*Actual* discussion on new starting alien(s)
StixNStonz
Join Date: 2006-11-06 Member: 58439Members, Reinforced - Shadow
Join Date: 2006-11-06 Member: 58439Members, Reinforced - Shadow
Well, i read the other post, and was disappointed how it turned out. So here's the real thing.
I dont have a name for the class, but perhaps something like this:
-Speed is same as onos, maybe slower.
-HP is about gorges (150) but armor is higher (100).
-Model is bigger than a gorge but resembles a small, fatter fade on all fours.
-Has wall-walk, but its about half normal speed (needs +use?). Perhaps this alien's jump propels him forward a bit, but it has a small cooldown (to avoid bunnyhopping... it would probably unbalance this class).
-You could do a lot with the abilities, but i'd go for two damage-focused attacks as the primaries (fade, skulk and gorge all only have 1 of their starting 2). Perhaps chomp, and a medium-range ranged attack (like Bile but shorter range, maybe armor absorbs 75% of the damage?).
I'm just writing this up on the fly, but i'm trying to make it a balanced and feasible new class. I'd personally still Skulk it up all the time; the low HP is made up completely in maneuverability and 'scout abilities', i.e. para. Add in the mentioned potential new ability of being able to 'sniff' and gain a temporary Scent-Of-Fear, you'd have the same old Skulk that we all know and love but now truly is the weak, skill-based Scout class, while also creating a beefier basic class for the newbs to feel a bit more comfortable with.
Thoughts?
I dont have a name for the class, but perhaps something like this:
-Speed is same as onos, maybe slower.
-HP is about gorges (150) but armor is higher (100).
-Model is bigger than a gorge but resembles a small, fatter fade on all fours.
-Has wall-walk, but its about half normal speed (needs +use?). Perhaps this alien's jump propels him forward a bit, but it has a small cooldown (to avoid bunnyhopping... it would probably unbalance this class).
-You could do a lot with the abilities, but i'd go for two damage-focused attacks as the primaries (fade, skulk and gorge all only have 1 of their starting 2). Perhaps chomp, and a medium-range ranged attack (like Bile but shorter range, maybe armor absorbs 75% of the damage?).
I'm just writing this up on the fly, but i'm trying to make it a balanced and feasible new class. I'd personally still Skulk it up all the time; the low HP is made up completely in maneuverability and 'scout abilities', i.e. para. Add in the mentioned potential new ability of being able to 'sniff' and gain a temporary Scent-Of-Fear, you'd have the same old Skulk that we all know and love but now truly is the weak, skill-based Scout class, while also creating a beefier basic class for the newbs to feel a bit more comfortable with.
Thoughts?
Comments
Lotta posts in this section, this got lowered quickly.
Why its needed? When someone commented that aliens spend about 3/4s of their time as skulks, Flayra said something akin to 'yeah we're fixing that', and that skulks will become more of a scout class.
IMO, skulks are perfect how they are, except for the very steep learning curve and how this turns away a lot of new players. So, add in a second optional free class that is more of a fighter, and let the Skulk be the more skill-related scout class.
Thats why I said this class should have two damage abilities. Skulk, gorge and fade all only have one damage ability in the beginning.
This class would fill the void there is currently for new players. They come in and usually play marines a bit, but then they want to be aliens and kill marines. Well, when they go skulk, they tend to not grasp the concept of ambushing for quite some time, and hence die a whole lot.
The new class would be the better option for new players:
-They would have tons more hp (at 150/100, it would take a full lmg clip to kill them, not counting innate regen.. maybe dont give them innate? or lower HP?)
-But they would be a lot slower (speed of an onos roughly).
-Perhaps make their main melee attack lower (65 damage?), and the second attack be more like a 1-second more-powerful Spore that especially damages armor (giving them a teamplay tool, while encouraging welding on the other team, while being beneficial for themselves).
-They could still wall-walk but at a much lower speed (keeping this fun 'aliens-feel' aspect)
With the addition of this new class, the better players would likely still go skulk all the time, while the newer players go this class. As such, with a more more small-scale bullet sponges around, it would encourage marines to group up even more.
