I think the problems are that skulks don't scale well enough into the mid-late game so that you NEED fades to be killing 2-2 marines.
When the fades start dying, the marines can push on easily.
As such, the fade needs to be somewhat OP at killing marines to compensate.
This gets boring and frustrating when 2 marines are pressuring something and 4 fades come in, 1 swipe each and leave. Sure you might have hit one or two fades full on, but the chances of the other guy hitting the same fade with the same magnitude of damage is slim.
Or perhaps you send 3 marines to pressure something, and the 4 fades just go around and kill the phase gate, and then attempt to defend.
Now, these scenarios I'm depicting are based around 6v6 play, and I'm well aware that 1 fade on it's own is very hard to play. But when you're up against 4-5 fades who are attached to each other by a piece of string, it becomes impossible to progress the game unless you start picking them off. But even then, you might face 3-4 fades and 2 res biters so you split up your marines to recap and fewer marines to combat the 3-4 fades.
Kill all the fades though, and your marines will start tearing apart the skulks with 1-2 or 2-2.
I think the game has too much of a pivot point based on the fades.
Skulks can struggle (not always) to play against 1-1, 1-2, 2-2 marines. AND THIS IS THE REASON WE SEE PEOPLE GO FADE.
Fades come out, marines are pushed back.
If fades die, the game essentially resets back to fighting skulks, but this time, the skulks are facing upgraded marines and it can be so difficult to do anything about it.
If fades don't die, aliens will most likely win.
My suggestion to fix this problem:
Make skulks benefit more from biomass (and maybe some more ways of scaling them better for late game.) Maybe add more biomass per hive and reduce the cost of it but spread out the evolutions.
Make fades' health pool lower. (Makes them easier to pick off, but with better scaling skulks, it might not matter so much, also might make a skulk go lerk for umbra)
Make fades' structure damage even lower (Might commit some players to skulks to res bite instead of a 4 fade group tearing apart structures.)
Make onos more viable again so players save for it. (If we have 1 going for umbra lerk, 1 for onos, then we'll see 3 fades)
Heck, maybe make lerks stronger to begin with and scale dramatically slowly as the game progresses so they are only umbra machines
This game is too pivital around fades. I hope my ideas will make it so that teams aren't forced into all going fade. They choose to go lerk because of lower fade hp, they choose to go onos because it's really strong, they can't afford to all go fade and stop res biting with lower sdmg, and if you lose your higher lifeforms, the game doesn't just turn into a land slide.
Or introduce a new lifeform with another support role and reduce fade damage slightly.
Or introduce a support role feature for fades and reduce their damage capabilities even more. (vortex too OP with current damage output and researched too late in games because of biomass requirements)
Skulks scale just about as well as a lmg marine. Lategame, both are more of a distraction than a killing machine like their fade/sg marine counterparts. Instead of buffing the skulk and nerfing the fade, why don't we just make it so the fade cannot stay in an engagement as long? Increasing blink costs by a small margin would reduce the time fades can stay engaged, thus reducing the effectiveness (even slightly) of the fade ball. Fades already do next to nothing to structures so unless you have a pack, expect it to take 8 years for you to kill an RT. As for the Onos, its currently more like the local ice cream truck. It doesn't really do much and you can always tell where it is. It does have this strange effect of making everyone chase it though. I propose to raise the onos' armor level through carapace. The +100 armor you currently get just isnt worth it.
Also the "pogo/bunny hop" trick I've been seeing fades use more and more commonly recently doesn't require usage of energy (by that I mean it regenerates faster than used), allowing fades to burn it up at their destination and escape most of the time taking minimal damage, shotguns aren't very effective if the fade is already on the other side of the room.
I've recently discovered this trick as well. It it an exploit or is it intended to be like this? I like it but it seems pretty powerful.
Also the "pogo/bunny hop" trick I've been seeing fades use more and more commonly recently doesn't require usage of energy (by that I mean it regenerates faster than used), allowing fades to burn it up at their destination and escape most of the time taking minimal damage, shotguns aren't very effective if the fade is already on the other side of the room.
I've recently discovered this trick as well. It it an exploit or is it intended to be like this? I like it but it seems pretty powerful.
You have to do this to be an effective/good fade. It is not a trick and it IS powerful haha
As for the Onos, its currently more like the local ice cream truck. It doesn't really do much and you can always tell where it is. It does have this strange effect of making everyone chase it though.
Brilliant! And so true! We need a mod that changes the Onos screen shake into an ice cream van ring.
