Yeah, 3 hive weapons got their Combat nerf ahead of time. Now they're worthless in both game types, and we can make them stronger without worries. Considering that Onoses can't realistically afford Charge anyway and Fades have to sacrifice quite a bit for AR, I don't think making them actually powerful will hurt much at all.
Perhaps. 1.04 acid rocket spam at 7th level could make the game unplayable (though I guess you could tweak the energy cost). Xeno isn't a problem, neither is primal, an onos without regen or cara = dead onos and gls > webs. Whilst I still think that the two gametypes should use differant rulesets, I guess 3 hive weapons could be rebalanced as they cost 2 points now. Well it's one more thing to hope for next beta.
There is a better way to balance 3 hive abilities in both classic and combat than nerfeing them or making them cost more points. Have level requirements in addition to point requirments for abilities. For example, make 3 hive abilities cost only one point, buff them up, but you must reach lvl8 to evolve them. They could still be strong in classic, and not be broken in combat.
This idea is not my own, btw. I stole it lock, stock, and barrel from Warcraft 3.
If kharaa get free rt, they will own the game unless the frontier mens manage to get out the jet pack of doom which will own every thing the aliens have to offer.
They should actually make onos and fade much harder to kill to balance out the crap rt issue
Firstly slow down the rate at which marines get res from RT's BUT keep the cost at 15 res.
Secondly have an "advanced rt" research that refines the nanite sludge better possibly taking rates back up to their current levels in 3.0 for a 10(?) res cost.
This would allow marines to cap RT positions because they're still cheap but later on they might want to re-visit some safe res nodes and upgrade them to get more out of them. The RT would show it is advanced somehow like an advanced armoury does currently so Aliens could target the advanced ones hurting them more.
And I like a lot of the other ideas aswell. The one I think would not fit in, however, would be a maintaince cost. It might work in some RTS games but if you were a marine and had a bad commander you could lose some important upgrades when you need them the most which would not be fun.
I think removing marine rfk is a definite yes, seeing as all it does is unfairly cripple the aliens when marines start getting heavier equipment, making lean even further in favour of the marines. It also draws out end games (as already mentioned).
I'm not sure about reducing the alien rt cost, as i can see this will further cheapen the gorge's primary role which is building, as people will be even more hasty to go gorge > get an rt > skulk at the beginning of the game (which i think is the opposite direction to which the gorge role should be progressing).
Unchaining the chambers is very popular (check the pole) and early feedback from people playing on servers with the metamod that enables this seem to think it adds greatly to the game. I wish this was given a chance.
Lastly, i think taking energy instead of health for the electricity upgrade is a truely brilliant idea as it would reduce any lifeform's ability to attack an rt, giving electricity purpose again (this goes back to res investment). This would have to be done with the increase in marine rt costs however.
Let's try to keep this thread alive guys, too many good ideas here to let it fall off the first page so soon.
To get back on the original topic, I'm beginning to think that both teams should ditch R4K. The first post pretty much covers it for marines, but for aliens I think it pulls emphasis away from the res fight, penalizes permagorges and might be overkill for alien res flow if the nodes are made cheaper. Permagorging is an extremely slow and boring process for the aliens in mid-large sized games and it doesn't make sense that the builder class should gain less res than the fighting ones. There's no need for an additional reward for killing a marine; as was said earlier in the thread, the fact that you're there and he's not should be incentive enough. I'd rather see R4K ditched and res flow increased a bit to compensate if necessary.
Totally killing RFK would make the game more strategic, I think. Marines would be less likely to rambo, and yet more likely to charge into battle and die in a have assault. And skulks would be happy to run out and be cannon fodder, like they should be. It would also make the focus on the war for res control much more important. You'd see fewer games where one uber skulk chomps a bunch of marines and then goes fade at two minutes and proceeds to whip the hell out of marines until the game ends.
(It's summer vacation, you know, and the authors have a lot better things to do than fix their games. <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo--> )
Here is new idea.... (I hope <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo--> )
Maybe slow heavy armor welding little bit. I think that would make HA trains stoppable with good alien teamwork.
Nice to see so many interesting, thoughtful ideas in one thread (whoever thought of them first), with nary a "marines shouldn't have to reload" or "stomp should make the commander explode" or whatever.
The issues that have been bugging me the most are the ones most affected by game size. There needs to be alien retching sound to use during games where the marines are all slapping each other on the back and complimenting Commander Shortbus in a big game because they've achieved victory by:
a) Wandering around the map according to some Brownian plan (i.e. aimlessly), shooting vanilla skulks down long halls with their increasingly deadly lmgs and mmgs (medium machine guns, i.e. pistols), knocking over the few alien rts in the process or
b) Moving about the level like a nanite glacier, leaving a crust of turrets in their wake or
c) Trying 8 various strategies and failing, then killing the unborn second hive when they accidently all find themselves in the same place at the same time or
d) Not typing "quit" all at once for 10 minutes.
