Marines. Last stand. Problem description and discussion.
2d0x
Join Date: 2013-03-16 Member: 184030Members, Reinforced - Supporter
Join Date: 2013-03-16 Member: 184030Members, Reinforced - Supporter
Greetings fellow NS2 players. First of all I want to apologize for my bad English, it will be a very large post, so you can not see my apology in the signature.
---Marines. Last Stand.---
Today I want to discuss a problem that you may have already encountered while playing on Aliens side: Marines at last base, after a long (25-40+ min) game.
As you may have noticed, destroying the last Marines base after long game, in most cases, are extremely difficult. Let me use as an introduction one of my tonight's game, which was the reason why I am writing this message.
Tonight. One of English Official GamingDeluxe Servers for 16 players. Map: Summit. Side: Aliens. First 15-20 minutes was a fierce fight, and it was not clear who will win. Eventually my team was able to push away enemy forces and occupy a large part of the game map. Marines occupied "Flight Control" and remained surrounded by Alien forces. And then began the Great Siege. Approximately 25 minutes (which is even longer than it took for most of the game while it was not clear who will win) we besieged Flight Control. We tried to attack together and separately, from one direction, and from two. We using Bombarding Whips, Onoses + Gorges, Enzyme, Fades, Bile Bombs ... We even used Onoses in the vanguard under the protection of Lerk's Umbra!!!! But still we could not do anything. We lost THOUSANDS OF ONOSES, but do not cause any significant damage to enemy forces!!!. Marines with Weapon\Armor upgrades lvl 3 did not leave us any chance. Three or four marines, even with light rifles, capable of killing Onos even before it reaches them!!! But there was not 3-4 marines, there were 7 marines!! And they are used not only light rifles, but also shotguns! This weapon has an enormous power that can kill an Fade with a single shot in the face. Despite the fact that they had only one resource tower, they are quite successfully throw our forces back again and again ... Our forces, who have control over the whole map. Our forces, who have 8 resource towers! At one of our numerous attacks, we gathered together and decided to attack at once, with all the forces, but from two different directions. In our numbers were: 5 mighty Onoses, 1 healing\bile-bombing Gorgie, 1 lerk with protective Umbra, and 1 khammander, who support us with non-stop Enzyme. We attacked with all our strength, but were able to destroy only a couple of buildings. We lost three Onoses and retreated lick the wounds to the nearest healing station. Our next attack was aimed at the resource tower, and the latest attack a minute later completely destroyed the remaining enemy forces. End of story. I think that every player was in such sieges. And by the way, this happened on the server for 16 people. A similar situation on a server with 24 players would have led to a siege that would end no one knows when, maybe just with restart the server.
So, from a 45 minute game, the siege took 20-25 minutes. More than half the time we were not able win a game that was already won. I agree that the true story is really not that epic as it may seem, and our attacks were not so well planned as you might imagine after reading. We made a lot of mistakes but this is not surprising - it was a public game. Anyway, we, Aliens, had to put a lot of effort to win the game that was already won.
And now we come to the most interesting part ... Let's imagine a situation similar to this ... But now we swap opponents.
Now Aliens under siege on the Last Stand, and the Marines have a large part of the map and keep the enemy in the siege. And now one of the main questions: how long they can hold their last base? I think that after the first massive attack, the Marines will be able to completely destroy the Alien forces and structures in less than 2 minutes, even without much effort and tactics. 2-3 Dual exo's with Mac's on follow, 3-4 jetpacking marines with shotguns\grenade launchers\flamethrowers, and one commander with "unlimited resources", that controls 10-15 ARC's, and helping the main troops with "unlimited" Nano Shield and MedKits, with the possibility to restore any loss of his troops. And what will be available at the defenders? Almost nothing, no second abilities, no money for higher lifeforms (aliens can't "pick up" body of fallen brethren for evolving to higher lifeform, as marine can pick up fallens comrade weapon), only 1 upgrade like Celerity or Carapace. No Leap for Skulks, no Bile-Bomb for Gorges, no Blink for Fades, no Umbra for Lerks.