Agree that the onos cara needs a boost, but it needs to be done carefully: cara shouldn't be the only viable upgrade (which I'm afraid it really is for most lifeforms with the possible exception of the lerk, but even then I'm not 100% convinced...). As it stands, even that extra only 20 armour on the fade is worth it: how many times after a couple of shotgun blasts are you left on <40hp? Each of those is a death without carapace! And it's so fast to go back to the hive to heal that regen is pointless.
I'd actually be in favour of removing carapace as an upgrade altogether. Anything that boosts effective HP is either pointless or necessary. Sure in a pub you can regen fade, but as I'm sure most people here are aware, cara fade is still the best option for clan play where marines are more likely to connect those level 3 shotgun shots with your buttski!
Sure in a pub you can regen fade, but as I'm sure most people here are aware, cara fade is still the best option for clan play where marines are more likely to connect those level 3 shotgun shots with your buttski!
The method of how fades engage in team play means regen is better.
I think the problems are that skulks don't scale well enough into the mid-late game so that you NEED fades to be killing 2-2 marines.
When the fades start dying, the marines can push on easily.
As such, the fade needs to be somewhat OP at killing marines to compensate.
This gets boring and frustrating when 2 marines are pressuring something and 4 fades come in, 1 swipe each and leave. Sure you might have hit one or two fades full on, but the chances of the other guy hitting the same fade with the same magnitude of damage is slim.
Or perhaps you send 3 marines to pressure something, and the 4 fades just go around and kill the phase gate, and then attempt to defend.
Now, these scenarios I'm depicting are based around 6v6 play, and I'm well aware that 1 fade on it's own is very hard to play. But when you're up against 4-5 fades who are attached to each other by a piece of string, it becomes impossible to progress the game unless you start picking them off. But even then, you might face 3-4 fades and 2 res biters so you split up your marines to recap and fewer marines to combat the 3-4 fades.
Kill all the fades though, and your marines will start tearing apart the skulks with 1-2 or 2-2.
I think the game has too much of a pivot point based on the fades.
Skulks can struggle (not always) to play against 1-1, 1-2, 2-2 marines. AND THIS IS THE REASON WE SEE PEOPLE GO FADE.
Fades come out, marines are pushed back.
If fades die, the game essentially resets back to fighting skulks, but this time, the skulks are facing upgraded marines and it can be so difficult to do anything about it.
If fades don't die, aliens will most likely win.
My suggestion to fix this problem:
Make skulks benefit more from biomass (and maybe some more ways of scaling them better for late game.) Maybe add more biomass per hive and reduce the cost of it but spread out the evolutions.
Make fades' health pool lower. (Makes them easier to pick off, but with better scaling skulks, it might not matter so much, also might make a skulk go lerk for umbra)
Make fades' structure damage even lower (Might commit some players to skulks to res bite instead of a 4 fade group tearing apart structures.)
Make onos more viable again so players save for it. (If we have 1 going for umbra lerk, 1 for onos, then we'll see 3 fades)
Heck, maybe make lerks stronger to begin with and scale dramatically slowly as the game progresses so they are only umbra machines
This game is too pivital around fades. I hope my ideas will make it so that teams aren't forced into all going fade. They choose to go lerk because of lower fade hp, they choose to go onos because it's really strong, they can't afford to all go fade and stop res biting with lower sdmg, and if you lose your higher lifeforms, the game doesn't just turn into a land slide.
Or introduce a new lifeform with another support role and reduce fade damage slightly.
Or introduce a support role feature for fades and reduce their damage capabilities even more. (vortex too OP with current damage output and researched too late in games because of biomass requirements)
Skulks scale just about as well as a lmg marine. Lategame, both are more of a distraction than a killing machine like their fade/sg marine counterparts. Instead of buffing the skulk and nerfing the fade, why don't we just make it so the fade cannot stay in an engagement as long? Increasing blink costs by a small margin would reduce the time fades can stay engaged, thus reducing the effectiveness (even slightly) of the fade ball. Fades already do next to nothing to structures so unless you have a pack, expect it to take 8 years for you to kill an RT. As for the Onos, its currently more like the local ice cream truck. It doesn't really do much and you can always tell where it is. It does have this strange effect of making everyone chase it though. I propose to raise the onos' armor level through carapace. The +100 armor you currently get just isnt worth it.
Assuming 2 hives (full biomass) vs W3, skulks survive 2 extra bullets again lmg marines. 6 biomass x 4hp = 24hp. 84 hp + 10 armor = 104 hp = 8 W3 bullets. With carapace it's 11 bullets. (This is why you need fades and losing them causes marines to steamroll)
At 0 upgrades for each. It's 9 bullets to kill a skulk.