The biggest problems with the gamesize balance seem to be:
1) Alien fixed spawnrate, the effect of which is multiplied by the number of aliens, by the number of aliens dying, and by the length of time the aliens must wait for a second hive (all of which go up in a big game)
2) The different upgrade schemes of the two teams:
MARINES:
*persistant *instant *free (with one-time fixed cost) *for every marine born
ALIENS:
*non-persistant *delayed onset (with vulnerable evolution time) *cheap but not free (importance of cost increased by reduced large-game alien resflow) *upgrades available only to aliens that invest in them (mitigated somewhat by proximity effects of chambers)
Addressing these two problems alone would go a long way towards making the game more fun on pubs (where game size is hard to control).
My suggestions:
Not sure what to say about the respawn rate (other than that it is a huge problem, since the marines get deadlier and the penalty to aliens for attacking increases with game size geometrically).
A possible cure for upgrade problem would be spot-controllable maintenance cost -- commander must drop upgrade packs from the arms lab to light marines in order to give them upgrades. Upgrades free with HA, JP, and big guns (but not SG). They could be cheap, but doing this would:
a) make upgrades scale with game size b) penalize marines for commander neglect (currently in large games the commander can be slow and stupid and it doesn't really matter) c) discourage 100% rambo teams e) make the marine team more customizable f) allow for a greater variety of marine tactics g) give the commander more opportunities to reward/penalize troops who will/won't follow orders
Although I also like the idea of humpable upgrade structures with limited energy, in bigger games the marines would have to build more of them.
In other news, don't be too upset about the "developers ignoring you". They have their own ideas and plans, which you must have a fair amount of respect for since you were drawn to their game in the first place. Also, they may read more than you think. I wouldn't post in every thread I read if I were them either.
Nadagast, you've sat though enough bitchfests on TFC forums to know that developers don't rush to implement every idea pitched on forums, no matter how intriguing the idea may be <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo-->
here are my thoughts, i came late in the game so i only read the first page, so dont bash my skull in and let me suffer a horrible death if these have been mentioned
about lien res nodes being free: i think gorges should only have the ability to build them, and i think it should be done from a menu, like it is already. what i do think is that since it is free, we could say that its less efficient at getting the res out. however, marine res nodes will get maybe a tiny bit more, because they are more efficient(forsome reason)
i forgot the rest.... i liked the idea mentioned about bacteria growing the res nodes... i make no sense. this sounds great. good luck.
The idea behind making alien nodes cheap or free is to compensate for the fact that they are <i>much</i> more vulnerable than marine nodes, not only because of their low HP but also the aliens' inability to defend them because they cost too much to drop OCs afterwards. One good marine guarding the node while the others knife it is usually enough to fend off the skulks that try to defend it. Because of the nature of alien res sharing, they need many more nodes to have good res flow compared to the marines only needing 3 or 4 at most for anything they need to do. That's especially a problem in large games. Nerfing the alien nodes would just cancel out any benefit of this change.
If alien nodes die easily(a single 10 res shotgun will take one down real fast), they should go up easily as well. Currently alien nodes seem balanced to be expendable, but they aren't easily replaced at all; the end result is that they're basically the same as marine nodes, only much more vulnerable. Also I think it fits in very well with the alien concept that they should be able to expand over the map rapidly if marines are unable to secure it. Alien static defense is much lighter duty than that of marines, but it's also less efficient for them to use it at the moment.
I've always found it interesting that the Marines seemed more Hive-oriented while the Kharaa only loosely benefit from each other.
All Marine res goes to the Commander, or "Hive" if you will. He does with it what he will and choses upgrades to affect the entire team. The rest of the team are the Commander's little drones. Go here, build this, kill that.
Meanwhile the Kharaa are all off doing their own thing. One player can turn the tide of the entire game with an Onos, and everyone would be doomed without the Gorgies. They each get their own individual paycheck to spend as they like. Seems like textbook Communism.
[EDIT:] I agree with Zek's last post. The server I play most on has a metamod plugin that allows Alien resnodes to emit Lerk-like spores whenever a Marine is in melee range if the Alien team has five or more upgrade chambers total (5 DCs work. 3 MCs, an SC, and a DC work. etc.) While this rarely comes into play until mid-game, it makes a difference when the Commander needs to invest 10 res in a shotgun or 10 in ammo packs.
