additionally, the best fades i've seen on pub servers primarily use blink. also, the best fades i've seen on pub tend to die when they don't have blink. when playing as a marine or fade, i just don't feel that non-blink fades are a threat.
The best fades are highly effective and a huge threat even without blink.
As for favouring blink over shadowstep; whatever works for you man!
additionally, the best fades i've seen on pub servers primarily use blink. also, the best fades i've seen on pub tend to die when they don't have blink. when playing as a marine or fade, i just don't feel that non-blink fades are a threat.
The best fades are highly effective and a huge threat even without blink.
As for favouring blink over shadowstep; whatever works for you man!
the best marines see a fade on map, then immediately head to the fade's likely 'escape path' and wait/find a hiding spot (or in organised games they sandwich the fade).
when an injured shadowstep fade falls predictably onto your lap, it's a free fade kill. noone wants to be that fade. your chance of survival is significantly higher if you can blink lerk-style to make yourself more difficult to anticipate.
I did say blink was for escaping. I also never said blink wasn't great. Quite the opposite. I said blink should be the upgrade to shadowstep, because shadowstep is the foundation and blink is the addendum, not the other way around.
- doubled team resource income and costs for better tuning cost variables
- increased personal resource income per RT from 0.125 to 1
- adjusted personal resource cost accordingly
Aliens
- personal upgrades cost now 1 resource (0.125 in old res value)
So yea everything costs 8x pres as it use to and 2x tres as kham/commander with this new res tuning.
Thanks for that post, that's what I requested during my first time in the BT
The skulk had no way of just turning around after a mid air with control (as for the gaining speed with the circling I don't think we're going to see that)
Also I wanted that chain jumping which was in an older version where you could gain speed by chaining jumps to accelerate very quickly, added I feel those things will add a lot to making skulk more complex in the hand of a skilled player, while adding more enjoyment to simply playing skulk. As of now most skulks are target practice besides when grouped, only thing that gets you nervous to run into is fades later on in the game, cause with w3 shotguns skulks and lerks are your dinner. however a faster skulk with better air control and all that, may change the tides
- doubled team resource income and costs for better tuning cost variables
- increased personal resource income per RT from 0.125 to 1
- adjusted personal resource cost accordingly
marine
- increased medpack cost to 3
- increase IP cost to 40
- increased command station cost to 40
- increased advanced armory cost by 20
- reduced jetpack research cost by 10
- reduced exosuit research cost by 10
- increased jetpack cost to 120 // typo?
- arms lab upgrade cost changed to 40/60/80
- increased EMP cost to 10
alien
- personal upgrades cost now 1 resource (0.125 in old res value)
- increased cost of crag, shade and shift to 30
- increased drifter cost to 10
- reduce drifter cloud costs to 2
- reduced gorge tunnel cost to 40
- added bio mass, upgrade at hive. each hive can provide 3 bio mass (1 default, 40 + 80 res for upgrading 2 times)
- scaleable upgrades (for example build a maximum of 3 shells to get maximum efficiency for carapace, regeneration), 40 res per structure
I embrace the "inflation" of res cost. The alternative would have been to use float values, but integers are simply nicer for RTS games.
Will be a bit unfamiliar at first but allows more finetuning of costs, like the medpacks that basically cost 1.5 res now.
Also to point out are the alien trait costs. Seems like you will spend about 0.375 res for all three traits per respawn (in the old currency). I am fine with that since "No res while dead" has been lifted, so this implies an (optional) cost to frequent dying instead.
It also scales with the tech level that you have, since you will only need to spend the cost for one trait when you only have that 1 Hive.
So effectively the only things changed in this update for now are that medpacks cost 1.5 res and cysts cost 0.5 res (according to old values).
I did say blink was for escaping. I also never said blink wasn't great. Quite the opposite. I said blink should be the upgrade to shadowstep, because shadowstep is the foundation and blink is the addendum, not the other way around.
then we are in agreement on the purpose of blink, but diverge on the idea of what you should get for your 50 pres. i don't value spending 50 pres for something which is less resilient and only marginally more proficient than a lerk.
it also leads to a mundane conundrum. if you don't go lerk (instead waiting for fade), then marines have a greater chance of preventing you from taking RT/2nd hive. if you don't get those resources/2nd hive, then you don't get blink and must cavort around the hive like a maypole for the rest of the game.
