I think both carapace AND regen are underpowered on higher lifeforms (actually regen sucks on skulk now too) I swear it got a quick nerf near the end of BT.
I think both carapace AND regen are underpowered on higher lifeforms (actually regen sucks on skulk now too) I swear it got a quick nerf near the end of BT.
Yeah I think it went from 7% to 5%. It's not exactly amazing right now but if you get crag first for beefier skulks then you're gonna pick regen on all your higher lifeforms because it's better than nothing.
Given that Drifters might need some improvements, how about this: upgraded Hives also upgrade the Drifters.
Crag Hive: Drifters have more HP/Armor
Shift Hive: Drifters are faster
Shade Hive: Drifters are cloaked again! (well, semi-cloaked)
You could upgrade all Drifters when the respective Hive is available, or have the upgrade depend on in which Hive the Drifter was built (so Commanders can/have to choose one of the improvements)
DC_DarklingJoin Date: 2003-07-10Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
crags need more healing now they dont stack.
I cant imagine any lifeform which isnt faster healed going to the hive and back, then spending cragtime with added potential to get shot.
Yeah, there's no point in putting forward crags to help your team out, it's more effective to retreat to hive, if you try heal on that crag you can get ambushed and die. It's ok for keeping harvesters up though. Increase healing to aliens by at LEAST double.
EDIT: Damn, posted this after only reading the first line of @DC_Darkling 's post. Reading the second line I basically repeated him....
Serious question why do some people hate the idea of the game they're playing changing? I generally give up on a game that doesn't have a serious balance and/or content patch every 4-6 months (unless it's a very very mature game with fairly impeccable balance already) because the same old stale strategies are always optimal and you're just playing the game the same way you always did.
My serious reply is that i dont view these as changes. Its a whole new game. The overwhelming majority of skills mastered playing as alien have been invalidated, for no reason. Take the fade changes, their effectiveness is pretty similar, so says everyone in support of BT. So, remind me, what balance purposes did pulling the rug out from under everyone who had previously played fade serve? Just to fuck with people? Dont get me wrong, theres a lot of positive changes. But they are lumped in with the horrid.
My condolences to the people who have apparently already mastered the replacement mechanics within their first 17 seconds of BT, as you all no longer have any reason to continue to play now that you've worked your way to the top. I expect to see you all in the next NSL.
Post useful content or feedback, not flame bait - or don't post at all.
That was definitely a bad post, however i was shocked UWE is going to continue with the balance mod after the backlash. It was a good idea, for testing INDIVIDUAL changes, but it ended up taking over the entire game. Additionally. i remember reading a dev post saying something about "never doing this again" or at least making it less of a pain for the players.
Well said, I like some of the changes but most feel like they were put in for no reason at all other then to "change things"? What the ****? I always thought the BT Mod was to many things at once, instead they implemented everything into the main game. What you should have done is add a few features at a time and see what the majority of the community thinks of it instead of JUST listening to people playing the BT. A lot of people liked everything the BT had to offer, a lot of us didn't. I tried the game after BT and theres so many things I don't like but I wont even bother to complain about it here, I know you wont change any of it.
Instead I quit playing the game entirely, even though it was one of the best games I played in many years. Now I think its ruined, I feel fucked over, learning to master every single life form and now i have to do it again for no valid reason.. Most of my friends quit playing as well, theres still a couple that goes on but thats mainly because they miss the community we had on one of our favorite servers.
Playing aliens has never been more intuitive then with 250.
Had alot of problems to play properly as fade before now I am at least a threath to the Marines,
same goes for Skulking.
Given that Drifters might need some improvements, how about this: upgraded Hives also upgrade the Drifters.
Crag Hive: Drifters have more HP/Armor
Shift Hive: Drifters are faster
Shade Hive: Drifters are cloaked again! (well, semi-cloaked)
You could upgrade all Drifters when the respective Hive is available, or have the upgrade depend on in which Hive the Drifter was built (so Commanders can/have to choose one of the improvements)
Any chance this could happen? :-)
This was actually part of BT for a long time. Drifters got regen with crag hives, celerity with shift hives, and cloaking with shade hives. It was removed near the end of the development process, not really sure what the reasoning was but I assume Sewlek didn't want to have cloaked drifters any more.
On an unrelated note, the effectiveness of GLs and flamers really needs to be reduced. These weapons are way too effective relative to the skill required to use them (virtually zero). Flamers in particular are way too good right now. They have tons of ammo, do direct damage, DOT, energy drain, stop alien structures from functioning, destroy spores and umbra, and destroy bile bombs. And the only requirement to use them is spray in the general direction of aliens. Nothing is more frustrating than being forced out of engagements by these weapons when you're playing as a lifeform that actually requires skill.
Also I'd love to see exos removed because they add nothing positive to the game experience, but this is likely a pipe dream.
