Mortars & drones: targeting shallow instead of deep creeper can be beneficial

[UpperKEES]

Thanks Aurzel, also for teaching me a new word. ;)

[mthw2vc]

When the grenade/shell hits the creeper it potentially damages a square of 7 by 7 blocks.

It damages one more square than a 7x7 in the corner.

[UpperKEES]

Thanks mthw2vc! :)

Apparently a mortar shell does 144 ccc damage (as seen in previous examples), while a drone bomb does 50 x 4 = 200 ccc damage.

A mortar shell costs 3.4 energy, so 144 / 3.4 = 42.4 ccc max. damage is done per unit of energy.
A drone bomb costs 1.6 energy, so 200 / 1.6 = 125 ccc max. damage is done per unit of energy, which is about 3 times more than a mortar (but of course the maximum damage is almost never done).

Edit: see here for a slight addition.

[Aurzel]

yeah while a drone seems to do far more damage, the bombing run ensures that only around 1/3 - 1/2 of the potential damage is done on average even assuming pretty thick creeper cover (unless there's ridiculously large amounts of creeper on the field)

[ctuna]

Wow - now I gotta figure out how to use the info - can't claim ignorance any more.

[UpperKEES]

I've also been thinking of creating a map that forces you to use 'through the wall damage' to be able to solve it.

Well, here it is!

[UpperKEES]

Apparently a mortar shell does 144 ccc damage (as seen in previous examples), while a drone bomb does 50 x 4 = 200 ccc damage.

A slight addition to this, discovered by Kapoios:

The cell directly targeted can be damaged up to 8 ccc! When it contains more than 4 ccc of creeper, only 35 cells will be damaged by a mortar shell instead of 36 (or 49 for a drone bomb respectively).

The maximum damage done remains the same however. This behaviour is similar to the way blasters do their damage, see here.

[BigBird]

This means a bomb targeting a single cell at elevation level 1 surrounded by cells at elevation level 2 will only do 1/49^th of the damage that a bomb would do that targets it's neighboring cell!

that was one of the things that got me frustrated. i saw fisherck's world at night map in his signature on this topic, and when i built a mortar on africa, anywhere i moved it, it still hit the same 3 cells in the south atlantic that was 1 level below the rest. still, made it more challenging regardless of how frustrating it was lol

[Destroyer333]

very well done upperkees, i dont think anyone else could have explained it so clearly and succinctly

Yes, very succulent.

[mthw2vc]

very well done upperkees, i dont think anyone else could have explained it so clearly and succinctly

Yes, very succulent.

Succinct =/= Succulent

[WreeperCorld]

Upperkees, thanks for the work you put into this.

[ontheworld]

Upperkees, thanks for the work you put into this.

Someone making an account just to say thanks... Things are going the good way in this world =D

[thepenguin]

Upperkees, thanks for the work you put into this.

Someone making an account just to say thanks... Things are going the good way in this world =D

and the useless way :P