33. Silver Bullets (experimentals and their real price)

Many players consider only experimentals when situations get deadlocked. I went through and calculated the price of each experimental in terms of siege bots.

Mavor’s is equivalent in price to 916 siege bots or 3 and a half T3 artillery or a combination of the two. Imagine what you could do with over nine hundred siege bots.

Strategic Missle Launcher is equivalent in price to 280 siege bots, and each nuke is equivalent in price to 52 siege bots. Honestly, how often do you kill fifty two siege bots worth of enemy hardware?

T3 Artillery 245 siege bots, costs three and a half siege bots a shot (13.6 a minute).

Scathis price is 182 siege bots and every two projectiles cost the same as a siege bot. Every minute the Scathis costs 30 siege bots to continue firing.

Don’t build experimentals until you’re completely handicapped by unit limits.

14. M = E/40 (Mass equals Energy)

Mass fabricators convert energy to mass at a ratio of 40 to 1.  If you are wasting energy than you are wasting mass.  Wasting 4000 energy per second is the same as wasting 100 mass per second; and 100 mass per second could be used to build an (Experimental Monkey Lord) spider bot in five minutes and fifteen seconds.  Therefore, if you are wasting 4000 energy per second then you are actually wasting one spider bot every five and a quarter minutes.  If you are wasting resources, then you are forgoing the units those resources could have built and the damage they could have dealt.

1. Firing nukes is losing, defending against nukes is winning.

Launching nuclear weapons is the economic equivalent of dropping thirty siege bots on a single spot; intercepting a nuclear warhead is the equivalent of destroying those thirty siege bots before they deal any damage, but at a third of the cost.  Having used the siege bots instead would have at least dealt damage.   An intercepted nuclear weapon can only ensure that the opponent spent a third of your nuke’s price to destroy it.

Never destroy an enemy nuclear missile launcher.  Allow your enemy the opportunity to try and overwhelm your missile defence and you can ensure an economic victory per missile. Intercept a nuke and destroy the equivalent of thirty siege bots for the price of ten siege bots.

Notice in the chart below that the price of a nuclear missile launcher is equivalent to 270 siege bots and that each nuke is equivalent to 30 siege bots. For the cost of five nukes you could have built 523 Siege Bots, ten nukes 775 Siege bots and twenty nukes 1279 Siege Bots.

Nuke cost is calculated in accordance with psalm 27. Fixed Costs and Variable Costs also apply to Supreme Commander