Minor Change To Arms Lab
GunFodder
Join Date: 2004-02-15 Member: 26572Members
Join Date: 2004-02-15 Member: 26572Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Let's Even it Up for the Aliens</div> We know how devastating it is for Aliens to lose a hive, right? It almost guarantees a loss for them at the 5-10 min mark. The Aliens lose all of the great lvl 2 hive upgrades and must build another hive again to get them back. Unfortunately, there will likely only be one open hive left.
Meanwhile, if the Alien team destroys the Marine arms lab, arguably the most important Marine building (other than the IP, CC) the Marines don't have to worry too much about getting them back, often in under 30 sec they are back up, costing but 20 res for the comm.
The solution? Make the cost of an arms lab cost more, increasing for every tech level researched. However, to make this effective, the Marines should be prevented from building another working arms lab somehow, as the Aliens should not have to chew down two arms labs when the Marines only have to shoot down one hive.
It's all about leveling the playing field.
Meanwhile, if the Alien team destroys the Marine arms lab, arguably the most important Marine building (other than the IP, CC) the Marines don't have to worry too much about getting them back, often in under 30 sec they are back up, costing but 20 res for the comm.
The solution? Make the cost of an arms lab cost more, increasing for every tech level researched. However, to make this effective, the Marines should be prevented from building another working arms lab somehow, as the Aliens should not have to chew down two arms labs when the Marines only have to shoot down one hive.
It's all about leveling the playing field.
Comments
5 seconds to 'restore' a lvl 1 upgrade
10 seconds for lvl 2.
15 seconds for lvl 3.
The upgrades are restored in the order they were researched. You cannot research upgrades while restoration is in progress.
This gives me an idea. What if there would be a advance arms lab. Like you can research stuff like weapons 1 armor 1 and some other thing. Then you have to upgrade the arms lab to research weapons 2-3 and armor 2-3. It would be half as long as advance armory though.
<b>The armory must be upgraded AGAIN if it is destroyed. The armslab can easily be rebuilt, and all upgrades are restored instantly.</b>
lvl 1 lvl1-lvl2 weaps lvl1-lvl2 armour
lvl2 lvl3 weaps lvl3 amoury and wot ever else can be upgraded/researched
The second the arm's lab goe's down, the marine's are insect's compared to alien's.
Especially in end-game's when the arms lab is destroyed, they just drop like flies to focus.
5-10 second wait can make a difference between holding your ground and winning.
Losing the advanced armoury is the closest thing the marines have to losing a hive, but is still nowhere near equal. (Unless you happen to kill it in the brief moment between it finishing upgrading and the protolab being built)
Some random ideas I've had while being trounced by an overpowered marine team are :
1/ Let aliens that're still alive when the second/third hive goes down keep their third or fourth abilitys until they die, at which point they respawn with the normal ability levels they'd have with that number of hives. (ie/ someone who went onos when aliens had 2 hives gets to keep stomp if one of the hives are lost, until the marines take him down)
and, more relevent to this topic...
2/ Make the commander have to re-research things at the arms lab if it's taken down.
<b>Not at full cost or time</b>, but enough to make the death of the arms lab a significant event. (ie/ marines have lvl3 weps, and lvl2 armour when the arms lab dies... the comm has to spend say 15 res to get lvl3 weapons back, which takes a minute or so, and 10 res on lvl2 armour... those are just numbers I've pulled out of the air, it's the idea I'm presenting, not the numbers)
As the game is now, one lucky attack on a hive by the marines instantly cripples the aliens, giving the marines an easier path to victory. Whereas if someone on aliens goes onos and charges the marine base, he can take down the obs, advanced armoury and arms lab and STILL not have crippled the marines in the same way. 30 seconds after the onos has left the base or died, the marines have replaced the arms lab and obs. 60 seconds later they can be out happily dominating the map with shotguns they got from an unupgraded armoury.
As the aliens start to lose the game they get weaker and easier to beat, but no matter what the aliens do, the marines stay the same strength until the screen fades to black and the words "The Aliens Have Won the Game !" appear in the corner. *That* for me, is the most unbalanced part of this game, and really should be sorted.