Why such difference between the defenders? How can Aliens effectively and quickly break through the Marines "Last Stand" defense? Which buildings should be destroyed first? Marines need to re-upgrade all weapon\armor upgrades again after the loss of the main ArmsLab building, as Aliens has to do? Why some locations so difficult to capture? Why Marines have 3 Level's for upgrade damage\armor, but Aliens do not have (by the way three of the five Aliens classes throughout the game has 3 "levels" of damage. As example, Skulk can do damage to Marines depending on the position of the camera \ distance to the target - 25-50-75 damage numbers. Try to count how many bites Skulk have to do (if he is "unlucky") with 25 damage, to kill a Marine with a3). Why Marine with w3\a3 upgrades can сause so much damage even to a Onos (and i'm not even talking about the weaker units like Lerk\Fade), but with weaker Aliens lifeforms it's nearly to impossible to kill a single marine? Why having only one Command Center they can defend such a long time, but their opponents are in the same conditions, with only one Hive, incomparably, completely helpless? Post your ideas and suggestions. I would love to see a message from the developers on this topic.
Thanks for your attention!
---Marines. Last Stand.---
Today I want to discuss a problem that you may have already encountered while playing on Aliens side: Marines at last base, after a long (25-40+ min) game.
As you may have noticed, destroying the last Marines base after long game, in most cases, are extremely difficult. Let me use as an introduction one of my tonight's game, which was the reason why I am writing this message.
Tonight. One of English Official GamingDeluxe Servers for 16 players. Map: Summit. Side: Aliens. First 15-20 minutes was a fierce fight, and it was not clear who will win. Eventually my team was able to push away enemy forces and occupy a large part of the game map. Marines occupied "Flight Control" and remained surrounded by Alien forces. And then began the Great Siege. Approximately 25 minutes (which is even longer than it took for most of the game while it was not clear who will win) we besieged Flight Control. We tried to attack together and separately, from one direction, and from two. We using Bombarding Whips, Onoses + Gorges, Enzyme, Fades, Bile Bombs ... We even used Onoses in the vanguard under the protection of Lerk's Umbra!!!! But still we could not do anything. We lost THOUSANDS OF ONOSES, but do not cause any significant damage to enemy forces!!!. Marines with Weapon\Armor upgrades lvl 3 did not leave us any chance. Three or four marines, even with light rifles, capable of killing Onos even before it reaches them!!! But there was not 3-4 marines, there were 7 marines!! And they are used not only light rifles, but also shotguns! This weapon has an enormous power that can kill an Fade with a single shot in the face. Despite the fact that they had only one resource tower, they are quite successfully throw our forces back again and again ... Our forces, who have control over the whole map. Our forces, who have 8 resource towers! At one of our numerous attacks, we gathered together and decided to attack at once, with all the forces, but from two different directions. In our numbers were: 5 mighty Onoses, 1 healing\bile-bombing Gorgie, 1 lerk with protective Umbra, and 1 khammander, who support us with non-stop Enzyme. We attacked with all our strength, but were able to destroy only a couple of buildings. We lost three Onoses and retreated lick the wounds to the nearest healing station. Our next attack was aimed at the resource tower, and the latest attack a minute later completely destroyed the remaining enemy forces. End of story. I think that every player was in such sieges. And by the way, this happened on the server for 16 people. A similar situation on a server with 24 players would have led to a siege that would end no one knows when, maybe just with restart the server.
So, from a 45 minute game, the siege took 20-25 minutes. More than half the time we were not able win a game that was already won. I agree that the true story is really not that epic as it may seem, and our attacks were not so well planned as you might imagine after reading. We made a lot of mistakes but this is not surprising - it was a public game. Anyway, we, Aliens, had to put a lot of effort to win the game that was already won.
And now we come to the most interesting part ... Let's imagine a situation similar to this ... But now we swap opponents.
Now Aliens under siege on the Last Stand, and the Marines have a large part of the map and keep the enemy in the siege. And now one of the main questions: how long they can hold their last base? I think that after the first massive attack, the Marines will be able to completely destroy the Alien forces and structures in less than 2 minutes, even without much effort and tactics. 2-3 Dual exo's with Mac's on follow, 3-4 jetpacking marines with shotguns\grenade launchers\flamethrowers, and one commander with "unlimited resources", that controls 10-15 ARC's, and helping the main troops with "unlimited" Nano Shield and MedKits, with the possibility to restore any loss of his troops. And what will be available at the defenders? Almost nothing, no second abilities, no money for higher lifeforms (aliens can't "pick up" body of fallen brethren for evolving to higher lifeform, as marine can pick up fallens comrade weapon), only 1 upgrade like Celerity or Carapace. No Leap for Skulks, no Bile-Bomb for Gorges, no Blink for Fades, no Umbra for Lerks.
