i'd make 3 kind of resources, personal, team and "supplies". That way the comander has a pool of resources that can only be spend in health, ammo and weapons, and not in regular things.
You are missing one here thing though Charlie: marine game dynamics.
In NS1 marines had considerably less mobility than aliens. This was apparenty in small-player games. When the player number goes, marines can afford only same number of weapons (excluding RFK which contributed to res pool) but marines have much more presence on the map changing the balance.
I think some of these resource model problems exist more on paper than reality. I don't have public NS statistics at handy but what I can tell from experience, the game does scale reasonably well even to 28 players, with NS1 resource model. It is not completely balanced, but things like map affect the balance much more. I suppose some ABLE admin or so could cite statistics. Public gamers don't use resources as efficiently as competitive games do, so the problems are not nearly as big you would expect from a math model for example.
I think medpacks and ammo could cost team resources if you just add RFK. I have commanded 28-player games on public and it didn't feel like it was a handicap. This way marines don't have to start turtling after all stuff is built.
The problem is that if you wan't to sacrifice depth for balance then you are going to NS1 combat direction where everyone has all the weapons all the time. Is this really the trade-off you want to make?
<!--quoteo(post=1853971:date=Jun 17 2011, 05:57 PM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 17 2011, 05:57 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853971"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Nope they don't - good point. With more players you can have more commanders though at least.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
how is more commanders a good thing to begin with?
sometimes feels like you trying to mix combat and ns maps into one type of environment.
edit
just to comment about medpacks, remove them restoring armor.
NS1 had players not getting cool weapons very often as marines (esp. in bigger games) because of how the resource model scaled. Alien resource flow could also be half or 1/3 of what it was in 6v6 player. Those are very big problems in my mind, and not theoretical or "on paper".
It will take too much time to go into depth explaining my logic but another reason why resources are split into two pools is to reduce the dependence on the Commander. Ie, players on the ground should be able to make some choices about how they play. I don't want the Commander determining if a player gets a shotgun - I want the player using it to decide.
I agree with you Flayra completely. I like the agency you have given the ground units. Before, I felt pretty passive when it came to deciding how I wanted to approach the battlefield.
However, I don't see the need to split resources up. Commanders should just use their personal resource to build everything then just scale the numbers accordingly. This would help cut down a lot on the confusion between the two and help simplify the resource model more.
The split seems redundant and unneeded since it is the exact same type of resource. In other RTS games, there is a split in resources because there are different resources at different locations. However, NS only has one type of resource so there is no real need to split it.
At least my thought.
Either way, I like the direction we're going here overall despite some small complaints I might have. Keep up the good work.
<!--quoteo(post=1852504:date=Jun 14 2011, 12:14 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 14 2011, 12:14 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1852504"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Seems like the "solution" if you could call it that, is to just regress to the NS1 resource model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The problem with the resource model in NS1 is that "tech" is constant cost, where as "equipment" scales with the size of the team; a 6v6 plays radically different than a 16v16(they are very different for more reasons than the res model, but the res model is a key contributor).
If you separate res into "personal" and "team", you can scale the personal res income by team size independently of team res income.
The split resource model as it currently exists also has serious problems. You can't trade off team res versus personal res; you can't choose to go heavily into upgrades <b>instead</b> of equipment because the resources aren't interchangeable.
I think the concept that's emerging here is that things that scale with player count (comm to player assistance) need to be personal res, while things that don't scale with player count (tech tree advancement) should be team res.
You know if the reason you want to make comm support powers cost personal res is to allow them to scale with players, you could solve it far more easily by just making all the comm powers scale themselves.
Arcs for example, arcs don't get better or worse the more team members you have, an arc is an arc, it shoots stuff in range, and it does area damage which means it takes a set amount of time to clear a ROOM, not clear a certain number of structures.
Medpacks on the other hand cost more the more players you have, because you have to pay more to heal more players.
You could quite easily fix this by replacing medpacks with a 'med cloud' or something, magic nanites appear in the area and regenerate everyone's health slowly. This scales in effectiveness with more players, exactly as making medpacks more available with more players would do. It is also much easier to use than the horribly fiddly med pack system because it requires only one click, and prevents comms from dropping medpacks on top of marines in comabt which is really annoying. Solves several problems at once.
That's a much better approach than the silly 'if you have more players you need to have more commanders to do the really menial parts of commanding' one.
In fact many things already do this, you don't need more crags the more players you have, or more armories, or more infestation, or more drifters, so they all work perfectly fine being limited by team res, or energy, or whatever. The things you're suggesting should cost personal res are really the odd things out here.
I'd tie it to comm chair energy rather than t res personally, so more chairs = more support powers, much as with aliens and hives. A lot of things kinda work best if you limit them by time rather than resources, because once they're charged you have no reason not to use them. Being able to store a couple of med clouds in the chair and fire them where they're needed freely would keep them from being overpowered, keep them in play a lot because they're easy to use and don't detract from your resource accumulation, and that's really what matters. The comm needs these things he can do to help out, they don't really need to tie into the resource balancing act, just giving him the powers and saying 'you can use these every so often, go nuts' would work nicely I think.
<!--quoteo(post=1853956:date=Jun 17 2011, 12:23 PM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 17 2011, 12:23 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853956"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- Commander "support" abilities cost personal res so general strategies, build orders and timing doesn't change depending on the number of players on your team (it's my stupid idea, thank you very much). The relative cost of a medpack changes completely between a 6x6 and a 12v12 in that model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<b><!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Its not a stupid idea at all! <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></b>Im glad to see that this is why NS2 has two resources for commanders. This is exactly why a 2 resource model is used in so many other RTS games. One resource acts as the "common resource" and the other is the "rare resource". The rare resource bottlenecks the creation of high tech and units, and generally sets the pace of the game. Think vespene gas in SC2. In NS2, the commander' pres acts as the rare resource. However, NS2 doesn't have to use pres as the rare resource to accomplish this, and I think its actually getting in the way tbh.
A few big problems with the commander using pres:
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>1) <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->Once a commander runs out of pres, its advantageous to kick him out.. and get someone else with more pres (irrespective of either player's skill as a commander)
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->2)<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> In the long term its going to be hard to balance a commander's pres with the rest of the players pres, since they are directly tied to each other. A change in one will affect the other. We will be constantly dancing around this issue. Its like balancing a single game mechanic for essentially 2 different games. I liken it to WoW devs constantly trying to balance talent trees for both PvE and PvP players (a fu*king nightmare).
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->3) <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->This is tied to the other two. A current minor problem is that the commander is out of pres rather often. We have the option of either making things cost less pres, or increasing the rate that the commander gets pres. Simple enough. However, if you go with the second option, you'll run the risk of promoting players to become commanders as a way to stock up on res, then leave. Basically your options are needlessly hampered, and the second point I posted starts rearing its ugly head.</b>
Nip it at the bud and separate pres for players and the commander's "rare resource" as two different things. They could mechanically behave exactly the same, but are not interchangeable. Call it "commander res (cres)" for the sake of differentiating the two in this post. For instance, once a player becomes commander, his pres is set to the side (he'll have it once he leaves). However, his former static pres rate increase now becomes the Cres rate increase. By doing it like this, it allows the pacing of the resource to be essentially identical to current commander pres. In the future you can increase or decrease this rate, but with the added luxury that it won't affect player pres rate. You can better fine tune individual parts of the game The Cres pool is connected to the current Commander regardless of which player it is. If a new commander hops in, he'll deal with the same cres the first one left him. There is no advantage in constantly switching out commanders. Once a team creates an additional CC/hive, another player can hop in and his pres rate increase is also then converted cress rate and adds to the cres pool (they both share the cres pool). So right there you still maintain the advantage of having multiple commanders...but also of having multiple hives/cc instead of just switching commanders to maximize pres. New Hives/CC(including initial)could add a one-time +25 cres to the pool approximating the amount of pres the player would have brought.
By separating these two into different resources, you can avoid all 3 points above, but can still maintain the advantages you mentioned.
As someone who played a lot of 28+ player NS servers (and 30 when there were still 30 player servers up), I thought the game was balanced even with res splitting thanks to RFK (I played both marines and aliens about equally).
Now probably not "competitive balance" (NS1 was only played "competitively" in smaller player sizes) but at least *public balance it felt balanced.
*Believe it or not, most +30 player servers still had a lot of good teamwork. It's a myth that teamwork doesn't exist on pubs. Teamwork is definitely there, especially when you have a game that really encourages teamwork.
Now I know there is already another thread on RFK but I feel it really helped in NS1 and it can help too in NS2.
(Plus I do like the fact aliens had "individuality" thanks to having their own res to spend.)
<b>For NS2 (since both teams now have commanders and their own res pool):</b> I like the idea of team and player resources being combined (commanders for either team decide how much each player obtains from either RTs and/or RFK).
Also how about making it so that if the commander gives a high percentage of the total res to individual players, their will be a bit of bonus res gained.
<b>Like for example a commander can give 90% of all res earned (res nodes and RFK) to players but if the commander does that, 20% bonus resources are gained.</b>
Players cannot give resources to the commander but lets say they help tech to an extent. Gorges could be changed to be able to build everything a commander could build (including hives possibly). Marines could have a way to also help tech (though maybe not. It could be kept so that the commander still builds but if the resource is pooled to the marines, they'll at least gain weapons a lot faster).
