Judging a mod solely based on the number of active servers is generally a difficult task, simply because of the negative connotation most people view yellow servers with.
Well that's a whole other issue, and yeah I agree with you in part. However, there are still plenty of modded servers (like KKG) that are filled constantly. What they need is a way for a person to see what kind of mod the server has before they join.
is there a new version for this mod ? because currently nothing works at all ( all players are called "noname", scoreboard is now completly empty, etc).
kinda a shame to have this mod not working on the free weekend
SewlekThe programmer previously known as SchimmelJoin Date: 2003-05-13Member: 16247Members, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, Subnautica Developer
edited March 2013
i updated the mod with 242 / 243, it should work fine. if you have any script errors, please send me you client or server log to andi AT unknownworlds.com
edit: just seeing you are running other mods on your server. I did not spend any time to try to make the mod compatible with other mods. I tested it only as the only mod being loaded and i wrote it in a way its easier to merge with NS2 (just copied the default lua files and edited them). I wont change that since, its too much work otherwise
edit2: you can try to disable mods one by one, and when you found out with which mod its incompatible, i can take a look.
- increased starting team resources to 75 (up from 50)
- increased resource tower costs to 15 (up from 10)
marine
- increased shotgun speed by 30%, reduced damage by 30%
- increased medpack cost to 2 (was 1)
- increase IP cost to 20 (was 15)
- increased command station cost to 20 (was 15)
- reduced nano shield duration to 3 seconds (down from 8)
- increased nano shield effectiveness to 75% (up from 50%)
- ARC cannon must now be constructed by a MAC or marine when deploying
- Phase Gates can now be build on infestation
- added ability for marine commander to temporary power individual structures)
- reduced health/armor of Phase Gates to 2500/300 (down from 2700/450)
alien
- reduced hive specialization upgrade time to 10 seconds (down from 20)
- increased spread for lerk spikes (8 degree up from 2)
- added biomass 2 research for reducing spike spread down to 2 degree
- disabled fade double jump
- enemies are now outlines with parasite only
- added new shade upgrade (called Aura for now) which outlines all enemies, range depends on level
- Aura upgrade shows indication when enemy is below 80% health
- reduced nano shield duration to 3 seconds (down from 8)
- increased nano shield effectiveness to 75% (up from 50%)
- increased spread for lerk spikes (8 degree up from 2)
- added biomass 2 research for reducing spike spread down to 2 degree
- disabled fade double jump
- enemies are now outlines with parasite only
Not sure how I feel about these, I also think aura should have different notification levels for different health values, other than that it's great.
- The shotgun change seems like a pretty heavy nerf, shouldn't the reload time be faster?
- Also not a fan of increasing the medpack cost, that's going to undermine the goal of keeping players away from the armory.
- Don't like the idea of the Lerk spike accuracy upgrade. Seems too complicated, and if spikes are balanced for a tight cone then that just means they'll be worthless by default with a wide one. If we're going back to inaccurate spikes then we should go all the way and balance them to be that way.
Otherwise the rest of it sounds good. Maybe just go ahead and call it Scent of Fear, we won't judge :P
Well, it's a nice try to utilize the new system to add minor researchable upgrades to the khammander (if the cost is appropriately low) so he actively chooses a strategy for which lifeforms to focus on.
Not sure how I feel about the marine cost increase, though. It's already hard enough to hold your ground against IP-chewing enemies with the increased respawn time, so the increased cost for them won't contribute to fighting the danger of instantly becoming spawn-locked by an early Skulk rush. The cost increase on the CC is fine, but it should not be on something so substantially necessary.
Three seconds for Nanoshield might be next to useless if the cost remains the same. Maybe four seconds would be enough.
Interesting take on ARC changes. Makes them less spammable and dangerous if not guarded. You can basically counter an ARC rush by killing the escorting marines before the ARCs get deployed.
Curious to see if there will be less medpack spam now with the cost increase. Though it can also backfire and make the commander consider whether or not a forward marine is actually worth being healed that expensively. Unfortunately we don't have float resources. 1.5 would seem appropriate for medpack cost.
Or maybe implement a system where you get one free medpack charge every 5-10 seconds. So if there is enough time, you can resupply your troops on the front line for free. But if you want them to be healed up instantly or medpack-spam a guy midcombat, you have to pay those 2 res per medpack before the free one recharged.
And I agree that outline color of aura should interpolate linearly from green to red with decreasing HP. After all you sacrifice Silence/Camouflage for that ability and the Aura will probably not help you in combat otherwise.