I did say blink was for escaping. I also never said blink wasn't great. Quite the opposite. I said blink should be the upgrade to shadowstep, because shadowstep is the foundation and blink is the addendum, not the other way around.
Blink was always intended to be the core movement skill of the Fade. Shadowstep was a late addition, intended purely as a dodge mechanic. I think it's a big problem that Shadowstep's momentum-preserving properties allow it to overlap so heavily with Blink's role, especially when the way to do that is so unintuitive for new players. They are two distinct abilities and should serve two distinct functions.
I did say blink was for escaping. I also never said blink wasn't great. Quite the opposite. I said blink should be the upgrade to shadowstep, because shadowstep is the foundation and blink is the addendum, not the other way around.
Blink was always intended to be the core movement skill of the Fade. Shadowstep was a late addition, intended purely as a dodge mechanic. I think it's a big problem that Shadowstep's momentum-preserving properties allow it to overlap so heavily with Blink's role, especially when the way to do that is so unintuitive for new players. They are two distinct abilities and should serve two distinct functions.
Possibly, but the way it's currently handled in the mod is not the way to go.
I think it's a big problem that Shadowstep's momentum-preserving properties allow it to overlap so heavily with Blink's role, especially when the way to do that is so unintuitive for new players. They are two distinct abilities and should serve two distinct functions.
Agreed. Vanilla is essentially two ways of doing the same thing. BT fade still needs work but I think it's on the right track with having blink and shadowstep fill different roles.
Would it be possible to change bonewall such that it makes a rumble sound below the marine before it goes off giving the marine time to react? I have been watching the NSL invitational 3rd place match and seeing it used as a CC is kind of lame (ie the marine getting trapped inside of it). I think adding a slight delay would make it way less frustrating.
my largest concern with the movement is with the air acceleration still being limited. there were two things that made bunnyhopping work,
1) circlejump
2) air control
neither of which are in NS2 in an acceptable state right now. as for circlejumping, I don't ever expect it to make its way back into a modern FPS, but that was basically half of the skill involved in bunnyhopping.
...
Great post, but I think you're being a bit overly dramatic here. Sewlek has shown a great willingness to change. I honestly did not expect him implement bunny hopping or jump queueing but he turned around and did both.
Air control is just a matter of tweaking a single value (air acceleration, which is currently set to 25 and could probably be doubled). Circle jumping involves tweaking a total of two numbers (ground acceleration and friction).
So you see, the current movement system is closer to perfection than some of you make it out to be. Keep coming with constructive feedback and eventually we'll get there
unless i'm mistaken the air control has been increased a bit.
at least, a couple of weeks ago i remember bunny hopping would give you the momentum of a locomotive... skulk movement didn't feel that heavy today.
make sure we're talking about the same version of the mod :P
imo skulk, lerk and fade movement feels shockingly good. it has no right to be so fun. gorge and onos still feel as mobile as herman munster, but i guess they're meant to
I wrote this in another forum, but it is relevant enough to repost here for the fade discussion in the last couple pages:
Shadowstep and Blink definitely overlap, but is that such a bad thing as to warrant an unproven rewrite? In vanilla there are situations where blink is better than shadowstep -- such as tight corners, jetpackers, and precision maneuvers. Shadowstep is more of an overarching ability that sacrifices precision and z-mobility for low energy cost and momentum. They each have their tradeoffs and yet each complements the other. No fade relies solely on shadow step. No fade relies solely on blink. You always see blink researched in every competitive game and fades still use shadowstep after blink is available. That's because, while they are both movement abilities, they have different advantages and disadvantages that synergize greatly with each other.
Personally, and of most of the competitive fade players I've spoken with, I prefer the vanilla fade's shadowstep + jump movement over the blink movement in the balance mod. The shadowstep + jump feels smooth, is easy to employ at a basic level, but takes a lot of skill to execute in combat maneuvers. There is planning (routes and battle egress) and timing (jumps, second jumps, cooldown, and swipe mid-shadow step) which leads shadowstep + jump movement to be a hugely skill based movement system for fades.
Why scrap that? People find the current fade movement fun -- why start over? Don't fix what isn't broken, better is the enemy of good, one in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc, etc.
