Rory and his Vespene Drones

Co-op Missions Discussion
21

In the interest of investigation

Here’s 2 test data done on M’s Void Launch

Test 1 - Drill Mastery Focused (30/0, 0/30, 0/30)

  • 7min Full Saturation
  • 890mineral, 1510gas banked
  • Investment (100/100 + 150/150 drill abilities, 720mineral vespene drones)
  • Total income 1860min/1760gas
  • 1 x Concentrated Beam used (Bonus 2 wiped) + 30sec out on 2nd Beam
  • 1 x Pulse Cannon used (Bonus 3 wiped)
  • Tech level Factory + Armory

Test 2 - Vespene Drone Mastery (0/30, 0/30, 30/0)

  • 7min Full Saturation
  • 1410mineral, 792gas banked
  • Investment (5 Tanks Made, 150/125 x 5 = 750/625)
  • Total income 2160min/1417gas
  • No enemy base touched
  • Tech level Factory + Armory

There you have it the comparison is fairly clear. Neither one has a clear advantage at all over the other.

  • 2160min - 1860min = 300min, make sense since non-drill opens with a faster CC, thus a bit extra mineral income.
  • 1417gas - 1760gas = -343gas, despite cheaper VD, this is a surprising find. Even if we account for the 325gas (see OP), this is basically equal gas income (off setting 350min... point is both income are equal)
  • Wave 1 & 2 dealt equally effective. ARES for wave 1. Abundance resource by wave 2, using any units made, drill, make static, etc.
  • Tech level exactly the same. Both of which could have pushed higher into Starport, as well as 2nd Armor with no problem. Given the similar income, research timing would be similar.
  • Biggest difference here is Drill Mastery actually wiped out 2 enemy strongholds, aka cleared Bonus 2 + 3 areas before 7min. Considering an active player can float Factory to Bonus 1, it is clear the progression is far faster.

Now, if anyone feel inclined to disagree with the data. I would love to see something different. After all, I don’t claim to be a mastery Swann player.

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22

I just do this and call it a day. (although don’t get me wrong, I’ll revisit this thread at a later time in more detail)

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23

It’s hard to say the post is wrong cause technically the calculations are right, it’s just that when its said that the drones give a 33% increase in gas it’s assumed that you are mining from 4 geysers but you have drones in 8 of them. In other words yes the drones give a 33% increase per gas but it’s divided between both players, in swann solos where he can’t drone ally bases the increase is only 16% which is really not worth.

I don’t think this is mentioned anywhere in the post, in the impossible scenario you say that the gain Is 1806 gas but 903 of that goes to the ally.

Now if we talk about optimal play, the standard mastery choice for anyone who is decent with swann is the drill mastery, I don’t know what people on this thread are talking about, there are only 2 reason to not pick it; you don’t know where to use the laser shots and end saving that top bar for “emergencies” or you are doing a specific mutation where you know the laser abilities are not very useful early, this second option is extremely rare.

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24

Early gas without dedicated gas workers is extremely valuable even if it is only 300ish.
You can focus more workers on minerals (both you and teammate) while letting the drones gather gas from empty refineries without slowing down your early tech.
Swanns use of many workers to fast build structures and turrets further puts a strain on his limited number of workers in the early game.

Swann dropping cheap gas drones asap in the early game is literally the most useful thing a swann can do.
Everything else swann does is barely equal if not overshadowed by other commanders - not to mention swann is the slowest rampup commander.

Faster drill is neat but imho nowhere near comparable to almost free gas drones that swann can drop as soon as the refineries are up (which should be rushed by both players to get the drones working asap).

Frankly i can’t be bothered to look into all that math you write.
If swann has one good thing those are gas drones, with the second being the silly herc+tank combo and the third being his turrets that he can sell.

Laser drill is nowhere in that list and while brutal is either way really easy i sure as heck won’t ever be glad to see that my swann ally has a bit faster drill setup while delaying gas drones to the point that most of their unique benefit is lost.

The best part about Gas Drones is that with the mastery they can be up right at the start of the game assuming you both rush the extractors.
Without mastery that entire functionality is lost and Gas Drones end up being something you plop down later in the game once you got 8*100 minerals to spare.

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That’s literally the whole point of this topic, including the gas you gain from plopping drones as early as possible. It’s HELPFUL, but it’s no where near enough to make or break most CO’s, who are mineral starved. I get where your coming from as far as collecting extra minerals instead of gas, but is the literally ~2 extra tanks better than clearing out two areas of enemies before you guys assault those positions? Remember, it’s always better to clear areas early before enemies get their upgrades. Not to mention, if you start very early aggression, having a drill kill all the flyers while your Herc and 2 tanks clear ground enemies is a lifesaver.

Again, both masteries are good and perfectly VIABLE in both brutal and mutation missions. This isn’t a topic to preach one over the other, but to show that both masteries are more competitive than we might have thought. Take a look at his math, and think what you could be doing with that extra gas at that point. What about your minerals? Are you usually floating too much gas anyways in the early game? Are you still mineral starved anyways despite the drone mastery? But ultimately, it comes do to YOUR preference. Do you like earlier map presence? Drill. Do you want to go into an army sooner? Gas.

