Hilarious Tactics
Deadonstick
Join Date: 2013-04-17 Member: 184877Members
Join Date: 2013-04-17 Member: 184877Members
1: Whack-A-Mole (Alien, Early Game, in the room Gravity Control):
When you enter the room as a Skulk you can hide on top of the tunnel. From here, Marines can't get to you, nor fire on you. You can ambush Marines when you see fit, or simply taunt them to try and catch you, rendering multiple Marines inoperative. The Marines can't let you simply stay there in Grav Control because you might kill their extractor, so they will spend hilarious minutes trying to shoot you down. When you have the resources, evolve into a Lerk on top of this tunnel, then kill all who oppose you.
2: Lerk Peekaboo (Alien, vs Rifles):
Whenever you encounter one or two rifle Marines, simply fly out of a corner, draw fire (by showing yourself and/or using Spikes( and then hide back around the corner. Most Marines will procede to empty their clips on the Lerk that's already gone. When their clips are empty, simply pop back out, bite them and finish them off with Spikes if nessecary.
3: Nexzil's Last Stand (Marines):
This tactic was introduced by Nexzil in the ENSL finals, I will not take credit for it as a result. Basically, a few Marines jump up the Command Station, ever since the patch Aliens can't climb this building anymore so you can safely shoot them down. Watch out for Lerks and Fades though.
4: Skulk Double Jump (Aliens, Mid-game to Late-game, Leap Evolved):
As a Skulk when facing a single Marine, use Leap to leap over his head, then, while in the air, turn around 180 degrees and leap again. The Marine will have their crosshairs aimed at where you were going to land instead of behind him where you now are. Once you leaped again you will be behind the Marine, bite him while you run to his front because most Marines will now try and turn back to see what's there. By the time he has you'll be behind him again and he'll probably be dead.
5: The Purifier (Marines, Late-Game, Flamethrowers and Jetpack required):
A jetpack allows you to move very fast (duh). A Flamethrower does major damage against flammable structures (cysts and clogs). It doesn't take a genius to put these two together. As a Marine, buy a flamethrower and jetpack and procede by simply flying across the map taking out cysts. A half second burst of flame is plenty to kill a fully matured Cyst. As a result you can clear half the map of infestation without too much effort and be a real pain in the Alien Commander's butt. Be sure though not to linger on killing Harvesters manually, just let them die from lack of Infestation. The beauty of this tactic is that you kill infestation quicker than the Alien Commander can replace the Cysts. This means that the Commander will be forced to focus on replacing Cysts rather than expanding or helping his team.
6: The LSD (Alien Commander, Shade Hive Required):
The much too uncommonly used Hallucination ability of a matured Shade allows a commander to create fake life forms whom seem real to Marines. Now the most common way of using this is to create a billion fake Onosses and send them in, but no-one is going to buy that. The best way to use this tactic is when Marines have two bases. Tell your team to stand-by near a Shade outside base A (this will hide them from the Marines). Then send in a couple of fake Skulks and one real Skulk to base B, the real Skulk will trigger the "your base is under attack" message, as soon as the first bite of the real Skulk has landed, send in two fake Onosses. The Marine Commander will see a bunch of Skulks attacking, hears a warning and sees Onosses move into his base. The Commander will then procede to beacon his entire team to that base, then send in your real team to the other base and voila. One base less.
7: The Lerk Strike Team (Sheer Evil required):
In case you don't know this yet. Lerks are usually availible through pRes relatively early in the game and are fast as hell. This tactic works on less experienced servers really well. Simply instruct your team to go Lerk, all of them. Due to the speed of Lerks, as well as their ranged capabilities you can have a very effective strike team. They can pendulum back and forward between two Marine Bases causing major havoc and taking out a structure each time. When attacking a Phase gate have a couple of lerks biting it (causing poison damage and bite damage) and the rest of the Lerks spike down any survivors as well as pressuring the gate even more. Important for this strategy to work is that your Lerk team is spread out and moving around, causing major confusion as to which Lerk is which.
