Also, I think why there's been such an alien domination earlier is because of the low pop servers, marines grow in strenght exponentially. The more there are the more effective they become, and with the new 21 player server that really shows imo. I think most of the balancing should be done when the game/servers are able to support the intended number of players (32? 16v16). Otherwise we'll end up with some really screwed balance, my 2c
FAST REPLY: Heres, my idea, based on what I have read so far and my own gameplay experience.
In a regular game, I usually play marines, and even with lmg, I can take on 2 skulks fairly well, but at the same time, a single sneaky skulk can slip in, eat one of my buddies and slip out.
That was just an example of how skulks are definately not overpowered.
So.
a) keep big leap from start of game. b) add in energy for marine sprint. - Give them lots of energy, they can still run a marathon, but have it so the marine can sprint all the way to the alien spawn on summit, but run out of energy shortly after that. This should prevent marines being able to skedaddle from being an idiot and blundering into an alien warzone, but not make sprinting useless. c) give skulks a sprint ability. - Being able to leap is cool and all, but if the alien could also zoom about, that would be awesome too. So you could go SWOOSH over spiraling around from wall to ceiling, to vent, to other wall, to marine and really freak them out.
So yes, I'm suggesting to make the skulk more powerful.
Perhaps give them one of those abilities early on, and then have it as an upgrade, or have the two abilities from the start.
I don't want to confuse things, but a half half of having to hold shift and right click to far leap is also an idea that I'm not personally fond of, but is a possibility.
Hmm... I am worried that marines will be able to sprint away from skulks, and skulks will be unable to defeat the (now) cheap shotgun and sentry gun. But there are plenty of beta builds to go - we should at least have a go at testing it.
I never saw this as a balance issue to begin with. The skulks' leap is what gives them the extra mobility to maneuver around in combat. But now, UWE seems to be making too much tech require that second hive. All that the marines will have to do to win is prevent the aliens from expanding for long enough to get farther ahead in tech. By placing so much importance on the second hive, it makes it much easier to stop the aliens from advancing.
Vladimir Van VodkaSexy BeastJoin Date: 2010-07-30Member: 73364Members, Reinforced - Shadow
I thought skulks where balanced since they fixed the bite hit registration, why would they nerf him to hell? I can easily down a skulk 1 v 1 with the default rifle, let alone the sniper pistol. The only thing marines need to be is vigilant and skulks cant even lay a butterfly fart on you.
matsoMaster of PatchesJoin Date: 2002-11-05Member: 7000Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Squad Five Gold, Reinforced - Shadow, NS2 Community Developer
I'm all for making leap an upgrade. Mostly because it will force the non-leaping skulk to be rebalanced (upgraded) against starting/shotty marines (after all, shotguns are available at the 1 minute mark, while 2nd hive won't be built until the 3.5min mark).
However, I think making the 2nd hive a requirement for leap is a bad idea. It would be better to let the aliens have a choice at the start of the game - either gamble with an early hive and weak early game skulks, or forego the hive to upgrade the skulks and try to achive early game domination. Making the leap a (possibly expensive) upgrade on the whip or crag rather than requiring a 2nd hive would be better, methinks.
Of course, I would love it if the marines had the same choice - right now, there is no sane reason for a marine commander not to drop an armory, ip and do the shotty upgrade right away.
Just because they change it and try it out doesn't mean it will stay like that, i rather them adjust it and find out it doesn't work than not test it at all. I agree though to a post above that marines effectiveness increases as player count does. Aliens are much stronger when teams are smaller. Let them change it and see how it goes and we can open this back up to discussion with much more feel of the effectiveness of leap. I personally would rather them keep the leap starting out but nerf it slightly by taking off a little bit of distance.
<!--quoteo(post=1854438:date=Jun 19 2011, 11:56 AM:name=Smasher)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Smasher @ Jun 19 2011, 11:56 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854438"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Also, I think why there's been such an alien domination earlier is because of the low pop servers, marines grow in strenght exponentially. The more there are the more effective they become, and with the new 21 player server that really shows imo. I think most of the balancing should be done when the game/servers are able to support the intended number of players (32? 16v16). Otherwise we'll end up with some really screwed balance, my 2c<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is a good point, marines grouped together are actually incredibly powerful in the early game. Marines in a group cover each other and bypass the alien advantage in melee by having most of the group able to shoot at any alien attacking a member of it.
Skulks on the other hand get in each other's way.
