Basic Procedures In The Early Game?
6pt7
Join Date: 2002-11-09 Member: 7836Members
Join Date: 2002-11-09 Member: 7836Members
<div class="IPBDescription">With the Frontiersmen/Kharaa alike</div> When playing as the frontiersman or kharaa (preferably the kharaa, for me <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--emo&::onos::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tiny.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='tiny.gif'><!--endemo-->), what basic procedures do you all go through to start a successful game?
Would you consider primary defense a top priority, or the acquisition of resources first? Do you upgrade, or go weapons/armor? Is ensuring a second hive as or more important as securing a steady defense on the first?
Would you consider primary defense a top priority, or the acquisition of resources first? Do you upgrade, or go weapons/armor? Is ensuring a second hive as or more important as securing a steady defense on the first?
Comments
well, from my experiences anyway... you need to have 1, at most 2 gorges in an alien team of 6-8. all skulks rush the marine base at the same time, and delaying their progress, and maybe even beating them in that first rush. the gorge(s) who are left behind are to branch out and acquire resources as fast as they can (not worry about defense as much, just need to learn the choke points in the map and make sure your team knows to back u up when your getting close to it.
then you setup defenses on the choke points in the map. most maps branch out in 2 different directions from a single hive. so if u went one way, and got 2 resource nodes (2-3 in one direction is the norm, with the third one being dangerously close to marine base). setup defenses on one choke point (not much, just enough to slow down marines and to give the alert for everyone on alien team to give them the heads up on where marines are heading), rush back the other direction, and pick up resources that way, and try to do the same. having secured a lot of resources, and having your skulks (or lerks) mostly at full resources now (33/33), you should be showered with resources by now, enough to easily get the hive up. you build it up (Dont forget to put a movement chamber there and your original hive for quick defense!) , set defenses on choke points, pick up resources, and hope your teammates are good and smart enough to hold the marines off long enough for you to achieve this... might be a good thing to note once your done, it's a nice idea to put defensive structures along with your hive... makes healing a lot faster in the middle of a hive takeover, and makes the hive last long enough for your team to get there if it does get under attack. then it's time to help your team acquire the third hive, which, if the commander is any good, has fortified it by the time you get 2nd hive up. building road blocks on the way consisting of usualy 2-3 offensive structures and 3-4 defensive structures (i hear that 3 is the max efficiency you can get, but it seems to me you heal faster with 4... is this actually correct?). take over third hive... or if they're overly fortifying it, rush their marine base and hole them up in there. kill them off fast before they have a chance to save up enough resources to fully equip their team with the proper equipment to fight back, and from here on, it's just a battle of abilities and smarts, who wins the firefight wins the game basically.
that's as a gorg. as one of the many skulks rushing, you need not have to save your life, though rushing a marine at the end of a long corridor is pointless, if you can slow down the marines at the cost of your life, it's worth more than whatever you may lose by dying (which would be nothing, other than your pride maybe). parasiting marines is another important part of the rush... and until you get your hive up, all you do is harass and impede marine progress. they will all be in light armor and mostly LMGs... so ambush attacks by skulks (multiple skulks) can take out marines pretty easily, though again, rushing from far away is the best way to get yourself killed (uselessly). you can evolve into a lerk if you want, though at this moment, in my opinion anyway, other than the needle attacks... lerks are a bit underpowered and unneeded, not to mention it drains on your teams resources, which should be going to your gorg(s) to help expand and get your 2nd hive. don't forget to take resource nodes and constantly ambushing marines trying to expand. you will not be able to push them back forever (if they're any good) but if you slow them down enough, you'll be stronger than them in that tide turning moment in the game where your firepowers about even and it's all about the individual units of your team doing what it does best.
once second hives come up, skulks start becoming a bit weak compared to what the marines should be putting it out right about now. there might be an HA or two walking around... maybe a grenade launcher... and an HMG. you will be fighting against marine defenses about this point, trying to take away their resources, and hopefully, secure, or possibly take over your third hive. the most potent, and a lot often used nowadays, is the lerk/fade/fade combo. with 2 hives up, it gives lerks the ability to use umbra, which is basically a mist that semi-protects you against regular bullets (HMGs, shotties, LMGs). they do not protect you against grenade launchers, so prepare to scuttle your way out of there once u hear those clink clink sounds, or if u just look down and see what looks like huge cans. as a lerk, the best upgrade would be adrenaline, as that would give you the energy regeneration you need to keep umbra up, and maybe even toss a few needles in there while the fades attack. carapace would help a lot too, and would save you time from running back and forth to the nearest defense chamber your gorg built to help you guys heal up.
i haven't had much joy playing fades, though it's pretty easy to explain their effectiveness. you are, to the alien team, what the HA/HMG bada$$es on the marine team are. your the walking tank, who can decimate a lot of things, buildings and marines alike.... as long as you have the proper backup. you use the lerk's umbra to make yourselves last longer, you use your acid rocket to kill off marines, you blink towards marines who might be spraying nades at you and kill them off... it is important to remember when your taking out a marine mini-base (or resource node... or choke point.. whatever) is that you should always keep an eye on how many marines your killing and how many of them are rushing back... they might be trying to put a feint attack and pretend they're defending it, while they're really halfway across the map doing something and securing something else.... which might be a siege turret next to your hive (big uh-oh).
