at 14 m/s you have 18 shots to kill a skulk before he can even bite you once, assuming you start firing when he is 14 meters away. At that range, if you tracked the skulk perfectly dead center, you most likely wouldnt miss a single bullet.
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
at 14 m/s you have 18 shots to kill a skulk before he can even bite you once, assuming you start firing when he is 14 meters away. At that range, if you tracked the skulk perfectly dead center, you most likely wouldnt miss a single bullet.
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
I'd be ok with pinpoint accuracy at any range honestly. I just don't see the point of having any sort of substantial random spread for the LMG, because it's supposed to be your long range weapon and primary tool for utilizing the marine's ranged advantage in the first place. Your effective range is limited by your ability to hit small fast moving targets from a distance anyway. If your aim and positioning is really good, you should be rewarded for that, and not have some random spread hold you back.
1) Lerk: when pressing left/right keys and flapping your wings you should gain more height then you do right now. Right now you just fly completely flat when pressing a strafe key like you are tied to the ground. Trying to spike and circle around your target makes you a very very easy target and doesn't allow you to gain elevation as you circle your target while spiking him. In live you have more lift involved when holding A or D, to control it you simply flap less often. Increasing the lift you get from flapping when holding A or D will raise the skill ceiling a bit since it will allow you to navigate your terrain and spike and at the same time make spiking more difficult since your not flying perfectly level.
Skulk:
2) Skulk: Figured out if i just pressed W and wall-jumped I moved around the map rather nicely. That IMO will bridge the gap between live and BT perfectly. You don't have to use A-D if you don't want to! .
3) Considering how often umbra is supposed to be used it needs to be considerably less vision blocking then it currently is. It's not immersive, its frustrating as fuck trying to shoot though that junk. I would say it needs a 80% reduction in how vision blocking the big cloud is.
4) Drifter HP seemes a bit low? Not sure how much they cost but it was very easy to shoot them suckers.
5) Shotgun- shot speed needs to be lowered a lot. Try whatever would be 50% between what BT is now and what it is in live.
camouflage on aliens confered from a shade and not an upgrade works strangely - aliens that are immobile are very easy to spot, there is a clear shimmer/distortion. when they move and particularly when viewed from the side they become harder to see. should this not be the other way around?
Descolada, if you're going to make some type of argument, how about you at least don't sound as though you've only played it for 10 minutes. Fades in BT mod start off with blink and not shadow step, and you can do 1 swipe passes in BT mod, it is actually recommended.
Descolada, if you're going to make some type of argument, how about you at least don't sound as though you've only played it for 10 minutes. Fades in BT mod start off with blink and not shadow step, and you can do 1 swipe passes in BT mod, it is actually recommended.
enjoy getting shotgunned because of the incredibly predictable movement
you clearly haven't played against anyone with a living pulse
at 14 m/s you have 18 shots to kill a skulk before he can even bite you once, assuming you start firing when he is 14 meters away. At that range, if you tracked the skulk perfectly dead center, you most likely wouldnt miss a single bullet.
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
Putting a huge spread on the LMG instead of simply doing damage falloff at longer distances is mind boggling stupidity. If your aim is to nerf the range of the rifle, then nerf the range of the rifle. Don't do it behind a terrible mechanic where you miss 100% accurately tracked shots.
Descolada, if you're going to make some type of argument, how about you at least don't sound as though you've only played it for 10 minutes. Fades in BT mod start off with blink and not shadow step, and you can do 1 swipe passes in BT mod, it is actually recommended.
enjoy getting shotgunned because of the incredibly predictable movement
you clearly haven't played against anyone with a living pulse
If you master bunnyhopping as a fade you can blink then dance passed them "unpredictably".
Descolada, if you're going to make some type of argument, how about you at least don't sound as though you've only played it for 10 minutes. Fades in BT mod start off with blink and not shadow step, and you can do 1 swipe passes in BT mod, it is actually recommended.
enjoy getting shotgunned because of the incredibly predictable movement
you clearly haven't played against anyone with a living pulse
If you master bunnyhopping as a fade you can blink then dance passed them "unpredictably".
once again you clearly haven't played anyone with a pulse
at 14 m/s you have 18 shots to kill a skulk before he can even bite you once, assuming you start firing when he is 14 meters away. At that range, if you tracked the skulk perfectly dead center, you most likely wouldnt miss a single bullet.
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
Putting a huge spread on the LMG instead of simply doing damage falloff at longer distances is mind boggling stupidity. If your aim is to nerf the range of the rifle, then nerf the range of the rifle. Don't do it behind a terrible mechanic where you miss 100% accurately tracked shots.
While i think that's an idea worth entertaining... I now wait for the counter argument of vets needing to "count their shots" like bites.
@descolada the shotgun is also going through some growing pains in the BT mod.. so try not to use that as a sole comparison for the fade currently. Things were different 2 weeks ago.
at 14 m/s you have 18 shots to kill a skulk before he can even bite you once, assuming you start firing when he is 14 meters away. At that range, if you tracked the skulk perfectly dead center, you most likely wouldnt miss a single bullet.