<b>What this does is give commanders (and their team) a choice - Does the commander want to pool all their resources to themselves so they get a specific job (like building another hive for example) faster? Or do they want to split it up to the players to get the bonus resource but tech slower (due to the fact that no single player will have enough resources to build a hive at a specific time).</b>
<b>Also changing how resources are divided could have some sort of penalty or cooldown (lets say there's a one minute cooldown).</b>
While it may seem that giving resources to players is the best choice (grants +20% res bonus [this number is just an example]), it's not true because it slows down tech significantly.
Instead of a commander getting 50 res per minute (for example) and saving it to spend it on a hive that lets say costs 70 resources, the commander could give 90% of the resource earned to aliens (that'd be 40 res per minute divided by <n> players) but there'd be a 20% bonus (so 44 res divided by <n> players).
[Note - Res splitting could be done for both resource node res and RFK. In case of RFK, it'd be split towards everyone rather than given to players individually that NS1).
So lets say there are 12 players on a team (1 is the com) so 11). That'd mean each player would only be given 4 res per minute. However if aliens could hold out a while, they could slowly be able to "all" be able to go to a higher lifeform (lerk for example) or build hydras faster.
Or this idea could be adjusted and RFK is not split but given to each player individuality (but the 20% bonus res will apply to RFK too. )
Err well actually I'm not sure about how things work (a lot of experimenting needs to be done) but I feel the resource model can be changed to something similar to NS1 (with res splitting) and still works.
I definitely feel that res splitting would be fine (well at least it worked in NS1).
Aliens in NS1 (for example) - No commander was needed because each player (well players who decide to be a gorge) could sort of be a mini commander (helping with tech, helping with resources, etc). This worked even in pubs (again I always hear a lot that pubs have no teamwork but most have a good amount which is why NS1 is still alive[barely unfortunately] today). <b>In bigger player servers, that'd still be true thanks to individual RFK (aliens could have a hive up by 2-3 minutes even in a 30 player game)</b>.
(Note - Sorry if the post was kind of jumbled and unclear. I wasn't sure [and still kind of] where I was going with the post).
<!--quoteo(post=1854001:date=Jun 18 2011, 03:48 AM:name=Soylent_green)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Soylent_green @ Jun 18 2011, 03:48 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854001"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The problem with the resource model in NS1 is that "tech" is constant cost, where as "equipment" scales with the size of the team; a 6v6 plays radically different than a 16v16(they are very different for more reasons than the res model, but the res model is a key contributor).
If you separate res into "personal" and "team", you can scale the personal res income by team size independently of team res income.
The split resource model as it currently exists also has serious problems. You can't trade off team res versus personal res; you can't choose to go heavily into upgrades <b>instead</b> of equipment because the resources aren't interchangeable.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> I know all this. I've actually explained all the same things in other threads, though less concisely than you did, admittedly. <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=113685&st=200&p=1852888&#entry1852888" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/in...p;#entry1852888</a> <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=113685&st=220&p=1853735&#entry1853735" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/in...p;#entry1853735</a> Sample: <!--quoteo(post=1852888:date=Jun 15 2011, 12:18 PM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 15 2011, 12:18 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1852888"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->tl;dr: 1a) Team res does not scale, but largely unnecessary. 1b) Personal res scales perfectly. 2a) Personal res should not have RFK since it messes up the scaling. 2b) Team res should have RFK since it helps scaling. Team res should be more important. 3a) Change mantra to: Personal resources for personal things (ammo, medpack, weapons); team resources for team things (ARC, MAC, structures, tech). 3b) Basic theory of independent personal and team resources is sound, but needs tweaking (see above). 4a) Increased abundance of better units should be managed through unit-vs-unit balance, rather than team-vs-team balance. (No more high-cost super-units.) 4b) Focus on economy game is reduced, but inevitable (and imo acceptable).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Anyway, regarding what <b>Charlie</b> said: <!--quoteo(post=1853956:date=Jun 18 2011, 01:23 AM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 18 2011, 01:23 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853956"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- Commander "support" abilities cost personal res so general strategies, build orders and timing doesn't change depending on the number of players on your team (it's my stupid idea, thank you very much). The relative cost of a medpack changes completely between a 6x6 and a 12v12 in that model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Or, <!--coloro:#00FF00--><span style="color:#00FF00"><!--/coloro-->"support should scale with player count".<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> I don't think it does with the current system anyway: assuming a single commander (<b>the de facto standard</b>). Team resources do not scale (and generally do not need to), and a <b>single player's</b> (the commander's) personal resource also does not scale. With increasing numbers of players, it doesn't matter which of these resources you use, you'll still have less resources available for support per capita.
Now, <b><i>moving RFK to team, and support costs to team</i></b>, does help with this scaling issue, because RFK is largely dependent on player count (assuming all things are equal: the more players you have, the more killers you have; and the more players the enemy has, the more kills your team can have; therefore, the sum of RFK increases with server player count).
The lack of personal RFK would also discourage (or at least, not encourage) rambo behaviour, and with res towers being the only source of personal res, they become important to players on the ground again (for you and the enemy).
The only real issue I currently see with this suggestion is that, just as in NS1, the major resource expenditure for the alien team was on life-forms, and that's now handled by personal resources; basically, there's just a lot less that the alien team will gain from team RFK since they have so little to spend team res on.
There's also the issue of plain and simple team res overabundance, <u>but</u> this will be mitigated to some extent by moving support costs to team res, and for the rest you could just simply reduce the team res income (or increase all the team res costs).
one way to solve the life-form glut / useless skulk problem is to just give skulks really awesome upgrades that other class don't get, for example the skulk can spend 40-50 res on upgrades becoming a super skulk.
In ns1 combat, being a super skulk with 4 or 5 upgrades was a lot of fun, I think you could make it so the skulk had a unique stealth/assassin type role late game, or maybe a power grid / building disruption field or something.
If skulks could spend a lots of res on upgrades, it might make the choice of going super skulk vs going fade interesting.
For the marines, how about (some percentage) say 90% of all Pres goes into the commander pool. Not the person playing as commander but avaliable to whoever jumps in.
This way the commander still has control on how the equipment is distributed allowing strats that require certain roll outs of weapons. The remaining 10% just pools with the individual players so that they can earn themselves a weapon if the com is being a tight-ass.
Having it this way allows the commander to have enough Pres to use adequately but prevents the issue of every other marine being flooded with res.
This should also give you another avenue to balance around (changing percentage player/com pool and the total rate at which it comes in)
<!--quoteo(post=1854099:date=Jun 17 2011, 10:45 PM:name=Techercizer)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Techercizer @ Jun 17 2011, 10:45 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854099"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I like dis new weapon...<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Well I'm glad you like it.
<!--quoteo(post=1854112:date=Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854112"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->3a) Change mantra to: Personal resources for personal things (ammo, medpack, weapons); team resources for team things (ARC, MAC, structures, tech).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Frankly we should probably get rid of such mantras. Unless the mantra is based on the principle that game pace and overall balance of the game takes precedence.
However, what constitutes as "personal" or "team" can be very arbitrary, and basing costs off this idea seems somewhat odd. If later its deemed that dropped weapons should probably cost tres, I don't want us to hesitate incorporating it just because it goes against some hard rule that no longer applies.
This type of arbitrary separation of items to a particular resource type is what Solyent green was talking about I believe. Since each type uses their own resource, they both progress linearly and separate in relation to each other. There is no trade-off between the two. For example, why couldn't a sentry turret cost 3-commander pres and 7-tres, instead of just tres or just pres? It would make it nearly as affordable in the early game...but a commander would think twice about mindlessly spamming it in the late game, since it could deplete his pres rather quickly. This goes back to the idea that the "rare resource" establishes pace. It also forces choosing the tradeoff of more defense for less support/tech/ect...
<!--quoteo(post=1854112:date=Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854112"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Anyway, regarding what <b>Charlie</b> said:
Or, <!--coloro:#00FF00--><span style="color:#00FF00"><!--/coloro-->"support should scale with player count".<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> I don't think it does with the current system anyway: assuming a single commander (<b>the de facto standard</b>). Team resources do not scale (and generally do not need to), and a <b>single player's</b> (the commander's) personal resource also does not scale. With increasing numbers of players, it doesn't matter which of these resources you use, you'll still have less resources available for support per capita.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well it seems they want more commanders playing in larger games to become a standard. But other than that there should be more group wide assist abilities..that come to their own in larger games. A commander could also drop "ammo crates" and "medical supply crates" (instead of just individual packs). They cost more, only last a limited time (10-30secs), but are able heal larger number of players simultaneously (think of it as a mini armory). In smaller games they might not be as efficient, but in larger games it beats spamming ammo/medpacks all over the place.