I wrote this in another forum, but it is relevant enough to repost here for the fade discussion in the last couple pages:
Shadowstep and Blink definitely overlap, but is that such a bad thing as to warrant an unproven rewrite? In vanilla there are situations where blink is better than shadowstep -- such as tight corners, jetpackers, and precision maneuvers. Shadowstep is more of an overarching ability that sacrifices precision and z-mobility for low energy cost and momentum. They each have their tradeoffs and yet each complements the other. No fade relies solely on shadow step. No fade relies solely on blink. You always see blink researched in every competitive game and fades still use shadowstep after blink is available. That's because, while they are both movement abilities, they have different advantages and disadvantages that synergize greatly with each other.
Personally, and of most of the competitive fade players I've spoken with, I prefer the vanilla fade's shadowstep + jump movement over the blink movement in the balance mod. The shadowstep + jump feels smooth, is easy to employ at a basic level, but takes a lot of skill to execute in combat maneuvers. There is planning (routes and battle egress) and timing (jumps, second jumps, cooldown, and swipe mid-shadow step) which leads shadowstep + jump movement to be a hugely skill based movement system for fades.
Why scrap that? People find the current fade movement fun -- why start over? Don't fix what isn't broken, better is the enemy of good, one in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc, etc.
I would argue that Fades are quite broken right now. In pub games they're rarely used to any real effect - their purpose in the game is unclear at best and I think most players simply avoid playing them. For a lifeform that used to be the backbone of the team in NS1, that's sad. I don't claim that it's entirely because of their movement mechanics, but something really isn't working right now IMO.
I wrote this in another forum, but it is relevant enough to repost here for the fade discussion in the last couple pages:
Shadowstep and Blink definitely overlap, but is that such a bad thing as to warrant an unproven rewrite? In vanilla there are situations where blink is better than shadowstep -- such as tight corners, jetpackers, and precision maneuvers. Shadowstep is more of an overarching ability that sacrifices precision and z-mobility for low energy cost and momentum. They each have their tradeoffs and yet each complements the other. No fade relies solely on shadow step. No fade relies solely on blink. You always see blink researched in every competitive game and fades still use shadowstep after blink is available. That's because, while they are both movement abilities, they have different advantages and disadvantages that synergize greatly with each other.
Personally, and of most of the competitive fade players I've spoken with, I prefer the vanilla fade's shadowstep + jump movement over the blink movement in the balance mod. The shadowstep + jump feels smooth, is easy to employ at a basic level, but takes a lot of skill to execute in combat maneuvers. There is planning (routes and battle egress) and timing (jumps, second jumps, cooldown, and swipe mid-shadow step) which leads shadowstep + jump movement to be a hugely skill based movement system for fades.
Why scrap that? People find the current fade movement fun -- why start over? Don't fix what isn't broken, better is the enemy of good, one in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc, etc.
I would argue that Fades are quite broken right now. In pub games they're rarely used to any real effect - their purpose in the game is unclear at best and I think most players simply avoid playing them. For a lifeform that used to be the backbone of the team in NS1, that's sad. I don't claim that it's entirely because of their movement mechanics, but something really isn't working right now IMO.
Wat I think fade is pretty nice atm in my opinion. People use them in pubs to pad their kill scores. Maybe a little too squishy but Sewlek's mod scales it with biomass. From my view, it's purpose is providing tough resistance to upgraded marines/those with shotguns/jetpacks mid game as they start to slaughter skulks. Onos is great but too limited in mobility to take out the sg/jp or ranged marines. I also highly enjoy the current shadowstep jumps mechanics for moving around and in combat. I was surprised when it was being changed because everything about it seems ideal to me. One of the lifeforms I have no real complaints about.
What do you think the role of the fade should be/what is wrong with them?
@gorgeous the old proverb 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' does not apply to a balance test mod.
also, momentum was placed on blink instead of shadowstep. this seemingly makes shadowstep a bit underwhelming, but imo blink/bunny hop is complex and rewarding enough to be at least on par with b244 shadowstep.
i half suspect the movement changes would prove to be terribly overpowered in a high level game... however, it's worth trying because the extra mobility and control is an extension of one of the stand out features of NS2 - crazy 'outside the box' alien mobility.
I wrote this in another forum, but it is relevant enough to repost here for the fade discussion in the last couple pages:
Shadowstep and Blink definitely overlap, but is that such a bad thing as to warrant an unproven rewrite? In vanilla there are situations where blink is better than shadowstep -- such as tight corners, jetpackers, and precision maneuvers. Shadowstep is more of an overarching ability that sacrifices precision and z-mobility for low energy cost and momentum. They each have their tradeoffs and yet each complements the other. No fade relies solely on shadow step. No fade relies solely on blink. You always see blink researched in every competitive game and fades still use shadowstep after blink is available. That's because, while they are both movement abilities, they have different advantages and disadvantages that synergize greatly with each other.
