. Was it not concluded that not being 100% invisible meant you might as well not be invisible at all which was why we ended up with 100%.
It was concluded years ago with NS1. The one thing you cannot "balance" is how the game looks on different setups. This is why no gamma settings is also just as nonsensical.
My suggestion for changing cloak would be to make a crawling skulk partially visible only when with X feet of a marine. This way, you get the best of both worlds - 100% cloak until you're trying to attack. It lessens the cheese factor while still retaining tactical positioning.
shade hive has ink cloud... pretty important to counter ARC (supposedly).
perma 100% cloak was an all or nothing strategy and horrible to play against... you can still have 100% cloak if you remain still when the marine is approaching you and sneak behind.
i still think celerity is greatly overrated. as long as you lose 100% of the effect in combat, imo it will always be inferior to adrenaline for every lifeform. double onos charge/blink/leap for the combat mobility versus celerity that doesn't even work when you need it. (i know this doesn't change anything because shift is still better than shade, but just had to make a point about celerity)
. Was it not concluded that not being 100% invisible meant you might as well not be invisible at all which was why we ended up with 100%.
It was concluded years ago with NS1. The one thing you cannot "balance" is how the game looks on different setups. This is why no gamma settings is also just as nonsensical.
My suggestion for changing cloak would be to make a crawling skulk partially visible only when with X feet of a marine. This way, you get the best of both worlds - 100% cloak until you're trying to attack. It lessens the cheese factor while still retaining tactical positioning.
I like this idea, would be more interesting, current state of camo is useless...
And about celerity, in combat speed increase would make more sense
. Was it not concluded that not being 100% invisible meant you might as well not be invisible at all which was why we ended up with 100%.
It was concluded years ago with NS1. The one thing you cannot "balance" is how the game looks on different setups. This is why no gamma settings is also just as nonsensical.
My suggestion for changing cloak would be to make a crawling skulk partially visible only when with X feet of a marine. This way, you get the best of both worlds - 100% cloak until you're trying to attack. It lessens the cheese factor while still retaining tactical positioning.
As i mentioned before the patch, as a veteren of crysis wars where cloaking was partial, even though it was far more effective than camo now is in NS2, people trained themselves to see it at any distance easily. The result was it never got used, even in pubs.
shade hive has ink cloud... pretty important to counter ARC (supposedly).
Except it doesn't, really. You would have to anticipate the incoming Scan, otherwise the ARCs will lock in on the targets for the next ~15 seconds regardless of whether you use Ink after that or not. And you can't keep perma-inking effectively either because it's all on a global cooldown, as far as I know.
Ink is mostly useless. At best you can quickly recloak your upgrade structures after a scan and hope that marines didn't remember their position. You can also try to disorient marines in the cloud, but any marine worth his money won't be impressed by that either.
Seeing how Hallucinations are pretty useless/too expensive in the early game as well, it's not that far off to say that the Shade Hive is on it's best way now to become a really useless upgrade path.
I don't mind the new camo too much & I think it makes sense to scale with speed, but I have a couple of suggestions on how to make it fun but still fair.
First off it could be rebalanced via the out of combat timer, shorting this could make for very engaging gameplay.
Compared to the way camo used to be for a lone skulk it would not be nearly as effective as it once was, however, it would increase the skill ceiling on camo considerably.
You could also use it to close distance quickly albeit noisily (like the statues game)
Either that or make camo 100% transparency while walking but make it so when you're 100% invisible marines can hear the camo sound effect that you get as kharaa.
You could then balance it around the volume of the effect.
This would make areas with ambient noise more important to get obs/scans in than other areas but would not make it a necessity for for comms to scan every single room & put obs in every second room,.
On a slightly related note, camo seems completely pointless on a lerk in the current state, which makes me sad.
(if traveling at mach speed while cloaked wasn't awesome, I don't know what is)
As for silence if I can have one thing and one thing alone, can I have silence remove lerk spike tracers since right now silent spikes are less effective that the noisy kind from previous builds.
