Both currently live in the US – StrikerVX is a 19-year old Chinese-Canadian who went to study in the US, and Omeleet attends college for a Nursing degree in his home country.
You can find both on Twitch:
• Omeleet’s Twitch Channel
• StrikerVX’ Twitch Channel
Q: Hey Omeleet, hey StrikerVX! Thanks for taking the time for this interview. Especially for Rivals players who visit the official Rivals Discord, you’re known for your contributions to discussions on balance, strategies and tracking / analyzing unit stats. What brought you to Rivals?
Omeleet: I first heard about Rivals when I stumbled on a morbid clip from Totalbiscuit's wife. At the time, I did not have much interest in mobile games. Bryan, who streams Red Alert 2, made me consider giving Rivals a chance. As I just had purchased a new phone, and my my friend was trying to get me into a mobile game he enjoyed, it was a perfect storm.
In StarCraft 2, I mained Zerg for a very brief time in WoL/HotS, hit diamond (before masters existed) and lost interest. Grew up playing a lot of the C&C games, from Tiberium Dawn to Kane's Wrath, so nostalgia was a factor.
StrikerVX: I’ve played video games for most of my life and started my C&C journey with Red Alert 2. I’ve since bought the ultimate collection on origin and caught up on most of the other titles.
I first heard about Rivals watching a Generals Gentlemen cast of the game and was immediately interested. As it was close to the release of the game, I never had the chance to participate in the beta and instead jumped in on the first day of release. I play a variety of games and the highest level (which isn’t too high) that I’ve achieved is diamond in SC2 with both Terran and Zerg.
Q: Let’s learn a bit about you as players. What's your personal favorite decks? What game types do you play mostly?
Omeleet: I like so many decks, it is hard for me to choose: With Nod, I’d say:
• Jade – Militants / Lasers / Chem Warriors – Bikes / Scorpion – Laser Drones
• The Oxanna Giga Cannon deck
• And the Seth variant of the 2-3-1: Seth – Militant / Lasers – Wheels / Bikes / Scorpion – Banshees [Zaku's deck]
And with GDI:
• Jackson – Rifles / Missiles / Grenadiers – Drones – Disruptor / Sandstorm
• And closer to meta, I’d say: Solomon – Rifles / Missiles / JJT – Pitbull – Drones / Orca (On the commander choice, I feel Strongarm is universally a better pick, but this deck often floats lots of Tiberium, so I want to experiment with Solomon as a tool to clear large clusters on pads)
I prefer playing Events and Tournaments over Ladder. Yet, most of my play has been on Ladder due to time constraints lately.
StrikerVX:
• For GDI: Missile / Shock – Dogs / Pitbull / Predator – Mohawk or Orca
• For Nod: Laser / Flames – Wheels – Bikes / Scorpion / Phantom.
These decks are both competitive and fun to play. They are designed to have no units that the decks auto-lose to. I play around 10-15 games of ladder per day and around 15 games per week for our alliance’s internal tournaments. I enjoy playing and streaming the Champions events especially when the rewards are good.
"Tiberium income accelerates throughout the game"
Q: Currently, the Tiberium income accelerates throughout the game, creating distinct phases with less and more income. Many players are at best intuitively aware of this -- do you know how exactly this works? How does this info flow into your strategies / decks?Omeleet: Silvercruise measured the Tiberium income during the game, the time it accelerates is after 2 minutes and 30 seconds. Which means it's not dependent on the nukes. See this chart:
On how to use this information: This is a very complex topic that I mostly play by intuition. If you are going to make double harvesters, you should do it as soon as possible. Even though the income is substantially higher later, if your deck’s win condition is to make it to late game, every delay in income will make that win condition harder to achieve. If you lose the first nuke, you have less time to reap the benefits of multiple harvesters, and building another really puts you on the backfoot.
Income matters less around the third nuke, at which point I think it is generally incorrect to attack the opponent’s harvesters. If you are floating enough tiberium to make it to the end of the game, you should pull your harvesters to the pads so that you can concentrate your military offensively. If I am floating 200+ tiberium on 2nd nuke, and there is enough time for my harvester to make it to the pad, I will pull my harvester to pad and concentrate as much damage on enemies as possible.
