Damage and Armor upgrades for Aliens
yourbonesakin
Join Date: 2005-08-06 Member: 57682Members
Join Date: 2005-08-06 Member: 57682Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Ala NS1 Marines</div>In Starcraft, every side can upgrade damage and health/armor. Thus, the upgrade battle between each opposing side contributes to the strategic complexity of the game.
In NS1, only Marines can upgrade weapons and armor. Not only is it unfair for skulks to go up against weapon 3 Marines with 280 HP, we are really losing out on rich gameplay by not letting Aliens also play the the upgrade game. If you know about professional level Starcraft, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Starcraft is still being played 10 years after release and is lauded as the best RTS of all time. Since NS2 will be a FPS-RTS hybrid, there may be something to the Starcraft upgrade model worth importing to NS2.
I propose something similar to marine upgrades be given to Aliens.
Damage: +10% of base damage (Fades get +8 damage each upgrade if they still deal 80 damage in NS2, for instance)
Armor: Varying amounts of +armor for each alien lifeform (so skulks and fades get the same amount of bonus proportional to their existing hardiness). I'm not sure how much armor would be good. Marines get ~+26% total base health with each upgrade. If we make upgrades for each side equal, skulks would get +12 armor (90 HP), gorges +38 (290 HP), lerks +25 (185 HP), fades +75 (600 HP), onos +286 (2100 HP). The numbers are of course invalid because we don't know the HP/Armor numbers for Aliens in NS2, but +26% seems good to me.
As with Marines, Aliens can only upgrade damage three times and armor three times. The main Alien Commander would basically research upgrades the same way Marine Commanders do; via interface without peon alien input (whether or not Aliens would have an arms lab structure, I'm uncertain).
In NS1, only Marines can upgrade weapons and armor. Not only is it unfair for skulks to go up against weapon 3 Marines with 280 HP, we are really losing out on rich gameplay by not letting Aliens also play the the upgrade game. If you know about professional level Starcraft, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Starcraft is still being played 10 years after release and is lauded as the best RTS of all time. Since NS2 will be a FPS-RTS hybrid, there may be something to the Starcraft upgrade model worth importing to NS2.
I propose something similar to marine upgrades be given to Aliens.
Damage: +10% of base damage (Fades get +8 damage each upgrade if they still deal 80 damage in NS2, for instance)
Armor: Varying amounts of +armor for each alien lifeform (so skulks and fades get the same amount of bonus proportional to their existing hardiness). I'm not sure how much armor would be good. Marines get ~+26% total base health with each upgrade. If we make upgrades for each side equal, skulks would get +12 armor (90 HP), gorges +38 (290 HP), lerks +25 (185 HP), fades +75 (600 HP), onos +286 (2100 HP). The numbers are of course invalid because we don't know the HP/Armor numbers for Aliens in NS2, but +26% seems good to me.
As with Marines, Aliens can only upgrade damage three times and armor three times. The main Alien Commander would basically research upgrades the same way Marine Commanders do; via interface without peon alien input (whether or not Aliens would have an arms lab structure, I'm uncertain).
Comments
Damage:
1. Sharpen
2. Aggression
3. Focus
Defense:
1. Husk
2. Carapace
3. Shell
Damage:
1. Sharpen
2. Aggression
3. Focus
Defense:
1. Husk
2. Carapace
3. Shell<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Damage upgrade would not be "Focus". It would simply increase base damage, without reducing rate of fire. It would be the exact same as Weapons upgrades for Marines, just +x damage.
But I like where you're going. Technically NS1 already has this, as upgrades have three levels of usefulness depending on how many chambers have been dropped. The idea of ACommanders further expending resources to make a certain upgrade more powerful (say, Cloaking or Regeneration) is intriguing.
Without knowing anything about NS2 tech tree or armor system it's really difficult to say how effective and useful those upgrades could be. Still, the general idea isn't all that bad.
One thingy that SC had figured in kinda weird way was the upgrades and low tech units. Marines and zerglins gained way more than 10% on their upgrades (6+1, 5+1). It partitially allowed them to remain important in the late game as the damage output increased quite a bit. The system goes a bit further than that with the weird armor reduction, but I think at least some bits of it might help the basic skulk/light marine to scale better to the late game.
