NS2 has very broken energy tension

DarkOmen · December 2011

<div class="IPBDescription">Reorganization of ability costs/tech to make a more interesting game</div>TL;DR
As of right now, NS2 contains a slew of cool tech options, but the tech tree and resource/energy costs aren't organized in a way that gives the commander many interesting decisions to make. Things could be changed to spice up a rather dull playing experience and open way to new play-styles.

Preface

What is Energy Tension?
"Energy tension" is a term that was used by Blizzard when designing races in StarCraft 2, which describes the relationship between abilities when using one ability can affect the player's ability to use another. For example, right now the Alien commander has to choose between whether to spend hive energy on cysts or drifters, as creating either takes from the hive's stored energy, preventing or reducing the commander's ability to create the other.

Good energy tension in RTS games requires two things:
1 - That the abilities that share energy tension each have a very clear benefit. For example, at the hive, "cyst" expands the area in which the Alien commander can build, and "drifter" creates a worker with which the commander can build. It's easy to tell what these contrasting abilities do.
2 - That the benefits of choosing an ability over it's competitors should not be so clear. In other words, commanders should value their energy, and have to think carefully about what abilities they want to spend their energy on. In my opinion, the Hive actually fails this test because which ability should be used is a matter of build order precedence, and not any "uncertain benefit". More on this later.

I really don't want to put down the development team's work, but the energy system in NS2 consists of a lot of structures that either have energy for one ability, or a bunch of abilities with effects that are so different in direction that the decision to cast one over another will rarely be an interesting one. In every case where this true, there is a better way to express these abilities on the command card. In this thread, I'm going to list every ability in the game and assess 1) it's valuation versus other abilities that share it's energy and 2) how effectively it's cost is presented to the commander in terms of frequency of availability, maximum uses on full energy, etc.

A Note About Players

In NS2, energy is a resource like Tres and Pres, only it's acquisition isn't tied to map control except for the space that the structures that generate it take up. Players and structures over time generate a given resource that empowers them to perform certain actions or enact certain upgrades. As a team expands, so does their individual members' resource pools, and as the options for spending those resources increase, so their the tension for choosing what to do with those resources. This considered, what to spend structure energy on is much like choosing which class of alien to become or which weapon to purchase. The effect of choosing each option is clear, but the ultimate benefit is not always so (choosing Fade or Onos notwithstanding). Just as choosing to go Lerk or Gorge can be measured as a matter of play style, so should whether to cast one ability versus another.

Take the Gorge for instance: As a Gorge, you need to build mini-cysts in order to push out on the map and hydras in order to hold your ground wherever you build. The more hydras you build, the stronger your footing in an area, but conversely if all of your mini-cysts die, then so do all of your hydras. So you need to find a balance between building more mini-cysts or more hydras, which is always a tough choice. In fact, you can get away with building fewer mini-cysts if your placement of each is more creative. So, finding ways of circumventing the "energy tension" between placing cysts and hydras actually yields a very fun experience. This should be the spirit behind designing commander abilities that cost energy.

Marine Team
Analysis

Command Station
Abilities: Nano-Shield (50 energy)
Maximum energy: 200

The command station has one ability, Nano-Shield, which costs 50 points of energy to use, and it can store point over time up to a maximum of 200. What's hidden here is that up to 4 uses of Nano-Shield can be stored in the command station over time. Because this 200 point energy pool is unshared with any other abilities, the inflation of 1/4 = 50/200 is redundant and it would be better to list the ability as having X/4 charges with a cool-down showing how soon the next cast will be available. That way, the commander would have all the information they need pertaining to using the ability, without the bloat and it would read a lot faster. This method is commonly called a "renewable charge".

Observatory
Abilities: Scan (20 energy), Distress Beacon (50 energy)
Maximum energy: 100

Observatories can finance 5 scans each when at maximum energy and can trigger a distress beacon for half their maximum energy, or 2.5 scans.

- Using scans to reveal the map reduces the commander's ability to defend with Distress Beacon.
- Using Distress Beacon for defense reduces the commander's ability to scout.