StrikerVX: From my experience, spamming a unit that costs around 50 will allow you to use approximately all of your income of a single harvester (it also depends on how quickly your units are dying). This means that spamming tanks will leave you resource starved. To combat this, I like to mix in lasers when I’m fighting a tank war, only making more tanks when I’m certain my economy can sustain it.
"EA should advertise tournaments with in-game mails"
Q: As you both enjoy tournaments, what would you like to see more of?Omeleet: Tournaments are always beneficial. I don’t really think prizes need to be a focus of them, but rather attracting interest should be the primary goal. The best way to do that is to show how competitive and fun the game can be, while having lively commentary. Prestige or unique skins could be rewards to encourage competition. I feel like this may be an unpopular opinion among some of the more competitive players, like Bikerush, who seem to be very interested in high-stakes tournaments.
StrikerVX: More tournaments would definitely be good. We are seeing more grassroot tournaments pop up and I hope EA takes notice and delivers on their promise. A good place to start would be for EA to advertise tournaments with in-game mails (even if they are community-run).
As for tournament formats, there’s a lot of room for creativity. Blade and I did a mock draft for 4 players a while back and ended up with some interesting decks. Adding unit vetos to tournaments would also make the games more strategic and reward players for knowing their opponents.
StrikerVX' ingame profile – one of the players to follow if you enjoy watching high-level play
"This is the most diverse meta I've played in"
Q: What's your view on the current state of the balance in Rivals? Generally, and with regards to the latest balance patch?StrikerVX: I think this is the most diverse meta I’ve played in. I’m generally happy with the state of balance. Several units that I originally thought didn’t deserve any play (such as APC and Orca) are now showing their strength. The nerfs to boost commanders also added some commander variety into the meta.
My biggest gripe about the current state of the game continues to be the difference in anti-air capabilities between the two factions. In my opinion, well-controlled Pitbulls are able to defeat all air units. Nod, however, doesn’t have such an easy time with air. Stealth Tanks are expensive and vulnerable and takes a lot of micro to keep effective, while Phantoms struggle to take out units like Drones Swarms and Laser Drones. I’m not sure which is the healthy state for air units, but lately I’ve been bringing only my GDI deck to tournament games in order to avoid losing to Borcas.
About buffs before nerfs, I think nerfs are at least equally as important as buffs. It’s much worse for player experience to play against the same overpowered unit than for a player to never see an underpowered unit. But we need to be careful with nerfs to avoid what happened to MGs and MLRS.
Omeleet: I also like the current deck diversity relative to balance. The balance team should continue to focus on the following:
- Buffs Before Nerfs: Nobody likes to see their units nerfed. Sometimes a buff for one unit can nudge another unit into balance. MGs are a unit that was nerfed, but buffs to other units have invalidated the unit mostly, unless it has significant level advantage. Nerfs should be a last resort: the unit should be too strong with no buff to other units able to bring it in line before a nerf should be considered.
- Counterplay needs to be available so units are not oppressive: Certain units are frustrating to play against, since there is very little counterplay available, such as a wildcard Bomber coming out moments before the nuke goes off to clear pads and take full control. There needs to be at least the potential to outplay these units that enables win conditions; e.g. while pitbull can beat a Bomber, if it is chased off the pad and the nuke goes off, it doesn't mean much.
- Creating unique unit interactions: I think it is fine for some units to be designed with new players in mind, but generally these types of units should be unlocked very early, like Zone Troopers or Wolverines. Units that have a vanilla playstyle and a 1:1 analog across factions dull the point of opposing factions. I feel like Marauders are a disappointment for this reason, they play identically to Grenadiers, but are generally worse. In contrast, I think Drone Swarms reverting to 5 squad members was a stroke of genius, while perhaps overtuned, it isn't frustratingly stale like the previous incarnation (pre-change: 8 missiles to clear a drone swarm – tedious to clear but not really interesting otherwise). Some people have advocated for Laser Drones to receive the same treatment; this change would make the unit more forgiving to play, but more frustrating to play against.