Remember that A2 it takes 4 bites and A3 takes 4 (5 with 1 med pack).
Skulks are pants mid game - late game which is one reason why we see all skulks turn into fades. They have the damage and hp to take engagements, mobility to go grind down RTs (if they stick together) and also PGs.
I would not call a W2 or W3 lmg marine a distraction. They are very good at killing structures still and are useful for chipping fades on the approach and exit of engagements. They are also good for lerks and onos engagements without jetpacks when you need to spread marines and keep distance. 3 LMG W3 marines have a potenial 1950 damage output (excluding pistols) that's shit scary for harvesters/upgrades/hives. Coupled with the med support on A3, it takes 6 bites (perfect timing bites, med spam with delays). With an average 20% accuracy you'd see 390 damage output, that's dangerous for fades.
Sure in a pub you can regen fade, but as I'm sure most people here are aware, cara fade is still the best option for clan play where marines are more likely to connect those level 3 shotgun shots with your buttski!
Regen is absolutely better in clan play. 20 armor is useless compared to 4-infinity regeneration ticks.
Also the "pogo/bunny hop" trick I've been seeing fades use more and more commonly recently doesn't require usage of energy (by that I mean it regenerates faster than used), allowing fades to burn it up at their destination and escape most of the time taking minimal damage, shotguns aren't very effective if the fade is already on the other side of the room.
I've recently discovered this trick as well. It it an exploit or is it intended to be like this? I like it but it seems pretty powerful.
You have to do this to be an effective/good fade. It is not a trick and it IS powerful haha
Cool, I was hoping it wasn't an exploit because I like doing it. I only called it a trick because the information on how to do it doesn't seem to be in the game anywhere. I actually stumbled upon it by accident and then was like, "Hey! This is awesome!". Getting so many more kills with the fade now
Yeah, the movement mechanics really should have been properly explained, preferably before 250 even went live. It was a fairly big change for those that didn't play the balance test mod.
Fade is fine. It's not meant to be equal to a marine 1v1. It's not meant to die easily because it's so expensive. It's meant to keep aliens in the game during mid-game. Fades cannot walk into a room of 5 marines and kill them all unless they're new and don't know the game. Watch competitive matches (not just the top 5 teams) and you'll see that a fade walking into a room with 2 marines will leave the room very soon after, and if he executed well, might have killed one marine. Any weapons he lost are recycled when he respawns. Marines essentially lose nothing. Fades make mistakes.
Carry shotguns, and fight them on yuor terms (in your base, with friends) not theirs (near their harvesters/hive/whip/gorge). In the mid-game, marines are meant to switch focus to killing higher life forms to win, and not sending their shotgunners to try and kill a harvester or hive. Marines lose their shotguns - like aliens losing their fades.
4 fades vs 4 marines is a fun fight. If both teams are similar in skill, it all comes down to execution and commander support. If the marines are getting nano's and meds, have armor 1 (2 preferred), and have shotguns (like they should, and don't lose them doing silly things like running off solo), then they may not die. If they land first blows against the fades, you force one to retreat. If two marines target the same fade, he'll explode. You 3 fades left, but likely you've forced them to retreat. Or maybe the fades execute well and kill off all the marines. The fades won. It doesn't make them OP. Most times, 2 marines die, fades escape, marines respawn and come back to get their guns. In cases with similar skill, it comes down to advanced awareness of a fade push on a particular area and commander support at the right milliseconds. Turrets also aid marines holding PG locations.
It's basically a "learn to play" response. But polite. Also balance discussions go out the window when you put it context of a 24 man server. You are intentionally accepting that the games you play are no longer going to be balanced if everyone is of similar skill.
As always fades are a people killer... They do limited damage to structures and are vulnerable when hitting structures... As such fades alone cannot win games... While on the other hand SG/Exo/gl/flame all do high damage to players and structures... This lends itself to balance...
A fade alone in a base isn't scarry but walk a dual Exo into an alien hive and see what damage is done...
My recommendation to the time team that can't handle the "god" fade on the other team, drop an extra ip ...if a player is 50-1 they are focusing on killing people adding an ip will negate any spawn delay and minimize his effect on the game. In the end a couple of pro fades can't stop a hard Exo push, arc train, or general push...