So, either players scan lots and don't use beacon, or they refrain from using scan in order to save up for beacon. Or they just build enough observatories to provide energy for whatever they want. A frequent issue I see in higher-tier games is that coordinating good use of Distress Beacon requires a good understanding of each team's map control, which is learned through scouting. Because scan is used for scouting, we can probably all agree that scans are in demand when the Marine team pushes (or defends) with beacon. If the commander needs both these abilities at the same time, then it's not really a matter of choosing to use one or the other, but rather a matter of just building as many observatories as are needed in order to meet the energy demand. The effect is, aggressive players then circumvent the energy tension on the observatory while players who use beacon blindly end up chewing at their ammunition for pushing back. Energy tension here is decent, as long beacon is an afterthought and gets used only as a contingency.

MACs
Abilities: Lay Mine (75 energy)
Maximum energy: 200

MACs fall into the exact same case as the command station with regard to how it's one ability has reign of it's entire energy pool. Imagine if MACs didn't have energy, but still each came with 3 mines as per build 188. Now imagine if after 75 seconds of having used a mine, you got a new mine. We wouldn't be changing what the MAC does; all we would do is clean up the numbers on it's command card to reflect what the commander wants to know without requiring them to do any mental math.

Alien Team
Analysis

Hive
Abilities: Cyst (15 energy), Drifter (25 energy)
Maximum energy: 300

Hives' energy can be spent to either spread the infestation or to create drifters, which have the potential to become alien structures. Commanders create drifters with the purpose of building, and otherwise sink energy into cyst production whenever they can or need. When the alien commander clearly feels like they need to build a drifter, energy tension is almost completely lost.

I propose that drifters cost Tres instead of energy (a cost which could be subtracted from the cost of every commander-produced alien structure). The cost of building a drifter would therefore be to front a portion of the cost incurred in the eventual construction of the structure that the drifter was intended for. While this may break any energy tension that existed at the hive before, Cyst still makes a good macro mechanic (an action that occupies a good portion of the commander's time, giving them meaningful things to do). Also, if the aliens are supposed to be encouraged to spread and conquer territory, it's probably best that building structures not hinder their ability to spread infestation, which is what is happening currently.

As a note, this doesn't actually improve energy tension at the hive per se, but I think it would add some more interesting decision-making into the alien commander role as a whole.

Crag
Abilities: Umbra (30 energy)
Maximum energy: 100

Whip
Abilities: Fury (50 energy)
Maximum energy: 100

Shade
Abilities: Camouflage (25 energy)
Maximum energy: 100

Same thing happening with each of these as with the command station and MAC. One ability gets whole resource pool, appears convoluted, and would probably best be served with renewable charges.

On Commander Personal Resources - A Phantom Third Resource?

If you read the second above "A Note About Players", I spoke about how players' personal resources behave much like structure energy, except where Pres grows with the number of extractors the team has as opposed to some other structure that can be placed anywhere. In NS2, a commander's Pres is gathered in exactly the same way as Tres, only in a smaller quantity. Because the commander can't acquire Pres at a different rate than Tres, there is no way the commander can pursue increasing the number of medpacks/ammo/weapons that they can drop separate from resources to build other stuff. It's as if the entire assist tab was a tool to smart-cast abilities straight off every extractor on the map, which would in turn have energy to spend on assist powers. Actually, it would be a lot more intuitive to a new player than what we have now with Pres, Tres and energy (and from a lore perspective, everything comes from nano-sludge anyway, right? =D). Don't worry; this discussion is for argument's sake, and I'm not about to suggest that extractors cast "Medpack" :P.

The only difference between this system and what we have now would be that the commander can't spend their personal resources when commanding. But assuming the commander commands all game long (as they usually do), all they now have to worry about is Tres and energy and nothing has really changed.

Making It All Work

This part of my post becomes really subjective as I try to solve the issues that I've exposed so far. Though there are some obvious problems with how the tech trees are designed with respect to commander abilities, can I do better? I think so, but I'll let the community be the judge.

If we want to fix these problems, we need to rearrange the tech tree with the following goals:

- Just as there is a good reason to want to use an ability, there should also be just as strong a reason not to use it (and use something else).
- Be mindful so that abilities with synergy don't anti-climatically starve each other of energy.
- Pres "assist" powers can easily be modified to cost Tres or energy depending on the case; if we can phase out a convoluted resource we probably should.
- Don't mess with existing tech timings if possible.