Alien nodes are extremely fragile and valuable, they are NOT expendable. Whereas Marine nodes pay for themselves in 1 minute (3 if elec'd) and can be built by anyone, Alien nodes can only be built by one class, and it can take several minutes until the Gorge has enough res to drop another node.
That was quite the read. Can't say I disagree with anything except the unchaining the chambers. I know it allows for diversity and will mean Kharaa have to spend their resources on all these chambers, but it would remove the old countering feel that NS had/has. I agree that it would be cool to have D-M-S broken, but I'd rather have it set in stone as it is now rather than have it screwed up in such a way that you're having a pesky gorge drop sensories everywhere and the such while skulks run around using focus/cloak in the first five minutes. All it achieves is pushing marines into the A1 start pattern straight away that's already used most of the time as well.
I'd love to see a few PT builds whipped out to test these suggestions together or even seperately, and I really think that when Flayra decided to nerf HMG versus structure damage, he didn't consider the shotgun, because it's cheaper, effective versus everything and more commonly used than hmg's now. The free Kharaa RT idea is pretty nuts, but I can see it working. I also wouldn't mind seeing RT's become more important than they are now, because when you lose one currently, it really isn't a big deal. I remember reading a suggestion somewhere about allowing RT's to be upgraded for a large cost to produce more resources at a faster rate, which sounded very interesting.
Conclusion; good stuff. Strange that I didn't see this thread before.
Marine resource nodes shouldn't be more expensive, as it would slow marines down a bit TOO much in clanplay, but i'm all for shortening their life expectancy. As it is, killing res nodes is a very boring chore, and a chore that is not very satisfying knowing the marines can send one guy out to save the node that comes from the other side of the map.
My suggestion: Everything needs to be researched at the arms lab prior to building. there will now be three classes of upgrades, and these are sandwiched in with the weapon and armour upgrades, which are now offense, defense, and support upgrades.
Offense upgrades:
Lvl1: All weapon damage increased 10%. Allows shotguns to be dropped at the armory and enables hand grenades.
lvl2: All weapon damage increased 20%. Allows advanced armory. Allows HMGs to be dropped at an advanced armory. Allows the building of siege turret factories, and siege turrets.
lvl3: All weapon damage increased 30%. Allows GLs to be dropped at advanced armory. Allows Motion Tracking. Enables jetpacks.
Defense upgrades:
lvl1: Armor is now 45. Allows the construction of Turret Factories, and turrets. Mines can now be dropped at the armory.
lvl2: Armor is now 65. Allows electrical defense.
lvl3: Armor is now 85. Enables Heavy Armour.
Support Upgrades:
Lvl0: Medpacks and ammo packs have a 1 second cooldown time, heal 50 health and one clip of ammo.
Lvl1: Medpacks and ammo packs have a 0.5 scond cooldown time. Allows construction of obs.
lvl2: Medpacks and ammo packs have no cooldown time. Enables catpacks. Allows phase tech and phase gates
lvl3: medpacks and ammo packs are now twice as effective. Welders now weld at twice the rate (which is the current welding rate). Heavy armor gets 50 bonus armor (from 250 to 300), jetpacks gain 50% more fuel.
NOTES:
Welders are now dropped in radius of the CC. A marine needs a welder to build anything.
There can never be any more then one arms lab. If the arms lab is destroyed, or recycled in any way, then the marines lose one level in one upgrade group and must re-research it. Seeing that, the techtree looks somthing like this:
Bring back quite the old thread, but it is a solid thread nonetheless.
The devs have kept quiet on a lot of these ideas, but something tells me in the next version we're gonna see a few decent changes following this light.
As a long term NS player, long term Alien player, long term understander of the game, I would be greatly pleased and enthused if even 50% of these ideas were roughly implemented. Sometimes when I think about NS, it becomes as erratic, non-sensical, and pointless as a two-party "democratic" system or incarcerating people for victimless crimes.
<!--QuoteBegin-Redford+Oct 1 2004, 10:18 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Redford @ Oct 1 2004, 10:18 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> ^ <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> quite a post there... and pretty interesting one too. i realise its just a prototype but unless you make the upgrade times lower, the aliens need to be changed too. maybe as not much but still. also the upgrade times, at least for lvl1, would need to be quite short. much shorter than now.
what could work better is that an obs can be built from the start, and from there the support upgrades can be teched.
i also disagree with:
mt being chucked all the way to the tech tree's top. because it can be an early game upgrade, in some marine strats. whether its the counter to sc, well that can be and has been discussed. i guess at least to some point it is.
lvl2 armor allowing elec. this would require reworking the elec, and it'd still make it pretty much useless, because it is an early game upgrade, at least on rt's. and a counter to sensory.
the welder ideas. i think the welder and its purpose are fine.
im still not totally agreeing with that, though. it could work some day but atm it'd need reworking both teams (a lot), not just marines.
