Some Ideas to buff Kassad, Analyzing why Kassad is underpowered and proposals to make him better Options

[Doctor X]

Hi! I am new to this forum and having played SW since it first rolled out, I have noticed Kassad is generally a really underpowered General.

Overall, ShockWave improves the trash pile that Kassad is in the original game. The addition of anti-infantry units (Assasins) and artillery that Kassad lacked in ZH (and seriously crippled him) allows him to fare better in battles than he used to do. Machine Gun Nests, Fundamentalists (a strong anti-vehicle and anti-building unit) and the auto-cloaked Scud Storm are also some useful additions. However, ShockWave still doesnt go far enough and Kassad is still pretty weak: He's stealth might sound exciting but isnt really worth it after all. When it come to buildings, camo netting is kinda expensive and once the cloak is revealed by stealth-detecting units (done really easily by aircraft), the opponet can take note of their locations. Unless he is too dumb and forgets, he can easily remember their location, even if they go cloaked again, because buildings are immobile. So camo netting is pretty useless. The strategy "once a building is detected, sell it and go build it elsewhere" isnt a good remedy for this, because it requires too much time, $$$ and micromanagment. Plus if your whole base gets exposed by aircraft for example, you cant simply sell it all up and build it somewhere else. The auto-cloaking of Scud Storm somewhat improves this disadvantage, because it is difficult to find it in the first place, if the player is smart enough to build it somewhere far away. After it has been noticed however, cloaking becomes useless for the reasons sated before. When it comes to defenses, camo netting is moar useless, because, even if they are auto-cloaked, you dont even need to send a stealth-detecting unit to discover them. Any unit going near them will do the trick, because defenses will attack it and immediately blow their covers off. Then the opponet will be alerted, notice their location, and easily remember it. Even if he is too dumb to remember the exact location of a building, he can always randomly shell its approximate location with artillery or some general's ability, it's not that hard to figure where someone's base is located after all.

However, buildings are not the problem with Kassad. They are a disadvatage for sure, but it's a disadvantage that has to exist in order to add to the game's balance, just like every general that must have a disadvantage of some kind. My main objection is with his units. And it's not his lack of units that troubles me, ie his non-existant heavy tanks. The problem is that the rest of his units dont fit into his strategy: He is supposed to be a stealth General capable of massing units and getting them under the nose of his enemies without getting traced. But nahhh he cant do that. He can cloak all of his buildings with camo netting, but when it come to units, he only get 3-4 cloaked ones (rebels, bikes etc). The rest can only get cloaking through... ughh... "GPS Scrambler"... This pathetic ability sounds soooo exciting hoorrayy imma get invisible terrorists and tankz. Except in praxis this ability is dramatically limited. First, its area of effect is so small, it can only cloak about 5-6 infantry, and even less if spacious vehicles are blended in. To make matters worse, its cooldown is extremely, tragically long. In ZH, it was on every 3 minutes. In ShockWave it's on every 4 minutes, if I am not mistaken. Pls tell me why??? Like, Scud Storm that is a super power with destructive capabilites far greater than the ~5 units that a GPS Scrambler can cloak, takes 5 minutes and a GPSS 3-4. Couple the small radious with the sluggish cooldown and all Kassad can get is a handful of cloaked units every blue moon. That means Kassad's strategy "stealth" is pretty much negated (or shall I say, is "non-existant") as he cannot cloak units efficiently and he is forced to fight with an uncloaked-units-majority army, that lacks both stealth (that was supposed to make it powerful) and heavy firepower.

Shockwave's goal was to make the game be how it may have been, had Electronic Arts not chainsawed the development time, am I right? While the goal I think had been accomplished brilliantly concerning all Generals, when it comes to Kassad, I think it hasnt. How can Kassad be a Stealth general if he cant use stealthed units and structures effectively?