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
Putting a huge spread on the LMG instead of simply doing damage falloff at longer distances is mind boggling stupidity. If your aim is to nerf the range of the rifle, then nerf the range of the rifle. Don't do it behind a terrible mechanic where you miss 100% accurately tracked shots.
While i think that's an idea worth entertaining... I now wait for the counter argument of vets needing to "count their shots" like bites.
@descolada the shotgun is also going through some growing pains in the BT mod.. so try not to use that as a sole comparison for the fade currently. Things were different 2 weeks ago.
I've always been a supporter of accurate guns in video games (like, quake tier, dead accurate or consistant spread), adding a random element to bullet spread adds a luck factor to a game of skill.
at 14 m/s you have 18 shots to kill a skulk before he can even bite you once, assuming you start firing when he is 14 meters away. At that range, if you tracked the skulk perfectly dead center, you most likely wouldnt miss a single bullet.
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
Putting a huge spread on the LMG instead of simply doing damage falloff at longer distances is mind boggling stupidity. If your aim is to nerf the range of the rifle, then nerf the range of the rifle. Don't do it behind a terrible mechanic where you miss 100% accurately tracked shots.
Bullet spread is a more intuitive way of communicating the effective range of the gun than magic numbers behind the scenes that make your bullets do imperceptibly less damage at longer distances.
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
edited June 2013
A good compromise might be the first 2 shots being more accurate/ centered, ala Counter Strike... giving a little bit more room for those able to make said shots, but at a far less effective degree.
Encouraging burst shots at a distance, creating more of a familiar meta game, and slightly scaling better with skill?
The current rifle is fine..why are we changing it? If we fixed a bug in the actual spread pattern fine thats great but please keep the diameter of the total spread the same....
fades are restricted to shadow stepping infront of a marine and holding down the button until he dies
regular ns2 fades on the other hand can continuously make 1 swipe passes because the shadow step is retarded
Fixed.
I've practiced BT fade against some of the best shots in the game and can reliably kill them 1v1. It needs to be played more hit and run because you don't have the invincibility that an instantaneous 20 speed shadowstep gives you.
at 14 m/s you have 18 shots to kill a skulk before he can even bite you once, assuming you start firing when he is 14 meters away. At that range, if you tracked the skulk perfectly dead center, you most likely wouldnt miss a single bullet.
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
Putting a huge spread on the LMG instead of simply doing damage falloff at longer distances is mind boggling stupidity. If your aim is to nerf the range of the rifle, then nerf the range of the rifle. Don't do it behind a terrible mechanic where you miss 100% accurately tracked shots.
I guess we should make shotgun put all its pellets in 0,0 then. What a terrible mechanic spread is. The only mind boggling stupidity is the suggestion of an unintuitive damage falloff.
Yes, the effective range is now reduced. Maybe it was reduced too much, maybe not, although personally i think it's mostly fine where it is currently (read no major issues). The evenly distributed spread is not huge relative to skulk size, and this only really affects people with incredible aim already (Think how many bullets most people miss. Hardly anyone has actual near perfect/perfect tracking all the time)
There is now some skill involved with distance judgement, needing to use movement more to gain your range space, and mostly all relevant situations have the same combat outcomes. If you can track, you can kill almost as effectively at ranges that matter. It never felt right being able to 10 bullet snipe a peeking skulk from some pretty long distances.
Anyway, it needed an evenly distributed spread either way for consistency and feel. Instead of vanilla with one random bullet with a 300% variation out by the side every now and then.
TL;DR
The evenly distributed spread is a good thing. Maybe the overall spread needs a small reduction eventually who knows. But its currently nowhere near huge enough to materially make lmg a 'luck based' weapon.
fades are restricted to shadow stepping infront of a marine and holding down the button until he dies
regular ns2 fades on the other hand can continuously make 1 swipe passes because the shadow step is retarded
Fixed.
I've practiced BT fade against some of the best shots in the game and can reliably kill them 1v1. It needs to be played more hit and run because you don't have the invincibility that an instantaneous 20 speed shadowstep gives you.
were you dropped on the head as a child?
instantaneous speed is critical to hit and run, of course your lack of gray matter leaves you unable to comprehend such notions
Instantaneous speed isn't critical to hit and run. Maybe you're just bad and don't know to play fade?
Shadowstep still has its uses. The fact that it redirects your current velocity rather than adds to it can be used in very interesting ways once mastered (which I don't think anyone has yet).
As for the rifle spread, the old formula for calculating the spread was bad so it was changed to a more consistent one. The number of degrees wasn't changed but the new formula means the shots are more evenly distributed rather than being clumped together in the middle with sporadical outliers, leading to a wider spread on average. Sewlek has mentioned he tried lowering the spread from 3 to 2 degrees, but felt that was too accurate (for reference, the spread was 4 degrees in NS1).
In close to mid range the new spread doesn't make any difference other than allow people without perfect aim to hit a few more shots than they did before. At long range it might mean people with good aim will hit less shots, but this is actually a good thing because it means marines will have to think more about positioning and you won't get killed instantly as a skulk when peeking around a corner. Also, the pistol is there for a reason.