this is where a lone skulk scout can help... one of the fastest and easiest maneuverable class in the khara side... this little bugger can cross the map and cover evey inch and passageway in less time than it takes to drink a can of pepsi. this guy, who's in charge of scouting, does not attack at this point in time. all he does is recon, look for the enemy, mark them with parasites, and try to stay alive and watch them and report them to your team. thanks to the numerous ducts in the greatly designed maps for NS, surviving would be no problem... just be wary of any nades that might be coming your way.
from here, it's just a fight... they try to do something, you try to stop them... you try to get third hive, they try to stop you... they try to destroy your hive, you try to defend it... it's just a battle of skills at this point in time... if you are able to push back the marine team, and secure your third hive, you should be on your way to victory within the next 10-20 minutes, depending on how entrenched their defenses are. onos+redemption is a good way to go for some of you who might enjoy this form. the lerk/fade combo is still devastating , and combined with the fades new bile bomb, and the lerk's poison gas, you should be able to deal with any counter-attacks they might try at this point in time. also keep in mind to bring a gorg... who's role as a support healer, and a defensive structure maker (and offensive structures too while your at it) is invaluable. make sure he builds it that is located pretty far from the radius of the marine base, but not so far that it'll take your troops forever to run back for heals... remember your only putting it far enough back out of siege turret range so it doesn't interfere with your teams assault. also, don't bother building on resource nodes close to the marine base. a lot of times it's still within a certain radius of the team's base, and a suddenly built siege factory, with your team in the way, might be the luck they need to actually mount a come back (though usually, it's very doubtful).
destroy their base, starting with turret factories, spawn points, and finally the commanders chair. use xenocide if you want to take out the turret factory in a coordinated attack, or just use your lerks/fades/onos and constantly rush it while running back for heals. then that's all. hopefully you finish them off easily, and gg, pwned, get off, talk **obscenity**, whatever.
ahhh anywayz, that's the end of my ramblings... i do this like everynite before going to bed... so i guess it's better someone gets something from it ^.^
marine guide coming up if anyone asks... if u think i'm dumb then i dont have to type it up and its gg for me.
tips:
parasite parasite parasite. even if you can't kill that marine, or you die in the process of attacking him (them) if you have them marked, someone else will have a beter opportunity to. now while you might not care about someone else's kills on a different game, you need to work as a team here, and if that means you're going to end up with a **obscenity** frag count at the end because you were helping your teammates get kills instead of getting them yourself... then so be it. the only thing that matters is winning... because it's no fun losing, especially as the khara. it's frustrating, draining, and not a fun experience at all.
plz, just skulk rush at the start... i read somewhere (haven't tested it) that while your dead, your resources are sent to be split among your team... so actually the more of you dead, the faster your lone gorge (or 2) gets the resources to expand quicker... now while this is great in concept (if it is true) then what would stop your team from just killing yourself with the 'kill' command in console so your gorgs get those resources quicker? well if you ever get attacked right away then your in deep $hit... not to mention that the marines are having no trouble at all gathering their resources and building their base. the faster they build their base, the faster they get out and secure resources, and the faster they get one of your hives... it might not be glorious work, but you just need to contain them, and slow them down...
lerks, for god's sake, get a fade to back you up... your way WAY more effective as a team than as a single lerk umbraing and firing needles at unarmored marines... sure you kill a few, but with the fade as a backup no team would even advance w/o a nade launcher or a good plan... which brings me to another point... wanna take out a marine defended resource point quickly while no one is there? rush the turret factory... run with your fade, umbra right there, and just keep it up long enough for you both to destroy it, soon as it's down the turrets are now down... and you've just cost the marines 40 resources on something that slowed you down less than 20 seconds... be sure to keep between the fade and the turrets, or try to avoid as much turret fire as you can... maybe by flying straight up and down or just hiding in a corner, rushing, umbraing, then hiding again (or use cloak, though imo 2 hive alien abilities are much better with defensive/movement upgrades than sensory ones.
learn the map, learn the map, and learn the map. i'm sure someone can provide links to ns maps sooner or later around these boards. learn the choke points, and where marines would need to travel to gather resources, and to secure the nearest hive. if you know where they *might* be, then you won't be surprised running into a hallway greeted by a bunch of marines grinning at their not-so-skulky little friend.
1. your new form has a lower rescource max then your current form.
2. You lose a hive, decreasing your max rescource.
One will only happen if you are a gorge, and you have less then three hives, and you evolve into somthing else - or die, going back to skulk.
Two will only happen if you lose a hive, and you have more then the rescources for the maximum of the hive teir below it. In either case, the rescources will be distributed as normal for the amount dumped from your alien. Note that there are some special cases.
1. all the current aliens have maxiumum rescources.
In that case, the hives store the excess, and deal it out as a lump sum whenever an alien uses any rescources until the hives have none left.
2. Your rescources are at maxiumum.
Any rescources that you would normally recieve will be skipped and ticked to other aliens without maximum rescources as normal.
