Let's prolong the early game
Xarius
Join Date: 2003-12-21 Member: 24630Members, Reinforced - Supporter
Join Date: 2003-12-21 Member: 24630Members, Reinforced - Supporter
<div class="IPBDescription">In 3 simple steps</div>I think many, if not most, NS 2 players will agree that the early game stage (skulk vs marines first 5 minutes of the game or so) is BY FAR the most enjoyable part of any NS 2 game as it stands. Unfortunately, compared to NS 1, or an RTS for that matter, the early game phase is incredibly short, and has been made even shorter in 210 (Possibly unintentional and only temporarily while the devs tweak the new economy system). Lately I've been seeing marine commanders get jetpacks in about 5 minutes (while still getting upgrades as well), alien commanders unlocking leap only a few minutes into the game, etc etc. The biggest problem with this really is that it significantly marginalises the importance of the 'early game stage', since both sides are now easily able to acquire 'midgame' tech, more or less regardless of how well they do in the first 5 - 10 minutes. (This in itself would mean DISASTER for any RTS really, meaning there's little reason why it should be acceptable for NS2' RTS model) Instead, most games automatically roll into that 'lategame' stage rather quickly, which is dominated by all kinds of spam and cheese.
Not only that, having a short early game significantly dumbs down the 'strategic' aspect of the game in general. Decisions made by your commander don't weigh nearly as much, since by the 15 - 20 minute mark MAX your team will have unlocked all buildings and tech anyway. (Provided you didn't get entirely rolled) Imagine if this was the case in an RTS, if 15 minutes in you'd have all units/tech anyway. That wouldn't make the RTS very exciting, now would it?
TL:DR version:
By prologing the early game phase, not only are you making that enjoyable portion of the game last much longer, you are also increasing its importance (like is the case in any RTS really); teamplay, strategy and skill will have a bigger deciding factor in which side ultimately takes home the victory. (While not necessarily prohibiting the side who has a bad 10 - 15 minutes from making a comeback)
So how would you go about prologing the early game you ask? It's really simple actually:
1. Tweak T.res costs on structures/tech, decrease T.res income (Possibly from 1/5 to for example 1/6 or 1/7)
Just increasing the T.res costs on a lot of the structures and tech would prolong the early game by itself. At the moment, in 210, T.res income has been increased by almost 60%, this while not all structures were made more expensive to account for it. I.e some, like extractors were made relatively cheaper as a result.
The reason why I also propose a decrease to the T.res income rate is because as it stands currently, late game when you've researched all tech, you're almost always going to be floating on large amounts of T.res as a commander, allowing you to spam it on just ARCs/Cysts/Meds/Nanos. (This could be solved in other ways as well I guess, one way would be to make it rare to 'exhaust' tech and upgrades on either side in your average game, or alternatively just providing both sides with more and better lategame t.res sinks)
2. Lower starting p.res. I'm not sure if this is still in the works, and there's been various threads on this already, but it's definitely something that would need to happen if UWE was serious about prolonging the early game. This primarily affects the alien side, since they are not T.res tech bound in getting higher lifeforms. (Where as Marines need T.res tech to unlock weapons first). In 210 this may seem less like a necessity, but I assure you it is only because of the ridiculous fast teching on both sides that the need for this is much less noticeable. (Since there is hardly an early game stage any more, it's hard to asses the need for mechanics that even out both sides in that early game stage.)
3. Fix maturation. Reintroduce structure Misting. Maturation was implemented to slow down the alien expansion, but as it stands in 210 (and previous builds really), it's become almost irrelevant, particularly on hives. (Where it matters the most) Hives now mature in only a few minutes, where as before it took +- 20 minutes, 6 minutes with continuous misting. I'm not going to claim those numbers were sound, they weren't, but I will claim that the logic behind it was. What we see currently is aliens acquiring leap only a few minutes into the game, with other tech upgrades following quickly. In most cases, you are now even able to have the t2 abilities of classes before players can even unlock those classes. (Fade blink for example) With some of these T2 abilities pretty much available from the start, aliens are almost immediately propelled into the midgame stage.