------------
as for the original post, well, you summed up the major flaws with ns pretty nicely, now all that needs to be done is to fix them <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
just dont nerf marines too much. its more fun to balance with buffs than with nerfs even though it can be harder. maybe not.
I personally favor the "swarm bonus". As well as making all upgrades and certain evolutions a one time cost. You pay 2 res for Focus thats it. You will have to evolve it after dying again, but with zero res costs. Same for gorge pay once 10 res and you can go gorge whenever you want.
Onos/Fade/Lerk should still cost res everytime you evolve into one of them.
I think the most important thing here is that the original poster identified the core problem: overpowered marine resource system that allows marines to have dynamically changing amounts of RT's and still be getting more than enough res to win.
This is one of two balance problems that marines have. (If you don't think MT is overpowered...well, come on now), at least as far as the current version goes.
However, I believe that if some of the core balance issues for the Kharaa team are fixed (and not through unchained chambers) the marine team will be effectively balanced by the Kharaa team.
Of course, the two main problems of the Kharaa team are:
1.) Bad res system.
2.) An imbalanced "lifeform" system.
The entire game, for aliens, is having a fade. That fade needs DC's. Therefore, DMS exists. Now, unchained chambers fix the problems of the current version, but they knock down NS from what it is capable of, as far as its RTS element goes. That's why I'm not in favor of unchaining servers.
Of course, all of these problems result from the average game time compression of 15 minutes, instead of say, 30 or 40.
--- I suggest adding counters to some of marines counterless tech: -HMG (no counter to that, it just kills everything effeciently) -Shotgun (Do not say, "take them at distance" because then i'll kill you) -JP (There is a counter named lerk, but it doesn't work out very well. Web is outruled) -Motion tracking (Don't say SC if you want to live)
2 gorges for the adren zapping idea. I just fear what happens when you have 5 tfs electified with one hive, and their marines welding the tfs.
You have a team that uses teamwork when you have weapons that are only good at specific things. If you look at a game such as warcraft 3, you wouldn't send air units all by themselves because they would get mowed by archers. What you SHOULD do is send air units with melee units because melee would own the archers.
Same thing can be applied here. If a gun such as a hmg has a weakness, a shotgun or so could make up for this weakness. This means a com would equip a few players with hmgs and another group with shotties. Diversity is key and this would give rambos are harder time (which is a good thing).
I think skulks should be given free upgrades as hive 1 skulks are severely weak without leap and it may be the solution they need.
We have 2 problems with the chambers for aliens:
First of all, the most obvious topic, is the fixed DMS structure. Marines do not need armor severely as aliens because when they die, they don't lose anything, since a costly weapon can be repicked up and when they respawn, they regain their upgrades. Aliens however, need the defense chamber to protect their costly investments. If the lifeforms were very cheap and reduced in power, then we would see more sensory or movement strategies tried. It's smarter to have a long term investment, then an investment that is stronger, but won't last as long.
I suggest we remove the defense chamber period. It's purpose as an upgrade "option" is a joke. Right now, it's a necessity to the lifeforms that cost many res. If you don't have it, you are putting your investment in that lifeform, in jeapordy, which is not a smart thing.
So where will the o-so-needed upgrades go? Simple, we can add passive regeneration to the alien team that is not as effective as the current regen. We could play with it, make it only work when you aren't getting shot at, etc. The possibilities are many. Chambers could heal you instead of only dcs, which would open up more strategies involving MCs or SCs.
Now what will replace DCs you ask? A possible solution is use the Offense Chamber as an actual upgrade chamber. All 3 chambers would have a unique purpose and I think that is a good thing. Of course 3 new upgrades would have to be developed, but it solves the problem that the DCs are a must, not an option.
With this idea, the gameplay has more options to experiment with. You could have sensory chambers in the first hive, offense chambers second, there are many possibilities. Staying alive is a very valuable thing in the game of NS. It gives you power, since you can be attacking res nodes, it saves other people spawn waiting time, and it gives marines less res.
If this idea is too radical, I suggest we fix the structure to DMS as it is the best way to play because of it's dominance over other structures (SMD, MSD, etc.). That way people won't be angry with the "WHO DROPPED THAT SENSORY!" fights and whatnot.
Now the next problem with alien res that is usually set aside: 3 levels of upgrades. People say that level 1 upgrades are pretty much crap, I tend to think so as well. Many players drop all 3 in one go as it saves gorging time and rarely ever use level 1 or level 2s of an upgrade.
I suggest 2 options.
We remove level 1 and level 2 upgrades and keep all upgrades at level 3.