Both StrikerVX & Omeleet aren’t the happiest playing against Orca Bombers – especially as Nod
Q: If you had to name some units each that are "too strong" and "too weak", which ones would you list & why?
Omeleet: This is kind of subjective, I feel there are versatile units that keep other units in check, and there are very strong units that are oppressive with specific or weak counters.
Pitbull is a very strong unit, but its presence keeps some potentially oppressive units in check, like Bombers or Swarms. So I consider it a necessary evil. Giga is strong too, but it performs best when you are already winning, and the meta is more air oriented.
Strong Units:
- Orca Bomber answers pretty much every unit on the ground; this is why I think Pitbull is a necessary evil, it should be possible to outplay units at times even if they are favored.
- Drone Swarms are very sticky units that do well as anti-infantry, countering even Zone Troopers in 2v1 scenarios. Very few units are adept at removing drones, meaning they can hold a pad reasonably well in 1v1 scenarios. These two traits make them very good for securing objectives. They most vulnerable to bikes/pitbulls, but outperform lasers (which feels okay given that they are only strong against infantry).
- Stealth Tank is a very safe pick, it counters all air at equal level (even Kodiak/Basilisk with a little micro), and can turn tank battles lopsided by lowering time to kill to one volley. I think it is too versatile, making it a no-brainer include in most decks.
- Honorable mentions:
- Phantom gets an honorable mention, because its EMP effectively shuts down all air choices (50% reduced AS, 30% reduced MS), allowing a well micro'd phantom to infinitely trade up in value. While I don't think the unit fits into the meta, because of Drone Swarms, I think it is too good at what it does.
- Chem Warriors are extremely tanky, I think a good whale leveraging high level Chem Warriors / Jade would be terrifying to face. They also do decent damage to vehicles: At the same level a Chem Warrior will defeat a Tank 1v1. Drone Swarms have artificially brought them in line.
Weak Units:
- Widowmakers & Wolverines come out at a point in the game where they rapidly become obsolete. They probably perform best when opponent is only fielding Air/Infantry. I think they should be specialized to deal with air, and priced accordingly. Sandstorm is the only unit from Tech Lab that is adept at dealing with Air, and only trades evenly with Kodiak. If Widows/Wolves are seen primarily as a beginner's generalist tool/support for other tech, and are not meant to be very powerful, perhaps it is best to leave them alone.
- Marauders are beefy boiz. Nothing really special, they win if your opponent chooses (or is forced to) crash war factory/tech units into them
- Rockworm: While it has the best cost-to-stat ratio in the game, it spends too much time underground. Pad control is the primary means to win, and since Rockworms do not excel at killing bases (they shouldn't), they are not really tailored for success. There is some really fun micro you can do with their emerge/cleave, that involves eruption damage, attacking, then burrowing and erupting again 6 seconds later (or continue attacking against a big armored vehicle).
- As an aside, I think Rockworms are very frustrating to play against, since they can burrow and are very tanky it is painful to try and kill them, I have often thought that the delay to burrow should be much higher, and the time underground should be lower; the downside is once you commit to burrowing, you already lose control of the unit for at least 3 seconds. This would probably make it worse.
- Scarabs
- Units that are weak but could be strong given the right meta/new units:
- Flame Tanks come out at a point in the game where they are not useful. If infantry becomes more meta, particularly for late game, this unit may find more use.
- Confessors with good infantry
StrikerVX: This meta has been pretty good and there aren’t any units that I think are absolutely broken/need nerfs. However, there are a few units that could potentially be nerfed.
Strong units:
- Orca Bomber: This unit is causing a lot of grief among players and for good reason. Ground counter play to this unit is relatively difficult and micro intensive while the borca player just has to fly them over units. Perhaps adding more counterplay by increasing reload can make the unit less frustrating to play against.
- Giga Cannon: Although Giga is not seen much on the ladder and seems easy enough to answer, it is a huge pain to play against a competent giga player when not running anti vehicle air units. The recent buff to Giga damage also made no sense to me. Nerfing Giga infantry damage is my idea for adding a way for non-air decks to handle Giga.
