A New Ns_caged Strategy, Seems To Work Quite Well
Chopper_Dave1
Join Date: 2002-11-01 Member: 2353Members
Join Date: 2002-11-01 Member: 2353Members
<div class="IPBDescription">You guys should have fun with it.</div> I tried this one out on COFR today, and it gave marines a solid victory over the aliens (who started in Generator). Stoney can back me up on this one, he was one of my marines =).
Anyways, as you have probably noticed, I have another one of my fabulous paint maps attached to this post. I'll be referring to it quite a bit.
So, you're going to start in marine main, as always. We're not going to be doing any relocations (at least I don't, but feel free to work your own personality into this). Drop one infantry portal and an observatory (no armory yet!), then split up your marine team into two basic groups, defenders and attackers. In a public server, you'll probably get the newbies and people who can't follow orders as defense, and the smarter players as your attack force. 3-4 people on the attack should be sufficient. Don't take too long - we want to be quick about this! I yelled at my marines to move out before I even reached the CC.
Send your group of marines off to freight elevator access (marked off by my black phase date dot). As soon as they reach the area, drop a resource node, then an armory, then mines. Once that's all built/placed, drop a welder and get the "secret node" opened up, then cap it and mine it too.
At this point, you're going to be at your weakest throughout the entire game. Marine start will have absolutely no defense at this point besides marines, and freight elevator will only have a few mines here and there. Split up your men to repel the alien threat at both places. Make sure the guards at main base are on the upper level (near CC) - they have guns, and should use the distance as an advantage. Also make sure that the vent leading to freight elevator is mined, as well as the nearby entrances covered by guns.
Stick through it. You have 3 resource nodes under your belt, shouldn't be too long for you to enter the next phase (no pun intended). Your next job, which should be obvious, is to get marine main base linked with freight elevator. Once that has happened, drop an armory in marine main base, and get mines there too. Now we're ready to make our next move.
This, of course, depends on the hive, and the aggressiveness of the aliens. I have marked 3 "secondary" phase locations - you'll only need (or be able to effectively hold, for that matter) one. The strategies involves with each also involve the hive. I'll give you a breakdown of what I would do with each one:
Generator: Take the shipping tunnel location. This (especially with its weld point) will block off the aliens from getting to vent, and will allow you to take and hold the shipping tunnel and ventilation resources without any real alien threat. Meanwhile, the aliens will be detoured to sewer if they want to get a hive up, which is good. They'll either have to go through or around Freight Elevator (covered), Shipping Tunnel (covered), or your marine main base (covered) to get there. Even if they do get it up, you will be able to destroy it easily once you tech up, since the aliens' reinforcements spawn a looooooong way away. If you can, try to move your forces up into the pipe rooms just south of Generator (another marked location) - it'll give you an even tighter grip on the situation.
Sewer: You're going to want the Sewer Vestibule Sublevel location. With this, your marines will be able to constantly harass their spawn, and will block off one of the three main routes out of the hive. Always, ALWAYS put the phase on the upper level - hight advantage! Since you already have Freight Elevator, Generator's a non-option, since there's no real open route they can use to get there. This way, you'll basically force the aliens into getting ventilation hive. Meanwhile, you can secure the stability and aux generator resources without much of a problem from wandering aliens. Next, you'll probably want to get a phase in the shipping tunnel location. This will, again, effectively barracade them into vent hive and sewer hive, give you resources, and allow you yet another good position to assault a hive. Good stuff.
Ventilation: This one's a bit tough. First you're going to want to sneak a welder into shipping tunnel and get that vent welded before the aliens seal it off (shouldn't be TOO hard- that guy who opened "secret" recource nozzle should be able to fairly early on). Then you'll probably want to set up a phase at the aux generator location I have marked down - this will barracade the aliens from getting into Generator Hive pretty effectively. And, as with sewer hive, you should be able to secure stability and aux generator in relative peace. Next, you'll want a phase in sewer vestibule sublevel, both to keep aliens from getting resources and to give you a nice place to assault sewer later. You can vie for the tertiary at pumping station 03 if you feal ballsy, but good luck with the aliens pouring out of the ventilation hive.
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The tertiary phases are there for the anal-retentive only, really. They are just to protect the hives, if you *really* feel the hives need to be watched over that badly. I think you should be just fine with the primary and secondaries, though.
The strategy, basically, involves the taking of the middle of the map early on to give you a nice resource shot, a confused alien team, and a nice place to both contrain and assault new locations. Obviously, it's a resource battle - the strategies outlined after the initial securing of frieght elevator all involve securing at least another 2 resources (total of 5-6), while at the same time keeping at least 1 hive basically off limits to (easy) alien control. Two hives will be left open, but it will hardly matter, as they will only have two resources at most, and not even that if your marines are good at harassing (I feel sorry for aliens who start in generator, with the stability res - lol!). You should very, VERY easily get jetpacks and HMG's, or HA's if you're like me and like to have a little fun, and end the game pretty quickly.
