More room for comebacks come from spread out tech, yes, thats what i said, why are you repeating this?
I actually think this is untrue, the mod adds more room for comebacks by UNTYING things from TPs as opposed to vanilla, particularly for aliens (biomass), not by tying it to TPs. How could you possibly argue marines with 3CC A/W3 have an easier time making comebacks than marines with 1 CC full tech available? It's simply not true. Yes, jps and exos provide an interesting dynamic, but this is being almost entirely undermined by the fact that marines now need CCs for A/W. Heck, one could even argue that the current situation becomes WORSE as the amount of marines with sufficient p.res decreases, i.e it's worse for vanilla marines and there is overall less potential for a comeback once they fall back on 1 - 2 CCs.
Let's do a little thought experiment, imagine aliens could only build a shell or veil for each hive. That's essentially what the current situation for marines is. Now tell me how exactly that gives aliens a bigger chance of making a comeback?
Now you COULD argue that tying things to tps makes it easier for the opposing side to make a comeback, but that's a different story altogether. I'm of the opinion that it's much more enjoyable when the comeback potential is inherent to a faction's design rather than the result of a penalty the other side receives. I.e Alien comeback potential is sufficiently derived from the fact that they have more abilities available at 1 hive, just like how the marine comeback potential would the result of them not needing 2 or even 3 CCs. (Or the fact that they maintain their upgrades at 1 CC)
At the very least we can all agree that aliens need to have their 3rd hive dependency increased. They should NEED the third hive to really reach their endgame potential but as it stands they don't need it neither in vanilla nor in the balance test mod. One could definitely not argue that currently aliens need a third TP as much as marines do in the BT mod, which is completely absurd given that the alien faction is designed around rapid expansion and multiple hive dependency. Maybe when that happens the 5th TP battle may actually be an exciting one, but at the moment it's just marines being crippled at 2 TPs vs aliens having an edge at 2 hives.
I'd honestly really like to see A/W3 tied to 2 CCs first, I think that would be a far more reasonable start for a mechanic like this. Then bump up alien third hive dependency and go from there. The build cap increase combined with the need to actually deny aliens a third hive would be more than sufficient in making the 5 TP battle a bloody one, without one side being at a severe disadvantage and without watering down the symmetrical beauty that is inherent to NS 2.
How could you possibly argue marines with 3CC A/W3 have an easier time making comebacks than marines with 1 CC full tech available? It's simply not true.
Yes. But marines with 1 TP in the end game should not have any comeback possibilities. The arguments for comebacks are always aimed at the early- and mid-game. And how it is to difficult right now to recover from early mistakes. But in the end game, things should be unforgiving or you will automatically increase the possibility of turtles.
The problem right now is, that you can't really recover from early mistakes. But this doesn't mean you should be able to comeback even in the late game.
marines with 1 TP in the end game should not have any comeback possibilities.
I get what you're saying and agree with the gist of it, but I'd actually rather that they had one comeback possibility in that situation. One shot, a hail mary pass; if it works the crowd goes nuts, if it doesn't then it's game over man.
As to what that possibility is, dunno. Preferably there would be several options - a ninja gate, a flamethrower/gl rush, an uberskilled rambo with a shotgun and jetpack, a robofac and arc blob in an overlooked corner, who knows. As long as it's something besides sitting in the base and doing target practice while waiting for the aliens to amass an overwhelming assault.
The problem with tying marine upgrades and tech to tech points is that your making it much worse with regards to snowballing. I dont know how or why you can keep denying this.. but if you start tying tech and upgrades to TPs, suddenly marines that cannot hold 5+ RTs and 3 TPs will loose every game. As I have said before, it really seems like some people dont understand how the game plays currently, or how its going to play with those changes. Unless there is radical changes to the alien classes (esp fade), aliens will always gain a massive increase in strength around 8-9 minutes (2nd tier abilities and fades). Tying both tech requirements and upgrade requirements all to tech point control will make the game all but decided by that point. You either win before fades or lose. Unless your planning on making major changes to marine expandibility early game and alien map dominance late game, you really shouldnt be suggesting an idea that would completely break gameplay. The current balance mod does much to fix the 10 minute game decider problem, with the remaining elements only being the fact that you can pop so many fades at once, which is a seperate issue.
Its important to note that its not just strength in combat here that causes this, as fades are relatively weak. Perhaps that is why people are confused, or that they play on pubs where aliens try to turtle and wait for marines to get exos. The gameplay you see currently on 18+ player pub servers in no way reflects the actual game progression, since so many aspects are completely destroyed by the increased player counts and the massive advantages marines get. Its important to note that many of the balance mod changes make aliens and marines scale up much better with larger playercounts, so those impacts are drasically lessened.
