What is up with the Gorge in 217?

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  • DaphistoDaphisto Hive Janitor Join Date: 2002-11-16 Member: 8917Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    <!--quoteo(post=1968917:date=Aug 30 2012, 12:36 PM:name=spellman23)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (spellman23 @ Aug 30 2012, 12:36 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1968917"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Dunno about costing 5 PRes to upgrade. I'd tweak it to the 3PRes personally, but now I'm just nitpicking. Overall on the tright track imo.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Also, maybe once a hydras is upgraded, it would change color or appearance slightly?
  • ImbalanxdImbalanxd Join Date: 2011-06-15 Member: 104581Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1968930:date=Aug 30 2012, 07:00 PM:name=TimMc)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (TimMc @ Aug 30 2012, 07:00 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1968930"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Doesn't stop you recognising a bad production decision in the TV show.

    Most players have a good idea of what does not work, knowing the solution is the hard thing. They tend to just throw out ideas that would improve their perspective. A game designer needs to understand all perspectives, and the underlying problem that is the root of these issues. For that I think a poll might be somewhat useful.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    A poll giving players the chance to voice their opinion about what they think is wrong? Sounds like a solid idea, but I think these forums are already doing a good job of that.
    A poll giving players the chance to voice their opinion about what specific solution they think should be implemented? No, I don't think that's a good idea. Not because the solution they choose won't tell the devs a lot, because it will. Its a bad idea because then the community will expect that chosen solution to be implemented. And as I, and you (indirectly) have said, people who simply play the game don't have any clue how to solve the problems, they can only identify them (and even that is sketchy).
  • General_L33tGeneral_L33t Join Date: 2010-09-21 Member: 74115Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1968323:date=Aug 29 2012, 11:03 AM:name=Imbalanxd)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Imbalanxd @ Aug 29 2012, 11:03 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1968323"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->What if Hydras were given more synergy with the commander, instead of just with gorges and other aliens on the ground.

    By this I mean it would be cool if the commander saw hydras as something worth getting behind. In NS1, gorges would build defence chambers behind offence chambers in order to make the fortification more... fortified. Now, at least in my opinion, when a comm sees a hydra, he doesn't even really see a "structure". He sees something that is there one second, gone the next.

    I would like to see structures really making a difference to hydras, as well as how a gorge places them.
    For example, a classic, crags backing up hydras. At the moment crags don't heal hydras anywhere near enough to improve their survivability. If crags healing to hydras was increased by, lets say three times, it would encourage gorges to build a straight line of hydras in front of the crag to cover it, while also receiving heals.
    Shifts could increase the speed at which hydras shoot, encouraging gorges to build them in places which aren't obvious until they are already shooting at you, to maximise the number of shots they got off on marines.
    Shades could provide a level of "permanent" cloaking to hydras, that is, when hydras shoot, they only partially uncloak, as a moving alien does. They could also silence the sound of hydra shots. Then gorges could place hydras in sneaky and obscure locations, so that marines struggle to find and destroy them as they search an area.

    Also this <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=120143" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/in...howtopic=120143</a>

    Just as a side note, if we want to make each upgrade, shade, crag and shift, equally attractive, I think we need to stop looking solely at the early game effect on skulks, and also try and implement ways in which these upgrades affect the other early game lifeform, the gorge.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    How is this not getting more recognition???

    Might I add to his idea:

    The Gorge hydra could be used like a spotter tool. Where Gorges build hydras (maybe not even on infestation) the Kham can build a building on top, or rather beneath, the hydra. This could lead to some sweet building placements as well as give the bonuses addressed by Imbalanxd above depending on the building type. Marines have power packs -> Kharaa have Hydras.
  • spellman23spellman23 NS1 Theorycraft Expert Join Date: 2007-05-17 Member: 60920Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1968953:date=Aug 30 2012, 10:53 AM:name=General_L33t)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (General_L33t @ Aug 30 2012, 10:53 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1968953"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->How is this not getting more recognition???<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Because it adds a decent amount of complexity.
  • alsteralster Join Date: 2003-08-06 Member: 19124Members
    Hydra should scale early to late game to always make them viable. Increasing # of hydras per hive is bad cause it makes low fps and bad lag late game. Marines have 3 levels of damage and armor. Hydras should have 30% increase in damage and health for 2 hives and 60% for 3. Each hives changes the hydra color to show this.
  • General_L33tGeneral_L33t Join Date: 2010-09-21 Member: 74115Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1969023:date=Aug 30 2012, 03:30 PM:name=spellman23)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (spellman23 @ Aug 30 2012, 03:30 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1969023"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Because it adds a decent amount of complexity.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Isn't the lack of mechanic complexity with the gorge and commander another issue people have been complaining about?

