Lets say, in an average game against people equally skilled as yourself, that you die once every minute. By the tenth minute minute you've spent 50 pRes on welders. You are going to have to come up with some pretty concrete evidence to make me think that welding up some marine's armour so that he can take 3 bites instead of one is worth 50 resources.
First off, don't make up stats about deaths per min.
Second, you claim that tripling the life of a marine is useless which is wrong. Without armor you can only take 100 damage(2 ok skulk bites, 4 bad skulk bites). If you only ever take <100 damage, yes welders are useless. If you take damage between 100-(effective health with full armor) welders save you. Welders saving you leads to map control which leads to winning.
Or should we not buy a welder every life? How should we know when to buy a welder? Are we going to spend in excess of a minute sitting at the armoury, wondering if this is the time to buy a welder? Maybe this time will be different, and this welder will actually save the game for us.
There is no need for drama. Stick with facts.
The proposed changes really just cripple bad players (avg pub player) and are a resource and time drain on good players(high end pub players).
It also gets rid of your Axe.
If marines are too strong at holding locations, this would be a way to correct that.
If the marines need another resource drain, this would be a way to correct that.
I'm not completely convinced that these are needed.
The armory repairing armor is a nice convenience for the Marine Comm. It's one less thing to micro manage. Drop an armory at a forward position and your marines should be taken care of without yelling at them to weld up.
If marines need an extra TRes resource drain, extra research (per armory or global) would be useful.
I would love some. But there aren't any. Hence the problem.
Most people in this thread are essentially saying welders = win game. That isn't true. It isn't even remotely true. And you know what? I would go so far as to say its probably the opposite of what is true. Unnecessary spending on welders will probably lose more games than it will win.
I like the change of no armor healing from the armory.
If the welder is made free, you might as well just auto spawn with it.
If there needs to be a resource sink, make the comm have to research it again (like in current vanilla), then once researched, the default marine build tool gets upgrade to a welder (like someone else already suggested in this thread).
it's a problem with accessibility just get hugh to make a tip video about repairing marine armor with a welder.
The fact that you and no one else in the thread have noticed there are already tip videos about welding marine armour is more cause for me to be extremely worried about the probable accessibility effects of a change like this.
Most people in this thread are essentially saying welders = win game. That isn't true. It isn't even remotely true. And you know what? I would go so far as to say its probably the opposite of what is true. Unnecessary spending on welders will probably lose more games than it will win.
Again dramatics.
No one said buy welders->win games.
They said Armor->winning more engagements-> map control -> winning
Currently, most of the armor regen comes from armories.
Thus Forward armory >> welders in hand.
People are saying that, if the armory no longer healed armor, buying welders becomes critical to providing the same support that an armory did.
You can't theorise everything away. I accept that NS2 is a much faster paced game than NS1; however, I have personally used the 'weld teammates, drop welder, get welded, retrieve welder' tactic successfully in NS2 several times. It's not always so fast-paced that welding is impossible, even if not everyone has a welder.
I would argue that the cost may or may not need to change, but you can only know this by testing, hence any arguments saying 'it must cost 0 or X res' are essentially meaningless. No-one knows until it's tested whether it's economically viable for marines to still be spending 5 res per welder. Besides, picking up dropped weapons happens almost as frequently now as it did before Gorgeous (and BB killing dropped weps). It's completely nonsensical theorycrafting to say that every marine spawn costs 5 pres.
So too is the argument that 'no-body will buy a welder.' Nonsense. If you need a welder to repair teammates, you will damn well make sure that the guy with you has a welder, or that you have a welder. And if you die and drop your welder, you make sure someone picks it up (you do this now, right? right??!). Add to that the fact that the comm can drop welders from tres...
As I said on the first page of this thread, the benefits of prevalent welders to the marine team offensively can be very real. It means that you really honestly can keep 2 or 3 marines alive with meds and welding while simultaneously holding an important choke point. No need to stop to build an armoury. Hey, you can weld and move at the same time, too - no need to stop to break out the welder, either.
Finally, as has been said by several people already, adv armoury repairing is pointless: this only serves to prolong turtling in already lost games. If marines are on top and winning, they will be mainly attacking hence will not be constantly near an adv armoury - therefore it will not make much difference to late game marines who are winning. Late game marines who are losing and on 1 tech point will still be able to hold out as they can now for a rather long time when it's already lost. Hell xenocide might actually be a worthwhile weapon if marines in their turtle didn't all have 100% armour... as it is, it's rarely used and frankly hurts aliens more than marines most of the time (taking a player out of the field and lengthening the spawn queue, not to mention adding a death to their total (you I know, meaningless...)).
