. Point decay is one thing. It makes sense. You can't "delete" a point and recapture it for no decay. It is silly to delete gens and rebuild them. That's why it wasn't in vanilla DoW. The Points are (or should be) a fluid thing as war rages on. They change hands and are meant to push you to conquer new territory and not turtle. Generator decay does no such thing. You can't go out and conquer new gens. You simply rebuild the ones you have.

My other suggestion is to put an ability in Necron gens that for 50 power you can "flash" a particular gen to remove its decay. This avoids the complexity of necron gen costs issue and is fair to all races.

The point was that when comparing unit costs you have to double the Necron power cost to be fair (since they have half the economy in mid game). A NW costs 35 power, that's equal to 70 req (a tau warrior for instance or 2 battlesisters).
Again see my suggestions for what I propose. I discuss a lot of things, but propose only 2 small changes for starters.

"You started your "reasonable" wall of text argument with an extremely false statement. Necrons are affected LEAST by decay because

Decay affects late game only.
Necrons aren't eco starved late game
They can rebuild their plasma gens if it gets to the point of silliness, and pay the reduced cost as such.
Other races have to ask their enemy necron "plz decap my points!" to regenerate their decay (didn't even know that could happen!)
Time does not decay."
LOL false statement indeed.

Decay affects lategame only:
-how does that mean it affects Necrons the least? Unless you mean that they are imba early on and don't get to late game. Necrons are not Tau or DE. WAKE UP! This isn't DC, it's SS! Go play a game.

Necrons aren't eco starved late game:
-Every race played skillfully can be eco starved late game. Especially one with 1/2 the income of others and decay affecing 100% of its income instead of just part of it. Necrons get some free units, but reinforcing isn't free and vehicles cost too much. You can't win late game with unreinforced NW squads.

They can rebuild their plasma gens if it gets to the point of silliness, and pay the reduced cost as such.:
-Did you miss the part where this is only easy for other races? Are you suggesting to delete all 10 or so gens at once and start over? Do you know how long it takes to build em again? How much it will cost? How will you survive with next to no income for so much time? Noob much?

Other races have to ask their enemy necron "plz decap my points!" to regenerate their decay (didn't even know that could happen!):
-Points do change hands in a game. Necron gens are very easy to destroy and totally cripple the Necron player. You didn't know such basic stuff you admit. It's nice you admit that at least.

Time does not decay.:
-Do you mean the time bonus from Obelisks? That's not income dude. It counters a handicap for the most part. It doesn't give a clear bonus.

"I had to ignore the post with the guy saying he had a minimum of 15 generators. You have to at least check your bs before you make it up. Freaking 5 minute build time if you have massive map control."
-Too bad, he actually made some good points. But why don't you use that build time argument against your fellow Necron-haters? Like the ones who talked about 300 power income in late game (20 upgraded gens LOL). Or yourself when talking about decay not affecting Necrons.

Seriously people, we get it. DC made you hate Necrons. TT probably made you hate Necrons too. I've heard it all before. Lets talk balance please, not emotion.
Danustar I think the problem isn't (only?) that Pariahs cost 4 pop (more than any other elite squad). It's that NW cost 3 pop in the first place (and Wraiths 2 pop).
Immortals cost 2 pop and they are worth it. NW aren't worth 3 pop. They barely do more dps than immortals (for same pop 6) to inf with less range and speed. They do far less melee damage too (not to even mention dps to vehicles). Only thing Immortals lack is hitpoints (mostly after the important second NW upgrade this is apparent). FO also may suck for 3 pop being a SLOW melee unit. Their morale damage AoE is the only thing that balances them. Same with Destroyers (heavy too). They are worth 2 pop and 2/3 the current cost. TS should be pop 3 instead and Lord Destroyers only. Let's not even talk about Scarabs...
Resurrection is not that good really. 25% chance with 30% health means an average of 7.5% more health (25%*30%=7.5%, I'm simplifying a bit here I know*). BIG DEAL! Now if they had some way to repair damage fast it would be different maybe. Ressurection orb at least should give more starting health with its one time ability.
Do you see me suggesting ALL this? No, I suggested 2 small tweaks and then we'll see.

*Because of secondary (and later) resses the correct % is a series:
25%*30%+25%^2*30%+25%^3*30%...
my 7.5% should be near 10%
Not that anyone here cares for correct math, they prefer to imagine things and pretend, to fit their rationalizations.

[desocupado]

Hey, the idea to "flash" a gen is very good. But 50 power is way too low. It needs to be something like 100, 150 maybe.

[simanos]

Yeah, 50 was a ballpark number. Feel free to change it. Anything would be better than the current situation.

Ideally it should be not a fixed number but instead relevant to the decay of that particular gen. For example if the gen goes from +10 to +8 then 50 cost, if it goes to +6 then 100 and so on (25 cost per "step" sounds more than fair).
Hmm, on second thought it wouldn't work right (even if it was moddable/doable in the first place). Because the decay starts after 15 minutes (or so) and then goes linearly for another 15 minutes (or so) it would always be better to pay the small cost when it starts (+9 to +8) and get the "free" 15 minutes of no decay.
So yeah a flat "flash" value works better.