Personally, and of most of the competitive fade players I've spoken with, I prefer the vanilla fade's shadowstep + jump movement over the blink movement in the balance mod. The shadowstep + jump feels smooth, is easy to employ at a basic level, but takes a lot of skill to execute in combat maneuvers. There is planning (routes and battle egress) and timing (jumps, second jumps, cooldown, and swipe mid-shadow step) which leads shadowstep + jump movement to be a hugely skill based movement system for fades.
Why scrap that? People find the current fade movement fun -- why start over? Don't fix what isn't broken, better is the enemy of good, one in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc, etc.
I would argue that Fades are quite broken right now. In pub games they're rarely used to any real effect - their purpose in the game is unclear at best and I think most players simply avoid playing them. For a lifeform that used to be the backbone of the team in NS1, that's sad. I don't claim that it's entirely because of their movement mechanics, but something really isn't working right now IMO.
Wat I think fade is pretty nice atm in my opinion. People use them in pubs to pad their kill scores. Maybe a little too squishy but Sewlek's mod scales it with biomass. From my view, it's purpose is providing tough resistance to upgraded marines/those with shotguns/jetpacks mid game as they start to slaughter skulks. Onos is great but too limited in mobility to take out the sg/jp or ranged marines. I also highly enjoy the current shadowstep jumps mechanics for moving around and in combat. I was surprised when it was being changed because everything about it seems ideal to me. One of the lifeforms I have no real complaints about.
What do you think the role of the fade should be/what is wrong with them?
I think the problem with them, at least from a fun gameplay perspective, is downtime. They take a lot of damage unless you're very good at dodging, which most players aren't, and thus after an engagement must run all the way back to the hive to recuperate. They were vastly more fun to play in NS1 due to Metabolize(Hive 2 ability that let them self-heal), which made them a constant presence on the field and removed the tedious hive runs. It was the perfect complement to their hit-and-run playstyle. Fade used to be my main class, now I don't really even enjoy it anymore.
If I had my way I would merge Shadowstep and Blink together into one ability at Hive 1, and bring back Metabolize at Hive 2. Balance the numbers as needed to make it work, but IMO that would make for a much more fun play experience.
The problem with bringing back metabolize in my mind is the lifeform explosion. Seeing multiple fades pop with that kind of self sufficiency would be too much for marines to handle.
I find the current implementation of the fade to be nearly perfect. It has an extremely high skill cap and the two movement abilities synergize extremely well, I don't find either of them to be redundant. It is hard to play for casual players, but so is every alien class even onos to some degree, you have to work to learn them.
If comms put 1-2 crags beside the hive, then taking your fade back to the hive and healing up takes very little time, hardly what I would describe as "onerous". However it can be a little bit annoying to sit beside a hive alone all the time which is often the case in pubs.
Metabolize would hardly be needed with the extreme mobility of ns2 fades, small maps and high healing capacity of hives/crag combos.
I wrote this in another forum, but it is relevant enough to repost here for the fade discussion in the last couple pages:
Shadowstep and Blink definitely overlap, but is that such a bad thing as to warrant an unproven rewrite? In vanilla there are situations where blink is better than shadowstep -- such as tight corners, jetpackers, and precision maneuvers. Shadowstep is more of an overarching ability that sacrifices precision and z-mobility for low energy cost and momentum. They each have their tradeoffs and yet each complements the other. No fade relies solely on shadow step. No fade relies solely on blink. You always see blink researched in every competitive game and fades still use shadowstep after blink is available. That's because, while they are both movement abilities, they have different advantages and disadvantages that synergize greatly with each other.
Personally, and of most of the competitive fade players I've spoken with, I prefer the vanilla fade's shadowstep + jump movement over the blink movement in the balance mod. The shadowstep + jump feels smooth, is easy to employ at a basic level, but takes a lot of skill to execute in combat maneuvers. There is planning (routes and battle egress) and timing (jumps, second jumps, cooldown, and swipe mid-shadow step) which leads shadowstep + jump movement to be a hugely skill based movement system for fades.
Why scrap that? People find the current fade movement fun -- why start over? Don't fix what isn't broken, better is the enemy of good, one in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc, etc.
