Atrocities or not in human multiplayer games?

[Earthmichael]

I appreciate you taking the trouble to create a scenario to test.  This is a balanced scenerio from a minerals standpoint, with 10 copters defending 8 attackers.  This is 40 rows of minerals for the defenders, and 40 rows of minerals for the attackers, a perfect balance.

But there are a few issues with your scenario:

1. Defense of 4 is available, but only attack 6.  I think it is extremely unlikely that the D4 technology would be achieved before A8 for most players.  The most typical scenario for early air is A6 vs D3.  I just don't believe players will prioritize polymorphic software, advanced subatomic theory, and silksteel alloys above other priorities to get D4.  If they do, I will probably win just from secret project advantage, since these are three technologies with no secret projects associated with them.

2. If you correct this to A4/D3 AAA attackers, which cost still 5 rows each, and keep missile copters, which cost 4 rows each (so the mineral balance is still the same), then I think you will have a more realistic multiplayer attack scenario.

3. Your attack force actually retreats instead of attacks.  This defeats the whole inititiave point I mentioned earlier.  I parked my defensive copter force at my base, started building a sensor next to my base with my former, and started building some defensive units to force a delay until the sensor could be built.  But to my surprise, the attack force ran away.  If it had not, I am fairly sure I could have won despite point (1) above.

4. But even if the attack force was trying to attack, since no SAM units were included, I could block the advance pretty easily with a couple of copters ZOC for several turns (rotating copters so that the 2 damaged copters each turn could start to repair), so that the sensor would get built, and any reinforcement from the rest of my far flung empire could begin to arrive to counter this threat.

5. The threat of copters causes you to make a homogeneous attack force, so that every unit can defend against the copters.  (Otherwise, you risk the copters killing the dedicated AAA defensive unit in a stack, and then clobbering the rest of the stack.)  But if copters were not available, you would never allocated your 40 rows of minerals in this way.  Instead, (assuming D3 is the highest available from point 1), you would have a balance of AAA 1/3 (3 rows) and SAM 6/1 (3 rows).  This would easily defeat a needlejet defense, but would fall to a copter defense, since the SAM units would be nearly irrelevant to the copters (it just would not permit them the delaying tactic).  Of course, if you only had AAA 1/3 units, then when you got to the city, 1/3 defenders would be difficult to defeat.  So copters pretty much force you into the 4/3 homogeneous attack force, instead of a more diverse force.

[Buster's Uncle]

...As a fair test of this, I would like to see you two play this out as a MP game.  Twice.  Switching sides after the first time...

[Yitzi]

But there are a few issues with your scenario:

1. Defense of 4 is available, but only attack 6.  I think it is extremely unlikely that the D4 technology would be achieved before A8 for most players.  The most typical scenario for early air is A6 vs D3.  I just don't believe players will prioritize polymorphic software, advanced subatomic theory, and silksteel alloys above other priorities to get D4.  If they do, I will probably win just from secret project advantage, since these are three technologies with no secret projects associated with them.

Well, now you see why I feel that pushing D:AP up to require 2 level 4 techs is so important.  That way, getting to air power allows a bit more defense.  (And it's true that those three have no projects attached, but neither do Doctrine:Air Power or any of its prerequisites above tech level 1.  So if you get air power and they get silksteel, neither side has a project advantage.  And of course project advantage is far harder to get if crawler use is houseruled to prevent hurrying/upgrading/storing for secret projects.)

3. Your attack force actually retreats instead of attacks.

This is because I don't know how to manipulate the AI to attack.  If I did, they'd reach your base in 3 turns, which isn't enough to put together a proper defense against impact infantry.

4. But even if the attack force was trying to attack, since no SAM units were included, I could block the advance pretty easily with a couple of copters ZOC for several turns

Yes, that is an issue, and the primary reason that SAM has to be available before needlejets.  But the goal here was to show that copters are not a strong defense; since needlejets are better for ZOC exploitation than copters, that really wasn't a concern here.  A more realistic scenario would have some SAM units in there too (interesting note: SAM ground units do not take a penalty on attacks against ground targets the way that interceptors do).

5. The threat of copters causes you to make a homogeneous attack force, so that every unit can defend against the copters.  (Otherwise, you risk the copters killing the dedicated AAA defensive unit in a stack, and then clobbering the rest of the stack.)

