Re: Is Rosalia FINALLY good now?
Responding to video by @ShadowViperGaming43 here:
• Is Rosalia FINALLY Good Now?
I did some deviations from what ShadowViperGaming did. The general strategy is still the same, but there are 2 significant tower differences:
-T3/M2 Alchemist traded out for M2 Mage positioned for the purposes of Advanced Intel support
-Top path Mermonkey traded out for B3/T2 Heli
This not only saves more money, but better addresses blimps, the bigger problem of the 80s where the Flying Fortress saveup is at its most relevant when Spectre is generally checking the Super Ceramics. The only concern with this notion beyond Camos being complacency killers in general is Round 78's Camo Ceramic cluster being potentially too convoluted.
Oh, and yes, I like when the game rewards me for creativity rather than drugging up on Alchemist drinks. More of that, please.
My interest was in displaying how to work with Rosalia. There's some conveniences with her placement that I go with here for the workshop:
-It's out of way from the bend at the land transition, meaning if I wanted, I could place more people in there with Rosalia not compromising anything
-It's close enough to the first, in-water turn for Rosalia to move to cover it and shoot blimps silly at an early portion of the track
-It also covers a middle portion of the track, bolstering Advanced Intel involvement
-The aerial machines' ports also get that massive amount of free real estate to work with for placement while still benefitting from the discounts
There are some additional points to Rosalia's own usage to allow for surviving to Spectre's purchase (the most pivotal point) on weaker defenses:
-Laser wants lineup shots to prevent Damage wasting, while Grenade wants clusters to hit more targets at once. Make use of these points to undermine the biggest threats to the defense.
-Scatter Missile is designed to wreck floods and buddy systems. Use it for that to help avoid dealing with leaks in the first place.
-Flight Boost has a long duration, similar to Etienne's Drone Swarm. Setting it up is a good way to have it break key threats while having it recharged sooner against followup threats for a better option.
-Both activations are solid against early blimps. Just make sure to understand what you could have to deal with so that you're not caught dealing with activation cooldown.
That said, do I think this addresses key imbalances with Rosalia? I have my doubts when all is said and done. Flying Fortress upon purchase is a win CHIMPS button with Camo crosspath, Radar Village support, or suitable Decmao, and we can see that Rosalia is affording it before Round 90, meaning DDTs and Round 98 are effectively bypassed. Now a reward like this for surviving with so much money banked would still be fine, if not for how the 80s have NO Camos, meaning the player can milk choosing the DPS crosspath over the Camo crosspath and other things like consistently having Bloontonium Reactor surfaced during the entirety of the 80s. This is absolutely worth ticketing, and I personally would not object to Spectre, already something that trivializes pre-81 in general even before some of its buffs in the past, getting a price increase if it means Rosalia having to survive against the Round 90 DDTs at least on lesser resources to get Flying Fortress.
I think Rosalia should be better designed as more than a Flying Fortress gimmick. There are some key issues that have not been addressed, such as the Laser overcentralization, and most notably Kinetic Charge comparing so poorly to Brickell's Mega Mine. Scatter Missiles having a shorter cooldown is still welcome and also involving cleaner usage with Kinetic Charge's own cooldown in mind, but NinjaKiwi was absolutely cautious to a clear fault about buffing her, while deciding a higher percent discount was a good idea. I'll have more to say about Kinetic Charge in a video I'm working on.