8: The Gorge Rush:
At the beginning of the game, have your entire team go Gorge, have them equip themselves with Babblers and then move them into the enemy base. Once there, tell every Gorge to make Hydras, the Marine base will now be filled with Hydras. When encountering any resistance simply swarm the Marine with your Gorges, Babblers and Heal Spray. As long as the Gorges stick together and keep spamming Heal Spray on each other (which also damages Marines), you'll have a nearly-invincible group of killers. And ofcourse it'll take the Marines ages to clear out the Hydras out of their base.
9: The Building Factory (Alien Commander):
A very underused ability in my opinion is the Echo ability of the Shift, which allows you to freely move buildings across the map (as long as you place them on infestation). This tactic involves having a few Shades and mostly Crags in your base along with a Shift. Then simply Echo these fully grown Crags to where-ever they are needed. Instead of having to wait until the Crags build when your new Hive is under siege, simply Echo-in a Mature one! (this works with Whips too when you need defense or are under attack from Grenades). Additionally, placing your upgrade structures near this Shift can mean echo'ing them to safety when nessecary. My personal favourite use is still the mobile Crags though.
10: Xenocide Finisher (Skulk, Late-game):
Xenocide is often an overlooked ability, mostly because it is considered useless, as are most Tier 3 abilities (except for Stomp and Umbra). Xenocide is however a nice way of finishing off a wounded marine. Biting a A3 Marine once and then activating Xenocide will almost surely kill him and severely damage any Marines around him. When you're attacking a group of Marines with a Skulk you will almost surely die, therefore it's best to go out with a bang. You could spend your last few seconds trying to get in those final bites on the one Marine you were chasing. Or you could spend your final seconds exploding, severely wounding any nearby Marines and finishing off the one you would have killed anyway.
11: The Swarm (Alien Commander, Thanks to Current1y):
I often hear complaints about the lack of an Alien ARC. Well have no fear, Drifters are even better! Create a swarm of Drifters, send them after that pesky lonely Marine sniping all your eggs. Or simply use them to supplement a base rush or harass the other base with them. The best thing about this tactic however is not the attack of the Drifter, but the clusterfuck it generates. Aiming at a Skulk is quite hard when there are 5-15 drifters swarming across the screen. And ofcourse there is the enzyme cloud. Consider combining this tactic with tactic #6 for maximum clusterfuck. (although when you combine these two I recommend making as many fake Skulks as you can due to their small size).
12: The Tunnel of Doom (Alien Commander + Gorge):
If you've ever had pesky Marines taking your Gorge Tunnels into your base, here is the solution for you! Simply make 2-4 (preferably Shaded) Whips around the exit of your tunnel. Turn that tunnel into a meat grinder! Additionally you can use this to set up a trap and create a tunnel having no other purpose than to serve as a trap. Now there are various methods to do this. The most effective way is having a tunnel somewhere undefended and easy for Marines to find, most Marines will be too tempted to go inside rather than kill it, so they will do so gladly. Then when they reach the other end, they find themselves in the middle of nowhere. Now it's up to you what to have waiting on the other end. If you're boring and uninteresting you can have nothing there and simply have them waste time. If you're an efficient commander you'll have (cloaked) whips waiting. However if you're truly sadistic and evil you'll have a swarm of Drifters waiting to nibble their way to victory.
13a: The Invisible Wall (Alien Commander):
Now this one is situational at best. But it involves putting Drifters in a straight line to form a wall. The thing with Drifters is, they are invisible. So a Marine will be minding its own business, running on to say, Crossroads. Only to suddenly stop dead in his tracks and see a Drifter right in front of him. Now the Marine will either choose to walk around this Drifter, finding another one, or to kill it. The fun thing about this wall is, you can use it as a meatshield so Marines will aim at a Skulk but instead hit a Drifter wall, use it to slow down their movement due to bumping into a drifter, and also using it to slow them down even more by having the entire wall biting down at the Marine and chasing him around, body blocking him. Sure, the Drifters may not stop the Marine(s), but it will buy you enough time for the cavalry to arrive. Also, the Marines don't see it coming due to Drifters not needing Infestation.