Not really.  I did it that way for simplicity and because it worked out cheaper, but you could have a mix of defensive AAA units (strong against copters), defensive other units (which aren't as good against copters, but tend to do enough damage that attacking two of them is suicide), and attack units.

Instead, (assuming D3 is the highest available from point 1), you would have a balance of AAA 1/3 (3 rows) and SAM 6/1 (3 rows).  This would easily defeat a needlejet defense, but would fall to a copter defense, since the SAM units would be nearly irrelevant to the copters (it just would not permit them the delaying tactic).

Of course, if you only had AAA 1/3 units, then when you got to the city, 1/3 defenders would be difficult to defeat.  So copters pretty much force you into the 4/3 homogeneous attack force, instead of a more diverse force.

Actually, what forces you into the homogeneous attack force is the fact that with those specific numbers, having a single super-unit is cheaper than separate offensive and defensive units.  Sometimes that isn't true, and you go with a mix.

And yes, copters do force you to include defensive units...but so do impact rovers hidden in a fungus line (and as a bonus, impact rovers do collateral damage, whereas you may have noticed that copters don't).  Copters are nowhere near unique in forcing the inclusion of defensive units.

Oh, and he'd have to use 4/1 SAM; in this scenario, the idea is that he was busy going after stuff like silksteel and never got Synthetic Fossil Fuels.  If you'd done the copter ZOC exploit under such circumstances without the SAM prerequisite being lowered, he'd be completely unable to attack without using probe teams.

...As a fair test of this, I would like to see you two play this out as a MP game.  Twice.  Switching sides after the first time...

That wouldn't be a fair test at all.  He's great at MP, whereas I can't even handle single player on transcend.  Most of that is experience, some is due to other areas where the game is unbalanced (e.g. the clean minerals mechanic), which he probably exploits and I refuse to when I can avoid it.  I'm good at analysis, not so good at gameplay at the current time.

Testing it in MP with my full air power fix is a good approach...pitting an as yet unskilled player against one of the best is not such a good implementation.

[Earthmichael]

Perhaps someone can post some help on how to make the AI attack in a scenario.  It seems natural that with vendetta the AI would attack the only enemy base on the board.

Meanwhile, let's look at what a realistic MP scenario would be.

1. The defender would definitely have a sensor (or two).  I won't insist that it be under the base, but it should be at least beside the base, so that is it not so easy for the attacker to reach and destroy.

2. The technology allows 6A/3D, so the attacking units must be allocated based on this..

2. The defender would have a couple of 1/3 units (2 rows) providing defense and police.  Remove 1 copter (4 rows) to provide this two units, and keep balanced minerals. 

3. The attack force should have at least 1-2 SAM units.  Decide what the stats of the SAM units would be, and sacrifice enough of the 4/3s.  This keeps the attack force from being stalled indefinitely due to copter ZOC.

4. Yitzi should decide the exact composition of the attacking units given the rules above.  Assuming that someone can help Yitzi with getting the AI set up to attack properly, I will play the scenario a few times and report the results.

5. Next, I play the scenario using Needlejets instead of copters.  Yitzi and I can figure out the best composition for the attacking force.

6. FInally, we can play with D4 (though I do not think this is the most likely scenario) to see the result.  (In this scenario, the city defenders become 1/4 also).

Here is what I predict will happen:

A. In the first scenario, A6/D3 using copters, the copters will destroy the attacking force with maybe 50-70% casualties.
B. In the second scenario, A6/D3 using needlejets, the attacking force will survive and take the city.
C. In the third scenario, A6/D4 using copters, it will be close, but the defendering copters will barely prevail. 


As for the other arguments, if you push D:AP up enough, then Chaos will be available, making the situation A8/D4, nearly identical to the A6/D3 that you seem to want to avoid, but which is the natural state of things in SMAC, i.e. the attack will typically be about double the defense at any given time.  So trying to push a A6/D4 scenario does not realistically portray the situation, since it will become A8/D4 long before D5 becomes available.

Air Power is a stepping stone to two of the best SPs in the game.

What is the clean minerals mechanic, and why do you consider it an exploit?

I think it is interesting that you are going to great lengths to try to weaken air units in general, when the main reason air units are problematic is because of copters.  The easiest and best solution is to get rid of copters.  If your bases are so far apart you that 2x movement won't get your air units across (one reason you gave for wanting to keep copters), then build an intermediate landing strip with your formers.  If you also want to make AAA and SAM units available sooner, then move them down to Gene Splicing.  Problem solved with a minimum of complications and side effects.

