Onos With Redemption
KMO
Join Date: 2002-11-07 Member: 7617Members
Join Date: 2002-11-07 Member: 7617Members
<div class="IPBDescription">isn't fair</div> This post comes about after an epic game this weekend. To cut a very long story short, the aliens managed to get 3 hives, but under a minute later they were knocked back down to 1; this was due to marines assaulting the start hive, losing one under marine control, and forgetting to scan the other sieged hive.
Now, this looked like it was going to be interesting. The game up to this point had been a near stalemate - the marines had a great comm, but a few marines just wouldn't follow orders, nevertheless it had looked like marines were, at last, going to do it. But now, they had onos to deal with.
Marines were fully upgraded, had heavy armour and weapons, had marine base and 1 hive siege spot secured, and had just emptied the alien start hive too. With onos on the scene I was expecting it to be a knife-edge battle that could go either way - the game had suddenly come to life. Could the marines kill the only onos before the onos wiped them out? Alas, it wasn't that interesting. <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif'><!--endemo-->
As it turned out, the aliens only managed to get 2 onos during their brief 3-hive period. The first did a significant amount of damage to marine base, but got careless and was mown down by a few HMGs. (Comm was yelling to abandon base and secure the new hive, but a few HA did die guarding the base, but they got that onos down).
But then it got silly. The other onos had redemption. He was thus totally invulnerable - he may as well have had god mode enabled. There was nothing the marines could do to stop him - all they could do was make him disappear for 30 seconds before he came back. He only needed a few trips to remove all the HA, then a few more to destroy all the resource points, then just strolling to the finish. He wasn't even one of the better alien players.
Now, the onos is supposed to be a "game-ender", yes. But a sole onos on a 1 hive alien team versus fully upgraded marines? Surely there should be <b>some</b> possibility of the marines surviving?
The on-screen help says that redemption isn't available for the onos (or "level 5 alien"). This is obviously not accurate. Was there a reason this was changed, or is it a bug? I would strongly suggest that enforcing it would aid gameplay in this (admittedly rare) situation. Having redemption in a real multiple onos rampage is a nicety, and noone would miss it. But in this sort of potentially knife-edge situation, it totally tips the game.
Has anyone got any suggestions for killing a redemption onos? 5 simultaneous grenade hits?
Now, this looked like it was going to be interesting. The game up to this point had been a near stalemate - the marines had a great comm, but a few marines just wouldn't follow orders, nevertheless it had looked like marines were, at last, going to do it. But now, they had onos to deal with.
Marines were fully upgraded, had heavy armour and weapons, had marine base and 1 hive siege spot secured, and had just emptied the alien start hive too. With onos on the scene I was expecting it to be a knife-edge battle that could go either way - the game had suddenly come to life. Could the marines kill the only onos before the onos wiped them out? Alas, it wasn't that interesting. <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif'><!--endemo-->
As it turned out, the aliens only managed to get 2 onos during their brief 3-hive period. The first did a significant amount of damage to marine base, but got careless and was mown down by a few HMGs. (Comm was yelling to abandon base and secure the new hive, but a few HA did die guarding the base, but they got that onos down).
But then it got silly. The other onos had redemption. He was thus totally invulnerable - he may as well have had god mode enabled. There was nothing the marines could do to stop him - all they could do was make him disappear for 30 seconds before he came back. He only needed a few trips to remove all the HA, then a few more to destroy all the resource points, then just strolling to the finish. He wasn't even one of the better alien players.
Now, the onos is supposed to be a "game-ender", yes. But a sole onos on a 1 hive alien team versus fully upgraded marines? Surely there should be <b>some</b> possibility of the marines surviving?
The on-screen help says that redemption isn't available for the onos (or "level 5 alien"). This is obviously not accurate. Was there a reason this was changed, or is it a bug? I would strongly suggest that enforcing it would aid gameplay in this (admittedly rare) situation. Having redemption in a real multiple onos rampage is a nicety, and noone would miss it. But in this sort of potentially knife-edge situation, it totally tips the game.
Has anyone got any suggestions for killing a redemption onos? 5 simultaneous grenade hits?
Comments
As for coping with it, i've had situation where heavies have timed it. They get to the alien spawn just in time to see the Onos redempt, promtly shooting it to death.
<a href='http://www.geocities.com/kitsune/ns-stats.htm' target='_blank'>NS Weapon and Health Stats</a>
I'm relatively certain that there are more pellets fired per shot than 5 (perhaps eight?). So if each of three of your men hit it with first shot with 5 pellets, the Onos is around 4/7 of his life. When it gets in closer more pellets will hit it, and the second volley should either kill it or send it back to heal. Get another person with a shotgun, wait until it doesn't redeem fast enough to send another volley, or just keep pushing him back to his hive with jp's or heavy armor. That's what I would try to do - I'm not sure how many resources you had, or other effects.
I also thought the Onos could not use redemption. I even thought I tried to upgrade with it and it didn't work. I could just not have had enough resources after evolving possibly...ah well.