13b: The Money Wall (Alien Commander):
If you have way too many resources, spare time, or a general hatred towards everything walking on two feet and wielding weaponary, this might be the thing for you. You create a wall with one layer of Crags, one layer of Shades and one layer of Crags again. This will create a nearly impenetrable, and more important, invisible wall. Make sure to use the Heal Wave and Ink abilities of the Shades and Crags to make it even harder to kill, for added evil, use Hallucinatory buildings and units to draw fire from your buildings or real units. You can even add Whips to taste! (Although with whips you won't need a real wall seeing as anything trying to pass through will be killed anyway, so you can leave a few gaps
).
14: The Fungal Healer (Alien, Lerk):
You know how Marines always love going to Armories to heal? Well not anymore! Instead of using Spores boringly to make a corridor harder to pass (which is btw totally valid). Instead use Spores offensively during a base rush/push! Simply make a quick circle around the Armory, this will make sure that any Marine trying to heal will be damaged just as much, making it easier for your team to pick them off. And while you're at it, do the Phase Gates and Infantry Portals aswell. Although the Armories are still the most evil thing to do.
15: The Exoploder (Alien, Late-game):
Well this one will require teamwork, but it's the best method I found so far to deal with Exo/Welder/MAC clusters. You know how Exos tend to be surrounded by a cloud of Weldarines and MACs to heal them? Now simply get a group of about 5 Skulks to run in and use Xenocide. This does almost enough damage to kill a A3 Exo, then simply finish it off with a few bites or a bile bomb. Remember, an Exo without support is easy to kill and with this Xeno bomb everything around it will definitely be dead (and the Exo probably too).
These tips I thought were worth sharing, I'm not saying they're useful or anything, but I sure had a lot of fun with them. And in the end, aren't all games about fun?
EDIT: More to be added
When you enter the room as a Skulk you can hide on top of the tunnel. From here, Marines can't get to you, nor fire on you. You can ambush Marines when you see fit, or simply taunt them to try and catch you, rendering multiple Marines inoperative. The Marines can't let you simply stay there in Grav Control because you might kill their extractor, so they will spend hilarious minutes trying to shoot you down. When you have the resources, evolve into a Lerk on top of this tunnel, then kill all who oppose you.
2: Lerk Peekaboo (Alien, vs Rifles):
Whenever you encounter one or two rifle Marines, simply fly out of a corner, draw fire (by showing yourself and/or using Spikes( and then hide back around the corner. Most Marines will procede to empty their clips on the Lerk that's already gone. When their clips are empty, simply pop back out, bite them and finish them off with Spikes if nessecary.
3: Nexzil's Last Stand (Marines):
This tactic was introduced by Nexzil in the ENSL finals, I will not take credit for it as a result. Basically, a few Marines jump up the Command Station, ever since the patch Aliens can't climb this building anymore so you can safely shoot them down. Watch out for Lerks and Fades though.
4: Skulk Double Jump (Aliens, Mid-game to Late-game, Leap Evolved):
As a Skulk when facing a single Marine, use Leap to leap over his head, then, while in the air, turn around 180 degrees and leap again. The Marine will have their crosshairs aimed at where you were going to land instead of behind him where you now are. Once you leaped again you will be behind the Marine, bite him while you run to his front because most Marines will now try and turn back to see what's there. By the time he has you'll be behind him again and he'll probably be dead.