Fade is fine. It's not meant to be equal to a marine 1v1. It's not meant to die easily because it's so expensive. It's meant to keep aliens in the game during mid-game. Fades cannot walk into a room of 5 marines and kill them all unless they're new and don't know the game. Watch competitive matches (not just the top 5 teams) and you'll see that a fade walking into a room with 2 marines will leave the room very soon after, and if he executed well, might have killed one marine. Any weapons he lost are recycled when he respawns. Marines essentially lose nothing. Fades make mistakes.
Carry shotguns, and fight them on yuor terms (in your base, with friends) not theirs (near their harvesters/hive/whip/gorge). In the mid-game, marines are meant to switch focus to killing higher life forms to win, and not sending their shotgunners to try and kill a harvester or hive. Marines lose their shotguns - like aliens losing their fades.
4 fades vs 4 marines is a fun fight. If both teams are similar in skill, it all comes down to execution and commander support. If the marines are getting nano's and meds, have armor 1 (2 preferred), and have shotguns (like they should, and don't lose them doing silly things like running off solo), then they may not die. If they land first blows against the fades, you force one to retreat. If two marines target the same fade, he'll explode. You 3 fades left, but likely you've forced them to retreat. Or maybe the fades execute well and kill off all the marines. The fades won. It doesn't make them OP. Most times, 2 marines die, fades escape, marines respawn and come back to get their guns. In cases with similar skill, it comes down to advanced awareness of a fade push on a particular area and commander support at the right milliseconds. Turrets also aid marines holding PG locations.
It's basically a "learn to play" response. But polite. Also balance discussions go out the window when you put it context of a 24 man server. You are intentionally accepting that the games you play are no longer going to be balanced if everyone is of similar skill.
4 fades. 1 res biting skulk.
5 marines.
Skulk forces 1 marine to defend.
You have a pg? 2 marines defend. 2 pressure
4 fades wipe 2 pressure group easy at a 1-2 stage which is most common by the time fades come out.
Fades move on to wipe down an RT and pressure another until they are called to defend.
Maybe you move 3 guys to pressure.
4 fades wipe 1 guy on pg and kill pg or force pressure team to come back.
Maybe you dont send 1 guy to recap.
Lose all your res, aliens cap map, alien pres + tech incredibly high.
Maybe you send dual pressure.
Fades wipe pg then wipe one side pressure, redrop, wipe other pressure, redrop. Prevent pg recap.
Marines do not pressure, constantly losing res, aliens cap a lot more, drop hives, tech up, fades harder to kill, res too low to tech up marines.
Marines 4 man hive, you take down pg in base if they can easily retreat to pg or obs if they can't.
If it's your only hive, you res bite whilst you 4 man defend in hive room whilst healing.
The fact is, that having a 4-5 fade ball is intensely hard to defeat. They can stick together and deny any pressure of 2 man or below and if the pressure is 3 man you can just res bite or take down map control PGs. I've always believed that fades become (almost) exponentially better the more fades stick together with very little diminishing returns. This makes it the optimal team setup. It's incredibly hard to break and difficult to play against but when you do crack it, the whole game unravels and marines will roll.
JektJoin Date: 2012-02-05Member: 143714Members, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
edited July 2013
At the same time, double pg turtles guarding 5 rts with sentries is also very difficult to break even with the fade ball. So many games resulting in stalemates as the marines attempt to get picks with constant sg recycles and sentry chip. Dull and frustrating to play against for both sides imo.
I've been getting 60 kills in pubs in one fade life pretty reguarly.
I still want the old fade back, you were forced to plan your moves more, and hopping like a moron downblinking wasn't how you got speed, if you did it the same way now as then, it was more of a dodge manuver. Now you can dodge and gtfo in one.
I think the problems are that skulks don't scale well enough into the mid-late game so that you NEED fades to be killing 2-2 marines.
When the fades start dying, the marines can push on easily.
As such, the fade needs to be somewhat OP at killing marines to compensate.
This gets boring and frustrating when 2 marines are pressuring something and 4 fades come in, 1 swipe each and leave. Sure you might have hit one or two fades full on, but the chances of the other guy hitting the same fade with the same magnitude of damage is slim.
Or perhaps you send 3 marines to pressure something, and the 4 fades just go around and kill the phase gate, and then attempt to defend.
Now, these scenarios I'm depicting are based around 6v6 play, and I'm well aware that 1 fade on it's own is very hard to play. But when you're up against 4-5 fades who are attached to each other by a piece of string, it becomes impossible to progress the game unless you start picking them off. But even then, you might face 3-4 fades and 2 res biters so you split up your marines to recap and fewer marines to combat the 3-4 fades.