We can unchain chambers, use 3 upgrades from each chamber that are hive based (1 hive = level 1), and allow the first upgrade to be free, but the second 2 be based on hive number (1 hive = 1 res for 2nd and 3rd upgrade, 3 hives = 3 res for 2nd and 3rd upgrade).
Right now, I think though upgrade levels for aliens was a good idea, it doesn't work as well, because you are getting an upgrade that is too small to be effective.
I can honestly say i read the whole thread... all 7 pages you bastards!
sticking to the main post. grendel had a lot of really good points:
removing rfk for the marine team changing electricity to drain energy unchaining the chambers
those points stand without needing much explanation... you can peruse this thread for all the arguments you want
now, onto the more messy resource node suggestions. Marine nodes: on making them more expensive, i concur that having nodes that pay themselves off in 1 minute... well there really isn't much reason not to drop them everywhere. i'm all for upping the cost, but first i want to see the effects of removing rfk for the marine team. that might have a big enough impact on its own.
Alien nodes: free is a bit much. there have been some good suggestions about having to have so many structures in the area first before getting to place one, but that is just too radical; there are a lot of other, easier fixes that we NEED to do first.
i'd just like to comment that this has probably been the most... intelligent?... thread i've read. a vast majority of the posts were legitimate, had content, and were on topic.
i can only assume that the only reason zunni hasn't posted yet is because he's too busy taking care of I&S or is too busy reading through all the posts for this thread.
I've long argued that seiging a hives is almost always a win-win situation (and now it's easier and cheaper to do with "dropped ammo"). The longer it takes, the more RFK the COMM has to play with and most all marine nodes go uncontested. This would also slow down the "beacon+phase" waves of marines durring a seige attempt giving aliens a decent chance at defeating the attack point. With RFK, the COMM can almost always afford another beacon.
Comments
This idea is not my own, btw. I stole it lock, stock, and barrel from Warcraft 3.
Thread officially hijacked <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
They should actually make onos and fade much harder to kill to balance out the crap rt issue
Firstly slow down the rate at which marines get res from RT's BUT keep the cost at 15 res.
Secondly have an "advanced rt" research that refines the nanite sludge better possibly taking rates back up to their current levels in 3.0 for a 10(?) res cost.
This would allow marines to cap RT positions because they're still cheap but later on they might want to re-visit some safe res nodes and upgrade them to get more out of them. The RT would show it is advanced somehow like an advanced armoury does currently so Aliens could target the advanced ones hurting them more.
And I like a lot of the other ideas aswell. The one I think would not fit in, however, would be a maintaince cost. It might work in some RTS games but if you were a marine and had a bad commander you could lose some important upgrades when you need them the most which would not be fun.
I'm not sure about reducing the alien rt cost, as i can see this will further cheapen the gorge's primary role which is building, as people will be even more hasty to go gorge > get an rt > skulk at the beginning of the game (which i think is the opposite direction to which the gorge role should be progressing).
Unchaining the chambers is very popular (check the pole) and early feedback from people playing on servers with the metamod that enables this seem to think it adds greatly to the game. I wish this was given a chance.
Lastly, i think taking energy instead of health for the electricity upgrade is a truely brilliant idea as it would reduce any lifeform's ability to attack an rt, giving electricity purpose again (this goes back to res investment). This would have to be done with the increase in marine rt costs however.
To get back on the original topic, I'm beginning to think that both teams should ditch R4K. The first post pretty much covers it for marines, but for aliens I think it pulls emphasis away from the res fight, penalizes permagorges and might be overkill for alien res flow if the nodes are made cheaper. Permagorging is an extremely slow and boring process for the aliens in mid-large sized games and it doesn't make sense that the builder class should gain less res than the fighting ones. There's no need for an additional reward for killing a marine; as was said earlier in the thread, the fact that you're there and he's not should be incentive enough. I'd rather see R4K ditched and res flow increased a bit to compensate if necessary.
...ago... ago... go... *Empty echo* <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
(It's summer vacation, you know, and the authors have a lot better things to do than fix their games. <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo--> )
Maybe slow heavy armor welding little bit.
I think that would make HA trains stoppable with good alien teamwork.
Buff, don't nerf. <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo-->
The issues that have been bugging me the most are the ones most affected by game size. There needs to be alien retching sound to use during games where the marines are all slapping each other on the back and complimenting Commander Shortbus in a big game because they've achieved victory by:
a) Wandering around the map according to some Brownian plan (i.e. aimlessly), shooting vanilla skulks down long halls with their increasingly deadly lmgs and mmgs (medium machine guns, i.e. pistols), knocking over the few alien rts in the process or
b) Moving about the level like a nanite glacier, leaving a crust of turrets in their wake or
c) Trying 8 various strategies and failing, then killing the unborn second hive when they accidently all find themselves in the same place at the same time or
d) Not typing "quit" all at once for 10 minutes.
