Listening For Hive: Legit Strat Or Lameness?

QuantumSlip

<div class="IPBDescription">joe.to servers have interesting TOS</div> I joined their beta 1.04 server, and noticed something as the game was loading. It was a message saying something like this:

No lameness, such as <b>listening for HIVE.</b>

Now I think listening is all part of the advantage of the marines, but this? I don't know about that... you can verify for yourself by joining their servers.

Defcon

hehe, it's a valid tactic

I think the comm should be able to hear everything only with a research on the observatory though, you can determine where there gorges are :o)

It raises the skill potential for commanders anyhow.

Nemesis_Zero

[edit]Flayra has spoken.[/edit]

Defcon

Games are great when players can be EXTREMELY good at it... thats when it's entered into bigger and bigger large tournaments and so on.

If the skill requirement for NS is pretty high, not only FPS skill but thinking skill, you'll have a top game with a LOT of potential.

JooJooFlop

How do they prove someone used such a tactic?

xect

I vote lameness. I dont think the marines should be given the location of the hive beforehand. But i also recall hearing something about the devs letting it in because they were unable to make the game know the difference between "known" and "unknown" sounds. I think and hope it will be fixed in the next patch.

Twex

If I remember correctly, hearing things you cannot see was never intended for Commander mode and will be turned off in the first client patch.

Whether something is "legit" doesn't matter if it cannot be detected in the first place.

But either way, I would never play on a server with such silly house rules, as they are a sign of power-hungry admins.

MobJustice

FYI, according to the game lore in the manual, if it weren't for the aliens prescence, comms would also be able to see everywhere, not just hear. Nanogridlock. Basically, it blocks video but not audio.

Linkage: <a href='http://www.natural-selection.org/manual/front_nanogridlock.html' target='_blank'>Nano Gridlock, from the manual</a>

So any admin that doesn't like it, should be referred to that page.

rebo

The funniest is when looking at the airlock on bast, you get rotated with it when someone uses it. <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->

Aminal

manual or not, i think its pretty lame, along with placing res towers on all hive towers to find out which one is which. starting hive location should be a secret, as <!--emo&::asrifle::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'><!--endemo--> rushes are far more devastating than the traditional <!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo--> rush.

I'd love to see maps with multiple marine starts as well, so that the aliens dont know where they are comming from.

From a narrative perspective, the marines are more likley to know where the aliens are, than the aliens know where the marines are comming from. Recon would have been done before the marines entered the ship/base, the aliens dont know where the marines are comming from. I think it would leave with a much more interesting game.

Elric

If youu're doing the standard phase thing, you'll know where it is due to scanner sweep anyway.

MMZ_Torak

Isn't this a moot point anyway? I mean with hives no longer healing at the start , will you still hear them?

Flayra

This is a bug, and listening is an exploit. The commander is supposed to hear sounds as the nearest marine to him does, but it's not working properly yet. It's totally unenforceable though, so it really doesn't make sense to tell people not to listen (all it does is tell people that didn't know, that they CAN listen). This will be fixed in a future patch.

ph4t_rabb1t

<span style='color:blue'>Be nice. </span>

Ahnteis

My guess is that having the hives start at full health will in some part limit this early in the game.

Fina

I used to have a similar "strategy" when playing Command and Conquer with a friend over modem. Except it had to do with my old PC being slow. I'd listen to the "tink tink tink tink" sound of getting money, and if I was looking over the enemy base, even if it was covered in shroud, it would slow down my PC. :\

SrCumference

I just always figured the comm was god...

GobyWan

My machine slows down whenever I'm within 20 feet of the enemy, especially as an alien. That makes it handy to figure out when I'm going to die horribly, as this slowdown makes the game into a rather uninteresting slideshow. Thank god that the netgraph won't display under 4 frames per second, I don't want to know how fast it's really going.

I'm sure this would be an exploit if I could react to it when it happened.

Bitter? Hell yes.

Doombringer

The aliens always know where the marines are.. why can't the commander search for the hive by listening? The only way to fairly balance this out would be to have maps with a few different marine spawn points. :/

MMZ_Torak

But, marine can start building right away, aliens can't. There are trade offs with everything. Fair does not have to be equal.

SemperFi

<!--QuoteBegin--GobyWan+Dec 23 2002, 06:08 PM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (GobyWan @ Dec 23 2002, 06:08 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->My machine slows down whenever I'm within 20 feet of the enemy, especially as an alien. That makes it handy to figure out when I'm going to die horribly, as this slowdown makes the game into a rather uninteresting slideshow. Thank god that the netgraph won't display under 4 frames per second, I don't want to know how fast it's really going.

I'm sure this would be an exploit if I could react to it when it happened.

Bitter? Hell yes.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Tee hee, hey goby remember me?

Caucasian

If you know the map as an alien, you know where the marine base is.

Completely fair.

Kinda counterbalances a skulk rush for a marine rush

Catgirl

So...

...Phase Gates will cost more and have less health...

...Infantry Portals will cost more...

...Hives will start at full health...

...And you won't be able to hear where Hives are at the start...

That's four ways the Marine rush has been gimped...when's the Alien turn?

Pulse

I cant imagine how pathetic a marine team would have to be to actually lose to a skulk rush, not saying aliens suck or anything, but skulk rushes are so easy to defend its not funny.

wlibaers

The most reliable way to lose to a skulk rush is when none of the marines feels like going comm and they just sit there in their starting spot looking at each other, waiting for one to "break" and command.
Don't laugh, it happens...