Regardless of whether or not people think it's a great idea bound to work, a terrible idea bound to fail, or somewhere in the middle - the fact that there is a division of opinion at least should highlight the now-met need to test this. So, nay-sayers and aye-sayers alike, get in the mod and see how it plays!! (I will be doing this when I next play).
Oh, and if a change like this goes in, would it be beneficial to change up the functionality of Nano Shield? I know it was being complained about before Gorgeous came out.
Perhaps leave it's use the same on buildings, but for marines, allow it to heal armor either to full, or maybe even past full (with it degrading back to full over time). That way if marines refuse to buy welders and weld each other, the comm has an option without having to get Macs.
But leave the cool down on it so you can’t cheese with it, and so it’s just about as effective as a marine weld train.
I think the fact that of all the people on this forum who generally LOVE to complain (including me) only 2 or 3 are against this change is proof that it is one of the best ideas ever
Let's just try it out. We have experiance with a game which of course was different(altough about 90% the same) that suggests that this will work. Maybe it will not which would be mainly caused by players generally getting 50% more stupid over the last few years. If it wont work out it wont make its way into the game anyways.
Generally I really encourage the makers of this mod to really embrace and test all ideas as long as there is a crowd willing to test them. Even the best idea could be reduced to a pile of stinking poo by some of the nagging whiners that run around these forums.
it's a problem with accessibility just get hugh to make a tip video about repairing marine armor with a welder.
The fact that you and no one else in the thread have noticed there are already tip videos about welding marine armour is more cause for me to be extremely worried about the probable accessibility effects of a change like this.
All the more reason to make welders stock equipment. Most every new player will cycle through their standard weapons. If they see others welding, and they recall that they are carrying a welder too, they should easily be able to learn from example.
it's a problem with accessibility just get hugh to make a tip video about repairing marine armor with a welder.
The fact that you and no one else in the thread have noticed there are already tip videos about welding marine armour is more cause for me to be extremely worried about the probable accessibility effects of a change like this.
I think most veteran players disabled the videos anyway before even looking through all of them. I did for sure. Getting the same tip frequently with no sight of the frequency of tips in general reducing got annoying pretty quickly.
It would probably be more effective if the system was more intelligent. For instance remembering what actions you already performed, so that it doesn't need to tell you about them more than once again.
And taking the current progress of a match and the player's equipment into account. If my first death occurs a minute into the game, then a hint video that teaches me about using Umbra on Onos in the endgame won't be beneficial at all because as new player I have probably already forgotten about that stuff by the time I can afford a Lerk, we aquired Umbra and got an Onos on the field.
Sad thing is that we have played with this mechanic for 10 years, and yet people come here making arguments and doomsday predictions about it, when we know exactly how it plays. Armory healing armory is a mechanic that adds nothing to the game, and only serves to break the engagement rules of every alien lifeform besides the onos. The fact that people here have not realized that already is astounding to me, and really makes me question if people actually play this game, or just theorycraft on the forums. The most amusing argument sofar is that marines will die every minute and loose their welder, and then have to rebuy it each time costing 50 pres over 10 minutes. Thats completely crazy to assume that the entire team needs to carry a welder at all times. Even just 1 welder is all that is needed, and honestly marines currently have way to much pres going around (do you see how many mines are spammed?).
In the end this is a mechanic that was tested and used for 10 years, and is well known. Every single drawback that has been mentioned to date is either grossly exaggerated or completely untrue. I suggest some of the people bringing up points from NS1 check their facts also, as many of the points are wrong.
Heck, it was even tested in the NS2 beta... and you know what? The world didn't end. Marines weren't overwhelmed by the alien hordes, tears in their eyes as the last remnants of humanity were wiped off the planet. They adapted, starting going around in groups with welders mixed in, and did just fine, while skulks (and lerks, and fades) were finally able to use hit-and-run attacks like they were supposed to. Welders are cheap, reusable and serve multiple functions (they wreck cyst chains like no tomorrow), and if they turn out to be too large of a pres sink they can just have their cost lowered. You lose nothing from this change (maybe a little convenience) and the change in attitude it brings about helps make the game a hell of a lot better.
oldassgamersJoin Date: 2011-02-02Member: 80033Members, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
edited March 2013
Make welders more appealing. Let armory only heal HP and not ARMOR.