What I would propose is lowering the maturation time significantly again, probably not 20 minutes but more like 10 minutes (without misting). Reintroduce structure misting, it was an excellent mechanic that added a lot more, and needed, depth to the Alien commander. (It would need to be expensive mind you, and balance out Marine nanoconstruct to an extent) Basically you are again given the choice: do I wait out the 10 minutes on one hive and focus my t.res on map control and lifeform upgrades or do I rush lifeform abilities (for example 5 minutes instead of 10 with continuous misting) at the cost of map control/other tech.
I'm confident these 3 steps, while obviously not solving all issues with NS2 gameplay and balance, will go a long way in making the game more enjoyable, while at the same time providing more depth/variety and improving balance.
As always, thanks for reading :)
Not only that, having a short early game significantly dumbs down the 'strategic' aspect of the game in general. Decisions made by your commander don't weigh nearly as much, since by the 15 - 20 minute mark MAX your team will have unlocked all buildings and tech anyway. (Provided you didn't get entirely rolled) Imagine if this was the case in an RTS, if 15 minutes in you'd have all units/tech anyway. That wouldn't make the RTS very exciting, now would it?
TL:DR version:
By prologing the early game phase, not only are you making that enjoyable portion of the game last much longer, you are also increasing its importance (like is the case in any RTS really); teamplay, strategy and skill will have a bigger deciding factor in which side ultimately takes home the victory. (While not necessarily prohibiting the side who has a bad 10 - 15 minutes from making a comeback)
So how would you go about prologing the early game you ask? It's really simple actually:
1. Tweak T.res costs on structures/tech, decrease T.res income (Possibly from 1/5 to for example 1/6 or 1/7)
Just increasing the T.res costs on a lot of the structures and tech would prolong the early game by itself. At the moment, in 210, T.res income has been increased by almost 60%, this while not all structures were made more expensive to account for it. I.e some, like extractors were made relatively cheaper as a result.
The reason why I also propose a decrease to the T.res income rate is because as it stands currently, late game when you've researched all tech, you're almost always going to be floating on large amounts of T.res as a commander, allowing you to spam it on just ARCs/Cysts/Meds/Nanos. (This could be solved in other ways as well I guess, one way would be to make it rare to 'exhaust' tech and upgrades on either side in your average game, or alternatively just providing both sides with more and better lategame t.res sinks)
2. Lower starting p.res. I'm not sure if this is still in the works, and there's been various threads on this already, but it's definitely something that would need to happen if UWE was serious about prolonging the early game. This primarily affects the alien side, since they are not T.res tech bound in getting higher lifeforms. (Where as Marines need T.res tech to unlock weapons first). In 210 this may seem less like a necessity, but I assure you it is only because of the ridiculous fast teching on both sides that the need for this is much less noticeable. (Since there is hardly an early game stage any more, it's hard to asses the need for mechanics that even out both sides in that early game stage.)
3. Fix maturation. Reintroduce structure Misting. Maturation was implemented to slow down the alien expansion, but as it stands in 210 (and previous builds really), it's become almost irrelevant, particularly on hives. (Where it matters the most) Hives now mature in only a few minutes, where as before it took +- 20 minutes, 6 minutes with continuous misting. I'm not going to claim those numbers were sound, they weren't, but I will claim that the logic behind it was. What we see currently is aliens acquiring leap only a few minutes into the game, with other tech upgrades following quickly. In most cases, you are now even able to have the t2 abilities of classes before players can even unlock those classes. (Fade blink for example) With some of these T2 abilities pretty much available from the start, aliens are almost immediately propelled into the midgame stage.