Kill all the fades though, and your marines will start tearing apart the skulks with 1-2 or 2-2.
I think the game has too much of a pivot point based on the fades.
Skulks can struggle (not always) to play against 1-1, 1-2, 2-2 marines. AND THIS IS THE REASON WE SEE PEOPLE GO FADE.
Fades come out, marines are pushed back.
If fades die, the game essentially resets back to fighting skulks, but this time, the skulks are facing upgraded marines and it can be so difficult to do anything about it.
If fades don't die, aliens will most likely win.
My suggestion to fix this problem:
Make skulks benefit more from biomass (and maybe some more ways of scaling them better for late game.) Maybe add more biomass per hive and reduce the cost of it but spread out the evolutions.
Make fades' health pool lower. (Makes them easier to pick off, but with better scaling skulks, it might not matter so much, also might make a skulk go lerk for umbra)
Make fades' structure damage even lower (Might commit some players to skulks to res bite instead of a 4 fade group tearing apart structures.)
Make onos more viable again so players save for it. (If we have 1 going for umbra lerk, 1 for onos, then we'll see 3 fades)
Heck, maybe make lerks stronger to begin with and scale dramatically slowly as the game progresses so they are only umbra machines
This game is too pivital around fades. I hope my ideas will make it so that teams aren't forced into all going fade. They choose to go lerk because of lower fade hp, they choose to go onos because it's really strong, they can't afford to all go fade and stop res biting with lower sdmg, and if you lose your higher lifeforms, the game doesn't just turn into a land slide.
Or introduce a new lifeform with another support role and reduce fade damage slightly.
Or introduce a support role feature for fades and reduce their damage capabilities even more. (vortex too OP with current damage output and researched too late in games because of biomass requirements)
Skulks scale just about as well as a lmg marine. Lategame, both are more of a distraction than a killing machine like their fade/sg marine counterparts. Instead of buffing the skulk and nerfing the fade, why don't we just make it so the fade cannot stay in an engagement as long? Increasing blink costs by a small margin would reduce the time fades can stay engaged, thus reducing the effectiveness (even slightly) of the fade ball. Fades already do next to nothing to structures so unless you have a pack, expect it to take 8 years for you to kill an RT. As for the Onos, its currently more like the local ice cream truck. It doesn't really do much and you can always tell where it is. It does have this strange effect of making everyone chase it though. I propose to raise the onos' armor level through carapace. The +100 armor you currently get just isnt worth it.
LMGs are actually pretty decent all game. Simply put they are the only non-exo weapon effective at any sort of range. Also, they supposedly do up to 650 damage at w3 per clip (note: I have NEVER seen 650 damage in a clip even vs a hive, might be bugged at full auto), which is actually enough to kill a fade. As a matter of fact given the fades propensity for being on the other side of a room before you can get a second shot off, I would actually say that in the hands of a really good aimer the LMG is a superior weapon to a shotgun. Shotguns are also highly pyrrhic, in order to actually kill a skulk or heavily damage any other lifeform you have to be in bite range, which means that if the skulk has any kind of accuracy and reaction time you WILL get bit once.
Of course skulks have their uses all game too. They are good for biting structures or getting some suicidal damage on exos even at the end. When xenocide is up they can take out jetpacks and any other marines fairly easily too. They also tend to be ignored or just not seen in larger battles with higher lifeforms so sometimes the skulks can do all the damage while the fades gorges and onos take all the shots. Their direct DPS is actually the highest out of any lifeform, it's just a matter of surviving long enough to use it
I've been getting 60 kills in pubs in one fade life pretty reguarly.
I still want the old fade back, you were forced to plan your moves more, and hopping like a moron downblinking wasn't how you got speed, if you did it the same way now as then, it was more of a dodge manuver. Now you can dodge and gtfo in one.
If you take the shotgun and fade seperately they are fine. But due to TRES on aliens, PRES on marines it results in shotgun/fade balls. If you remove fade balls, you also have to remove shotgun balls...
NS1 was played with 1-2 fades max in 6v6, however this was balanced out by a marine commander not being able to afford 5 shotguns at the same time. Loosing your shotguns was devestating as was loosing a fade.
Remove alien commander, remove PRES for marines and problem fixes itself Unfortunately I know that won't happen as UWE have set down on the alien commander and will loose face if they remove it.
The solution would be to force 1-3 alien players to use PRES to survive early game. If they didn't, then marines would have an overwhelming advantage. Same thing for marines, force them to use early pres to build or something i'm not sure.
The solution is to figure out a way to force players to use pres early game and not just save all pres for shotgun/fade.