I'd love to see Bile Bomb mess up the vision of Exos again. The Gorge takes a high risk by getting that close to Exos and then the Bile itself is not all that effective anyway, especially if there is someone welding the Exo. All the vision obscuring stuff is not really affecting halfway decent players anyway.
Also, any chance to get some nerf to marines on 1 CC?
Aliens need to hold 3 tech points to get to their full potential, marines only really need 1. The Dual Exo is something that is just the cream topping by giving them a pain train that aliens can't stop, even though the tech from 1 CC would be enough already. Restricting W3/A3 to the 2nd CC as well would go a long way.
FTs and GLs also need a nerf. The latter is way too spammy, especially if you can hit aliens point blank with it for massive damage without taking much of a hit yourself.
The biggest problem with those weapons is not even their base stats but how much they get buffed when combined with a Jetpack, which happens to be pretty much the next thing to get on the tech tree after gaining access to Advanced Weapons. The drawback of the Advanced Weapons is supposed to be that you are vulnerable to aliens because you can't really kill them in time before they get you (unlike when having a Shotgun). But the Jetpack negates too much of that drawback because you can nearly indefinitely kite your opponent behind you until you easily kill them. You can't even run away with a Drifter from a Jetpacker with FT, which is severely frustrating.
One balancing factor that could maybe tried out is to make the Jetpackconsume more fuel based on the weight of your weapon, so FTs don't become that much of an overkill with Jetpacks. Reducing the clip size of the FT would be another balancing option as well. It's so ridiculously high right now that the reload period (which is supposed to be the crucial moment that offers aliens a chance to counter-attack) rarely comes into play before the alien is already dead.
GLs should do more self-damage or have a fuse time so that they simply can't explode right into an aliens face in front of you. And perhaps allow Vortex to reverse the momentum of grenades so they go back to the shooter. But this is probably not working out with the new prediction either…
I've also seen a lot of Sentry nests being used recently and they were really a pain for aliens to deal with since they can be set up so quickly and everywhere to secure entire rooms without the need of a marine. I really hope that we will see the player-deployed Sentries from Last Stand at some point in the BT, since having players invest their personal resources and having to carry the stuff to the front lines themselves would be quite a balancing factor. It would basically mean that you sacrifice some offensive power (res that could be used for other weapons) to get some static defenses.
Also, still pledging for the re-introduction of the passive Drifter abilities from previous iterations. I've stated my view on the subject often enough, for instance here.
You are forcing aliens into a role that they don't fit into. Relying on Skulks or Builder Drifters for intelligence means that marines can cut your intelligence short in the very moment that they kill the Skulk or Drifter and it also means that you can't provide players with the necessary information before they actually enter the fight.
Aliens have the handicap of not being able to stand up to marines in an open fight until they get higher lifeforms. Their early lifeforms need to use cunning and guerrilla tactics to gain advantages in fights, so it's perfectly fine to have an NPC unit like the Drifter that is suitable for scouting (and not just for building) by receiving such passive upgrades (or alternatively just regular cloaking) that allow it to fit in that role one way or another. Having to give your position away with parasite for effective scouting clashes with the concept of an ambush-based lifeform.
Another topic: why do aliens have to cope with such overly expensive Tres drops that don't even have shorter evolve times while marines get their stuff basically at a 1:1 Pres-Tres conversion rate and grab it up instantly and get into a fight? Marines get all the means to crush aliens once they established a map domination but aliens are forced into long sieges (especially since marines can have Exos on 1 CC, which are extremely good at holding off turtles since their weakness of being ambushed easily in a location without Welder support never comes into play) because the loss of each lifeform is still very crucial. And that even though they have already much more Tres cost associated with getting all their tech than marines.
I understand that Fade explosions due to Fade eggs were a problem. But I feel like a 100 Tres Onos with an unchanged evolution time is a bit too expensive, given how fragile they are and given that the player still needs to pay for trait upgrades with his own Pres afterwards. 75 Tres would seem way enough for an Onos. 50 Tres for Fade, etc. Basically every egg at the old Pres cost.
Last but not least, something that would be interesting to try out: Give aliens an option for a 4th Biomass upgrade in a Hive after the 3rd. The logical price would be 40 res (based on the previous 2 upgrades), but 50 would work as well if you wanted it to be used more as a last resort for desperate situations, rather than an upgrade choice that is preferred over a 3rd Hive.
What would be the implications of this change:
- It evens the ground a bit in that aliens can become quite strong on 1-2 Hives similar to marines on 1 CC. Aliens would stand a fighting chance if they can hold enough res and are just lacking the map control for a 3rd tech point.
- More strategic choices: get an actual new Hive (which is ultimately cheaper) or play it save on the established ground and get another upgrade first at a higher cost?
- Biomass system becomes more self-sustained. Currently it acts more like a tech delay while you are still effectively bound to the requirements of 3 Hives. Those requirements would blur with such a change.
- Getting a new Hive is still encouraged, since it's cheaper, offers a new tech path and map control.