Now we all shall use welders. May the POO be with you.
I'm happy that the uwe brought up this important change. I'm SO EXCITED IF IT GOES THROUGH THE MOD. Please only let armory heal HP. ONLY THAT or players will hump around the armory all the time and spam armories everywhere. Me not like that
The current armory has 2 issues when talking about healing armor.
1) Provides significant front line support by quickly dropping an armory.
2) Aids in turtleing
I would be for the change to remove the ability for armories to heal armor but a few things should be considered first.
1) Welders price should be reduced dramatically (2-3 res max)
2) You should consider making welders come pre researched. I'm not sure this is really needed though.
3) Please fix it so axe gets a slot weapon so you can still axe RTS since more people will be using welders.
4) slightly lengthen the time welders stay "alive" when dropped.
5) Advanced armories should heal armor at first. I only say this one because this will produce a radical change in the way marines play and win games. Having advanced armories still heal is just to "ease" into the change rather then jumping in with both feet hoping its balanced. If it proves stable then the patch after that remove it from advanced armories. Keeping armor healing on advanced armories doesn't solve issue 2 but it does with issue 1 as few will purchase advanced armories for risky forward positions.
I wana know where you guys were playing that the commander dropped welders for light marines. That is some serious role playing right there. I bet he held a memorial every time one of his soldiers died as well.
I played on the YO server exclusively. In my experience, if the comm had any idea what they were doing, as soon as it was necessary and worth it, it was almost always made sure at least 1 or 2 welders were being passed around somewhere. I have basically never seen shotguns being given out without 1-2 welders. In fact, most of the time they were even given out in sets. People actually asked for and used welders a lot, and not only on heavies.
Come to think of it, I actually still pretty much never buy a shotgun without buying a welder as well.
I assume you meant to imply that everyone who is against the change has not played NS1 and everyone in favor of it has, and likewise imply that this proves that the change must be good.
The people in this thread that have expressed reservations about this change include me, strofix, DamDSx, Xao, tarquinbb, and virsoul. Are you certain that none of these people have played NS1?
If not, then please retract your baseless ad-hominem arguments. They don't contribute to the discussion.
Don't turn what I wrote into a hostile black and white thing. I meant no harm. I'm saying people who've seen it work in NS1, regardless of the difference between NS1 and NS2, mostly agree it could work again, and we should all try it before judging - meaning both the 'for' and 'against' parties. We can all write pages and pages on how it will or won't work in theory, but in the end, if it clearly doesn't work in-game, I'm sure the opinions won't be so split anymore.
Also, I made all my points on page 1 and I'm contributing to this discussion quite extensively.
However, if this is to be changed then welders need to be free. It would create a massive game imbalance if marines were expected to be buying a tool that effectively is lost nearly every time they die. It creates an artificial resource sink for the marines, which depresses their economy. So if marines are expected to buy a welder when spawning, aliens will need a similar resource sink to keep the economic impact balanced.
[...]
Edit: Before anyone decides to click 'disagree', keep in mind that there WILL be an economic impact if marines need to buy welders. How much imbalance that creates in the game is open to debate, but there will be an imbalance by the simple nature of putting a cost on something that didn't have a cost before. So please keep that in mind.
You are overestimating the economic impact it would have. Even if the welder cost stays at 5 res, the actual impact would be minimal. You're forgetting that with this change, marines will (hopefully) move in groups and no welder will ever be lost to the team unless all of them die in a push with the area lost. In which case marines were perfectly aware of the calculated risk they were taking and probably lost things far more precious than a few welders.
This is leading back to what I said in my first post on page 1; there wouldn't be a negative impact on actual gameplay, because the only times armouries not healing armour makes a difference is with base turtling or forward pushes. Arguing it's a huge res sink is not thinking things through, because clearly you're not expected to buy a welder every time you spawn. You buy one when it makes sense. You'd spawn, phase to the forward location and buy a welder there if you see no one has one. Or, you gather up in a base to push somewhere and can check if you're taking enough welders along, should you even decide to take any. If you're going on a suicide mission to kill an RT, you obviously won't buy a welder. It's a calculated choice that introduces an intelligent element and even a certain amount of strategy to the game, not a mindless res sink.
Also, I totally agree with the general consensus that, if this goes in, macs and picking up weapons would have to be reworked and there'd have to be better visual feedback on who has a welder, who needs welding and the welding effect itself. Massive sparkles anyone?