    Wouldn't this kill 3 birds with one stone?
  • spellman23spellman23 NS1 Theorycraft Expert Join Date: 2007-05-17 Member: 60920Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1969043:date=Aug 30 2012, 03:26 PM:name=General_L33t)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (General_L33t @ Aug 30 2012, 03:26 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1969043"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Isn't the lack of mechanic complexity with the gorge and commander another issue people have been complaining about?

    Wouldn't this kill 3 birds with one stone?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Uh, no.

    People complain the Khamm is redundant, and that the Gorge is gimped and superflous with the Khamm. Splitting the role of base-building and teching to two roles made both a bit less interesting, and so other mechanics were developed to help keep things interesting. The segregation of Hydras and Whips being a good example, as well as commander activated abilities on buildings.

    Adding complexity for sake of complexity is bad.


    Overall it's not a bad idea, but at this time it would take a decent amount of time to rebalance the Hydra as the game progresses. Also, giving feedback that Hydras are geting upgraded as the Khamm is upgrading techs will take some finagling. It's easier to say have a nearby chamber give bonuses. Crags already help heal, and Shades already cloak them. Do we need the redundancy? Sidenote: do Shifts help speed up attacks of Hydras?

    So, interesting and possibly fruitful idea, but not a OMG must implement NOW idea.
  • TimMcTimMc Join Date: 2012-02-06 Member: 143945Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1969043:date=Aug 30 2012, 04:26 PM:name=General_L33t)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (General_L33t @ Aug 30 2012, 04:26 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1969043"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Isn't the lack of mechanic complexity with the gorge and commander another issue people have been complaining about?

    Wouldn't this kill 3 birds with one stone?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Not when its unintuitive like that. A commander will not know that a shift helps the hydras naturally. A gorge will not know, so will not build near shifts.

    Shades cloaking the structures is obvious, crags healing them is obvious.


    Previously I built shifts nearby gorge locations to aid healing, but adrenaline has made this obsolete. I really hate adrenaline and carapace - flat buffs like this are boring.
  • NEX9NEX9 Join Date: 2005-03-08 Member: 44299Members
    ok firstly lets look at this from another prospective. and both sides of the fence.

    sentry's they have a limited arc of detection, if one sights a skulk gorge or lerk. its pretty much near instant death even with upgrades. unless you can back peddle out of it. at which point you have next to no health, and must heal before going back on the offensive.

    upon getting behind a sentry as a skulk it can take a near on a minute to drop the sentry. but they are rarely built unguarded or with out a second sentry watching its back. a fade even needs to use a few swings to drop a sentry. critical venerable time. and health lost.

    if you look at the ranged way of taking out sentry's, lerk spikes miss two out of three at the distance were sentry's cant detect its attacker. gorge will hit every time with spit. but both take a good minute plus to drop a sentry. bile bomb will mess up a sentry. but its a energy juggling game. bile bile take damage, back up, gain energy back, heal heal, poke nose out and bile bile repeat. all taking time. depending on situation. if marines are defensive with welders have a offensive guy, so on. all this is fine but sentys are very rarely placed in a long area were you can avoid there detection. and both gorge and lerk corner hugging sniping to take out the sentry is a risky adventure. especially if their is more than one. its almost instant death. and a lot of healing energy Regen repeat. all takes time.