What I would propose is lowering the maturation time significantly again, probably not 20 minutes but more like 10 minutes (without misting). Reintroduce structure misting, it was an excellent mechanic that added a lot more, and needed, depth to the Alien commander. (It would need to be expensive mind you, and balance out Marine nanoconstruct to an extent) Basically you are again given the choice: do I wait out the 10 minutes on one hive and focus my t.res on map control and lifeform upgrades or do I rush lifeform abilities (for example 5 minutes instead of 10 with continuous misting) at the cost of map control/other tech.
I'm confident these 3 steps, while obviously not solving all issues with NS2 gameplay and balance, will go a long way in making the game more enjoyable, while at the same time providing more depth/variety and improving balance.
As always, thanks for reading :)
Comments
I support your thesis, that early game stage should be longer. I also support your suggestions 1. and 2.
But I don't like maturation and the misting mechanic. A much cooler and simpler approach is to increase the research time a good bit (maybe even double it). Not only does that prolong the early game, you also have to decide carefully what upgrade you choose, because you won't get another soon. But in order to work right, the res income should not be so big, that you can't spend enough res because of the long research times.
The need of maturing the starting hive (maybe just 3 or 5 minutes) should prolong the early vanilla game.
But please don't let us forget about the roots of this. Why is the early game more fun than late game? Because it is much more balanced. So instead finding solutions to prolong the early game, it would be better to make the mid and late game the same fun, the early game is.
I'm also disagreeing with your "make the com decisions matter more". Because this will not only create many games where you know the outcome after 5 minutes (but the game drags on for 20 or 30 minutes after that) only because you got a noob-com that did one single failure, it also creates unbalance. Increasing the importance of com decisions means increasing the impact of upgrades / buildings of the FPS-side of the game, those leading to the said inbalance. One player on a team should not doom the whole team to a loss, only because of one mistake or lower experience.
I think the trick is to make the com <b>feel</b> important, but on the other hand not letting the RTS-part of the game create huge balance differences between the teams.
<b>Game length</b> : 10-20 minutes on average. Longer game becomes tiring for the players. 15 minutes is enough for a rts game (it's about the typical sc1 game length).
<b>Lifeforms timing</b>: Lerk: 2-3 minutes. Fade: 8-10 minutes. Onos: 15min.
<b>Upgrade/abilities timing</b>: First upgrade: ?. Leap should be around fade time.
*
<b>Tying abilities to hive</b>
The reason for untying abilities from hives is to give the alien comm more choices, more strategy. It doesn't work for some the following reason:
- Aliens are a class based team, their main tech are lifeforms. Due to the resource system, the lifeforms are unlocked in a rigid time sequence. Therefor the abilities will be unlocked in the same sequence. There is no point to research stomp or blink before leap. This cannot be changed without changing the alien economy completely.
Since hives are under-critical right now, tying abilities back to the second hive might not be a bad idea. We also need to consider that taking down a hive take time and resources for the marines and is likely to cause them to loose map control on other fronts, so killing the second hive should hurt the aliens greatly. It should also delay the abilities as desired (leap and blink around fade time).
Alternative solution would be to increase ability cost, research time greatly. Mature seems not as good as second hive.
Honestly don't know why maturation is still in the game, it doesn't delay anything anymore.
Oh, and I don't see a problem that stomp or blink will never be researched before leap. You got at least the options between the life forms. They could even bind Tier3 weapons to a second hive.
That's not a problem per se. But the positive argument for untying abilities from the hive is to give the alien commander more choices, more depth. Is theses choices turns out to be false choices, as I argued above then this positive argument falls and tying up abilities to the second should be reconsidered.
About matured hive vs. second hive, some of the arguments, if I remember correctly were that the marines cannot scout it or do anything about it (except killing the main hive and win the game) and is not very interesting in general compared to the second hive solution, which creates a critical moment in the game where both teams have to organize around a main objective.