By the way, a different matter entirely but the new starting resources make alien second hive start pretty much a no brainer imo. You can instantly drop a second hive and still have quite a bit of spare resources to get 2 extra extractors not long after. Given how important the second hive is, starting like this is not nearly as risky as it is in vanilla, where you would severely cripple your starting economy.
The problem with tying marine upgrades and tech to tech points is that your making it much worse with regards to snowballing. I dont know how or why you can keep denying this.. but if you start tying tech and upgrades to TPs, suddenly marines that cannot hold 5+ RTs and 3 TPs will loose every game. As I have said before, it really seems like some people dont understand how the game plays currently, or how its going to play with those changes. Unless there is radical changes to the alien classes (esp fade), aliens will always gain a massive increase in strength around 8-9 minutes (2nd tier abilities and fades). Tying both tech requirements and upgrade requirements all to tech point control will make the game all but decided by that point. You either win before fades or lose. Unless your planning on making major changes to marine expandibility early game and alien map dominance late game, you really shouldnt be suggesting an idea that would completely break gameplay. The current balance mod does much to fix the 10 minute game decider problem, with the remaining elements only being the fact that you can pop so many fades at once, which is a seperate issue.
Its important to note that its not just strength in combat here that causes this, as fades are relatively weak. Perhaps that is why people are confused, or that they play on pubs where aliens try to turtle and wait for marines to get exos. The gameplay you see currently on 18+ player pub servers in no way reflects the actual game progression, since so many aspects are completely destroyed by the increased player counts and the massive advantages marines get. Its important to note that many of the balance mod changes make aliens and marines scale up much better with larger playercounts, so those impacts are drasically lessened.
It should go without saying IMO that part of this change has to be making sure 2 CC marines are evenly matched to 2 hive aliens. If that isn't the case with level 2 upgrades, balance changes can be made. There is no better time than now to introduce fundamental changes that will require major balance revamps. It'll be too late once all the other changes have gone live and settled in.
Your still missing the point.... Its not balance that shifts at that point. I dont know any other way to explain it but do you not realize how the game changes once aliens get fades? Its not because of combat strength like I said, its more about the mobility and attack power. Aliens can start hitting marines anywhere on the map, and can apply much higher levels of pressure.... If your going to 'balance' that out then your basically gutting the fades only strengths, which goes down the path I warned before of making both sides 'play the same'. Its similar to the marine expansion strengths early game, and their strength in engagements... Why you see marines taking 5+ RTs early and aliens taking only 3.. There are massive fundamental differences between the teams here that would need to be 'corrected' to make them both have equal access to techpoints.
I think one of the ways you can determine a game's enjoyability is the hitpoints that exist on the map. When this number gets ridiculous (and it does because of techpoints/armouries/etc. and will do so more with the CC requirements), the game just becomes a spamfest and stalemates exist not because the game is delicately poised but because it is so imbalanced at fortress locations. I don't want to play walls, I want to play people.
We should be actively promoting back-and-forth play because it is far more desirable than its entrench-and-crawl counterpart.
Discovered a game breaking bug: as marine commander, when you lose a CC and you are over the lower build cap (for example lose 2nd cc and now 130/100) you are unable to do anything. Can't recycle, can't drop meds, ammo, can't drop CC, everything is just greyed out. It gets fixed once you drop below 100 again, but needless to say by that time you may have already lost.
I actually think this is untrue, the mod adds more room for comebacks by UNTYING things from TPs as opposed to vanilla, particularly for aliens (biomass), not by tying it to TPs. How could you possibly argue marines with 3CC A/W3 have an easier time making comebacks than marines with 1 CC full tech available?
Biomass has been adjusted many many times already, and you can easily make biomass match any TP adjustments. Its currently balanced somewhat to match the current conditions.
I guess this is where people seem to keep misusing the phrase"snowballing".. its simply the doubling advantage one side gets from being successful.
So if a marine team is @ A3/W3 then they have a harder time holding it, lessening the previous double advantage of securely owning upgrades and ground.
It doesn't mean those who are on one shred of life left (turtling) succeed.. in fact quite the opposite. This change would not favor single bases, it allows them to fall quickly, with less stalemates, as its easier to kill them.
BUT that other team that is now pushing you back is farrr more open to attack. Albiet you aren't as strong anymore, so its a tradeoff.
Now, that being said, that's how it works on paper, but currently its far easier for aliens to put that pressure on marines on keep them cornered than it is for marines.
Things like being able to build on infestation and power surges will help reduce this, but this is an underlying problem anyways, and like the below issue, should be fixed regardless.
There are massive fundamental differences between the teams here that would need to be 'corrected' to make them both have equal access to techpoints.