So killing yourself won't cause you to lose rescources (because your maximum will be no less then your current), nor will it cause gorges to get them faster. The one sure fire way to cause your team, and eventually, gorges to get more RP is to simply not spend any. When your RP is at maximum, you will stop recieving RP, thusly allowing the gorges on your team to get more.
A great endgame strategy for when you finally get 3 hives online and the fades are harrasing their base while waiting for the onos to start coming is to build a couple offense turrets close to the marine base (not TOO close. If a seige starts blasting what you're working on, flee the area and build a few meters further away.) and use them to wall off an alcove, then fill the alcove with defenseive structures. Now your onos can heal themselves there. Just dash into the enemy base, eat a turret or two, and then scamper off to heal whenever your armor gets low. (Around 50, assuming you start with full health and armor.)
The best part of this is, once you're finished gorging yourself a feild medic station this way, you can turn into an onos+carapice and just retreat for health instead of dying and HOPING you get transported to the hive and have to run all the way back to the base. It really freaks out the marines to have onos coming and going constantly from their base. Once you get it up, this will keep them so busy just defending against onos, they can't even think about advancing on your hives. You have to work quickly though and make sure the other guys on your team know that it's there.
Marines should build a very basic defense at base, and leave behind a skeleton crew to maintain it, while the rest move out and build a second base at any unoccupied hive.
Aliens should constantly attack the marine base, attempt to secure any hive rooms, and -then- start working on building. I'd recommend no more than about 3 gorges at any time, 2 in the beginning of the game.
So, with aliens (while constantly harrassing the marine base) <!--emo&::asrifle::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--emo&::gorge::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/pudgy.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='pudgy.gif'><!--endemo--> :
- Secure resources
- Defend them/hives at choke points
- Move into another hive
- Upgrade chambers along the way
And with the marines:
- Secure the primary base's defenses first, with a few marines to help defend/build
- Secure resources with marines helping to defend
And..that's about it, from what I know at the moment. A little sparse on the marine side, but I'd rather play alien than marine anyway. But does anyone have any more marine advice?
sentry turrets are only effective enough for first hive abilities, while offensive/defensive towers only hold back marines that are still in LMG. in both cases, both sentry turret defense, and offensive turret defense can and does go down against basic forms (though it's much harder for aliens to advance on a undefended sentry defended area than it is for the marines to advance on some offensive towers, even with a couple of defensive turrets there for healing). basically, they're not walls. you still have to defend them.
the minute aliens get 2nd hive abilities and evolve, and the minute marines get hmgs and grenade launchers, those defenses won't stand up by itself for very long. basically, once they have 2nd hive abilities, in my opinion anyway, that the resources would be much better put to use to equipping your good players with has/hmgs/grenade launchers than setting up sentry farms. around this time, it's always good to have a welder as your sole builder and healer, while the rest of the team push back the aliens from getting the third hive... while trying to slowly advance into their 2nd hive and taking those out. if you take into account how much resources you will save for not putting up sentries right away, and instead building a phase portal in that first hive you secured, and just have it defended by HA units, it might be more cost-effective in the long run. lerks can't kill ha marines that easily, we all know what happens to skulks, and with a welder hiding and healing units whenever they run back, you can push back a lerk/fade/fade attack long enough to put up basic defenses, and finish them off with 1-3 ha'd marines with nade launchers and HMGs...
btw, as marines, when your taking out those blockades of offensive/defensive turrets... always remember to shoot at the same time. your damage is not cumulative, you need one good round of attack to destroy a tower fast... do it slow and your just wasting ammo. i always see marines shooting up at offensive turrets that are backed by 4-5 defensive turrets solo... your just wasting ammo heh.
Essentially, what I've found is that in a game with experienced players, the team that harrasses and blocks the other team the most will win.
As <!--emo&::asrifle::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'><!--endemo--> : I find myself a good corner where I can see the <!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo--> comming ( cuz they almost always rush ) and I cover the builders. Once the base is setted up, I follow the group and I stay behind looking for hidden <!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo--> ( where I usualy hide as an alien ). I also keep the comm. aware of whats happening and sometimes reminding him of things he may have forgot.
As <!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo--> : I always rush as a skulk with the team until the marines have lots of towers up. Playing with friends help, especially after the 1st rush when less skulks are rushing. If you can run around their base a bit, they'll stop building to kill you, wasting precious time. By this time, the gorges should have progressed through the map, establishing choke defense and if you're lucky, you'll have an upgrade available and if you're super lucky, a 2nd hive. As of there, I stay skulk, hiding near their base, ready to jump on the little <!--emo&::asrifle::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'><!--endemo--> . When we get 2nd hive, I get Fade + cloaking, staying near a corner and I wait for them. There again, if you are extra lucky, you can get to Onos fast. Stay near their base, cloaked ( i.e. down the elevator in marines' spawn - ns_bast ) and wait for them. Dont forget to tell them to get 3 sens chamber so you are totally cloaked !
To sum things up : Stick with the team and be careful, change hiding spot every kill ( execpt when you're cloaked )
Sorry if it sounds complicated.