I would argue that Fades are quite broken right now. In pub games they're rarely used to any real effect - their purpose in the game is unclear at best and I think most players simply avoid playing them. For a lifeform that used to be the backbone of the team in NS1, that's sad. I don't claim that it's entirely because of their movement mechanics, but something really isn't working right now IMO.
My question to you would be: How is rewriting the movement going to change this? Pub fades with the new fade are still going to be crappy fades. Combined with the fact that most pubs are played at 8v8 to 12v12 player counts, fades are always going to be weaker in pubs. It's not like the new blink gives fades any more survivability. In fact, the new blink gives even less precision than the old blink because it attemps to give the fade shadowstep-like momentum. I think that pub fades will find the new fade even worse in pubs, if you excluded other independent changes (such as armory-armor and weaker shotguns).
@gorgeous the old proverb 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' does not apply to a balance test mod.
also, momentum was placed on blink instead of shadowstep. this seemingly makes shadowstep a bit underwhelming, but imo blink/bunny hop is complex and rewarding enough to be at least on par with b244 shadowstep.
i half suspect the movement changes would prove to be terribly overpowered in a high level game... however, it's worth trying because the extra mobility and control is an extension of one of the stand out features of NS2 - crazy 'outside the box' alien mobility.
It's fine to test these things. I'm not concerned about the movement making it into a test build as that is the perfect place for it. I just don't want to see it going live because I think it's a big step backward from what we already have.
The movement changes in general (for skulk) are terribly overpowered. Given that we now have bunny hopping, I run around most maps at 12-14 speed as skulk. It's obviously broken and will need a lower speed cap, probably around 10 or so. The addition of bunny hopping to NS2 is mostly irrelevant to fade. Tapping blink gives you insane speed (15++) that you can maintain just by jumping.
We've basically traded a well regarded skill-based movement system in the shadowstep + jump for a movement system with no skill curve.
I cannot disagree more with the current fade having a high skill ceiling. Once you learn the basics of the un-intuitive mechanics of shadowstep and doublejump, mastering the fade is hardly challenging, and in no way has a high skill ceiling. Blink is horrible in the current NS2 implementation and has so many stupid tradeoffs that its only utility is really to kite jetpacks midair (or abuse the vision impairment of it). Blink from NS1 had a huge skill ceiling, and to see the current NS2 fade in the state it is currently is probably the most depressing part of NS2 for me.
I cannot disagree more with the current fade having a high skill ceiling. Once you learn the basics of the un-intuitive mechanics of shadowstep and doublejump, mastering the fade is hardly challenging, and in no way has a high skill ceiling. Blink is horrible in the current NS2 implementation and has so many stupid tradeoffs that its only utility is really to kite jetpacks midair (or abuse the vision impairment of it). Blink from NS1 had a huge skill ceiling, and to see the current NS2 fade in the state it is currently is probably the most depressing part of NS2 for me currently.
The first half of this post is just completely wrong. As evidenced by competitive games, there is a huge difference between very good fades and your average fade. When fades play poorly, they get absolutely destroyed (a la 2 shot) by competitive marines. On the other hand, really well played fades frequently live for the entire game by using shadowstep jump movements combined with blink to great effect. Nobody in the game perfectly performs shadowstep in combat. Even the currently best fades have so much room for improvement.
Shadowstep jump movement is the definition of skill based movement. It's easy for anyone to grasp the basics of, yet has the depth available for players to become extremely proficient at. It beats the ns2b version of blink movement in every single category from a skill-based perspective. Shadowstep jump is all around a superior option to what we're being offered or to what anyone has created for fade movement in ns2 to date.
Ok so I went on the BT server and couldn't try out anything other than the skulk since it was late and it was empty but currently
ground movement slips after you stop moving (friction)
Skulk loses momentum quickly
Skulk now has some form of bhop sound, and possibly a quicker momentum gain. However I couldn't seem to figure out what causes the sound, I tried timing the jump and it seemed like I was hitting it randomly from structure to floor and etc, I tried jumping as soon as I landed, a short amount after, and then another short amount after, and then even right before landing; seemed like it was just random atm
Skulk clings to walls a lot more than regular, sometimes I accidentally cling to something
Skulk turns in air more with mouse it feels
Skulk loses momentum when turning in air w/ mouse (but if you bounce off a structure and quickly turn around with mouse you don't lose all the momentum
I wrote this in another forum, but it is relevant enough to repost here for the fade discussion in the last couple pages:
Shadowstep and Blink definitely overlap, but is that such a bad thing as to warrant an unproven rewrite? In vanilla there are situations where blink is better than shadowstep -- such as tight corners, jetpackers, and precision maneuvers. Shadowstep is more of an overarching ability that sacrifices precision and z-mobility for low energy cost and momentum. They each have their tradeoffs and yet each complements the other. No fade relies solely on shadow step. No fade relies solely on blink. You always see blink researched in every competitive game and fades still use shadowstep after blink is available. That's because, while they are both movement abilities, they have different advantages and disadvantages that synergize greatly with each other.
