discussion on skulks
kill4thrills
Join Date: 2004-06-24 Member: 29506Members, Constellation
Join Date: 2004-06-24 Member: 29506Members, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">and how they suck</div>Skulks are the worst part of NS. <b>They are absolutely no fun to play</b>. It takes at least 3 skulks to take out 1 good marine and when there are multiple marines the number of skulks you need to overtake them increases almost exponentially. They're obsolete right at the start of the game and get worse as the game progresses. They REALLY need buffs to keep them relevant and now that 3.2 hive armor is taken away they're just pathetic. To make matters worse, the marines still retain THEIR armor boost.
I realize skulks are supposed to be mass expendable units you just throw at the enemy, but it makes no sense when there are the same number of players on both teams and when you die you give resources to the other team. This is a huge fundamental flaw in NS. When people game, they like to know that the odds are even. When you expect people to suicide every spawn, you shouldn't make the teams even or reward the other team resources. It's bad enough you lose ground and clog up the spawn queue when you die. Marines can get up to 3 res for killing a skulk!
Seems like the only thing the skulk is good for is ambushing, but they're not good at that either. Even when you get the drop on a marine, he can still turn around and kill you before you can get in 3 bites or 2 bites/1 parasite. Add in multiple marines and med spam, and you get what you see every mid-game. skulks being slaughtered without a chance left and right.
Skulk vs light marine is just no contest. Just look at end game. it takes forever to wipe out marine start but when its 1 hive, aliens are a complete push over. 1 marine can spawn camp a hive but 1 skulk will be lucky to have enough hp to kill more than 1 marine that spawns.
There are tons of other things wrong with the skulks role in NS, but I'm not going to elaborate further. Anyone who plays NS knows just how crappy skulks are. I never have fun playing skulk. It's always just something to waste time on until I can afford to evolve to something else. Lately, I've been res-whoring just so I can get out of being a skulk as quickly as possible. If I morph into a gorge or drop any chambers to help my team, it just means I'll be stuck as a skulk much longer. Should this really be the role of the skulk? A fun-absorbing time-waster?
I'm going to take a lot of heat for this I'm sure, but these are some of what I think needs to happen to make skulks fun to play:
<blockquote>-they need to have more hp/armor (85/25)
-they need to have something to give them an edge at melee range. a vanilla marine vs vanilla skulk at melee range should have the skulk come out victorious most of the time. they need have a concussion effect on marines when a bite lands (like TFC conc nade or DOOM3 melee hit). This shouldn't affect heavies if their armor is higher than 90
-they need to NOT give res to marines upon death, otherwise, there's not point in throwing waves of skulks at marines (increase res for killing other aliens types to compensate). right now everyone is afraid of dying because it benefits the other team.
-they need to either not lose hive abilities when hives are lost, or have some alternative upgrade system to keep them relevant and eliminate slippery slope.
-hive armor needs to return, perhaps implement hive damage as well since it's so damn hard to rub out marines at end game.
-they need increased sidespeed and backspeed
</blockquote>
Nerf the other alien types if you must but the skulk really needs a buff because they are not fun to play. The novelty of being a wall-climbing ankle-biter has long worn out. Please give us something that can kill marines throughout the game without dying 10 times first.
<!--fonto:Franklin Gothic Medium--><span style="font-family:Franklin Gothic Medium"><!--/fonto--><!--sizeo:1--><span style="font-size:8pt;line-height:100%"><!--/sizeo-->[pyschic vision]
elitists will come and call me a noob
[/pyschic vision]
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I realize skulks are supposed to be mass expendable units you just throw at the enemy, but it makes no sense when there are the same number of players on both teams and when you die you give resources to the other team. This is a huge fundamental flaw in NS. When people game, they like to know that the odds are even. When you expect people to suicide every spawn, you shouldn't make the teams even or reward the other team resources. It's bad enough you lose ground and clog up the spawn queue when you die. Marines can get up to 3 res for killing a skulk!
Seems like the only thing the skulk is good for is ambushing, but they're not good at that either. Even when you get the drop on a marine, he can still turn around and kill you before you can get in 3 bites or 2 bites/1 parasite. Add in multiple marines and med spam, and you get what you see every mid-game. skulks being slaughtered without a chance left and right.