Note: All I have to suggest for improving the alien team is to modify the drifter so that it costs only Tres, which actually does nothing about energy tension. The alien energy system really doesn't have any capacity for any better tension without adding more stuff for the commander to do or making more drastic changes to the race.

Let's look at each ability:

Marine Team
Proposed Changes

Distress Beacon

- Probably intended as a contingency power in case the Marines get overrun at base.
- Shouldn't starve any abilities that would be used in defense of the base or to push back (nano-shield, ammo, medipack, scan, weapon drops at armory)
- Any penalty brought for using Distress Beacon should become effective after the commander has defended the base, leaving them to defend with all their might.

It seems pretty clear that Distress Beacon is probably left to it's own resource pool so that if it does get used, the commander is free to use all their other tools to deal with the alien menace. The best way to impose a penalty for a period of time after defense of a base would be to give the ability a cool-down, or a minimum wait time before it can be used again. As the only member of it's energy pool, it probably doesn't even need energy - or charges. Just give it a cool-down once unlocked in the tech tree and a single charge that only begins recharging once it's been used.

Because it's a mechanism for defending "the base", it should be moved from the observatory to the command station (which is incidentally where the effect takes place anyway), but should keep the observatory as it's tech prerequisite. This makes it a one-shot ability for base defense at a given location, but with multiple command stations, can still be used to orchestrate organized flanks or mass teleport the entire team to a foreign location.

The command station should have no energy and no other abilities.

Scan and Nano-Shield

Scan allows the commander to gather sight and information on what's going on around the map, but so do players. When players are holding ground on the border of alien territory, they provide line of sight for the commander, allowing him/her to see what the Marines see. Increasing the survivability of players with nano-shield can potentially allow them to gain visual information longer, partially filling the same role as scan in limited circumstances. It is therefore not too destructive to class these abilities under the same energy pool to create tension between directly supporting troops and searching for knowledge. Therefore, nano-shield can be moved to the observatory. The cost of nano-shield would need to be reduced, as even though it costs 50 energy now, it has had to compete for viability against such an endorsed staple as scan. It would also give the commander the new ability to save energy at the observatory to breach a hive with lots of nano-shield rather than slow siege with ARCs/scan.

Ammo Pack / Medpack

In NS2, no matter how many players you have on your team, the commander's tech structure requirements never change. However, armories, sentries, observatories and infantry portals are built in quantities needed to meet the team's demands. Medpacks and Ammo Packs also also required proportionately to the number of players on the Marine team. In order to satisfy this demand, the commander must be able to increase medpack/ammo production independently of map control, just as they can do with infantry portals. It therefore cannot suffice to buy medpacks/ammo with the commander's personal resources.

My suggestion regarding this pair is a little more ambitious than the others so far. Because these items are consumable and less tangible than Marine structures, I would sooner think that they should cost energy rather than Tres (which going back to "A Note About Players" is like moving the abilities off the extractor and onto a building that can be placed anywhere). Because the command station sits on a tech point, and is limited by map control (and the observatory is accounted for), we could give energy to another structure, such as the Arms Lab. As an added benefit, players would now have a more tangible reason to want to construct an Arms Lab early than only for eventual upgrades down the road. (The WIP research for Catalyst Packs is there anyway.)

Personal Resources can be removed from the commander interface (and maybe capped at 100 or so, in case anyone's worried about commanders stockpiling unusable amounts of Pres).

Conclusion

I have sought to expose some issues with how NS2 employs it's resource mechanics and lend somewhat of a solution. Not everyone will agree with what I've posted (and the specific solution I've proposed isn't really the focus of what I'm trying convey anyway). Hopefully, what I've written can help NS along on it's journey to becoming a complete game with lots of rewarding content for FPS/RTS gamers alike!

swalk · December 2011

Well, this is basicly the same thing I made a thread about.
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=115515" target="_blank">Nano Shield, Beacon, Energy doesn't scale with resource situation</a>
My solution:
Revert the 189 change to beacon(now revives dead marines again), and make it cost 10 team res.
Then have ALL remaining energy costs, cost personal resources for the commanders, with the exception of drifters maybe.
This would give the whole game alot more structure, and have a more interesting resource model.
So the idea is to have both commanders spend their personal resources for all of their abilities to support the players on the ground.
Then have the tech/expansion/powerful last resort abilities(distress beacon) cost team resources.
So here are the specific cost changes I would like to see:
Distress beacon - 10 team res
Scan - 2 personal res
Nano Shield - 5 personal res, moved to assist menu
Alien chamber abilities - 5 personal res
Cysts - 3 personal res
Numbers could be tweaked for balance, but I think they are pretty close.

