The changing Zeitgeist of Chambers
Ryo-Ohki
Join Date: 2009-03-26 Member: 66917Members
Join Date: 2009-03-26 Member: 66917Members
<div class="IPBDescription">The death of D-M-S</div>I played Natural Selection when it released, all the way up to part way through 2004. With NS2 in the very near future I decided to come back into NS, and immediately realized why I played it in the first place. A few rounds on the old familiar maps and it all came back to me. I was quite interested to see how tactics had evolved in the 5 years I'd been out of the game, and was even more interested to see that most were the same ones used back when I used to play.
With one major exception. When I stopped playing, the chamber order was Defense - Movement - Sensory. This was more or less completely immutable; Alien teams often had rage-quits if someone dropped sensory or movement first. For a brief time after the major sensory buff that allowed them to cloak everything nearby, sensory enjoyed a resurgence, then once again we were back to D-M-S. I had no reason to think it would change.
I come back now and defense is relegated to the 3rd hive. Sensory and movement fight for first hive, with movement seeming to be slightly ahead. Now what puzzles me most about this is that the Marine team doesn't seem to have any new strategy or tactics that I've been able to see. So why is S-M-D or M-S-D working against them now when it was an abject failure in the olden days? The chambers and upgrades haven't changed since I last played. I honestly can't figure it out. I'd love to hear some feedback from people who've been playing consistently all the way through to the present day, and thus witnessed the changing times first hand.
With one major exception. When I stopped playing, the chamber order was Defense - Movement - Sensory. This was more or less completely immutable; Alien teams often had rage-quits if someone dropped sensory or movement first. For a brief time after the major sensory buff that allowed them to cloak everything nearby, sensory enjoyed a resurgence, then once again we were back to D-M-S. I had no reason to think it would change.
I come back now and defense is relegated to the 3rd hive. Sensory and movement fight for first hive, with movement seeming to be slightly ahead. Now what puzzles me most about this is that the Marine team doesn't seem to have any new strategy or tactics that I've been able to see. So why is S-M-D or M-S-D working against them now when it was an abject failure in the olden days? The chambers and upgrades haven't changed since I last played. I honestly can't figure it out. I'd love to hear some feedback from people who've been playing consistently all the way through to the present day, and thus witnessed the changing times first hand.
Comments
Defense chambers can be countered by rines somewhat by doing weapon upgrades.
The only chamber that cannot be countered at all is the movement chamber, hence it is the most popular one.
I dont really remember a time where 1st MC was not the most usable setting. At least in the more serious games with competent teams.
/edit now I remember, yeah DC was popular as well back in the days, due to heal-stacking. Since heal stacking was removed, DCs lost a lot of their popularity.
Defence chambers proximity healing was kicked well and truely in the crotch, which combined with the easy mode hitboxes there is now, gives it less appeal than before. However with the majority of games played movement first, defence chambers first can result in a second more consistantly than sensory first, which is due in part to skulks simply not dieing as quickly as players expect. Sometimes you see players change target at the point the first target would have died if they didn't have carapace.
Although as second chamber (assuming movement was taken first), sensory outweighs defence, this is due to scent of fear, which is the single most useful ability in the game when you have two hives. Cloaking is easily countered, and focus assumes that the player can get close enough to make use of it. On a side note, there are far, far to many lerks taking focus.
Although technically defence and sensory should work fine together, you'll probably find its more a player attitude towards this combination as first pair that causes the aliens to lose than the viability of that pairing to work.
MVT's are in because you can use them to go to different hives/hives under attack, they provide adren to players nearby. Adren, Silence, and Celerity are all very solid upgrades. Silence is better than cloaking in some ways, and adren an celerity can be used by lower lifeforms and higher lifeforms alike to great effect. In this way the stack of 2/3 dcs was replaced by a gorge with adren/MC nearby.
Focus fades is the main reason you see SC second.
Sorry I was being optimistic for the community with my reason.
I'd agree with that :D