5: The Purifier (Marines, Late-Game, Flamethrowers and Jetpack required):
A jetpack allows you to move very fast (duh). A Flamethrower does major damage against flammable structures (cysts and clogs). It doesn't take a genius to put these two together. As a Marine, buy a flamethrower and jetpack and procede by simply flying across the map taking out cysts. A half second burst of flame is plenty to kill a fully matured Cyst. As a result you can clear half the map of infestation without too much effort and be a real pain in the Alien Commander's butt. Be sure though not to linger on killing Harvesters manually, just let them die from lack of Infestation. The beauty of this tactic is that you kill infestation quicker than the Alien Commander can replace the Cysts. This means that the Commander will be forced to focus on replacing Cysts rather than expanding or helping his team.
6: The LSD (Alien Commander, Shade Hive Required):
The much too uncommonly used Hallucination ability of a matured Shade allows a commander to create fake life forms whom seem real to Marines. Now the most common way of using this is to create a billion fake Onosses and send them in, but no-one is going to buy that. The best way to use this tactic is when Marines have two bases. Tell your team to stand-by near a Shade outside base A (this will hide them from the Marines). Then send in a couple of fake Skulks and one real Skulk to base B, the real Skulk will trigger the "your base is under attack" message, as soon as the first bite of the real Skulk has landed, send in two fake Onosses. The Marine Commander will see a bunch of Skulks attacking, hears a warning and sees Onosses move into his base. The Commander will then procede to beacon his entire team to that base, then send in your real team to the other base and voila. One base less.
7: The Lerk Strike Team (Sheer Evil required):
In case you don't know this yet. Lerks are usually availible through pRes relatively early in the game and are fast as hell. This tactic works on less experienced servers really well. Simply instruct your team to go Lerk, all of them. Due to the speed of Lerks, as well as their ranged capabilities you can have a very effective strike team. They can pendulum back and forward between two Marine Bases causing major havoc and taking out a structure each time. When attacking a Phase gate have a couple of lerks biting it (causing poison damage and bite damage) and the rest of the Lerks spike down any survivors as well as pressuring the gate even more. Important for this strategy to work is that your Lerk team is spread out and moving around, causing major confusion as to which Lerk is which.
8: The Gorge Rush:
At the beginning of the game, have your entire team go Gorge, have them equip themselves with Babblers and then move them into the enemy base. Once there, tell every Gorge to make Hydras, the Marine base will now be filled with Hydras. When encountering any resistance simply swarm the Marine with your Gorges, Babblers and Heal Spray. As long as the Gorges stick together and keep spamming Heal Spray on each other (which also damages Marines), you'll have a nearly-invincible group of killers. And ofcourse it'll take the Marines ages to clear out the Hydras out of their base.
9: The Building Factory (Alien Commander):
A very underused ability in my opinion is the Echo ability of the Shift, which allows you to freely move buildings across the map (as long as you place them on infestation). This tactic involves having a few Shades and mostly Crags in your base along with a Shift. Then simply Echo these fully grown Crags to where-ever they are needed. Instead of having to wait until the Crags build when your new Hive is under siege, simply Echo-in a Mature one! (this works with Whips too when you need defense or are under attack from Grenades). Additionally, placing your upgrade structures near this Shift can mean echo'ing them to safety when nessecary. My personal favourite use is still the mobile Crags though.
10: Xenocide Finisher (Skulk, Late-game):
Xenocide is often an overlooked ability, mostly because it is considered useless, as are most Tier 3 abilities (except for Stomp and Umbra). Xenocide is however a nice way of finishing off a wounded marine. Biting a A3 Marine once and then activating Xenocide will almost surely kill him and severely damage any Marines around him. When you're attacking a group of Marines with a Skulk you will almost surely die, therefore it's best to go out with a bang. You could spend your last few seconds trying to get in those final bites on the one Marine you were chasing. Or you could spend your final seconds exploding, severely wounding any nearby Marines and finishing off the one you would have killed anyway.