Rambos could still do a lot of damage, especially if they could outrun these new aliens (they ARE pretty slow), but rambos all around would definitely not appreciate suddenly having basic aliens with so much more meat (which is a good thing).
All in all, it has potential to be a huge boost to the game that could meet all of the desired goals.
All in all, it has potential to be a huge boost to the game that could meet all of the desired goals.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I don't agree with giving any starting life form this much hp. Since marines only have so much ammo and are usually split into groups, you could just send your whole team against one of those groups and expect very few casualties on your side.
A better idea for a starting alien would be to just give a skulk-like creature 90 hp and 20 armor and give it innate leap which would actually damage marines, but make its base speed lower.
Why do new players have such a hard time playing the skulk?
My conclusion is melee is tough.
So, I offer 2 solutions:
A) Give melee Kharaa the alien perspective of a 3rd person view, aka over the shoulder view. There are good reasons why other melee oriented games use this perspective, chief among them use of terrain and distance to connect a hit with a target. Interestingly enough, this view also works well for stealth, another key game play element of a skulk, especially when you are trying use cover, hide, and ambush.
B) Have the alternate starting class be something everything a First Person Perspective is familiar with - Ranged combat. I don't care what the creature looks like but I do know for it still be different than playing a marine you need to mess with some things, make it slow, make the ranged ability slow, make it need to re-fill back in Kharaa controlled territory ... essentially, its a gorge, but it doesn't cost anything to become it, you choose it before you spawn. I did describe spit and a gorge's speed - funny thing is, they have a higher hit point just like the original poster brain stormed. So, turns out we don't need a new life form after all, we just need to make gorges free and something the "noobs" get by default, so they can "shoot" at the enemy.
Well, hope you don't bite my head off ... unless you are 3rd person and a skulk <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
Seeing as how it would take 35 lmg bullets instead of the 9 for a skulk, thats a pretty significant boost. BUT, the catch is, they are FAR SLOWER. The reason skulks win battles is because they avoid so many hits. These creatures would have a much larger hitbox (larger than a gorges by perhaps 30%), and would be a tad slower, perhaps 200 units (gorge is 170, onos 240, skulk 290).
As marines, these aliens would be easier to hit. But they would take a lot more bullets. Already that is nearing balanced; furthermore i proposed that the main attack is slightly lower, but that their second attack would be a short-range ranged weapon which damages armor more than hp. As such, while they would be worse at closing the gap, they would have more HP to do so, and would be able to cause some damage before they get within melee range.
Yes, a huge rush of these aliens would be pretty interesting. Yes, if their whole team attacked a smaller group of marines, they'd own. But so do skulks. Send 6 skulks after 2-3 marines and the skulks will usually come out with 2-4 of them alive. The slower speed of these aliens, mixed with their bigger hitboxes, would even out the difference from skulks.
And hell, gorges supported skulks in-battle (chasing after the skulks and healing WHILE they're attacking marines) helps out a lot already. Should this new alien be implemented, this same tactic would become almost a continuous feat of teamwork, since it makes so much sense (medic + heavy? Noone needed to be told that).
Gorges take 25 lmg bullets to kill. But, they tend to take a lot more because they bounce around a lot and either have tons of self-heal (adren) or are quick little ######s (cel).
This new class, taking about 35 bullets, would likely in practice take just as many bullets as a gorge. Bigger hitboxes alone would make them that much easier to hit, but you could also implement the jump feature i mentioned: when they jump, they leap forward just a few extra feet, but it has a 2 second cooldown between jumps, or so. That would make for a nice, middle-of-the-road half-walker, half-leaper little half-tank.
And the new guys would have their class.
200 may be a bit low here. Its all up for debate. But keep in mind too that Celerity will be almost always in use here, too. Especially for this class; it sounds like silence and adren would be damn near pointless.
We'd probably not want the speed much higher than 200, maybe up to 220. Marines slow down like 50% or so when they're walking backwards, which is also the only way they can shoot.
-HP is about gorges (150) but armor is higher (100).
-Model is bigger than a gorge but resembles a small, fatter fade on all fours.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It would get vaporized (36-37 bulleted factoring in innate) by a good marine. Something like this is just <i>impossible</i> for some people I know to miss.
This way, the players who DO use this class would feel like they at least spent more of the marines' clips <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />.