Exactly what @Zek and I have been proposing??
Correct the problem regardless, then what argument would be left for those against tying tech?
Just a like for Asymmetrical economic models.. Which is a valid point because fun must also be accounted for, even if not all find it fun. @elodea 's post is a good example. While i am not that in love with asymmetrical resource models (hell, we have an alien commander now, equal expansion restrictions, and pres for both teams.) i can appreciate a love for asymmetry. I just dislike the lack of variance and the set "Roles" that elodea mentioned.. its very stale in my eyes, and is limiting.
very much against being forced to hold CCs to maintain weapon and armor ups. I can already see people wanting to turtle more purely for the risk of losing W3 or A3 in the process of trying to take a hive. Frankly I quite enjoy some of the asyemtical features of the game, just because one team has it one way does not mean the other team has to have it he same way as well. besides, aliens lose abilities NOT upgrades at hive lost. that's just as equivelant as marines losing the ability to have jetpacks and exos at second CC loss. it's the loss of abilities that should be ties to tech points, not the upgrades themselves. if aliens lose upgrades due to hive lost that's due to poor insite on what the most endangered hive would be during a match or poor upgrade structure placement in general. if anything you want to balance it. allow aliens to redrop upgrade chambers (at cost) and re designate them as cara and silence etc (at cost) much like marines have the ability to rebuild an arms lab even after they've lost it regardless if they've lost CC locations or not. but if you want to go that round might as well separate out the arms labs as one armor and one weapons arms lab (cheapen the cost of either and lower the HP of each individual arms lab) and treat it like an alien structure... build an arms lab, designate it either as armory or weapons lab then it becomes that structure until it's destroyed. so it requires two structures to have both weapons and armor just like aliens.
-flux
Again restating since I think this is getting lost. Alien abilities are tied to hive count not upgrades (it's possible to be down to one hive and still have all upgrades). The loss of upgrades is due to the lose of the upgrade structure either due to poor placement or lack of foresight which is the most vulnerable hive. Requiring marines to have a certain number of CC's to maintain upgrades is just a rather silly method to appease those who feel aliens lose too much at hive loss. Aliens have always had the requirement of slightly greater map control, that's why endgame has always been based off 2tps for marines and 3hives for aliens, half the time aliens not even needing hat third hive when it comes to comp games. However if you really wanted remove some of the asymmetrical aspect of the game really felt the need to balance out he idea of lost upgrades.
Again why not give aliens the ability (once already researched) to re drop the upgrade chambers (At res cost of course.) and re upgrade them to their given upgrade, cara, silence etc. (at rest cost of course) as long as the upgrade was previously researched no matter if a hive was lost in the process. That way it's now on the same level of an arms lab, not tied to cc's.. if it goes down it has the ability to be rebuilt without having to research weapon and armor again. You can simply allow aliens to do the same at that point as long as they already researched the upgrade once much like marines are afforded to.
Abilities should be tied to tech points much as it always have, but upgrades have always been a progressive feature of the game as round time increases.
tl;dr version
Do not tie upgrades to cc requirements for marines.
Much like marines and the arms lab, once an upgrade has been researched (no matter hive loss) aliens should just be able to drop upgrade structures of previously researched upgrades after a loss of the structure.
Maintain Tech point requirements for abilities only (exos, jetpacks, specific hive structures such as crag or shift, tres aliens, leap, bile etc.)
So with this implementation, as long as aliens had have had 3 hives at one point in the game in theory they could have every upgrade still as (carapace+adreline+silence combo) late game as long as the commander redrops the upgrade structures even if they were down to one hive as long as they upgrades were previously researched at some point in the game.
matsoMaster of PatchesJoin Date: 2002-11-05Member: 7000Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Squad Five Gold, Reinforced - Shadow, NS2 Community Developer
How could you possibly argue marines with 3CC A/W3 have an easier time making comebacks than marines with 1 CC full tech available? It's simply not true.
Yes. But marines with 1 TP in the end game should not have any comeback possibilities.
So just have the game end when the marines drop from 2 TP to 1 then... if they are not going to have any chance anyhow.
I've seen late-game comebacks - ninja PG, JP/FT takedown, power/obs taken out etc... - they are awesome when they turn the whole game around. Removing that possibility seems silly.
Your not arguing for those problems to be fixed, you havent acknowledged that they even exist in a single post before that one. IMO those are not problems, but dynamics in a asymetrical game. Fixing them would not be nearly as easy as you claim, because yet again both sides are still different in combat, and also it would drastically change the way lifeforms play, in a very undesireable way. I would say it would be harder to balance the game around both sides being equal at all times than to balance it under the current ideals, simply because we have 10 years of experience with the latter, and because the progression fits the dynamics of each sides strengths well.