In general, I'm for this. In general means: try it out (playtesting), look if it works/is balanced (cheaper welders, researched with game start, things like that), when it does (imo it would) give it to the masses.
Here are some of my thoughts:
- Recovering armor through welders is much quicker than at armories (afaik) so marines would really benefit from that change. I think that people don't weld each other now simply because they don't know that its important or usefull. If welders become more important (through that change to armories) I only see better use of welders as an outcome because it really benefits an aggressive marine play where you don't have to retreat every time to get full health.
- Forward armories are most of the times better than spaming medpacks/ammo in key locations when it comes to tres. But with the armor healing ability, forward armories are often too strong imo: marines can turtle just outside alien bases and when armories are placed to block oni they become even stronger because marines can just camp behind the armory getting healed and stuff while the onos is trying to break through. Now when the aliens manage to kill all the marines except one and this fella is able to be maxed out at an armory over and over again until backup arrives that's not good imo. I even think that many more pub games would be over very soon when marines would just rush key locations (system waypoint, stability monitoring, the dome, ...), drop an armory there and push the nearest hive, retreating for all the goodies an armory gives them.
- Making welders too cheap or even free can't be good with that huge buff in repairing power nodes and the ability to heal buildings. Killing power nodes is often the only chance for aliens to throw back marine advances imo and only the gorge can heal alien buildings so there shouldn't be a whole marine team (except exos) to be able to repair buildings free of charge or for cheap. I think that 5 pres is fine because properly used, marines should survive longer with welders. and dropped welders can be picked up.
- I remember the morale boost which came with welding each other in NS1. imagine: you cleared a room of aliens with some teammates, you had a moment of peace and silence before the next skirmish, you weld each other, get close together... welding players is like a pat on the shoulder and saying: "you did well! you survived, you killed that alien scumbag! lets make a stand again, let us stand as one agian! now brace yourself, xenophorm spotted!"
Also...when killing harvesters and other alien structures (except cysts and clogs), my weapon of choice is the axe because it doesn't use ammo and (I believe) it does structural damage. Once I get a welder, I have to drop it in order to use my axe. Is it possible to move welders to slot 4, mines to slot 5 (once mines are placed, slot 5 shouldn't be used very much anymore)?
I'm sorry if this has been suggested, but what if an icon appeared over the head of a welder weilding marine similar to the "I need to be welded" icon. That way, players know who can heal armor, and the weilder knows people know he's got it?
When you have a welder in you hands, you already see an icon over every player who should be welded. They don't see an icon over your head though.
One of the big problems with NS2, to me, is the lack of the mid range player. The casual player that is experienced, but doesn't take that step up to the "is he hacking?" type (for any number of reasons). With changes like requiring welders to weld armor, you help create a niche for the mid ranged experienced player - which to me is awesome. This is another reason I like the gorges role in NS1 more than the khamm - it was a great place for that type of player to be.
I think marines currently lack much of a place for this player - you're either commanding or on the front lines where your shot is a very large part of your game.
Anyway, I also think you couldn't implement it where the game is right now - but I am not totally familiar with the balance changes in the mod.
In short, I have come to agree with the removal of armor healing from the armory, for the sake of increasing parts of the marine game you can improve on, that aren't just positioning and shots.
That's exactly my point. Everyone in this thread is a highly skilled NS player. Thus my stated worry.
You should see me play sometime. That fear will go away quite quickly.
Seriously though, teaching a concept like this doesn't usually take very long. In the beta games when this change came out, people would be confused at first about the change but quickly adapt once told by their teammates or commander. Heck, welders are already in the game - people would just need to get used to buying them more often and traveling in groups.
Edit: Maybe players who had welders on them could be pointed out by the interface somehow, to make it more obvious to newer players who to go to for aid?
3) Please fix it so axe gets a slot weapon so you can still axe RTS since more people will be using welders.
Welders are an upgrade to the builder tool anyway, so why don't we let them have that "slot" and enable welding other marines with the use key? This would inevitably mean you can't drop welders, so they'd have to be made a lot cheaper like a lot of people seem to want anyway.
Everyone in this thread is a highly skilled NS player. Thus my stated worry.
If the bolded part were changed to, "has some knowledge of base mechanics" it'd be much more accurate. I'm going to go out and say that the vast majority of this forum (mirroring the player base as a whole) is not particularly good at the game despite being familiar with its mechanics.