Pretty much everyone on this forum would try the class out once to check it out, and then go back to skulk permanently. Its simply a more skill-based class, which can reap far greater rewards. But those who dont have the skulk skills need to have a class that wont completely <i>suck</i> every life.
Think of it from the abstract. The Skulk is supposed to become more of the Scout class. Do you think they'll make Fades or Lerks that much lower down the hierarchy, in terms of res or power? Devs would be murdered. IMO the best solution is to add in a second free, base class. One with more HP but less maneuverability. It was from that starting point that this class arose.
<u>Response to Enigma.</u> Yes, it would take 36 bullets to kill. Just like how the Skulk takes 10. But how many bullets does it actually take to kill a skulk? With the cone of fire and the skulk's speed, generally 25 bullets, and as the range closes it still takes usually at least 13. Despite the larger size and slower movement, with the current numbers this new alien would take probably at least 40 bullets, probably 43ish.
Thats a LOT of the clip. Suddenly, instead of two noob skulks getting two-lined by a pro player over and over, they can rush and at least one will survive the first barrage. Or even better, if one of them realized that he could skulk and let the other player soak the bullets, then he (the skulk) could rush the marine with a far emptier clip; the beginnings of real tactics.
This new class, being significantly slower than skulks, would also behave differently in the immediate aftermath of being shot at. Right now, two+ skulks get shot at, and if one of them survives, he'll close that gap and the marine could be in trouble. This new class, they could not close the gap nearly as well. So while one of the two newbs may survive against a good marine, that marine will have to <u>retreat</u>, at least a bit. Maybe it would lead to him killing the other alien, maybe not. But regardless, I see this as a FAR, FAR better outcome for people who are new to aliens, then to them being forced to Skulk when they're not ready for it and are just dying over and over and over.
Leads to the chase where as they close the gap, they launch these blobs, which dont reach at first but get closer and closer (and you could make the splash enough so it hampers vision just a tiny bit, when placed right), and then they start eating away your armor. If they close the gap, they start biting. If you get backup, they can weld your armor up and it lessens the effect (so Spore is still the pre-eminent AoE weapon).
Plus, it leads to them being more than basic grunts with no abilities. New players tend to think that of Skulks, but after some time they realize its power (usually after they realize the para-bite-bite).
Plus, this AoE weapon would be great to use in conjunction with Focus from other lifeforms. And despite it being the only non-gorge ranged weapon that can hit structures before Hive 3, it is still only 25 damage; Bile is 200 (and that takes PLENTY long to kill an RT).
DC would be more useful; picture one of these new aliens with Cara. Or any DC upgrade really.
Cel would be useful as hell, but i think it'd be the only MC upgrade worthwhile.
SC would likely lead to a lot of Cloakers, and Scent. Though actually, with the armor-damaging weapon, focus could be good too...
Maybe this is exactly what is needed to balance out the first three chambers! <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />
Overall I'm in favor of more starting classes, but then again, overall I'm in favor of communism. It's just the specifics that cause problems.
Ok, constructive part of the post.
If I were trying to create a noob-friendly class, I wouldn't make it a mini fadenos. I'd probably make it part of the background color, ie, some kind of a cocoon on the wall, stationary, that had a faster RoF spitlike attack (maybe with a bit of splash damage) and also some form of parasite. Give it a structure-class AP/HP setup and fast innate regen, then a skulk could climb onto a wall, gestate into this thing, and do some scouting for the team, suppress an area, etc.
It would get new players thinking strategically instead of "how many can i frag" and let them have some fun abusing hapless rambos who wandered into the room, which is all some players really want to begin with.
I don't believe you can water down the essential skills of the game (like hit and run assassinations), because either the class will be overpowered, or it will result in raging newbies who leave because they can't frag with it, because it's been reduced to a level of weakness comparably with the other classes like marine and skulk.
Well I think just having another starting fighter lifeform at a different speed would be good. Of course you'd want skulk support, you don't want a team of all lerks either.
But at the same time, I've realised that if you make it a (pretty much) newbie-only class, later on when more players are experienced, everyone will just stop using it - it becomes obsolete.
It's kind of a paradox.
