OP, sorry, but I don't think I've ever read someone put it as, "players unbalance our game."
This is not a thing, this is not an actual argument. A person must never, ever conscientiously struggle against design or be forced to adapt to it. The game obviously needs to have some numbers adjusted, or better yet, some new feature introduced or major fix to balance things. Playing as a marine is just much more difficult, both for the commander and players alike. I find it silly that "casuals", despite being the same paying customers, and a MAJORITY, have to be considered only half-heartedly on the discussion forum.
Not sure what your point was, but the reasons casual will Always be considered less worth on balance issues is simple, the do not know the ins and out of the game mechanics and lack the expertise, if you will. You wouldnt let a none economist make budget decisions for your company would you? Would be a disaster. Sure, they have their right to voice their opinion but you cant always listen to ppl that sont know what they're talking about.
OP, sorry, but I don't think I've ever read someone put it as, "players unbalance our game."
This is not a thing, this is not an actual argument. A person must never, ever conscientiously struggle against design or be forced to adapt to it. The game obviously needs to have some numbers adjusted, or better yet, some new feature introduced or major fix to balance things. Playing as a marine is just much more difficult, both for the commander and players alike. I find it silly that "casuals", despite being the same paying customers, and a MAJORITY, have to be considered only half-heartedly on the discussion forum.
Not sure what your point was, but the reasons casual will Always be considered less worth on balance issues is simple, the do not know the ins and out of the game mechanics and lack the expertise, if you will. You wouldnt let a none economist make budget decisions for your company would you? Would be a disaster. Sure, they have their right to voice their opinion but you cant always listen to ppl that sont know what they're talking about.
No, but you would have non-economists setting the goals of your company and tell the economists to achieve those goals.
The economist is the tool, not the sculptor.
A game's function is to be fun for it's players, not to fit the vision of the person designing it. A game that is exactly what the designer wanted but not fun is a bad game.
This is not about business, this is a game. If you have two teams, and one of them is fundamentally more difficult to learn to play, there is a balance issue. It is simply bad design. The devs did good on the alien side: there are easier lifeforms where screwing up is hard or not much of an issue (skulk, gorge, onos) and harder lifeforms that take some time to master (eg fade, lerk). On the marine side on the other hand there is a lack of an easy way to learn while you play. Newbs just get stomped and dont really know what to do. The comms have difficulties giving proper orders thanks to UI limitations (seems to be getting better with patches).
As I have been playing some dota2 recently, I may make a little analogy: Dota has easy heroes and hard heroes. While they all are fairly well balanced, some are just easier for new players to work with. If dota would not have these heroes, the newbie rage would be even worse and it would definitly not be as popular as it is.
bErt0r has a point, but then again this never has been a game aiming for mass appeal and that what makes it unique, imo it does well. I like it, i have to say. They carved themselfs and us out a nice niche, that does not follow the 'trend' everybody else has been following for years. Here you really need to be on your toes at all times and play as a team. Every bit matters. Maybe dont set so high expectations. Nowadays i get the feeling poeple wanna own right from the start.
I have a conspiracy theory... one that I have a worrying amount of faith in.
First of all, something I noticed. Since I play in a very small community, I am always scared that the game will suddenly die, as it has before and as it did many times during the NS1 times. So my primary concern at all times is avoiding things that degrade players perception of the game over time, and cause them not to come back. Such things are team stacking, predictable wins, getting stomped, etc. So I noticed that, games which have the alien team losing badly, in scenarios where they either have one hive, or they have 2 hives with basically no upgrades or res, tend to empty quite quickly. It is a thoroughly painful experience, and people genuinely dislike playing at that stage. So much so that it can actually ruin your mood even after an entire night of really good games. The other thing I noticed is that games in which the marines are losing badly, where they have almost no resource towers, or cannot leave their base, have the complete opposite effect on the game. I've seen empty servers full rapidly when turtling starts, and I've seen players play into the wee hours of the morning just to finish with a turtle.
Taking this into account, I believe that, had the win ratios been 70/30 in favour of the marines, the game would have substantially fewer players at this moment in time. Therefore, I propose that UWE INTENTIONALLY MADE THE ALIENS STRONGER.
I have a conspiracy theory... one that I have a worrying amount of faith in.