- Higher risk of potential res loss if you have that much Biomass invested into a single Hive.
- Aliens can max out Biomass level 12 on 3 Hives (aka also on 4-TP maps).
- Actual alien strategy is less obvious to marines than with the current 3-Biomass-per-Hive requirement.
Yes, grenades feel too powerful now, if you want a skill based, make them fuse-only (e.g. no more explode on alien contact, or make it so that infestation or bile also detonates them?)
Drifters should get their passives back (either by being attached to a hive type, or as a separate research maybe?)
To reduce the effectiveness of 1 CC for marines, maybe the Arms Lab upgrades shuold be tied a bit to the number of CCs? Two ideas can be that you can onlyy research up to W/A2 with only one CC, or that you can only do 3 or 4 upgrades with only 1 CC, thus requiring a 2nd CC to get W/A 3, because at the moment it's very hard for aliens to recover from being left with only one Hive, whereas Marines can get most of their upgrades with only 1 CC.
Another thing might be that JP fuel be tied to the number of CCs? (i.e. the more CCs the more Fuel).
The current problem with CCs is that there isn't much incentive to build any (of course, there's strategic value for beacons and a fall-back insurance against base-rush)
Maybe hives hsuold go up to 4 Biomass each or 4 for the 1st hive and 3 for the second? thus requiring a 3rd hive for Stomp+xeno.
Haven't read all the posts and also this mod changed every 15 minutes, so it's hard to know what has been tried and why/if that failed. I do remember a very OP vortex that would create a wall that would block all bullets that was a bit(very) OP
ScatterJoin Date: 2012-09-02Member: 157341Members, Squad Five Blue
Med packs - Dislike marine commander paying res to win an encounter so directly. Make medpacks have half of the initial heal and make the rest a HoT, so that it is more focussed on between-encounter healing. If the commander really wants to spam meds that should be ok as it will have more impact on the economy (need to do it twice as much).
Alien Economy - Too easy to expand still with the drifter army. Would prefer a system where drifters can build things but if you want the maximum utility of the building it must be matured, which a gorge would be able to do. So you can expand res at the current rate but must either get a gorge to get the current res output, mist it (costs money) or wait for it to slowly mature. This would encourage more gorging and less fades.
Lerks - Still need to have a good look at as I suggested in a post a while back. Mops up for the few minutes after its out before the shotguns, then becomes just a crappy umbra spam vehicle after. Spikes are pretty good but require too much exposure time to have any significant impact on marine HP. Suggest projectile spores on tier 1.
Biomass - If I have 4 hives then have biomass should give me loads of HP so I can finish it quickly.
Fades - If we're going to have 3 or 4 balled up on the field then they are too fast or have too much HP. Basically they're like shadowstep fades in their ability to go into a group of 4 marines and live, except they don't run into corners and walls due to clunky shadowstep mechanic.
Onos - Nerfed HP, movement and damage output. If doing a big nerf, pick 2 and nerf the other, not all 3. Movement makes the life form un-fun and it really lacks a skill mechanic. What happened to boneshield?
Med packs - Dislike marine commander paying res to win an encounter so directly. Make medpacks have half of the initial heal and make the rest a HoT, so that it is more focussed on between-encounter healing. If the commander really wants to spam meds that should be ok as it will have more impact on the economy (need to do it twice as much).
Please don't nerf med packs any more, the .3 second pick up delay already makes spamming marines painful.
ScatterJoin Date: 2012-09-02Member: 157341Members, Squad Five Blue
If it's painful then that's another issue. Currently they have too little impact on the marine economy and decide the outcome of the encounter far more than they should. Combine that with lolnano and marine jump spam and the frustration for skulks and lerks is significantly higher than what the marine commander undergoes.
twilitebluebug stalkerJoin Date: 2003-02-04Member: 13116Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue
edited July 2013
I have a few suggestions to address player frustration with grenade launchers:
- Give Grenade Launcher a "detonate" function, which destroys all unexploded grenades without dealing damage, on alternative fire. This will help address the "teammates reflecting grenades in my face" issue.
- Reduce Grenade damage, and re-enable Weapons upgrades for GL. Grenades are just too powerful early game, while alien players have less health, and don't have many structures that need clearing.
Other suggestions:
Lerk and Gorge biomass health scaling are too low, they currently only gain less than 1% of base effective HP per biomass. Giving them about 2-3% bonus health per biomass would bring them on par with marine upgrades.
Alien biomass progression feels rather too linear. If aliens can afford to pay the expensive biomass costs, they almost always research the early upgrades, such as tunnel, bile bomb and umbra. Rushing for higher Biomass tier abilities are currently not viable strategies, because Biomass upgrades provide so little return for their high costs.
