Xeno and Bite
PsympleJester
Join Date: 2008-04-06 Member: 64024Members
Join Date: 2008-04-06 Member: 64024Members
Comments
But
Have you...
TRIED IT WITH 2 SKULKS?
if you want to use it alone you will not kill anything most of the time but if you do want to use it alone still be helpful try jumping in a group of marines and xeno them all right before a big push, everyone you hit will be like an A0 marine against your higher lifeform allies.
xeno is fine right where it is imo.
Have 2-3 skulks xeno spamming at the same time and the same base and marines will crumble.
Have a gorge or 2 bile down marine armor to set up the next xeno attack and marines will die.
Have a skulk or 2 xeno right off the bat in an attack push to severely weaken the marines for an easy clean up by the rest of the team.
Using teamwork and proper tactics can easily bring xenocide back to its former glory, it's just that teamwork like this is very hard to find in pub games and the competitive players usually have the game over long before xeno would find any use.
That being said, yes, I agree that you should be able to bite while xeno is charging up. It just stops dead when you switch your attack, which really sucks. I was actually still used to bite spamming while trying to xeno from NS1, so it took me a couple failed xeno attempts to realize what was going on and why I wasn't blowing up. I do hope that they change this though, it was always cool to get an extra kill per xeno attempt or be able to guarantee at least 1 kill with a simple bite or 2.
I wouldn't be surprised if all of this is why the majority of people think xeno sucks, it doesn't work like it used to and they don't know how to use it yet. But, since no one uses it, they'll never learn and the cycle of ignorance will continue.
I actually had a comm refuse to research xeno in a game where we had 4 hives and 135+ res banked because he thought it sucks. Fast forward to 30 minutes later and we're still trying to get the marines out of their turtle. Xeno would've cut that game down by at least 20 minutes with the way those marines were humping their armory, but nope, "xeno is useless".
Also, the blast radius is pretty small all things considered. It's not that hard to avoid, where as it takes quite a bit of precision to land right. THAT alone should warrant the ability being much more deadly.
We already have bile for structures, Xeno should be anti-personnel and instant-kill anything under armor 2.
Also make the damage dependent on how close you were to the target.
This system isn't good. You can only encourage teamwork in video games, not force it. If two skulks have to xeno to kill a marine or two, big deal. It's a stalemate.
I'd change it to be more like NS1.
I understand the thoughts behind this. Even end-game-tech shouldn't insta-kill a LvL3 marine. End-game marines vs end-game aliens should be a fair fight.
But instead of balancing this mechanic with low damage, it would be better if it would be effective (=high damage, maybe even insta-kill up to LvL2 armor marines) BUT it should be easily counter-able if used without skill. A skulk that simply leaps into a group of marines with activated xeno should not be rewarded. But a skulk that can manage it to sneak into that group, should be.
How could such a skillful solution look:<ul><li>One example of this could be, that you do more damage the more energy you have the moment you explode. To avoid the difficult situation to counter leap -> xeno skulks</li><li>Another example would be, that you lose health per second as soon as you activate xeno, the closer the time is to your explosion, the easier it is to kill you. So it isn't useful if they see you coming.</li><li>Or instead of making you more vulnerable, you could allow to bite while Xenociding and every bite you land increases the damage (and/or range) you do when going BOOM. (The timer of the explosion needs to be increased in this case.)</li></ul>
<b>TL;DR:
Instead of making Xenocide useless by decreasing the damage how it is now, make it an ability that needs skill to be successfully used. This can be easily achieved by creating a counter to xeno for marines. It doesn't feel unfair, when it needs skill and the marine gets a chance to counter this attack.</b>