- Drone Swarm: I’m not sure that this unit is actually too strong, but it is very frustrating to play against. Because they can handily beat Missile Squads on defense, Nod players must rely on Bikes or Banshees to kill these in a timely manner. Being forced to run certain units to counter drone swarms doesn’t feel good. That said, only the devs have data on the performance of the unit, and have a more objective way of gauging the power of the unit.
Weak units: There are a lot. I’ll be ignoring tech units since they are a different discussion entirely.
- MLRS: The reverted nerf on its cost didn’t help it come back. The increased orcas in the meta doesn’t help it either. Perhaps some mobility related help (such as no pack-up time) will help it become more viable without being oppressive.
- Mutant Marauders: If this question was asked before mutant marauders were released, I would’ve chosen the grenadiers. After some brief testing with blade, it is clear that marauders have a fundamental problem: they can’t effectively engage their targets. When I tested the unit with blade, I could feel his frustration as I simply moved my vehicles away and sent shocks to take down these fairly expensive units. Grenadier’s problems may be fixed by slightly longer EMP time, but these Marauders will likely need something drastic to see play. They are very very tanky though, so adding raw stats may make them op.
- MG Squad: I hate playing against these things, so I’m not too sad that they aren’t in the meta anymore. However, this unit created a unique (albeit annoying) playstyle that makes the game more interesting. My idea to fix this unit would be to simply revert it back to the state it was in months ago, before the movement speed buff and the damage nerf.
"Scarabs provide a unique learning curve that acts as a rite of passage"
Q: Do you think it's a valid goal to make all units usable at high level play? Or do you think it's okay / natural that there's some core units and others that are fringe (e.g. because they otherwise might be too powerful for beginners)?StrikerVX: It depends on what you think is usable. In my opinion, having a core set of meta units is fine. Having all units see play just doesn’t sound realistic. For example, I find the Basilisk interesting. While it doesn’t necessarily work as a win condition, it can be used to effectively shut down avatar and most tech units. Overall, I wouldn’t try to force units to be usable by arbitrarily adding hard stats (such as the unwarranted sandstorm health buff and Liang drone cost decrease).
Omeleet: I believe this will always be in flux. Meta and counter metas are determined by the units in use. People will advocate for certain units to be better because they want an answer to every situation. If such a deck exists, it pushes deck diversity down at higher levels. Examples:
- Orca edged out Mohawk because of Stealth Tanks (and Avatar)
- Drones are rising in popularity despite Talon being the more flexible choice
- Stealth Tanks are still highly represented in the highest level of play, despite being a slow answer to Drone Swarm
- Drone Swarm has encouraged the reappearance of Bikes
With proper adjustments, viability is a good goal to work towards, but it should not take precedence over healthy meta balance. A meta where one unit [or certain pairs] answers most situations is dangerous. Orca Bombers nearly represents this in my mind.
Personally, I appreciate the different play styles appearing, but I know many become upset having their favorite units become less “meta” viable. Making more units viable probably threatens those that have limited deck selections the most, since it has the potential to challenge their units the most.
Some units are actually very polarizing despite not being viable at high levels. Scarab is an example of a unit that frustrates players in lower division, but is a liability in higher divisions. There are many fans of Scarabs, so I think Redwood is taking this into consideration before changing them. Scarabs also provide a unique learning curve that increases the value of cheap units and acts as a rite of passage to break into higher levels of play.
"If Tech becomes more viable, it could invalidate other pla styles"
Q: What's your take on the "tech debate"? Do you think the current way that tech is used, and the amount and diversity of tech play we see in the ladder is good?Omeleet: Tech holds more weight as a core identity of the game than my opinion of it does. I think many people are drawn to Tech because they like the idea of big units demolishing other units. I think it is dangerous to try to abruptly change this dynamic; I would like to see tech be significantly less tanky, but faster, cheaper, with only a slightly advantageous trade potential in even matchups. However, based off what I wrote before, I realize this may not be best for the game. Remember, the vast majority of players use 3 tech units in their deck. This kind of change will impact them the most.