    lets look at the shoe on the other foot. and not even look at how exos have changed this game. 0/0 rine walks up stands in front of hydra. stands there for about 20 seconds. then finally dies. which means he can in that time run up and axe it down. 3-4 swings at about half a second each swing.
    he could if he wishes to keep his health and armor. snipe from a corner in under 10 seconds.
    he can also run past the hydra. knowing full well he can sprint and loose less than 1/4 of his health. knowing thats its a safe bet that with the limit on hydra's there isnt one around the corner. he will get hit 1 out of two times if he had a jp.
    he could kill it in one or two volleys and any thing around it with a gl, or sighting for a arc.
    any health lost is a tiny res investment med spam instant back to full ready to fight.

    hydras have the perks of being placed on all surfaces, and have a full detection arc... you cant get behind them.

    but they lack rate of fire, and rate of turn, when tracking.

    to kill a sentry kharra have to risk almost certain death
    to kill a hydra rines have gotten it down to second nature, and it barely registers as a speed hump.

    we know why the limited them. ok so player vs structure may of had some impact on it but really that's a crutch.
    the problem is each hydra runs several bits of detection code. each one running it multiple times. as soon as each one is done it begins again. hydras dont just run a detect and shoot code, they also run a detect and play animation code. and i think this is the big problem. the detect and play hydra warning animation code. which plays a animation to show any one with a visual on the hydra that a marine is near by. you know when they hydra flowers stand on end and wail and shake like a rattle snake tail. well this bit of detection code is firing off every about .4 .3 or .5 of a second. you can tell this as the animation is jittery always bouncing back to the start of its animation. at the rough interval i said. only when a marine started the animation and then walks back out side the hydras detection range do you see this entire animation being played.

    SO what does this say to the lame simple person who plays NS for fun. and has no idea about what goes one inside his 1's and 0's computer. if you have one hydra running this script every .5 of a second ok cool. but when each kharra has the potential to go temp gorge and speed extra rez on hydras. when they were uncapped. you now have X amount of hydras defined by users willingness to spend time and rez on dropping hydras. i have seen a few ns2 maps with about 80 hydras on them back in early beta. imagine them all running the detection script every .5 of a second. 80 hydras telling the server hey i am doing this. if i see this is give you a response and do this animation. now tell everyone else whats going on. then the server talks through the net to all the players connected... but wait a minute hydras dont just run one script. thats just there detection script for the warning animation.

    each hydra runs two scripts. fireing off at about .5 of a second. the second script is the hydras LOS target script. which if a marine walks into line of sight with in X range of the hydra. the hydra can then begin firing on him. that doesn't sound to bad does it...except its not a 120 degree cone detection arc like the sentry. the detection script is checking full 360 degree sphere. its got about a .5 of a second every time it fires off this check and a extra .2 or 3 of a second to work it out on the server and every one connected that its found something and its going to play the fire animation. at which point is spawns the sprite that fire through the level of the map. that sprite also runs a code to see if it hits a hit box. the sprite moving slightly slower than sentry sprite which means the sprite runs it hit reg code more often. to see if its hit the marine.

    so what does this mean if 80 hydras are doing this on a map. it means the server melts. crashes. marine jumps around the corner 20 lots of hydra code come back.. and its kinda like 160 kids all yelling a different answer at you when you ask them why the sky is blue.

    this is why they capped it. at least if there are only 3 hydras per person. the chance that all kharra will go gorge and drop 3 hydras each is much more manageable for the server. a lot less scripts and code being fired off that needs calculating and checking. which means. a lot less data being sent through the line. meaning faster game play. less animation your video card has to render, and your box to handle. meaning higher frame rate as well. so now instead of 80 hydras. we have 18 hydras average give or take. and thats if only 6 people drop three hydras each.

    the funny thing about the detect and shoot script. it also repeats its detection to quick and the last bit of the shoot animation gets cut off. unless the marine just happen to die while the hydra is shooting at him.

    all these reason contribute to the hydra being easily sniped.

    you want my ultimate two cents. in a ranged attack vs melee attack asymmetric game.

    tone down sentry's or buff hydras, if time, rez and skill spent on both sides dealing with static defense structures = same = win.

    as for gorges role, which is the ops question. i dont know any more... staring at a onos ass. and spectating in death cam?
  • ImbalanxdImbalanxd Join Date: 2011-06-15 Member: 104581Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1969054:date=Aug 31 2012, 01:02 AM:name=TimMc)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (TimMc @ Aug 31 2012, 01:02 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1969054"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Not when its unintuitive like that. A commander will not know that a shift helps the hydras naturally. A gorge will not know, so will not build near shifts.