Now you have an interesting game with alot of strategic trade-offs.
And you effectively filled the gap with alien commander and personal res.
As more abilities are added, more trade-offs will come.
Trade-offs are essential for RTS games, we should see more of them in NS2 than we do now.
And they should revolve around actual resources imo.

I strongly disagree with resources not being able to do the balancing of medpacks.
In theory it would be the same as now if you just let it cost simple energy, just even worse than now.
As you would be limited by command stations instead of your resources, as you will most likely get more resources than command stations, or simply lose the game because you used all your res on command stations instead of tech.
At least now you can claim more ground now, and get more resources. And it is easier to hold these resources with larger player numbers, as higher player counts help marines more(in even combats) than aliens.
But you could go so far and make the resource flow scale with player numbers, that would not be too hard to code.
For this, you could make the current resource flow fit with 6 players on the team, then it's just a basic calculation.

Less energy costs, more resource costs.
Energy makes the game too forgiving and "spammable".
Resources makes more trade-offs and deeper strategic decisions.
Having Personal Res costs instead of Energy costs will effectively eliminate problems with alien commander not having anything to use PRes on.

I just wonder which way UWE is gonna go.
Would like to see a dev reply to this problem, hopefully saying that they will remove most of the energy costs, in favor of personal res.

Harimau · December 2011

So, opportunity cost?

Techercizer · December 2011

I disagree with moving Nano-Shield to the Observatory. I don't want to see late-game commanders building 10 Obs and having every member of their team at 200% health for the entire match; you'd either need to balance Marines around being shielded all the time (which would remove the tactical choice from nano-shield, since it would basically be a necessity), or you'd need to not balance them around being constantly shielded (and let them obliterate Kharaa when they are)

matso · December 2011

A very good and thoughtful post. Personally, I have long thought that you need to sit down and completly rethink the way that the resource/tech system works. As you indirectly points out, its a mess.

The current system is based on the NS1 system (basically team res only, but with alien players sharing the team res between them). This scaled badly as the number of players changed, because the alien tech advance/hive building slowed with increasing number of players, while the marines increased (due to res-for-kills). So, small games (10 players or less) was automatic alien wins, and large games (14 players or more) was automatic marine wins (given teams of roughly equal skill).

So NS2 adds the alien commander which gets all the team res (thus keeping tech advance independent of player count), and introduces personal res
which goes to each player (thus keeping weapon and alien lifeforms independent of number of players). Fairly clear.

Also new is the energy system and using personal res for paying for *packs. Fairly messy, actually. It used to be team res that paid for beacons/medpacks, so if you spammed medpacks, you slowed down your tech advance, and beaconing ALSO slowed down your tech advance/cost you weapons.

What's another problem is that is used to be that the marine team got all their weapons from the same pool as their tech. Now they don't need to spend team res for weapons anymore, they are going to get their weapons no matter what.

Same thing for the alien players. Used to be that the alien team had to have someone drop a hive instead of going fade, a hard tradeoff. Now, the closest thing you have is an alien going gorge and spend his personal res to buy cysts/hydra to defend alien areas.

So, both the alien team and the marine team has lost a great deal of "energy tension", as they don't need to make the tradeoff between tactical strength (weapons/life form upgrades) and strategic (tech/hive) anymore.

Basically, in NS1 you were TIED to res (and to the team) in a much higher degree than you are in NS2. Personally, I'd like to get something like that back into NS2. Sure, being tied to your team is frustrating, because other ppl will affect your chance of being personally successful. But that's a tradeoff you have to be willing to make in order to get those great games that you remember.

Right now, NS2 has less than half of the planned tech implemented (lots of tier 1/2 upgrades missing, whole tier 3 also missing, infestation mechanics still in flux etc), so spending too much effort on rethinking the economy system right now is premature - but it will need doing, becuase the current system is, indeed, a mess.

NS2 has very broken energy tension

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