Why such difference between the defenders? How can Aliens effectively and quickly break through the Marines "Last Stand" defense? Which buildings should be destroyed first? Marines need to re-upgrade all weapon\armor upgrades again after the loss of the main ArmsLab building, as Aliens has to do? Why some locations so difficult to capture? Why Marines have 3 Level's for upgrade damage\armor, but Aliens do not have (by the way three of the five Aliens classes throughout the game has 3 "levels" of damage. As example, Skulk can do damage to Marines depending on the position of the camera \ distance to the target - 25-50-75 damage numbers. Try to count how many bites Skulk have to do (if he is "unlucky") with 25 damage, to kill a Marine with a3). Why Marine with w3\a3 upgrades can сause so much damage even to a Onos (and i'm not even talking about the weaker units like Lerk\Fade), but with weaker Aliens lifeforms it's nearly to impossible to kill a single marine? Why having only one Command Center they can defend such a long time, but their opponents are in the same conditions, with only one Hive, incomparably, completely helpless? Post your ideas and suggestions. I would love to see a message from the developers on this topic.
Thanks for your attention!
Comments
Also what Squishpoke said: don't be afraid to "waste" your Onos on a powernode at this stage. When you die there will be at least two Onos left to deal with the remains of the marines forces once the power is down.
This made me giggle. It sounds like this was mostly due to poor prioritising from the alien team.
I'm not saying marine turtling isn't a problem, but there's nothing the marines can do if you stage a well-organised rush, apart from having multiple dual exos defending their base.
Most people concede that marines having w3 and a3 available on 1 tech point leads to long drawn out end games (and was why marines used to recycle as they acknowledged the aliens likely may not be able to finish them).
Unless I am mistaken the only things marines cant build/have access to when on 1 CC is JP's and Exo's...but they still have all weapons upgrades, armour upgrades and all advanced weaponry (ie FT, GL's etc)
I among others here am of the opinion that weapons and armour upgrades should be limited by the number of tech points you hold.
So if you want weapons 2 or armour 2 then you need 2 CC's, want W3 A3 you need to have 3 CC's.
At the very least w3 and a3 should only be available if you have 2 or more CC's.
That you can have super duper strong marines on 1 tech point is laughable when you consider how screwed aliens are as their hive numbers drop and their available tech diminishes.
The best answer is an alternate win condition. Some way to win the game without directly assaulting the enemy, or alternatively force the enemy to go offensive or lose, the Wonder in Age of Empires is a good example. The problem is that UWE is dead-set against victory tech, which is a position I am inclined to disagree with.
Meanwhile, Concede is the only reasonable option. I think Concede needs to be tweaked so that it's more satisfying for both parties, rather than simply suddenly ending a game at what is for one side it's highest point. My idea is last stand mode with restricted respawns and tech and a draw timer if the aliens still can't manage to kill the marines in a reasonable period.
Once all the jetpacks were down, no more exos, then it became much easier to finish the job, with a little help of a drifter army (oh my god the lag...).
It is a problem and I'd like to see it addressed (like the armoury change!), but it's not an insurmountable problem, even as it stands now.
I've said it before: There's a need for something on the Alien side that stops turtling but only works in those situations. Possibly something that's very expensive and provides the Marines with a chance (however small) to strike back. It could be a slow-moving kamikaze/siege unit that needs to consume a Hive in order to mature, for instance.
Oh, and why can't UWE make it so grenades doesn't explode in proximity of friendlies? Just fizzle. That would be such an elegant solution to the Grenade Spam Shield problem.
Or give someway for aliens to spend res to scale like marines (just don't call it an evolution chamber :P) so that by end game Onos are much tougher than when they first come out making it easier to break the turtle.
If that's not enough to end a turtle, you're doing something wrong. Should have killed the power almost instantly, cleaned up the rest. I mean, that's what's the power node is for. To end turtles.
"...don't take refuge in the false security of consensus..." I acknowledge that it can possibly be more difficult to finish off one tech point marines than it is one tech point aliens. This of course depends on the alien team and the marine team. I will object to calling this a problem though. I have yet to see a one tech point marine team come back to win against an alien team that isn't grossly incompetent, in which case, how did they find themselves in this scenario in the first place? That being said, the game gives you all the tools to end the game in that situation... or you know, we would be having a much different discussion. At this point, I think we can agree that there is an asymmetry in the shape of the end game for either team, and that aliens can win the game, that it is possible. This just means that the problem isn't with ending the game, there's a path to victory for that, the problem is with knowing how.
Hence my, L2P ya jackass. You can take your, "trying to sound cool" and shove it, i'd rather just be right. Also, there might be a marine turtling problem with dualies and macs oh my... but this isn't it. the op's problem has nothing to do with turtling, so you can take your little crusade to a thread it's relevant in.
