Psychological Warfare - The Kharaa Way
Rolling_Rock
Join Date: 2002-11-15 Member: 8677Members
Join Date: 2002-11-15 Member: 8677Members
<div class="IPBDescription">The way Kharaa win.</div> Marines have weaknesses, and that is their teamwork design: They have one overseeing commander, and he is generally only in one place at a time. Marines themselves are weak if alone, and even numbers of aliens will generally win against an even number of marines (in most cases).
The real key to the Kharaa is psychological warfare. CONSTANTLY attack, especially in the early game.
* Distract the Commander - Wounding marines is often worse than killing them. Then they run around yelling "medpack" which distracts the commander and causes them to use 2-4 resources per marine. Killing a LMG marine will simply respawn, not causing the commander any resources or time. But wounding them, such as with a few lerk spikes or fade acid rockets, is a great way to distract and cause trouble.
* Attack Resource sites and Turret Factories - There is often a gap in the turret defenses, and a single skulk can get in and do some damage to a resource tower or a turret factory. So do suicide runs. If it takes 4 runs to kill a turret factory - DO IT. Once the factory goes down, so does all the turrets, the resource node, and the time and energy the marines spent putting them up. It deprives them of resources and forces them to waste more to get the same thing back. And only ONE skulk is needed to do this in most cases.
* Distract the Marines - 2 fades and a lerk can distract the marines in the mid-game by attacking a hive location or resource site. The commander and marines usually re-route to this, expend resources, time, energy, and medpacks to do it. Meanwhile the other resource sites and strategic places are being attacked by the rest of the team.
* Harass their Main Base - even a single lerk doing umbra and spiking from a vent into the marine main base can tie up 3-4 marines, PLUS the commander. The marines just don't know to ignore the lerk. If you can get a third of their team occupied with one man, you have struck a mighty blow. Even if they kill you, they'll likely throw up added defenses to prevent your return. This too takes time and resources. Any men you wounded will need medpacks. Marines often defend their base fiercely and will pile up ther eif even one or tow aliens start attacking it. Use this to distract them from your real target - a fortified hive or their now weakly defended or completely undefended resource towers.
The primary key here is TIME. The Kharaa have time on their sides. With 2-3 gorges building structures, stuff can go up faster than the mariens can put up stuff, and they don't require a central commander to do it. If you distract the marines at their main base while your gorges throw up that second hive, you have taken a great step toward victory. If you harass their resource sites every step of the way, they aren't attacking your gorges or securing hives very well.
The second key is to SPLIT UP THE MARINES. Attack several locations at once, even if it is just one skulk - he's cheap, expendible, and if he occupies 2 marines in the process, he has struck a deadlier blow than killing those 2 marines. Marines are nasty and devastating if they all move together quickly and sweep across a map in a wave of destruction. They are far less nasty if they split up into smaller teams, or get hung up defending stuff they shouldn't. They are de-fanged when their commander is distracted by trivial things, like lmg marines needing medpacks and ammo.
It's all psychological. If the marines see damage they usually run to stop it. What they really need to do is move as a focused group. If you can prevent them from doing that, you are winning the war - regardless of whether or not you die. That is a critical point. If you don't kill any marines, but you cause them to waste a lot of ammo and run around chasing you, then they have fallen into your trap. The more you distract them from their goal, the more your own goals are furthered.
Harassment is a critical weapon of the Kharaa. They are built for psychological guerrilla warfare, so use it. Lure them to useless places. Distract them from your hives. Get them to focus on places your gorges arent. And if you die? So what? You'll die, which means gorges get more resources anyway. If you do some damage, even if it is a little, keep at it. The damage will add up, and it can strike a critical blow if the enemy doesn't fix it.
To those marines reading, learn from this and don't fall into Kharaa psychological trappings. Stick to your objectives and complete them, making the Kharaa come to you in order to stop them. Don't let them lure you away. This will be your doom.
The real key to the Kharaa is psychological warfare. CONSTANTLY attack, especially in the early game.
* Distract the Commander - Wounding marines is often worse than killing them. Then they run around yelling "medpack" which distracts the commander and causes them to use 2-4 resources per marine. Killing a LMG marine will simply respawn, not causing the commander any resources or time. But wounding them, such as with a few lerk spikes or fade acid rockets, is a great way to distract and cause trouble.
* Attack Resource sites and Turret Factories - There is often a gap in the turret defenses, and a single skulk can get in and do some damage to a resource tower or a turret factory. So do suicide runs. If it takes 4 runs to kill a turret factory - DO IT. Once the factory goes down, so does all the turrets, the resource node, and the time and energy the marines spent putting them up. It deprives them of resources and forces them to waste more to get the same thing back. And only ONE skulk is needed to do this in most cases.