The solution is to figure out a way to force players to use pres early game and not just save all pres for shotgun/fade.
Yes! RPS requirements!
Like not having gorges be 5 pres... and removing drifter building.
As long as expansion only optionally requires player assistance/interaction, it will only worsen explosions. Roles are needed.
If gorges in NS1 figured out they needed to drop a hive, i'm pretty sure gorges will coordinate with commanders to assist expansion.
With good early gorging, you'll still need a lerk asap, so the number that can go fade becomes really limited.
Spammy gorges? Solved.
Early skulk rush stategy? Really risky now.
Fade explosions? Notably lessened/Solved.
(6v6 teams = back to NS1's 1 to 2 fades again... 1 gorge, 1 lerk, 1 fade, 1 harassing/RT skulk/Onos + one more for any of those roles)
Something also needs to be done though for marines... I'd almost lean towards needing a welder to build buildings but that seems a bit to drastic. I'm at a loss though for an idea of how to force them to use pres early and not have 5 people saving all game for welder/shotgun combo.
I've been getting 60 kills in pubs in one fade life pretty reguarly.
I still want the old fade back, you were forced to plan your moves more, and hopping like a moron downblinking wasn't how you got speed, if you did it the same way now as then, it was more of a dodge manuver. Now you can dodge and gtfo in one.
Good luck "downblinking" tonight
I see it was "fixed" in the patch, probably for the best. I guess "bugs" like that get through when your replacing a game with a poorly tested unbalance mod.
Can we now have fades "fixed" by being reverted to the 249 version.
By the way, i'd like to point out that marine res is worth a lot more than alien res. Aliens are currently balanced to have better map control than marines. If they don't acheive it they both can't get their full arsenal of upgrades and have to deal with the more expensive pres stuff that both can't be recycled and without the extra.
What if gorges role was made even more necessary or fades did even less damage than they do now to extractors. Changing the energy pool, rate of fire, res cost, or damage on the fade would not a step in the right direction in my opinion.
What if gorges role was made even more necessary or fades did even less damage than they do now to extractors. Changing the energy pool, rate of fire, res cost, or damage on the fade would not a step in the right direction in my opinion.
god... it's not even worth it for me to chop down RTs as it is now... i think fades are even worse than lerks at it.
I like the new Fade. More fun to play and very rewarding with tactical attacks if you work with building up speed before going in. I feel more alive than with the old fade.
The simplest solution for the last few posts (which seemed to be leaning heavily towards comp play) is to simply have a (ENSL or whatever) comp mod that gives the desired results.
I think everyone agrees that, in NS2, small (especially comp) games and large games play completely different, so just embrace that fact and make the small games what you ( you being the comp community) want them to be. Once the changes are decided upon, then that mod would become Competitive NS2™. No sense trying to make the devs change the vanilla (chocolate?) version of the game to suit you when you can easily just implement the changes without them.
It could be as simple as just enforcing lifeform caps or as complicated as changing every aspect of the alien and/or marine res model (res for kill, changing costs, exponential res flow from number of towers etc) while leaving the base game mostly unchanged, or even as ambitious as reworking almost everything like Sewlek did.
Comments
Skulks scale just about as well as a lmg marine. Lategame, both are more of a distraction than a killing machine like their fade/sg marine counterparts. Instead of buffing the skulk and nerfing the fade, why don't we just make it so the fade cannot stay in an engagement as long? Increasing blink costs by a small margin would reduce the time fades can stay engaged, thus reducing the effectiveness (even slightly) of the fade ball. Fades already do next to nothing to structures so unless you have a pack, expect it to take 8 years for you to kill an RT. As for the Onos, its currently more like the local ice cream truck. It doesn't really do much and you can always tell where it is. It does have this strange effect of making everyone chase it though. I propose to raise the onos' armor level through carapace. The +100 armor you currently get just isnt worth it.
I've recently discovered this trick as well. It it an exploit or is it intended to be like this? I like it but it seems pretty powerful.
Fade blink + bhop is not a trick or exploit. It's how the fade is designed to get around in 250. You blink then bhop to maintain your speed.
You have to do this to be an effective/good fade. It is not a trick and it IS powerful haha
Brilliant! And so true! We need a mod that changes the Onos screen shake into an ice cream van ring.
Agree that the onos cara needs a boost, but it needs to be done carefully: cara shouldn't be the only viable upgrade (which I'm afraid it really is for most lifeforms with the possible exception of the lerk, but even then I'm not 100% convinced...). As it stands, even that extra only 20 armour on the fade is worth it: how many times after a couple of shotgun blasts are you left on <40hp? Each of those is a death without carapace! And it's so fast to go back to the hive to heal that regen is pointless.