Commander interactions on PVP combat is currently way too strong in NS2, and honestly is probably one of the most frustrating parts of playing it. That, along with tech massing (shotguns/fades) remain two of the biggest things that need to be addressed. I think medpacks are simply a necessity at this point, just because so much of the gameplay has been balanced AND designed around them. Ideally however, they would cost 2 tres per med so that they cannot be spammed. As for drifter abilities and other marine comm (turrets,nano,macs) all those should either be removed, or severely nerfd IMO. Those would need to come at a similar time with both shotgun changes to either lower its power, or the addition of another mid tech level weapon (ideally IMO shotguns become midlevel, new weapon is high level). Also there would need to be fade changes to make the 'fade ball' less destructive, and also to hopefully require one additional player to gorge earlygame so that there is max 3 fades, or 4 without a lerk. This would also require even more changes (see a pattern?) to the alien comm to prevent them from just hopping out to build everything, or changes to the structure of the alien team that balances around that play (something to require 2 gorges?).
I also disagree with regen nerf (cara needs buff on fade/onos), and disagree that crag is the worst chamber (its still the best). Celerity will be better once fade movement is less speedy overall, and aura/phantom are already quite strong so I dont think anything further should be done there. I think cara first will be less popular once A-people learn the movement better, and B-Once the shotgun mass is fixed.
Med packs - Dislike marine commander paying res to win an encounter so directly. Make medpacks have half of the initial heal and make the rest a HoT, so that it is more focussed on between-encounter healing. If the commander really wants to spam meds that should be ok as it will have more impact on the economy (need to do it twice as much).
You Lerk a lot more than you command. I command a lot more than I Lerk. Medpacks are how marines prevent being slaughtered by Lerks and Fades in the mid game, particularly in 1v1 encounters. The outcome with medpacks is, the Lerks and Fades are forced to retreat while the marines have spent SOME amount of tRes. Bad Lerks and Fades stay too long and get killed. If you want to reduce medpacks in any shape or form, you're essentially buffing Lerks and Fades in the mid game. I'm 100% against that. It's already hard enough to get even experienced commanders to recognise the importance of dropping medpacks in those encounters. Medpacks in the early game against skulks is more damaging to the marine economy because it delays upgrades.
Also the cooldown means the marine has to have some amount of skill in order to survive until the next medpack can be absorbed. From what I've seen, this is a pretty good balance at the moment - I still lose marines to lerks dispite having medpacks under their feet, about 1 time in 3 I would say. Then it feels like you've wasted those medpacks... Making them less effective risks tipping the balance to the point where commanders will think "well he won't survive anyway, so what's the point in dropping any medpacks"
You Lerk a lot more than you command. I command a lot more than I Lerk. Medpacks are how marines prevent being slaughtered by Lerks and Fades in the mid game, particularly in 1v1 encounters. The outcome with medpacks is, the Lerks and Fades are forced to retreat while the marines have spent SOME amount of tRes. Bad Lerks and Fades stay too long and get killed. If you want to reduce medpacks in any shape or form, you're essentially buffing Lerks and Fades in the mid game. I'm 100% against that. It's already hard enough to get even experienced commanders to recognise the importance of dropping medpacks in those encounters. Medpacks in the early game against skulks is more damaging to the marine economy because it delays upgrades.
Also the cooldown means the marine has to have some amount of skill in order to survive until the next medpack can be absorbed. From what I've seen, this is a pretty good balance at the moment - I still lose marines to lerks dispite having medpacks under their feet, about 1 time in 3 I would say. Then it feels like you've wasted those medpacks... Making them less effective risks tipping the balance to the point where commanders will think "well he won't survive anyway, so what's the point in dropping any medpacks"
This essentially goes back to what Dragon said about the game being balanced around medpacking during encounters, and I somewhat agree with the above points. If the com finds something frustrating, well to me that is subordinate to what is frustrating for the players on the field as they are more numerous. I simply would rather the game be balanced around me vs other players rather than me vs other players and the hand of god.
This essentially goes back to what Dragon said about the game being balanced around medpacking during encounters, and I somewhat agree with the above points. If the com finds something frustrating, well to me that is subordinate to what if frustrating for the players on the field. I simply would rather the game be balanced around me vs other players rather than me vs other players and the hand of god.
Well fair enough. But I'm happy for asymmetry to exist at this level. I'm happy that NS2 has intersections between the strategy layer and the tactical layer. I don't play games like quake because I find them boring after a little while.
I think NS2 has had a fair bit of difficulty making the game engaging for commanders. As a commander, sometimes it feels like you could be playing a single player game. Those direct interventions actually help fix that. That the game has achieved some degree of balanced based on those interactions is an achievement, I think. I would want for more such interactions rather than less but they wouldn't necessarily have to be as immediate or as direct.
twilitebluebug stalkerJoin Date: 2003-02-04Member: 13116Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue
edited July 2013
In regard to commander influence in combat, I support transparent (for both teams) commander interactions, as long as they can be reasonably countered by players on the opposing team.