First of all, something I noticed. Since I play in a very small community, I am always scared that the game will suddenly die, as it has before and as it did many times during the NS1 times. So my primary concern at all times is avoiding things that degrade players perception of the game over time, and cause them not to come back. Such things are team stacking, predictable wins, getting stomped, etc. So I noticed that, games which have the alien team losing badly, in scenarios where they either have one hive, or they have 2 hives with basically no upgrades or res, tend to empty quite quickly. It is a thoroughly painful experience, and people genuinely dislike playing at that stage. So much so that it can actually ruin your mood even after an entire night of really good games. The other thing I noticed is that games in which the marines are losing badly, where they have almost no resource towers, or cannot leave their base, have the complete opposite effect on the game. I've seen empty servers full rapidly when turtling starts, and I've seen players play into the wee hours of the morning just to finish with a turtle.
Taking this into account, I believe that, had the win ratios been 70/30 in favour of the marines, the game would have substantially fewer players at this moment in time. Therefore, I propose that UWE INTENTIONALLY MADE THE ALIENS STRONGER.
I don't think they intentionally made it imbalanced. However I have noticed that when marines win, they really win and it's no fun as aliens playing against that.
I don't think they intentionally made it imbalanced. However I have noticed that when marines win, they really win and it's no fun as aliens playing against that.
According to NS2Stats, aliens have a substantial advantage in competitive games. Almost 70/30, in fact.
I think a fairly good amount of that stats is also from ENSL gathers where lack of coordinated play is prevalent in spite of being "competitive". It's just how the game is now. You need to play flawlessly as marines to win 6v6 whereas playing as aliens is a lot more forgiving
No, a fair amount comes from the real organized teams. Gathers are rare in comparison to scrimmages between actual competitive teams or at least pick up games/mixes of team members.
There are almost no North American gathers anymore and the European ones are pretty slim in comparison to European scrimmages. The bulk of the stats if you filter competitive definitely come from actual teams.
@Strofix
I think there might be some truth in that observation actually. Getting rammed as aliens is really not very fun. I don't remember having the same feeling in NS1 as it happens but that might be because I was epic at NS1 and am distinctly average in NS2. Someone who is/was equally bad at both games might have a better idea?
So I noticed that, games which have the alien team losing badly, in scenarios where they either have one hive, or they have 2 hives with basically no upgrades or res, tend to empty quite quickly. It is a thoroughly painful experience, and people genuinely dislike playing at that stage.
This times a million. Nothing worse than a marine stack. (except perhaps a marine stack where the alien com went camo first) This usually empties servers out if people don't vote concede ASAP. I've often seen it on the Monash servers here, a few good (or neon pink skulk modding?) dudes will stack marines and no one will want to play aliens against people with K:D of 25+.
I'm not entirely sure if UWE meant for it to be like this or not though.
One thing I have noticed is that often when playing a fairly good balanced game. (balanced in terms of map control, res, having a few tech point trades) is that for this to happen, usually the marines have K:D over 1 if not 2. Aliens on the other hand can still pull this off with sub 1 K:Ds. It doesn't always make for an enjoyable time to be alien in that instance.
Why wouldn't you strive to make the skill curves for both races in the game relatively similar?
I think they have this vision but a fundamental lack of understanding about what was good about the NS1 movement mechanics has led to inferior equivalents for NS2 (although this may also be engine-related I guess). For example, when I mentioned to Charlie roughly two months ago about why combining speed and unpredictability was problematic, it was the first time he had ever heard/thought of it - not overly reassuring!
I still think there's a great deal of work to be done in this area and I think achieving the first goal of an acceptable skill-gradient for the movement system will make it easier to balance the rest of the game out properly in the sense that they won't need cheap mechanics like vision reduction and massive HP soaking lifeforms to compensate for the lack of strong foundations. Such mechanics only work at very specific levels of play and break down at the extremes quite easily. You can see evidence of this in how vastly different perceptions are between public and competitive play.
This thread can be summed up by Tweadle's avatar.. Aliens are not nerfed. They fixed the gorge spit because it was too powerful. They fixed the bile from the nano vents because that was an EXPLOIT people found, it was unintended. The vents are there to give aliens another point of entry, not to allow them to bile spam the power node while remaining completely safe in the vent, effectively making it impossible for marines to EVER hold nano until they research jetpacks / GLs.
Why? Because they win a lot more than the marines.
Alien players can be insta-aggressive in any game, where as marines must split up to gain map control which leads to a less aggressive style of play from marines. You can thank the Alien Kham mechanics of self-building structures for this.