I am not judging the shotgun change without seeing how it performs in game against the changed alien movement. Though it probably sucks to no longer be able to one-shot close up Skulks. If you allow them to get that close, you deserve the kill.
I think I disagree with every single change there...
same here.... none of those new changes strike me as being 'fun' (or even fair).
it's a blanket nerf patch.
in public play the shotgun is what gives solo marines a chance against lerk/fade. why on earth would you seek to make it impossible to solo a decent lerk/fade?? that would be super frustrating, as when the weaker team happens to be marines - the ONLY fun you get is from valuable shotgun kills (as the aliens have plenty of time to flee with anything more than a scratch). it's NOT easy to kill lerk/fade with shotgun, you still have to outplay them by having them underestimate your aiming ability or overcommit.
i'm disappointed for the same reason SC2 is disappointing compared to broodwar. reaver (aka colossus), storm, tanks, guardian (aka broodlord) etc were all super nerfed to have reduced damage and in some cases increased rate of fire to compensate. why? because blizzard wanted to make the game easier to balance by making almost every unit have the same humdrum strength. anyone who watched pro broodwar will remember the excitement and epic micro from reaver/tank/storm drops - in SC2 it's not viable because the alternative units are too expensive and gimmicky to suit the same purpose.
anyway, returning to the topic of marine nerfs, why oh why? if anything is 'overpowered' on marine team it's jetpacks. it's the jetpack that makes marines 10 times harder to kill, not nano shield or medpacks. (i don't really like nano shield or medpacks, but increased cost/reduced strength would make them pathetically weak luxuries - might as well remove them from the game). a stranded shotgunner with no jetpack is 20pres waiting to be dropped.
i've enjoyed most of the changes in the BT mod, especially ranged spores (which was sadly reverted). however, the unwelcomed change is biomass - it's far too complicated. i consider myself a fast learner, but even after a few rounds as alien commander i didn't immediately know which hive needs biomass, neither was it obvious whether it's more efficient to place hive #2/#3 or get hive #1/#2 to next level of biomass for upgrades. i still don't understand the purpose of biomass... if it's meant to allow more upgrades from fewer hives, then i don't understand why the cost is exponentially higher for the 'top' upgrades... biomass 9 is effectively having about 5-6 hives
i've enjoyed most of the changes in the BT mod, especially ranged spores (which was sadly reverted). however, the unwelcomed change is biomass - it's far too complicated. i consider myself a fast learner, but even after a few rounds as alien commander i didn't immediately know which hive needs biomass, neither was it obvious whether it's more efficient to place hive #2/#3 or get hive #1/#2 to next level of biomass for upgrades. i still don't understand the purpose of biomass... if it's meant to allow more upgrades from fewer hives, then i don't understand why the cost is exponentially higher for the 'top' upgrades... biomass 9 is effectively having about 5-6 hives
Stomp on Onos is really a game ender (it pretty much guarantees a marine death unless they have jetpacks and even then can you seal their fate once they run out of fuel). It kinda deserves to be on the last researchable spot there. Those last upgrades tickle in slowly because it is assumed that aliens have dominated the map for quite a while already to get them. You often see aliens piling up plenty of tres in the lategame once they secured three Hives. This allows to put them to use.
Besides that Biomass is not only tech research but also a passive HP buff for every alien lifeform. It's a similar res sink for aliens as an Arms Lab is for marines.
The cost of late upgrades has also been adjusted already to be a bit lower due to the Biomass you invested to get there. (Gorge Tunnels are only 10 res compared to the 30 res from vanilla, Leap is 20 res, Spores is 15 res again, etc.). I think the cost balances out just fine.
And there are really not that many Hives in a game. It's not really hard to remember in which Hive you researched what Biomass level. And if that feature should even make it into the main game, you can still add some more indicators like a fancy number on the Hive name that indicates the Biomass in it. It is already showing in the Biomass progress bar which upgrades/Biomass amount you are about to lose with a Hive if that Hive is under attack.
The more efficient way (unless you aim to get the maximum Biomass level anyway) is always to drop another Hive. But the question is whether you can actually manage to secure such a Hive or maybe want another upgrade before the Hive is ready. In that case the more comfortable way is to research another Biomass.
i've enjoyed most of the changes in the BT mod, especially ranged spores (which was sadly reverted). however, the unwelcomed change is biomass - it's far too complicated. i consider myself a fast learner, but even after a few rounds as alien commander i didn't immediately know which hive needs biomass, neither was it obvious whether it's more efficient to place hive #2/#3 or get hive #1/#2 to next level of biomass for upgrades. i still don't understand the purpose of biomass... if it's meant to allow more upgrades from fewer hives, then i don't understand why the cost is exponentially higher for the 'top' upgrades... biomass 9 is effectively having about 5-6 hives
Stomp on Onos is really a game ender (it pretty much guarantees a marine death unless they have jetpacks and even then can you seal their fate once they run out of fuel). It kinda deserves to be on the last researchable spot there. Those last upgrades tickle in slowly because it is assumed that aliens have dominated the map for quite a while already to get them. You often see aliens piling up plenty of tres in the lategame once they secured three Hives. This allows to put them to use.