Since I'm so narrow minded, I'm going to blame the Concede option and say that since the ease of use for the concede function, the ability to end games among the vast majority of players is virtually non-existent. In reality, it's probably just because people don't like playing games they know they'll lose, as has been said by quite a few people around the forum.
Its for this reason that situations like this arise. Alien teams are so used to crushing a marine's forward bases and then having them concede, they don't have the foggiest idea how to break a turtle.
In my experience, most Alien teams in the end game stage run in in a nice single file line, always from the same door (because of that nice little crag nest), then once they realize that those pesky guns actually hurt, they run away. Rinse and repeat. This can go on for quite a while. Onos after Onos goes down, the marines are having a grand ol time.
Regardless of whether it is a "problem" or not, you still need to know how to deal with it. Somehow you have to coordinate an attack and focus down the powernode. That's the easiest way to break a turtle. You can use hallucinations, whip spam, enzyme cloud, spores, stomp, umbra, bile bomb, heck, even xenocide or vortex (vortex the arms lab anyone?) to get this done. The biggest thing is coordination.
There's tons of ways for aliens to break a turtle, the problem isn't that, it's lack of coordination.
1.http://gyazo.com/57b5ba71fc4d6675f0008c7be2477a5e Distance to the Power Node. Until Onos reach PowerNode, 3-4 Marines have enough time to shot out at least 1 full assault rifle clip. But even if he could survive so many incoming damage and reach the destination, in his way will be ...
2.http://gyazo.com/6d0dce1f55392ce232336fd94d3071e7 Obstacles through which he likely never be able to jump over ... at least alive.
3.http://gyazo.com/21b91e62f2ca9c48ac7bdedb102d4297
4.http://gyazo.com/5d3fc47f3a24f39c4fc0d73568b7241f
^ possible positions for Marines where they can keep the defense (unreachable for Onoses), and easily kill Gorges who tries to come within Bile-Bomb range.
5.http://gyazo.com/59ed2b7323d30d35d92c9e077e9defd0
6.http://gyazo.com/11e4ffc942a15c582a5cccd2fac39660
7.http://gyazo.com/476b2e01b76e7cd10c5887e658ac7e3d
8.http://gyazo.com/39cf45cced4191d496acac0b7c8e0c85
^ possible positions for Marines where they can keep the defense on the part of second entrance (these places hardly to reach by Onos)
And by the way do not forget that the more Onoses, the more they obstruct each other.
Guys, in any case, I'm not saying that it is impossible to break through a defense. All what I want to focus on is the comparison of the two Defenders. Aliens need to work hard to win the game is already won. But Marines in the same situation do not need to make any effort to win. Yeah, maybe I was wrong (unfortunately my friend stopped playing ns2 and I can not test this at the moment). But how many random bullets from a light rifle Fade will survive after this? 2? 3? Amount of Fade's health after shotty hit with a3 is negligible. Can be considered that he was already dead. I'd like to see that in this case you would do. Almost all that we tried to attack, ended in failure. Good ideas guys, thanks.
fade can be two+shotted by a lvl 3 shotgun, 2 full shots and change. so one shot will bring it down to something over half health. yay.
i'd say, in a base assault, onos's role is the tank + power node hitter, but that's with a bunch of gorges. you had a lopsided composition, everybody went onos, add more gorges, add more lerks, you have no idea how debilitating spore is if used properly. this stacked with umbra should get you through most things, also, don't try and charge from one side, make them spread themselves thin, hit and run. If it were my call, i'd go something like 2 onos, 3 gorges and a lerk. spore and umbra as called for, 2 gorges and onos on one side, onos and gorge on the other. make them pick whether they want to lose their power node or lose their structures outright.
Oh, I almost forgot. Khamm can also cyst, mist and whip spam right into the room. Even if the marines kill the cysts and whips, it's wasting their time and ammo, giving your team some breathing room.
The comm could even throw in a drifter barrage/hallucinations to help out.
Your team was just disorganized and didn't know what to go for.
If this story had dual exos on the marine team, then you may have a case.... but with none, you guys were just terribly disorganized at trying to finish it.
Marines stuck in one base are easy picking. Have 3 players go Lerk and then spore like crazy. 3 Lerks, 2 Onos, 2 Gorges should be enough on an 8 player team.
3 Spore = 60 damage a second.
The best way to avoid these kinds of situations is to not play on servers higher than 9v9. You can get some holdout situations there, but they should seem perfectly reasonable to crack. At 6v6 to 8v8 this is almost a non-issue when aliens are playing correctly. Quite frankly I don't think the OP's team was playing that well. =/