Nerfing Aliens will not make them boring. Expecting a Skulk at mid/end-game to be just as effective in the early game would be a slap in the face. As it stands, very good Skulks can already solo JP/SG marines (a tough feat, but not impossible.). Can a fresh A0/W0 marine take on a single Onos? Nope.
People are so afraid of being challenged in a game lately. It's like they forget that the hill to overcome, the challenge to become a better player, is all part of the fun.
This thread can be summed up by Tweadle's avatar.. Aliens are not nerfed. They fixed the gorge spit because it was too powerful. They fixed the bile from the nano vents because that was an EXPLOIT people found, it was unintended. The vents are there to give aliens another point of entry, not to allow them to bile spam the power node while remaining completely safe in the vent, effectively making it impossible for marines to EVER hold nano until they research jetpacks / GLs.
Bile bombing from the vents was not an exploit. It was just considered overpowered. Players were doing it entirely within the bounds of the map and the game rules. Adding the covers doesn't fix an "exploit" it removes a ridiculously powerful strategy that people were having problems countering. Really, you could stand on top of your own extractors and just shoot the gorge most of the time. The gorge was never completely safe, there were multiple ways you could clear them out prior to GLs / JPs they just weren't obvious and required teamwork. If they were using clogs as a platform in the vent to make it harder to shoot them from on top of the extractors then you just boost into the vents from either of the junctions, pop the clogs and kill the gorge.
Aliens get nerfed and marines get power boosted cause of ratios. People get this game and think it call of duty, then play marines and suck. This brings down the win % for marines but when players actually know what they are doing the scales are drastically tipped in favor of marines.
Aliens get nerfed and marines get power boosted cause of ratios. People get this game and think it call of duty, then play marines and suck. This brings down the win % for marines but when players actually know what they are doing the scales are drastically tipped in favor of marines.
Which is plain wrong, as numerous references to the ns2stats.org site's competitive section as well as the anecdotal evidence of almost every competitive player indicate.
the problem with balancing to the competitive scene, is that the competitive scene doesn't necessarily reflect the full game experience. I mean, how many games end before the 15 minute mark? how many end due to early base rush? how many games actually last until arcs and 3-3 comes into play? but pub games certainly do, consistently. I'd like them to further divvy up the stats into things like, game duration. maybe we see that aliens win really early or really late, and they can balance for those aspects of the game. I don't mind using competitive stats to balance elements, but really... nerfing the gorge spit? the gl? did they really think that these are what's at the root of the lopsided w/l?
honestly, i'd like to see a mid-late game buff so skulks don't have to bite a marine 6 times to kill them. cuz the dude is right, being skulk late game is no fun, 33 marines chew through you even if you get the jump on them.
In Finnish gather games it's 50% draws and most of them being both sides winning as alien no matter what kind of skill balance exists between the teams. It seems like at least for gather games aliens are easier to play and pretty strong to boot. Marines can pretty much only win if aliens aren't destroying marine RTs actively enough. The recent build might change this and we have to wait and see.
It's a really complex issue that needs to be looked at from as many angles as possible without rushing something half baked out.
Comments
Not sure what your point was, but the reasons casual will Always be considered less worth on balance issues is simple, the do not know the ins and out of the game mechanics and lack the expertise, if you will. You wouldnt let a none economist make budget decisions for your company would you? Would be a disaster. Sure, they have their right to voice their opinion but you cant always listen to ppl that sont know what they're talking about.
No, but you would have non-economists setting the goals of your company and tell the economists to achieve those goals.
The economist is the tool, not the sculptor.
A game's function is to be fun for it's players, not to fit the vision of the person designing it. A game that is exactly what the designer wanted but not fun is a bad game.
As I have been playing some dota2 recently, I may make a little analogy: Dota has easy heroes and hard heroes. While they all are fairly well balanced, some are just easier for new players to work with. If dota would not have these heroes, the newbie rage would be even worse and it would definitly not be as popular as it is.
I try to avoid modded servers, since I generally have no idea whats different about them. 2cents
The almost 70% winrate on NS2Stats.org is my short answer. I won't go into a long one.
Making marine play frustrating for new players is OK though, so it's all good.
It's never been relatively easy to play marines, why should it be relatively easy to play aliens?