I'd actually be in favour of removing carapace as an upgrade altogether. Anything that boosts effective HP is either pointless or necessary. Sure in a pub you can regen fade, but as I'm sure most people here are aware, cara fade is still the best option for clan play where marines are more likely to connect those level 3 shotgun shots with your buttski!
The method of how fades engage in team play means regen is better.
Assuming 2 hives (full biomass) vs W3, skulks survive 2 extra bullets again lmg marines. 6 biomass x 4hp = 24hp. 84 hp + 10 armor = 104 hp = 8 W3 bullets. With carapace it's 11 bullets. (This is why you need fades and losing them causes marines to steamroll)
At 0 upgrades for each. It's 9 bullets to kill a skulk.
Remember that A2 it takes 4 bites and A3 takes 4 (5 with 1 med pack).
Skulks are pants mid game - late game which is one reason why we see all skulks turn into fades. They have the damage and hp to take engagements, mobility to go grind down RTs (if they stick together) and also PGs.
I would not call a W2 or W3 lmg marine a distraction. They are very good at killing structures still and are useful for chipping fades on the approach and exit of engagements. They are also good for lerks and onos engagements without jetpacks when you need to spread marines and keep distance. 3 LMG W3 marines have a potenial 1950 damage output (excluding pistols) that's shit scary for harvesters/upgrades/hives. Coupled with the med support on A3, it takes 6 bites (perfect timing bites, med spam with delays). With an average 20% accuracy you'd see 390 damage output, that's dangerous for fades.
Regen is absolutely better in clan play. 20 armor is useless compared to 4-infinity regeneration ticks.
Cool, I was hoping it wasn't an exploit because I like doing it.
Carry shotguns, and fight them on yuor terms (in your base, with friends) not theirs (near their harvesters/hive/whip/gorge). In the mid-game, marines are meant to switch focus to killing higher life forms to win, and not sending their shotgunners to try and kill a harvester or hive. Marines lose their shotguns - like aliens losing their fades.
4 fades vs 4 marines is a fun fight. If both teams are similar in skill, it all comes down to execution and commander support. If the marines are getting nano's and meds, have armor 1 (2 preferred), and have shotguns (like they should, and don't lose them doing silly things like running off solo), then they may not die. If they land first blows against the fades, you force one to retreat. If two marines target the same fade, he'll explode. You 3 fades left, but likely you've forced them to retreat. Or maybe the fades execute well and kill off all the marines. The fades won. It doesn't make them OP. Most times, 2 marines die, fades escape, marines respawn and come back to get their guns. In cases with similar skill, it comes down to advanced awareness of a fade push on a particular area and commander support at the right milliseconds. Turrets also aid marines holding PG locations.
It's basically a "learn to play" response. But polite. Also balance discussions go out the window when you put it context of a 24 man server. You are intentionally accepting that the games you play are no longer going to be balanced if everyone is of similar skill.
A fade alone in a base isn't scarry but walk a dual Exo into an alien hive and see what damage is done...
My recommendation to the time team that can't handle the "god" fade on the other team, drop an extra ip ...if a player is 50-1 they are focusing on killing people adding an ip will negate any spawn delay and minimize his effect on the game. In the end a couple of pro fades can't stop a hard Exo push, arc train, or general push...
4 fades. 1 res biting skulk.
5 marines.
Skulk forces 1 marine to defend.
You have a pg? 2 marines defend. 2 pressure
4 fades wipe 2 pressure group easy at a 1-2 stage which is most common by the time fades come out.
Fades move on to wipe down an RT and pressure another until they are called to defend.
Maybe you move 3 guys to pressure.
4 fades wipe 1 guy on pg and kill pg or force pressure team to come back.
Maybe you dont send 1 guy to recap.
Lose all your res, aliens cap map, alien pres + tech incredibly high.
Maybe you send dual pressure.
Fades wipe pg then wipe one side pressure, redrop, wipe other pressure, redrop. Prevent pg recap.
Marines do not pressure, constantly losing res, aliens cap a lot more, drop hives, tech up, fades harder to kill, res too low to tech up marines.
Marines 4 man hive, you take down pg in base if they can easily retreat to pg or obs if they can't.
If it's your only hive, you res bite whilst you 4 man defend in hive room whilst healing.
