Defending Home Base On Ns_nothing
McMasters
Join Date: 2002-11-13 Member: 8536Members, Constellation
Join Date: 2002-11-13 Member: 8536Members, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">try as I might, I never can!</div> It seems like an awfully hard base to defend! What do you use for a base setup (after welding the one vent shut, as usual). Anyone have an opinion? It seems like this base is made to allow the aliens nooks and crannies to surpass your defenses..
Comments
Or (and I like doing this) build new infantry portals (about 4 or so), recycle the old ones, and then rebuild the ones at the original spawn. Marines spawn at gates according to build order, so your marines will spawn in the new base, but the old spawn will look complete to any alien attacking it. It's great to have the other team throw everything it can against a faux base, only to destroy it all and notice that marines are still alive.
Time is on the Kharaa side. If you focus on defenses instead of focusing on destroying their resources, taking hives, and putting the pressure on both of those, the Kharaa will eventually wear you down and kill you.
In most cases, if you seriously need to defend your base, you are doing something wrong and have likely already lost. If aliens are continually getting into your base, you need to secure areas further away that they are using to get there. You left a path open. Put phase gates to that location and continually push.
Attack attack attack. Do not give them time to breath, let alone think about harassing your main base.
What they SHOULD be doing is having 1-2 stay while the other 3-4 go and put the pressure somewhere else or cut them off from doing that in the first place. Waypoints help with this, and combat officers on the ground help even more.
Aliens can and will keep harassing your main base if you don't stop them or simply allow them to. Their goal is not to really do any serious damage, they're just trying to buy time. They're just trying to keep more marines at base instead of attacking.
They are tying you up so thei can get that 2nd hive online, and once that happens, if you don't have enough secure positions and be ready to very quickly upgrade to heavy weapons and armor (with the resources to USE them) and continue the fight, you are screwed.
If you waste your time having 4-5 marines get tied up with 1-2 aliens, then they have already won.
See Psychological Warfare pinned topic in Kharaa Strategy section for more details.
but not simple to do when ur comm and the marines wont do what u tell them..
and as a marine comms dont usually seem to listen to the players suggestions <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='confused.gif'><!--endemo-->
The fact is that when attacking an alien buildup one tactic that many aliens use (myself included) is to send something like a couple of fades to attack the marine spawn to draw marine attention when the rest of the team secure the debated area (often something like a third hive). A lot of the time it works. So having defences secure enough to keep a couple of fades at bay for a while is something handy to have in the mid to late game. That way you don't need to divert your manpower as soon and you can focus on taking territory.
This is all keeping in mind that ns_nothing is a very resource-rich map. I've found that if you are attacking and grabbing some holdings like marines should, you can collect a lot of resources. You can also grab the cargo bay foyer fairly easily, as it's on your side of the split-level structure of the map. Unfortunately, this split-level architecture makes it a little bit more difficult to keep the aliens from taking the lower two hives. Cargo bay is nice there because it has a vent that marines can use to get down to the resource nozzle at east viaduct. Sure, aliens can use it too (and you should keep that in mind), but it's a great holding for marines. I've seen some fantastic marine rushs where we simply took cargo as an early grab, then stormed viaduct.
But if you keep up the pressure and you still can't break the aliens or keep them from a second hive, my advice stands. One other thing to consider is placing two turret factories in your spawn at two corners of the room. Not only does this allow you to place turrets within the spawn, since turret factory ranges work through walls, you can often turret beyond the spawn enterance off into the hallway off of the same factories (instead of have two additional facories outside).
[And I know it can be frustrating to have a commander or marines not listen. If your commander is doing something obviously stupid or ridiculous, he should be booted. Otherwise, its usually best to go along with him (though making good suggestions is hardly a crime), as following a mediorce stragey is usually better than half-following a mediocre strategy while thinking about a better one. If your marines aren't listening... I dunno. Coaxing your marines into listening to you is one of the skills of being a commander. It probably SHOULDN'T be, but it is. My advice is to find a few competent players on your team and speak mainly to them, then just set waypoints and use Phase Gates and Ammo Depots to try to focus where your team moves. /EDIT]
I have noticed that Turret Factories are usually placed in obscenely vulnerable positions sometimes and auxilary factories are almost never built. Understandably, 25 resources is quite valuable early-mid game but if your turrets won't go down because a 2-4 RP skulk ate your factory you'll be able to hold a key area (such as a Hive) and buy more time for reinforcements.
I agree with you Rock on the Marines staying inside the base. The cost of time and Marine respawns is not worth having damaged structures. Most likely one or two Marines can fend off the aliens and possibly die a few times. But only a focused attack should be able to overrun the basic Marine defenses in early game. In most games, there is the "classic" Kamikaze Skulk Rush and for the most part it doesn't seem to work all that well anymore.
Despite all the vents on every map, especially ns_nothing, Marines can use the vents to their advantage. Mines in the vents can put a damper on any small aliens' day. Set a mine right around a corner inside a well used vent, usually you won't be disappointed. Mines are "low tech" items in the game and can be obtained rather quickly, usually all one needs is a "boost" in some cases, wheras it is teamwork so I don't consider the standing on another teammate's head an exploit (of course, I could be wrong). Many mods use the human tower strategy to get into unexpected locations. There is a thread about Mines started by eccentric Mr. Bean if you're interested in uh.. mine tactics. Despite being static defenses, they can really ruin an alien's day.