Besides that Biomass is not only tech research but also a passive HP buff for every alien lifeform. It's a similar res sink for aliens as an Arms Lab is for marines.
The cost of late upgrades has also been adjusted already to be a bit lower due to the Biomass you invested to get there. (Gorge Tunnels are only 10 res compared to the 30 res from vanilla, Leap is 20 res, Spores is 15 res again, etc.). I think the cost balances out just fine.
And there are really not that many Hives in a game. It's not really hard to remember in which Hive you researched what Biomass level. And if that feature should even make it into the main game, you can still add some more indicators like a fancy number on the Hive name that indicates the Biomass in it. It is already showing in the Biomass progress bar which upgrades/Biomass amount you are about to lose with a Hive if that Hive is under attack.
The more efficient way (unless you aim to get the maximum Biomass level anyway) is always to drop another Hive. But the question is whether you can actually manage to secure such a Hive or maybe want another upgrade before the Hive is ready. In that case the more comfortable way is to research another Biomass.
that still seems like cutting off the nose to spite the face.
stomp isn't a game-ender in the live build, never mind increasing the cost of stomp by ~150 tres. aliens can have marines pegged back to a single base in 10 minutes, but it takes another 10 minutes to get the "game-ender"? that doesn't make sense.
the extra health per biomass could easily be associated with number of hives.
it's mass complication for the benefit of giving the alien commander some m&m's... i think most people would rather getting out of the alien commander seat and contributing as another lifeform.
you know the fun way to make alien commander more fun? add more potency to the options when expanding infestation - at the moment it's incredibly limited; you can shift (extemely limiting cooldown) or grow a whip, and then there's the awfully boring gameplay of crag spam with shift/shade. in BT mod you can't even drop a proxy shift and spawn eggs, because the function was moved to the hive.
innovative aggressive infestation options > being occupied with whack-a-mole biomass.
But you can still get the eggs to a forward location by the use of a Shift, just that the responsible Shift is no longer out in the open. You have a slightly higher cost associated with forward egg spam but it's less expensive to move eggs to a forward location if you already have a lot in a Hive location.
You can get forward eggs at any location you want without a Shift there (and decide on your own where exactly the egg is, rather than having it spawn randomly in the open), but the rate for that is lower in return. And you are no longer forced to go with a Shift Hive first if you are close to being egg-locked.
You count those 150 additional res for getting Stomp under the premise that you don't get any of the other higher upgrades. Which is one of the design goals of the system as well: it encourages the khammander to also get upgrades for other lifeforms on the way, because they are cheaper than before since a part of their cost is payed anyway to get to higher tech and increase the lifeform HP.
It's the same reason why traits are both acquired with a single structure now: there are more players in a game than just the khammander, so their fun should not be solely dependent on what the khammander thinks is worth researching. Countless times I actually had to beg a khammander to get me Regeneration as well. Most would just sit on Carapace, despite Regen being imho more suited for Skulks and possible Lerks as well.
Another reason behind the system is that aliens have more to lose with the loss of a Hive due to the Biomass system. It costs them more time and res to get back to the old level after regrowing the Hive, since they have to invest in Biomass again. Basically upgrade costs are split in the pure upgrade that you only purchase once and another part which is the Biomass which you have to reinvest if you lose it.
Anyway, can we maybe get a purchasable Grenade for the marines prototyped in the Balance Mod too? 1 Grenade for 4 res purchasable at an Armory?