I actually agree with Shaker's post. There's not much difference at the moment between players who are 100% new to the game, and your average player that knows mechanics but lacks execution. NS2 in its current form really doesn't have a middle class. 98%+ (and that's probably being generous) of players who play the game lack the fundamental aiming or movement execution to truly separate themselves from new players.
Not saying that a more welder centered marine game changes that to any significant degree, but it probably wouldn't hurt.
edit: Slight tangent, but the binary good or not skill curve this game has is heavily influenced by the ultra low time to kill (TTK) in the game. From a marine perspective, you either have the aim to kill skulks well before they kill you, or you simply die. The TTK just doesn't allow for any major middle ground skill wise.
Normal Armory: Health only Advanced Armory: Also heals armor, Time to upgrade from normal armory reduced if you have a 2nd chair, 3rd chair = AA can be built straight up
Welders: 5 res to unlock tech purchasable from Armory, 15 res to have marines spawn with welder (upgrade via Armory /w 2nd chair or AA)
Same logic could be applies to Advanced Robotics with 2nd and 3rd chairs and other weapons If you want to pay 60 res to have all marines spawn with shotguns I say go for it commander!
Sad thing is that we have played with this mechanic for 10 years, and yet people come here making arguments and doomsday predictions about it, when we know exactly how it plays.
You have no clue how it plays.
Not sure how many times this needs repeating, but we do. We tested it in NS2 as well and it worked just fine. The only reason it was not included in public builds is because marines were too weak at a time. This would have weakened them even more.
Amongst the PT's there were also people for and against, with various arguments. In the end, nobody can say that it didn't work - the teamplay was just fine and everyone carried around a welder.
The only real argument right now is economics. Savant went into that just fine. I think the best way would be to either make welders very cheap, or free.
I'm sorry if this has been suggested, but what if an icon appeared over the head of a welder weilding marine similar to the "I need to be welded" icon. That way, players know who can heal armor, and the weilder knows people know he's got it?
When you have a welder in you hands, you already see an icon over every player who should be welded. They don't see an icon over your head though.
Aye, which is exactly what I said when I referenced the "i need to be welded" icon. If there was an Icon that was shown when a welder is equipped, players would run to that after a successful engagement to recover lost armor.
This would encourage squad movement, and reduce the need to break off from the group to hump the armory, which is good in my opinion.
Sad thing is that we have played with this mechanic for 10 years, and yet people come here making arguments and doomsday predictions about it, when we know exactly how it plays.
You have no clue how it plays.
I am going to blow your mind, so brace yourself. You can, RIGHT NOW, go play this balance mod and see how it works out. All that evidence you want, well son, you can help generate it. Put on your life jacket jump in the deep end and prepare to be empirically overwhelmed with all this FIRST HAND EVIDENCE.
One thing that could be done to ease the transition for players to become aware that they need to weld each other is to make armories (or just advanced, w/e) only have a set amount of armor welding available. Once the percentage shown reaches 0, they armories only health health points.
Of course, turtle situations would just keep building new armories unless something like a slow trickle in the increase of global welding points or something was implemented.
it's a problem with accessibility just get hugh to make a tip video about repairing marine armor with a welder.
The fact that you and no one else in the thread have noticed there are already tip videos about welding marine armour is more cause for me to be extremely worried about the probable accessibility effects of a change like this.
Not every NS2 player with over 500 hours of experience is going to leave the tips on. If you are really concerned about veteran players learning about gameplay changes you would have a hide-able changelog list built into the main menu.
Comments
First off, don't make up stats about deaths per min.
Second, you claim that tripling the life of a marine is useless which is wrong. Without armor you can only take 100 damage(2 ok skulk bites, 4 bad skulk bites). If you only ever take <100 damage, yes welders are useless. If you take damage between 100-(effective health with full armor) welders save you. Welders saving you leads to map control which leads to winning.
There is no need for drama. Stick with facts.
The proposed changes really just cripple bad players (avg pub player) and are a resource and time drain on good players(high end pub players).
It also gets rid of your Axe.
If marines are too strong at holding locations, this would be a way to correct that.
If the marines need another resource drain, this would be a way to correct that.
I'm not completely convinced that these are needed.
The armory repairing armor is a nice convenience for the Marine Comm. It's one less thing to micro manage. Drop an armory at a forward position and your marines should be taken care of without yelling at them to weld up.
If marines need an extra TRes resource drain, extra research (per armory or global) would be useful.