* Distract the Marines - 2 fades and a lerk can distract the marines in the mid-game by attacking a hive location or resource site. The commander and marines usually re-route to this, expend resources, time, energy, and medpacks to do it. Meanwhile the other resource sites and strategic places are being attacked by the rest of the team.
* Harass their Main Base - even a single lerk doing umbra and spiking from a vent into the marine main base can tie up 3-4 marines, PLUS the commander. The marines just don't know to ignore the lerk. If you can get a third of their team occupied with one man, you have struck a mighty blow. Even if they kill you, they'll likely throw up added defenses to prevent your return. This too takes time and resources. Any men you wounded will need medpacks. Marines often defend their base fiercely and will pile up ther eif even one or tow aliens start attacking it. Use this to distract them from your real target - a fortified hive or their now weakly defended or completely undefended resource towers.
The primary key here is TIME. The Kharaa have time on their sides. With 2-3 gorges building structures, stuff can go up faster than the mariens can put up stuff, and they don't require a central commander to do it. If you distract the marines at their main base while your gorges throw up that second hive, you have taken a great step toward victory. If you harass their resource sites every step of the way, they aren't attacking your gorges or securing hives very well.
The second key is to SPLIT UP THE MARINES. Attack several locations at once, even if it is just one skulk - he's cheap, expendible, and if he occupies 2 marines in the process, he has struck a deadlier blow than killing those 2 marines. Marines are nasty and devastating if they all move together quickly and sweep across a map in a wave of destruction. They are far less nasty if they split up into smaller teams, or get hung up defending stuff they shouldn't. They are de-fanged when their commander is distracted by trivial things, like lmg marines needing medpacks and ammo.
It's all psychological. If the marines see damage they usually run to stop it. What they really need to do is move as a focused group. If you can prevent them from doing that, you are winning the war - regardless of whether or not you die. That is a critical point. If you don't kill any marines, but you cause them to waste a lot of ammo and run around chasing you, then they have fallen into your trap. The more you distract them from their goal, the more your own goals are furthered.
Harassment is a critical weapon of the Kharaa. They are built for psychological guerrilla warfare, so use it. Lure them to useless places. Distract them from your hives. Get them to focus on places your gorges arent. And if you die? So what? You'll die, which means gorges get more resources anyway. If you do some damage, even if it is a little, keep at it. The damage will add up, and it can strike a critical blow if the enemy doesn't fix it.
To those marines reading, learn from this and don't fall into Kharaa psychological trappings. Stick to your objectives and complete them, making the Kharaa come to you in order to stop them. Don't let them lure you away. This will be your doom.
Comments
-PD
Harassment is key, if you can keep the marines from expanding because they are occupied, you have already won!
Skulk in some random location.
Chomp some marine.
*chuckle*
/say Send more meat, I'm hungry.
I guarentee you'll have one marine hunting for you. Do it 2-3 times he'll get some of the team to go with him.
but other then that this hits the nail on the head.
OK.
I also build a line of defense towers right up the vent leading to the marine base. If they aren't paying attention, I'll build 1 or 2 offensive towers on the vent overlooking their base. Said turrets will then fire nonstop into the marine base, while the <b>entire marine team</b> comes in from all over the map to deal with it! With 3 DTs backing them, my OTs usually last a few minutes before they get enough turrets/LMGs/shotties on them. At that point, I go Lerk. I give them a few minutes to think I've gone, then..."splinksplinksplinksplink" on whatever I can hit that will get their attention.
Now the whole team comes back AGAIN, and usually at this point they go to seige towers and I have to vacate. But I've managed to tie up almost the entire team, plus at least 100 rps they've spent on extra defenses on their main base while they should have been expanding. By this time we have 2 hives and have possibly even started a 3rd.
Just like the man said, harass them harass them harass them, and you will win every time.
Just a little clarification there. <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='wink.gif'><!--endemo-->
...ok, personally I disagree with the wounding LMG marines. I think it's more important to deny them access to bases to be contructed than to leave them walking wounded, especially if they aren't newbies. But that's just my opinion <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->
I've seen a team of 4 players (two fades, a lerk, and a gorge) keep an entire marine team of 12 players stuck in their spawn building defenses and spamming grenades while the rest of the aliens went about the real business of getting up a third hive.
It does work the other way though, I've seen marines rush in a tag a hive just to distract the alien team and get 'em to come running. It's a good reason to have movement chambers up, as you'll almost have someone at one of the hives to check it out and call if there's more than the one.
some help on how to kill HA HMGs ;\ <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='confused.gif'><!--endemo-->
Case in point - Last night I was playing 'rines on Caged. We took freight elevator access, sewer vestibule, sewer hive, and stability monitoring. Aliens had the rest. We had phase gates going to all of those locations, so we could instantly react to any alien attack.