Nano Shield (on players) and Bone Wall are two prime examples of commander abilities that exert too much influence on the outcomes of combat too quickly, and cause too much player frustration. The opponent players being negatively affected by these types of interactions often feel as if a piano was dropped on their heads from the hand of a cruel god. That is because the "victims" is often not given enough time to react to such heavy handed swings of odds.
Although the abilities mentioned above may be considered "balanced" from the commanders' perspective, due to their costs to the team. They can be very unfair, and "antifun" for individual players, who cannot predict the actions of the invisible enemy commander.
Instant "global" abilities should be carefully balanced, because they are powerful, while being easy to use. But most of all, they can potentially kill the enjoy of the game for players.
At least Bone Wall can be prevented by removing infestation in the combat zone first.
Nano Shield is just like giving you the middle finger out of nowhere. I wonder if it should be tied to having an active Power Node in the room instead, so it only works in friendly territory as well.
Well fair enough. But I'm happy for asymmetry to exist at this level. I'm happy that NS2 has intersections between the strategy layer and the tactical layer. I don't play games like quake because I find them boring after a little while.
I think NS2 has had a fair bit of difficulty making the game engaging for commanders. As a commander, sometimes it feels like you could be playing a single player game. Those direct interventions actually help fix that. That the game has achieved some degree of balanced based on those interactions is an achievement, I think. I would want for more such interactions rather than less but they wouldn't necessarily have to be as immediate or as direct.
I wasn't really suggesting the game be turned into quake, just that frustration inducing elements be reduced or removed. Bouncing marines, medpack spam and nanospam; do we really need all 3 of these intrusive elements to be present? Yes it may be balanced in some UWE-esque statistical 50/50 holy grail fashion, but it doesn't reflect whether the mechanics used to achieve that are fun (the primary goal of the game) or at the very least as un-frustrating as possible (a desirable goal).
This isn't an objection to the commander influencing the game, just an objection to it being so intrusive at all points in the game especially if its for the creation of artificial asymmetry. We used to have true asymmetry, but then UWE decided it would be good to bring in alien commander and pres for the marine team causing a direct undermining of commander involvement in the game flow.
I wasn't really suggesting the game be turned into quake, just that frustration inducing elements be reduced or removed. Bouncing marines, medpack spam and nanospam; do we really need all 3 of these intrusive elements to be present? Yes it may be balanced in some UWE-esque statistical 50/50 holy grail fashion, but it doesn't reflect whether the mechanics used to achieve that are fun (the primary goal of the game) or at the very least as un-frustrating as possible (a desirable goal).
This isn't an objection to the commander influencing the game, just an objection to it being so intrusive at all points in the game especially if its for the creation of artificial asymmetry. We used to have true asymmetry, but then UWE decided it would be good to bring in alien commander and pres for the marine team causing a direct undermining of commander involvement in the game flow.
I should have clarified a bit better what I meant by asymmetry there. I was basically talking about the number of players in an encounter. Lerk > Marine but Marine+Comm ~= Lerk. Specifically in that mid game period where upgrades are low and lone marines are roaming around to deal with res nodes etc. The reason I brought quake in to this is because it has very clear balance based on 1v1 encounters, not because I think you are a bad person.
As for it being overly intrusive I'm not convinced. Maybe I simply need a better example of what the alternative is before I could see that the current system is bad. Either way, I don't believe it has been implemented for the purpose of creating asymmetry. Clearly it was introduced because medpacks were in NS1, and back then it was a relatable way to connect the commander to the battlefield.
I would mention that I re-read your original post at this point and noticed you at least identified the problem with Lerks, but I don't think the change you proposed there offsets the change to medpacks, nor does it really resolve the problem you identified with Lerks. What I'm getting at here is that I could accept a change to medpacks if it was packaged with some changes to Lerks and Fades. Still, I'm not sold on medpacks being a problem of the highest order.
And on the topic of Fades, the problem with them is 'Fade Cycling' (that thing where 4 fades tag team their attacks, blinking back and forth between the hive and the combat area). The only way to counter it is to get lucky with shotguns landing simultaneous hits which is then enormously annoying to fades because it's entirely luck based not skill based when you lose your fade. (Fade being my preferred higher lifeform). I still think that in balance mod fades are either fast or deadly, but maybe that's just a reflection of my mediocre skills as fade.
I tried the game after BT and theres so many things I don't like but I wont even bother to complain about it here, I know you wont change any of it.
Instead I quit playing the game entirely, even though it was one of the best games I played in many years.
I dont know where people get this "i wont bother because i know it wont change" attitude from?
This page, this thread, these forums.. are nothing but the masses providing feedback to change this game.
You've seen how radical things can change from feedback with 250... so why wouldn't you contribute any yourself?
:-/
Comments
Yeah I think it went from 7% to 5%. It's not exactly amazing right now but if you get crag first for beefier skulks then you're gonna pick regen on all your higher lifeforms because it's better than nothing.