Have fun, and tell me how it works out in other servers - I'd like to know =).
Anyways, as you have probably noticed, I have another one of my fabulous paint maps attached to this post. I'll be referring to it quite a bit.
So, you're going to start in marine main, as always. We're not going to be doing any relocations (at least I don't, but feel free to work your own personality into this). Drop one infantry portal and an observatory (no armory yet!), then split up your marine team into two basic groups, defenders and attackers. In a public server, you'll probably get the newbies and people who can't follow orders as defense, and the smarter players as your attack force. 3-4 people on the attack should be sufficient. Don't take too long - we want to be quick about this! I yelled at my marines to move out before I even reached the CC.
Send your group of marines off to freight elevator access (marked off by my black phase date dot). As soon as they reach the area, drop a resource node, then an armory, then mines. Once that's all built/placed, drop a welder and get the "secret node" opened up, then cap it and mine it too.
At this point, you're going to be at your weakest throughout the entire game. Marine start will have absolutely no defense at this point besides marines, and freight elevator will only have a few mines here and there. Split up your men to repel the alien threat at both places. Make sure the guards at main base are on the upper level (near CC) - they have guns, and should use the distance as an advantage. Also make sure that the vent leading to freight elevator is mined, as well as the nearby entrances covered by guns.
Stick through it. You have 3 resource nodes under your belt, shouldn't be too long for you to enter the next phase (no pun intended). Your next job, which should be obvious, is to get marine main base linked with freight elevator. Once that has happened, drop an armory in marine main base, and get mines there too. Now we're ready to make our next move.
This, of course, depends on the hive, and the aggressiveness of the aliens. I have marked 3 "secondary" phase locations - you'll only need (or be able to effectively hold, for that matter) one. The strategies involves with each also involve the hive. I'll give you a breakdown of what I would do with each one:
Generator: Take the shipping tunnel location. This (especially with its weld point) will block off the aliens from getting to vent, and will allow you to take and hold the shipping tunnel and ventilation resources without any real alien threat. Meanwhile, the aliens will be detoured to sewer if they want to get a hive up, which is good. They'll either have to go through or around Freight Elevator (covered), Shipping Tunnel (covered), or your marine main base (covered) to get there. Even if they do get it up, you will be able to destroy it easily once you tech up, since the aliens' reinforcements spawn a looooooong way away. If you can, try to move your forces up into the pipe rooms just south of Generator (another marked location) - it'll give you an even tighter grip on the situation.
Sewer: You're going to want the Sewer Vestibule Sublevel location. With this, your marines will be able to constantly harass their spawn, and will block off one of the three main routes out of the hive. Always, ALWAYS put the phase on the upper level - hight advantage! Since you already have Freight Elevator, Generator's a non-option, since there's no real open route they can use to get there. This way, you'll basically force the aliens into getting ventilation hive. Meanwhile, you can secure the stability and aux generator resources without much of a problem from wandering aliens. Next, you'll probably want to get a phase in the shipping tunnel location. This will, again, effectively barracade them into vent hive and sewer hive, give you resources, and allow you yet another good position to assault a hive. Good stuff.
Ventilation: This one's a bit tough. First you're going to want to sneak a welder into shipping tunnel and get that vent welded before the aliens seal it off (shouldn't be TOO hard- that guy who opened "secret" recource nozzle should be able to fairly early on). Then you'll probably want to set up a phase at the aux generator location I have marked down - this will barracade the aliens from getting into Generator Hive pretty effectively. And, as with sewer hive, you should be able to secure stability and aux generator in relative peace. Next, you'll want a phase in sewer vestibule sublevel, both to keep aliens from getting resources and to give you a nice place to assault sewer later. You can vie for the tertiary at pumping station 03 if you feal ballsy, but good luck with the aliens pouring out of the ventilation hive.
----
The tertiary phases are there for the anal-retentive only, really. They are just to protect the hives, if you *really* feel the hives need to be watched over that badly. I think you should be just fine with the primary and secondaries, though.
The strategy, basically, involves the taking of the middle of the map early on to give you a nice resource shot, a confused alien team, and a nice place to both contrain and assault new locations. Obviously, it's a resource battle - the strategies outlined after the initial securing of frieght elevator all involve securing at least another 2 resources (total of 5-6), while at the same time keeping at least 1 hive basically off limits to (easy) alien control. Two hives will be left open, but it will hardly matter, as they will only have two resources at most, and not even that if your marines are good at harassing (I feel sorry for aliens who start in generator, with the stability res - lol!). You should very, VERY easily get jetpacks and HMG's, or HA's if you're like me and like to have a little fun, and end the game pretty quickly.
Have fun, and tell me how it works out in other servers - I'd like to know =).
Comments
As for the main base probably getting destroyed - well, yeah, that is a problem. Why I said the period between getting the "hidden" node and the phase gates is the point where most trouble occurs. Dropping an observatory in the beginning can be a bit of a risk, I suppose, but I feel things will usually turn out alright.