I would love some. But there aren't any. Hence the problem.
Most people in this thread are essentially saying welders = win game. That isn't true. It isn't even remotely true. And you know what? I would go so far as to say its probably the opposite of what is true. Unnecessary spending on welders will probably lose more games than it will win.
DEFINITELY better control on macs. A guard & weld order would be ideal.
All in all, im for trying. I will not deny that i also tend to run back to armor up.
If the welder is made free, you might as well just auto spawn with it.
If there needs to be a resource sink, make the comm have to research it again (like in current vanilla), then once researched, the default marine build tool gets upgrade to a welder (like someone else already suggested in this thread).
Also, please allow us to keep our AXE!
The fact that you and no one else in the thread have noticed there are already tip videos about welding marine armour is more cause for me to be extremely worried about the probable accessibility effects of a change like this.
No one said buy welders->win games.
They said Armor->winning more engagements-> map control -> winning
Currently, most of the armor regen comes from armories.
Thus Forward armory >> welders in hand.
People are saying that, if the armory no longer healed armor, buying welders becomes critical to providing the same support that an armory did.
You can't theorise everything away. I accept that NS2 is a much faster paced game than NS1; however, I have personally used the 'weld teammates, drop welder, get welded, retrieve welder' tactic successfully in NS2 several times. It's not always so fast-paced that welding is impossible, even if not everyone has a welder.
I would argue that the cost may or may not need to change, but you can only know this by testing, hence any arguments saying 'it must cost 0 or X res' are essentially meaningless. No-one knows until it's tested whether it's economically viable for marines to still be spending 5 res per welder. Besides, picking up dropped weapons happens almost as frequently now as it did before Gorgeous (and BB killing dropped weps). It's completely nonsensical theorycrafting to say that every marine spawn costs 5 pres.
So too is the argument that 'no-body will buy a welder.' Nonsense. If you need a welder to repair teammates, you will damn well make sure that the guy with you has a welder, or that you have a welder. And if you die and drop your welder, you make sure someone picks it up (you do this now, right? right??!). Add to that the fact that the comm can drop welders from tres...
As I said on the first page of this thread, the benefits of prevalent welders to the marine team offensively can be very real. It means that you really honestly can keep 2 or 3 marines alive with meds and welding while simultaneously holding an important choke point. No need to stop to build an armoury. Hey, you can weld and move at the same time, too - no need to stop to break out the welder, either.
Finally, as has been said by several people already, adv armoury repairing is pointless: this only serves to prolong turtling in already lost games. If marines are on top and winning, they will be mainly attacking hence will not be constantly near an adv armoury - therefore it will not make much difference to late game marines who are winning. Late game marines who are losing and on 1 tech point will still be able to hold out as they can now for a rather long time when it's already lost. Hell xenocide might actually be a worthwhile weapon if marines in their turtle didn't all have 100% armour... as it is, it's rarely used and frankly hurts aliens more than marines most of the time (taking a player out of the field and lengthening the spawn queue, not to mention adding a death to their total (you I know, meaningless...)).
Regardless of whether or not people think it's a great idea bound to work, a terrible idea bound to fail, or somewhere in the middle - the fact that there is a division of opinion at least should highlight the now-met need to test this. So, nay-sayers and aye-sayers alike, get in the mod and see how it plays!! (I will be doing this when I next play).
Perhaps leave it's use the same on buildings, but for marines, allow it to heal armor either to full, or maybe even past full (with it degrading back to full over time). That way if marines refuse to buy welders and weld each other, the comm has an option without having to get Macs.
But leave the cool down on it so you can’t cheese with it, and so it’s just about as effective as a marine weld train.
Let's just try it out. We have experiance with a game which of course was different(altough about 90% the same) that suggests that this will work. Maybe it will not which would be mainly caused by players generally getting 50% more stupid over the last few years. If it wont work out it wont make its way into the game anyways.
Generally I really encourage the makers of this mod to really embrace and test all ideas as long as there is a crowd willing to test them. Even the best idea could be reduced to a pile of stinking poo by some of the nagging whiners that run around these forums.
I think most veteran players disabled the videos anyway before even looking through all of them. I did for sure. Getting the same tip frequently with no sight of the frequency of tips in general reducing got annoying pretty quickly.
It would probably be more effective if the system was more intelligent. For instance remembering what actions you already performed, so that it doesn't need to tell you about them more than once again.