Having the 2nd hive be important also negates the alien life form explosions where you all the sudden see 3-4 onos. You will have to use lower lifeforms to ensure your 2nd hive goes up... and, you know, aliens would have to spend res on something other than getting all of their tech off of 1 building with no pre-reqs or timing costs.
If that were to happen, marine timings would definitely need some looking at (5min GL rush or JP rush).
My personal opinion is:
1) Lower pres
2) Slower res gain
3) Slower research/maturation
4) Split up marine tech so they need more CCs for all upgrades. I've previously said making the tech split to be - robotics, exosuit and jetpack. So need 3 CCs to get all 3.
5) Limit number of ability upgrades per hive - to say 3. Aliens need to build multiple hives to unlock everything, and each hive becomes important as its death will lose the abilities.
Prolonging maturation along with reduced res will also make defense of structures more of a priority too, possibly reducing suicide skulks too.
I miss the days i would grab my massive blanket with some snacks and get prepared for 2 hour games of ns1 all night :/
I do believe 25 - 30 minutes on average is a much better game length goal than 10 - 20, though I guess that's personal. I definitely agree with your lifeform time estimates, it also allows for better 'lategame' balancing ... What we see currently is that alien lategame is gimped because they nerfed most lifeforms to be 'counterable' earlier in the game by marines (Onos armour nerf, A1 buff vs fade, etc) instead of just delaying the time at which these lifeforms come out. (10 minute onos vs 15 minute onos, at 15 minutes the base onos can be a stronger unit)
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- Aliens are a class based team, their main tech are lifeforms. Due to the resource system, the lifeforms are unlocked in a rigid time sequence. Therefor the abilities will be unlocked in the same sequence. There is no point to research stomp or blink before leap. This cannot be changed without changing the alien economy completely.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I don't think this is necessarily a problem. Ideally by the time leap becomes available, you would already or almost have lerks and fades on the field as well. At that point, provided you are pressed on resources (and maybe with an increase in research time, which would also encourage dual hive play), it DOES become a choice for the commander to make. Sure you can get leap for all skulks, but you may actually want to put your money on boosting those 2 - 3 fades right off the bat instead. The tricky part is that essentially all the abilities have to be worth it, spikes for example often gets neglected, simply because it's not a significant 'upgrade' for the lerk. I don't see why for example quick bilebomb tech instead of leap couldn't be viable.
So by delaying tier 2 research, which can be done in various ways, you are also going to increase the actual choices the khammander has to make. (Because by the time you do get to research T2, you will have more lifeforms on your team already, and a bigger choice to make between which lifeform to give its T2 ability first)
The worse thing is that in a six player team you often have only one lerk and four skulks, so spikes should be four time more efficient, or cheaper to justify getting it instead of leap.
My personal opinion is:
1) Lower pres
2) Slower res gain
3) Slower research/maturation
4) Split up marine tech so they need more CCs for all upgrades. I've previously said making the tech split to be - robotics, exosuit and jetpack. So need 3 CCs to get all 3.
5) Limit number of ability upgrades per hive - to say 3. Aliens need to build multiple hives to unlock everything, and each hive becomes important as its death will lose the abilities.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Agree on 1)-3)
4) Would strip NS of some of its asymetrical design, and generally you only need either exo or jp unless it's really lategame. So I don't think it would make a big impact
5) That would make it even harder for some classes to get their abilitys.
<!--quoteo(post=1944477:date=Jun 18 2012, 08:05 AM:name=Yuuki)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Yuuki @ Jun 18 2012, 08:05 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1944477"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The worse thing is that in a six player team you often have only one lerk and four skulks, so spikes should be four time more efficient, or cheaper to justify getting it instead of leap.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That wouldn't work, but I guess you know that. So yea, separating abilitys from hives created a lot more problems imo.
I also enjoy long games such as 60mins in length.
The most enjoyable and memorable game was 2.25 hours long
This is experienced through a well balanced team.
Too many people are focusing on winning by ending game, then winning through strategy and battle events and counter attacks.