Tech is actually very powerful; the issue is you give up field control to make it: If tech was to become "viable" in its current form, it could invalidate other play styles. It is not because tech is weak, it is because the current game timings prevent tech from making a large enough impact to consistently regain control of the game. I am certain anyone who has faced tech of equal or higher level, can attest to how difficult it is to remove it once it has a foothold.
StrikerVX: Tech on the ladder is usually run by players with high level units. I think this is mostly fine since our aggro players have more or less reached the level where they have a chance against tech whales. I think tech units are interesting and shouldn’t sit there being useless. There needs to be some kind of rework. I hear the devs are experimenting with some of these rework options and await their results.
Q: If you play a new deck, do you have a "learning by doing" approach, or do you come up with a deliberate game plan for the most common situations / opponent decks?
StrikerVX: I’ve recently tried out the APC drone orca deck that Suzaku is running. Before I played the deck I would have an idea on what to make against different enemy units and keep in mind any key breakpoints I can think of.
For example, an Orca can kill a full health scorpion with only around 5 shots of chip damage from the APC, meaning that having your APC fight a tank isn’t as bad if you have orca follow up.
However, theory isn’t enough. When you play a deck enough there’ll be an intuition to build the right unit for the right situation. As situations can vary so much, the only way to obtain this intuition is by practicing a certain deck a lot.
Omeleet: Usually I try to build my decks around a very specific unit. This means picking units that accentuate that unit. Sometimes it doesn't work out very well. There are so many situations where you will learn by doing, that I have to say it is a little of both.
For example, I just learned the other night that Rockworm eruption damage cools down every 6 seconds. I can exploit Disruptors cleaving squads on the tile between my target and the disruptor for double base damage or faster squad kills. It is these weird mechanics you have to be on the lookout for. Mastering all the little quirks is how you make a unit your own.
I think most meta decks are happy accidents that try to field cheap fast counters with enough firepower that forward the primary objective: Holding pads when the Nuke fires.
Advice for new Rivals players
Q: What’s your advice to new players to get better?Omeleet: I think the only way to improve is to play more and think about what is going wrong in games. Starting a new "throwaway" account can be a low investment way to do this:
- Don't level any units on it beyond the minimum level of the league (Level 5 for Gold, Level 6 for Platinum etc.)
- Your average unit level should disqualify you from Challenge Matches and should not give you an advantage against opponents
- Climb as high as you can, don't worry about your rank
- When you are down in levels, you have to outplay your opponent to win
- Think critically about how you can leverage every advantage.
The tip that really opened my eyes, suggested by Striker, was Militants taking damage from Tiberium dying in the same number of shots to shocks, no matter how much tiberium damage they took. This is called a unit’s breakpoint, and it is the key to getting advantageous trades and snowballing advantages.
StrikerVX: An advice that I don’t see often is to make units and to make the right units. Sometimes players get so fixated on microing the units that they have that they forget to make more units. If and when their unit dies, having a hole in their production would most certainly mean they lose the missile.
In most RTS, macro is a lot more important than micro. In Starcraft, no matter how good your micro is, you’ll have a hard time beating an army twice your size. While this isn’t nearly as extreme in Rivals (which focuses on smaller scale battles), making the right units is very important to winning the game.
"We should show EA that non-p2w monetization can work for Rivals"
Q: Thanks a ton for your time & commitment to this! Any other messages to the Rivals community?Omeleet: Thanks for reading! And remember to have fun: if you can't find your fun in the game, take a break.
StrikerVX: Lately I’ve seen a lot of negative feedback on the vanity teasers. While I’m personally not too impressed with these, I think we should show EA that non-p2w monetization can work. If the reception of these vanity is poor, there is a chance that we get more p2w mechanics, and that’s something that I would hate more than a couple of bad emotes.
You cYou can find both on Twitch:
• Omeleet’s Twitch Channel
• StrikerVX’ Twitch Channel
Omeleet in Rivals and his alliance – California with a Spanish flag, should the FBI investigate?!
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