[Kirov]

3. The attack force should have at least 1-2 SAM units.  Decide what the stats of the SAM units would be, and sacrifice enough of the 4/3s.  This keeps the attack force from being stalled indefinitely due to copter ZOC.

Hi guys, just to add my two ec: I believe that copters suck at providing ZOC, which is why I insisted than even at MMI needlejets are still handy. Copters when they 'crashland' may be attacked by regular, non-SAM units (either on land or at sea) and on the top of that they don't receive terrain (fungy/rocky/forest) bonuses (they do receive the sensor bonus, tho). So in most cases when the enemy tries to block you with choppers, you can successfully destroy them with scout patrols (if he uses several choppers in one tile, collateral damage does not apply).

What is the clean minerals mechanic, and why do you consider it an exploit?

Yitzi mentioned somewhere earlier that he means constant building and scrapping centauri preserve in one base set aside for his purpose.

[Kirov]

I did some additional tests:

If you land your chopper over your ground stack, you provide no kind of protection whatsoever. The stack may still be attacked by any kind of units with the best defender chosen as usual, with the exception that if attacked by a SAM air unit (and not SAM land unit), the chopper will be targeted first and the attacker will receive the standard +100% air to air bonus (the defending chopper may receive the sensor bonus). Other air units, ground units and ground units with SAM pick up the best defender to fight. In such cases, the chopper in question still receives collateral damage like a regular ground unit.

[Earthmichael]

I know that chopper do not protect the underlying ground unit (unlike needlejets), but they do provide a ZOC.  So you can protect against an advance in this manner.

I was not aware that a hovering chopper could be attacked by non-SAM units.  If this is true, then choppers would be no real value in protecting against an advance.  Can anyone comfirm?

[Yitzi]

1. The defender would definitely have a sensor (or two).  I won't insist that it be under the base, but it should be at least beside the base, so that is it not so easy for the attacker to reach and destroy.

Ok, however, that won't really help chopper attackers, which is the issue being discussed here.

2. The technology allows 6A/3D

No, it doesn't.  The defender has MMI and the prerequisites (22 techs with the changes I'm advocating, assuming SMAX), plus presumably lifting energy restrictions for another 3 techs, so the attacker can choose 25 techs of his own (since he doesn't have choppers or even air power; the whole point here is that getting air power substantially before the other guy should not be worth more than its cost.)

So...the other guy will want energy restrictions lifted as well (9 techs), and of course he needs AAA and SAM (with the changes I'm advocating and assuming SMAX another 8, for 17 so far).  He wants silksteel as well, for another 5, so that's 22.  Finally, superconductor gives him attack 5 (so better than my scenario, which was attack 4, though it will probably affect composition) and gives him a leg up toward superconductor  For the last 2, we can say that he's a bit behind in tech (though that should come with corresponding production advantages), or maybe he grabbed something not relevant here.

2. The defender would have a couple of 1/3 units (2 rows) providing defense and police.  Remove 1 copter (4 rows) to provide this two units, and keep balanced minerals. 

Once we're allowing defensive units, this is no longer purely about copters.  Therefore, you'd need to show not only that it can beat an equal-mineral attack force (which pure defensive units could do with a perimeter defense), but that it can do it with less minerals than can be done without choppers.

4. Yitzi should decide the exact composition of the attacking units given the rules above.  Assuming that someone can help Yitzi with getting the AI set up to attack properly, I will play the scenario a few times and report the results.

If you'll accept my modifications to the attacker's tech capabilities, and someone can help with the AI, then we'll do the test as follows:

1. You make a defending composition including copters, I make an attacking composition with the above tech, and we see how large my composition needs to be to take the base with copters in play.
2. We do the same thing with needlejets; not having copters does save you several techs, so my attacking force will only have up to 3 defense.
3. We scrap air power entirely; this time, I try to make the defending lineup, and you try to beat it with substantially less mineral cost than I used in step 1.

As for the other arguments, if you push D:AP up enough, then Chaos will be available, making the situation A8/D4, nearly identical to the A6/D3 that you seem to want to avoid, but which is the natural state of things in SMAC, i.e. the attack will typically be about double the defense at any given time.

