The Daemons wrote:Getting back to the original topic, I just wanted to point out that even if the airstrike could go high enough to reach the turret up on the hill, (i think somebody already said this but i'm not sure) the markers would most likely just roll off the side of the hill, and so the airstrike wouldn't even go near the turret.
It depends on how steep the hill is, and where on the map it is. In Melting Pot, it is certainly possible to (a) setup turrets in places where the hills are steep enough that all markers will roll to the bottom and (b) actually make use of those turrets. On other many of the other maps, there are steep places to place turrets, but many of them are so far from where action might occur as to be useless. However, the tactic is useful near the center flag or near enemy bases in the Bleak Mountains, for instance. On the other hand, while there are some steep hills in Confrontation Point at each base, they are not steep enough that a well placed marker can't take out a turret that is guarding the base.
One must also consider where the space invaders will come from. I used to know where they would travel, but this applied only to Darwinia, and it has been a while. My recollection is that they travel in from one of the corners of the map (or maybe the center of one of the sides---I'm sure Jordy.. will chime in to tell me exactly how wrong I am), and travel to an adjacent side or corner, with the exact start- and end-points determined by where the markers are. Thus, by placing markers in slightly different places, it is sometimes possible hit even hard-to-hit objects by either taking advantage of different flight paths, or using the terrain to your advantage.
The Daemons wrote:As for the meteor shower, in my experience, it almost never covers the targeted area evenly, so for me hitting a turret head on with a meteor is kind of a 50/50 coin flip. (sometimes i almost think they're purposely avoiding any enemy units or spawn points in the targeted area) :wink:
Exactly. The total area of a meteor strike is quite large (larger than a nuke strike zone, maybe---about the same size, at any rate), and there are only a few objects that land (seven, in total, if I recall correctly). Even with a more powerful blast wave than just about any other weapon (I think that nukes are about equivalent), the area of effect is so large that it is physically impossible to kill everything in the area of effect. Basically, a meteor shower is like a weakened nuke strike, though it has the advantage of being almost immediate, rather than having to wait 30-60 seconds for the nukes to actually reach their target.
xander