Your asking to change fundamentals of this game that hardly anyone would agree with as being broken.. Quite honestly if those changes are made, I will never play this game again. I cant even begin to imagine how dull fade play would become, or how stale early game marine pressure would feel.
I'd hate to see nothing tied to second techpoint even more than I'd hate to see anything tied to third techpoint. The turtles will be godawful if marines can get 3-3, exos, and jetpacks off 1 CC.
In NS1 three-hive aliens were good enough to break a marine turtle anyway. But now they've removed all of the third hive abilities except for xeno so that sort of causes a turtle problem
How could you possibly argue marines with 3CC A/W3 have an easier time making comebacks than marines with 1 CC full tech available? It's simply not true.
Yes. But marines with 1 TP in the end game should not have any comeback possibilities.
So just have the game end when the marines drop from 2 TP to 1 then... if they are not going to have any chance anyhow.
I've seen late-game comebacks - ninja PG, JP/FT takedown, power/obs taken out etc... - they are awesome when they turn the whole game around. Removing that possibility seems silly.
What comeback abilities do aliens have late game with 1 hive currently? Why not just have the game end in the current version when aliens drop from 2 hives to 1?
Both sides should require two tech points to unlock their "near-end" game tech. While a 3rd tech point for either side drastically increases their power. A3/W3, and exo and jps on two tech points, while the 3rd tech point will unlock dual exo upgrades and upgrades for exo armor and jp fuel/speed.
On the flip side, aliens with biomass increases and t3 abilities that don't blow chunks.
It should be a constant struggle between both sides to secure a 3rd tech point, while stopping the other side from doing the same. The 3rd tech point should help give a big enough boost to help win the game, but it should come with the inherent difficulty with holding it due to the possibility of spreading the team thin with such increased map control.
I'd hate to see nothing tied to second techpoint even more than I'd hate to see anything tied to third techpoint. The turtles will be godawful if marines can get 3-3, exos, and jetpacks off 1 CC.
Wait... you're telling me I can have JP shotguns on one tech point? GG fades, GG. W1 + shotgun + jetpack = dead fades, 100% of the time. Lerks will basically be useless.
matsoMaster of PatchesJoin Date: 2002-11-05Member: 7000Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Squad Five Gold, Reinforced - Shadow, NS2 Community Developer
How could you possibly argue marines with 3CC A/W3 have an easier time making comebacks than marines with 1 CC full tech available? It's simply not true.
Yes. But marines with 1 TP in the end game should not have any comeback possibilities.
So just have the game end when the marines drop from 2 TP to 1 then... if they are not going to have any chance anyhow.
I've seen late-game comebacks - ninja PG, JP/FT takedown, power/obs taken out etc... - they are awesome when they turn the whole game around. Removing that possibility seems silly.
What comeback abilities do aliens have late game with 1 hive currently? Why not just have the game end in the current version when aliens drop from 2 hives to 1?
I'm not a great fan of aliens loosing hive 2 abilities when they loose their second hive. That said ... it usually works out fairly well; aliens either loose their second hive to a superior ARC/JP rush, which then quickly takes out the last hive. Or the hive lost is a sneak action from marines, and the aliens can retake it. Or it's a base trade, which the aliens usually benefit from.
And with concede, aliens can avoid those games where the marines had won but stopped to enjoy a bit of stomping at the end ...
Sidebar:
Major reason for not liking ability loss on aliens on 2 is the lack of vertical movement for hive-1 fades and skulks - the only hive-1 alien with a reasonable chance against jetpacks is the lerk.
A secondary is the lack of AE anti-arc attacks; moving ARCs takes 3000 hits to kill (500 hits less when deployed), which is 36 seconds for a skulk (at 83 dps).
At 15 tres each and each RT producing 10 tres/min, 6 RTs produces 4 ARC/min, which will take a total of 2.5 minutes of dedicated munching for a skulk.
In a way it is too bad that the aliens have bilebomb to handle swarms of ARCs - if they did not, ARCs would have to be a LOT easier to kill or stop.
I'd hate to see nothing tied to second techpoint even more than I'd hate to see anything tied to third techpoint. The turtles will be godawful if marines can get 3-3, exos, and jetpacks off 1 CC.
Also not if exo's get fixed.
Exos are in a horrible place. Their damage output is so incredibly high that it is unfun to play anything against exos. The dual miniguns need to do much less damage (think, about 1/2 as much dps) and be given more speed/mobility to compensate. I think the railguns and single arm exos are alright. Though they're not much fun to play against either -- they suffer from the "stupid-high-hp-syndrome" that onos has previously enjoyed.