I like the changes to camo. People are just used to waltzing over to an unsuspecting marine very slowly, and getting an easy kill without having to work for it.
Just an fyi, please don't blame the playtesters (Nor am I one), they don't have any pull to be honest, and it isn't their fault this happened.
This is true, and also the cause why many of the best players in the game stopped being play testers.
Regardless, the game did get to this point in this fashion, which is fun. Would it have gotten to a more balanced point faster with actual dedicated talent behind the changes? Not a question to ask. But unfortunately due to development time constraints, developing a high level comprehension of the game remains in the hands of players only. (You can't have hundreds of hours of actual game play while scrambling on development at the same time)
It seems like the buff that was intended to offset the change to Camo is that you now cloak instantaneously except in combat. The problem is that jumping or leaping will label you as in combat thus preventing this from working. Fixing that would be a good start, since there's no competent skulk that runs anywhere without jumping.
The new camo is a welcomed change. I was never a fan of ghosting around the map and having that ethereal vision filter. It just seemed too fantastical. You want to blend into the environment and appear invisible? Stay still. If you need to ambush, stay out of line of sight and shift walk up to them, most of the time they still wont see you coming. I don't see what the problem is.
I think most people are butt hurt because they have to use their head to take on marine groups now. Silence and Camo both offer two varied ways of approaching marines. Figure it out.
Now carapace and celerity are pretty much the only useful upgrades left in the game. UWE seriously needs to take a look at their upgrade system and sort this mess to be honest, it's not okay for only 2/6 possible upgrades to be viable.
I don't understand how silence still isn't good? I think it's the second best upgrade myself, after cara of course.
maybe it's just me, but having seen a few shade hives today i can say that silence is very good.
it's not so much that marines can't hear you - but that you can actually hear the marines. you chop an RT or blink about the map in total silence, you can hear a pin drop 100 miles away. it's excellent.
whether it's on par with shift/crag i'm not sure, however i personally prefer silence over celerity/adrenaline.
i also played with camo quite a bit and it's still a guaranteed marine kill if you're smart enough to plan a good ambush (opposed to randomly waiting for marine to approach).
I'm not sure why people like Celerity so much seeing as you lose it in combat, while a Skulk can use Adrenaline and leap to the ceiling and bounce off to build a lot of speed and get around the map just as fast.
Camo is extremely easy to spot right now (I played a LOT of Aliens vs Predator 2, and I fought a LOT of cloaked predators). Silence is still good.
As is stands, I will likely never go Shade first again unless the team is stacked, or I'm betting on early silenced Lerks.
Absolutely zero reason to go Shade before 3rd hive, zero. Especially with all the "cham" players lately. Seems roughly 25% of the playerbase is wallhacking with chams which further make cloak useless.
Cloak needs to be re-worked in the code to prevent wall-hacking from spotting you.
I wasn't aware you lose Celerity in combat, thats really bad as well, no wonder Marines are winning every game now.
Guess Crag/Shift/Shade is only build order now. Shame, this game used to be a lot more fun.
I wasn't aware you lose Celerity in combat, thats really bad as well, no wonder Marines are winning every game now.
This is perhaps the fifth time I've heard/read this in the past 24 hours. I sense a communication error!
Make this the sixth then! I guess it's still good for getting the gorgy-porgies around though--the amount of times i've had an Onos run away from me, leaving me slowly plodding (and bellysliding ;P) around marine territory by myself is unreal
I like the new camo mechanics quite a bit. Waltzing up to a marine while completely invisible felt a bit cheap to me. It seems like you cloak much faster now too, which makes it more precise in terms of moving at the right times than it was in previous builds.
I like the new camo mechanics quite a bit. Waltzing up to a marine while completely invisible felt a bit cheap to me. It seems like you cloak much faster now too, which makes it more precise in terms of moving at the right times than it was in previous builds.
this...
played probably 12 hours since patch already (lol) and must have seen dozens of ppl failing with camo because they seemed to think they were still invisible while moving. i've also seen a few of the better players use it to good effect without being ezmode cheap fraggerz.
personally i believe the new problem with cloak is that in alien vision it's impossible to see the cloak effect.... it can be confusing as the camo 'flutter' looks almost the same as the flutter when you're in range of obs/scan etc.
