Portal Technology in Natural Selection
JusticeBlade
Join Date: 2002-12-23 Member: 11440Members
Join Date: 2002-12-23 Member: 11440Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Wouldn't you like to see....</div>We've played Portal in all its fun cake infused glory. Its fun and amazing, and the technology behind it is quiet useful and interesting.
So here is my proposition for using similar concepts in Natural Selection.
Phase gates, and Infantry Portals are the first things that come to my mind as benefiting from using portal tech. I remember times where I rappidly mashed my Use key to warp to the right place via phase gate and either killed a teamate by warping inside him or got chopped while getting my barings after the warp.
What to do?
Why not have a max limit of four phase gates per map. When you go up to one phase gate and hit the Use key it brings up a portal two way door way to the existing phase gates, four portals if there are four phase gates, one if theres only one etc. These portals are simple two way portal doorways aranged around in a circle or square like fashion around the phase gate. You can look through them. You can shoot through them, and go through them. But these portals only stay open for four seconds so you can't camp with them. Then they recharge for four seconds, rinse and repeat. This helps because A) You can see where your going before hand B) You can shoot at where your going before hand, and C) No exploding teamates with your existance.
Can Kharaa go through phase gate two way portals? Why yes they can, so be smart with using it.
Infantry Portals would use it in a specific fashion to stop spawn camping. First you start in a room, it could look like a ship hanger, dropship, asthetics don't matter, all that matters is that you have your gun and your in a safe place. Then you go to a button. You press it. A one way portal opens up to an infantry portal. You can shoot throught, you can jump through, and they can't come in. It stays open as long as you need to exit it. The portal faces only one direction, so Kharaa can camp the back of the IP and chomp it, there by closing the portal.
These are just some thoughts about possibilities and they seem to be very Marine side oriented. So if you have any good ideas for Portal tech for Kharaa or Marine your thoughts and speculations are just as valid as mine. Personally, I think portals are very cool when used in moderation and could make NS2 a very interesting and fun game.
So here is my proposition for using similar concepts in Natural Selection.
Phase gates, and Infantry Portals are the first things that come to my mind as benefiting from using portal tech. I remember times where I rappidly mashed my Use key to warp to the right place via phase gate and either killed a teamate by warping inside him or got chopped while getting my barings after the warp.
What to do?
Why not have a max limit of four phase gates per map. When you go up to one phase gate and hit the Use key it brings up a portal two way door way to the existing phase gates, four portals if there are four phase gates, one if theres only one etc. These portals are simple two way portal doorways aranged around in a circle or square like fashion around the phase gate. You can look through them. You can shoot through them, and go through them. But these portals only stay open for four seconds so you can't camp with them. Then they recharge for four seconds, rinse and repeat. This helps because A) You can see where your going before hand B) You can shoot at where your going before hand, and C) No exploding teamates with your existance.
Can Kharaa go through phase gate two way portals? Why yes they can, so be smart with using it.
Infantry Portals would use it in a specific fashion to stop spawn camping. First you start in a room, it could look like a ship hanger, dropship, asthetics don't matter, all that matters is that you have your gun and your in a safe place. Then you go to a button. You press it. A one way portal opens up to an infantry portal. You can shoot throught, you can jump through, and they can't come in. It stays open as long as you need to exit it. The portal faces only one direction, so Kharaa can camp the back of the IP and chomp it, there by closing the portal.
These are just some thoughts about possibilities and they seem to be very Marine side oriented. So if you have any good ideas for Portal tech for Kharaa or Marine your thoughts and speculations are just as valid as mine. Personally, I think portals are very cool when used in moderation and could make NS2 a very interesting and fun game.
Comments
Though off topic, I did in my search come across an interesting idea on the Kharaa and their base mechanics..
What if Kharaa, like Marines, could build their hives anywhere on the map? Of course there would be a proximity zone where you couldn't build two hives on each other or within a certain distance but it could be very feasable and possibily very balancing for the Kharaa. Keep those Marines on there toes.