How could you possibly argue marines with 3CC A/W3 have an easier time making comebacks than marines with 1 CC full tech available? It's simply not true.
Yes. But marines with 1 TP in the end game should not have any comeback possibilities.
So just have the game end when the marines drop from 2 TP to 1 then... if they are not going to have any chance anyhow.
I've seen late-game comebacks - ninja PG, JP/FT takedown, power/obs taken out etc... - they are awesome when they turn the whole game around. Removing that possibility seems silly.
What comeback abilities do aliens have late game with 1 hive currently? Why not just have the game end in the current version when aliens drop from 2 hives to 1?
I'm not a great fan of aliens loosing hive 2 abilities when they loose their second hive. That said ... it usually works out fairly well; aliens either loose their second hive to a superior ARC/JP rush, which then quickly takes out the last hive. Or the hive lost is a sneak action from marines, and the aliens can retake it. Or it's a base trade, which the aliens usually benefit from.
And with concede, aliens can avoid those games where the marines had won but stopped to enjoy a bit of stomping at the end ...
Sidebar:
Major reason for not liking ability loss on aliens on 2 is the lack of vertical movement for hive-1 fades and skulks - the only hive-1 alien with a reasonable chance against jetpacks is the lerk.
A secondary is the lack of AE anti-arc attacks; moving ARCs takes 3000 hits to kill (500 hits less when deployed), which is 36 seconds for a skulk (at 83 dps).
At 15 tres each and each RT producing 10 tres/min, 6 RTs produces 4 ARC/min, which will take a total of 2.5 minutes of dedicated munching for a skulk.
In a way it is too bad that the aliens have bilebomb to handle swarms of ARCs - if they did not, ARCs would have to be a LOT easier to kill or stop.
So how exactly is your situation any different for marines? If the marine team goes from 2 tp's to 1, it's either a situation where the game is going to end quickly or it was a trade/sneak scenario which is something they can deal with similarly to how you suggest the aliens can. The irony of your statement is the game has been in a state for the last 6+ months where if aliens late game get reduced to 1 TP (with the exception of trades/sneaks) the game should just end as the aliens are boned anyway since they have effectively zero comeback potential.
1. do something to help crappy marine teams that can't kill skulks. preferably without breaking the game and making good marines even stronger against skulks. this is important because when the game starts out; the impetus is undeniably on marines. if marines don't get X resources (upgrades) by the time pres lerk/fades come out, it's the most difficult thing in the game to recover from.
2. reduce the power of onos/exosuit. preferably without making them expensive trash. they should be powerful like starcraft battlecruisers or broodlords, but there MUST be a counter strategy which enables you to cost effectively beat them. they should only be 'GG time' if one team is at a critical income deficit; enough of a deficit where it would be 'undeserved' to counter them. right now it often feels like a game is very close, then 1-2 onos comes out and it's insta GG.
some of the BT mod changes help with these issues, but are they enough to solve the problem? i honestly don't know because the last two times i've been raring to go on a BT marathon, the server is full of newbie marines that don't last 5 minutes.
If exos get nerfed in any serious way then they need to be beaconable. Their crazy DPS is the only reason you use them given the risk having even one or two of them poses to your base.
Exos were always going to be gimmick first, feature second, balanced last. It's kind of frustrating that we have to balance that abomination because it's unashamedly designed to get new players, rather than keep them. It's like they spent ages coming up with something "cool" and then went away and built a giant shoehorn to ram it into our beautiful game.
By the way, a different matter entirely but the new starting resources make alien second hive start pretty much a no brainer imo. You can instantly drop a second hive and still have quite a bit of spare resources to get 2 extra extractors not long after. Given how important the second hive is, starting like this is not nearly as risky as it is in vanilla, where you would severely cripple your starting economy.
Perhaps it could be helped a bit by making early Hives more vulnerably by reducing the base HP/armor (and thus the amount of HP/armor that the Hive can have while growing) and increasing the HP/armor gained through maturity instead.
Or drastically increase the Hive autobuild time when it has no connection to infestation. The only drawback with that is that ninja Hives would be less viable.
Or increase the autobuild time in general to force the team to dedicate a Gorge to building the Hive. But that might harm pub play.
Or increase the Hive cost to 500 res. That could hamper alien expansion in general and make unscouted Hive drops even more risky, but it would be an appropriate account for the starting cost increase to make the early drops more risky again.
Also, I think Exos and Onos are in quite a good spot in the mod. Exos are vulnerable enough to be countered if you can get close to them. Onos are more vulnerable than in vanilla as well and I have seen more Onos die in the mod than in vanilla. The gore nerf is good as well.