Skulk vs light marine is just no contest. Just look at end game. it takes forever to wipe out marine start but when its 1 hive, aliens are a complete push over. 1 marine can spawn camp a hive but 1 skulk will be lucky to have enough hp to kill more than 1 marine that spawns.
There are tons of other things wrong with the skulks role in NS, but I'm not going to elaborate further. Anyone who plays NS knows just how crappy skulks are. I never have fun playing skulk. It's always just something to waste time on until I can afford to evolve to something else. Lately, I've been res-whoring just so I can get out of being a skulk as quickly as possible. If I morph into a gorge or drop any chambers to help my team, it just means I'll be stuck as a skulk much longer. Should this really be the role of the skulk? A fun-absorbing time-waster?
I'm going to take a lot of heat for this I'm sure, but these are some of what I think needs to happen to make skulks fun to play:
<blockquote>-they need to have more hp/armor (85/25)
-they need to have something to give them an edge at melee range. a vanilla marine vs vanilla skulk at melee range should have the skulk come out victorious most of the time. they need have a concussion effect on marines when a bite lands (like TFC conc nade or DOOM3 melee hit). This shouldn't affect heavies if their armor is higher than 90
-they need to NOT give res to marines upon death, otherwise, there's not point in throwing waves of skulks at marines (increase res for killing other aliens types to compensate). right now everyone is afraid of dying because it benefits the other team.
-they need to either not lose hive abilities when hives are lost, or have some alternative upgrade system to keep them relevant and eliminate slippery slope.
-hive armor needs to return, perhaps implement hive damage as well since it's so damn hard to rub out marines at end game.
-they need increased sidespeed and backspeed
</blockquote>
Nerf the other alien types if you must but the skulk really needs a buff because they are not fun to play. The novelty of being a wall-climbing ankle-biter has long worn out. Please give us something that can kill marines throughout the game without dying 10 times first.
<!--fonto:Franklin Gothic Medium--><span style="font-family:Franklin Gothic Medium"><!--/fonto--><!--sizeo:1--><span style="font-size:8pt;line-height:100%"><!--/sizeo-->[pyschic vision]
elitists will come and call me a noob
[/pyschic vision]
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Comments
if you have to kill them, go in with some more skulks/scream for your lerk/fade to help
First off I think you should be fully aware of skulk methods, such as bunnyhopping, wall hopping and silent running.
In the first few you should be parasiting as many marines as possible, and possibly looking to see if base is empty.
If you are not confident in your skulk abilities then don't try and solo marines, just drop back until you have support or a favourable ambush position.
Once chambers are up, 1 v 1 is more evenly matched and you can afford to be more aggressive.
Next thing you need to look out for is higher lifeforms.
You should tail them around the map as they will create your best opportunities.
When that lerk/fade enters a room of marines and everyone is emptying at them, you need to time it so you are getting them when they are distracted or reloading.
If you are leading an attack as skulk, your best option is often to take an obtuse route and just draw fire, as marines are expecting you to charge them down. Try bunnyhopping in circles whilst your fellow skulks charge them down <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":D" border="0" alt="biggrin-fix.gif" />
Also don't be afriad to retreat as skulk, you talk of skulks as expendable, but it is nearly always worthwhile to retreat and heal.
The skulk is supposedly an ambush unit, as it supposedly has an “advantage” at melee range. BS. More than often, marines can EASILY out manoeuvre a skulk at close range simple by strafing/jumping around. A skulk has A LOT more work to do to land the kill than what the marine does.
This isn’t something I would expect to be looked at in NS, but certainly something to attend to in NS2, weather by a skulk buff or another early game unit.
If you still have trouble getting kills as skulk with Leap, you just plain suck at skulking...
Only way to fix that would be to nerf marine mobility, since buffing the skulk would make it ridicolous at 2 hives.
If you still have trouble getting kills as skulk with Leap, you just plain suck at skulking...
