Spawnable discussion: Bonk choy and Boxer bot

Making an immobile defender limited to melee has always been a problem; Mister Toasty and Snapdragon are only marginally longer ranged, but we can discuss them when you get to posting them. But indeed, Bonk Choy was at his best in GW, despite how most pots in that game had to be replaced almost every Ops round unless you babysat them as a Sunflower. 

In GW2, both sides have a quest to build/plant 15 bots/pots, and I often use these guys as throw away guys to get the quest done, instead of trying to actually use them (although Sunflowers can cheat this a bit by using heal flowers, although not rainbow heal flowers, not sure about the dark flower, for this quest), so I can preserve more useful bots/pots, despite having tons. I haven't been using my legendary consumables in some time as Rux hasn't sold them since 2019 or earlier, so can't replace them, but Monk Choy is better than the base plant for sure, but still not all that hot.

BfN pots/bots are already underperformers, but these 2 are just awful. The proliferation of TV Heads and Wildflowers make these guys little more than speed bumps, and aren't really worth using.

A new game should do make these guys better. They already can only damage you in melee as it is, so even back in GW where Bonk Choy was at its best, they weren't the greatest things to put down. Getting rid of the accursed Wildflowers and TV Heads would go a long way at fixing this, but more would need to be done.

@Iron_Guard8Gw1 ops had the best bonk choy. He could often handle anything that came his way until the engineers started to appear midway through but could dispose of practically every regular zombie in the game.

Gw1 turf also had plenty of corner pots where you could put him for some cheap vanquishes but thab 2 nerfed him and bfn removed good pot placement in the map design alltogether.

Snapdragon is also gonna need a buff when I get to him.

Tv head and wildflower have to go. Ops should rely on the class zombies to break through the defenses requiring players to stop them like in 1 and 2. Bfn also spams way more heal zombies than 1 or 2 did.

Time to start punching the enemies with these summonables!

Introduction

The Bonk Choy and Boxer Bot are summonable variants that attack enemies at close range, and while they operate in mostly the same fashion as their counterparts, there is a crucial difference between both. The Bonk Choy has a 2 punch combo, while the Boxer Bot has 3. Why they both deal the same damage, except that Boxer Bot gets an extra punch, I never will know. The puches deal various damage between games, in Battle for Neighborville, the damage is quite redundant and not significant, while in the Garden Warfare series, they deal much more damage. Their health is fairly significant, a decent amount more than the basic summonables, which would make sense since they are close range. 

NOTE: There is a legendary summonable variant called the Monk Choy, which is a Bonk Choy upgrade which is hard to obtain, I will discuss this later. The Boxer Bot does not have a legendary variant, however there is a different legendary variant for a different zombie summonable.

My Thoughts

These summonables are quite useful when placed well, as they can attack an enemy by surprise and deal decent damage. Unfortunately, in the later shooters such as Battle for Neighborville, their damage has been really reduced to the point they are not greatly worthwhile unless an enemy is at low health, while in earlier shooters, they can be really powerful. This is made worse as these summonables are almost identical, apart from the fact that Boxer Bot gains an extra punch in the combo. For this reason, I suggest a bunch of changes, including giving Bonk Choy the 3 punch combo like Boxer Bot, providing some more health for these summonables due to their low range, increasing the damage they deal significantly and reducing the cooldown between their punch combos where possible.

I would give the toughness for these summonables an Easy difficulty to defeat, as they are limited to close ranged attacks and they do not deal that much damage, however they can be somewhat tough to defeat due to their decent health. They can be easily attacked from long range without them posing a threat at all, but they can take a while to take out due to their health. If you turn a corner and you find one of these summonable variants, they may be able to attack you by surprise, but as long as your health is not too low and you can quickly move away from it and shoot it down, it should not be too much of a problem to deal with.

The Bonk Choy and Boxer Bot appear in Battle for Neighborville, which is quite good to see, and they possess a cooldown of about 2 minutes each. I would actually recommend that they have no cooldown in the game instead, because they do not seem to perform that well due to only being able to attack at close range, not dealing that much damage upon landing their punches which seems unnecessary, and enemies and other summonables being able to take it out from longer ranges. They are quite situational, as they can be utilised around corners or close to or in objectives, but generally enemies will not find it difficult to vanquish these summonables.

In A Future Shooter

Seeing these summonables in a future shooter is something I would like to see, but they should be buffed similar to how powerful they were in the older Garden Warfare series. As they can be easily destroyed at range and are not even too much of a threat at close range, I would suggest that these summonables be easy to obtain and quite easy to get in large numbers if desired, at around 1,000 Coins each. I actually do not recommend an unlock cost this time, like the basic summonables, as it does not seem currently necessary because of how underpowered they are right now. 

Overall

Due to them being quite underpowered currently, I would suggest that they would be easily obtained and feasible to get in large numbers if players desire. No unlock cost should be necessary either to make them even easier to get early on. Because of their current state, I also have a few change suggestions for them including giving the Bonk Choy the 3 punch combo to match the Boxer Bot, increase their health further due to their close range nature, increase the damage each punch does because currently it is not that significant and reducing cooldown between punch combos if enemies are still nearby after a punch, as these changes would make them significantly more powerful.

MONK CHOY

There is a legendary summonable called the Monk Choy which is a legendary variant of the Bonk Choy, and is only available in GW2. The Monk Choy has more health and 50% more damage, essentially meaning that the damage output can match the Boxer Bot (because of its 3 punch combo as opposed to Bonk Choy's 2), while also having additional health. I would suggest giving it an additional punch in its combo. Currently, the only way to obtain it in GW2 is to obtain them in DLCs. Rux used to sell them sometimes, but I do not know if this is still the case. 

I think this legendary summonable should be obtainable in a future shooter. I would recommend the way to obtain them in a future shooter is to either get them rarely in Sticker Packs, rarely from Rux or you would get them as an exclusive reward for purchasing a bundle. It may only be available some of the time for purchase (depending on how it would be obtained) and cost more Coins than normal, or have a different currency attached to its purchase, such as a premium currency (which I would assume would be obtainable without having to spend real money if players want).

@TheSprinter85Every time I go back to gw1 I have to remind myself that I cant just walk past corners without looking or else my soldier is gonna be sent to the moon.