ScardyBobScardyBobJoin Date: 2009-11-25Member: 69528Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
Moving camo change was definitely a nerf, but the totally invisible while moving proved very problematic in matches where you had a comm unable or unwilling to use scan. I'd actually support removing the camo speed penalty so that you could go full speed with the partially visible camo effect to balance it out.
Silence is okay, but it totally screws over your team in the lategame if you don't manage to get a third hive for either cara or cele.
Camo/silence first mainly forces you to go cara second to stay viable in the mid-game (against w1/2/3, sg). As long as you have lerks/fades who know how to play without celerity/adren, it's not a bad choice. However, in 24-player pubs, you typically need the shift as either a first or definitely second hive upgrade to counter egg-lock, which makes the silence/camo first path largely not viable.
Moving camo change was definitely a nerf, but the totally invisible while moving proved very problematic in matches where you had a comm unable or unwilling to use scan. I'd actually support removing the camo speed penalty so that you could go full speed with the partially visible camo effect to balance it out.
Take into account the trade off between not only the other upgrades, but between the crag/shift hives as well, with like scan that completely nullifies your upgrade, it was pretty balanced.
I'm just glad we were warned about the change in camo ahead of time. In that time I started using silence exclusively so the change in camo now isn't as painful as it would have been.
Needless to say I won't be using camo at all anymore. While it's still somewhat useful it's pretty limited in its uses. This will be especially true once players learn how to scan the screen for any camoed targets.
It's a shame that shade is now effectively a third hive tech. It was always fun to get camo first to strike fear into the marine team. It was also great terrifying fun to be on the receiving end of a camo first strategy.
My suggestion is still awesome, albeit impossible to implement prolly: Full camo when standing still, full camo when moving if the marine watching you is moving, but if the marine watching you is standing still, he sees you while you move in camo. (as a 10% blur)
I really really like the idea of making it dependent on the marine's movement. That would add a lot of skill to it.
Comments
It was concluded years ago with NS1. The one thing you cannot "balance" is how the game looks on different setups. This is why no gamma settings is also just as nonsensical.
My suggestion for changing cloak would be to make a crawling skulk partially visible only when with X feet of a marine. This way, you get the best of both worlds - 100% cloak until you're trying to attack. It lessens the cheese factor while still retaining tactical positioning.
perma 100% cloak was an all or nothing strategy and horrible to play against... you can still have 100% cloak if you remain still when the marine is approaching you and sneak behind.
i still think celerity is greatly overrated. as long as you lose 100% of the effect in combat, imo it will always be inferior to adrenaline for every lifeform. double onos charge/blink/leap for the combat mobility versus celerity that doesn't even work when you need it. (i know this doesn't change anything because shift is still better than shade, but just had to make a point about celerity)
I like this idea, would be more interesting, current state of camo is useless...
And about celerity, in combat speed increase would make more sense
Also, skulk seems to take down RT like 20% faster. For sure.
Really interesting. Proximity based cloak! Hmmn
This was a poorly thought out change
Thats how it was in beta, guess what it didn't work. Why they decided to bring something back that doesn't work idk.
Except it doesn't, really. You would have to anticipate the incoming Scan, otherwise the ARCs will lock in on the targets for the next ~15 seconds regardless of whether you use Ink after that or not. And you can't keep perma-inking effectively either because it's all on a global cooldown, as far as I know.
Ink is mostly useless. At best you can quickly recloak your upgrade structures after a scan and hope that marines didn't remember their position. You can also try to disorient marines in the cloud, but any marine worth his money won't be impressed by that either.
Seeing how Hallucinations are pretty useless/too expensive in the early game as well, it's not that far off to say that the Shade Hive is on it's best way now to become a really useless upgrade path.
There's so many stuff on the alien side that is either god-damn awful or entirely pointless. It's depressing.
First off it could be rebalanced via the out of combat timer, shorting this could make for very engaging gameplay.