<!--quoteo(post=1853956:date=Jun 17 2011, 07:23 PM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 17 2011, 07:23 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853956"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Great thread guys. Some thoughts:
- I don't like the idea of less choices, but I don't want to go back to the old NS1 resource model either. I'd rather have less depth then make the overall game balance fragile and difficult to manage. The idea is that the team IS making strategic trade-offs here though: the commander has to decide whether to research shotguns or not, and that costs team resources. I think that weapon-research may just be too cheap though, that might improve tradeoffs nicely. It probably won't ever be at the RTS/NS1 level where the commander totally chooses the amount of offense, but that's the tradeoff inherent in this model. To me it's more important that the overall balance and pacing scale properly with players, and that players don't get tech-starved because there are too many players on the server (ie, there aren't enough shotguns to go around). One major difference between NS1 and NS2 is that NS1 sometimes gave a higher priority to the RTS experience and NS2 will probably always give priority to the FPS experience (which makes sense because more players are experiencing it as a FPS).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I understand your reasoning, but I still think the res model doesn't have to be as limiting. Sure, we can still make some decisions like building an observatory or researching shotguns instead. However those decisions are mostly limited to the area of teching. In NS1 things like med/ammo support vs. research, weapon drops vs. research or weapon drops vs. med/ammo support played a role. They made managing the resources a bit more challenging.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- Commander "support" abilities cost personal res so general strategies, build orders and timing doesn't change depending on the number of players on your team (it's my stupid idea, thank you very much). The relative cost of a medpack changes completely between a 6x6 and a 12v12 in that model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The relative cost changes, but the res income doesn't. Also, like mentioned before, there is always the problem that personal res need to be balanced for two aspects, namely weapons and comm support. You could make support abilities cost team res and split RFK into team and personal res. That way, the team res income from RFK balances out the different team sizes.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- I like the idea of infestation and drifters costing personal res and would fulfill my goals of having multiple commanders change the game. 2-3 commanders could spread infestation 2-3x (at a cost of less offense) and that would really change the game in a cool way. <b>Update:</b> Although the current Hive/energy system planned for this in that you're not supposed to be able to use a Hive's energy-abilities if you're not in it (but it's a bit clunky).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The alien comm has not that much to do, to justify multiple commanders. In practice a few field players are going to jump into a hive every now and then to spread some infestation, then get back on the field. Why not make infestation and drifters (and macs) cost team res? Their cost is not dependant on team size, shouldn't be too hard to balance that.
<!--quoteo(post=1853998:date=Jun 17 2011, 09:29 PM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 17 2011, 09:29 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853998"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->NS1 had players not getting cool weapons very often as marines (esp. in bigger games) because of how the resource model scaled. Alien resource flow could also be half or 1/3 of what it was in 6v6 player. Those are very big problems in my mind, and not theoretical or "on paper".
It will take too much time to go into depth explaining my logic but another reason why resources are split into two pools is to reduce the dependence on the Commander. Ie, players on the ground should be able to make some choices about how they play. I don't want the Commander determining if a player gets a shotgun - I want the player using it to decide.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think players buying their own equipment is an acceptable compromise between the FPS and RTS sides. I didn't mind how it worked in NS1, but I see the reason for changing it for NS2.
What about this: - The commander only spends team res (exception: weapon drops) - Field players only spend personal res - The commander buys weapons with his personal res* - RFK is split between team res and personal res by some %, thereby balancing support costs for different team sizes
*The alien comm also needs something to spend personal res on. Maybe infestation after all?
Results: - All trade-offs from NS1 are present, ... - ...except weapons/lifeforms are bought by players, enabling them to make choices on their own. - The commanders always have a reason to spend their res, ... - ...while not being starved by the limited pres income.
Each Command Station provides an Energy pool that only the Commander in that Chair can spend. All Structures use Energy from the Chair to perform most single-use actions. So far this includes:<ul><li><b>Command Station</b>: Nano-Grid Defense</li><li><b>Extractors</b>: Timed Production Speed Buff?</li><li><b>Infantry Portal</b>: Transponder (Global: The next Marine will respawn at the location of the last Squad he was in, instead of the IP?)</li><li><b>Armory</b>: Drop Weapon, Drop Ammo Pack</li><li><b>Advanced Armory</b>: Drop Catalyst Pack</li><li><b>Robotics Factory</b>: Build ARC, Build MAC</li><li><b>Arms Lab</b>: Drop Med Pack</li><li><b>Observatory</b>: Scanner Sweep, Distress Beacon</li><li><b>Prototype Lab</b>: Drop Jetpack, Drop Exosuit</li></ul>
Commander-controlled units are owned by the Command Chair that spent the Energy to create the unit. They can only be controlled by the Commander in the chair at that time.
Commanders only spend P.Res to produce entities they directly control that have the capacity to build structures or kill enemies. This includes building MACs (Mines?), ARCs, and Sentry Turrets.
Commanders are awarded P.Res for unit and structure kills (ResAward = 25% of the Point Value instead of random 1 - 3?) with entities directly controlled by the Commander. This includes MAC Mines, ARCs, and Sentry Turrets.
This way, Commander doesn't have to spend P.Res on purchases that don't directly enable him. Additionally, multiple Commanders become beneficial with Chair-specific Energy pools, but it's still unclear whether this is a good thing.
<!--quoteo(post=1853956:date=Jun 17 2011, 01:23 PM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 17 2011, 01:23 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853956"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- I like the idea of infestation and drifters costing personal res and would fulfill my goals of having multiple commanders change the game. 2-3 commanders could spread infestation 2-3x (at a cost of less offense) and that would really change the game in a cool way. <b>Update:</b> Although the current Hive/energy system planned for this in that you're not supposed to be able to use a Hive's energy-abilities if you're not in it (but it's a bit clunky).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> If only that Hive's Commander/Overlord could use that Hive's Energy, Infestation growth would increase with multiple comms anyways, so changing to P.Res may not be necessary. Besides, if the Shift is going to be increasing the Energy Regeneration rates of nearby structures, that would also be a way to increase Infestation growth, but only if we stayed on the Energy-based model.
I partially go over what I think is wrong with the current marine resource model <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL6lVP6Scv4" target="_blank">here</a>.
If you're too lazy to watch: Marines shouldn't be able to all get shotguns AS WELL AS any tech of their choosing.
<!--quoteo(post=1854318:date=Jun 18 2011, 02:40 PM:name=KuBaN)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (KuBaN @ Jun 18 2011, 02:40 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854318"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Each Command Station provides an Energy pool that only the Commander in that Chair can spend. All Structures use Energy from the Chair to perform most single-use actions. So far this includes:<ul><li>Command Station: Nano-Grid Defense</li><li>Extractors: Timed Production Speed Buff?</li><li>Infantry Portal: Transponder (Global: The next Marine will respawn at the location of the last Squad he was in, instead of the IP?)</li><li>Armory: Drop Weapon, Drop Ammo Pack</li><li>Advanced Armory: Drop Catalyst Pack</li><li>Robotics Factory: Build ARC, Build MAC</li><li>Arms Lab: Drop Med Pack</li><li>Observatory: Scanner Sweep, Distress Beacon</li><li>Prototype Lab: Drop Jetpack, Drop Exosuit</li></ul> Commander-controlled units are owned by the Command Chair that spent the Energy to create the unit. They can only be controlled by the Commander in the chair at that time. Commanders only spend P.Res to produce entities they directly control that have the capacity to build structures or kill enemies. This includes building MACs (Mines?), ARCs, and Sentry Turrets. Commanders are awarded P.Res for unit and structure kills (ResAward = 25% of the Point Value instead of random 1 - 3?) with entities directly controlled by the Commander. This includes MAC Mines, ARCs, and Sentry Turrets. This way, Commander doesn't have to spend P.Res on purchases that don't directly enable him. Additionally, multiple Commanders become beneficial with Chair-specific Energy pools, but it's still unclear whether this is a good thing.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The problem I see with this is that it further separates and isolates items/tech/ect into simple to manage categories for the commander to deal with. There are less tradeoffs, less hard decisions to be made and less ways to bottleneck certain items/tech.
Its easy when you know everything from column A can be bought with Pres. Everything from column B can be bought with Tres. Everything from column C can be bought with energy. There is less to worry about. There is no hard decision of focusing your limited resources on either column A, B or C...because columns A, B and C will progress on their own independent of each other making the game more predictable and stale in the long run.
We shouldn't pigeonhole things into separate categories which only one type of resource can acquire. It should be perfectly fine if certain items cost multiple resources...either to prevent spamming and/or dictate pacing/balance. And again, what gets placed into these categories seems very arbitrary right now, and not necessarily dictated by whats needed for pacing/balance.
<!--quoteo(post=1854321:date=Jun 18 2011, 02:49 PM:name=TrueVeritas)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (TrueVeritas @ Jun 18 2011, 02:49 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854321"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I partially go over what I think is wrong with the current marine resource model <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL6lVP6Scv4" target="_blank">here</a>.
If you're too lazy to watch: Marines shouldn't be able to all get shotguns AS WELL AS any tech of their choosing.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Its too early to tell if you predictions will ring true, but I think you might have point about shotguns. In general Pres is another separation and isolation of a particular tech that I mentioned above. There is no tradeoff for commander of either handing out weapons or doing something else, since its now largely in the hands of the players. I think the lowering of shotgun price might have been a step in the wrong direction. I rather see marine weapons being bit pricey, making them rely a bit more on commander drops. However weapon drops are themselves extremely pricey for the commander right now, so you hardly ever see it. The devs however can't lower the pres price of weapon drops, since players will just get their weapons via the CC and ignore the armory. Another reason why commander shouldn't use pres and should have their own distinct resource(s).
<!--quoteo(post=1854346:date=Jun 18 2011, 06:24 PM:name=OutlawDr)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (OutlawDr @ Jun 18 2011, 06:24 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854346"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The problem I see with this is that it further separates and isolates items/tech/ect into simple to manage categories for the commander to deal with. There are less tradeoffs, less hard decisions to be made and less ways to bottleneck certain items/tech.