Yep...that's exactly what I was trying to eliminate with my idea. Once Marines get HA or JP, they have them for the rest fo the game, unless they can't afford to rebuild a proto lab. If that's the case then the marine team has bigger problems to worry about.
That's part of the reason why marines have their 15 min Alamos at the end of losses and Aliens can be toast in 1 min.
Incorrect. Destruction of advanced armory in the mid-late game is a huge setback, fully equivalent to the loss of one of the hives. Not only are you set back 40 res and ~3.5 minutes, if your prototyte lab is destroyed as well, it is NOT rebuildable until you have advanced armory again. And as for shotguns, owning hive2-hive3 high-tier aliens with shotgungs? Only if said aliens are real newbies, otherwise you'll stand very little chance of being able to hold your ground (nodes) before advanced armory is up again. And don't forget that advanced armory is VERY fragile - only 2400HP compared to 7000HP of the hive, coupled with the fact that hive has self-healing and respawns kharaa around itself.
My point is that destruction of the advanced armory in the mid-late game is almost as devastating for good marine team as loss of the hive to a good alien team. Teams with low skill are nerfed more by hive loss then adv. armory loss though.
I don't know what games you've been playing, but in the ones I've been playing Shotguns are bloody good from the word 'go' to endgame.
Pretty much every comm I've played with still gives out Shotguns after we have HMGs.
The only thing I miss when the upgraded armoury is taken down is GLs for taking down those pesky vent lerks / vent gorges, but even then your marines can have hand grenades to keep them at bay until you can chuck some more down.
All you do when you take down an advanced armoury is buy time, but when you take down a hive you've taken a massive step towards victory.
5 seconds to 'restore' a lvl 1 upgrade
10 seconds for lvl 2.
15 seconds for lvl 3.
The upgrades are restored in the order they were researched. You cannot research upgrades while restoration is in progress. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
those seconds past incredibly fast if you just camp.
And everyone here knows what happens when marines lose all their nodes and are forced to camp their base during mid-late game <!--emo&::tsa::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tsa.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tsa.gif' /><!--endemo--> R.I.P.
Generally a player that ISN'T a higher lifeform would be the one to take out the arms lab. a single skulk stripping LvL 3 armor/weapons is much more useful doing that then attacking the HAs with the group.
Losing a second hive is NOTHING like losing an arms lab. Hives take a long time to kill, and generally most or all of the marine team to kill them. An arms lab can be taken down by a ninja skulk with ease. Plus you don't lose upgrades when you lose a hive, you lose upgrades when you lose chambers. I really don't see where your comparison even came from.
Um, Leap? Umbra? Stomp? Metabolize?
You're right; technically those aren't upgrades.
But I'd rather have them than, say... adren or celerity.
But making marines have two key structures instead of one is one heck of a nerf, that will only force them to rely more heavily on defence, or even build two-three of arms labs. Not a solution, and it seems to me that in general, some people just want the solo skulk to have more effect on the entire alien team. I don't think that's quite equiatable, as, just like it was pointed out above, hive takes a huge effort to kill for entire marine team, while arms lab goes down very quickly to a single lifeform after the main defence is gone (main defence=mines/turrets on AL's side if you're a skulk, and there's very little chance of any AI-controlled entity slowing you down enough for main force to arrive if you're a fade/onos).
Is NS a game where a soloing skulk should be able to win the entire game for his team by killing a single fragile structure? Or is that just a dream of the people that want those headshots/bites and sniper rifles in as well?
My concern is that when the aliens lose tech levels it's harder/impossible to get them back, and takes quite a while. When marines lose tech, it's 20 res and take 10 sec for the next spawn to rebuild...
There are multiple marine structures so that a single alien can quickly knock out a small part of the marine's tech giving the aliens an advantage. You have to think about the roles each side is supposed to be taking when you think about balance... marines are supposed to be attackers and aliens defenders. If the attackers succeed in striking a major blow (killing a hive) it SHOULD make a big difference in the game. The defenders shouldn't be able to strike major blows like that with a ninja skulk destroying a single structure.