At least what the skulk did well, is that some (actually <b>most</b>, which became the problem) people still played it because the skulk was an advanced (skill-wise) lifeform that could do amazing things - but it was too hard to get into in the first place, which discouraged new players.
Maybe you could introduce some kind of 'trade-off' system, which is very un-NS-ish. Essentially, the skulk and the newbie-class are the <b>same</b>. But as you upgrade the skulk more into a traditional 'skulk', you lose the benefits of the newbie-style-skulk (less hp, lose your ranged weapon). That kind of thing. I don't like the idea myself, balance issues and all, but I just thought of it so I might as well share it.
I like the limited wall-walking idea of the starter class. Because players could get used to wall-walking in a limited fashion, then move on to the more advanced wall-walker, the skulk.
Btw, my bad for reviving this thread, but blame Stix ;p
The alien mentioned here would be GREAT. Regardless of your skill as a marine, your bullets still do as much damage. Having a slower target that you can actually HIT would make you feel less useless. When you're out building RTs and the other marine tells you to guard while he builds, when you get owned by a skulk or two, he gets owned, the RT gets destroyed, and you feel particularly useless and bad that your sucky skills are hurting the team. This new alien leads to longer fights with it, allowing time for the builder to come out and start shooting with you, in addition to you being less useless. In situations where you're in a group of marines on assault, you have something to shoot at. While this alien doesn't do much damage, it still does damage, and shooting at it wouldn't be a waste of your time or bullets, meaning you're not feeling useless to the team.
As an alien, working in tandem with skulks in this class would work out really well. If you see a marine, start using the bile-bomb-esque weapon. He either has to come to you to shoot you, or sit there and die slowly. With your amount of HP, you could take enough bullets to lure him out, with skulks waiting in ambush.
Besides, since skulks are smaller, weaker creatures, it shouldn't take much res or time to change into one anyway. If you prefer skulk, you can stick with it, so if you're good at NS, having this new starting class wouldn't affect you all too much. It simply makes it easier for new players to join in, makes them less useless, and so forth. Once they see how much you're tearing up marines as a skulk, they'll start switching to that. This new class is similar enough to a skulk to work as training to become a skulk. In addition, the teamwork with skulks would teach you how you should use skulks in terms of strategy.
I am in full support of the new starting class.
Lifeforms become too useless, if 10 marines are hitting them at once, so aliens need more spore-like weapons and with spore-like I only mean ranged area damage not just another cloud shooting alien.
i've gotta agree. i've mentioned gorge before in other threads. most recently,
<!--quoteo(post=1665558:date=Dec 29 2007, 01:22 PM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Harimau @ Dec 29 2007, 01:22 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1665558"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->i actually think they should <b>try</b> gorge as the starting class (maybe kick up its ranged attack weapon) - anyway, fiction-wise, gorge is the... progenitor of the alien buildings, so why not the other alien lifeforms too?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
plus it doesn't have that setback that you get with adding a new newbie-only class (making it become obsolete later) - people will still go gorge for support and building roles.
but perhaps gorge is a bit slow. and it doesn't have the advantage i pointed out of the suggested newbie-class in that it doesn't teach wall-walking before you go skulk, you'll have to go skulk, and jump right in.
if not gorge then.. Even though I don't particularly <b>like</b> the idea i just mentioned, of the transforming 'trade off' newbie skulk, since it isn't very much like NS (where if you upgrade, you upgrade, you don't lose anything except res), but i think it might work.
1) New players to NS <u>feel useless</u> far too often. Because of the huge learning curve, you end up seeing a massive gap between the combat effectiveness of vets and newbies.
A situation like the one you mentioned is exactly what happens; even though two marines are working in tandem (a VERY good move on their part, teaming up), a good skulk can likely still take out the one and then manage the other due to his vulnerability (it still takes time to stop building, move away, and start aiming and firing). Then, both players feel like they just completely failed. One enemy, and a tiny one, had taken them both out, leading to respawn time, run time, loss of the RT cost and res not gained. Thats a pretty big deal.
In a game like NS it still has to happen. And it always will. With this new alien class, the vets will still go skulk and pull off those moves.