The biggest problems with the gamesize balance seem to be:
1) Alien fixed spawnrate, the effect of which is multiplied by the number of aliens, by the number of aliens dying, and by the length of time the aliens must wait for a second hive (all of which go up in a big game)
2) The different upgrade schemes of the two teams:
MARINES:
*persistant
*instant
*free (with one-time fixed cost)
*for every marine born
ALIENS:
*non-persistant
*delayed onset (with vulnerable evolution time)
*cheap but not free (importance of cost increased by reduced large-game alien resflow)
*upgrades available only to aliens that invest in them (mitigated somewhat by proximity effects of chambers)
Addressing these two problems alone would go a long way towards making the game more fun on pubs (where game size is hard to control).
My suggestions:
Not sure what to say about the respawn rate (other than that it is a huge problem, since the marines get deadlier and the penalty to aliens for attacking increases with game size geometrically).
A possible cure for upgrade problem would be spot-controllable maintenance cost -- commander must drop upgrade packs from the arms lab to light marines in order to give them upgrades. Upgrades free with HA, JP, and big guns (but not SG). They could be cheap, but doing this would:
a) make upgrades scale with game size
b) penalize marines for commander neglect (currently in large games the commander can be slow and stupid and it doesn't really matter)
c) discourage 100% rambo teams
e) make the marine team more customizable
f) allow for a greater variety of marine tactics
g) give the commander more opportunities to reward/penalize troops who will/won't follow orders
Although I also like the idea of humpable upgrade structures with limited energy, in bigger games the marines would have to build more of them.
In other news, don't be too upset about the "developers ignoring you". They have their own ideas and plans, which you must have a fair amount of respect for since you were drawn to their game in the first place. Also, they may read more than you think. I wouldn't post in every thread I read if I were them either.
Nadagast, you've sat though enough bitchfests on TFC forums to know that developers don't rush to implement every idea pitched on forums, no matter how intriguing the idea may be <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo-->
about lien res nodes being free: i think gorges should only have the ability to build them, and i think it should be done from a menu, like it is already. what i do think is that since it is free, we could say that its less efficient at getting the res out. however, marine res nodes will get maybe a tiny bit more, because they are more efficient(forsome reason)
i forgot the rest.... i liked the idea mentioned about bacteria growing the res nodes... i make no sense. this sounds great. good luck.
If alien nodes die easily(a single 10 res shotgun will take one down real fast), they should go up easily as well. Currently alien nodes seem balanced to be expendable, but they aren't easily replaced at all; the end result is that they're basically the same as marine nodes, only much more vulnerable. Also I think it fits in very well with the alien concept that they should be able to expand over the map rapidly if marines are unable to secure it. Alien static defense is much lighter duty than that of marines, but it's also less efficient for them to use it at the moment.
All Marine res goes to the Commander, or "Hive" if you will. He does with it what he will and choses upgrades to affect the entire team. The rest of the team are the Commander's little drones. Go here, build this, kill that.
Meanwhile the Kharaa are all off doing their own thing. One player can turn the tide of the entire game with an Onos, and everyone would be doomed without the Gorgies. They each get their own individual paycheck to spend as they like. Seems like textbook Communism.
[EDIT:] I agree with Zek's last post. The server I play most on has a metamod plugin that allows Alien resnodes to emit Lerk-like spores whenever a Marine is in melee range if the Alien team has five or more upgrade chambers total (5 DCs work. 3 MCs, an SC, and a DC work. etc.) While this rarely comes into play until mid-game, it makes a difference when the Commander needs to invest 10 res in a shotgun or 10 in ammo packs.
Alien nodes are extremely fragile and valuable, they are NOT expendable. Whereas Marine nodes pay for themselves in 1 minute (3 if elec'd) and can be built by anyone, Alien nodes can only be built by one class, and it can take several minutes until the Gorge has enough res to drop another node.
I'd love to see a few PT builds whipped out to test these suggestions together or even seperately, and I really think that when Flayra decided to nerf HMG versus structure damage, he didn't consider the shotgun, because it's cheaper, effective versus everything and more commonly used than hmg's now. The free Kharaa RT idea is pretty nuts, but I can see it working. I also wouldn't mind seeing RT's become more important than they are now, because when you lose one currently, it really isn't a big deal. I remember reading a suggestion somewhere about allowing RT's to be upgraded for a large cost to produce more resources at a faster rate, which sounded very interesting.
Conclusion; good stuff. Strange that I didn't see this thread before.
I didn't read past the first post, btw.