I'm sorry, but I don't like where this is going. Both focus skulk and focus fade could kill in one hit against a non-upgraded marine. I don't want an upgraded marine to have the same problem.
My suggestion was that instead of just one big jump to more damage and slower attack speed, we have three levels. In fact, it doesn't have to be fast/weak, medium/medium, slow/strong. Sharpen could be the same attack speed with slighter higher damage, aggression could be regular damage with faster attack speed, and focus could be slow attack speed with high damage. That way, you can pick and choose which you want and base your strategy accordingly.
These might not even be a lvl 1, lvl 2, lvl 3 type of system. It could just be two alternatives to focus that you can choose at any time (like choosing GL in combat mode instead of HMG).
True it can one-hit an non-upgraded marine, but by the time focus appears, how often do you find a marine with no upgrades?
<== Builder
You are right about making Focus too powerful. It's easily fixed though. We can scrap Focus or just make the +x damage not be doubled with Focus strikes. Or perhaps just take away +x damage upgrades if an alien has Focus. Or perhaps make +x damage upgrades increase rate of fire instead of increase damage when combined with Focus.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->My suggestion was that instead of just one big jump to more damage and slower attack speed, we have three levels. In fact, it doesn't have to be fast/weak, medium/medium, slow/strong. Sharpen could be the same attack speed with slighter higher damage, aggression could be regular damage with faster attack speed, and focus could be slow attack speed with high damage. That way, you can pick and choose which you want and base your strategy accordingly.
These might not even be a lvl 1, lvl 2, lvl 3 type of system. It could just be two alternatives to focus that you can choose at any time (like choosing GL in combat mode instead of HMG).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I really like your idea about differing damage upgrades (+x damage and same rate of fire, same damage and more rate of fire, more damage and less rate of fire). I'm not sure if NS2 is going to keep the same NS1 Alien upgrade model (Aliens pick and choose) or just slap on the Starcraft model (Commander decides HP and damage for the entire team). I think that the most basic upgrade, damage and health, should copy from Marines. That's just a balance issue, really. It would be very cool if the AComm could spend resources to make a particular upgrade better (Like Celerity, Regeneration, Cloaking, etc). That would definitely increase strategic complexity AND be fun to play around with. I'd love to play on a maxed Cloak team, for example. If the AComm hands out lifeforms, then there would choices between getting more fades on the team or increasing celerity for every skulk.
On a side tangent, AComm should decide which upgrade "types" are available to aliens; they would choose Sensory, Defense, or Movement (NOT Gorges). That is assuming aliens still have "upgrade types" in NS2.
On a side tangent to my side tanget, I think there is some merit in giving the AComm the power to research which particular upgrades are available to aliens and can cross over upgrade "types" (They can research Celerity, then Cloaking, then Scent of Fear, then Regeneration, then Silence, for instance). Aliens would be at the whim of their Commander, but they would be able to cross into different upgrade "types" quicker. This idea is no different from MComm deciding HA versus JP for the Marines.
Perhaps Aliens would still be limited to 3 upgrades available to pick per hive and only 1 upgrade per alien per hive. (With 1 hive, the AComm could research Celerity, Cloaking, and Focus, but the aliens could only pick 1 upgrade until second hive. At which point, the AComm could research more upgrade options).
If this were implemented, then certain upgrades would become more popular and hedge out others and eventually there would be a One True Build Order to the Alien side (I'm thinking Celerity will always come first, followed by Focus (for Fades) or Adrenaline (for Gorges/Lerks)), which is very BAD. Movement Chambers are always dropped first in NS1, this is what I'm talking about, just on a upgrade by upgrade level. Thus, unlike in NS1, upgrades will have to become more equal in terms of power in order for each one to be a viable "first choice".
I wasn't aware focus skulks could one shot no upgrade marines.
parasite + focus lvl 3 = 1 hit kill on a marine with lvl 0 armor.
Or just Spore them.