The only real problem is not the Exo/Onos itself but the lifeform explosion of them. Individual Exos/Onos are balanced, but an entire team of them suddenly appearing is not. Since we can't hardcap them, there are three possible solutions:
- There need to be more reasons for players to spend res instead of hording it for super lifeforms. Currently I still have no problems to play as rifle marine for the entire game and accumulating 100 res without ever purchasing anything - there is simply no real need or I have the feeling that I will waste my res on a Shotgun because I tend to die more often during risky lone wolf actions.
- Some mechanic needs to be in place that prevents all players from reaching the crucial lifeform point at the same time.
- There need to be more reasons for having a colorful mix of different classes/roles. A combination of distinguished roles would need to be more viable than just steam-rolling as army of high lifeforms.
Some other things: I really hope that some of the improvements that were made during the ModJam will make their way into the game. For instance the new weapon pickup system and the ability to leave Exos (so you can repair them on your own but stay vulnerable while doing so and leave the suit vulnerable to an attack - you could also leave the suit behind to participate in an emergency beacon). Perhaps even introduce Sentries as expensive player-deployable item for pres instead of letting them only be dropped by commanders, similar to Last Stand. A player carrying a Sentry could not shoot until he deploys it, encouraging more teamplay by having other players protect their Sentry carriers if marines plan to deploy them at a forward location.
there is simply no real need or I have the feeling that I will waste my res on a Shotgun because I tend to die more often during risky lone wolf actions.
I get this same feeling playing as a marine. I really think marine weapons ought to last much longer on the field (res cost may have to be increased to balance this). This would add a whole new dynamic over guarding the weapons. Gorge bilebomb should still destroy them.
Comments
Let's do a little thought experiment, imagine aliens could only build a shell or veil for each hive. That's essentially what the current situation for marines is. Now tell me how exactly that gives aliens a bigger chance of making a comeback?
Now you COULD argue that tying things to tps makes it easier for the opposing side to make a comeback, but that's a different story altogether. I'm of the opinion that it's much more enjoyable when the comeback potential is inherent to a faction's design rather than the result of a penalty the other side receives. I.e Alien comeback potential is sufficiently derived from the fact that they have more abilities available at 1 hive, just like how the marine comeback potential would the result of them not needing 2 or even 3 CCs. (Or the fact that they maintain their upgrades at 1 CC)
At the very least we can all agree that aliens need to have their 3rd hive dependency increased. They should NEED the third hive to really reach their endgame potential but as it stands they don't need it neither in vanilla nor in the balance test mod. One could definitely not argue that currently aliens need a third TP as much as marines do in the BT mod, which is completely absurd given that the alien faction is designed around rapid expansion and multiple hive dependency. Maybe when that happens the 5th TP battle may actually be an exciting one, but at the moment it's just marines being crippled at 2 TPs vs aliens having an edge at 2 hives.
I'd honestly really like to see A/W3 tied to 2 CCs first, I think that would be a far more reasonable start for a mechanic like this. Then bump up alien third hive dependency and go from there. The build cap increase combined with the need to actually deny aliens a third hive would be more than sufficient in making the 5 TP battle a bloody one, without one side being at a severe disadvantage and without watering down the symmetrical beauty that is inherent to NS 2.
The problem right now is, that you can't really recover from early mistakes. But this doesn't mean you should be able to comeback even in the late game.
As to what that possibility is, dunno. Preferably there would be several options - a ninja gate, a flamethrower/gl rush, an uberskilled rambo with a shotgun and jetpack, a robofac and arc blob in an overlooked corner, who knows. As long as it's something besides sitting in the base and doing target practice while waiting for the aliens to amass an overwhelming assault.
Its important to note that its not just strength in combat here that causes this, as fades are relatively weak. Perhaps that is why people are confused, or that they play on pubs where aliens try to turtle and wait for marines to get exos. The gameplay you see currently on 18+ player pub servers in no way reflects the actual game progression, since so many aspects are completely destroyed by the increased player counts and the massive advantages marines get. Its important to note that many of the balance mod changes make aliens and marines scale up much better with larger playercounts, so those impacts are drasically lessened.
It should go without saying IMO that part of this change has to be making sure 2 CC marines are evenly matched to 2 hive aliens. If that isn't the case with level 2 upgrades, balance changes can be made. There is no better time than now to introduce fundamental changes that will require major balance revamps. It'll be too late once all the other changes have gone live and settled in.
We should be actively promoting back-and-forth play because it is far more desirable than its entrench-and-crawl counterpart.
I guess this is where people seem to keep misusing the phrase"snowballing".. its simply the doubling advantage one side gets from being successful.
So if a marine team is @ A3/W3 then they have a harder time holding it, lessening the previous double advantage of securely owning upgrades and ground.