@sewlek what do you make of the suggestion from earlier, which involved giving aliens a special benefit from getting a second or third of the same hive type? for example 3 x crag hive means you can't get shift/shade upgrades, but you get a triple-powered carapace and regeneration instead. perhaps also allow an option to 'morph' hive from crag to shift/shade at a hefty cost - to allow powerful tech switching; switching your carapace3 for celerity3 etc. marines can scan/scouts hive to see which build they're up against, ergo i think it adds tactical depth at no cost.
additionally, i strongly believe that the alien commander should have at least one offensive ability akin to the marine medpack drop. something which raises the alien commander skill ceiling, rewarding micro management and enables you to assist lifeforms in combat. for example the alien commander pheromones could cost 1-2 tres and each have an area-of-effect bonus ('threat here' could temporarily increase damage by X% for X seconds, 'healing needed here' could temporarily increase healing by X% for X seconds and 'expanding here' could increase construction rate by X% for X seconds). for clarity, the effect of pheromones could give the lifeforms an aura effect like regeneration - so the marines know what to expect. imagine your skulks engage a marine group, you drop 'threat' pheromones for damage boost, then afterwards you drop 'heal' pheromones to speed up the healing factor - it would really give alien commander a greater sense of importance.
But you can still get the eggs to a forward location by the use of a Shift, just that the responsible Shift is no longer out in the open. You have a slightly higher cost associated with forward egg spam but it's less expensive to move eggs to a forward location if you already have a lot in a Hive location.
You can get forward eggs at any location you want without a Shift there (and decide on your own where exactly the egg is, rather than having it spawn randomly in the open), but the rate for that is lower in return. And you are no longer forced to go with a Shift Hive first if you are close to being egg-locked.
You count those 150 additional res for getting Stomp under the premise that you don't get any of the other higher upgrades. Which is one of the design goals of the system as well: it encourages the khammander to also get upgrades for other lifeforms on the way, because they are cheaper than before since a part of their cost is payed anyway to get to higher tech and increase the lifeform HP.
It's the same reason why traits are both acquired with a single structure now: there are more players in a game than just the khammander, so their fun should not be solely dependent on what the khammander thinks is worth researching. Countless times I actually had to beg a khammander to get me Regeneration as well. Most would just sit on Carapace, despite Regen being imho more suited for Skulks and possible Lerks as well.
Another reason behind the system is that aliens have more to lose with the loss of a Hive due to the Biomass system. It costs them more time and res to get back to the old level after regrowing the Hive, since they have to invest in Biomass again. Basically upgrade costs are split in the pure upgrade that you only purchase once and another part which is the Biomass which you have to reinvest if you lose it.
Anyway, can we maybe get a purchasable Grenade for the marines prototyped in the Balance Mod too? 1 Grenade for 4 res purchasable at an Armory?
it's still reduced clarity and over-complicated.
in the live build you can see your 'carapace shell' or 'regeneration shell'. it gives marines a tactical option to destroy a specific upgrade. i know the BT mod has the benefit of tiered upgrades, but i don't believe that merging both upgrades into a single structure is a preventative measure to stop troll commanders from skipping your desired upgrade. aside from that, in BT mod you still have to research the leap, spores, stomp etc in addition to meeting the biomass requirement. ergo your fear of a troll commander is still at full capacity.
i believe the game will be improved by primarily ensuring everything is viable, while at the same time being as clear and fun as possible. it needs to be viable otherwise the game is broken, you don't want redundancy - like the role of alien commander a lot of the time and stuff like flamethrower/vortex/xenocide/camo. then it needs to be fun to attract and withhold the majority of players. then it needs to be clear to reduce the randomness, which enables greater focus on tactics etc at competitive level - and makes it easier to follow as a spectator.
Aliens, 350 + Hive, Biomass, 3 X upgrades, Umbra, Spores, Vortex, Nearly Useless Onos Shield, and Stomp.
575 or so.
This is not counting the time difference for Aliens to get such an upgrade. This leads into the question, is it supposed to be Aliens are even on Two Hives compared to Marines or balanced on Three Hives?
2nd CC seems all the fashion now adays. And besides nano trolling, it essentially serves no purpose up untill much later game. Just because it makes new players feel safer, does not mean it is required. Actually something more comparable would be
Give or take. Trying to evaluate cost balance in this fashion past this is like trying to plug half the holes in a ship with jelly, while leaving the other half empty. I wouldn't even feel comfortable making tech tree change evaluations based solely on tres cost, even at the more accurate tech level definition i used in this post. 210 with 210 does not necessarily indicate 'balance'.
There are too many variables (player pressure and base unit balance, res income, med/ammo drops, ability power, pres lifeform timings etc.) to do any kind of solid analysis without playing the game at higher skill levels. Especially with the new 75 starting tres.
I have my own concerns with some costs, but I now think its best to actually play them out extensively, and in as wide a range of skill levels as possible first.
If anything I think the second CC should provide more functionality to justify its being built. Players have the instinct that it's important for an expansion to have a CC, but right now it isn't at all until you want that specific tech. There should also be some incentive to have more than 2 IMO.