Its easy when you know everything from column A can be bought with Pres. Everything from column B can be bought with Tres. Everything from column C can be bought with energy. There is less to worry about. There is no hard decision of focusing your limited resources on either column A, B or C...because columns A, B and C will progress on their own independent of each other making the game more predictable and stale in the long run.
We shouldn't pigeonhole things into separate categories which only one type of resource can acquire. It should be perfectly fine if certain items cost multiple resources...either to prevent spamming and/or dictate pacing/balance. And again, what gets placed into these categories seems very arbitrary right now, and not necessarily dictated by whats needed for pacing/balance.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It really just moves most of the P.Res costs to a separate resource, because honestly they don't belong in the P.Res category.
Ground units spend P.Res to make themselves more powerful. Commanders spend P. Res to either empower his allies' primary functions (killing and building), or to enable the Commander to perform these functions himself (Sentry, MAC, ARC). Spending a PERSONAL RESOURCE for the former is contradictory to the notion of a personal resource. If Commanders are going to be able to leave their chair and play as ground units, the model for earning P.Res (spend P.Res to make you stronger, which makes it easier to get kills, which makes it easier to earn P.Res) needs to be conceptually identical for Marines and Commanders alike, otherwise it's extremely difficult to balance.
It's no different than asking Marines to spend P.Res to build Structures. Which no one would want to do.
Personal Res needs to be used for one, or the other, but not both.
<!--quoteo(post=1854372:date=Jun 18 2011, 07:12 PM:name=KuBaN)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (KuBaN @ Jun 18 2011, 07:12 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854372"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->It really just moves most of the P.Res costs to a separate resource, because honestly they don't belong in the P.Res category.
Ground units spend P.Res to make themselves more powerful. Commanders spend P. Res to either empower his allies' primary functions (killing and building), or to enable the Commander to perform these functions himself (Sentry, MAC, ARC). Spending a PERSONAL RESOURCE for the former is contradictory to the notion of a personal resource. If Commanders are going to be able to leave their chair and play as ground units, the model for earning P.Res (spend P.Res to make you stronger, which makes it easier to get kills, which makes it easier to earn P.Res) needs to be conceptually identical for Marines and Commanders alike, otherwise it's extremely difficult to balance.
It's no different than asking Marines to spend P.Res to build Structures. Which no one would want to do.
Personal Res needs to be used for one, or the other, but not both.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Thats exactly why commanders shouldn't use pres as commanders, and instead go with their own separate resources. Like I mentioned a page back, it like ts trying to balance single mechanic for two very different games. Its just going to cause endless headaches for the devs later down the road.
I think we are getting way too hung up on the ideals and names of these resources. I wish we'd call them something else tbh. I think its getting in the way of creating a resources model that works.
SewlekThe programmer previously known as SchimmelJoin Date: 2003-05-13Member: 16247Members, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, Subnautica Developer
i posted here my thoughts about the resource model and what should change: <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=113841&view=findpost&p=1854189" target="_blank">Resource Model</a>
<!--quoteo(post=1854204:date=Jun 18 2011, 08:33 PM:name=OutlawDr)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (OutlawDr @ Jun 18 2011, 08:33 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854204"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Well it seems they want more commanders playing in larger games to become a standard.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Let's put aside that I think that's a bad idea, for various reasons. Let's put aside the fact that a single commander will still be the de facto standard, the way it should be. It'll still be very wrong, because the scaling would be... clumsy, I guess. There will be gradual drops in available Pres (for <u>support</u>) with increasing players, and large jumps with extra commanders. Here, I'll show you what I mean. <img src="http://i.imgur.com/K3pMS.png" border="0" class="linked-image" /> The above assumes permanent commanders. For really effective play with the current system, you'd probably have commander rotations (when someone in the chair starts getting low in Pres and/or someone in the field starts getting excess Pres), but I don't like the concept of that; it also won't work well in public play. And what is there as an equivalent on the alien team? What is there taking more players out of the field?
Just to be clear, what I am advocating as a solution to this, is that both Support Costs and Res-For-Kill are moved to team resources (or else a third resource), because the total sum of RFK, in theory, scales naturally with smaller or larger teams. I would also add that team resources need more consumables, or rather, that more consumables exist that cost team resources. <i>But then, what would the commander do with his Pres?</i> Not sure, but probably kit out his poorer marines.
<i>Ignore what I said earlier about personal resources for personal things (that is, including support), I've changed my mind.</i>
The goal seems to be a combination of team strategy (where to attack) and squad strategy (dividing combat roles between players).
Why not work like other FPS games or NS1's Skirmish game mode?
Teams collect Res, individuals earn XP.
Balance weapons and lifeforms into classes.
Classes unlocked by XP and improved with both XP and Res. Keep class roles steady throughout game but their power is a combination of global upgrades from the commander and abilities from the player. Much like the alien team in NS1 having their upgrades be limited by structures.
Commander uses structure powers instead of personal XP. So supply drops of ammo would be on a timer/energy bar off the armory like comm sweep. Add as many commander powers as you want, just like an RTS the commander decides on his 'army' composition but uses structures instead of units.
Allow such powers to be tied to waypoints. So an attack order can be combined with a catalyst drop that whichever squad makes it to the waypoint (or the waypoints are private for the squad) they get the powerup. Add more such carrots for the commanders to use.
<!--quoteo(post=1854451:date=Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854451"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Let's put aside that I think that's a bad idea, for various reasons. Let's put aside the fact that a single commander will still be the de facto standard, the way it should be. It'll still be very wrong, because the scaling would be... clumsy, I guess. There will be gradual drops in available Pres (for <u>support</u>) with increasing players, and large jumps with extra commanders. Here, I'll show you what I mean. The above assumes permanent commanders. For really effective play with the current system, you'd probably have commander rotations (when someone in the chair starts getting low in Pres and/or someone in the field starts getting excess Pres), but I don't like the concept of that; it also won't work well in public play. And what is there as an equivalent on the alien team? What is there taking more players out of the field?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I don't think commanders should be using Pres to begin with, so I agree that multiple commanders should not be used as the direct way to scale pres and support abilities.
I think the standard will always be one main commander followed....but by supporting commanders when needed. These are commanders that will probably not stay as commanders the entire time, and only hop now and then when the need arises.As games get larger, more of the supporting comms will stay in the chairs longer. Its a tradeoff. Its not too much of stretch to imagine there being one main commander with supporting commanders in pub games. Just pointing this out, and is not a direct contradiction to what you are saying.
<!--quoteo(post=1854451:date=Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854451"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Just to be clear, what I am advocating as a solution to this, is that both Support Costs and Res-For-Kill are moved to team resources (or else a third resource), because the total sum of RFK, in theory, scales naturally with smaller or larger teams. I would also add that team resources need more consumables, or rather, that more consumables exist that cost team resources.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I am also leaning towards RFK going to Tres and Tres being used for support abilities as well. Though this does go counter to Charlie's wish of team size not affecting the pace of the game... but yea...in theory it should be offset by having more players means more support needed. Its a tradeoff
<!--quoteo(post=1854451:date=Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854451"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><i>But then, what would the commander do with his Pres?</i> Not sure, but probably kit out his poorer marines.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Just axe pres use by commanders. Either they just use Tres (not the ideal model) or give them their own second resource.. I've been calling commander resource (cres). It scales as more commanders are on the chair (just like pres), but is not interchangeable with pres (so no playing musical comm chairs to maximize pres use). The second resource is the scarcer resource that can be used as a balance tool for builds, timing and in general inhibit spamming of certain items (like its doen in many RTS games). However its a resource that can be used for things in every category: economy, defense, tech, support, ect..(just like Tres would). Everything has a cost ratio of Tres:Cres (some cost just one if needed). What I don't want to see is support costing one separate resource, economy costing another resource, ect...Anyway I already wrote a wall of text about it last page so I'll stop here.
A slightly off topic idea...it could help if there is a more in-game distinction between the main commander and other supporting commanders. Of the current commanders, the one that has sat as commander the longest is be labeled "commander" all others are "lieutenants" (name you can on the scoreboard). Commander has priority over all others on certain actions...such as the only one with recycle privileges and things of that nature.
The problem as identified by UWE is that in NS1 commanders can deprive their marines of access to the weapons and equipment they've researched. This can either be because
1. they feel there are higher priorities elsewhere 2. because they feel particular marines are not worth spending res on 3. out of spite for certain players
I suspect that the second two are the main driver for this being a problem. If the commander wants to tech hard rather than spending res on weapons, that's his option. If the team as a whole disagrees with his strategy, he'll get voted out. But the second two don't damage the team as a whole, they just affect a couple of players, and so they have no recourse and their game experience suffers.
So, how do we solve the problem of the comm not wanting to spend his precious resources on new players who are going to 'waste' them, or not giving weapons to particular players out of spite?
I think the idea UWE had was a sound one: give players their own resources so they can buy things themselves. This certainly solves all three problems above. The implementation of this has been that player's purchasing their own equipment is the only (or more recently, the primary) way of marines to get equipment.
