Three simple B178 balance suggestions

ScardyBob

<div class="IPBDescription">In hope that some of the B178 balance issues can be lessened</div>Having played B178 a bit more, I have a better grasp of the major balance issues. While many will be fixed with future features (onos, HA, etc.) it would be nice to have some simple short term fixes to make the game a bit more playable. Here are three major problems I think could be mitigated with simple changes.

<u><b>1. The unstoppable DI</b></u>
Now that PRes is greatly reduced, the only counter to DI (i.e. flamethrower) is much harder to get. As such, DI spam is more devastating against marines than previous patches. This will be (hopefully) fixed with pustules, but it would be nice to reduce DI's health as a short term fix.
<ul><li><b>Change: Reduce DI health 500 -> 200</li><li> Reduce DI cost to compensate 25 -> 15</b></li></ul>

<u><b>2. Poor marine survivability</b></u>
Quite simply, marines die a lot, even if they are working together in groups. However, it gets particularly bad in the late game where a) marines have expensive weapons they can lose and b) aliens get fades. Even with lvl3 armor, I've watched fades blink assassinate marines in marine start. My solution is to greatly increase the armor upgrade value. This would still maintain the early game skulk v LMG balance while giving a sufficient late game counter to fade blink assassins.
<ul><li><b>Change: Increase marine armor upgrade values</li><li><u>Current </u>
Base: 30
Armor1: 50
Armor2: 70
Armor3: 90</li><li><u>Proposed </u>
Base: 25
Armor1: 50
Armor2: 100
Armor3: 200</b></li></ul>

<u><b>3. Sentry Spam</b></u>
This has become an effective strategy with the decreased sentry cost and higher TRes flow. However, since aliens don't have their siege-breaking class (onos) yet, it can create an unbearable stalemate, where marines are trapped in marine start, but have sufficient sentries to prevent aliens from finishing them off. Instead of increasing the sentry cost again, I propose that sentry health and armor be halved, so that it would be easier to kill them. That way fades would have a chance at breaking sentry spam fortresses.
<ul><li><b>Change: Decrease sentry health and armor</li><li> Reduce cost to compensate 10 -> 5</li><li><u>Current </u>
Health: 1040
Armor: 130</li><li><u>Proposed</u>
Health: 500
Armor: 100</b></li></ul>

Koruyo

A little problem with your armor upgrades is, that marines will be more or less forced to upgrade it first. (its too good + lower lifeforms wont be viable anymore)

The balance must be distributed between, possible available weapons, weapon dmg, weapon dmg upgrades, armor upgrades, supply (pres flow)

My idea would be:
<ul><li><b>increase the pres flow via rt upgrades</b> (maybe only to the <b>cc res pool </b>as suggested below)</li><li> Changing <b>fade blink </b>to have an <b>umbra effect instead of full dmg immunity</b>. (not stackable with real umbra, no bloodsplatters on hit while phased out but with hitfeedback on marine crosshair if hit occured/not dodged by umbra)</li><li> <b>RFK goes into a pres pool of the commandstation</b> (shared between all commstations, spent first over pres of the commander)</li></ul>
Commander Res would look like this:

Pres: 25 (+ 10) Tres: 60
Commander buys an ARC (Cost: 25pres)
Pres: 10(+ 0) Tres: 60

PRES: xxx(+ yyy RFK) TRES: zzz

Better, <b>just visually add the rfk value for commanders</b> - only add a tooltip for PRES that shows your own and RFK like my suggested (+ yyy), or only show it on the scorebord.
Why not just add it to the players pool? <u>a disconnect will destroy your game</u>, (even more than now) and distributing between multiple comms gets tricky.

<b>This ensures the commander has enough pres to support his team, droping weapons, medpacks, catalysts or ammo.
And works a bit against having to change Commanders</b>

My changes + weapon drop&pickup after death bugfix could be enough. (maybe a slight increase in weapon dmg and armor upgrades could be needed, or bigger more expensive steps)
I hope charlie takes a look at this thread.


Addition:
To make the RFK change viable for aliens too, on player select add a menu with lifeforms and upgrades - onclick the player gets the value transfered from the comm pres pool.
Or drop special lifeform eggs at your hive, on use the alien can gestate into the lifeform.

Vladimir Van Vodka

no no no!

every single marine could have 200 f***ing armor??
this brings back the "skulks are useless" when marines research something problem again.

and make it so sentries are spammable like what hydras used to be?

dammit, I'm not sure about you, but I'd rather keep it as it is, I can already kill aliens easy enough as a marine with any weapon, the only problem I have with balance is fades.

The one and only problem right now is fades:
super speed+invulnerability, +super damage + super health is an absolute nightmare.
I find that they could be balanced by giving them 250-200 health instead of 300.
so that way you might actually have a chance in killing them before they hit you twice.
I mean, don't get me wrong, having a scary team slaughtering aliens is badass!... but when you can not survive long enough to pump 4 shotgun shots in them to kill one, and on top of that eventually fight a brigade of them, you just can not win as the marines.

Zuriki

I think by delaying the fade's appearance, Marines could have a much better fighting chance against fades, without the issue of changing the stats around. It's the early game when fades are the real issue, the only counter so far is to prevent them as long as possible, which is not an easy task.

ScardyBob

Fades are the most obvious problems, but I find that skulks, lerks, and even gorges can do serious damage against (if not outright kill) marines even with the current lvl3 upgrade. Its also been this way in nearly every patch, which is part of the reason why aliens have been dominant. Now, since PRes is so limited, comm medpacks have become so rare that its become easy to wear down groups of marines and even pick off those who go back to get healed.

Also, skulks wouldn't become useless. You just wouldn't be able to solo marines anymore, which you shouldn't expect to do since marines have better armor/weapons. You wouldn't say that marines should be able to solo fades with the LMG would you? Its no different with marines with better weapons/armor.