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26

What’s so silly about Herc + tanks. It the most fun combo in the game. Is it because u can’t F2 this combo.

Slow ramp up I agree with but not overshadowed. Swann is just a little harder or awkward to play but not overshadowed by other COs. Swann’s destructive power I think it’s better than a lot of other COs.

Also slow ramp up does not mean u can’t contribute early game. Ares and static can cover u until u get some units out.

Yeah I agree with this part.

If u r a decent brutal player I think u can manage to do ok in a match without the need of super early gas drones. In fact I think u will be floating a lot of gas when match ends. Regular brutal is forgiving unlike mutations or solos.

Yeah this is it.

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It is literally not “extremely valuable”, that’s why I made the post.

Now if you don’t want to bother doing the tests and checking all the numbers cuz you’re lazy. That’s why I posted mine, so you don’t have to.

I imagine reading a post takes at most 2min over testing/checking of 30min.

So far, I’m not even suggesting to you or anyone to choose Drill Mastery, just that the data show Vespene Drone Mastery isn’t what you and others claim - that it’s better.

If you disagree this strongly, I’m afraid your passionate words aren’t going to be worth much against my actual data.

You shouldn’t because unlike him, I don’t automatically sit 3 workers on each gas as they are constructed.

  1. I didn’t rush gas for no reason just to skew the test.
  2. I insta-cast VD since it only costs 10min.
  3. I multi-constructed on 2 main while not saturating them for the reason he said.
  4. I know how to play non-drill mastery unlike he is assuming.
  5. Yet, despite all of that, the gas income is really similar.

Thanks for the clarification here. I hope people can take that into account too.

I can’t verify that exactly but for everyone reading, this basically means at most that 325gas is unchanged. And I have no doubt Anc is correct, so that’s really 163gas extra in that 6min. Even worse than I thought.

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In case of doubt, 50-50 is a perfect solution

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29

This ends up working with many of the other masteries as well!

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30

Either way thanks for the effort you put into these tests and theory crafting.

I can’t say i will ever be glad to see a swann ally go for early drill mastery (instead of early gas drones) but luckily brutal is so easy it can be played even without masteries.
These days so many commanders & prestiges provide early game power that im not sure is the faster drill even needed but in some cases it can be useful.

To each his own…

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31

The savings from taking laser drill mastery are close to irrelevant, as they happen later, where the imapct of savings is greatly diminished.

Also having all 8 VD at 6:00 with no VD mastery is optimistic for your average game. Most people without VD mastery will delay drones much further, sometimes past 10:00. Swanns units are costly and he is minerals starved enough… you can’t just spend 720 extra minerals without cutting 7 supply depots or something like 5 tanks. That is a lot early game. In addition, if you take laser drill mastery, you usually want to get armory earlier and also upgrade the laser ASAP, so as to not waste your mastery bonus (oterwise whats the point taking the mastery?), which further reduces the ressources available for units.

Bottom line: i would say, swann gimps either his army or laser upgrades if he spends 800 minerals before 6:00 on drones compared to spending that 800 on units.

With VD mastery you can always get drones asap with close to 0 negative impact on your economy or army ramp up.

I also don’t know why you consider 825 gas to be “not that much”. If as you suggest, you get that before 6:00 - i would say that’s huge. It’s worth like 8 tanks or so?

To me VD mastery seemed preferable in most situations, and obviously so.

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32

If you take the Laser mastery, and as you pointed it out, the drill upgrades happen much earlier so the cost reduction does matter and matters early on.

What Fearr also pointed out is that quick laser allowed people to be aggressive sooner (and possibly an extra use of each of drill’s CD).

33

Everything you said indicate to me you didn’t check the data I provided.

Your preference is your own always but don’t mistake that as correct.

I can guarantee you, if you claim you know how to play Swann as VD mastery. Then 6min VD no mastery is possible, faster clearance is possible, and higher utility is definitely so.

I doubt you’ll believe it but if you truly care then I think it’s worth your time to learn. Once you have learned it, it really isn’t worth the time to do VD mastery (outside of mutations that mutes drill use).

34

Maybe. Some quantitative analysis could provide some insight here… let me give it a try…

Drakken Laser (no mastery) takes 300s initial build time, then 190s for first upgrade and another 220s for last upgrade, costing 200/200 and 300/300.

Drakken Laser (with mastery) takes 165s initially, then 105s and 121s for upgrades, costing 110/110 and 165/165.