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I don't know about you, but I find it VERY EASY to one-hit a leaping skulk with a shotgun shot, unless the skulk isn't leaping to kill me but to distract me of course.
there are tutorials on bunnyhopping <a href="http://www.google.fi/search?hl=fi&q=bunnyhopping&btnG=Google-haku&meta=" target="_blank">everywhere</a>. if your keys are in uncomfortable or hard-to-reach positions, rebind them. adjust your sensitivity to something that works, not too high or low. you might need a different sensitivity for alien and marine play, that's fine.
you should absolutely get rid of mouse acceleration. add the parameters <!--c1--><div class='codetop'>CODE</div><div class='codemain'><!--ec1-->-noforcemaccel -noforcemparms -noforcempspd<!--c2--></div><!--ec2--> to your ns launch options. it'll be tricky at first and you'll need to readjust your sensitivity but your aim will improve a lot.
download fana's <a href="http://www.ninelegends.com/content/view/115/146/" target="_blank">Online Superstar Pack</a> and some annoying, distracting stuff will go away and you can concentrate better on hitting marines. it'll make your ns brighter, too. and if you still need more gamma then use this little program called <a href="http://ensl.zanith.nl/custom/GammaPanel.rar" target="_blank">GammaPanel</a>.
Now seeing as we've checked up on that nasty mobility thing, the rest is balance. You can't make skulks stronger without reducing their mobility or you get a hugely alien biased version of the game again, just like last version.
Skulking well is all about being smart and noticing when you can go in without dying halfway there, and when you need to just not go at marines but do something else (chew res).
When vanilla, two skulks are much more frightening to a lone one. Two skulks can take on two marines if they attack from ambush, since four creatures in one of the station's narrow hallways is often too crowded to allow marines an easy escape.
The big problem with skulks early on is motion tracking. As a marine, I've noticed how early commanders tend to throw down the observatory and start researching, and as a commander, I know how easy it is, and as a skulk, I can feel how deadly it is. It's often there before the first hive, leaving skulks in a frustrating limbo where they can't ambush marines and they can't assault, even in numbers, without leap. This might be why fades walk the Sublime Way, crushing armor and flesh alike beneath their terrific blades: they need to, because skulks can't. It can be frustrating for humans, too, to be haunted by that ghastly black figure and be unable to react without command support. Then, as the battle continues, the skulk is little improved with the stingy boost they get from defense chambers.
Natural Selection would be more fun if the skulks were boosted and the fade was dampened, because fun rests in level challenges. Skulks would receive a boon from the removal of motion tracking, and it would also make the game much more interesting for both sides. Skulks would spend less time dead and spend less lives being shot at without fighting back. Marines love their blue circles, but being on edge when you spend time on the ground is what the game is about. To balance the scales, some weight would need to be removed from the fades, also making the marine game less suicidal and more exciting.
I agree that you have to be smart as skulk,
but the fact still remains, chewing res is boring especially considering the duration and amount of rt eating that has to be done during one game.
I think fist part of game is quite balanced if alien play with a little strategy.... why skulks don't go in team as marines? They should and with a good ambush 2 skulks can kill easily 3-4 marines.
You must be hallucinating.
Regular skulking is the part in ns that's the most fun (and being a LA marine vs skulks).
You must be hallucinating.
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Mid-game you get Leap which is a massive boost to performance, but you still shouldn't be treating Skulks as a direct combat unit. Yes, you can be shot down in mid-air by a shotty or HMG in the hands of any competent marine. Solution: quit playing the hero and attack from behind or while they're reloading. Leap is excellent for exploiting weaknesses, i.e. picking off marines that are hurt, reloading or otherwise pre-occupied.
More importantly though, from the midgame on Skulks are no longer combat units. If you're a skulk and you're out of res, what you should be doing is killing res. If they're electrified, get a gorge to help out. Leave the fighting to your evolved teammates, and back them up in emergencies if necessary. It pains me to see a skulk sacrifice itself again and again against well equipped marines as if there's nothing more productive for them to be doing.
Summary: Skulks are fine, l2p.
When the time comes that marines must be attacked down a hallway, moving on the walls and ceiling is slower and harder (avoiding obstacles) then bunny hopping down the hall.
Even new aliens stick more to the ground instead of the added hassle of trying to stay on the ceiling.