No it won't, because Chaos and D:AP are not on the same track.  (Neither are Silksteel and D:AP, but the attacker doesn't have D:AP.)

Air Power is a stepping stone to two of the best SPs in the game.

Two of the best?  Hardly, unless you're playing a highly militaristic game like a 1v1 (where if you lose a lot and the other guy lost more, you came out ahead).  Obviously all direct-conflict stuff will have to be depowered for a 1v1; that's not really a situation that concerns me, though, as it's clearly not how the game was intended to be played.

More specifically, the power of CBA is (leaving aside satellites, which could use their own nerf) because it boosts an already overpowered feature (air power); nerf air power and CBA becomes a twin to the maritime control center, and sort-of a triplet to the command nexus.  The Cyborg Factory is definitely a powerful asset for a non-native conquest-focused faction (outside 1v1, conquest becomes a lot less appealing, because a war with another faction is a great opportunity for a third faction who isn't fighting to get ahead of both of you), but it's fairly expensive, and of course is less useful if you're not planning on more direct conflict than you have to.

What is the clean minerals mechanic, and why do you consider it an exploit?

The most exploit-ish part is the fact that you can boost your "clean minerals" (minerals that don't produce ecodamage) by building centauri preserves and tree farms.  But perhaps even more seriously unbalancing is the idea of "clean minerals" in the first place, since they don't depend on your PLANET rating, and vastly outweigh the amount of minerals above that which you can produce safely even with a +6 PLANET rating; thus, they mean that your PLANET rating does not substantially affect your ecological stability (in comparison to how many facilities you've built or even in comparison to slight changes in mineral output per base), which throws all sorts of things off.
And that's not getting into what a per-base soft cap does to unbalance base size tendencies and ICS...

I think it is interesting that you are going to great lengths to try to weaken air units in general, when the main reason air units are problematic is because of copters.

No, the reasons that air units are strong are, from worst to mildest:
1. If you have D:AP and your opponent doesn't, you can use needlejets to protect a stack of attackers/counterattackers/PROBE TEAMS from anything the opponent can throw at the stack.  This is exacerbated by how little it costs (in terms of techs you need) to get D:AP, meaning that everybody beelines for D:AP.
2. If you have D:AP and your opponent doesn't, you can use needlejets to create undestroyable Zones of Control.  This is exacerbated by how little it costs (in terms of techs you need) to get D:AP, meaning that everybody beelines for D:AP.
3. If you have D:AP and your opponent doesn't, you can use needlejets to destroy terraforming with impunity.
--------Above here is exploits, below here is at worst overpowered.---------
4. D:AP is needed for satellites, which are overpowered because they (especially sky hydroponics labs, which are by far the most powerful) can be built far earlier in the tech tree than they can be destroyed.
5. By focusing your air units at one front, you can take an enemy base fairly easily if he doesn't have D:AP and thus can't build aerospace complexes.  This is far worse with choppers, although if you have choppers it's more likely that he has at least D:AP, or fusion (which lets his units beat yours even without aerospace complexes), or good enough defense that together with AAA he can defend against even choppers (this of course relies on him having AAA, which could be tough if D:AP is easy to get).
6. Choppers are very good at destroying soft targets in a wide radius from your bases.
-------Above here is overpowered, below here is niche uses, which are therefore not overpowered, or stuff that just isn't that great.
7. Choppers are very good at destroying soft targets near your bases.
8. By focusing your air units at one front, you can take an enemy base if you're willing to sacrifice enough for it (though keeping the base after such a sacrifice is another story).  (Choppers are a tiny bit better than needlejets for this purpose because they can attack twice, but that's not such an advantage if most of your units won't survive the first attack and none can survive attacking twice.)
9. D:AP is a prerequisite for the Cyborg Factory, which is a fairly good project for a conquest-based strategy.
-------Above this is a real problem, below this is a side effect of playing the game in a way that creates larger problems.------
10. D:AP is a military-oriented tech, and when playing 1v1 or a win-in-the-minimum-time game, military focus is far more desirable than when playing SMAC(x) normally.

So the worst things are actually needlejet-based, and the only really unbalanced copter-based thing is due to it not getting a move penalty.

Oh, and I can confirm that you don't need SAM to attack copters; the image (with colors off because I have not yet loaded that fix) is attached.