    Shades cloaking the structures is obvious, crags healing them is obvious.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    This is incorrect. Give me a single basic logical reason why it is obvious that shades cloak and crags heal. The answer: its because you know these things to be true. It isn't intuition, its knowledge. There are plenty of things in this game which aren't intuitive, and which you simply have to know in order to take advantage of.
  • GrimfangGrimfang Join Date: 2003-02-04 Member: 13086Members, Constellation, Reinforced - Shadow
    Even if it's not intuitive, but is something that can be learnd from a game or two, it's still okay. I think in almost all games we play, we end up learning things. Even if some of you read the manuals and guides before actually playing, I'm sure you will learn from playing. maybe you see a strategy or a play used by another player, and tries to copy it, or you experience from the marin side, that shooting hydras with a gorge healing them is hard, and even harder, when a crag is behind it. Then playing gorge, you realise, that if you could get a crag behind your hydras, it would boost them. Same goes for shade.

    I'm sure many new players saved up for fade, onos or exo, and was disappointed, that they got killed quickly. Then they decided to look at other players, and learn how they stayed alive, and thus adapted and improved. But that doesn't make fade, onos and exo bad units, because they require some skills to master.
  • CobraCommanderCobraCommander Join Date: 2012-07-30 Member: 154472Members
    edited August 2012
    <!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I'm sure many new players saved up for fade, onos or exo, and was disappointed, that they got killed quickly. Then they decided to look at other players, and learn how they stayed alive, and thus adapted and improved. But that doesn't make fade, onos and exo bad units, because they require some skills to master.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Yep, that's how games work, who would disagree?

    I used to hate Skulk until I saw a skulk tutorial on YouTube and now I love Skulking Marines! Skulks are so small and maneuver nicely, you can do so much with these little guys!
  • YotopiaYotopia Join Date: 2010-11-22 Member: 75176Members
    <!--quoteo(post=1969163:date=Aug 31 2012, 08:13 AM:name=NEX9)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (NEX9 @ Aug 31 2012, 08:13 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1969163"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->you want my ultimate two cents. in a ranged attack vs melee attack asymmetric game.

    tone down sentry's or buff hydras, if time, rez and skill spent on both sides dealing with static defense structures = same = win.

    as for gorges role, which is the ops question. i dont know any more... staring at a onos ass. and spectating in death cam?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Good post.
    And hydras need a buff !
    More health and more dmg.
  • DaphistoDaphisto Hive Janitor Join Date: 2002-11-16 Member: 8917Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    OP here.

    Glad to see I wasn't the only one who was having difficulty understanding the Gorge changes in 217.

    Looking forward to seeing what UWE does with all of the interesting suggestions that you guys made in this thread.
  • 1dominator11dominator1 Join Date: 2010-11-19 Member: 75011Members
    edited August 2012
    Keep in mind that in addition to the 9pres your also paying with one of your players, hydras are worthless without a gorge behind them (1 marine can kill all 3 in about 8 seconds).

    <!--quoteo(post=1968323:date=Aug 29 2012, 01:03 PM:name=Imbalanxd)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Imbalanxd @ Aug 29 2012, 01:03 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1968323"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->*snip* 1st post<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Increasing the synergy between gorge and kharaa comm would be pretty good imo, and would fit with the feel the devs have been aiming for.

    <!--quoteo(post=1969192:date=Aug 31 2012, 05:11 AM:name=Imbalanxd)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Imbalanxd @ Aug 31 2012, 05:11 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1969192"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->This is incorrect. Give me a single basic logical reason why it is obvious that shades cloak and crags heal. The answer: its because you know these things to be true. It isn't intuition, its knowledge. There are plenty of things in this game which aren't intuitive, and which you simply have to know in order to take advantage of.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

    Well they ARE called shades.
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