11: The Swarm (Alien Commander, Thanks to Current1y):
I often hear complaints about the lack of an Alien ARC. Well have no fear, Drifters are even better! Create a swarm of Drifters, send them after that pesky lonely Marine sniping all your eggs. Or simply use them to supplement a base rush or harass the other base with them. The best thing about this tactic however is not the attack of the Drifter, but the clusterfuck it generates. Aiming at a Skulk is quite hard when there are 5-15 drifters swarming across the screen. And ofcourse there is the enzyme cloud. Consider combining this tactic with tactic #6 for maximum clusterfuck. (although when you combine these two I recommend making as many fake Skulks as you can due to their small size).
12: The Tunnel of Doom (Alien Commander + Gorge):
If you've ever had pesky Marines taking your Gorge Tunnels into your base, here is the solution for you! Simply make 2-4 (preferably Shaded) Whips around the exit of your tunnel. Turn that tunnel into a meat grinder! Additionally you can use this to set up a trap and create a tunnel having no other purpose than to serve as a trap. Now there are various methods to do this. The most effective way is having a tunnel somewhere undefended and easy for Marines to find, most Marines will be too tempted to go inside rather than kill it, so they will do so gladly. Then when they reach the other end, they find themselves in the middle of nowhere. Now it's up to you what to have waiting on the other end. If you're boring and uninteresting you can have nothing there and simply have them waste time. If you're an efficient commander you'll have (cloaked) whips waiting. However if you're truly sadistic and evil you'll have a swarm of Drifters waiting to nibble their way to victory.
13a: The Invisible Wall (Alien Commander):
Now this one is situational at best. But it involves putting Drifters in a straight line to form a wall. The thing with Drifters is, they are invisible. So a Marine will be minding its own business, running on to say, Crossroads. Only to suddenly stop dead in his tracks and see a Drifter right in front of him. Now the Marine will either choose to walk around this Drifter, finding another one, or to kill it. The fun thing about this wall is, you can use it as a meatshield so Marines will aim at a Skulk but instead hit a Drifter wall, use it to slow down their movement due to bumping into a drifter, and also using it to slow them down even more by having the entire wall biting down at the Marine and chasing him around, body blocking him. Sure, the Drifters may not stop the Marine(s), but it will buy you enough time for the cavalry to arrive. Also, the Marines don't see it coming due to Drifters not needing Infestation.
13b: The Money Wall (Alien Commander):
If you have way too many resources, spare time, or a general hatred towards everything walking on two feet and wielding weaponary, this might be the thing for you. You create a wall with one layer of Crags, one layer of Shades and one layer of Crags again. This will create a nearly impenetrable, and more important, invisible wall. Make sure to use the Heal Wave and Ink abilities of the Shades and Crags to make it even harder to kill, for added evil, use Hallucinatory buildings and units to draw fire from your buildings or real units. You can even add Whips to taste! (Although with whips you won't need a real wall seeing as anything trying to pass through will be killed anyway, so you can leave a few gaps
).14: The Fungal Healer (Alien, Lerk):
You know how Marines always love going to Armories to heal? Well not anymore! Instead of using Spores boringly to make a corridor harder to pass (which is btw totally valid). Instead use Spores offensively during a base rush/push! Simply make a quick circle around the Armory, this will make sure that any Marine trying to heal will be damaged just as much, making it easier for your team to pick them off. And while you're at it, do the Phase Gates and Infantry Portals aswell. Although the Armories are still the most evil thing to do.
15: The Exoploder (Alien, Late-game):
Well this one will require teamwork, but it's the best method I found so far to deal with Exo/Welder/MAC clusters. You know how Exos tend to be surrounded by a cloud of Weldarines and MACs to heal them? Now simply get a group of about 5 Skulks to run in and use Xenocide. This does almost enough damage to kill a A3 Exo, then simply finish it off with a few bites or a bile bomb. Remember, an Exo without support is easy to kill and with this Xeno bomb everything around it will definitely be dead (and the Exo probably too).
These tips I thought were worth sharing, I'm not saying they're useful or anything, but I sure had a lot of fun with them. And in the end, aren't all games about fun?