[Earthmichael]

In my experiments, sensors do affect copters attacking ground units in range of the sensor.  Do you have experience otherwise?

The point I was trying to illustrate is how powerful copters are on the defense, even with the movement reduced.

Most of the needlejet issues listed above can be addresed by moving SAM and AAA earlier in the tech tree, as I have already suggested.

I will be happy to play the scenarios I suggested.  You add way too much complexity to what should be a simple test.  I don't want to bother with that.  Let's just try 6/3 and 6/4, with needlejets and copters as I proposed.  This will give a nice 2x2 matrix of results.

I am also not going to argue about the value of CBA even in a builder strategy; it is just too obvious.  Cyborg factory is also very useful, even if it just helps survive mindworms.

I never sell my tree farms or centauri preserves.  They are too useful.  I just build lots of them, which is not an exploit.

I do not think satellites need a nerf.  They are expensive, and the value is halved in cities without an areospace complex.  I rarely see satellites built to maximum capacity; if they were overpowered, all players would quickly build as many as they could use, but they do not.

I do not play ICS, and I have never lost to ICS.  If anyone who thinks that they can win with ICS on the vets map wants to try, let's set up a game.

[Yitzi]

In my experiments, sensors do affect copters attacking ground units in range of the sensor.  Do you have experience otherwise?

No, why would I?

The point I was trying to illustrate is how powerful copters are on the defense, even with the movement reduced.

And my point is that unless the assault force contains few or no defensive units of its own (a fairly bad idea even before air power due to the potential for fungus lines with rovers in them), they really aren't that strong on defending.  Doubling the chassis cost on top of that would easily be sufficient to limit copters to attacking soft targets.

Most of the needlejet issues listed above can be addresed by moving SAM and AAA earlier in the tech tree, as I have already suggested.

I think I suggested it first  , but yes, that is definitely the way to deal with needlejet issues.  The only question is how to rework it; I feel that D:AP is still powerful enough to justify two tier 4 prerequisites (albeit both ones that a combat-focused player will want anyway).

I will be happy to play the scenarios I suggested.  You add way too much complexity to what should be a simple test.  I don't want to bother with that.  Let's just try 6/3 and 6/4, with needlejets and copters as I proposed.

So in your scenarios, when one side went for air power, what did the other side do instead?

I am also not going to argue about the value of CBA even in a builder strategy; it is just too obvious.  Cyborg factory is also very useful, even if it just helps survive mindworms.

They're definitely useful, but other than satellites they're nowhere near other stuff (e.g. Neural Amplifier, seeing as you discussed surviving mindworms.)

I never sell my tree farms or centauri preserves.  They are too useful.  I just build lots of them, which is not an exploit.

Ok, it's not an exploit.  It's still a broken mechanic, because it makes your PLANET rating close to irrelevant, and because it encourages ICS.

I do not think satellites need a nerf.  They are expensive, and the value is halved in cities without an areospace complex.  I rarely see satellites built to maximum capacity; if they were overpowered, all players would quickly build as many as they could use, but they do not.

So why don't players build that many, seeing as they allow you to crawl farm/condenser spaces for extremely high production and energy income per square?

I do not play ICS, and I have never lost to ICS.  If anyone who thinks that they can win with ICS on the vets map wants to try, let's set up a game.

So how far apart do you usually space your bases?

[Kirov]

So the worst things are actually needlejet-based, and the only really unbalanced copter-based thing is due to it not getting a move penalty.
Oh, and I can confirm that you don't need SAM to attack copters; the image (with colors off because I have not yet loaded that fix) is attached.

What I'm saying here is getting slightly off-topic, but I wanted to share an interesting observation and maybe ask somebody to verify it. Let's say on one tile you have a stack of ground units and some choppers, and you are under attack. Now, if it's your ground units which are targeted, then choppers take collateral damage as everyone else. But if the choppers are targeted (maybe by SAM air units), collateral damage doesn't take place.

So I started thinking if you can protect large ground unit stacks against col. damage via putting choppers on top of them and hitting ctrl+d (designate defender). This, however, doesn't work as expected if the chopper in question has only 1 armour. If a chopper with D1 is designated defender, it will only take the heat before other choppers, not before the entire stack. So it's seems like there's a separate defender selection for either ground or air units (I wonder how it works in terms of game mechanics, but choppers may exhibit features of a ground and air unit in one and the same combat).