Personally, and of most of the competitive fade players I've spoken with, I prefer the vanilla fade's shadowstep + jump movement over the blink movement in the balance mod. The shadowstep + jump feels smooth, is easy to employ at a basic level, but takes a lot of skill to execute in combat maneuvers. There is planning (routes and battle egress) and timing (jumps, second jumps, cooldown, and swipe mid-shadow step) which leads shadowstep + jump movement to be a hugely skill based movement system for fades.
Why scrap that? People find the current fade movement fun -- why start over? Don't fix what isn't broken, better is the enemy of good, one in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc, etc.
I would argue that Fades are quite broken right now. In pub games they're rarely used to any real effect - their purpose in the game is unclear at best and I think most players simply avoid playing them. For a lifeform that used to be the backbone of the team in NS1, that's sad. I don't claim that it's entirely because of their movement mechanics, but something really isn't working right now IMO.
My question to you would be: How is rewriting the movement going to change this? Pub fades with the new fade are still going to be crappy fades. Combined with the fact that most pubs are played at 8v8 to 12v12 player counts, fades are always going to be weaker in pubs. It's not like the new blink gives fades any more survivability. In fact, the new blink gives even less precision than the old blink because it attemps to give the fade shadowstep-like momentum. I think that pub fades will find the new fade even worse in pubs, if you excluded other independent changes (such as armory-armor and weaker shotguns).
You're seriously telling me that Fades are just weak in pubs and that's okay? No it's not okay, that's completely unacceptable. Fades are a major part of the alien team - at least, they should be - and for them to just not be useful in pub games because the skill floor is too low is a serious design flaw. And no, pubstomping doesn't count.
Like I said it's not all about the movement, and I'm not saying the balance mod Blink is good or bad, but I have a couple problems with the live Fade's movement setup:
- Shadowstep is completely unintuitive. Intuitively it appears to be a simple dodge mechanic. Knowing the jump trick transforms it into a major movement skill, arguably the Fade's primary movement skill - that's not how you implement a good skill curve.
- The Fade has no active skills outside of movement abilities until Hive 3. He just moves around and swings his claws, that's it. It's silly to me that he starts with a movement skill, and then at Hive 2 he gets another one that does effectively the same thing. That's boring.
Comments
As for favouring blink over shadowstep; whatever works for you man!
the best marines see a fade on map, then immediately head to the fade's likely 'escape path' and wait/find a hiding spot (or in organised games they sandwich the fade).
when an injured shadowstep fade falls predictably onto your lap, it's a free fade kill. noone wants to be that fade. your chance of survival is significantly higher if you can blink lerk-style to make yourself more difficult to anticipate.
- doubled team resource income and costs for better tuning cost variables
- increased personal resource income per RT from 0.125 to 1
- adjusted personal resource cost accordingly
Aliens
- personal upgrades cost now 1 resource (0.125 in old res value)
So yea everything costs 8x pres as it use to and 2x tres as kham/commander with this new res tuning.
Thanks for that post, that's what I requested during my first time in the BT
The skulk had no way of just turning around after a mid air with control (as for the gaining speed with the circling I don't think we're going to see that)
Also I wanted that chain jumping which was in an older version where you could gain speed by chaining jumps to accelerate very quickly, added I feel those things will add a lot to making skulk more complex in the hand of a skilled player, while adding more enjoyment to simply playing skulk. As of now most skulks are target practice besides when grouped, only thing that gets you nervous to run into is fades later on in the game, cause with w3 shotguns skulks and lerks are your dinner. however a faster skulk with better air control and all that, may change the tides
I embrace the "inflation" of res cost. The alternative would have been to use float values, but integers are simply nicer for RTS games.
Will be a bit unfamiliar at first but allows more finetuning of costs, like the medpacks that basically cost 1.5 res now.