And taking the current progress of a match and the player's equipment into account. If my first death occurs a minute into the game, then a hint video that teaches me about using Umbra on Onos in the endgame won't be beneficial at all because as new player I have probably already forgotten about that stuff by the time I can afford a Lerk, we aquired Umbra and got an Onos on the field.
Everyone in this thread turned off the tip videos as soon as we figured out how to do it.
I'm sure new players appreciate them, though.
In the end this is a mechanic that was tested and used for 10 years, and is well known. Every single drawback that has been mentioned to date is either grossly exaggerated or completely untrue. I suggest some of the people bringing up points from NS1 check their facts also, as many of the points are wrong.
Now we all shall use welders. May the POO be with you.
I'm happy that the uwe brought up this important change. I'm SO EXCITED IF IT GOES THROUGH THE MOD. Please only let armory heal HP. ONLY THAT or players will hump around the armory all the time and spam armories everywhere. Me not like that
Sincerely,
Poofighter
1) Provides significant front line support by quickly dropping an armory.
2) Aids in turtleing
I would be for the change to remove the ability for armories to heal armor but a few things should be considered first.
1) Welders price should be reduced dramatically (2-3 res max)
2) You should consider making welders come pre researched. I'm not sure this is really needed though.
3) Please fix it so axe gets a slot weapon so you can still axe RTS since more people will be using welders.
4) slightly lengthen the time welders stay "alive" when dropped.
5) Advanced armories should heal armor at first. I only say this one because this will produce a radical change in the way marines play and win games. Having advanced armories still heal is just to "ease" into the change rather then jumping in with both feet hoping its balanced. If it proves stable then the patch after that remove it from advanced armories. Keeping armor healing on advanced armories doesn't solve issue 2 but it does with issue 1 as few will purchase advanced armories for risky forward positions.
Come to think of it, I actually still pretty much never buy a shotgun without buying a welder as well.
Don't turn what I wrote into a hostile black and white thing. I meant no harm. I'm saying people who've seen it work in NS1, regardless of the difference between NS1 and NS2, mostly agree it could work again, and we should all try it before judging - meaning both the 'for' and 'against' parties. We can all write pages and pages on how it will or won't work in theory, but in the end, if it clearly doesn't work in-game, I'm sure the opinions won't be so split anymore.
Also, I made all my points on page 1 and I'm contributing to this discussion quite extensively.
You are overestimating the economic impact it would have. Even if the welder cost stays at 5 res, the actual impact would be minimal. You're forgetting that with this change, marines will (hopefully) move in groups and no welder will ever be lost to the team unless all of them die in a push with the area lost. In which case marines were perfectly aware of the calculated risk they were taking and probably lost things far more precious than a few welders.
This is leading back to what I said in my first post on page 1; there wouldn't be a negative impact on actual gameplay, because the only times armouries not healing armour makes a difference is with base turtling or forward pushes. Arguing it's a huge res sink is not thinking things through, because clearly you're not expected to buy a welder every time you spawn. You buy one when it makes sense. You'd spawn, phase to the forward location and buy a welder there if you see no one has one. Or, you gather up in a base to push somewhere and can check if you're taking enough welders along, should you even decide to take any. If you're going on a suicide mission to kill an RT, you obviously won't buy a welder. It's a calculated choice that introduces an intelligent element and even a certain amount of strategy to the game, not a mindless res sink.
Also, I totally agree with the general consensus that, if this goes in, macs and picking up weapons would have to be reworked and there'd have to be better visual feedback on who has a welder, who needs welding and the welding effect itself. Massive sparkles anyone?
Here are some of my thoughts:
- Recovering armor through welders is much quicker than at armories (afaik) so marines would really benefit from that change. I think that people don't weld each other now simply because they don't know that its important or usefull. If welders become more important (through that change to armories) I only see better use of welders as an outcome because it really benefits an aggressive marine play where you don't have to retreat every time to get full health.
- Forward armories are most of the times better than spaming medpacks/ammo in key locations when it comes to tres. But with the armor healing ability, forward armories are often too strong imo: marines can turtle just outside alien bases and when armories are placed to block oni they become even stronger because marines can just camp behind the armory getting healed and stuff while the onos is trying to break through. Now when the aliens manage to kill all the marines except one and this fella is able to be maxed out at an armory over and over again until backup arrives that's not good imo. I even think that many more pub games would be over very soon when marines would just rush key locations (system waypoint, stability monitoring, the dome, ...), drop an armory there and push the nearest hive, retreating for all the goodies an armory gives them.