Still, you can work around that if you give your chopper at least armour 2. Then a synthmetal chopper may be put on top of your units, designated defender and thus it will protect the entire stack against collateral damage (it just needs low weapon, otherwise it'll cost an arm and a leg). Of course you still have to worry about artillery damage, but still I can imagine quite a number of situations where you'd like to protect your stack like that against strong ground units.

And funny thing I just noticed - the rules seem to change if your stack with a chopper stands on an airbase. For one, you can designate your normal armour 1 choppers as defenders and they will work normally, i.e. protect the entire stack. And another thing - if a SAM air unit targets such stack, it does not go directly for air units, but select defenders as usual, i.e. either the strongest or the designated defender.

Such an immensely complex game and only one life to explore it...

[Yitzi]

Still, you can work around that if you give your chopper at least armour 2. Then a synthmetal chopper may be put on top of your units, designated defender and thus it will protect the entire stack against collateral damage (it just needs low weapon, otherwise it'll cost an arm and a leg). Of course you still have to worry about artillery damage, but still I can imagine quite a number of situations where you'd like to protect your stack like that against strong ground units.

Of course, if he knows you're doing that he can work around it by attacking with a few impact rovers first to get rid of the choppers and then using his main force for collateral damage.

And funny thing I just noticed - the rules seem to change if your stack with a chopper stands on an airbase. For one, you can designate your normal armour 1 choppers as defenders and they will work normally, i.e. protect the entire stack.

Do you mean "protect" as in "prevent collateral damage" or as in "non-SAM units can't even attack it"?

[Kirov]

Of course, if he knows you're doing that he can work around it by attacking with a few impact rovers first to get rid of the choppers and then using his main force for collateral damage.

Sure. At this point i wasn't even trying to join the discussion on how strong choppers are and why so much, I just ran a few tests in the scenario editor and wanted to share some results.

Do you mean "protect" as in "prevent collateral damage" or as in "non-SAM units can't even attack it"?

The former of course, I can't think of a situation where choppers may protect against non-SAM under any circumstances. I can test it if you think of any, that's why I submit these bits.

[magic9mushroom]

Something I either had never worked out or had forgotten that this thread eventually inspired me to check:

Terrain defensive bonuses do not apply to combat between air and ground units (though the sensor bonus does).

This definitely makes choppers much more powerful than they would be if forest/bunker provided its normal immense defensive bonuses against them (and the fact that it doesn't benefit the chopper either doesn't counterbalance, as unless there are roads/magtubes involved a land unit cannot catch a chopper).

AFAIK this is undocumented within the game or manual, and I haven't found it on the AC wiki either. I'm sure the experienced players know it, but it should probably be listed somewhere.

A mod that let land units keep terrain bonuses to defence against air (or even merely choppers) would seem to be yet-another option for eroding chopper dominance - and my understanding is that forests and bunkers aren't meaningfully negated by air attack IRL, so this would seem to improve verisimilitude rather than reduce it.

[magic9mushroom]

Okay, I spoke too soon.

Things that work: Fungus +50%, Rocky +50% (mutually exclusive with fungus despite a square being able to have both), Sensor +25%
Things that don't work: Forest +50% (mutually exclusive with fungus/rocky), Bunker +50% (stacks with everything).

The +50% and +25%, combined with the +100% AAA, are in fact enough to allow a AAA defender outside a base to beat a chopper (13 Shard * 1.5 Nerve Gas = 19.5; 6 Probability * 1.5 Fungus * 1.25 Sensor * 2 AAA = 22.5, and the defender costs 40 to the chopper's 60). But when attempting to make a push into enemy territory under air attack, this is still a really tough ask: the choppers can fully heal in one turn away from the front, while the AAA defenders need at least two (retreat along magtube to base/heal), and the attack force can only advance one square per turn unless it has hovertanks or splits its defenders (because to form a square two in front of where you are prior to hovertanks, you need a road on the intervening square, and that means leaving at least one former on that square vulnerable to chopper attack), plus going deep into enemy territory loses the sensor bonus.

If bunkers worked against air, I could see pushes being much more useful, and it seems really weird that they don't given that rocky terrain does.

(Dissociative Wave of course means the choppers win, but I'm working from vanilla as a base here; Alien Crossfire is bad for balance and we all know it.)