Also to point out are the alien trait costs. Seems like you will spend about 0.375 res for all three traits per respawn (in the old currency). I am fine with that since "No res while dead" has been lifted, so this implies an (optional) cost to frequent dying instead.
It also scales with the tech level that you have, since you will only need to spend the cost for one trait when you only have that 1 Hive.
So effectively the only things changed in this update for now are that medpacks cost 1.5 res and cysts cost 0.5 res (according to old values).
then we are in agreement on the purpose of blink, but diverge on the idea of what you should get for your 50 pres. i don't value spending 50 pres for something which is less resilient and only marginally more proficient than a lerk.
it also leads to a mundane conundrum. if you don't go lerk (instead waiting for fade), then marines have a greater chance of preventing you from taking RT/2nd hive. if you don't get those resources/2nd hive, then you don't get blink and must cavort around the hive like a maypole for the rest of the game.
Blink was always intended to be the core movement skill of the Fade. Shadowstep was a late addition, intended purely as a dodge mechanic. I think it's a big problem that Shadowstep's momentum-preserving properties allow it to overlap so heavily with Blink's role, especially when the way to do that is so unintuitive for new players. They are two distinct abilities and should serve two distinct functions.
Agreed. Vanilla is essentially two ways of doing the same thing. BT fade still needs work but I think it's on the right track with having blink and shadowstep fill different roles.
Air control is just a matter of tweaking a single value (air acceleration, which is currently set to 25 and could probably be doubled). Circle jumping involves tweaking a total of two numbers (ground acceleration and friction).
So you see, the current movement system is closer to perfection than some of you make it out to be. Keep coming with constructive feedback and eventually we'll get there
at least, a couple of weeks ago i remember bunny hopping would give you the momentum of a locomotive... skulk movement didn't feel that heavy today.
make sure we're talking about the same version of the mod :P
imo skulk, lerk and fade movement feels shockingly good. it has no right to be so fun. gorge and onos still feel as mobile as herman munster, but i guess they're meant to
Shadowstep and Blink definitely overlap, but is that such a bad thing as to warrant an unproven rewrite? In vanilla there are situations where blink is better than shadowstep -- such as tight corners, jetpackers, and precision maneuvers. Shadowstep is more of an overarching ability that sacrifices precision and z-mobility for low energy cost and momentum. They each have their tradeoffs and yet each complements the other. No fade relies solely on shadow step. No fade relies solely on blink. You always see blink researched in every competitive game and fades still use shadowstep after blink is available. That's because, while they are both movement abilities, they have different advantages and disadvantages that synergize greatly with each other.
Personally, and of most of the competitive fade players I've spoken with, I prefer the vanilla fade's shadowstep + jump movement over the blink movement in the balance mod. The shadowstep + jump feels smooth, is easy to employ at a basic level, but takes a lot of skill to execute in combat maneuvers. There is planning (routes and battle egress) and timing (jumps, second jumps, cooldown, and swipe mid-shadow step) which leads shadowstep + jump movement to be a hugely skill based movement system for fades.
Why scrap that? People find the current fade movement fun -- why start over? Don't fix what isn't broken, better is the enemy of good, one in the hand is worth two in the bush, etc, etc.
I would argue that Fades are quite broken right now. In pub games they're rarely used to any real effect - their purpose in the game is unclear at best and I think most players simply avoid playing them. For a lifeform that used to be the backbone of the team in NS1, that's sad. I don't claim that it's entirely because of their movement mechanics, but something really isn't working right now IMO.
Wat I think fade is pretty nice atm in my opinion. People use them in pubs to pad their kill scores. Maybe a little too squishy but Sewlek's mod scales it with biomass. From my view, it's purpose is providing tough resistance to upgraded marines/those with shotguns/jetpacks mid game as they start to slaughter skulks. Onos is great but too limited in mobility to take out the sg/jp or ranged marines. I also highly enjoy the current shadowstep jumps mechanics for moving around and in combat. I was surprised when it was being changed because everything about it seems ideal to me. One of the lifeforms I have no real complaints about.
What do you think the role of the fade should be/what is wrong with them?
also, momentum was placed on blink instead of shadowstep. this seemingly makes shadowstep a bit underwhelming, but imo blink/bunny hop is complex and rewarding enough to be at least on par with b244 shadowstep.
i half suspect the movement changes would prove to be terribly overpowered in a high level game... however, it's worth trying because the extra mobility and control is an extension of one of the stand out features of NS2 - crazy 'outside the box' alien mobility.