It doesn't mean those who are on one shred of life left (turtling) succeed.. in fact quite the opposite. This change would not favor single bases, it allows them to fall quickly, with less stalemates, as its easier to kill them.
BUT that other team that is now pushing you back is farrr more open to attack. Albiet you aren't as strong anymore, so its a tradeoff.
Now, that being said, that's how it works on paper, but currently its far easier for aliens to put that pressure on marines on keep them cornered than it is for marines.
Things like being able to build on infestation and power surges will help reduce this, but this is an underlying problem anyways, and like the below issue, should be fixed regardless.
Exactly what @Zek and I have been proposing??
Correct the problem regardless, then what argument would be left for those against tying tech?
Just a like for Asymmetrical economic models.. Which is a valid point because fun must also be accounted for, even if not all find it fun.
@elodea 's post is a good example. While i am not that in love with asymmetrical resource models (hell, we have an alien commander now, equal expansion restrictions, and pres for both teams.) i can appreciate a love for asymmetry. I just dislike the lack of variance and the set "Roles" that elodea mentioned.. its very stale in my eyes, and is limiting.
Again restating since I think this is getting lost. Alien abilities are tied to hive count not upgrades (it's possible to be down to one hive and still have all upgrades). The loss of upgrades is due to the lose of the upgrade structure either due to poor placement or lack of foresight which is the most vulnerable hive. Requiring marines to have a certain number of CC's to maintain upgrades is just a rather silly method to appease those who feel aliens lose too much at hive loss. Aliens have always had the requirement of slightly greater map control, that's why endgame has always been based off 2tps for marines and 3hives for aliens, half the time aliens not even needing hat third hive when it comes to comp games. However if you really wanted remove some of the asymmetrical aspect of the game really felt the need to balance out he idea of lost upgrades.
Again why not give aliens the ability (once already researched) to re drop the upgrade chambers (At res cost of course.) and re upgrade them to their given upgrade, cara, silence etc. (at rest cost of course) as long as the upgrade was previously researched no matter if a hive was lost in the process. That way it's now on the same level of an arms lab, not tied to cc's.. if it goes down it has the ability to be rebuilt without having to research weapon and armor again. You can simply allow aliens to do the same at that point as long as they already researched the upgrade once much like marines are afforded to.
Abilities should be tied to tech points much as it always have, but upgrades have always been a progressive feature of the game as round time increases.
tl;dr version
Do not tie upgrades to cc requirements for marines.
Much like marines and the arms lab, once an upgrade has been researched (no matter hive loss) aliens should just be able to drop upgrade structures of previously researched upgrades after a loss of the structure.
Maintain Tech point requirements for abilities only (exos, jetpacks, specific hive structures such as crag or shift, tres aliens, leap, bile etc.)
So with this implementation, as long as aliens had have had 3 hives at one point in the game in theory they could have every upgrade still as (carapace+adreline+silence combo) late game as long as the commander redrops the upgrade structures even if they were down to one hive as long as they upgrades were previously researched at some point in the game.
So just have the game end when the marines drop from 2 TP to 1 then... if they are not going to have any chance anyhow.
I've seen late-game comebacks - ninja PG, JP/FT takedown, power/obs taken out etc... - they are awesome when they turn the whole game around. Removing that possibility seems silly.
Your asking to change fundamentals of this game that hardly anyone would agree with as being broken.. Quite honestly if those changes are made, I will never play this game again. I cant even begin to imagine how dull fade play would become, or how stale early game marine pressure would feel.
even making comebacks twice as likely is a bad idea if it makes turtling just 1% stronger because overall the time wasted will increase
What comeback abilities do aliens have late game with 1 hive currently? Why not just have the game end in the current version when aliens drop from 2 hives to 1?
On the flip side, aliens with biomass increases and t3 abilities that don't blow chunks.
It should be a constant struggle between both sides to secure a 3rd tech point, while stopping the other side from doing the same. The 3rd tech point should help give a big enough boost to help win the game, but it should come with the inherent difficulty with holding it due to the possibility of spreading the team thin with such increased map control.
Also not if exo's get fixed.
I'm not a great fan of aliens loosing hive 2 abilities when they loose their second hive. That said ... it usually works out fairly well; aliens either loose their second hive to a superior ARC/JP rush, which then quickly takes out the last hive. Or the hive lost is a sneak action from marines, and the aliens can retake it. Or it's a base trade, which the aliens usually benefit from.
And with concede, aliens can avoid those games where the marines had won but stopped to enjoy a bit of stomping at the end ...
Sidebar:
Major reason for not liking ability loss on aliens on 2 is the lack of vertical movement for hive-1 fades and skulks - the only hive-1 alien with a reasonable chance against jetpacks is the lerk.