The fact is, that having a 4-5 fade ball is intensely hard to defeat. They can stick together and deny any pressure of 2 man or below and if the pressure is 3 man you can just res bite or take down map control PGs. I've always believed that fades become (almost) exponentially better the more fades stick together with very little diminishing returns. This makes it the optimal team setup. It's incredibly hard to break and difficult to play against but when you do crack it, the whole game unravels and marines will roll.
So basicly Godar,
It's not just Godar.
You should see snails, duplex, quaxy, radical (imo they're actually the best at it and the hardest fade ball team I've played against)
Varying pres fade and weapon timings. One day.
I still want the old fade back, you were forced to plan your moves more, and hopping like a moron downblinking wasn't how you got speed, if you did it the same way now as then, it was more of a dodge manuver. Now you can dodge and gtfo in one.
LMGs are actually pretty decent all game. Simply put they are the only non-exo weapon effective at any sort of range. Also, they supposedly do up to 650 damage at w3 per clip (note: I have NEVER seen 650 damage in a clip even vs a hive, might be bugged at full auto), which is actually enough to kill a fade. As a matter of fact given the fades propensity for being on the other side of a room before you can get a second shot off, I would actually say that in the hands of a really good aimer the LMG is a superior weapon to a shotgun. Shotguns are also highly pyrrhic, in order to actually kill a skulk or heavily damage any other lifeform you have to be in bite range, which means that if the skulk has any kind of accuracy and reaction time you WILL get bit once.
Of course skulks have their uses all game too. They are good for biting structures or getting some suicidal damage on exos even at the end. When xenocide is up they can take out jetpacks and any other marines fairly easily too. They also tend to be ignored or just not seen in larger battles with higher lifeforms so sometimes the skulks can do all the damage while the fades gorges and onos take all the shots. Their direct DPS is actually the highest out of any lifeform, it's just a matter of surviving long enough to use it
Good luck "downblinking" tonight
NS1 was played with 1-2 fades max in 6v6, however this was balanced out by a marine commander not being able to afford 5 shotguns at the same time. Loosing your shotguns was devestating as was loosing a fade.
Remove alien commander, remove PRES for marines and problem fixes itself
The solution would be to force 1-3 alien players to use PRES to survive early game. If they didn't, then marines would have an overwhelming advantage. Same thing for marines, force them to use early pres to build or something i'm not sure.
The solution is to figure out a way to force players to use pres early game and not just save all pres for shotgun/fade.
Like not having gorges be 5 pres... and removing drifter building.
As long as expansion only optionally requires player assistance/interaction, it will only worsen explosions. Roles are needed.
If gorges in NS1 figured out they needed to drop a hive, i'm pretty sure gorges will coordinate with commanders to assist expansion.
With good early gorging, you'll still need a lerk asap, so the number that can go fade becomes really limited.
Spammy gorges? Solved.
Early skulk rush stategy? Really risky now.
Fade explosions? Notably lessened/Solved.
(6v6 teams = back to NS1's 1 to 2 fades again... 1 gorge, 1 lerk, 1 fade, 1 harassing/RT skulk/Onos + one more for any of those roles)
Something also needs to be done though for marines... I'd almost lean towards needing a welder to build buildings but that seems a bit to drastic. I'm at a loss though for an idea of how to force them to use pres early and not have 5 people saving all game for welder/shotgun combo.
I see it was "fixed" in the patch, probably for the best. I guess "bugs" like that get through when your replacing a game with a poorly tested unbalance mod.
Can we now have fades "fixed" by being reverted to the 249 version.
By the way, i'd like to point out that marine res is worth a lot more than alien res. Aliens are currently balanced to have better map control than marines. If they don't acheive it they both can't get their full arsenal of upgrades and have to deal with the more expensive pres stuff that both can't be recycled and without the extra.
Pretty much everything you wrote is incorrect.
god... it's not even worth it for me to chop down RTs as it is now... i think fades are even worse than lerks at it.
I know, but 'some' caster always goes on about godars fades so it sticks.
I think everyone agrees that, in NS2, small (especially comp) games and large games play completely different, so just embrace that fact and make the small games what you ( you being the comp community) want them to be. Once the changes are decided upon, then that mod would become Competitive NS2™. No sense trying to make the devs change the vanilla (chocolate?) version of the game to suit you when you can easily just implement the changes without them.
It could be as simple as just enforcing lifeform caps or as complicated as changing every aspect of the alien and/or marine res model (res for kill, changing costs, exponential res flow from number of towers etc) while leaving the base game mostly unchanged, or even as ambitious as reworking almost everything like Sewlek did.