I think rather than balancing it for a certain number of players, aliens in the early game need more ways in which to work well in groups. The obvious approach is to attack marines from multiple simultaneous directions, however this is difficult to pull of and actually involves not working in groups, because you need to split up to pull it off.
If anything, skulks need to be more mobile in order to allow them to split up once they engage marines and attack the entire group at once, causing disarray and confusion. it is difficult to do this at the moment.
if they want to keep crippling alien movement, remove marine sprint.
this type of thing will go back and forward till they actually add skill based movement for aliens, and they will be more agile to the point not having leap wouldn't be so bad. Though until we reach that point, remove marines sprint.
<!--quoteo(post=1854600:date=Jun 19 2011, 06:39 PM:name=Chris0132)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Chris0132 @ Jun 19 2011, 06:39 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854600"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Why is everyone saying to remove sprint? What does sprint have to do with it?
Why would marines sprint when they can just shoot the incredibly easy to shoot skulks?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Amen.
How about we leave marines sprint and skulks leap alone? Neither need to be nerfed! Lets just wait til performance is perfect before we argue about close quarters combat balance. Marines vs skulk battles are over within 3 seconds, those 3 seconds need to be as fluid as possible if we ever want to ever have a true basis for arguing balance.
There is simply too much up to chance right now, there could be a lag spike or frame rate dip at any time.
If skulks lose leap then marines will have too much of an early advantage with free shotguns. So basically either:
a. Lose the leap until second hive AND remove p.res from marines. b. Lose the leap and somehow make shotguns much more difficult to obtain for marines.
Personally I'd go with a, since I think the game is SOOOO horribly skewed in the marine's favor right now. Generally people don't think it is because they don't play against decent marines.
<!--quoteo(post=1854614:date=Jun 19 2011, 06:00 PM:name=TrueVeritas)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (TrueVeritas @ Jun 19 2011, 06:00 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854614"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->If skulks lose leap then marines will have too much of an early advantage with free shotguns. So basically either:
a. Lose the leap until second hive AND remove p.res from marines. b. Lose the leap and somehow make shotguns much more difficult to obtain for marines.
Personally I'd go with a, since I think the game is SOOOO horribly skewed in the marine's favor right now. Generally people don't think it is because they don't play against decent marines.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You do realize A is kinda not an option and p.res is here to stay? Helps the resource model to scale properly.
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
<!--quoteo(post=1854345:date=Jun 18 2011, 02:22 PM:name=Seraphace)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Seraphace @ Jun 18 2011, 02:22 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854345"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Aren't skulks much larger in ns2 as well, making them obviously easier to hit? Mobility is much more of an issue then, so taking away leap without solving that problem is a huge issue.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
^ this. larger and slower role for the skulk has made NO sense to me since the first available alpha.
Moving leap to hive2 is terrible idea IMO. I love playing as skulk because I stand a chance even in 2 vs 1, and with the leap I can access vents/hiding spots faster, or leap over obstacle to air-bite marines. Plus, marines will be able to pick up weapons from dead comrades, and the shotguns cost only 15 res, skulks gonna have tough time.
The standard Jump is useless for a lifeform that can climb all surfaces. Let's Simplify.
<!--coloro:#FFFF00--><span style="color:#FFFF00"><!--/coloro-->Give Jump a forward trajectory<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->, but make it a very short one (default jump height is 1, so maybe something between 2 and 4). Essentially turn Jump into a short-ranged, 0-Energy Leap. Then the devs can limit Leap to whatever Tier they want.
This should give Skulks more maneuverability from the start without introducing any convoluted new rules or mechanics.
standard jump isn't so much useless but rather restricted. In ns1, jumping gave you momentum to slowly pick up speed, and avoid direct assaults - making the aliens more agile, helping them close gaps. NOW, jumping is somewhat useless but its because its missing skill based movement aliens should have. (air control, momentum - skill based movement)
They need to make aliens far more agile than they are now. Also skulks are much larger than they were in ns1, this also hurts them. While marines having their sprint, start of any match they could simply out RUN skulks - another problem of course.
my advice, which I've said before. Give the aliens the skill based movement they must have, that they had in ns1.
All we doing now is finding ways to buff aliens while something worked for years already exists.
I also never saw this as a balance issue to begin with. Try playing on a full 20+ person server.
Yeah if you're playing 3v3 or something small, there's going to be issues, but perhaps you should balance health/numbers based on population to fix that.
Don't forget about the FUN factor. Leap makes the skulk fun. You're leaping onto walls, leaping off walls, onto the ceiling, etc... you feel like an alien. Without it, you're a marine with a only a knife.