Arch train is little silly too, just had two games with 15 archs and 285 res.
Vortex is awsome btw.
Gorge needs to be able to drop more oc towers or some more useful enginneering tasks. Maybe have level 1 and level two offensive towers, allow for scailing. This can cost res.
I have a feeling from NS1 (although hey, I haven't played that for eons, so I could be wrong) that things progressed slower. I also feel like tension dropped over time, but as fades and then onos entered, tension increased etc. A longer game would help in keeping this tension lasting a bit longer before things progress into cluster###### base rushes. A main issue with trying to balance for longer games however is that I don't want all my games to be longer. That kills servers, because some games are done at the 3 minute mark (actually a lot of games are done at the 1 minute mark with no comm/bad comm) but there is a nasty habit of drawing these games out for 10, 15 or even 20 minutes. I think this issue that could potentially be aggravated by attempting to increase the average length of the game. Although I'd certainly like to see balance changes and mechanics to try and create a longer early game, and a longer game overall, I think it'd be key to ensure mechanics were in place to try and reduce the 20 minute long sieges by winning but not quite winning enough teams, teams without commanders, etc.
Also I don't really feel like Nano has done anything to extend the early game.
i.e. 0-10 minutes, early game skulk vs lmg/lerk vs shotty. 15% of games are won during this time, 10 min - 25 min midgame, armor/weapons vs fades, GLs/jetpacks vs upgraded lerks, bilebomb 45% of games end during this phase, 25 min - 35min + onos vs exo, full upgrade jetpacks vs vortex fades/xeno skulks, 40% games end during this phase
This would be nice.
Another thought I just had was about carapace. It aliens got it as quickly as they currently do, it would screw up this extended beginning (because really, carapace swings the game alot right now but marines can catch up later).
My proposal is this: mature shells gives carapace at current amplitude, but without maturation it is weaker than current. Maturation would take longer anyway with these changes, reducing carapace until a more reasonable point in the game.
Has anyone considered map design as possible fix? I posted this <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=118741&st=60&p=1941736&#entry1941736" target="_blank">in a different thread</a> but I feel like it's relevant:
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->In NS1 the bigger maps really made the game play better. There were more hallways which created awesome skulk/marine gameplay and allowed a team to actually scout, intercept, or prepare for an incoming attack. In NS2 I feel like a room is under attack, almost nonstop, and the only way to really 'defend' is to just coordinate (read; scream/complain) over the mic to have a big counter rush to a different area of the map. Because, in NS2, the battles are so common I feel like my performance and death matter a lot less. In NS1 if I solo'ed two skulks I would usually have a chance to deal some kind of damage to their team, like taking down an RT. In NS2, if I solo two skulks there are two more a few seconds away.
I was excited when I first heard that NS2 would have smaller maps. I had thought, back in the NS1 days, that teams were uncoordinated and just rambo'ed around because of the size of the maps. After playing NS2, I realize teams are still uncoordinated and now the smaller maps just removes all the really cool parts of early/mid game NS.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That said, I like all 3 of your suggestions. A longer early game would be very fun.
Brilliant idea. I've been calling for a carapace nerf for quite a while, but this would be even better. We could also bring back mist for maturity now that it is on Tres, as it will give the alien comm even more options in how to spend res.
Also,
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->"Let's prolong the early game"<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
...that's what she said
Has anyone considered map design as possible fix? I posted this <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=118741&st=60&p=1941736&#entry1941736" target="_blank">in a different thread</a> but I feel like it's relevant:<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I have also noticed this and agree that bigger maps would help. This seems to be confirmed by my experiences with playing on the new docking, which is a lot bigger than the other NS2 maps, where the pace seems a bit more manageable. I think there's more than just map size behind the frantic nature of NS2 though. Shameless crosspost from a different thread:
<!--quoteo(post=1944724:date=Jun 19 2012, 02:50 AM:name=fanatic)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (fanatic @ Jun 19 2012, 02:50 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1944724"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Yup, the "rushy-ness" of NS2 is a real disappointment compared to the methodical NS1 skulk vs. marine gameplay. I'm not entirely sure why it's happening, but I have a few thoughts:
<u><b>1. Poor performance/weird model animations/map geometry</b></u> means skulks can rush with impunity because marines have a really hard time aiming at, and registering hits on, fast moving targets. Since rushing works so well, skulks don't have any incentives to play the slow ambushing game.