If anything I think the second CC should provide more functionality to justify its being built. Players have the instinct that it's important for an expansion to have a CC, but right now it isn't at all until you want that specific tech. There should also be some incentive to have more than 2 IMO.
good point - that's another one of those 'redundancy' problems.
maybe something like making scan free, but give it a cooldown of 1 minute. then if you establish a second CC it's 30 second cooldown and 3 CC's it's 20 second cooldown. nano shield could also possibly be changed to be free with a large cooldown, which is reduced with establishing a 3rd CC.
Give or take. Trying to evaluate cost balance in this fashion past this is like trying to plug half the holes in a ship with jelly, while leaving the other half empty. I wouldn't even feel comfortable making tech tree change evaluations based solely on tres cost, even at the more accurate tech level definition i used in this post. 210 with 210 does not necessarily indicate 'balance'.
The problem is that you ignored the things that bring up the cost to a stupid degree. Biomass and the individual costs of each upgrade have gone up a fair deal.
To get Carapace, Adrenaline, Leap, Blink/Shadowstep, and Bile Bomb in the current NS2 version is 125 res. In this version it will cost around 270 res. Admittedly one will get more upgrades with the new system, more base health that is amazing, and it is helpful that Regen is good now, but the idea is that the cost is still too much.
For what its worth, I just wanted to thank you guys for doing this. Balance is a thankless job but having played NS with you guys before I trust your thinking in this and know it will come together in the end. You understand the spirit of the game. That goes a long way.
@Cyberkun Can i just preface by saying that the level of skill on the balance server has been abyssmally low, with you as one of the only dependable players. So i'm not taking what you say lightly.
Basically right now in live ns2, aliens have an overcharged res system both in income and low cost. Its cheap to get upgrades, so excess res gets put into hive/harvester/cyst/lifeform spam. So comparing the cost to that is not that descriptive. Do not be fooled by 50/50 overall winrates like many others. The balance mod keeps important early timings such as 2nd hive, fast leap, early upgrade etc, while addressing our problem of low opportunity costs as the game progresses.
You also have to think about ability power and base lifeform scaling. For example, fade now starts with blink, and while shadowstep is powerful, it means base fade is more versatile. 4 biomass umbra is also something that I havn't seen fully utilized yet.
A large part of the 270 is the 2nd upgrade (75), and quite honestly i don't think it's as crucial as it may seem. You can do decently with just one upgrade. Slower 2nd upgrade doesn't shut you out of the midgame, it just smooths out your power and tech progression, while also soaking up the excess res that you would see in live ns2 going towards the spam i mentioned above.
I admit my issue with the thing is that I primarily command, and due to the lower skill levels, it is hard for me to see the difference in how things work in midgame. I understand by how the skills have changed that it is better for the aliens overall, but as a commander I tend to only see the bigger numbers on res counts. Combined with how aliens feel to need three hives to finish any game in the current and BT mod, I also feel the full research is needed. Even then though, that is a lie. I've watched enough competitive games to know aliens are doing fine with the two hives currently and the three hive vs dual exos super late game rarely happens in serious matches. Just in pubs it is annoying to know half the time you require the full research tree to have Stomp and the ability to spam Onos to win the game, and I wish that was not the case. Just it is so expensive to finish the research tree even when you are in the lead to a stupid degree.
Really, this is just a rant about a commander angry at how hard it is for pubs to push the Marine base end game if they turtle. I suppose my other rant demand is that W3/A3 on Marines require two CCs.
I do think Aliens cost too much, but I need to play more with better people to see when Aliens are having serious issues with the cost, and not just me being angry.
I've seen comp matches where aliens completely ignored upgrades like Leap even though they were almost swimming in res. They would rather drop yet another Hive and then probably save right up for a tres Onos drop.
Comments
Any way to request admin power or someone that will be an admin?
http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197970170423/
There is one of them. You can see the screenshots of some of his prior trolling. Fun stuff.
kinda a shame to have this mod not working on the free weekend
edit: just seeing you are running other mods on your server. I did not spend any time to try to make the mod compatible with other mods. I tested it only as the only mod being loaded and i wrote it in a way its easier to merge with NS2 (just copied the default lua files and edited them). I wont change that since, its too much work otherwise
edit2: you can try to disable mods one by one, and when you found out with which mod its incompatible, i can take a look.
ill deactivate them and see if that fixes it.
edit: works fine now thx for the help
Not sure how I feel about these, I also think aura should have different notification levels for different health values, other than that it's great.