So in my humble opinion, some tweaks must be made to make Kassad more playable. I think these things below would help:
1) Make Kassad's defenses be able to switch on and off their auto-attacks. This may sound weird and useless at first, but think about it: As I have analyzed above, Kassad's defenses may by cloaked by default but once a unit gets near them they start attacking automatically and get exposed to the enemy instantly. In the beginning, players usually send cannon fodder infantry and fast vehicles to scout. This means that Kassad's defenses get easily discovered early on and afterwards no player is too dumb to forget where they're approximately located.
If however his defenses are capable of turning off their auto-attacks, they will be kept from exposing themselves. This will prove extremely useful in the early game, when opponets will send their cannon fodder scouts and Kassad's defenses will withhold their fire, meaning their positions will not be found out by enemy. They wont waste their cloaks fighting weak units and will be kept hidden until much later in the game, when more threating units come by. Then they can switch their attacks on, "surprising" and ambushing the enemy, who may have not known of their existance if he hadnt used stealth-detecting units. Since I have some modding skills, I was able to test it (albeit in ZH only) and it worked smoothly! I lured a swarm of my friend's stronk Overlordz into a wall of stinger sites he never knew was there and boom! Afterwards I sold them all off and rebuilded them somewhere else, while he was left wasting his gen's abilities on an empty space.

2) Buff GPS Scrambler. 3-4 minutes cooldown is wayy to much. You can reduce it to like 1.30 or 1 minute. I was also able to test it (1 min, albeit in ZH only) and it didnt seem op. Kassad simply got a lot more cloaked units at his disposal. Which is supposed to happen, because he is the freakin Stealth General. Also, as noted here http://cnc.wikia.com/wiki/GPS_Scrambler#Normal GPS Scrambler was supposed to have 3 different levels in general's powers (just like Repair for example), each one further increasing the area of effect. This was left out in ZH, leaving us stuck with a really limited version of it. I was surprised that in ShockWave this was not improved, but it seems we are stuck with the same limitation too. Bringing back this scrapped feature and coupling it with a reduced to 1-1.30 min cooldown would greatly benefit Kassad, solving his lack of stealth units (his lack of heavy firepower was fortunately addressed in ShockWave. He may still not have access to heavy tanks, but this is part of his intended disadvantages)

3) Reduce the build time of Hijackers, so Kassad can spam them a bit more often and get access to the heavy tanks that he lacks in late game

4)Make Sneak attack available earlier and also make it stealthed

This post has been edited by Doctor X: 9 Mar 2018, 20:30

[Doctor X]

OMG The project leader replied to me! Thankss

3-4? He has Rebels, Assassins, Rocket Snipers, Hijackers, Saboteurs, Default Ambushes, and Technicals

Well you right, my mistake, I meant 3-4 cloaked units that can fight. I excluded Saboteurs and Hijackers.

I'm not sure where you are getting "6 infantry units" considering I'm able to use it on 20 or even more fundamentalists at any one time

Seems you are misunderstanding. Actually, the GPS Scramber we have in-game is the maximum level that was in the Beta

Well I have to admit you are right here, I kind of exaggerated on this.

But I insist when it comes to cooldown being cripplingly long:

3-4 minutes is not that long. That's about the time for an A-10 Strike, which is a one-time use power . Considering those units remain stealth, it's much more efficient than an A-10 in many cases

I disagree. Yes it is long. GPS cant be compared to A-10, because you said it yourself, the one is an one-time use power while the other is not. Still, Scud Storm is incredibly powerful and can be used multiple times just like GPS, yet GPS is much weaker (dont need to argue why) and it only has 1 min less cooldown. I dont know why cant you see how unfair and unbalanced this is. Either increase the Scud or decrease the GPS cooldown. The second option is preferred I think.

Now as for the exact time of the GPS:

1 minute? You may claim that isn't overpowered, but I beg to differ. That's 8 rocket buggies from a war factory stealthed every minute. That's 14 Cobras stealthed in one minute. Or to put it in another perspective, that's 7 Warmasters stealthed in one minute. And yes that's something to consider, since GPS Scrambler works on allied units too.