<u><b>2. Small maps/fast marine respawn rate/sprint</b></u> means marines can run from their base to "locations of interest" so fast that aliens simply don't have time to set up ambushes.
<u><b>3. Larger skulks/maps with fewer natural hiding spots</b></u> means aliens have fewer viable places to hide.
<u><b>4. Unusable skulk walk key (you stick to everything so it's essentially useless for skulks)</b></u> means skulks can't move around without making any sounds, which means marines always know where the skulks are, which in turn means that you may as well rush because how are you going to ambush somebody that knows where you are?
<u><b>5. Walljumping system for skulks</b></u> means giving skulks incentives for rushing, since the only way to get it up to proper speeds is to spend time building up speed before rushing. If you stop to evaluate the situation or ambush, you lose all your speed.
<u><b>6. No bunnyhop</b></u> means skulks can't get a quick speed boost when jumping out from a hiding spot (walljump is useless for this as you need a few jumps to build up speed).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yes sorry that was my thought, but carapace was the biggest concern. Not entirely sure how others could be scaled...
Camouflage - Move slightly faster while invisible when mature?
Silence - ???
Celerity - Reduce speed a bit until mature?
Hypermutation - ???
Regeneration - Reduce delay before regen?
Silence: only silences footsteps, all other abilities like bite and leap get silence at maturation
Hyper: can always tech up to next lifeform for less res but cannot recieve res from evolutions. At mature, allow for de-evolving and getting back res (so you can get money off comm eggs? Or if you change from fade to gorge and you die, you keep the extra 40 res)
Silence: only silences footsteps, all other abilities like bite and leap get silence at maturation
Hyper: can always tech up to next lifeform for less res but cannot recieve res from evolutions. At mature, allow for de-evolving and getting back res (so you can get money off comm eggs? Or if you change from fade to gorge and you die, you keep the extra 40 res)<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Nice ideas. Hyper is a bit non-intuitive though. That said I don't really like hypermutation as an upgrade anyway, it always feels like something that should be a commander upgrade rather than personal.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I have also noticed this and agree that bigger maps would help. This seems to be confirmed by my experiences with playing on the new docking, which is a lot bigger than the other NS2 maps, where the pace seems a bit more manageable. I think there's more than just map size behind the frantic nature of NS2 though. Shameless crosspost from a different thread:<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Bigger maps would be sweet, though given that most of the maps are already in the game, it'd probably just be easier to slow the marine movement speed. It's really hard to compare NS 1 and NS 2 in this regard, but imo one of the reasons Ns 2 feels and is more fast paced is likely because Marines also move quicker.
Scaling alien lifeform upgrades to the lategame would probably be a good idea, though the only plausible way to do so, without implementing a whole new mechanic, would be to tie it to maturation. (And increase maturation time significantly) If these upgrades would scale, and some 'higher' lifeforms were delayed (and made stronger again to account for that) you may actually see an enjoyable lategame stage for the aliens.
Though we should really discuss not the late but the early game in this thread :P
i.e. 0-10 minutes, early game skulk vs lmg/lerk vs shotty. 15% of games are won during this time, 10 min - 25 min midgame, armor/weapons vs fades, GLs/jetpacks vs upgraded lerks, bilebomb 45% of games end during this phase, 25 min - 35min + onos vs exo, full upgrade jetpacks vs vortex fades/xeno skulks, 40% games end during this phase<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
this