Comments
Shooting a wall is all good and nice, but the spread changes only serve to reduce the effective range of the rifle. Is there some distance you think the rifle should maintain ~95% hitrate up to on a skulk?
I'd be ok with pinpoint accuracy at any range honestly. I just don't see the point of having any sort of substantial random spread for the LMG, because it's supposed to be your long range weapon and primary tool for utilizing the marine's ranged advantage in the first place. Your effective range is limited by your ability to hit small fast moving targets from a distance anyway. If your aim and positioning is really good, you should be rewarded for that, and not have some random spread hold you back.
Few comments.
1) Lerk: when pressing left/right keys and flapping your wings you should gain more height then you do right now. Right now you just fly completely flat when pressing a strafe key like you are tied to the ground. Trying to spike and circle around your target makes you a very very easy target and doesn't allow you to gain elevation as you circle your target while spiking him. In live you have more lift involved when holding A or D, to control it you simply flap less often. Increasing the lift you get from flapping when holding A or D will raise the skill ceiling a bit since it will allow you to navigate your terrain and spike and at the same time make spiking more difficult since your not flying perfectly level.
Skulk:
2) Skulk: Figured out if i just pressed W and wall-jumped I moved around the map rather nicely. That IMO will bridge the gap between live and BT perfectly. You don't have to use A-D if you don't want to!
3) Considering how often umbra is supposed to be used it needs to be considerably less vision blocking then it currently is. It's not immersive, its frustrating as fuck trying to shoot though that junk. I would say it needs a 80% reduction in how vision blocking the big cloud is.
4) Drifter HP seemes a bit low? Not sure how much they cost but it was very easy to shoot them suckers.
5) Shotgun- shot speed needs to be lowered a lot. Try whatever would be 50% between what BT is now and what it is in live.
Overall: Very fun games...good stuff!
Is/should a single marine be able to kill off multiple skulks before they get to him?
fades are restricted to shadow stepping infront of a marine and holding down the button until he dies
regular ns2 fades on the other hand can continuously make 1 swipe passes because the shadow step isn't retarded
That's because you're trying to play BT fade like live fade.
you can't do swipes, you have to get infront of him and hold the button
its basically the fps equivalent of 1a2a3a
you clearly haven't played against anyone with a living pulse
Putting a huge spread on the LMG instead of simply doing damage falloff at longer distances is mind boggling stupidity. If your aim is to nerf the range of the rifle, then nerf the range of the rifle. Don't do it behind a terrible mechanic where you miss 100% accurately tracked shots.
If you master bunnyhopping as a fade you can blink then dance passed them "unpredictably".
once again you clearly haven't played anyone with a pulse
or hands
@descolada the shotgun is also going through some growing pains in the BT mod.. so try not to use that as a sole comparison for the fade currently. Things were different 2 weeks ago.
I've always been a supporter of accurate guns in video games (like, quake tier, dead accurate or consistant spread), adding a random element to bullet spread adds a luck factor to a game of skill.
Bullet spread is a more intuitive way of communicating the effective range of the gun than magic numbers behind the scenes that make your bullets do imperceptibly less damage at longer distances.
Encouraging burst shots at a distance, creating more of a familiar meta game, and slightly scaling better with skill?
Fixed.
I've practiced BT fade against some of the best shots in the game and can reliably kill them 1v1. It needs to be played more hit and run because you don't have the invincibility that an instantaneous 20 speed shadowstep gives you.
Yes, the effective range is now reduced. Maybe it was reduced too much, maybe not, although personally i think it's mostly fine where it is currently (read no major issues). The evenly distributed spread is not huge relative to skulk size, and this only really affects people with incredible aim already (Think how many bullets most people miss. Hardly anyone has actual near perfect/perfect tracking all the time)
There is now some skill involved with distance judgement, needing to use movement more to gain your range space, and mostly all relevant situations have the same combat outcomes. If you can track, you can kill almost as effectively at ranges that matter. It never felt right being able to 10 bullet snipe a peeking skulk from some pretty long distances.
Anyway, it needed an evenly distributed spread either way for consistency and feel. Instead of vanilla with one random bullet with a 300% variation out by the side every now and then.
TL;DR
The evenly distributed spread is a good thing. Maybe the overall spread needs a small reduction eventually who knows. But its currently nowhere near huge enough to materially make lmg a 'luck based' weapon.
Instantaneous speed isn't critical to hit and run. Maybe you're just bad and don't know to play fade?
As for the rifle spread, the old formula for calculating the spread was bad so it was changed to a more consistent one. The number of degrees wasn't changed but the new formula means the shots are more evenly distributed rather than being clumped together in the middle with sporadical outliers, leading to a wider spread on average. Sewlek has mentioned he tried lowering the spread from 3 to 2 degrees, but felt that was too accurate (for reference, the spread was 4 degrees in NS1).
In close to mid range the new spread doesn't make any difference other than allow people without perfect aim to hit a few more shots than they did before. At long range it might mean people with good aim will hit less shots, but this is actually a good thing because it means marines will have to think more about positioning and you won't get killed instantly as a skulk when peeking around a corner. Also, the pistol is there for a reason.