1) The main reason for the increase in marine wins is simple:
Sensory goes down first.
Marines lock a hive.
Aliens and marines clash for control of third hive, ultimately the marines siege it.
Aliens stuck with sensory and now its countered by observatories overlapping eachothers vision and MT.
The early 2.0 overuse of sensory has been its downfall, sensory was the reason of the epic 5 or 6 hour games that happened alot in the first week of NS 2, now any marine team with player who have the slightest idea about sensory and how it works, know how to counter it.
One hive onos is just a big softy, without regen or carapace it dies very fast indeed, without celerity or adrenaline it doesnt want to be in an open confrontation, with only sensory, its a nice place to store excess ammo.
2) Some (even 1.0 "veterans") people think that if you are good as a marine, you automatically hack. They cant accept the fact that their "unballanced" alien team can lose at all, let alone with in the first 5 minutes of the game, thats just insane, isn't it?
3) Teamwork pfffft, Its backwards, 1 Marine (going on average to skilled players) is equal to 5 skulks early game, I have been ordered by the comm more than a few times to go rambo for some res. I go find a area in the map that greatly favours a marine, and is in the skulk path to another hive or marine base, and i dont move at all. Where as yes a skulks may take out 5 marines, but it cannot hold ground as effectively alone as his counterpart.
4) Res for kills has gotten me abused by other players, and even kicked from a server I used to frequent for "stealling" another players kill.
5) Knife is still as lethal as ever <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
6) Leap sometimes bugs when you try to change to bite again straight after (not sure if it is a bug, it just refuses to let me change to bite quickly sometimes)
7) A TF in base right at the start is a bad idea and a waste of resourses in my opinion, an arms lab and level 1 armour is far more effective, and on top of that sit a marine in base and read number 3 again.
8) Mines are very efficient at killing the llama redempt onos gits!
9) Auto-concede HAS to go if they are keeping F4 im afraid <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
10) The servers allow a player imbalance of +/-2 so stop complaining teams when its 10 v 8, the server is happy to allow this.
11) TOO many new players came at once and made clans for NS.... the new clans lasted about a week before reforming, or merging with known clans.
12) Jet Packs are HUGELY underestimated, the phrases "its ok they only have jetpa...." "Your hive is dieing" springs instantly to mind.
13) Your Pistol still fires at an imense rate of fire, much to the surprise of many skulks, who still yell out "scrip0r"
14) The majority of new NS players are willing to learn from you (thank god for that) but every now and then you get the arse holes new players, who get ignored and muted sadly <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
15) Marine shotgun rush is countered by lerks
16) Two onos with regen and adren are a game ender on hive 2, one stomps, other mauls, the turrets tickle you slightly.
17) The new "fixed" skulk bite seems somewhat broken still <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
18) Far to many people call the first fade/onos to apear a res hogger, well in all honesty its his res, he killed alot of marines for that res, AND ON TOP OF THAT he probably did put up an RT at the beginning.
19) More and more people think noone is a better player than they are, reminds me of another famous HL mod <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
20) Gone is the feeling of achievement for breaking a hive lock down, many people disagree to this, but this nubbin here doesnt care if he wins or loses in all honesty.
21) The imbalance is still apparent on equal skilled teams, just not suc a large imbalance as what was originally thought.
I have more, but i cant be bothered just now to type them out <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
Alien teamwork is almost invincible on smaller servers. Umbraed onos and fades can ruin a turret farm in no time , after dealing with the marine guards first. A healsprayed onos can endure continuous fire from a JP HMG , and keep smashing the hive siege while the gorge is protected by his massive bulk. 3 onos are unstoppable regardless of their upgrades and the marine's equipment , the outpost <i>will</i> be crushed. The aliens have to accumulate sloppy errors to let the marines win nowadays.
I found that the average game length was somehow related to the number of players... that is , more marines can either defend their remaining base better , or form a stronger HA HMG train and take the map's nodes one by one.
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->A TF in base right at the start is a bad idea and a waste of resourses in my opinion, an arms lab and level 1 armour is far more effective, and on top of that sit a marine in base and read number 3 again.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
TF is needed for elec. Usually after the base is set up people set out to go for res so it's only common sense that you have the tf ready.
EDIT: I noticed a lot of newbie players too. Of the annoying type...