EDIT: More to be added
Comments
You should add drifter rush. 5 drifters can easily kill one marine. If you have 15+ drifters you can do a lot of damage real quick. I have had my team attack one base while my drifters attack the other. They have to decide which one they want.
Before they put a limit on drifters I used to have armies of drifters do everything for me. I would spend tres on drifters instead of upgrades. It usually worked and was soo much fun. That is why they were limited though.
I always get a chuckle at some poor sucker getting killed by drifters, from the safety of my box.
Actually, you can easily kill a Skulk in that spot by jumping on to the railing next to the RT, and then jumping on to the RT.
Awesome, I did not know that. However neither do a lot of people, so shhhh, this is our little secret ok?
http://www.twitch.tv/scardybob/c/2123829
A Haunting:
Evolve Camouflage as a Lerk and fly into a Marine base, just out of reach of an Obs. Hide somewhere on the wall or ceiling and taunt them relentlessly in an effort to make them waste tRes on scans. As soon as the scan happens, fly away and do it in a different room. Rinse, repeat.
Gorge rushes are pretty easily countered if marines notice you in time. They just have to go all back to base and fend you off for a massive res loss on the alien team. Bonus points for fast Shotgun research to counter them.
Echo costs 15 additional res on the Shift to upgrade. Afterwards it still costs res to teleport stuff. You also can't teleport upgrade structures as far as I know.
And Xenocide is not per se useless. I once used it successfully by letting our Skulks in Departures explode into the marines who were trying to set up a siege base there and were coming in with Exo support. Since it's our base, we respawn right next to it after blowing up while dead marines have to walk all the way back and can't weld Exos in the meanwhile. Xenocide is most useful on the defense, but unfortunately it requires 3 Hives, which is rarely a real defense situation for aliens.
Not gonna happen this way. Oh I wish it did, but there's a little flaw in your theory: Hallucinations instantly die when they are scanned - not only active "pings" by the comm, also the passive continous scan around active Observatories. You want to force the comm to beacon. For that he needs an Observatory near that base. The Hallucinations you want to force the beacon with evaporate before they can really trigger the comm to panic.
When your team is already inside an enemy base and the Obs is down, it can be useful to send in some Hallucinations (Skulks and Gorges seem to work best for that, because they are percived as relatively easy targets) that act as distraction and catch some bullets that otherwise might have killed an Alien player.
I've used the fact that Hallucinations die to a scan as a sort of "radar warning" in late game. I put a Hallucination Shift in my Shift hive, Hallucination Crag at my Crag hive, etc., place other Hallucinated structures at key locations. WHen I see the kill message, I can quickly check if the comm actually scanned there (and send somebody to check for incoming ninjas) or the timer has simply run out and place a new one. This did save my hives a couple of times, but it's still rather gimmicky and Hallucinations rarely have any offensive impact.
I never claimed any of these tactics to be 100% effective everytime. I merely claimed them to be hilarious, which, well, they are. Echo'ing in a fully matured Crag is quite awesome, even though not economic. And he can see that it's an Onos due to him usually having an Obs built. And Gorge rushes are indeed crappy, but if they work, funny as hell.
Wait wait wait wait, I do remember using Hallucinations effectively in this way thanks to an Obs, and the commander did beacon because of it. Passive scanning does not kill them, or did they change that recently?
With them all healspraying the snot out of each other and bouncing around like hippobunnies and given that they all look alike, how do you focus fire one of them down when they're all massed together?
He did say T-res gorge....
Drifters don't have collision, you know. The marines wouldn't probably even notice having walked through a wall of drifters.
On summit (marines were in flight control & aliens in sub access) : marines launched a rush & our hive was almost down but with hydras, 5 gorges & a skulk we launched our babblers on the command station to take it down quicker... a babbler get the kill for the command station (our hive was like 1% health & died just after the victory screen
I try this all the time, but marines I face lack adventurist spirit. Gone are the days of finding an exo in the tunnel.
I, on the other hand love diving into a tunnel... Once per game however, they figure it out after awhile.