- Also not a fan of increasing the medpack cost, that's going to undermine the goal of keeping players away from the armory.
- Don't like the idea of the Lerk spike accuracy upgrade. Seems too complicated, and if spikes are balanced for a tight cone then that just means they'll be worthless by default with a wide one. If we're going back to inaccurate spikes then we should go all the way and balance them to be that way.
Otherwise the rest of it sounds good. Maybe just go ahead and call it Scent of Fear, we won't judge :P
Not sure how I feel about the marine cost increase, though. It's already hard enough to hold your ground against IP-chewing enemies with the increased respawn time, so the increased cost for them won't contribute to fighting the danger of instantly becoming spawn-locked by an early Skulk rush. The cost increase on the CC is fine, but it should not be on something so substantially necessary.
Three seconds for Nanoshield might be next to useless if the cost remains the same. Maybe four seconds would be enough.
Interesting take on ARC changes. Makes them less spammable and dangerous if not guarded. You can basically counter an ARC rush by killing the escorting marines before the ARCs get deployed.
Curious to see if there will be less medpack spam now with the cost increase. Though it can also backfire and make the commander consider whether or not a forward marine is actually worth being healed that expensively. Unfortunately we don't have float resources. 1.5 would seem appropriate for medpack cost.
Or maybe implement a system where you get one free medpack charge every 5-10 seconds. So if there is enough time, you can resupply your troops on the front line for free. But if you want them to be healed up instantly or medpack-spam a guy midcombat, you have to pay those 2 res per medpack before the free one recharged.
And I agree that outline color of aura should interpolate linearly from green to red with decreasing HP. After all you sacrifice Silence/Camouflage for that ability and the Aura will probably not help you in combat otherwise.
same here.... none of those new changes strike me as being 'fun' (or even fair).
it's a blanket nerf patch.
in public play the shotgun is what gives solo marines a chance against lerk/fade. why on earth would you seek to make it impossible to solo a decent lerk/fade?? that would be super frustrating, as when the weaker team happens to be marines - the ONLY fun you get is from valuable shotgun kills (as the aliens have plenty of time to flee with anything more than a scratch). it's NOT easy to kill lerk/fade with shotgun, you still have to outplay them by having them underestimate your aiming ability or overcommit.
i'm disappointed for the same reason SC2 is disappointing compared to broodwar. reaver (aka colossus), storm, tanks, guardian (aka broodlord) etc were all super nerfed to have reduced damage and in some cases increased rate of fire to compensate. why? because blizzard wanted to make the game easier to balance by making almost every unit have the same humdrum strength. anyone who watched pro broodwar will remember the excitement and epic micro from reaver/tank/storm drops - in SC2 it's not viable because the alternative units are too expensive and gimmicky to suit the same purpose.
anyway, returning to the topic of marine nerfs, why oh why? if anything is 'overpowered' on marine team it's jetpacks. it's the jetpack that makes marines 10 times harder to kill, not nano shield or medpacks. (i don't really like nano shield or medpacks, but increased cost/reduced strength would make them pathetically weak luxuries - might as well remove them from the game). a stranded shotgunner with no jetpack is 20pres waiting to be dropped.
i've enjoyed most of the changes in the BT mod, especially ranged spores (which was sadly reverted). however, the unwelcomed change is biomass - it's far too complicated. i consider myself a fast learner, but even after a few rounds as alien commander i didn't immediately know which hive needs biomass, neither was it obvious whether it's more efficient to place hive #2/#3 or get hive #1/#2 to next level of biomass for upgrades. i still don't understand the purpose of biomass... if it's meant to allow more upgrades from fewer hives, then i don't understand why the cost is exponentially higher for the 'top' upgrades... biomass 9 is effectively having about 5-6 hives
Stomp on Onos is really a game ender (it pretty much guarantees a marine death unless they have jetpacks and even then can you seal their fate once they run out of fuel). It kinda deserves to be on the last researchable spot there. Those last upgrades tickle in slowly because it is assumed that aliens have dominated the map for quite a while already to get them. You often see aliens piling up plenty of tres in the lategame once they secured three Hives. This allows to put them to use.
Besides that Biomass is not only tech research but also a passive HP buff for every alien lifeform. It's a similar res sink for aliens as an Arms Lab is for marines.
The cost of late upgrades has also been adjusted already to be a bit lower due to the Biomass you invested to get there. (Gorge Tunnels are only 10 res compared to the 30 res from vanilla, Leap is 20 res, Spores is 15 res again, etc.). I think the cost balances out just fine.