But it wasn't enough. Alien attacks were slowly wearing down at all of those forward positions. They were attacking from all sides. Until I grabbed a couple guys with HA and HMGs and yelled at them "Follow me" enough times until htey finally did. We pushed hard in a direction they didn't expect, linked up with another group, and immediately pushed toward ventilation hive, using the weldable entrance. We walked right by the few defensive towers, shot a gorge in the **obscenity** who was trying to build them up more, and annihilated the hive itself in about 10 seconds of 5x HMG fire. Game over Aliens. About 15 minutes later we cleaned up.
We won because:
1) we secured 5 resource sites, enough to actually outfit everyone with HA and HMGs.
2) we had phase gates to all locations, allowing us to instantly move across the map where needed, without them we would have DEFINITELY failed.
3) most importantly, we focused all our firepower on one location, one the aliens didn't expect - their ventilation hive - from an angle they didn't expect - the weldable entrance. I feel sorry for the gorge, he was the only one on their team who could have slowed us down, but he acted too late.
At the time of the push toward vent hive, the aliens had all but annihilated the stability monitoring position. Because we ignored their attacks and only left 2-3 men to defend that position while pretty much the rest of the team blitzed the other hive (where 90% of the alien team was NOT defending).
If we hadn't pushed, and kept reacting to alien attacks on all fronts, we would have held out, but sooner or later, one position would have fallen, such as stability monitoring, then another, then another, then we would have lost the sewer hive, and all that remained was for the fat onos to sing.
Bottom line: The aliens did well to practice pyschological warfare. I have to say it was working for most of my team, but I knew those tactics as a marine and knew how to counter them - ignore them and bring the fight home.
Basically if the marines follow a counter-doctrine to this one, which I posted here: <a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=20&t=12401' target='_blank'>The Marine Way</a>
In most cases marines do NOT do this.
Marines are fighting a battle against TIME.
If they can secure enough resources, one hive, and put the pressure on the aliens by the time they get fades, then they have a chance.
If the aliens sufficiently slow them down, practice psychological warfare, and have fades, then it's only a matter of time before the marines fall.
If the marines know that time is not on their side and push hard on the offensive, working TOGETHER, then their fighting chance will become victory.
It's all about TIME, and the Kharaa have it on their side innately due to their ability to out-expand/build the marines unless they stay very focused and diligent. Most marines on pub servers do not, which is why Kharaa usually win.
The other was a bit longer but its was nice, we had one gorge out of 6 building at the very start and saving for another hive (on bast this time) and I decided I would help build to. WE ended up putting our second and third hives up ath the exact same time, then by building lots of defenses we were able to secure the entire map within a short time, and the marines basically gave up.
Very early in the game the commander should not heal his troopers so wounding them would cause eighter the commander to spend resources at a crusial time and/or the trooper distracts him by yelling for health he should not get!
When I play commander there is nothing more annoying than a trooper that keeps yelling for med pack while im waiting for resources to go up hig enuff to buy a second rescourse factory.
But l8ter in game when the mariens have enuff resourses this is a very minor distraction not worth the bother so kill-em-all.
That which cannot hit you cannot kill you. Remember that, Grasshopper.
<a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=21&t=12357' target='_blank'>Melee Combat: Tips and Tricks</a>
scare them.
make them snap back to the reality that they are mortal.
distraction is death and god, rolled into one.
PS: ooo, looks like that'll be going into my account. <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
I was a Lerk during our final offense on the Marine base, and spent my energy dodging around alternately launching spores into their base at the people camped and the ones respawning, and umbra-ing my teammate Fades and Onos' that were the front line. I got a slew of spore cloud kills doing that.
When I play commander there is nothing more annoying than a trooper that keeps yelling for med pack while im waiting for resources to go up hig enuff to buy a second rescourse factory.
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Do you let your team know what you are doing when you ignore the requests??
I find that this game plays best with COMMUNICATION!!!
If the comm lets his troops know what he's doing (saving res for now, building res points etc) the majority of the troops will shut up and wait... You of course may have the "Gimmie a SG" guy who continues on but better 1 guy who spams then the entire team...
My 2cents
No, I don't believe they do.
On Caged and Bast, there's an opening to Marine main base that they normally can't reach.
Until they are able to afford Grenade Launcher, a skulk can just pop in and out parasiting everything it sees.
Most of the time, the skulk will successfully keep at least one or two marines at the base trying to shoot you.
Work great with Chuckling Hotkey (SPAM!) and regeneration.
At worst, you will give your team bunch of parasite victims.
<!--emo&::asrifle::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'><!--endemo--> ....... <!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo-->
<!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--emo&::asrifle::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'><!--endemo--> .....<!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo-->
*chuckle chuckle as the marine bites the dust*