Think of it this way: you never really have more than 4 dedicated alien rushers on any alien team - 1 person gorges, and the rest patrol the map. The marines 1) spawn in marine main and 2) have the height advantage of being able to sit near that CC and fire on to incoming aliens. Marine main really *won't* get eaten if there are 2-3 decent guys guarding it in the beginning. Once the aliens' find out about freight elevator, they aren't going to attack marine main much - for a while. They'll wanna kill you in freight instead. Once they notice it's all mined up, they'll all say on their team_chat "Rush marine main!" But at that point, you should *probably* have your phases going by now, and marine main will be mined too. If you really want to avoid the risk, you can even plop down an armory before the phase gates and get marine main nice and mined to avoid the risk. So the aliens should attack marine main when defense there is strongest, then freight when defense THERE is strongest, then marine main again when defense has become stronger, then they'll sigh and just try to go for a hive. That's what I count on when I use this strat, anyway...
If you're saying you could safely hold stability monitoring and aux gen while the aliens started at generator, I'm thinking pretty much any strategy would work against that alien team.
If you <b>can</b> get it your set though.
You've also correctly identified the critical bit of your plan. A full team rush on marine base 3 minutes into this would kill you easy.
The one time I tried something like this before (I comm very rarely), I was going to then take stab mon and aux gen (and by sieges in stab mon gen hive). That would have gaven me 5 RTS, a central location and a hive. Pretty solid. Before the armoury went up though my 3 marines in freight were all killed by a (obviously pre-planned) swarm of skulks <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
Just to re-iterate, until you get a mined PG in freight this is really risky.
i jumped in sent em all to freight got the res up.. the bonus was here the marines had been punding the aliens starting hive location so the aliens gorges couldnt get out of gen and seeing as i had just jumped in chair we had a bit of res but unfortunatley no res nodes..
sent em all to freight built res tf and had to wait for the res to get the phases up.
once the phases were up and i had some 1 mine freight and hidden node, got turrets up and quickly started the res to flow in. sent 2/3 of team to shipping which hadnt been blocked =D.
from there it was pretty much history as with the 2 nodes around freight and the 1 in base then 1 in shipping and finally vent hive when res.. 5 nodes is loads of res for a good marine team. ive seen to many turret farms ripped down by lvl3 carad skulks so i to lvl3 weaps asap then started on armour and the other upgrades.
and then blah blah blah u can guess the rest =]
basically freight is a very good place if u can secure it early it provides 2 res nodes and easy access to 2 hives ( if shippings not blocked... if it is siege then siege damn u!) freight is pretty much a very key point in caged if u hold it u should win
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Ya know, you dont need to be arrogant to make a point. Plus, the marine guards are there to make sure structures dont get eaten.
To quote Stoneburg....
<!--QuoteBegin--Stoneburg+Apr 6 2003, 05:25 AM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Stoneburg @ Apr 6 2003, 05:25 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Yeah, I can't understand how marines could <b>ever</b> win against you. Very good post, gives me a lot to think about and really makes me re-evaluate my position on this strategy. How did you get your name by the way? <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin--Minstrel Knight+Apr 6 2003, 03:27 PM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Minstrel Knight @ Apr 6 2003, 03:27 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Owned.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
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It's a fun strat though since you get to be in Freight <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo--> Freight is one of the cooler places and I'm alwqys happy when I get to run around there, and going for the "middle of the map" is usually very destructive for the opponent (Generator room, Cargo on Tanith...) so I give it a thumbs up.
Few problems i see with your strat is things like relying on aliens not wondering through your defenses to kill undefended res nodes, relying on shipping being unblocked and sewer vestibule as a mini-base.. and of course the weakness at the start. And rather than secure shipping (there is another vent into shipping besides the weldable one for sneaky skulks) it might be better to send a few rines with a welder to open the other vent access and secure vent itself (in the west hallway).
I experimented with the aux gen 2ndary phase position though... works nicely, and is much better than putting anything inside the gen hive.
New opinion:
If aliens start anywhere but in Vent hive, and aggressive marine team will beat the crap out of them. Have 1-2 Marines guard base (with a coupld of mines for good measure) then send everyone but one to attack their starting RT. The last guy runs off to cap nodes on the otehr side of the map. If their original RT falls it is pretty much game over. Even if it doesn.t the aliens will have been kept busy defending it and Marines should have a nice res flow going.
This way you use the fact that the res nodes are <b>outside</b> the hives to the Marine advantage.
If they start in Vent Chopper Dave's strategy is brilliant since it allows you to put a huge amount of pressure on it from both directions.
This is a strat that could be used to stop that one. However I will try your plan if I am comm because it is the best one I have seen for that map. No plan if perfect (if their was a prefect plan then NS wouldn't be fun.) If the marines buy the plan and go all out for it, the aliens will have their hands full.
However you dont really take into account that a skulk rushing past aux gen could easily get to generator, and there are vent systems in the map which are unweldable etc.