Offense upgrades:
Lvl1: All weapon damage increased 10%. Allows shotguns to be dropped at the armory and enables hand grenades.
lvl2: All weapon damage increased 20%. Allows advanced armory. Allows HMGs to be dropped at an advanced armory. Allows the building of siege turret factories, and siege turrets.
lvl3: All weapon damage increased 30%. Allows GLs to be dropped at advanced armory. Allows Motion Tracking. Enables jetpacks.
Defense upgrades:
lvl1: Armor is now 45. Allows the construction of Turret Factories, and turrets. Mines can now be dropped at the armory.
lvl2: Armor is now 65. Allows electrical defense.
lvl3: Armor is now 85. Enables Heavy Armour.
Support Upgrades:
Lvl0: Medpacks and ammo packs have a 1 second cooldown time, heal 50 health and one clip of ammo.
Lvl1: Medpacks and ammo packs have a 0.5 scond cooldown time. Allows construction of obs.
lvl2: Medpacks and ammo packs have no cooldown time. Enables catpacks. Allows phase tech and phase gates
lvl3: medpacks and ammo packs are now twice as effective. Welders now weld at twice the rate (which is the current welding rate). Heavy armor gets 50 bonus armor (from 250 to 300), jetpacks gain 50% more fuel.
NOTES:
Welders are now dropped in radius of the CC. A marine needs a welder to build anything.
There can never be any more then one arms lab. If the arms lab is destroyed, or recycled in any way, then the marines lose one level in one upgrade group and must re-research it. Seeing that, the techtree looks somthing like this:
CC --> Infantry Portal --> Armory --> Arms Lab
from there...
Offense Upgrades --> Advanced Armory --> Siege Upgrade (and sieges) -->(prototype lab)
Defense Upgrades --> TF (and turrets) --> (prototype lab)
Support upgrades --> Obs --> Phase Gates
This is, of course, totally prototypical and I wouldn't be posting it if you weren't asking for my idea. SO THER.
The devs have kept quiet on a lot of these ideas, but something tells me in the next version we're gonna see a few decent changes following this light.
As a long term NS player, long term Alien player, long term understander of the game, I would be greatly pleased and enthused if even 50% of these ideas were roughly implemented. Sometimes when I think about NS, it becomes as erratic, non-sensical, and pointless as a two-party "democratic" system or incarcerating people for victimless crimes.
g0g0g0 3.06b <!--emo&::nerdy::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/nerd-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='nerd-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
quite a post there... and pretty interesting one too. i realise its just a prototype but unless you make the upgrade times lower, the aliens need to be changed too. maybe as not much but still. also the upgrade times, at least for lvl1, would need to be quite short. much shorter than now.
what could work better is that an obs can be built from the start, and from there the support upgrades can be teched.
i also disagree with:
mt being chucked all the way to the tech tree's top. because it can be an early game upgrade, in some marine strats. whether its the counter to sc, well that can be and has been discussed. i guess at least to some point it is.
lvl2 armor allowing elec. this would require reworking the elec, and it'd still make it pretty much useless, because it is an early game upgrade, at least on rt's. and a counter to sensory.
the welder ideas. i think the welder and its purpose are fine.
im still not totally agreeing with that, though. it could work some day but atm it'd need reworking both teams (a lot), not just marines.
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as for the original post, well, you summed up the major flaws with ns pretty nicely, now all that needs to be done is to fix them <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
just dont nerf marines too much. its more fun to balance with buffs than with nerfs even though it can be harder. maybe not.
As well as making all upgrades and certain evolutions a one time cost. You pay 2 res for Focus thats it. You will have to evolve it after dying again, but with zero res costs. Same for gorge pay once 10 res and you can go gorge whenever you want.
Onos/Fade/Lerk should still cost res everytime you evolve into one of them.
*Thumbs up to the swarm bonus*
This is one of two balance problems that marines have. (If you don't think MT is overpowered...well, come on now), at least as far as the current version goes.
However, I believe that if some of the core balance issues for the Kharaa team are fixed (and not through unchained chambers) the marine team will be effectively balanced by the Kharaa team.
Of course, the two main problems of the Kharaa team are:
1.) Bad res system.
2.) An imbalanced "lifeform" system.
The entire game, for aliens, is having a fade. That fade needs DC's. Therefore, DMS exists. Now, unchained chambers fix the problems of the current version, but they knock down NS from what it is capable of, as far as its RTS element goes. That's why I'm not in favor of unchaining servers.
Of course, all of these problems result from the average game time compression of 15 minutes, instead of say, 30 or 40.
All you wrote is so true, that i almost cried.