I think the problem with them, at least from a fun gameplay perspective, is downtime. They take a lot of damage unless you're very good at dodging, which most players aren't, and thus after an engagement must run all the way back to the hive to recuperate. They were vastly more fun to play in NS1 due to Metabolize(Hive 2 ability that let them self-heal), which made them a constant presence on the field and removed the tedious hive runs. It was the perfect complement to their hit-and-run playstyle. Fade used to be my main class, now I don't really even enjoy it anymore.
If I had my way I would merge Shadowstep and Blink together into one ability at Hive 1, and bring back Metabolize at Hive 2. Balance the numbers as needed to make it work, but IMO that would make for a much more fun play experience.
If comms put 1-2 crags beside the hive, then taking your fade back to the hive and healing up takes very little time, hardly what I would describe as "onerous". However it can be a little bit annoying to sit beside a hive alone all the time which is often the case in pubs.
Metabolize would hardly be needed with the extreme mobility of ns2 fades, small maps and high healing capacity of hives/crag combos.
My question to you would be: How is rewriting the movement going to change this? Pub fades with the new fade are still going to be crappy fades. Combined with the fact that most pubs are played at 8v8 to 12v12 player counts, fades are always going to be weaker in pubs. It's not like the new blink gives fades any more survivability. In fact, the new blink gives even less precision than the old blink because it attemps to give the fade shadowstep-like momentum. I think that pub fades will find the new fade even worse in pubs, if you excluded other independent changes (such as armory-armor and weaker shotguns).
It's fine to test these things. I'm not concerned about the movement making it into a test build as that is the perfect place for it. I just don't want to see it going live because I think it's a big step backward from what we already have.
The movement changes in general (for skulk) are terribly overpowered. Given that we now have bunny hopping, I run around most maps at 12-14 speed as skulk. It's obviously broken and will need a lower speed cap, probably around 10 or so. The addition of bunny hopping to NS2 is mostly irrelevant to fade. Tapping blink gives you insane speed (15++) that you can maintain just by jumping.
We've basically traded a well regarded skill-based movement system in the shadowstep + jump for a movement system with no skill curve.
The first half of this post is just completely wrong. As evidenced by competitive games, there is a huge difference between very good fades and your average fade. When fades play poorly, they get absolutely destroyed (a la 2 shot) by competitive marines. On the other hand, really well played fades frequently live for the entire game by using shadowstep jump movements combined with blink to great effect. Nobody in the game perfectly performs shadowstep in combat. Even the currently best fades have so much room for improvement.
Shadowstep jump movement is the definition of skill based movement. It's easy for anyone to grasp the basics of, yet has the depth available for players to become extremely proficient at. It beats the ns2b version of blink movement in every single category from a skill-based perspective. Shadowstep jump is all around a superior option to what we're being offered or to what anyone has created for fade movement in ns2 to date.
ground movement slips after you stop moving (friction)
Skulk loses momentum quickly
Skulk now has some form of bhop sound, and possibly a quicker momentum gain. However I couldn't seem to figure out what causes the sound, I tried timing the jump and it seemed like I was hitting it randomly from structure to floor and etc, I tried jumping as soon as I landed, a short amount after, and then another short amount after, and then even right before landing; seemed like it was just random atm
Skulk clings to walls a lot more than regular, sometimes I accidentally cling to something
Skulk turns in air more with mouse it feels
Skulk loses momentum when turning in air w/ mouse (but if you bounce off a structure and quickly turn around with mouse you don't lose all the momentum
You're seriously telling me that Fades are just weak in pubs and that's okay? No it's not okay, that's completely unacceptable. Fades are a major part of the alien team - at least, they should be - and for them to just not be useful in pub games because the skill floor is too low is a serious design flaw. And no, pubstomping doesn't count.
Like I said it's not all about the movement, and I'm not saying the balance mod Blink is good or bad, but I have a couple problems with the live Fade's movement setup:
- Shadowstep is completely unintuitive. Intuitively it appears to be a simple dodge mechanic. Knowing the jump trick transforms it into a major movement skill, arguably the Fade's primary movement skill - that's not how you implement a good skill curve.
- The Fade has no active skills outside of movement abilities until Hive 3. He just moves around and swings his claws, that's it. It's silly to me that he starts with a movement skill, and then at Hive 2 he gets another one that does effectively the same thing. That's boring.