I didn't see this as a balance issue. I thought they were pretty close to having vanilla marine vs. vanilla skulk done.
I was playing both fairly regularly and pretty happy how early game was setup with both sides scouting.
I was more worried about the cheapness of shotties. It pretty much made lone skulking worthless since everyone had shotties.
Perhaps they are getting their stats on skulk domination due to the new fade. I know if there is a fade and I am skulk ... I follow him to action and get tons of cleanup kills. So my final stats as a skulk may look far better than my early game.
They (UW) should perhaps have internal gametypes that test combat balance (deathmatch) for certain scenarios that they believe should be balanced. (plain skulk vs. plain marine) 3 vs. 3 (shotty marine vs. fade) 4 vs. 2
Once they have those scenarios solid they can discuss balancing upgrades, turrets, etc without disturbing basic combat balance.
Not sure if this was <b>[EDIT] suggested already</b>...if the first hive is a Shift Hive, skulks get leap right away. Otherwise, they must wait for a second hive (regardless of which type of hive both are).
So the conditions for having leap are having 2 Hives, or one Shift Hive.
<!--quoteo(post=1854803:date=Jun 20 2011, 03:45 PM:name=OutlawDr)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (OutlawDr @ Jun 20 2011, 03:45 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854803"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Not sure if this was mentioned...if the first hive is a Shift Hive, skulks get leap right away. Otherwise, they must wait for a second hive (regardless of which type of hive both are).
So the conditions for having leap are having 2 Hives, or one Shift Hive.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Hmm, are you sure? It says "Moved Leap to TwoHive research on the Shift.". As I got it, it is a research on the Shift which becomes available when you have 2 Hives up, or am I reading it wrong?
<!--quoteo(post=1854764:date=Jun 20 2011, 01:42 PM:name=luns)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (luns @ Jun 20 2011, 01:42 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854764"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->standard jump isn't so much useless but rather restricted. In ns1, jumping gave you momentum to slowly pick up speed, and avoid direct assaults<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> I imagine that was a consequence of the engine, not an intended effect. Even if it were, it isn't a typical or immediately intuitive concept that you'd gain momentum by jumping (because you wouldn't gain momentum by jumping up and down in reality), so this isn't really a proper solution.
<!--quoteo(post=1854764:date=Jun 20 2011, 01:42 PM:name=luns)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (luns @ Jun 20 2011, 01:42 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854764"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- making the aliens more agile, helping them close gaps. NOW, jumping is somewhat useless but its because its missing skill based movement aliens should have. (air control, momentum - skill based movement)
All we doing now is finding ways to buff aliens while something worked for years already exists.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Again, another consequence of an outdated engine. It shouldn't necessarily be the solution just because it used to be.
You don't have directional influence in mid-air. Why would you? It makes no logical sense to be able to shift yourself in any direction once you leave the ground unless you're a Lerk and can flap your wings).
There is a better solution out there for skill-based movement than what we came up with decades ago.
Currect leap is a very poor choice for alien (skulk) movement mechanic althought it very easy to grasp it is very predictable and lacks control meaning when the higher level players eventually take interest in to the game skulks get bashed 100-0 and there will be very little to improve on. In the very low level however leap is consired overpowered due simpleness and speed with only few realizing the few attack patterns and no continuation or simply lack of experience.
Adding ability to control your character with much more accuracy and encourage more variety creating more unique randomness that may not be used in lower levels, are used to some extend in middle level and mastered in higher level creating equal fights in all skill levels.
Leap while as a mechanic very imperfect and flawed can be polished with proper air control and momentum to continue however it is most likely too powerful for tier 1.
Although removing it right would only break the alien game, keeping it is only prolonging the underlying problem.
<!--quoteo(post=1854759:date=Jun 20 2011, 06:28 PM:name=KuBaN)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (KuBaN @ Jun 20 2011, 06:28 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854759"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The standard Jump is useless for a lifeform that can climb all surfaces. Let's Simplify.
<!--coloro:#FFFF00--><span style="color:#FFFF00"><!--/coloro-->Give Jump a forward trajectory<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->, but make it a very short one (default jump height is 1, so maybe something between 2 and 4). Essentially turn Jump into a short-ranged, 0-Energy Leap. Then the devs can limit Leap to whatever Tier they want.
This should give Skulks more maneuverability from the start without introducing any convoluted new rules or mechanics.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Hmm that's an idea.
