2010-02-10, 17:33:18
It's just pointless to compare things which actually never happen that way. It's a dynamic game, there is no "heli+hull+fireball vs air ship + fireball without any creeps on both sides" a whole game. As soon as you get hull and the other one gets air ship the game doesnt stop. In this situation noone can really harm the other one (put them on any lane and they will just creep, doing nothing else with their "incredible" dps - note that the air ship will creep better most of the times), more important is what the strats transition into and that can be for example weapon, troops, porter, steel/gold hull for the air ship. I don't see any helicopter strat beating this, some may play 0-0, but better isn't possible. Even those 0-0 playing strats would be at a disadvantage as whenever 2v2+ fights come up air ship is stronger.
You say "if I want to creep, i'd go thunder", but thunder cannot attack the side lanes from mid as well as the air ship can. Thunder does worse against heavy tank, shredder and gobo. Thunder is really slow, so you might spend additional gold for speed. Thunder might creep better, but the advantage of the air ship is that it is just incredible flexible and able to create many favorable situations (like 2v1 at side lanes when air ship is playing mid) better than any other tank, without losing too much creeping or 1v1 strength.
You say "if I want to creep, i'd go thunder", but thunder cannot attack the side lanes from mid as well as the air ship can. Thunder does worse against heavy tank, shredder and gobo. Thunder is really slow, so you might spend additional gold for speed. Thunder might creep better, but the advantage of the air ship is that it is just incredible flexible and able to create many favorable situations (like 2v1 at side lanes when air ship is playing mid) better than any other tank, without losing too much creeping or 1v1 strength.