Mineshaft - Try sneaking onto a low ledge at the waterfall in Cave with a grenade launcher. I've solo'd that hive several times (with a couple of ammo packs) as Aliens can't see you and fail to follow the trajectory of the grenades back to you. Works great if the rest of your team is pushing on another hive at the same time as you keep several aliens busy looking for you and away from your team.
Summit - Relocate to crossroads at the start of the match (1 marine heads off to cap extractors). Gives better map control and can easily cut off aliens at choke points locking them to 3 harvesters max. Bonus points if the comm relocates and recycles first CC
Veil - Relocate to Cargo! Instead of rushing to get a phase gate up somewhere, send marines straight through the dome (1 stays to build topographical) into cargo and get a base up there. It's such a strong position for marines and cuts off alien expansion. TIP - Once Cargo CC built, hop out of first CC and have a teammate recycle it from Cargo. Kill yourself or stay on the field till you die (if your teammate commander is effective) then retake command.
Docking - Rush all marines into Stability Monitoring at the start where you've dropped blueprints for your armory, extractor & robotics factory...As they move out, Comm gets out, drops his weapons and runs to build nearest extractor (Bar from Cafe' ideally). I'd then suggest he kill himself to get his guns back before hopping back in the chair, Spawning in won't take much longer than travel time back to base. This tactic gives enough res income to get a couple of arcs out very early. Drop an obs in range of their hive (by this point you should know where it is) and blow it up. High Risk, but so satisfying!
Tram - Similar to Docking, If Aliens start warehouse, rush north tunnels whilst comm builds logistics and 1 marine heads to observation, get your robotics factory, armory & obs up. Pump out a couple of arcs and watch the explosions. If they spawned in server room you'll need scans which you can't really afford at this point. I've yet to test this strategy if they spawned Shipping, but I suspect it's easy enough (rush south tunnel whilst comm builds mezzanine and 1 marine builds warehouse)
Any Map (MAC Mania) - Get some MAC's out mid-game and order them to follow your marines. This gives them a substantial boost to survivability (though they do block shots) AND you can use them to build up areas whilst your team continues the push. I've even successfully used MAC's to place a ninja PG in the Alien Hive. This will become much more viable if armories stop giving armor in the future (currently being considered... Check out Sewlek's Balance mod)
Any Map (Decoy) - Utilize those pesky drifters against the aliens. If you know where they are, you can send a single arc across their FOV. The aliens may spot it and converge on that location (15 T-res undefended and heading towards hive!) where you can either ambush them, or attack elsewhere on the map.
Any Map (MAC-Attack) There's nothing that causes as much panic as seeing structures being hit all over the map. Try positioning a mac or 2 near harvesters and ordering them to attack it as your marines move in elsewhere to do the real damage. It's a bit fiddly and doesn't always give the option to attack, so it's situational at best. The same works for drifters against marines. the damage is practically worthless but unless the comm/Khamm looks to see how slowly the health is going down, he'll be ordering people to 'save' them, pulling enemies away from the real threat
Keep in mind, both Tram & Docking strategies above leave you wide open to a base rush. Both are fairly small maps though and once your obs is up (anywhere) you can beacon if needed (though it's very costly if you need to do so and you probably wont have the 10T-Res needed). Marines may be able to get back to the forward base before too much damage is done depending on the coordination of the aliens
Some guy just tried this tactic today, the execution kind of failed because we lost Nano TWICE in the span of three minutes, and the CC recycle game way late. It could have worked beautifully if we were on the ball.
This post puts in mind how much NS2 is rich and fun and encourage creative playing
It turns out that the 5 res upgrade buildings also serve as a cheap concrete wall. They're tall enough that can't be jumped over, wide enough to block a marine's movement, and they come with the added bonus of a shade behind them with some hidden whips. A marine tries to get through and finds a wall of veils, with a couple of whips in the back, slapping them silly. Complement with crags for maximum effect.