Much better than silly magic air controlling bunnyhopping rubbish that went out of date almost as soon as it was discovered.
As fade I find a lot of success blinking erratically towards the enemy, with diagonals and lateral movement to throw off the aim. It's a bit cheaper on energy than blinking right to people and also encourages them to waste ammo, making them easier to kill once you get there.
Allowing the skulk to do something similar with jumping would be interesting. You wouldn't need air control because you wouldn't be off the floor that long.
Comments
In a regular game, I usually play marines, and even with lmg, I can take on 2 skulks fairly well, but at the same time, a single sneaky skulk can slip in, eat one of my buddies and slip out.
That was just an example of how skulks are definately not overpowered.
So.
a) keep big leap from start of game.
b) add in energy for marine sprint.
- Give them lots of energy, they can still run a marathon, but have it so the marine can sprint all the way to the alien spawn on summit, but run out of energy shortly after that. This should prevent marines being able to skedaddle from being an idiot and blundering into an alien warzone, but not make sprinting useless.
c) give skulks a sprint ability.
- Being able to leap is cool and all, but if the alien could also zoom about, that would be awesome too. So you could go SWOOSH over spiraling around from wall to ceiling, to vent, to other wall, to marine and really freak them out.
So yes, I'm suggesting to make the skulk more powerful.
Perhaps give them one of those abilities early on, and then have it as an upgrade, or have the two abilities from the start.
I don't want to confuse things, but a half half of having to hold shift and right click to far leap is also an idea that I'm not personally fond of, but is a possibility.
I can easily down a skulk 1 v 1 with the default rifle, let alone the sniper pistol.
The only thing marines need to be is vigilant and skulks cant even lay a butterfly fart on you.
However, I think making the 2nd hive a requirement for leap is a bad idea. It would be better to let the aliens have a choice at the start of the game - either gamble with an early hive and weak early game skulks, or forego the hive to upgrade the skulks and try to achive early game domination. Making the leap a (possibly expensive) upgrade on the whip or crag rather than requiring a 2nd hive would be better, methinks.
Of course, I would love it if the marines had the same choice - right now, there is no sane reason for a marine commander not to drop an armory, ip and do the shotty upgrade right away.
This is a good point, marines grouped together are actually incredibly powerful in the early game. Marines in a group cover each other and bypass the alien advantage in melee by having most of the group able to shoot at any alien attacking a member of it.
Skulks on the other hand get in each other's way.
I think rather than balancing it for a certain number of players, aliens in the early game need more ways in which to work well in groups. The obvious approach is to attack marines from multiple simultaneous directions, however this is difficult to pull of and actually involves not working in groups, because you need to split up to pull it off.
If anything, skulks need to be more mobile in order to allow them to split up once they engage marines and attack the entire group at once, causing disarray and confusion. it is difficult to do this at the moment.
this type of thing will go back and forward till they actually add skill based movement for aliens, and they will be more agile to the point not having leap wouldn't be so bad. Though until we reach that point, remove marines sprint.
Why would marines sprint when they can just shoot the incredibly easy to shoot skulks?
Why would marines sprint when they can just shoot the incredibly easy to shoot skulks?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Amen.
How about we leave marines sprint and skulks leap alone? Neither need to be nerfed! Lets just wait til performance is perfect before we argue about close quarters combat balance. Marines vs skulk battles are over within 3 seconds, those 3 seconds need to be as fluid as possible if we ever want to ever have a true basis for arguing balance.
There is simply too much up to chance right now, there could be a lag spike or frame rate dip at any time.
a. Lose the leap until second hive AND remove p.res from marines.
b. Lose the leap and somehow make shotguns much more difficult to obtain for marines.
Personally I'd go with a, since I think the game is SOOOO horribly skewed in the marine's favor right now. Generally people don't think it is because they don't play against decent marines.
a. Lose the leap until second hive AND remove p.res from marines.
b. Lose the leap and somehow make shotguns much more difficult to obtain for marines.
Personally I'd go with a, since I think the game is SOOOO horribly skewed in the marine's favor right now. Generally people don't think it is because they don't play against decent marines.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You do realize A is kinda not an option and p.res is here to stay? Helps the resource model to scale properly.
^ this.
larger and slower role for the skulk has made NO sense to me since the first available alpha.
<!--coloro:#FFFF00--><span style="color:#FFFF00"><!--/coloro-->Give Jump a forward trajectory<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->, but make it a very short one (default jump height is 1, so maybe something between 2 and 4). Essentially turn Jump into a short-ranged, 0-Energy Leap. Then the devs can limit Leap to whatever Tier they want.
