So I've now been on Vulcanus, I've fought Demolishers. I have more solid opinions now, and I feel I have an idea of how Rampant can proceed with Demolishers. Some of this is rehashing from my other posts, but better put together.
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They need to have some sort of spawning mechanic, otherwise Vuncanus is a 'solved' situation after a few encounters. My best suggestion for this is that new Demolishers should spawn in unclaimed territories on the edge of claimed territories. This creates pressure over time, meaning you have to keep defenses capable of killing them. 90% of the time this should be a little Demolisher, so easy to kill. But add perhaps a 7% chance it being a medium, and a 3% chance of a large, just to keep things potentially scary.
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The balance on hp regen is flawed. From what I've seen they can regen to full hp from very low in roughly ~15-25 seconds. I agree extended kiting for an hour would be boring, but they pushed too far the other direction. They are dead instantly or they are fine, there is no purpose to defense in depth. You either can pass the very high dps check and you win without losses, or you lose. I suggest tuning the HP perhaps 5x higher, perhaps more, and lowering the regen to perhaps a third of what it is. The ultimate goal should be something that can regen to full in a few minutes, not instantly. Still prevents any long kiting chases, but also means they are likely to do damage before they die and are a bit more vulnerable to being worn down.
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Now, for the thing that makes Rampant a true gem, the AI. Here is where I think the best 'fun' factor can be created. I propose two major changes here. First, that we make the attacks more random in nature. Basically, not knowing what an enemy will do makes them more interesting to deal with. I suggest that Demolishers should spend roughly 90% of their time in a 'passive' state where they will not seek out anything to attack, they still damage anything they pass by, of course, and do not avoid players or player structures. But nor do they seek them out, so the damage in such a situation will be random and generally limited. The other 10% of the time we should see normal behavior of seeking out anything in their territory, just as vanilla AI.
Except when they are damaged. Another random number generated every so often should be a 'retreat percentage'. Or perhaps just generate that number once for each worm, to give them personality. Basically this is a number which if they reach a certain amount of hp, they attempt to flee. My best guess would be a random number locked between 30%-70%. This produces a very interesting behavior where they will attack but retreat when badly damaged. Have them stay in 'retreat mode' where they avoid player structures for a day or two. This again makes them feel unique, but also means that not all defenses have to be able to kill a worm, perhaps they will be enough to deter a worm, unless that worm is feeling especially brave.
This means worms will survive much longer, since they can't be lured into grinding themselves to death, which means kiting will be less of an issue. It also just makes them interesting, when 90% of the time as long as you aren't in the way they will ignore you. Every time you see a worm, you'll be wondering, 'Is it aggressive right now?' and 'Will it turn around if I just hit it really hard?' More tactics for the player to use, less predictability.
Oh, and I also suggest we make them immune to electric, because electric is far too effective on a segmented enemy. Also they swim in lava, I don't think a little burning will bother them.