But, as has been pointed out here, by divorcing the purchasing of equipment from movement up the tech tree, we have removed a major decision point from the game: Comms no longer have to balance teching with supplying the marines with the results of that tech. In any RTS, balancing teching with army size (or in NS's case, army power through purchased equipment) is a crucial part of any strategy. The more that various game functions get split off into their own resource buckets, the less decision-making is needed, and so strategy gets simplified down to the point where there are no decisions to make, no tradeoffs to consider.
I think the solution is to treat player purchasing of weapons as a fallback method of acquiring weapons, not the only method or even primary method. Go back to the NS1 model of resources and the comm being the primary supplier of weapons, but give player's a <i>trickle</i> of 'personal res' that they can use to purchase equipment <i>occasionally</i>, when the comm isn't handling stuff out or blacklisting a new player.
pleasing everyone for the sake of making things easier for everyone means the quality of the game will suffer. I'm trying to understand why charlie might do this, but I just can't agree with it.
allow the armory to supply limited amount of tech, while higher tech can be only gotten from the commander. This might change things, it will allow marines to get something but still depend on the commander for higher tech - somewhat like ns1 model.
<!--quoteo(post=1854537:date=Jun 19 2011, 01:52 PM:name=luns)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (luns @ Jun 19 2011, 01:52 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854537"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->pleasing everyone for the sake of making things easier for everyone means the quality of the game will suffer. I'm trying to understand why charlie might do this, but I just can't agree with it.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Personal res scales, it is used to buy equipment; team res doesn't scale, it is used to buy tech. A unified resource model is broken; the game plays vastly differently depending on team size.
<!--quoteo(post=1854537:date=Jun 19 2011, 01:52 PM:name=luns)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (luns @ Jun 19 2011, 01:52 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854537"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->allow the armory to supply limited amount of tech, while higher tech can be only gotten from the commander. This might change things, it will allow marines to get something but still depend on the commander for higher tech - somewhat like ns1 model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Unlikely. I don't believe they'll go back to the unified resource model. But what you could do is remove personal res from players and assign it to a big pool of personal res the commander uses to buy equipment, med packs etc.
Good thread, but pretty overwhelming. Below is a quick summary if you are lost.
3 main general resource models: 1) Players use PRes, Commander uses PRes and Tres <!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>(current)</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> 2) Players use PRes, Commander uses commander only resource(s) 3) Commander only controls the resource(s)
If commander uses multiple resources: A) Items are placed into categories that only a single type resource can buy (Example: commander support abilities only bought with PRes...economy and tech with TRes) <!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>(current)</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> B) All types of item can be bought with a combination of resources...the "scarcer" resource acts as a bottleneck for high tech and spamming (Example: SC2 does this)
RFK: X) RFK goes to players <!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>(current)</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> Y) RFK goes to commander Z) RFK slider between players and comm
Im partial to 2,B and X....though I wouldn't be completely opposed to 3 or Y.
Comments
In NS1 marines had considerably less mobility than aliens. This was apparenty in small-player games. When the player number goes, marines can afford only same number of weapons (excluding RFK which contributed to res pool) but marines have much more presence on the map changing the balance.
I think some of these resource model problems exist more on paper than reality. I don't have public NS statistics at handy but what I can tell from experience, the game does scale reasonably well even to 28 players, with NS1 resource model. It is not completely balanced, but things like map affect the balance much more. I suppose some ABLE admin or so could cite statistics. Public gamers don't use resources as efficiently as competitive games do, so the problems are not nearly as big you would expect from a math model for example.
I think medpacks and ammo could cost team resources if you just add RFK. I have commanded 28-player games on public and it didn't feel like it was a handicap. This way marines don't have to start turtling after all stuff is built.
The problem is that if you wan't to sacrifice depth for balance then you are going to NS1 combat direction where everyone has all the weapons all the time. Is this really the trade-off you want to make?
how is more commanders a good thing to begin with?
sometimes feels like you trying to mix combat and ns maps into one type of environment.
edit
just to comment about medpacks, remove them restoring armor.
It will take too much time to go into depth explaining my logic but another reason why resources are split into two pools is to reduce the dependence on the Commander. Ie, players on the ground should be able to make some choices about how they play. I don't want the Commander determining if a player gets a shotgun - I want the player using it to decide.
However, I don't see the need to split resources up. Commanders should just use their personal resource to build everything then just scale the numbers accordingly. This would help cut down a lot on the confusion between the two and help simplify the resource model more.
The split seems redundant and unneeded since it is the exact same type of resource. In other RTS games, there is a split in resources because there are different resources at different locations. However, NS only has one type of resource so there is no real need to split it.
At least my thought.
Either way, I like the direction we're going here overall despite some small complaints I might have. Keep up the good work.
The problem with the resource model in NS1 is that "tech" is constant cost, where as "equipment" scales with the size of the team; a 6v6 plays radically different than a 16v16(they are very different for more reasons than the res model, but the res model is a key contributor).
If you separate res into "personal" and "team", you can scale the personal res income by team size independently of team res income.
The split resource model as it currently exists also has serious problems. You can't trade off team res versus personal res; you can't choose to go heavily into upgrades <b>instead</b> of equipment because the resources aren't interchangeable.
Arcs for example, arcs don't get better or worse the more team members you have, an arc is an arc, it shoots stuff in range, and it does area damage which means it takes a set amount of time to clear a ROOM, not clear a certain number of structures.
Medpacks on the other hand cost more the more players you have, because you have to pay more to heal more players.
You could quite easily fix this by replacing medpacks with a 'med cloud' or something, magic nanites appear in the area and regenerate everyone's health slowly. This scales in effectiveness with more players, exactly as making medpacks more available with more players would do. It is also much easier to use than the horribly fiddly med pack system because it requires only one click, and prevents comms from dropping medpacks on top of marines in comabt which is really annoying. Solves several problems at once.
That's a much better approach than the silly 'if you have more players you need to have more commanders to do the really menial parts of commanding' one.
In fact many things already do this, you don't need more crags the more players you have, or more armories, or more infestation, or more drifters, so they all work perfectly fine being limited by team res, or energy, or whatever. The things you're suggesting should cost personal res are really the odd things out here.
I'd tie it to comm chair energy rather than t res personally, so more chairs = more support powers, much as with aliens and hives. A lot of things kinda work best if you limit them by time rather than resources, because once they're charged you have no reason not to use them. Being able to store a couple of med clouds in the chair and fire them where they're needed freely would keep them from being overpowered, keep them in play a lot because they're easy to use and don't detract from your resource accumulation, and that's really what matters. The comm needs these things he can do to help out, they don't really need to tie into the resource balancing act, just giving him the powers and saying 'you can use these every so often, go nuts' would work nicely I think.
<b><!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Its not a stupid idea at all! <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></b>Im glad to see that this is why NS2 has two resources for commanders. This is exactly why a 2 resource model is used in so many other RTS games. One resource acts as the "common resource" and the other is the "rare resource". The rare resource bottlenecks the creation of high tech and units, and generally sets the pace of the game. Think vespene gas in SC2. In NS2, the commander' pres acts as the rare resource. However, NS2 doesn't have to use pres as the rare resource to accomplish this, and I think its actually getting in the way tbh.
A few big problems with the commander using pres:
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>1) <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->Once a commander runs out of pres, its advantageous to kick him out.. and get someone else with more pres (irrespective of either player's skill as a commander)
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->2)<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> In the long term its going to be hard to balance a commander's pres with the rest of the players pres, since they are directly tied to each other. A change in one will affect the other. We will be constantly dancing around this issue. Its like balancing a single game mechanic for essentially 2 different games. I liken it to WoW devs constantly trying to balance talent trees for both PvE and PvP players (a fu*king nightmare).
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->3) <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->This is tied to the other two. A current minor problem is that the commander is out of pres rather often. We have the option of either making things cost less pres, or increasing the rate that the commander gets pres. Simple enough. However, if you go with the second option, you'll run the risk of promoting players to become commanders as a way to stock up on res, then leave. Basically your options are needlessly hampered, and the second point I posted starts rearing its ugly head.</b>
Nip it at the bud and separate pres for players and the commander's "rare resource" as two different things. They could mechanically behave exactly the same, but are not interchangeable. Call it "commander res (cres)" for the sake of differentiating the two in this post. For instance, once a player becomes commander, his pres is set to the side (he'll have it once he leaves). However, his former static pres rate increase now becomes the Cres rate increase. By doing it like this, it allows the pacing of the resource to be essentially identical to current commander pres. In the future you can increase or decrease this rate, but with the added luxury that it won't affect player pres rate. You can better fine tune individual parts of the game
The Cres pool is connected to the current Commander regardless of which player it is. If a new commander hops in, he'll deal with the same cres the first one left him. There is no advantage in constantly switching out commanders.
Once a team creates an additional CC/hive, another player can hop in and his pres rate increase is also then converted cress rate and adds to the cres pool (they both share the cres pool). So right there you still maintain the advantage of having multiple commanders...but also of having multiple hives/cc instead of just switching commanders to maximize pres. New Hives/CC(including initial)could add a one-time +25 cres to the pool approximating the amount of pres the player would have brought.
By separating these two into different resources, you can avoid all 3 points above, but can still maintain the advantages you mentioned.
I like dis new weapon...
Now probably not "competitive balance" (NS1 was only played "competitively" in smaller player sizes) but at least *public balance it felt balanced.