Crag Hive: Drifters have more HP/Armor
Shift Hive: Drifters are faster
Shade Hive: Drifters are cloaked again! (well, semi-cloaked)
You could upgrade all Drifters when the respective Hive is available, or have the upgrade depend on in which Hive the Drifter was built (so Commanders can/have to choose one of the improvements)
Any chance this could happen? :-)
I cant imagine any lifeform which isnt faster healed going to the hive and back, then spending cragtime with added potential to get shot.
EDIT: Damn, posted this after only reading the first line of @DC_Darkling 's post. Reading the second line I basically repeated him....
Well said, I like some of the changes but most feel like they were put in for no reason at all other then to "change things"? What the ****? I always thought the BT Mod was to many things at once, instead they implemented everything into the main game. What you should have done is add a few features at a time and see what the majority of the community thinks of it instead of JUST listening to people playing the BT. A lot of people liked everything the BT had to offer, a lot of us didn't. I tried the game after BT and theres so many things I don't like but I wont even bother to complain about it here, I know you wont change any of it.
Instead I quit playing the game entirely, even though it was one of the best games I played in many years. Now I think its ruined, I feel fucked over, learning to master every single life form and now i have to do it again for no valid reason.. Most of my friends quit playing as well, theres still a couple that goes on but thats mainly because they miss the community we had on one of our favorite servers.
Had alot of problems to play properly as fade before now I am at least a threath to the Marines,
same goes for Skulking.
This was actually part of BT for a long time. Drifters got regen with crag hives, celerity with shift hives, and cloaking with shade hives. It was removed near the end of the development process, not really sure what the reasoning was but I assume Sewlek didn't want to have cloaked drifters any more.
On an unrelated note, the effectiveness of GLs and flamers really needs to be reduced. These weapons are way too effective relative to the skill required to use them (virtually zero). Flamers in particular are way too good right now. They have tons of ammo, do direct damage, DOT, energy drain, stop alien structures from functioning, destroy spores and umbra, and destroy bile bombs. And the only requirement to use them is spray in the general direction of aliens. Nothing is more frustrating than being forced out of engagements by these weapons when you're playing as a lifeform that actually requires skill.
Also I'd love to see exos removed because they add nothing positive to the game experience, but this is likely a pipe dream.
Aliens need to hold 3 tech points to get to their full potential, marines only really need 1. The Dual Exo is something that is just the cream topping by giving them a pain train that aliens can't stop, even though the tech from 1 CC would be enough already. Restricting W3/A3 to the 2nd CC as well would go a long way.
FTs and GLs also need a nerf. The latter is way too spammy, especially if you can hit aliens point blank with it for massive damage without taking much of a hit yourself.
The biggest problem with those weapons is not even their base stats but how much they get buffed when combined with a Jetpack, which happens to be pretty much the next thing to get on the tech tree after gaining access to Advanced Weapons. The drawback of the Advanced Weapons is supposed to be that you are vulnerable to aliens because you can't really kill them in time before they get you (unlike when having a Shotgun). But the Jetpack negates too much of that drawback because you can nearly indefinitely kite your opponent behind you until you easily kill them. You can't even run away with a Drifter from a Jetpacker with FT, which is severely frustrating.
One balancing factor that could maybe tried out is to make the Jetpack consume more fuel based on the weight of your weapon, so FTs don't become that much of an overkill with Jetpacks.
Reducing the clip size of the FT would be another balancing option as well. It's so ridiculously high right now that the reload period (which is supposed to be the crucial moment that offers aliens a chance to counter-attack) rarely comes into play before the alien is already dead.
GLs should do more self-damage or have a fuse time so that they simply can't explode right into an aliens face in front of you. And perhaps allow Vortex to reverse the momentum of grenades so they go back to the shooter. But this is probably not working out with the new prediction either…
I've also seen a lot of Sentry nests being used recently and they were really a pain for aliens to deal with since they can be set up so quickly and everywhere to secure entire rooms without the need of a marine. I really hope that we will see the player-deployed Sentries from Last Stand at some point in the BT, since having players invest their personal resources and having to carry the stuff to the front lines themselves would be quite a balancing factor. It would basically mean that you sacrifice some offensive power (res that could be used for other weapons) to get some static defenses.
Also, still pledging for the re-introduction of the passive Drifter abilities from previous iterations. I've stated my view on the subject often enough, for instance here.
You are forcing aliens into a role that they don't fit into. Relying on Skulks or Builder Drifters for intelligence means that marines can cut your intelligence short in the very moment that they kill the Skulk or Drifter and it also means that you can't provide players with the necessary information before they actually enter the fight.
Aliens have the handicap of not being able to stand up to marines in an open fight until they get higher lifeforms. Their early lifeforms need to use cunning and guerrilla tactics to gain advantages in fights, so it's perfectly fine to have an NPC unit like the Drifter that is suitable for scouting (and not just for building) by receiving such passive upgrades (or alternatively just regular cloaking) that allow it to fit in that role one way or another. Having to give your position away with parasite for effective scouting clashes with the concept of an ambush-based lifeform.