Give that man a ceegar! <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
@ about 200 health
random fact...
if there is not a large enough area around the spwan point the ohno will not redeem because there is not enough space <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->... but on some maps there is room. depending on which hive and map.
i also think redemption on an onos is a glich...
i did it b4 too... i was on eclipes and i think i always redeemed to eclips command... that surely has a large spawn area. they didnt garentee redemption to work for onos. and they DID say it WON'T work... but i dunno
1) have a jp/hmg sneak into the last hive and camp unseen. then when a marine sees the onos redemp he tells the hmg jp to finish him off.
2) get motion tracking so you know when he is coming. 3 hmgs hitting an onos will redempt him before he even gets near you.
3) **** heavy armor and give everyone jetpack/hmgs. can easily run from an onos while shooting him. an hmg'er can also EASILY take out fades alone, you said they were fully upgraded. then all you would have is all skulks and an onos. pretty easy win for fully upgraded marines.
4) add turrets to your hive strongholds and base. and have a lmg marine with a welder phasing between to keep everything touched up. lmg fire + turrets will redempt an onos pretty quick.
They dael instant dmg and coupled with 2-3 HMGs, you *should* be able to take an onos down b4 it redeems, due to the massive damage of the shotty.
If you can get behind the onos, and smack it with a lvl3 shotty at close range to ensure all pellets hit, that 200 dmg, that is a LOT, so if u can get that final punch in with that, then it is good.
Also keep in mind the gren launcher deals in the regoin of 150-180(I forget) damage, and if you can be accurate, these will be able to aid the HMGS in killing the onos quick enuf.
I do think however, that if the aliens can save 70 res to a person, they deserve SOME sort of advantage, not one that can be riped apart easily, thou it may be too powerful, but that is what testing is for <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->
Ex. 3 shots to kill a carapaced lerk when fully upgraded with fuly upgraded shotty should be 2 if direct hits.
Lerks take more that 17 spikes to kill full armormed rine i beleive. I got check this one but i KNow for absolute sure you can drop a lerk in 2 shotgun shots.
Ex. 3 shots to kill a carapaced lerk when fully upgraded with fuly upgraded shotty should be 2 if direct hits.
Lerks take more that 17 spikes to kill full armormed rine i beleive. I got check this one but i KNow for absolute sure you can drop a lerk in 2 shotgun shots.
O and about the post. You could always kill all their dcs.
2. How often have you seen Aliens get 3 hives then be reduced to 1? I have had this happen to me once on Hera (damn vents everywhere).
3. Camp the hive and wait for him to redeem, then kill his ****!
4. Just don't let the Aliens get 3 hives up :O
I have had this happen to me, I was the only Onos and helped to take down the hives that Marines had captured. Of course, the Marines just started hibernating while I took down the hive (all that was there was a PG, 2 turrets).
But the game dragged on for a rediculously long time because of that one Onos with redemption. Not to say it wasn't a fun game, but it was kind of frustrating. It was almost realistic...4 marines crouched on the stairs, waiting for that huge processing door to open. Then the alarms start sounding and the door starts opening, and you hear that familiar roar...followed by a marine saying ONOS INCOMING!!! Then all hell breaks loose with bullets goinge verywhere and grenades exploding and all these skulks and marines getting impaled and bleh and blah and OMG total war action it was crazy. And then the dust clears and the Onos has disappeared without a trace. Then one LA marine runs up to the switch and closes the door, only to get parasite killed. Fun gaem =D
If an onos gets redemption, he doesn't have carapace or the all-powerful onos regen - and if you have a guy with an HMG back at that hive, it's fish in a barrel. There's a counter to everything. I agree it's unsatisfying to have the onos go poof on you, which is why I never take redemption as an onos - I think the marines deserve the occasional thrill of mowing one down if they're going to die anyway. (Then again, if I knew I was my team's one hope for survival and I knew the server had unstuck, I might make an exception.)
From your story the Onos probubly had about 4837 minutes to launch that many attacks and heal in between...
*/me Points at thread*
You see kids... this is why marines shouldnt turtle up EVERY SINGLE TIME THEY GET TWO HIVEs SECURED...
Had you rushed, you would have taken out the hive... you should have sent 3 JP/HMGers to the hive, killed it, and then knifed the onos to death...
They had vent hive, and WOL'd all the way down. Multiple WOL's and web from when they had 2 hives...now everytime we launched an attack with ha/hmg, that onos would come and flatten us. It would kill 2, then be redeemed back. Rinse and repeat.
If we set up siege or something, the onos would come in...and not to forget all the skulks too. From what i remember, the game went on for close to 2 and a half hours, and the reason why the aliens got the hive was to make the game interesting.
It's not a bug, it's a feature. <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
From your story the Onos probubly had about 4837 minutes to launch that many attacks and heal in between...
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I suppose so. We didn't have time though. I think that onos only redempted about 6 times tops. The onos was able to cripple us fairly rapidly down to the point we wouldn't be able to muster up any significant number of HMG/JP attacks.
TBH, I hate cheap HMG/JP hive takedowns with a vengeance, so even in this emergency situation it didn't occur to me, I'm so prejudiced against them. And we weren't that good a team, tbh. But, significantly, neither were they.