I would like to see ceiling movement work closer to ground movement. Not messing with the camera but having a forward button move parallel to the ceiling and having a jump button get the skulk around obstacles.
Strafe buttons on the ceiling moves the skulk along the ceiling regardless of where he is looking. I would like to see a mode that moves along the ceiling straight forward the same way strafe does.
Something like the +walk button that doesn't: 1) slow down speed 2) slow down speed based on mouse angle. Pushing forward while the ground works the same even if you look straight up or down.
Even something like a forward and backwards strafe with normal speed would help.
To get around small bumps I would like to see a jump-like function that moves the skulk down then back up. Enough to get through doorways easier and allow bunny hopping on the ceiling. The jump would only raise to a bit more then the level they jumped from (to get up slight slopes on the ceiling). I was thinking that skulks are agile enough and are more rearing their front legs up then jumping. Jumping improving dodging agility.
I think this would make the skulk more useful, make life easier for everyone, improve atmosphere by having more aliens attack from the top (more interesting for marines too), and work the same for pub and clan play.
Skulks on the ceiling help them survive. Tracking both up and down targets is harder then just two bottom ones, it spreads the skulks out from GLs and HMG spray, at closer ranges it is harder to track on the ceiling,. And it looks much cooler (I think most people imagined an alien rush to include the ceiling). If a marine makes it to the end of a important hallway the skulks don't have much choice but to rush.
Getting back to a hiding spot is also a use of wall running and currently you can't move easily, especially if you want to keep an eye on your target or parasite him. Escape is also important.
Look: People play this game. Sometimes they're good at it, sometimes they're not. Best go play singleplayer if you can't comprehend that. Good marines will tear bad skulks apart, the same applies the other way around. On an even footing with good skulks versus good marines it's usually 1:1, although marines with for example shotguns or upgrades will gain the upper hand, the same applies for alien upgrades. Skulks are not 1:1 with marines late game, for obvious reasons that shouldn't need explaining.
I will agree that learning to be a good skulk can be more difficult than learning to be a good marine, though, mostly because it's so different from anything you can find in most other games.
(in case you know you're dumb and you fear intelligent people will tell you how it really is, better make snide remarks at the end of your posts to try to prevent them from doing so)
Early game skulking used to be and still is one of my favorite things to do. When the early-middle phase arrives, however, motion tracking emasculates the critters.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming the game for my mistakes. At this point, the mistake is setting lone ambushes as a skulk when I see a parasite blip approaching. I'm repeating it less and less: nowadays, I get help or wait to see if he's careless enough to start building something alone. I think the game would be more fun, however, if that wasn't a mistake at all (unless that parasite blip has backup).
(To be honest, I'm pulling a lot of my thoughts from my marine experiences. I consider myself a fairly aware soldier, and often times I find myself popping would-be ambushers in corners thanks to their blue spotlights. I keep thinking to myself, "yeah, I've been there before.")
Most good 'ambushes' are actually executed by the skulk going around the corner into the marine, rather than waiting for the marine to come through.
It's quite evident that the skulk design is inherently flawed. So few players actually play them well and only because they know all the "trap door" workarounds. The "just aim your bites" joke is always good for a laugh because the representation of skulk bite and the implementation aren't the same and bites are <b>designed</b> to be hard to aim on purpose (rather retardedly). Even worse is the fact that you'll miss bites if you get too close to the marine or aim slightly below parallel with the ground. If your monitor refresh rate and FPS isn't fast, you're going to get blinded even moreso by the bite animation and if you think skulk is only good if you learn to bunnyhop, then you've already proven the design flaw. Press the "walk" key and the skulk will still make noise, decloak, and show up on MT depending on your FPS. Your claws will stick out of ambush points unless you know the skulks real point of view. The whole "skulks should chew on RTs" arguement is also laughable because someone has to defend RTs, stop phase pushes, and stop marine expansion in general - which means that early game skulks have to be able to kill marine cappers, defend RTs, defend at least 2 hive positions from capture and spawn camping, and chew on RTs all at the same time. Once marines make an initial push, ambushing is not an option - unless you want to watch your RTs and territories get claimed by marines while you sit in a corner counting your change. Alien attack and movement should be almost as second nature as the point and click marine, but instead you've been given a crappy non-intuitive obscuring animation, an incorrect viewpoint, and a "just learn to bunnyhop" locomotion which requires a combination or unatural jump repititions that can't be done on BS 1 servers without a mousewheel or macros (the prefered choice these days) and a system so overpowered that it can compensate for the poor inconsistant FPS's generated by ns+half-life's engine (something a geforce6800 and an 2Gz AMD 64 can't do) and a config where strafe, duck, and jump are easily accesable and pressable all at the same time so you can get 180% normal speed because it's obvious that normal skulks suck without an unnatural speed boost.