First of all, something I noticed. Since I play in a very small community, I am always scared that the game will suddenly die, as it has before and as it did many times during the NS1 times. So my primary concern at all times is avoiding things that degrade players perception of the game over time, and cause them not to come back. Such things are team stacking, predictable wins, getting stomped, etc. So I noticed that, games which have the alien team losing badly, in scenarios where they either have one hive, or they have 2 hives with basically no upgrades or res, tend to empty quite quickly. It is a thoroughly painful experience, and people genuinely dislike playing at that stage. So much so that it can actually ruin your mood even after an entire night of really good games. The other thing I noticed is that games in which the marines are losing badly, where they have almost no resource towers, or cannot leave their base, have the complete opposite effect on the game. I've seen empty servers full rapidly when turtling starts, and I've seen players play into the wee hours of the morning just to finish with a turtle.
Taking this into account, I believe that, had the win ratios been 70/30 in favour of the marines, the game would have substantially fewer players at this moment in time. Therefore, I propose that UWE INTENTIONALLY MADE THE ALIENS STRONGER.
I don't think they intentionally made it imbalanced. However I have noticed that when marines win, they really win and it's no fun as aliens playing against that.
OPEN YOUR EYES MAN
No, a fair amount comes from the real organized teams. Gathers are rare in comparison to scrimmages between actual competitive teams or at least pick up games/mixes of team members.
There are almost no North American gathers anymore and the European ones are pretty slim in comparison to European scrimmages. The bulk of the stats if you filter competitive definitely come from actual teams.
I think there might be some truth in that observation actually. Getting rammed as aliens is really not very fun. I don't remember having the same feeling in NS1 as it happens but that might be because I was epic at NS1 and am distinctly average in NS2. Someone who is/was equally bad at both games might have a better idea?
This times a million. Nothing worse than a marine stack. (except perhaps a marine stack where the alien com went camo first) This usually empties servers out if people don't vote concede ASAP. I've often seen it on the Monash servers here, a few good (or neon pink skulk modding?) dudes will stack marines and no one will want to play aliens against people with K:D of 25+.
I'm not entirely sure if UWE meant for it to be like this or not though.
One thing I have noticed is that often when playing a fairly good balanced game. (balanced in terms of map control, res, having a few tech point trades) is that for this to happen, usually the marines have K:D over 1 if not 2. Aliens on the other hand can still pull this off with sub 1 K:Ds. It doesn't always make for an enjoyable time to be alien in that instance.
I still think there's a great deal of work to be done in this area and I think achieving the first goal of an acceptable skill-gradient for the movement system will make it easier to balance the rest of the game out properly in the sense that they won't need cheap mechanics like vision reduction and massive HP soaking lifeforms to compensate for the lack of strong foundations. Such mechanics only work at very specific levels of play and break down at the extremes quite easily. You can see evidence of this in how vastly different perceptions are between public and competitive play.
Alien players can be insta-aggressive in any game, where as marines must split up to gain map control which leads to a less aggressive style of play from marines. You can thank the Alien Kham mechanics of self-building structures for this.
Nerfing Aliens will not make them boring. Expecting a Skulk at mid/end-game to be just as effective in the early game would be a slap in the face. As it stands, very good Skulks can already solo JP/SG marines (a tough feat, but not impossible.). Can a fresh A0/W0 marine take on a single Onos? Nope.
People are so afraid of being challenged in a game lately. It's like they forget that the hill to overcome, the challenge to become a better player, is all part of the fun.
Bile bombing from the vents was not an exploit. It was just considered overpowered. Players were doing it entirely within the bounds of the map and the game rules. Adding the covers doesn't fix an "exploit" it removes a ridiculously powerful strategy that people were having problems countering. Really, you could stand on top of your own extractors and just shoot the gorge most of the time. The gorge was never completely safe, there were multiple ways you could clear them out prior to GLs / JPs they just weren't obvious and required teamwork. If they were using clogs as a platform in the vent to make it harder to shoot them from on top of the extractors then you just boost into the vents from either of the junctions, pop the clogs and kill the gorge.
Problem solving hoooooooo.
Marines get new toys and the magic isn't ruined for aliens.
Which is plain wrong, as numerous references to the ns2stats.org site's competitive section as well as the anecdotal evidence of almost every competitive player indicate.
honestly, i'd like to see a mid-late game buff so skulks don't have to bite a marine 6 times to kill them. cuz the dude is right, being skulk late game is no fun, 33 marines chew through you even if you get the jump on them.
It's a really complex issue that needs to be looked at from as many angles as possible without rushing something half baked out.