And there are really not that many Hives in a game. It's not really hard to remember in which Hive you researched what Biomass level. And if that feature should even make it into the main game, you can still add some more indicators like a fancy number on the Hive name that indicates the Biomass in it. It is already showing in the Biomass progress bar which upgrades/Biomass amount you are about to lose with a Hive if that Hive is under attack.
The more efficient way (unless you aim to get the maximum Biomass level anyway) is always to drop another Hive. But the question is whether you can actually manage to secure such a Hive or maybe want another upgrade before the Hive is ready. In that case the more comfortable way is to research another Biomass.
that still seems like cutting off the nose to spite the face.
stomp isn't a game-ender in the live build, never mind increasing the cost of stomp by ~150 tres. aliens can have marines pegged back to a single base in 10 minutes, but it takes another 10 minutes to get the "game-ender"? that doesn't make sense.
the extra health per biomass could easily be associated with number of hives.
it's mass complication for the benefit of giving the alien commander some m&m's... i think most people would rather getting out of the alien commander seat and contributing as another lifeform.
you know the fun way to make alien commander more fun? add more potency to the options when expanding infestation - at the moment it's incredibly limited; you can shift (extemely limiting cooldown) or grow a whip, and then there's the awfully boring gameplay of crag spam with shift/shade. in BT mod you can't even drop a proxy shift and spawn eggs, because the function was moved to the hive.
innovative aggressive infestation options > being occupied with whack-a-mole biomass.
You can get forward eggs at any location you want without a Shift there (and decide on your own where exactly the egg is, rather than having it spawn randomly in the open), but the rate for that is lower in return. And you are no longer forced to go with a Shift Hive first if you are close to being egg-locked.
You count those 150 additional res for getting Stomp under the premise that you don't get any of the other higher upgrades. Which is one of the design goals of the system as well: it encourages the khammander to also get upgrades for other lifeforms on the way, because they are cheaper than before since a part of their cost is payed anyway to get to higher tech and increase the lifeform HP.
It's the same reason why traits are both acquired with a single structure now: there are more players in a game than just the khammander, so their fun should not be solely dependent on what the khammander thinks is worth researching. Countless times I actually had to beg a khammander to get me Regeneration as well. Most would just sit on Carapace, despite Regen being imho more suited for Skulks and possible Lerks as well.
Another reason behind the system is that aliens have more to lose with the loss of a Hive due to the Biomass system. It costs them more time and res to get back to the old level after regrowing the Hive, since they have to invest in Biomass again. Basically upgrade costs are split in the pure upgrade that you only purchase once and another part which is the Biomass which you have to reinvest if you lose it.
Anyway, can we maybe get a purchasable Grenade for the marines prototyped in the Balance Mod too? 1 Grenade for 4 res purchasable at an Armory?
additionally, i strongly believe that the alien commander should have at least one offensive ability akin to the marine medpack drop. something which raises the alien commander skill ceiling, rewarding micro management and enables you to assist lifeforms in combat. for example the alien commander pheromones could cost 1-2 tres and each have an area-of-effect bonus ('threat here' could temporarily increase damage by X% for X seconds, 'healing needed here' could temporarily increase healing by X% for X seconds and 'expanding here' could increase construction rate by X% for X seconds). for clarity, the effect of pheromones could give the lifeforms an aura effect like regeneration - so the marines know what to expect. imagine your skulks engage a marine group, you drop 'threat' pheromones for damage boost, then afterwards you drop 'heal' pheromones to speed up the healing factor - it would really give alien commander a greater sense of importance.
it's still reduced clarity and over-complicated.
in the live build you can see your 'carapace shell' or 'regeneration shell'. it gives marines a tactical option to destroy a specific upgrade. i know the BT mod has the benefit of tiered upgrades, but i don't believe that merging both upgrades into a single structure is a preventative measure to stop troll commanders from skipping your desired upgrade. aside from that, in BT mod you still have to research the leap, spores, stomp etc in addition to meeting the biomass requirement. ergo your fear of a troll commander is still at full capacity.
i believe the game will be improved by primarily ensuring everything is viable, while at the same time being as clear and fun as possible. it needs to be viable otherwise the game is broken, you don't want redundancy - like the role of alien commander a lot of the time and stuff like flamethrower/vortex/xenocide/camo. then it needs to be fun to attract and withhold the majority of players. then it needs to be clear to reduce the randomness, which enables greater focus on tactics etc at competitive level - and makes it easier to follow as a spectator.
Marines for decent 2 CC tech.