<img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/skulk.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="::skulk::" border="0" alt="skulk.gif" /> <design blunders 101>
none of these learn to play comments convinces anyone that skulks are fun to play. If you're maintaining a positive kill/death ratio as a skulk when shotguns and hmgs and motion tracking is in play, then you're a better player than I, but it does not change the fact that the vast majority of players can't do jack ishe as a skulk as soon as marines get a few upgrades.
waiting in ambush for minutes is not fun
chewing on res towers for minutes is not fun
parasiting marines is not fun
getting killed in a fraction of a second without a chance to close in is not fun
getting the drop on a lone marine to have him turn around and out manuever you can pistol you after he empties his lmg is not fun
giving marines res for killing you is not fun
everyone res-whoring to go fade is not fun
the only reason i play alien anymore is to save enough res to go fade. if my team mates are good then we win. if they suck i organize a rage f4 because skulks don't stand a chance at a come back and is just a waste of time
light marines on the contrary are a blast to play. you kill skulks left and right and when you pick up a heavy weapon you can kill every kind of alien life form with ease. you can come back from near impossible odds. how often do you see aliens come back from losing a hive? a lot less often than heavy trains blasting down a hive or a ninja-phase siege
skulks NEED to be stronger at melee range to be fun. if you get that close to a light marine at full health you should KILL him. lone marines run pretty much into ambushes with impunity right now. i know i do because unless there are 2 or more skulks they don't stand a chance. motion tracking lets me know where he's coming from, i stand still until he runs by and<!--coloro:#CC0000--><span style="color:#CC0000"><!--/coloro--><b> I AMBUSH THE SKULK, not the other way around</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->. instead of letting marines flush out ambushes with their guns, give them refillable nades at the armory to throw around corners.
I don't see how parasiting marines would be un-fun even though it might not be actual fun. What's the problem here?
Getting killed in a fraction of a second, and being able to kill in a fraction of a second. It adds to the tension and excitement of the game - I think it's fun. *shrug*
Being outskilled is never fun, but that is hardly the fault of the game design.
As for RfK: dying is seldom fun, agreed. Don't see how this would be any different as something other than a skulk either though.
Not everyone is reswhoring for fade, and they shouldn't. I don't know what crappy servers you play on, but this is hardly any reason to dislike the SKULK for. Switch servers to one where people play roles depending on what their team needs.
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As for the mid and late game, no not even a good skulk would keep a positive death ratio there, but that's because the role of the life forms change throughout the game. I don't see a problem with one life form not being meant to charge into marines and fight all the time, but instead go around and carry out scouting missions and looking for the right opportunity to go in and attack.
A skulk deals more damage than a fade or a lerk at close distance, and the job of the alien team when fighting marines is to set up situations where skulks can get close and deal that damage. That is the challange and the fun in the mid and late game skulking.
All I see is you people crying over not being able to rack up as high scores with your skulk as someone who's gone fade. Stop looking at the scoreboard and crying over your "poor" stats, and try to see the game for what it is. A skilled skulk doing his job could go 6-20 during a round and still have contributed more than his share. Take pride in what you accomplish. Lerks will spore and scout, gorges will build heal and distract and skulks will do damage where they can by being careful when and how they go in, and what they do when they're not confronting marines.
you can come back from near impossible odds. how often do you see aliens come back from losing a hive? a lot less often than heavy trains blasting down a hive or a ninja-phase siege
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I thought that, too, until I watched some pretty amazing matches from the ensl nightcup yesterday.
On pubs it might be tougher to comeback as aliens though.