Buff Chomper Please!

[PotatoLoRD]

I for one LOVE controlling the chomper. It's a fun ship to use, but right now I feel that it isn't as useful as it could be. I'll make pros and cons:

Pros

• VERY fast mining time
  
• more efficient while mining large clusters of asteroids than using a miner
  

Cons

• You have to buy it (which takes away from other upgrades)
  
• Very slow
  
• Has to dock to return minerals
  
• Very bad at escaping compared to miners(no boosting ability)
  
• No upgrades for it (unlike miner)
  

Now I'm not saying that these cons are necessarily wrong, but I feel that this ship has so much more potential. If you want to keep it as a ship that needs to stay near the BC, that's fine. But I would like it if this ship had its own upgrades (like the miner) to make a strategy revolving around them to work in certain situations.

I personally think they would be a lot more viable if they had one of the following:

• Return cargo (with perhaps a longer cooldown than the miner)
  
• A turboboost ability that requires energy(could be researched)
  
• Increased maximum speed that drains energy

But again, whatever you want the unit to be good at, just make it more of that.
As I said before, an easy way to do this would be in the form of upgrades. Every other ship has upgrades available except this one, which makes me sad. :(

Perhaps also have an upgrade that reduces the cooldown of the actual chomping and the one that has the EMP icon? (I forget the name of it). That alone might increase its viability, but I can't be sure.

Thanks for taking the time to read this post! I really like Cruiser Command, thank you for your hard work in designing and maintaining this map!

[Red-Rocket]

Ya the chomper needs to be buffed, however, it is indeed supposed to be a big lumbering ship that is slow and cumbersome to use. however, i think that it should have a much bigger buff in health so that it is hard to take down as it is supposedly very big and tough as it deals with smashing into astroids and has a massive cargo hold, the hull upgrade should go in increments of 100 for the chomper so that it could go up to 1K health, the chomper should be protected, that is how chompers work they dont escape, you protect a big and juicy feild and let a chomper munch away at it while you protect it from enemies, it is not meant to go out on its own and explore, thats what miners are for. It does need a buff but in the area of it having much more health would be awesome. In upgrades for chomper we could have a seperate hull upgrade that will only upgrade the chomper and maby increese the *munch* *munch* range and the power of the pull.

[PotatoLoRD]

However, one of the problems with the chomper is knowing when you are supposed to get it. You already start with all 3 miners available, and most of the time it is a better to use miners than to lug over your BC to protect and mine efficiently with the chompers, unless there is some way to make them viable whilst far away from the BC. It needs some way to reduce the time it takes to return minerals, either through a speed buff or a return cargo ability. Alternatively, it would be cool if you could do a mid-space transport from a chomper to a miner, and have the miners carry it back.

I think that your ideas on upgrades are good, though.

[DumbMarine]

More than half of the cons you listed go away if the chomper stays near the battlecruiser. And keep in mind the huge cargo hold means the chomper can hold like 10 shields and still chomp just fine.

The problem with the chomper is people buy it and treat it like an upgraded miner, when it's not. The real problem is that it's a mid-game ship when you shouldn't need money anymore when the mid-game hits, you should have most of the upgrades done and a sizeable bank. Neither of those are problems that are solved by buffing the chomper unfortunately.

[PotatoLoRD]

I agree that most of the cons should stay there. However, this unit still is extremely limited compared to the default miner.

I just find its use extremely limited. You have to 1) get your navigator to stop the ship near an asteroid field and 2) buy the chomper 3) mine it out before your navigator decides to leave again, in which case you can barely keep up with the ship. It actually takes quite a while depending on how spread the asteroids are.

Now that I have thought it over more, I think the best buffs would be to 1) give this ship upgrades 2) make the cooldown for the chomper's abilities shorter or nonexistent and 3) increase the top speed a tad while keeping acceleration the same. Or even 2 out of 3 would make me happy.

@dumbMarine, you still need minerals in the mid to late game. You can use them for missiles and ships like minelayers and destroyers. Getting a mineral bank is extremely important at all stages of the game, and getting chompers out is extremely rewarding when ships get destroyed and need rebuilding. There is no such thing as too many minerals!

[Racism Minerbane]

Chomper needs some revamp, perhaps it doesn't need to stand still to eat ships / asteroids so its mobility is less trashy.

[PotatoLoRD]

Chomper needs some revamp, perhaps it doesn't need to stand still to eat ships / asteroids so its mobility is less trashy.

I don't know...I don't think that would really help considering the gravity-like ability is much better in most circumstances. I guess it would be a little better for mining groups of 1 or 2 asteroids, but it wouldn't really help all that much.

[LordDragon]

Reduced cooldown of chomping ability would be good - reducing/negating cooldown of magnetic pull ability would make it a small-ship killer beyond what any may believe. Keep the magnetic where it is, unless the reduction is slight.

All in all, it is a ship meant to be escorted by the BC. It provides alternative strategies, and a dedicated crew can have nav/weapons/power manned while one chomps and another 2 take wraith/vette. I don't prefer this strategy personally, but it's there and viable.

Some buff? Good - great idea. They are vastly underused, and often become a waste for newer players who don't know the finer points of CC. Ultra buff? Bad idea - it could quickly become something which performs roles outside of chomping minerals.

[Red-Rocket]

it should have its own upgrades that will increase the power of magnetic pull and increase the range of the *munch* *munch* ability and maby do increments of 100 whenever you upgrade the ships hull. It should reletivly stay the same but you can tech into it if you want as a viable direction instead of completely buffing the chomper in the begining where we might face balancing issues early game.

[PotatoLoRD]

What about this?

• "Chomping" asteroid cooldown is no longer effective
  
• Upgrade small ship hull now gives + 100 HP to Chomper per upgrade
  
• Chomper now has its own upgrade page, including 2 upgrades
  
• Gravitic Pulse - increases AoE of Magnetic Pull by 75% (could be scaled back if necessary)
  
• Core Overdrive - reduces the cooldown of the Magnetic Pull ability, but cannot chomp for another 2 seconds after (to keep it from combat use)
  

I think these would be reasonable.