- Making welders too cheap or even free can't be good with that huge buff in repairing power nodes and the ability to heal buildings. Killing power nodes is often the only chance for aliens to throw back marine advances imo and only the gorge can heal alien buildings so there shouldn't be a whole marine team (except exos) to be able to repair buildings free of charge or for cheap. I think that 5 pres is fine because properly used, marines should survive longer with welders. and dropped welders can be picked up.
- I remember the morale boost which came with welding each other in NS1. imagine: you cleared a room of aliens with some teammates, you had a moment of peace and silence before the next skirmish, you weld each other, get close together... welding players is like a pat on the shoulder and saying: "you did well! you survived, you killed that alien scumbag! lets make a stand again, let us stand as one agian! now brace yourself, xenophorm spotted!"
I'm pretty sure that it's a good change.
I like that!
When you have a welder in you hands, you already see an icon over every player who should be welded. They don't see an icon over your head though.
That's exactly my point. Everyone in this thread is a highly skilled NS player. Thus my stated worry.
I think marines currently lack much of a place for this player - you're either commanding or on the front lines where your shot is a very large part of your game.
Anyway, I also think you couldn't implement it where the game is right now - but I am not totally familiar with the balance changes in the mod.
In short, I have come to agree with the removal of armor healing from the armory, for the sake of increasing parts of the marine game you can improve on, that aren't just positioning and shots.
You should see me play sometime. That fear will go away quite quickly.
Seriously though, teaching a concept like this doesn't usually take very long. In the beta games when this change came out, people would be confused at first about the change but quickly adapt once told by their teammates or commander. Heck, welders are already in the game - people would just need to get used to buying them more often and traveling in groups.
Edit: Maybe players who had welders on them could be pointed out by the interface somehow, to make it more obvious to newer players who to go to for aid?
Two birds with one stone?
If the bolded part were changed to, "has some knowledge of base mechanics" it'd be much more accurate. I'm going to go out and say that the vast majority of this forum (mirroring the player base as a whole) is not particularly good at the game despite being familiar with its mechanics.
I actually agree with Shaker's post. There's not much difference at the moment between players who are 100% new to the game, and your average player that knows mechanics but lacks execution. NS2 in its current form really doesn't have a middle class. 98%+ (and that's probably being generous) of players who play the game lack the fundamental aiming or movement execution to truly separate themselves from new players.
Not saying that a more welder centered marine game changes that to any significant degree, but it probably wouldn't hurt.
edit: Slight tangent, but the binary good or not skill curve this game has is heavily influenced by the ultra low time to kill (TTK) in the game. From a marine perspective, you either have the aim to kill skulks well before they kill you, or you simply die. The TTK just doesn't allow for any major middle ground skill wise.
How I see it being balanced:
Normal Armory: Health only
Advanced Armory: Also heals armor, Time to upgrade from normal armory reduced if you have a 2nd chair, 3rd chair = AA can be built straight up
Welders: 5 res to unlock tech purchasable from Armory, 15 res to have marines spawn with welder (upgrade via Armory /w 2nd chair or AA)
Same logic could be applies to Advanced Robotics with 2nd and 3rd chairs and other weapons
If you want to pay 60 res to have all marines spawn with shotguns I say go for it commander!
Amongst the PT's there were also people for and against, with various arguments. In the end, nobody can say that it didn't work - the teamplay was just fine and everyone carried around a welder.
The only real argument right now is economics. Savant went into that just fine. I think the best way would be to either make welders very cheap, or free.
Aye, which is exactly what I said when I referenced the "i need to be welded" icon. If there was an Icon that was shown when a welder is equipped, players would run to that after a successful engagement to recover lost armor.
This would encourage squad movement, and reduce the need to break off from the group to hump the armory, which is good in my opinion.
I am going to blow your mind, so brace yourself. You can, RIGHT NOW, go play this balance mod and see how it works out. All that evidence you want, well son, you can help generate it. Put on your life jacket jump in the deep end and prepare to be empirically overwhelmed with all this FIRST HAND EVIDENCE.
Of course, turtle situations would just keep building new armories unless something like a slow trickle in the increase of global welding points or something was implemented.
Not every NS2 player with over 500 hours of experience is going to leave the tips on. If you are really concerned about veteran players learning about gameplay changes you would have a hide-able changelog list built into the main menu.