With a new starting class, it will even out the playing field among newbie-on-newbie as well as newbie-on-vet. For new marines, they will get to shoot more bullets. For new aliens, they will get to take more bullets. When you are new to NS and its intricately original gameplay, you will <u>very often</u> be put into situations where you do feel useless; this is the price of the long-term, amazing gameplay that will come with experience and skill.
Giving them more battles where they simply get to shoot and be shot longer will simply make them feel more useful.
2) This class is meant to be <u>training</u> for skulk. Again, I love the current skulk. Its the perfect base alien, and almost anyone with NS experience will agree.
But i/we only feel that way <u>because we're already good at it</u>, or at least already understand it enough to get SOME kills.
A class as such would let new players have more interaction time with skulks without having to either be a weak (walker) skulk, or a semi-valuable Gorge. Limited wall-walking would ease them into the concepts of ceiling architecture and ambushing. The natural meatshield tactics, along with bile-bomb-esque anti-armor weapon (or a similar ranged mild support weapon) would help the player understand the importance and power of teamwork. And all the while, they get to watch the other aliens work, in a somewhat more comfortable environment.
Harimau:
I understand what you mean about the paradox. Do you really think we'd simply at one point get past new players, where noone would use such a class? Personally, I don't believe so. Even today we still see (a surprising amount of) new players. And it takes a long time to be really comfortable as a Skulk. Ive played for years, and am now completely comfortable with every aspect of NS. But I remember many, many times where I'd feel that my Marine game was good, but my skulk game needed work. Or vice versa; or simply that a few weeks off had made me lose like half of my NS skill in general <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tounge.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p" border="0" alt="tounge.gif" />. This seems to happen to a lot of the people i've talked to in NS. I'd think that there would always be at least a few players on who would still be using this class. And worst case scenario, where everyone IS able at skulk and are all avoiding this other class? Well, then we simply have some amazing matches with... the current gameplay of NS.
CanadianWolverine:
Its true, the Gorge is a contender for this new class. He almost fits my description in many ways.
But IMO they need to be separated. It would cause too many side problems if the gorge was used as such.
You would have to figure out what to do with the cost of the gorge. Following the newb-friendly train of though, it would have to be free. But then you'd have to rework the whole res system; you'd take away most of the small thrill of killing gorges; I don't even know what would happen with Gorge Rushes.
Spit is a powerful weapon. It is the only mass available ranged weapon for aliens in the game (since lerks are low in number and acid comes extremely late). The only reason it seems fairly weak is because most people don't aim it well. Gorges with good aim can get a very surprising number of spit kills.
If the Gorge was a free starting alien, you'd sure as hell see a WHOLE lot more of them. And you'd start seeing gorge spit machineguns (adren + 3 gorges, go try it). Thats 90 damage every halfsecond or so, in an infinitely straight line. Yes it misses, but with added gorges, the damage potential as well as the chance of hitting goes up very quickly. With 3+ gorges, any tight area (e.g. every doorway) can be pretty much held indefinitely.
These are just a few problems I can foresee with the gorge being used in this role rather than this new class.
Psykoman:
Feel free to go back to the first page of this thread and check out the details of the alien. The second weapon proposed IS an area-of-effect weapon. Low enough damage with a short range (i.e. bilebomb-esque), but it affects armor moreso than HP, like Acid Rockets. This pretty much fits exactly what you suggested.
Good discussions <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile-fix.gif" />
And it's not really 'reverts back to current NS gameplay', first of all, this isn't NS, this is NS2, and as such, it won't have the same gameplay. And because you'd balance the aliens - perhaps, the entire game, to account for the presence of this newbie class, and when no one's really using it anymore, the game would just sort of tip.
I still like the gorge idea. It'd also prevent situations where aliens will simply wait for other aliens to spend <b>their</b> 10 res or so going gorge and building buildings. It'd be easier for marines to hit. It'd be easier for newbies to get into (because of the ranged attack weapon more familiar to FPS gamers).
While you have the gorge as the starting class, you should also make the skulk a cheap (i dunno, 5 res?) upgrade.
The only thing we're losing here is the 'middle step' of the suggested newbie-class (that is, learning to wall-walk more comfortably) - newbies would have to make the leap into the skulk class (excuse the pun) and its rather advanced wall-walking playstyle. (but that could be remedied with a tutorial, which is almost certainly going in)