Marshall_Drummin's thoughts post b240
Marshall_Drummin
Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
The new patches were marine favored for two reasons. Skulk acceleration and friction values were decreased and lerk and hydra tracers were added. This has been discussed in many threads, but I feel like the points need to be laid out clearly without having to shuffle through the posts.
First lets talk about lerk tracers. Lerk tracers were added because marines had a hard time finding the lerks. Tracers were added, and this was a very hasty decision, it entailed many underlying consequences. The devs created shift-key abilities for all the lifeforms and currently one is not being used. That is perching. Skulks and lerks were the sneakiest of the lifeforms, but lerks are no longer sneaky, far from it. 'Finding the lerk' was its own game and playing that game created immersion. Its something that was lost post-gorgeous. Its hard to imagine the devs would think that lerks would not be able to perch and shoot when they created it. Now there is so much game clutter with tracers, and it affects the marines ability to shoot at lerks. Tracers were never needed to find lerks, just more experience with the game. A game that isn't even half a year old. Tracers have no place in the game for said reasons, and now we have a mess of clutter.
*Aside, lerks hiding in the pipe at central drilling on mineshaft was a nuisance. This is a map issue. Another problem I have found is that the crag regeneration trait when used on lerks is very strong. I would suggest reducing its effects by a marginal 10-15%.
On to skulk movement. Everyone knows that ambushing is very effective, but what happens when you need to take intiative. The patch has made it harder to do so. In addition to the celerity in-combat debuff, skulk movement nerfs have left them on the backfoot. With the drastic decrease in skulk friction and acceleration, the time it takes for skulks to get into range has increased. Each second wasted exponentially increases the probability of death. Skulks are way too easy to track and shoot. The game has slowed down considerably and has become MOST importantly, less entertaining and more tedious for the aliens as a result of the speed decrease.
MD's suggestions:
-remove celerity in-combat debuff (losing celerity while in combat is such a disaster)
-decrease SKULK celerity speed bonus marginally by perhaps 10-15% to test
-remove lerk and hydra tracers
-perhaps allow tracers on rookie servers
-reduce LERK regeneration marginally by 10-15% to test
-increase skulk friction and acceleration values to between b239 and b241 (as b240 was a 54% decrease)
This is my take on the currently slow paced gameplay of aliens and the consequently lowered skill ceiling. In other words, up the nerfed movement so we can have fun again and utilize skill potential, instead of limiting us to being ridiculously easy to hit. Proceed with objective criticisms or subjective "i'm better than you's" or perhaps the laughably ironic "get more skills with a lower skill ceiling" argument.
-md
First lets talk about lerk tracers. Lerk tracers were added because marines had a hard time finding the lerks. Tracers were added, and this was a very hasty decision, it entailed many underlying consequences. The devs created shift-key abilities for all the lifeforms and currently one is not being used. That is perching. Skulks and lerks were the sneakiest of the lifeforms, but lerks are no longer sneaky, far from it. 'Finding the lerk' was its own game and playing that game created immersion. Its something that was lost post-gorgeous. Its hard to imagine the devs would think that lerks would not be able to perch and shoot when they created it. Now there is so much game clutter with tracers, and it affects the marines ability to shoot at lerks. Tracers were never needed to find lerks, just more experience with the game. A game that isn't even half a year old. Tracers have no place in the game for said reasons, and now we have a mess of clutter.
*Aside, lerks hiding in the pipe at central drilling on mineshaft was a nuisance. This is a map issue. Another problem I have found is that the crag regeneration trait when used on lerks is very strong. I would suggest reducing its effects by a marginal 10-15%.
On to skulk movement. Everyone knows that ambushing is very effective, but what happens when you need to take intiative. The patch has made it harder to do so. In addition to the celerity in-combat debuff, skulk movement nerfs have left them on the backfoot. With the drastic decrease in skulk friction and acceleration, the time it takes for skulks to get into range has increased. Each second wasted exponentially increases the probability of death. Skulks are way too easy to track and shoot. The game has slowed down considerably and has become MOST importantly, less entertaining and more tedious for the aliens as a result of the speed decrease.
MD's suggestions:
-remove celerity in-combat debuff (losing celerity while in combat is such a disaster)
-decrease SKULK celerity speed bonus marginally by perhaps 10-15% to test
-remove lerk and hydra tracers
-perhaps allow tracers on rookie servers
-reduce LERK regeneration marginally by 10-15% to test
-increase skulk friction and acceleration values to between b239 and b241 (as b240 was a 54% decrease)
This is my take on the currently slow paced gameplay of aliens and the consequently lowered skill ceiling. In other words, up the nerfed movement so we can have fun again and utilize skill potential, instead of limiting us to being ridiculously easy to hit. Proceed with objective criticisms or subjective "i'm better than you's" or perhaps the laughably ironic "get more skills with a lower skill ceiling" argument.
-md
Comments
that's the only thing I disagreed with his post, the only thing I can say for sure that we don't need is more clutter
Definitely, the tracers are first of all redundant, and second of all way too prominent.
Lurks sitting somewhere at the top of central spiking power was so incredibly annoying before. It's more manageable now.
I agree it should be made a little more subtle.
The lerk tracers are just kind of silly and unnecessary... while I certainly don't mind them when playing Lerk (roost and shoot is always a bad idea) I just think they add too much visual clutter, and give the lerk smoke screen that it didn't really need. At the same time though it might allow for some sneaky lerk play, where you use the tracers to draw marine attention one way and send your skulks behind the marines as they're shooting at the lerk.
I do agree with the skulk points though.
(<3)
...The ice skating mod?
I wasn't impressed. I liked the whole "Balance the game" part, but when it was "LOL sv_gravity 600, sv_friction 0.50%, cl_icerink 1", I lost all interest and quickly stopped caring or appreciating.
The skulk nerfs went too far. It's absolutely necessary to rush lifeforms because skulks are pretty much the next best thing to target practice. The game is significantly less fun as aliens when you can't even get to grips with marines. "lol ambush them" isn't a valid response because aliens need to attack positions and go on the offensive as well.
Lerk tracers are silly. It completely destroys the benefits of perching because anyone with a brain will just shoot your face off. Also, the smoke adds visual clutter to the map that is really unnecessary.