*Believe it or not, most +30 player servers still had a lot of good teamwork. It's a myth that teamwork doesn't exist on pubs. Teamwork is definitely there, especially when you have a game that really encourages teamwork.
Now I know there is already another thread on RFK but I feel it really helped in NS1 and it can help too in NS2.
(Plus I do like the fact aliens had "individuality" thanks to having their own res to spend.)
<b>For NS2 (since both teams now have commanders and their own res pool):</b>
I like the idea of team and player resources being combined (commanders for either team decide how much each player obtains from either RTs and/or RFK).
Also how about making it so that if the commander gives a high percentage of the total res to individual players, their will be a bit of bonus res gained.
<b>Like for example a commander can give 90% of all res earned (res nodes and RFK) to players but if the commander does that, 20% bonus resources are gained.</b>
Players cannot give resources to the commander but lets say they help tech to an extent. Gorges could be changed to be able to build everything a commander could build (including hives possibly). Marines could have a way to also help tech (though maybe not. It could be kept so that the commander still builds but if the resource is pooled to the marines, they'll at least gain weapons a lot faster).
<b>What this does is give commanders (and their team) a choice - Does the commander want to pool all their resources to themselves so they get a specific job (like building another hive for example) faster? Or do they want to split it up to the players to get the bonus resource but tech slower (due to the fact that no single player will have enough resources to build a hive at a specific time).</b>
<b>Also changing how resources are divided could have some sort of penalty or cooldown (lets say there's a one minute cooldown).</b>
While it may seem that giving resources to players is the best choice (grants +20% res bonus [this number is just an example]), it's not true because it slows down tech significantly.
Instead of a commander getting 50 res per minute (for example) and saving it to spend it on a hive that lets say costs 70 resources, the commander could give 90% of the resource earned to aliens (that'd be 40 res per minute divided by <n> players) but there'd be a 20% bonus (so 44 res divided by <n> players).
[Note - Res splitting could be done for both resource node res and RFK. In case of RFK, it'd be split towards everyone rather than given to players individually that NS1).
So lets say there are 12 players on a team (1 is the com) so 11). That'd mean each player would only be given 4 res per minute. However if aliens could hold out a while, they could slowly be able to "all" be able to go to a higher lifeform (lerk for example) or build hydras faster.
Or this idea could be adjusted and RFK is not split but given to each player individuality (but the 20% bonus res will apply to RFK too. )
Err well actually I'm not sure about how things work (a lot of experimenting needs to be done) but I feel the resource model can be changed to something similar to NS1 (with res splitting) and still works.
I definitely feel that res splitting would be fine (well at least it worked in NS1).
Aliens in NS1 (for example) - No commander was needed because each player (well players who decide to be a gorge) could sort of be a mini commander (helping with tech, helping with resources, etc). This worked even in pubs (again I always hear a lot that pubs have no teamwork but most have a good amount which is why NS1 is still alive[barely unfortunately] today). <b>In bigger player servers, that'd still be true thanks to individual RFK (aliens could have a hive up by 2-3 minutes even in a 30 player game)</b>.
(Note - Sorry if the post was kind of jumbled and unclear. I wasn't sure [and still kind of] where I was going with the post).
If you separate res into "personal" and "team", you can scale the personal res income by team size independently of team res income.
The split resource model as it currently exists also has serious problems. You can't trade off team res versus personal res; you can't choose to go heavily into upgrades <b>instead</b> of equipment because the resources aren't interchangeable.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I know all this. I've actually explained all the same things in other threads, though less concisely than you did, admittedly.
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=113685&st=200&p=1852888&#entry1852888" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/in...p;#entry1852888</a>
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=113685&st=220&p=1853735&#entry1853735" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/in...p;#entry1853735</a>
Sample:
<!--quoteo(post=1852888:date=Jun 15 2011, 12:18 PM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 15 2011, 12:18 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1852888"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->tl;dr:
1a) Team res does not scale, but largely unnecessary.
1b) Personal res scales perfectly.
2a) Personal res should not have RFK since it messes up the scaling.
2b) Team res should have RFK since it helps scaling. Team res should be more important.
3a) Change mantra to: Personal resources for personal things (ammo, medpack, weapons); team resources for team things (ARC, MAC, structures, tech).
3b) Basic theory of independent personal and team resources is sound, but needs tweaking (see above).
4a) Increased abundance of better units should be managed through unit-vs-unit balance, rather than team-vs-team balance. (No more high-cost super-units.)
4b) Focus on economy game is reduced, but inevitable (and imo acceptable).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Anyway, regarding what <b>Charlie</b> said:
<!--quoteo(post=1853956:date=Jun 18 2011, 01:23 AM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 18 2011, 01:23 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853956"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- Commander "support" abilities cost personal res so general strategies, build orders and timing doesn't change depending on the number of players on your team (it's my stupid idea, thank you very much). The relative cost of a medpack changes completely between a 6x6 and a 12v12 in that model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Or, <!--coloro:#00FF00--><span style="color:#00FF00"><!--/coloro-->"support should scale with player count".<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
I don't think it does with the current system anyway: assuming a single commander (<b>the de facto standard</b>). Team resources do not scale (and generally do not need to), and a <b>single player's</b> (the commander's) personal resource also does not scale. With increasing numbers of players, it doesn't matter which of these resources you use, you'll still have less resources available for support per capita.
Now, <b><i>moving RFK to team, and support costs to team</i></b>, does help with this scaling issue, because RFK is largely dependent on player count (assuming all things are equal: the more players you have, the more killers you have; and the more players the enemy has, the more kills your team can have; therefore, the sum of RFK increases with server player count).
The lack of personal RFK would also discourage (or at least, not encourage) rambo behaviour, and with res towers being the only source of personal res, they become important to players on the ground again (for you and the enemy).
The only real issue I currently see with this suggestion is that, just as in NS1, the major resource expenditure for the alien team was on life-forms, and that's now handled by personal resources; basically, there's just a lot less that the alien team will gain from team RFK since they have so little to spend team res on.
There's also the issue of plain and simple team res overabundance, <u>but</u> this will be mitigated to some extent by moving support costs to team res, and for the rest you could just simply reduce the team res income (or increase all the team res costs).
In ns1 combat, being a super skulk with 4 or 5 upgrades was a lot of fun, I think you could make it so the skulk had a unique stealth/assassin type role late game, or maybe a power grid / building disruption field or something.
If skulks could spend a lots of res on upgrades, it might make the choice of going super skulk vs going fade interesting.
This way the commander still has control on how the equipment is distributed allowing strats that require certain roll outs of weapons. The remaining 10% just pools with the individual players so that they can earn themselves a weapon if the com is being a tight-ass.
Having it this way allows the commander to have enough Pres to use adequately but prevents the issue of every other marine being flooded with res.
This should also give you another avenue to balance around (changing percentage player/com pool and the total rate at which it comes in)
Well I'm glad you like it.
<!--quoteo(post=1854112:date=Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854112"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->3a) Change mantra to: Personal resources for personal things (ammo, medpack, weapons); team resources for team things (ARC, MAC, structures, tech).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Frankly we should probably get rid of such mantras. Unless the mantra is based on the principle that game pace and overall balance of the game takes precedence.
However, what constitutes as "personal" or "team" can be very arbitrary, and basing costs off this idea seems somewhat odd. If later its deemed that dropped weapons should probably cost tres, I don't want us to hesitate incorporating it just because it goes against some hard rule that no longer applies.
This type of arbitrary separation of items to a particular resource type is what Solyent green was talking about I believe. Since each type uses their own resource, they both progress linearly and separate in relation to each other. There is no trade-off between the two. For example, why couldn't a sentry turret cost 3-commander pres and 7-tres, instead of just tres or just pres? It would make it nearly as affordable in the early game...but a commander would think twice about mindlessly spamming it in the late game, since it could deplete his pres rather quickly. This goes back to the idea that the "rare resource" establishes pace. It also forces choosing the tradeoff of more defense for less support/tech/ect...
<!--quoteo(post=1854112:date=Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 18 2011, 12:02 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854112"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Anyway, regarding what <b>Charlie</b> said:
Or, <!--coloro:#00FF00--><span style="color:#00FF00"><!--/coloro-->"support should scale with player count".<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
I don't think it does with the current system anyway: assuming a single commander (<b>the de facto standard</b>). Team resources do not scale (and generally do not need to), and a <b>single player's</b> (the commander's) personal resource also does not scale. With increasing numbers of players, it doesn't matter which of these resources you use, you'll still have less resources available for support per capita.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well it seems they want more commanders playing in larger games to become a standard. But other than that there should be more group wide assist abilities..that come to their own in larger games. A commander could also drop "ammo crates" and "medical supply crates" (instead of just individual packs). They cost more, only last a limited time (10-30secs), but are able heal larger number of players simultaneously (think of it as a mini armory). In smaller games they might not be as efficient, but in larger games it beats spamming ammo/medpacks all over the place.