This should give Skulks more maneuverability from the start without introducing any convoluted new rules or mechanics.
They need to make aliens far more agile than they are now. Also skulks are much larger than they were in ns1, this also hurts them. While marines having their sprint, start of any match they could simply out RUN skulks - another problem of course.
my advice, which I've said before. Give the aliens the skill based movement they must have, that they had in ns1.
All we doing now is finding ways to buff aliens while something worked for years already exists.
Yeah if you're playing 3v3 or something small, there's going to be issues, but perhaps you should balance health/numbers based on population to fix that.
Don't forget about the FUN factor. Leap makes the skulk fun. You're leaping onto walls, leaping off walls, onto the ceiling, etc... you feel like an alien. Without it, you're a marine with a only a knife.
I thought they were pretty close to having vanilla marine vs. vanilla skulk done.
I was playing both fairly regularly and pretty happy how early game was setup with both sides scouting.
I was more worried about the cheapness of shotties.
It pretty much made lone skulking worthless since everyone had shotties.
Perhaps they are getting their stats on skulk domination due to the new fade.
I know if there is a fade and I am skulk ... I follow him to action and get tons of cleanup kills.
So my final stats as a skulk may look far better than my early game.
They (UW) should perhaps have internal gametypes that test combat balance (deathmatch) for certain scenarios that they believe should be balanced.
(plain skulk vs. plain marine) 3 vs. 3
(shotty marine vs. fade) 4 vs. 2
Once they have those scenarios solid they can discuss balancing upgrades, turrets, etc without disturbing basic combat balance.
So the conditions for having leap are having 2 Hives, or one Shift Hive.
Leap + speed upgrades vs Armor vs sensory upgrades (which could be sweet) ? It would be a dumb move not to chose shift.
So the conditions for having leap are having 2 Hives, or one Shift Hive.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Hmm, are you sure? It says "Moved Leap to TwoHive research on the Shift.". As I got it, it is a research on the Shift which becomes available when you have 2 Hives up, or am I reading it wrong?
BTW that was a suggestion, sorry if that sounded like it was something official I was reading off.
I imagine that was a consequence of the engine, not an intended effect. Even if it were, it isn't a typical or immediately intuitive concept that you'd gain momentum by jumping (because you wouldn't gain momentum by jumping up and down in reality), so this isn't really a proper solution.
<!--quoteo(post=1854764:date=Jun 20 2011, 01:42 PM:name=luns)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (luns @ Jun 20 2011, 01:42 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1854764"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- making the aliens more agile, helping them close gaps. NOW, jumping is somewhat useless but its because its missing skill based movement aliens should have. (air control, momentum - skill based movement)
All we doing now is finding ways to buff aliens while something worked for years already exists.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Again, another consequence of an outdated engine. It shouldn't necessarily be the solution just because it used to be.
You don't have directional influence in mid-air. Why would you? It makes no logical sense to be able to shift yourself in any direction once you leave the ground unless you're a Lerk and can flap your wings).
There is a better solution out there for skill-based movement than what we came up with decades ago.
Adding ability to control your character with much more accuracy and encourage more variety creating more unique randomness that may not be used in lower levels, are used to some extend in middle level and mastered in higher level creating equal fights in all skill levels.
Leap while as a mechanic very imperfect and flawed can be polished with proper air control and momentum to continue however it is most likely too powerful for tier 1.
Although removing it right would only break the alien game, keeping it is only prolonging the underlying problem.
<!--coloro:#FFFF00--><span style="color:#FFFF00"><!--/coloro-->Give Jump a forward trajectory<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->, but make it a very short one (default jump height is 1, so maybe something between 2 and 4). Essentially turn Jump into a short-ranged, 0-Energy Leap. Then the devs can limit Leap to whatever Tier they want.
This should give Skulks more maneuverability from the start without introducing any convoluted new rules or mechanics.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Hmm that's an idea.
Much better than silly magic air controlling bunnyhopping rubbish that went out of date almost as soon as it was discovered.
As fade I find a lot of success blinking erratically towards the enemy, with diagonals and lateral movement to throw off the aim. It's a bit cheaper on energy than blinking right to people and also encourages them to waste ammo, making them easier to kill once you get there.
Allowing the skulk to do something similar with jumping would be interesting. You wouldn't need air control because you wouldn't be off the floor that long.