Lets assume both cases prioritize drones and laser drill upgrades above all else:

(A) Main base drones @3:00, expo drones @5:00, armory @3:40
(B) Main base drones @3:00, expo drones @5:00, armory @1:25

Now lets add up when and how much is spend…

Cases:                (A) VD mastery   (B) DL mastery   (A) Ressource lead
Time (s)               min / gas        min / gas        min /  gas
 1m (B)armory            0 /   0        100 /  50        100 /   50
 2m (B)DL-UP             0 /   0        210 / 160        210 /  160
 3m drones+(A)armory   140 /  50        610 / 160        470 /  110
 4m (B)DL-UP           140 /  50        775 / 325        635 /  275
 5m drones+(A)DL-UP    380 / 250       1175 / 325        795 /   75
 6m                    380 / 250       1175 / 325        795 /   75
 7m                    380 / 250       1175 / 325        795 /   75
 8m (A)DL-UP           680 / 550       1175 / 325        495 / -225
 9m                    680 / 550       1175 / 325        495 / -225
10m                    680 / 550       1175 / 325        495 / -225

This was all done in notepad… so typos are not unlikely…

Anyway i find the difference to be substantial, even if case (B) gets gas drones as fast as (A), which i think is not the case… not sure if case (B) is even possible that fast (resource wise).

Above examples are pretty synthetic. It should be said, that the lead values are minimum values… e.g. if (B) delays all gas drones by 1 minute (A)s gas lead would increase substantially by 150 between 3:00 - 5:00, and by 300 starting at 6:00. Same for (A) getting gas drones earlier, which is easy for (A), but not really feasibly for (B).

Bottom line - still think done mastery is preferable, unless there is some very strong need to have concentrated beam before 8:00… something that war bots somehow can’t deal with.

Edit: armory times were wrong in the header paragraph (table was correct though)

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:slight_smile:

I don’t know… look at my above reply to noobishere… i was writing that for a few hours before your post. I think i contemplated your numbers quite a bit. All theory of course… i guess i’ll play some swann games to check it out…

I assume you mean using laser drill mastery. So all 8 drones @6:00?
One important question remains: how fast can you get your first 4 drones without delaying anything? Can you even get armory that early and start laser upgrade asap?

Delaying each of the 8 drones by 1 minute means 300 gas lost on top of everything else.

Edit: ok i played 1 quick game… it seems to me you cannot even get first 4 gas drones before 4:00 without massively compromising fast expo, scv production, or your armory / laser drill upgrades. And i made 0 units until 5:00. You have to cut the ressources for early armory and upgrades from somewhere… minerals and gas.

Care to share a good replay for the first 8:00 of playing swann with laser drill mastery on a map with expo covered by rocks. I wonder what your armor and gas drone timings are…

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Please read post #20. It is not theory. It is two tested games.

I don’t agree a 495min/-225gas is “substantial” at 10min into the game. So unless I’m reading your chart wrong here, that’s actually pretty bad. 22.5gas/min difference for a commander that isn’t gas starved in early game…

Sc.drop is down. Those games in post 20 were meant to be uploaded. It doesn’t truly matter cuz both works. My OP and the entire discussion is to dispel the notion that VD Mastery is “super crucial”. It really isn’t.

And there’s a big difference between “it really isn’t” and “it’s horrible”. Not saying it’s horrible at all, it is quite good.

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Just to make it clear: the numbers mean that VD mastery has 495 more minerals then laser drill mastery, but the laser drill mastery has 225 more gas.

That being said, i agree that it is not substantial at 10:00. Though i think it is more so earlier at 3-6m. That time window is more crucial… there i would regard even 300 as substantial t.b.h.

You get a lead of ~300 minerals at 7:00… quite different to my ~800. Then again i made a lot of crude assumptions…

I don’t think any one commanders mastery is super crucial.

If I had to put a number on our case though… on how good i think LD mastery is (overall) vs VD mastery, i would say the difference is surely <10%.

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38

Swann is not starved for gas with most builds. Going a few games without vespene drones can show that. Even herc tank early is limited by minerals. People say “oh, that’s why you need to get the cost reduction, to save minerals”
No, that’s why you don’t make drones in the first place.

If swann is limited by minerals, the solution is not “be able to get gas for cheaper/earlier,” the solution is “hold off gas for later, so you get more minerals earlier”.

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39

This hit the point exactly in my opinion.

And it’s the essence of Drill Mastery. You simply don’t rush it out like your life is dependent on it. That isn’t to say to delay VD indefinitely, just don’t invest 400-800 mineral when you can use that on earlier CC/turrets for expansion.

That difference in VD price is equalized between the two approaches. Where VD mastery spends less, it spends far far more by its need for Tanks (6 or so). Where Drill mastery spends more, it has that luxury by its no-need for units.

People can think of it this way if it helps. Both mastery choice don’t change your intrinsic build order’s investment. What it does change is how and when you place VDs. If your belief is 100-200 more gas during the first 5min of your game is what limit your roll out, then there is something wrong with your build order entirely.

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Since day 1 when they allowed Swann have the drill mastery I put 30 points there and had 0 issues with him.

I’m more agressive and carry many games as him, but he’s still slow.

The only bad part of this are noobs spamming ping for drones. I just ignore them and everything is just fine.

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