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I suggest adding counters to some of marines counterless tech:
-HMG (no counter to that, it just kills everything effeciently)
-Shotgun (Do not say, "take them at distance" because then i'll kill you)
-JP (There is a counter named lerk, but it doesn't work out very well. Web is outruled)
-Motion tracking (Don't say SC if you want to live)
You have a team that uses teamwork when you have weapons that are only good at specific things. If you look at a game such as warcraft 3, you wouldn't send air units all by themselves because they would get mowed by archers. What you SHOULD do is send air units with melee units because melee would own the archers.
Same thing can be applied here. If a gun such as a hmg has a weakness, a shotgun or so could make up for this weakness. This means a com would equip a few players with hmgs and another group with shotties. Diversity is key and this would give rambos are harder time (which is a good thing).
I think skulks should be given free upgrades as hive 1 skulks are severely weak without leap and it may be the solution they need.
We have 2 problems with the chambers for aliens:
First of all, the most obvious topic, is the fixed DMS structure. Marines do not need armor severely as aliens because when they die, they don't lose anything, since a costly weapon can be repicked up and when they respawn, they regain their upgrades. Aliens however, need the defense chamber to protect their costly investments. If the lifeforms were very cheap and reduced in power, then we would see more sensory or movement strategies tried. It's smarter to have a long term investment, then an investment that is stronger, but won't last as long.
I suggest we remove the defense chamber period. It's purpose as an upgrade "option" is a joke. Right now, it's a necessity to the lifeforms that cost many res. If you don't have it, you are putting your investment in that lifeform, in jeapordy, which is not a smart thing.
So where will the o-so-needed upgrades go? Simple, we can add passive regeneration to the alien team that is not as effective as the current regen. We could play with it, make it only work when you aren't getting shot at, etc. The possibilities are many. Chambers could heal you instead of only dcs, which would open up more strategies involving MCs or SCs.
Now what will replace DCs you ask? A possible solution is use the Offense Chamber as an actual upgrade chamber. All 3 chambers would have a unique purpose and I think that is a good thing. Of course 3 new upgrades would have to be developed, but it solves the problem that the DCs are a must, not an option.
With this idea, the gameplay has more options to experiment with. You could have sensory chambers in the first hive, offense chambers second, there are many possibilities. Staying alive is a very valuable thing in the game of NS. It gives you power, since you can be attacking res nodes, it saves other people spawn waiting time, and it gives marines less res.
If this idea is too radical, I suggest we fix the structure to DMS as it is the best way to play because of it's dominance over other structures (SMD, MSD, etc.). That way people won't be angry with the "WHO DROPPED THAT SENSORY!" fights and whatnot.
Now the next problem with alien res that is usually set aside: 3 levels of upgrades. People say that level 1 upgrades are pretty much crap, I tend to think so as well. Many players drop all 3 in one go as it saves gorging time and rarely ever use level 1 or level 2s of an upgrade.
I suggest 2 options.
We remove level 1 and level 2 upgrades and keep all upgrades at level 3.
We can unchain chambers, use 3 upgrades from each chamber that are hive based (1 hive = level 1), and allow the first upgrade to be free, but the second 2 be based on hive number (1 hive = 1 res for 2nd and 3rd upgrade, 3 hives = 3 res for 2nd and 3rd upgrade).
Right now, I think though upgrade levels for aliens was a good idea, it doesn't work as well, because you are getting an upgrade that is too small to be effective.
Thread hijacked =/
sticking to the main post. grendel had a lot of really good points:
removing rfk for the marine team
changing electricity to drain energy
unchaining the chambers
those points stand without needing much explanation... you can peruse this thread for all the arguments you want
now, onto the more messy resource node suggestions.
Marine nodes: on making them more expensive, i concur that having nodes that pay themselves off in 1 minute... well there really isn't much reason not to drop them everywhere. i'm all for upping the cost, but first i want to see the effects of removing rfk for the marine team. that might have a big enough impact on its own.
Alien nodes: free is a bit much. there have been some good suggestions about having to have so many structures in the area first before getting to place one, but that is just too radical; there are a lot of other, easier fixes that we NEED to do first.
i'd just like to comment that this has probably been the most... intelligent?... thread i've read. a vast majority of the posts were legitimate, had content, and were on topic.
i can only assume that the only reason zunni hasn't posted yet is because he's too busy taking care of I&S or is too busy reading through all the posts for this thread.
I've long argued that seiging a hives is almost always a win-win situation (and now it's easier and cheaper to do with "dropped ammo"). The longer it takes, the more RFK the COMM has to play with and most all marine nodes go uncontested. This would also slow down the "beacon+phase" waves of marines durring a seige attempt giving aliens a decent chance at defeating the attack point. With RFK, the COMM can almost always afford another beacon.