Another topic: why do aliens have to cope with such overly expensive Tres drops that don't even have shorter evolve times while marines get their stuff basically at a 1:1 Pres-Tres conversion rate and grab it up instantly and get into a fight? Marines get all the means to crush aliens once they established a map domination but aliens are forced into long sieges (especially since marines can have Exos on 1 CC, which are extremely good at holding off turtles since their weakness of being ambushed easily in a location without Welder support never comes into play) because the loss of each lifeform is still very crucial. And that even though they have already much more Tres cost associated with getting all their tech than marines.
I understand that Fade explosions due to Fade eggs were a problem. But I feel like a 100 Tres Onos with an unchanged evolution time is a bit too expensive, given how fragile they are and given that the player still needs to pay for trait upgrades with his own Pres afterwards. 75 Tres would seem way enough for an Onos. 50 Tres for Fade, etc. Basically every egg at the old Pres cost.
Last but not least, something that would be interesting to try out:
Give aliens an option for a 4th Biomass upgrade in a Hive after the 3rd. The logical price would be 40 res (based on the previous 2 upgrades), but 50 would work as well if you wanted it to be used more as a last resort for desperate situations, rather than an upgrade choice that is preferred over a 3rd Hive.
What would be the implications of this change:
- It evens the ground a bit in that aliens can become quite strong on 1-2 Hives similar to marines on 1 CC. Aliens would stand a fighting chance if they can hold enough res and are just lacking the map control for a 3rd tech point.
- More strategic choices: get an actual new Hive (which is ultimately cheaper) or play it save on the established ground and get another upgrade first at a higher cost?
- Biomass system becomes more self-sustained. Currently it acts more like a tech delay while you are still effectively bound to the requirements of 3 Hives. Those requirements would blur with such a change.
- Getting a new Hive is still encouraged, since it's cheaper, offers a new tech path and map control.
- Higher risk of potential res loss if you have that much Biomass invested into a single Hive.
- Aliens can max out Biomass level 12 on 3 Hives (aka also on 4-TP maps).
- Actual alien strategy is less obvious to marines than with the current 3-Biomass-per-Hive requirement.
Yes, grenades feel too powerful now, if you want a skill based, make them fuse-only (e.g. no more explode on alien contact, or make it so that infestation or bile also detonates them?)
Drifters should get their passives back (either by being attached to a hive type, or as a separate research maybe?)
To reduce the effectiveness of 1 CC for marines, maybe the Arms Lab upgrades shuold be tied a bit to the number of CCs? Two ideas can be that you can onlyy research up to W/A2 with only one CC, or that you can only do 3 or 4 upgrades with only 1 CC, thus requiring a 2nd CC to get W/A 3, because at the moment it's very hard for aliens to recover from being left with only one Hive, whereas Marines can get most of their upgrades with only 1 CC.
Another thing might be that JP fuel be tied to the number of CCs? (i.e. the more CCs the more Fuel).
The current problem with CCs is that there isn't much incentive to build any (of course, there's strategic value for beacons and a fall-back insurance against base-rush)
Maybe hives hsuold go up to 4 Biomass each or 4 for the 1st hive and 3 for the second? thus requiring a 3rd hive for Stomp+xeno.
Haven't read all the posts and also this mod changed every 15 minutes, so it's hard to know what has been tried and why/if that failed. I do remember a very OP vortex that would create a wall that would block all bullets that was a bit(very) OP
Alien Economy - Too easy to expand still with the drifter army. Would prefer a system where drifters can build things but if you want the maximum utility of the building it must be matured, which a gorge would be able to do. So you can expand res at the current rate but must either get a gorge to get the current res output, mist it (costs money) or wait for it to slowly mature. This would encourage more gorging and less fades.
Lerks - Still need to have a good look at as I suggested in a post a while back. Mops up for the few minutes after its out before the shotguns, then becomes just a crappy umbra spam vehicle after. Spikes are pretty good but require too much exposure time to have any significant impact on marine HP. Suggest projectile spores on tier 1.
Biomass - If I have 4 hives then have biomass should give me loads of HP so I can finish it quickly.
Fades - If we're going to have 3 or 4 balled up on the field then they are too fast or have too much HP. Basically they're like shadowstep fades in their ability to go into a group of 4 marines and live, except they don't run into corners and walls due to clunky shadowstep mechanic.
Onos - Nerfed HP, movement and damage output. If doing a big nerf, pick 2 and nerf the other, not all 3. Movement makes the life form un-fun and it really lacks a skill mechanic. What happened to boneshield?
Please don't nerf med packs any more, the .3 second pick up delay already makes spamming marines painful.
- Give Grenade Launcher a "detonate" function, which destroys all unexploded grenades without dealing damage, on alternative fire. This will help address the "teammates reflecting grenades in my face" issue.