Anyway, back to portals...
i dont know what should be done in this area thers a clone thread there sa portals thread so undisided, but i definatley think this technology should be used.
on topic!
i think it would be very cool to use potral tech of some kind - but instead of having exactly like portal where you are free to walk and shoot objects through, i think it would be more fun to have it like this:
the phase gate is exactly the same as it is now only
when you hit "e" / use button the bottom circle area of the phase gate opens up
the marine jumps down through the portal, and is now in "limbo" (the marine can press "E" anytime to pop back out)
now the commander can select the phase gate and teleport the marines to a desired location.
This happens when the commander clicks where he wants the marines to arrive
portals open and the marines all fall through with in a certain radius.
The disadvantage being that the marines can't get back.
its also a bit of a blatant rip :s
Imho it fits more to aliens than marines considering their hit and run playstyle.
Using portals for infantry portals or phasegates would just be too good for the marines.
If you don't guard phasegates, you are supposed to risk death after phasing and with multiple ips it's easier for marines to avoid a spawncamp than for the aliens anyway.
they (in my pov) work in completely different ways.
Portals bend space-time to create a bridge between two points making hte distance Zero.
Phasegates demolecularize the object, transfer the data/molecules from point A to B and then remolecularize them. (using nanotech? <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />)
and iirc Infantry Portals arnt even portals at all, but a sort of Star Trek transporter room thing, where marines are "energised" into the field from a space ship <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
plus its gimmicky
I don't like the idea of seeing where you are going for the same reason Buzzou mentioned. And also, you shouldn't be able to pick the phase gates you wish to travel to, forces the commander to keep the total amount down while not restricting him.
After giving it some thought, I think portal tech, as seen in Portal, would be interesting in the Natural Selection universe in the following fashion. Keep the Infantry Portals and Phase Gate roughly the same, only place that see through, shoot through portal in the center of the structure, and it can only appear in the structure.
<u>Phase Gate:</u>
So marines jump in one end, pop out the other, flip over and land on the floor of their destination. Anyone who dropped a portal on the floor and then a portal on the floor elsewhere and jumped in will know what I am talking about.
Only, in this situation, there is no possibility of placing the portal with a "gun", it can only be done with a structure. Without the structure, the portal doesn't exist.
Other balances would be, someone looking through the portal only sees the ceiling in the room where the other gate is placed. The chances of being able to defend a phase gate from the other side should be slim to none, and you must jump through if you want to defend and hold that position.
<u>Infantry Portal:</u>
With the addition of a drop ship "gate room" where marines spawn out of sleep / clone chambers, then the marines can try to wait and jump through at the same time to the Infantry Portal.
This drop shop gate / spawn room would also add atmosphere, IMHO.
<b>KHARAA</b>
The one place I see the portal would shine would be the Fade. Instead of blink, he could appear to melt through walls if the portal that the fade places was invisible to the marine's eye.
For those who will miss the Fade's blink, if you have played Portal you would realize that you will get far more air time and mobility with this if you use it correctly. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if this gives Fades even more of an advantage in speed and agility, as well as the surprise factor of popping up behind the enemy.
If you still think that doesn't make the Fade unique enough, I would give the sucker the ability to clip through structures and possibly even marines as a ability that also makes the Fade appear "faded" or "see through". Have the fade be able to take half damage and deal half damage during the ability too.
<b><u>Come on, think of the possibilities!</b></u>
The comander has a list of Phase GATES and the room they are in from a pop up menu. One can select one as Primary phase (maybe this could be a TECH or cost res every time you change primary phases?). Once a Marine phases they go to this one first and then will cycle through the rest in the order that they where built. After 15 seconds the next time the marine phases it will be straight to the primary phase again even if there are more on the list he has not visted. This way the marines can GL 30 rounds into the OC nest, phase back to base, reload and phase straight back. Alternately if the marines "shift+use" then they could either phase directly to the primary phase or get a location menu.
Alternately, I think it would be cool if, when multiple gates were built, the inner "nexus" of the gate would expand into a third dimension, where when you walked into it you'd be in a little room shaped like a triangle (or hexagon, or whatever, corresponding to the number of gates on the map) and it would let you walk through any gate from there (including the one you came in from).
Alternately, I think it would be cool if, when multiple gates were built, the inner "nexus" of the gate would expand into a third dimension, where when you walked into it you'd be in a little room shaped like a triangle (or hexagon, or whatever, corresponding to the number of gates on the map) and it would let you walk through any gate from there (including the one you came in from).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That would strain a lot of people's computers.