Ant Analysis: Wood Ant Melees

Are Wood Ant Melees A Viable Unit?


  • Total voters
    10

HofNerd

Colony
Beta Tester
Extremely Helpful Person
If by combat power, you mean damage, then I'm not sure what happened. What I do know is that the Wood Ant Melees died first, giving the other side's Mortars more time to fire on their ranged units.
I see now I have not been clear enough... I meant for a fight with only wood ant melee against only AA media. In that situation lvl 3 wood ant melee would win against lvl 1 AA media if spawn ratio is based on respawn cost.
 

TheRexYo

Queen
I see now I have not been clear enough... I meant for a fight with only wood ant melee against only AA media. In that situation lvl 3 wood ant melee would win against lvl 1 AA media if spawn ratio is based on respawn cost.
Ah, that makes more sense. AA Media are more damage and less toughness, so I could see them dying quicker in a normal fight.
 

Rayalot72

Maximum difficulty
Beta Tester
Extremely Helpful Person
I would like to point out that the main balance issue with the wood ant melee soldier is not that it's weak compared to other species, but that it's not very effective compared to wood ant workers. Melee wood ants need an edge to ensure that they are the most viable tank within their own nests, rather than being overshadowed by a non-combatant unit that happens to serve its role just as well.

The main advantage that wood ant melees have right now is their high tolerance to AoE, since they can eat moderate AoE attacks without dying while workers tend to get obliterated immediately. This is worth considering, but I'm inclined to think it's such a minor edge that it can't justify their use in the majority of cases. That said, the melee soldier needs only a mild buff for odds to be tipped in its favor. Since it's a better option for AoE, it only needs to be just as efficient against most other opponents. This would give it a clear combat advantage, while the workers would remain a viable option preferred mainly for numbers (helpful for tasks like harvesting, but not for combat anymore).
 

HofNerd

Colony
Beta Tester
Extremely Helpful Person
I would like to point out that the main balance issue with the wood ant melee soldier is not that it's weak compared to other species, but that it's not very effective compared to wood ant workers. Melee wood ants need an edge to ensure that they are the most viable tank within their own nests, rather than being overshadowed by a non-combatant unit that happens to serve its role just as well.
Wood ant melee are better tanks than wood ant workers of the same cost according to their stats. However, wood ant workers are a better option if the enemy is likely to overkill.
The main reason why I favour workers over melee is the huge number of worker ants it will give to collect food with. This results in different army copositions in missions 2.1 and 2.2. Mission 2.1 being worker-heavy due to the large amount of food that can be collected. While mission 2.2 is relatively low in the worker count, only having as many workers as required.
 
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