- I don't like the idea of less choices, but I don't want to go back to the old NS1 resource model either. I'd rather have less depth then make the overall game balance fragile and difficult to manage. The idea is that the team IS making strategic trade-offs here though: the commander has to decide whether to research shotguns or not, and that costs team resources. I think that weapon-research may just be too cheap though, that might improve tradeoffs nicely. It probably won't ever be at the RTS/NS1 level where the commander totally chooses the amount of offense, but that's the tradeoff inherent in this model. To me it's more important that the overall balance and pacing scale properly with players, and that players don't get tech-starved because there are too many players on the server (ie, there aren't enough shotguns to go around). One major difference between NS1 and NS2 is that NS1 sometimes gave a higher priority to the RTS experience and NS2 will probably always give priority to the FPS experience (which makes sense because more players are experiencing it as a FPS).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I understand your reasoning, but I still think the res model doesn't have to be as limiting. Sure, we can still make some decisions like building an observatory or researching shotguns instead. However those decisions are mostly limited to the area of teching. In NS1 things like med/ammo support vs. research, weapon drops vs. research or weapon drops vs. med/ammo support played a role. They made managing the resources a bit more challenging.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- Commander "support" abilities cost personal res so general strategies, build orders and timing doesn't change depending on the number of players on your team (it's my stupid idea, thank you very much). The relative cost of a medpack changes completely between a 6x6 and a 12v12 in that model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The relative cost changes, but the res income doesn't. Also, like mentioned before, there is always the problem that personal res need to be balanced for two aspects, namely weapons and comm support. You could make support abilities cost team res and split RFK into team and personal res. That way, the team res income from RFK balances out the different team sizes.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- I like the idea of infestation and drifters costing personal res and would fulfill my goals of having multiple commanders change the game. 2-3 commanders could spread infestation 2-3x (at a cost of less offense) and that would really change the game in a cool way. <b>Update:</b> Although the current Hive/energy system planned for this in that you're not supposed to be able to use a Hive's energy-abilities if you're not in it (but it's a bit clunky).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The alien comm has not that much to do, to justify multiple commanders. In practice a few field players are going to jump into a hive every now and then to spread some infestation, then get back on the field. Why not make infestation and drifters (and macs) cost team res? Their cost is not dependant on team size, shouldn't be too hard to balance that.
<!--quoteo(post=1853998:date=Jun 17 2011, 09:29 PM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 17 2011, 09:29 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853998"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->NS1 had players not getting cool weapons very often as marines (esp. in bigger games) because of how the resource model scaled. Alien resource flow could also be half or 1/3 of what it was in 6v6 player. Those are very big problems in my mind, and not theoretical or "on paper".
It will take too much time to go into depth explaining my logic but another reason why resources are split into two pools is to reduce the dependence on the Commander. Ie, players on the ground should be able to make some choices about how they play. I don't want the Commander determining if a player gets a shotgun - I want the player using it to decide.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think players buying their own equipment is an acceptable compromise between the FPS and RTS sides. I didn't mind how it worked in NS1, but I see the reason for changing it for NS2.
What about this:
- The commander only spends team res (exception: weapon drops)
- Field players only spend personal res
- The commander buys weapons with his personal res*
- RFK is split between team res and personal res by some %, thereby balancing support costs for different team sizes
*The alien comm also needs something to spend personal res on. Maybe infestation after all?
Results:
- All trade-offs from NS1 are present, ...
- ...except weapons/lifeforms are bought by players, enabling them to make choices on their own.
- The commanders always have a reason to spend their res, ...
- ...while not being starved by the limited pres income.
Each Command Station provides an Energy pool that only the Commander in that Chair can spend. All Structures use Energy from the Chair to perform most single-use actions. So far this includes:<ul><li><b>Command Station</b>: Nano-Grid Defense</li><li><b>Extractors</b>: Timed Production Speed Buff?</li><li><b>Infantry Portal</b>: Transponder (Global: The next Marine will respawn at the location of the last Squad he was in, instead of the IP?)</li><li><b>Armory</b>: Drop Weapon, Drop Ammo Pack</li><li><b>Advanced Armory</b>: Drop Catalyst Pack</li><li><b>Robotics Factory</b>: Build ARC, Build MAC</li><li><b>Arms Lab</b>: Drop Med Pack</li><li><b>Observatory</b>: Scanner Sweep, Distress Beacon</li><li><b>Prototype Lab</b>: Drop Jetpack, Drop Exosuit</li></ul>
Commander-controlled units are owned by the Command Chair that spent the Energy to create the unit. They can only be controlled by the Commander in the chair at that time.
Commanders only spend P.Res to produce entities they directly control that have the capacity to build structures or kill enemies. This includes building MACs (Mines?), ARCs, and Sentry Turrets.
Commanders are awarded P.Res for unit and structure kills (ResAward = 25% of the Point Value instead of random 1 - 3?) with entities directly controlled by the Commander. This includes MAC Mines, ARCs, and Sentry Turrets.
This way, Commander doesn't have to spend P.Res on purchases that don't directly enable him. Additionally, multiple Commanders become beneficial with Chair-specific Energy pools, but it's still unclear whether this is a good thing.
<!--quoteo(post=1853956:date=Jun 17 2011, 01:23 PM:name=Flayra)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Flayra @ Jun 17 2011, 01:23 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1853956"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- I like the idea of infestation and drifters costing personal res and would fulfill my goals of having multiple commanders change the game. 2-3 commanders could spread infestation 2-3x (at a cost of less offense) and that would really change the game in a cool way. <b>Update:</b> Although the current Hive/energy system planned for this in that you're not supposed to be able to use a Hive's energy-abilities if you're not in it (but it's a bit clunky).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
If only that Hive's Commander/Overlord could use that Hive's Energy, Infestation growth would increase with multiple comms anyways, so changing to P.Res may not be necessary.
Besides, if the Shift is going to be increasing the Energy Regeneration rates of nearby structures, that would also be a way to increase Infestation growth, but only if we stayed on the Energy-based model.
If you're too lazy to watch: Marines shouldn't be able to all get shotguns AS WELL AS any tech of their choosing.
Commander-controlled units are owned by the Command Chair that spent the Energy to create the unit. They can only be controlled by the Commander in the chair at that time.
Commanders only spend P.Res to produce entities they directly control that have the capacity to build structures or kill enemies. This includes building MACs (Mines?), ARCs, and Sentry Turrets.
Commanders are awarded P.Res for unit and structure kills (ResAward = 25% of the Point Value instead of random 1 - 3?) with entities directly controlled by the Commander. This includes MAC Mines, ARCs, and Sentry Turrets.
This way, Commander doesn't have to spend P.Res on purchases that don't directly enable him. Additionally, multiple Commanders become beneficial with Chair-specific Energy pools, but it's still unclear whether this is a good thing.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The problem I see with this is that it further separates and isolates items/tech/ect into simple to manage categories for the commander to deal with. There are less tradeoffs, less hard decisions to be made and less ways to bottleneck certain items/tech.
Its easy when you know everything from column A can be bought with Pres. Everything from column B can be bought with Tres. Everything from column C can be bought with energy. There is less to worry about. There is no hard decision of focusing your limited resources on either column A, B or C...because columns A, B and C will progress on their own independent of each other making the game more predictable and stale in the long run.
We shouldn't pigeonhole things into separate categories which only one type of resource can acquire. It should be perfectly fine if certain items cost multiple resources...either to prevent spamming and/or dictate pacing/balance. And again, what gets placed into these categories seems very arbitrary right now, and not necessarily dictated by whats needed for pacing/balance.
<!--quoteo(post=1854321:date=Jun 18 2011, 02:49 PM:name=TrueVeritas)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (TrueVeritas @ Jun 18 2011, 02:49 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854321"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I partially go over what I think is wrong with the current marine resource model <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL6lVP6Scv4" target="_blank">here</a>.
If you're too lazy to watch: Marines shouldn't be able to all get shotguns AS WELL AS any tech of their choosing.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Its too early to tell if you predictions will ring true, but I think you might have point about shotguns. In general Pres is another separation and isolation of a particular tech that I mentioned above. There is no tradeoff for commander of either handing out weapons or doing something else, since its now largely in the hands of the players. I think the lowering of shotgun price might have been a step in the wrong direction. I rather see marine weapons being bit pricey, making them rely a bit more on commander drops. However weapon drops are themselves extremely pricey for the commander right now, so you hardly ever see it. The devs however can't lower the pres price of weapon drops, since players will just get their weapons via the CC and ignore the armory. Another reason why commander shouldn't use pres and should have their own distinct resource(s).
Its easy when you know everything from column A can be bought with Pres. Everything from column B can be bought with Tres. Everything from column C can be bought with energy. There is less to worry about. There is no hard decision of focusing your limited resources on either column A, B or C...because columns A, B and C will progress on their own independent of each other making the game more predictable and stale in the long run.
We shouldn't pigeonhole things into separate categories which only one type of resource can acquire. It should be perfectly fine if certain items cost multiple resources...either to prevent spamming and/or dictate pacing/balance. And again, what gets placed into these categories seems very arbitrary right now, and not necessarily dictated by whats needed for pacing/balance.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It really just moves most of the P.Res costs to a separate resource, because honestly they don't belong in the P.Res category.
Ground units spend P.Res to make themselves more powerful. Commanders spend P. Res to either empower his allies' primary functions (killing and building), or to enable the Commander to perform these functions himself (Sentry, MAC, ARC). Spending a PERSONAL RESOURCE for the former is contradictory to the notion of a personal resource. If Commanders are going to be able to leave their chair and play as ground units, the model for earning P.Res (spend P.Res to make you stronger, which makes it easier to get kills, which makes it easier to earn P.Res) needs to be conceptually identical for Marines and Commanders alike, otherwise it's extremely difficult to balance.