My concern isn't that the marines lost, it is that I couldn't see any feasible counter to a redemption onos. The only counter is to actually wipe out the final hive, I suppose. But that's not easy to do at the same time as defending from that onos.
I agree that this is a very rare situation; my point is that if we do get into that situation, the gameplay should make sense. I don't feel invulnerable aliens are helpful in this (or any other) situation. Onos are extremely powerful. A redemption onos is simply ridiculous. In the other direction, I'm dead against the alien ping of death, as it encourages super-cheap marine hive rushes.
A single good, carapace onos should have been able to wipe the marines out anyway - it would have been a battle of wits - the marines would have had to rely on cunning escape route ambushes to take him down, but it would have been <b>possible</b>, and as a marine I would have had a damned good try. But what smarts is that a bad redemption onos was able to just walk all over us. There was no skill or finesse in his performance. Ok, an onos doesn't normally need skill or finesse, but shouldn't it if you are the sole onos against full marine gear? Shouldn't you at least have to make half an effort not to get killed? I can live with redemption fades, but onos are 1 step too far, being invulnerable until the hive is killed.
For those who are interested, the story of the game was roughly:
1) ns_nothing, 8v8, aliens start in Cargo Bay Hive.
2) Commander starts the base off with a few bits and a TF, then gets out.
3) Another, brave, commander takes over, and secures Docking Wing 1 and Power Silo Hive.
4) Both aliens and marines appear to have a few new/bad players and a few good players.
5) Someone sneaks a phase gate into viaduct and marines manage to secure it.
6) The usual heavy lerk assault starts, with DCs up on viaduct gantry. Comm is busy doing all upgrades. Welders keep stuff going.
7) Jetpacks are ready, lerks knocked out, but they come back.
8) Aliens really start concentrating on viaduct. Welder guy pinned down under hive with TF etc.
9) 3 marines with jetpacks in base refuse to phase to viaduct until they are given HMGs, despite begging for about 3 minutes. <!--emo&:angry:--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/mad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='mad.gif'><!--endemo-->
10) Aliens take viaduct.
11) Rapidly a phase goes up in red room, and viaduct is sieged, but not before it goes up briefly.
12) Game proceeds as a stalemate for some time. A couple of times aliens get a few fades due to insufficient viaduct scanning, but marines manage to hold them back. Both sides seemed to be fighting their own n00bs rather than each other. Marines get full upgrades.
13) Comm saves up for HA and gear, and launches an assault towards Cargo Bay.
14) Cargo bay is heavily fortified, and a fade or two is still roaming - it takes some time.
15) During the assault, Power Silo is lost. Comm orders the marines to continue attacking Cargo.
16) Just as Cargo Hive is being shot/grenaded, I see the gorge using babblers, and start yelling "3 hives!"
17) Cargo hive goes down, and viaduct is rescanned and goes down, leaving the aliens with Power Silo.
18) One onos takes down about a third of marine base, but is killed (told you the aliens weren't that good - he was extremely careless). Comm sets up chair in Cargo and orders marines to concentrate on holding it. (Red room is still secure).
19) Redemption onos wipes out marine base and cargo bay in a few minutes.
With hindsight, I suppose the correct strategy would have been to drop a CC in red room, out of onos range, and try to equip up with JPs instead of HA. That might just have worked, assuming marines had some 100fps players - I certainly couldn't have taken down Silo with a JP with my fps.
How many times do you see a 1-hive redemption onos ? I've never seen one personally. Therefore when you <b>did</b> meet up with one you had no idea how to counter it. After reading this thread, you do.
So, when the next blue moon comes round and you see a 1-hive redemption onos, you'll know to get a JP/HMGer to sneak into the last hive and ambush the redempting onos. There was no way you were going to come up with that in the middle of a pub game though.
Onos do have paralyze with one hive <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'><!--endemo-->
Onos do have paralyze with one hive <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'><!--endemo--><!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=26&t=26862' target='_blank'>A post in the bug reports forum</a>
Is that even remotely realistic though? How do you "sneak" into their only hive to wait for the onos to redempt without being spotted? I suppose it could be done in theory, but I just don't see it in practice.
Aw crap. I have missed that one <!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif'><!--endemo-->
Is that even remotely realistic though? How do you "sneak" into their only hive to wait for the onos to redempt without being spotted? I suppose it could be done in theory, but I just don't see it in practice. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well, whatever basically. the point I was making is that you know now that a 1-hive redemption onos can quite easily cost the game. You didn't before the game and when one turned up didn't know how to counter it effectively.
You <b>could</b> sneak a JP/HMG in to the rafters of power, JP/HMG power ASAP or turret farm up cargo and via so even a Onos doesn't stand a chance. Those would be my personal choices.You/your comm didn't know to do this because you've never faced the sitaution before and thinking on your feet is really difficult on a pub.
As to the realism of sneaking into power, presuming you had MT by this point you could tell when power was empty. JPing into power is then fairly easy. Job done. As the Onos redempts hes gonna be on low health and the JPer hurtles from the rafters spitting HMG fire, being med spammed by the commander if and when necessary. You could even have built a PG up there <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->