Well, you refuted my point, yes you are right, 1 min is overpowered.
But as I said above, 4 minutes is still too long to be left as it is. How about a golden ratio? I think 1.30 or 2.00 cooldown would be a much much needed buff

(Making Kassad's defenses be able to switch on and off their auto-attacks) I don't see the point of this. Infantry units are generally -not- sent as cannon fodder units since it's a waste of cash. As for light vehicles, all of Kassad's defenses are perfectly capable of killing them, and a lot of factions rely on them for early game offenses anyway.

I dont think you got my point here. You are right, all of Kassad's defenses are perfectly capable of killing them, but I wasnt saying the opposite. What I said is that Kassad defenses are not able to accomplish the "ambushing" role they're supposed to have as auto-cloaked defenses. Why? Let me say it as simple as possible: I built a wall of cloaked stinger sites and wait for the opponet to send his troops. The opponet sends one single scout (1 infantry, 1 bike or 1 humvee) that doesnt even have stealth detecting capabilities and *boom* all my defense start firing because they are coded to autoattack anything that gets near, but in the proccess their cover is blown off and get exposed to the enemy. Just by one scout. One. Now this isnt an unbalanced thing per say, it's actually a clever strategy that can be exploited and used against Kassad. But what's the point of Kassad's defenses being cloaked if they get their location known so easily? At least the rest of his building cant get exposed to the enemy by themselves, so stealth-detecting units are required to discover them.
I insist on this, what I suggested is a way to make Kassads defenses more sneaky and more "ambush-y", so to speak. Why it would be beneficial for Kassad's defenses to be able to turn on/off their autoattacks? For example, I build a stinger and turn off its attack (the switch should be applied individually to each defense, so the player can choose which defenses he wishes to turn down and which not). An enemy scout passes nearby and if it doesnt have stealth detection, the stinger doesnt fire and therefore its location doesnt become known to the enemy from so early. Later in the game, the enemy is completely unaware of that stinger and sends his more important units down the stinger's path. I turn on the stinger's autoattack and boom! we have a perfect ambush. The point is that Kassed's snaring capabilities will be increased and he will be able to set up future ambushes from the beginning of the game, with the enemies having fewer chances to discover his defenses if the autoattack switch is used correctly by a smart general. It's not overpowered because it will require micromanagmet in order to be exploited in its full potential and because stealth detecting units can still find the defenses out.
Plus, programming-wise it's not that hard to be implamented, and you have nothing to lose by implamenting it, since players that find it too complex to understand or unnecessary can simple choose not to switch any of their defenses off. I say you give it a try and implament it, you have nothing to lose.

Hijackers are already the most cost efficient infantry units in the game. Not only do they remove a vehicle from the enemy, but it actually gives you a vehicle yourself. And in Shockwave, they are reusable as they pop back out when the vehicle dies

Yeah you refuted my point, you are right, they are fine as they are.

But making them (Sneak Ataacks) available any earlier than they already are would absolutely screw over a lot of games as Kassad already has a fair few units you do not want in your base, like Fundamentalists and Quad Snipers

You refuted my point here too, they dont need to made available earlier.

Stealthed Sneak Attacks would be pointless since they are already announced to the entire game and take a while to build up

I kind of insist on this. Yeah they are announced, but that's irrelevant. I am not saying the announcement must go. I suggest that if they are stealthed, after construction it will be made harder for enemies to find them out if they dont use stealth detecting units. Well it's not that hard yeah, but it will be a small advantage for Kassad

What I think is that EA intended for Kassad to be how he was in the second GLA mission, where he has stronger, upgraded Quads (check! done in Shockwave ✓), stealth bikes (✓), snipers (✓) and the majority of his units, if not all, stealthed (not checked, this aspect is still lacking in SchockWave, for the reason stated in my first post) Decreasing the GPS Scrambler time and adding the attack switch to his defenses (and secondarily adding the stealth sneak attack) would help put the final check!

The discussion with you is sweet sir Thanks for hearing me

This post has been edited by Doctor X: 10 Mar 2018, 22:02