Compared to the way camo used to be for a lone skulk it would not be nearly as effective as it once was, however, it would increase the skill ceiling on camo considerably.
You could also use it to close distance quickly albeit noisily (like the statues game)
Either that or make camo 100% transparency while walking but make it so when you're 100% invisible marines can hear the camo sound effect that you get as kharaa.
You could then balance it around the volume of the effect.
This would make areas with ambient noise more important to get obs/scans in than other areas but would not make it a necessity for for comms to scan every single room & put obs in every second room,.
On a slightly related note, camo seems completely pointless on a lerk in the current state, which makes me sad.
(if traveling at mach speed while cloaked wasn't awesome, I don't know what is)
As for silence if I can have one thing and one thing alone, can I have silence remove lerk spike tracers since right now silent spikes are less effective that the noisy kind from previous builds.
(edited to make more sense)
This is true, and also the cause why many of the best players in the game stopped being play testers.
Regardless, the game did get to this point in this fashion, which is fun. Would it have gotten to a more balanced point faster with actual dedicated talent behind the changes? Not a question to ask. But unfortunately due to development time constraints, developing a high level comprehension of the game remains in the hands of players only. (You can't have hundreds of hours of actual game play while scrambling on development at the same time)
I think most people are butt hurt because they have to use their head to take on marine groups now. Silence and Camo both offer two varied ways of approaching marines. Figure it out.
Silence isn't good because Xarius says so. Duh.
it's not so much that marines can't hear you - but that you can actually hear the marines. you chop an RT or blink about the map in total silence, you can hear a pin drop 100 miles away. it's excellent.
whether it's on par with shift/crag i'm not sure, however i personally prefer silence over celerity/adrenaline.
i also played with camo quite a bit and it's still a guaranteed marine kill if you're smart enough to plan a good ambush (opposed to randomly waiting for marine to approach).
Camo is extremely easy to spot right now (I played a LOT of Aliens vs Predator 2, and I fought a LOT of cloaked predators). Silence is still good.
As is stands, I will likely never go Shade first again unless the team is stacked, or I'm betting on early silenced Lerks.
Cloak needs to be re-worked in the code to prevent wall-hacking from spotting you.
I wasn't aware you lose Celerity in combat, thats really bad as well, no wonder Marines are winning every game now.
Guess Crag/Shift/Shade is only build order now. Shame, this game used to be a lot more fun.
This is perhaps the fifth time I've heard/read this in the past 24 hours. I sense a communication error!
Make this the sixth then! I guess it's still good for getting the gorgy-porgies around though--the amount of times i've had an Onos run away from me, leaving me slowly plodding (and bellysliding ;P) around marine territory by myself is unreal
this...
played probably 12 hours since patch already (lol) and must have seen dozens of ppl failing with camo because they seemed to think they were still invisible while moving. i've also seen a few of the better players use it to good effect without being ezmode cheap fraggerz.
personally i believe the new problem with cloak is that in alien vision it's impossible to see the cloak effect.... it can be confusing as the camo 'flutter' looks almost the same as the flutter when you're in range of obs/scan etc.
Camo/silence first mainly forces you to go cara second to stay viable in the mid-game (against w1/2/3, sg). As long as you have lerks/fades who know how to play without celerity/adren, it's not a bad choice. However, in 24-player pubs, you typically need the shift as either a first or definitely second hive upgrade to counter egg-lock, which makes the silence/camo first path largely not viable.
Take into account the trade off between not only the other upgrades, but between the crag/shift hives as well, with like scan that completely nullifies your upgrade, it was pretty balanced.
Needless to say I won't be using camo at all anymore. While it's still somewhat useful it's pretty limited in its uses. This will be especially true once players learn how to scan the screen for any camoed targets.
It's a shame that shade is now effectively a third hive tech. It was always fun to get camo first to strike fear into the marine team. It was also great terrifying fun to be on the receiving end of a camo first strategy.
I really really like the idea of making it dependent on the marine's movement. That would add a lot of skill to it.