20 res, CC
10 res, Armory
15 res, Obs
15 res, Phase,
30 res, Two PG,
20 res, Shotgun,
25 res, Upgrade Buildings
100 res, W2/A2
235.
Aliens for decent 2 Hive tech
40 res, Hive
120 res, 3rd Biomass Each Hive
120 res, 3rd upgrade of two upgrades
10 res, Gorge Tunnel,
20 res, Bilebomb
15 res, Leap
25 res, Shadowstep
350.
I was being nice and assuming PG. If I do total res cost for max tier on three hives aliens to two CC Marines, cost is stupid.
Marines, 235 + W/A3, Prototype Lab, Jetpack, Dual Exos, Flamethrowers.
445
Aliens, 350 + Hive, Biomass, 3 X upgrades, Umbra, Spores, Vortex, Nearly Useless Onos Shield, and Stomp.
575 or so.
This is not counting the time difference for Aliens to get such an upgrade. This leads into the question, is it supposed to be Aliens are even on Two Hives compared to Marines or balanced on Three Hives?
marines
10 armory
20 shotgun
60 obs/pg
90 armslab - a1/w2
15 mines
15 2nd IP
210
aliens
40 hive
40 biomass
75 1 upgrade
10 tunnel
20 leap
25 umbra
210
Give or take. Trying to evaluate cost balance in this fashion past this is like trying to plug half the holes in a ship with jelly, while leaving the other half empty. I wouldn't even feel comfortable making tech tree change evaluations based solely on tres cost, even at the more accurate tech level definition i used in this post. 210 with 210 does not necessarily indicate 'balance'.
There are too many variables (player pressure and base unit balance, res income, med/ammo drops, ability power, pres lifeform timings etc.) to do any kind of solid analysis without playing the game at higher skill levels. Especially with the new 75 starting tres.
I have my own concerns with some costs, but I now think its best to actually play them out extensively, and in as wide a range of skill levels as possible first.
good point - that's another one of those 'redundancy' problems.
maybe something like making scan free, but give it a cooldown of 1 minute. then if you establish a second CC it's 30 second cooldown and 3 CC's it's 20 second cooldown. nano shield could also possibly be changed to be free with a large cooldown, which is reduced with establishing a 3rd CC.
The problem is that you ignored the things that bring up the cost to a stupid degree. Biomass and the individual costs of each upgrade have gone up a fair deal.
To get Carapace, Adrenaline, Leap, Blink/Shadowstep, and Bile Bomb in the current NS2 version is 125 res. In this version it will cost around 270 res. Admittedly one will get more upgrades with the new system, more base health that is amazing, and it is helpful that Regen is good now, but the idea is that the cost is still too much.
Basically right now in live ns2, aliens have an overcharged res system both in income and low cost. Its cheap to get upgrades, so excess res gets put into hive/harvester/cyst/lifeform spam. So comparing the cost to that is not that descriptive. Do not be fooled by 50/50 overall winrates like many others. The balance mod keeps important early timings such as 2nd hive, fast leap, early upgrade etc, while addressing our problem of low opportunity costs as the game progresses.
You also have to think about ability power and base lifeform scaling. For example, fade now starts with blink, and while shadowstep is powerful, it means base fade is more versatile. 4 biomass umbra is also something that I havn't seen fully utilized yet.
A large part of the 270 is the 2nd upgrade (75), and quite honestly i don't think it's as crucial as it may seem. You can do decently with just one upgrade. Slower 2nd upgrade doesn't shut you out of the midgame, it just smooths out your power and tech progression, while also soaking up the excess res that you would see in live ns2 going towards the spam i mentioned above.
I admit my issue with the thing is that I primarily command, and due to the lower skill levels, it is hard for me to see the difference in how things work in midgame. I understand by how the skills have changed that it is better for the aliens overall, but as a commander I tend to only see the bigger numbers on res counts. Combined with how aliens feel to need three hives to finish any game in the current and BT mod, I also feel the full research is needed. Even then though, that is a lie. I've watched enough competitive games to know aliens are doing fine with the two hives currently and the three hive vs dual exos super late game rarely happens in serious matches. Just in pubs it is annoying to know half the time you require the full research tree to have Stomp and the ability to spam Onos to win the game, and I wish that was not the case. Just it is so expensive to finish the research tree even when you are in the lead to a stupid degree.
Really, this is just a rant about a commander angry at how hard it is for pubs to push the Marine base end game if they turtle. I suppose my other rant demand is that W3/A3 on Marines require two CCs.
I do think Aliens cost too much, but I need to play more with better people to see when Aliens are having serious issues with the cost, and not just me being angry.