A secondary is the lack of AE anti-arc attacks; moving ARCs takes 3000 hits to kill (500 hits less when deployed), which is 36 seconds for a skulk (at 83 dps).
At 15 tres each and each RT producing 10 tres/min, 6 RTs produces 4 ARC/min, which will take a total of 2.5 minutes of dedicated munching for a skulk.
In a way it is too bad that the aliens have bilebomb to handle swarms of ARCs - if they did not, ARCs would have to be a LOT easier to kill or stop.
Exos are in a horrible place. Their damage output is so incredibly high that it is unfun to play anything against exos. The dual miniguns need to do much less damage (think, about 1/2 as much dps) and be given more speed/mobility to compensate. I think the railguns and single arm exos are alright. Though they're not much fun to play against either -- they suffer from the "stupid-high-hp-syndrome" that onos has previously enjoyed.
So how exactly is your situation any different for marines? If the marine team goes from 2 tp's to 1, it's either a situation where the game is going to end quickly or it was a trade/sneak scenario which is something they can deal with similarly to how you suggest the aliens can. The irony of your statement is the game has been in a state for the last 6+ months where if aliens late game get reduced to 1 TP (with the exception of trades/sneaks) the game should just end as the aliens are boned anyway since they have effectively zero comeback potential.
imo there should be two priority goals here:
1. do something to help crappy marine teams that can't kill skulks. preferably without breaking the game and making good marines even stronger against skulks. this is important because when the game starts out; the impetus is undeniably on marines. if marines don't get X resources (upgrades) by the time pres lerk/fades come out, it's the most difficult thing in the game to recover from.
2. reduce the power of onos/exosuit. preferably without making them expensive trash. they should be powerful like starcraft battlecruisers or broodlords, but there MUST be a counter strategy which enables you to cost effectively beat them. they should only be 'GG time' if one team is at a critical income deficit; enough of a deficit where it would be 'undeserved' to counter them. right now it often feels like a game is very close, then 1-2 onos comes out and it's insta GG.
some of the BT mod changes help with these issues, but are they enough to solve the problem? i honestly don't know because the last two times i've been raring to go on a BT marathon, the server is full of newbie marines that don't last 5 minutes.
Perhaps it could be helped a bit by making early Hives more vulnerably by reducing the base HP/armor (and thus the amount of HP/armor that the Hive can have while growing) and increasing the HP/armor gained through maturity instead.
Or drastically increase the Hive autobuild time when it has no connection to infestation. The only drawback with that is that ninja Hives would be less viable.
Or increase the autobuild time in general to force the team to dedicate a Gorge to building the Hive. But that might harm pub play.
Or increase the Hive cost to 500 res. That could hamper alien expansion in general and make unscouted Hive drops even more risky, but it would be an appropriate account for the starting cost increase to make the early drops more risky again.
Also, I think Exos and Onos are in quite a good spot in the mod. Exos are vulnerable enough to be countered if you can get close to them. Onos are more vulnerable than in vanilla as well and I have seen more Onos die in the mod than in vanilla. The gore nerf is good as well.
The only real problem is not the Exo/Onos itself but the lifeform explosion of them. Individual Exos/Onos are balanced, but an entire team of them suddenly appearing is not. Since we can't hardcap them, there are three possible solutions:
- There need to be more reasons for players to spend res instead of hording it for super lifeforms. Currently I still have no problems to play as rifle marine for the entire game and accumulating 100 res without ever purchasing anything - there is simply no real need or I have the feeling that I will waste my res on a Shotgun because I tend to die more often during risky lone wolf actions.
- Some mechanic needs to be in place that prevents all players from reaching the crucial lifeform point at the same time.
- There need to be more reasons for having a colorful mix of different classes/roles. A combination of distinguished roles would need to be more viable than just steam-rolling as army of high lifeforms.
Some other things: I really hope that some of the improvements that were made during the ModJam will make their way into the game. For instance the new weapon pickup system and the ability to leave Exos (so you can repair them on your own but stay vulnerable while doing so and leave the suit vulnerable to an attack - you could also leave the suit behind to participate in an emergency beacon). Perhaps even introduce Sentries as expensive player-deployable item for pres instead of letting them only be dropped by commanders, similar to Last Stand. A player carrying a Sentry could not shoot until he deploys it, encouraging more teamplay by having other players protect their Sentry carriers if marines plan to deploy them at a forward location.
I get this same feeling playing as a marine. I really think marine weapons ought to last much longer on the field (res cost may have to be increased to balance this). This would add a whole new dynamic over guarding the weapons. Gorge bilebomb should still destroy them.