It's no different than asking Marines to spend P.Res to build Structures. Which no one would want to do.
Personal Res needs to be used for one, or the other, but not both.
Ground units spend P.Res to make themselves more powerful. Commanders spend P. Res to either empower his allies' primary functions (killing and building), or to enable the Commander to perform these functions himself (Sentry, MAC, ARC). Spending a PERSONAL RESOURCE for the former is contradictory to the notion of a personal resource. If Commanders are going to be able to leave their chair and play as ground units, the model for earning P.Res (spend P.Res to make you stronger, which makes it easier to get kills, which makes it easier to earn P.Res) needs to be conceptually identical for Marines and Commanders alike, otherwise it's extremely difficult to balance.
It's no different than asking Marines to spend P.Res to build Structures. Which no one would want to do.
Personal Res needs to be used for one, or the other, but not both.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Thats exactly why commanders shouldn't use pres as commanders, and instead go with their own separate resources. Like I mentioned a page back, it like ts trying to balance single mechanic for two very different games. Its just going to cause endless headaches for the devs later down the road.
I think we are getting way too hung up on the ideals and names of these resources. I wish we'd call them something else tbh. I think its getting in the way of creating a resources model that works.
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=113841&view=findpost&p=1854189" target="_blank">Resource Model</a>
Let's put aside that I think that's a bad idea, for various reasons.
Let's put aside the fact that a single commander will still be the de facto standard, the way it should be.
It'll still be very wrong, because the scaling would be... clumsy, I guess. There will be gradual drops in available Pres (for <u>support</u>) with increasing players, and large jumps with extra commanders.
Here, I'll show you what I mean.
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/K3pMS.png" border="0" class="linked-image" />
The above assumes permanent commanders. For really effective play with the current system, you'd probably have commander rotations (when someone in the chair starts getting low in Pres and/or someone in the field starts getting excess Pres), but I don't like the concept of that; it also won't work well in public play.
And what is there as an equivalent on the alien team? What is there taking more players out of the field?
Just to be clear, what I am advocating as a solution to this, is that both Support Costs and Res-For-Kill are moved to team resources (or else a third resource), because the total sum of RFK, in theory, scales naturally with smaller or larger teams.
I would also add that team resources need more consumables, or rather, that more consumables exist that cost team resources.
<i>But then, what would the commander do with his Pres?</i> Not sure, but probably kit out his poorer marines.
<i>Ignore what I said earlier about personal resources for personal things (that is, including support), I've changed my mind.</i>
Why not work like other FPS games or NS1's Skirmish game mode?
Teams collect Res, individuals earn XP.
Balance weapons and lifeforms into classes.
Classes unlocked by XP and improved with both XP and Res. Keep class roles steady throughout game but their power is a combination of global upgrades from the commander and abilities from the player. Much like the alien team in NS1 having their upgrades be limited by structures.
Commander uses structure powers instead of personal XP. So supply drops of ammo would be on a timer/energy bar off the armory like comm sweep. Add as many commander powers as you want, just like an RTS the commander decides on his 'army' composition but uses structures instead of units.
Allow such powers to be tied to waypoints. So an attack order can be combined with a catalyst drop that whichever squad makes it to the waypoint (or the waypoints are private for the squad) they get the powerup. Add more such carrots for the commanders to use.
Let's put aside the fact that a single commander will still be the de facto standard, the way it should be.
It'll still be very wrong, because the scaling would be... clumsy, I guess. There will be gradual drops in available Pres (for <u>support</u>) with increasing players, and large jumps with extra commanders.
Here, I'll show you what I mean.
The above assumes permanent commanders. For really effective play with the current system, you'd probably have commander rotations (when someone in the chair starts getting low in Pres and/or someone in the field starts getting excess Pres), but I don't like the concept of that; it also won't work well in public play.
And what is there as an equivalent on the alien team? What is there taking more players out of the field?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I don't think commanders should be using Pres to begin with, so I agree that multiple commanders should not be used as the direct way to scale pres and support abilities.
I think the standard will always be one main commander followed....but by supporting commanders when needed. These are commanders that will probably not stay as commanders the entire time, and only hop now and then when the need arises.As games get larger, more of the supporting comms will stay in the chairs longer. Its a tradeoff. Its not too much of stretch to imagine there being one main commander with supporting commanders in pub games. Just pointing this out, and is not a direct contradiction to what you are saying.
<!--quoteo(post=1854451:date=Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854451"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Just to be clear, what I am advocating as a solution to this, is that both Support Costs and Res-For-Kill are moved to team resources (or else a third resource), because the total sum of RFK, in theory, scales naturally with smaller or larger teams.
I would also add that team resources need more consumables, or rather, that more consumables exist that cost team resources.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I am also leaning towards RFK going to Tres and Tres being used for support abilities as well. Though this does go counter to Charlie's wish of team size not affecting the pace of the game... but yea...in theory it should be offset by having more players means more support needed. Its a tradeoff
<!--quoteo(post=1854451:date=Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Jun 19 2011, 06:30 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854451"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><i>But then, what would the commander do with his Pres?</i> Not sure, but probably kit out his poorer marines.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Just axe pres use by commanders. Either they just use Tres (not the ideal model) or give them their own second resource.. I've been calling commander resource (cres). It scales as more commanders are on the chair (just like pres), but is not interchangeable with pres (so no playing musical comm chairs to maximize pres use). The second resource is the scarcer resource that can be used as a balance tool for builds, timing and in general inhibit spamming of certain items (like its doen in many RTS games). However its a resource that can be used for things in every category: economy, defense, tech, support, ect..(just like Tres would). Everything has a cost ratio of Tres:Cres (some cost just one if needed). What I don't want to see is support costing one separate resource, economy costing another resource, ect...Anyway I already wrote a wall of text about it last page so I'll stop here.
A slightly off topic idea...it could help if there is a more in-game distinction between the main commander and other supporting commanders. Of the current commanders, the one that has sat as commander the longest is be labeled "commander" all others are "lieutenants" (name you can on the scoreboard). Commander has priority over all others on certain actions...such as the only one with recycle privileges and things of that nature.
The problem as identified by UWE is that in NS1 commanders can deprive their marines of access to the weapons and equipment they've researched. This can either be because
1. they feel there are higher priorities elsewhere
2. because they feel particular marines are not worth spending res on
3. out of spite for certain players
I suspect that the second two are the main driver for this being a problem. If the commander wants to tech hard rather than spending res on weapons, that's his option. If the team as a whole disagrees with his strategy, he'll get voted out. But the second two don't damage the team as a whole, they just affect a couple of players, and so they have no recourse and their game experience suffers.
So, how do we solve the problem of the comm not wanting to spend his precious resources on new players who are going to 'waste' them, or not giving weapons to particular players out of spite?
I think the idea UWE had was a sound one: give players their own resources so they can buy things themselves. This certainly solves all three problems above. The implementation of this has been that player's purchasing their own equipment is the only (or more recently, the primary) way of marines to get equipment.
But, as has been pointed out here, by divorcing the purchasing of equipment from movement up the tech tree, we have removed a major decision point from the game: Comms no longer have to balance teching with supplying the marines with the results of that tech. In any RTS, balancing teching with army size (or in NS's case, army power through purchased equipment) is a crucial part of any strategy. The more that various game functions get split off into their own resource buckets, the less decision-making is needed, and so strategy gets simplified down to the point where there are no decisions to make, no tradeoffs to consider.
I think the solution is to treat player purchasing of weapons as a fallback method of acquiring weapons, not the only method or even primary method. Go back to the NS1 model of resources and the comm being the primary supplier of weapons, but give player's a <i>trickle</i> of 'personal res' that they can use to purchase equipment <i>occasionally</i>, when the comm isn't handling stuff out or blacklisting a new player.
allow the armory to supply limited amount of tech, while higher tech can be only gotten from the commander. This might change things, it will allow marines to get something but still depend on the commander for higher tech - somewhat like ns1 model.
Personal res scales, it is used to buy equipment; team res doesn't scale, it is used to buy tech. A unified resource model is broken; the game plays vastly differently depending on team size.
<!--quoteo(post=1854537:date=Jun 19 2011, 01:52 PM:name=luns)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (luns @ Jun 19 2011, 01:52 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854537"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->allow the armory to supply limited amount of tech, while higher tech can be only gotten from the commander. This might change things, it will allow marines to get something but still depend on the commander for higher tech - somewhat like ns1 model.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Unlikely. I don't believe they'll go back to the unified resource model. But what you could do is remove personal res from players and assign it to a big pool of personal res the commander uses to buy equipment, med packs etc.
Below is a quick summary if you are lost.
3 main general resource models:
1) Players use PRes, Commander uses PRes and Tres <!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>(current)</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
2) Players use PRes, Commander uses commander only resource(s)
3) Commander only controls the resource(s)
If commander uses multiple resources:
A) Items are placed into categories that only a single type resource can buy (Example: commander support abilities only bought with PRes...economy and tech with TRes) <!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>(current)</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
B) All types of item can be bought with a combination of resources...the "scarcer" resource acts as a bottleneck for high tech and spamming (Example: SC2 does this)
RFK:
X) RFK goes to players <!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro--><b>(current)</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
Y) RFK goes to commander
Z) RFK slider between players and comm
Im partial to 2,B and X....though I wouldn't be completely opposed to 3 or Y.