- Reduce Grenade damage, and re-enable Weapons upgrades for GL. Grenades are just too powerful early game, while alien players have less health, and don't have many structures that need clearing.
Other suggestions:
Lerk and Gorge biomass health scaling are too low, they currently only gain less than 1% of base effective HP per biomass. Giving them about 2-3% bonus health per biomass would bring them on par with marine upgrades.
Alien biomass progression feels rather too linear. If aliens can afford to pay the expensive biomass costs, they almost always research the early upgrades, such as tunnel, bile bomb and umbra. Rushing for higher Biomass tier abilities are currently not viable strategies, because Biomass upgrades provide so little return for their high costs.
I also disagree with regen nerf (cara needs buff on fade/onos), and disagree that crag is the worst chamber (its still the best). Celerity will be better once fade movement is less speedy overall, and aura/phantom are already quite strong so I dont think anything further should be done there. I think cara first will be less popular once A-people learn the movement better, and B-Once the shotgun mass is fixed.
Also the cooldown means the marine has to have some amount of skill in order to survive until the next medpack can be absorbed. From what I've seen, this is a pretty good balance at the moment - I still lose marines to lerks dispite having medpacks under their feet, about 1 time in 3 I would say. Then it feels like you've wasted those medpacks... Making them less effective risks tipping the balance to the point where commanders will think "well he won't survive anyway, so what's the point in dropping any medpacks"
This essentially goes back to what Dragon said about the game being balanced around medpacking during encounters, and I somewhat agree with the above points. If the com finds something frustrating, well to me that is subordinate to what is frustrating for the players on the field as they are more numerous. I simply would rather the game be balanced around me vs other players rather than me vs other players and the hand of god.
I think NS2 has had a fair bit of difficulty making the game engaging for commanders. As a commander, sometimes it feels like you could be playing a single player game. Those direct interventions actually help fix that. That the game has achieved some degree of balanced based on those interactions is an achievement, I think. I would want for more such interactions rather than less but they wouldn't necessarily have to be as immediate or as direct.
Nano Shield (on players) and Bone Wall are two prime examples of commander abilities that exert too much influence on the outcomes of combat too quickly, and cause too much player frustration. The opponent players being negatively affected by these types of interactions often feel as if a piano was dropped on their heads from the hand of a cruel god. That is because the "victims" is often not given enough time to react to such heavy handed swings of odds.
Although the abilities mentioned above may be considered "balanced" from the commanders' perspective, due to their costs to the team. They can be very unfair, and "antifun" for individual players, who cannot predict the actions of the invisible enemy commander.
Instant "global" abilities should be carefully balanced, because they are powerful, while being easy to use. But most of all, they can potentially kill the enjoy of the game for players.
Nano Shield is just like giving you the middle finger out of nowhere. I wonder if it should be tied to having an active Power Node in the room instead, so it only works in friendly territory as well.
I wasn't really suggesting the game be turned into quake, just that frustration inducing elements be reduced or removed. Bouncing marines, medpack spam and nanospam; do we really need all 3 of these intrusive elements to be present? Yes it may be balanced in some UWE-esque statistical 50/50 holy grail fashion, but it doesn't reflect whether the mechanics used to achieve that are fun (the primary goal of the game) or at the very least as un-frustrating as possible (a desirable goal).
This isn't an objection to the commander influencing the game, just an objection to it being so intrusive at all points in the game especially if its for the creation of artificial asymmetry. We used to have true asymmetry, but then UWE decided it would be good to bring in alien commander and pres for the marine team causing a direct undermining of commander involvement in the game flow.
As for it being overly intrusive I'm not convinced. Maybe I simply need a better example of what the alternative is before I could see that the current system is bad. Either way, I don't believe it has been implemented for the purpose of creating asymmetry. Clearly it was introduced because medpacks were in NS1, and back then it was a relatable way to connect the commander to the battlefield.
I would mention that I re-read your original post at this point and noticed you at least identified the problem with Lerks, but I don't think the change you proposed there offsets the change to medpacks, nor does it really resolve the problem you identified with Lerks. What I'm getting at here is that I could accept a change to medpacks if it was packaged with some changes to Lerks and Fades. Still, I'm not sold on medpacks being a problem of the highest order.
And on the topic of Fades, the problem with them is 'Fade Cycling' (that thing where 4 fades tag team their attacks, blinking back and forth between the hive and the combat area). The only way to counter it is to get lucky with shotguns landing simultaneous hits which is then enormously annoying to fades because it's entirely luck based not skill based when you lose your fade. (Fade being my preferred higher lifeform). I still think that in balance mod fades are either fast or deadly, but maybe that's just a reflection of my mediocre skills as fade.
This page, this thread, these forums.. are nothing but the masses providing feedback to change this game.
You've seen how radical things can change from feedback with 250... so why wouldn't you contribute any yourself?
:-/