I have one observation about why marines are winning more now. In some of the pubs, marines are starting to understand that the counter to the normal "everyone go gorge for RT" strat is to be VERY aggressive VERY early. Once the aliens have 3+ res for any significant period of time the game will immediately turn very ugly for the marines, early aggressiveness goes a long way to stop this, but only if it is done as a team. On a 6 person pub, here is one of my major starting lines of play. Ip, armory, arms lab, armor 1, 1 shotties (2 in the beta), then I have all my marines move out to a building alien RT. After they destroy it (most likely they will), I quickly move on to the next RT and repeat. With some good marines I have killed 5+ RT's in a row like this in maybe 2 minutes, which will really hurt the aliens, plus get you some really good RFK (armor 1 helps this a lot). If done properly, the rest of the game is merely of a matter of when to continue attacking/teching or attempt to expand.
Comments
1)
The main reason for the increase in marine wins is simple:
Sensory goes down first.
Marines lock a hive.
Aliens and marines clash for control of third hive, ultimately the marines siege it.
Aliens stuck with sensory and now its countered by observatories overlapping eachothers vision and MT.
The early 2.0 overuse of sensory has been its downfall, sensory was the reason of the epic 5 or 6 hour games that happened alot in the first week of NS 2, now any marine team with player who have the slightest idea about sensory and how it works, know how to counter it.
One hive onos is just a big softy, without regen or carapace it dies very fast indeed, without celerity or adrenaline it doesnt want to be in an open confrontation, with only sensory, its a nice place to store excess ammo.
2)
Some (even 1.0 "veterans") people think that if you are good as a marine, you automatically hack. They cant accept the fact that their "unballanced" alien team can lose at all, let alone with in the first 5 minutes of the game, thats just insane, isn't it?
3)
Teamwork pfffft, Its backwards, 1 Marine (going on average to skilled players) is equal to 5 skulks early game, I have been ordered by the comm more than a few times to go rambo for some res. I go find a area in the map that greatly favours a marine, and is in the skulk path to another hive or marine base, and i dont move at all. Where as yes a skulks may take out 5 marines, but it cannot hold ground as effectively alone as his counterpart.
4)
Res for kills has gotten me abused by other players, and even kicked from a server I used to frequent for "stealling" another players kill.
5)
Knife is still as lethal as ever <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
6)
Leap sometimes bugs when you try to change to bite again straight after (not sure if it is a bug, it just refuses to let me change to bite quickly sometimes)
7)
A TF in base right at the start is a bad idea and a waste of resourses in my opinion, an arms lab and level 1 armour is far more effective, and on top of that sit a marine in base and read number 3 again.
8)
Mines are very efficient at killing the llama redempt onos gits!
9)
Auto-concede HAS to go if they are keeping F4 im afraid <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
10)
The servers allow a player imbalance of +/-2 so stop complaining teams when its 10 v 8, the server is happy to allow this.
11)
TOO many new players came at once and made clans for NS.... the new clans lasted about a week before reforming, or merging with known clans.
12)
Jet Packs are HUGELY underestimated, the phrases "its ok they only have jetpa...." "Your hive is dieing" springs instantly to mind.
13)
Your Pistol still fires at an imense rate of fire, much to the surprise of many skulks, who still yell out "scrip0r"
14)
The majority of new NS players are willing to learn from you (thank god for that) but every now and then you get the arse holes new players, who get ignored and muted sadly <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
15)
Marine shotgun rush is countered by lerks
16)
Two onos with regen and adren are a game ender on hive 2, one stomps, other mauls, the turrets tickle you slightly.
17)
The new "fixed" skulk bite seems somewhat broken still <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
18)
Far to many people call the first fade/onos to apear a res hogger, well in all honesty its his res, he killed alot of marines for that res, AND ON TOP OF THAT he probably did put up an RT at the beginning.
19)
More and more people think noone is a better player than they are, reminds me of another famous HL mod <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
20)
Gone is the feeling of achievement for breaking a hive lock down, many people disagree to this, but this nubbin here doesnt care if he wins or loses in all honesty.
21)
The imbalance is still apparent on equal skilled teams, just not suc a large imbalance as what was originally thought.
I have more, but i cant be bothered just now to type them out <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
I found that the average game length was somehow related to the number of players... that is , more marines can either defend their remaining base better , or form a stronger HA HMG train and take the map's nodes one by one.
Yep, complacency is whats biting kharaa in the backside right now.
TF is needed for elec. Usually after the base is set up people set out to go for res so it's only common sense that you have the tf ready.
EDIT: I noticed a lot of newbie players too. Of the annoying type...