Ha Is Now 15 Res...
yagsidrahcir
Join Date: 2003-09-20 Member: 21051Members
Join Date: 2003-09-20 Member: 21051Members
Am I the only person who thinks this change might have been a little extreme? Now it costs less to get an HA/HMG than a fade. Hell, HA/HMG now costs as much as a lerk. Now please tell me how can a 50 res fade be better than a 30 res HA/HMG in terms of flexibility and usefulness? What's even more absurd is how you can equate a lerk with HA/HMG in terms of resources!
(I might be wrong here, because honestly, I don't have any idea how the res system in 2.0 works. Could someone clarify it for me and maybe prove me wrong?)
(I might be wrong here, because honestly, I don't have any idea how the res system in 2.0 works. Could someone clarify it for me and maybe prove me wrong?)
Comments
its a totally different world and therefore not comparable.
you can still say its too cheap, i personally think it should be up around 18, but please dont compare him to a lerk!
So TBH its quite pricey unless you're working to a plan.
Additionally, lets consider that lerks, fades, onii, anything kharaa can choose redeem and never worry about dying - HAs must be constantly replaced on death. Also please bear in mind that HA is the counter to spores more than anything else - it has to be affordable by necessity.
So I think 15 res is seriously a tad bit to cheap.
A better way to handle this would be to make HA's research cheaper and the research time a bit lower but upping it's cost to arround 30 again. But that's just my opinion.
Perhaps i'm a bit too one-sided on this argument. The total of 10 res difference we'll now see on outfitting HA\HMG means that for every 3 soldiers one could previously outfit, the commander can now outfit a 4th. That means your old 6-man HA train is now an 8-man HA train. No Onos (or even 2 onoses) can challenge that, even with stomp.
Can anyone think of a decent idea for expanding the Aliens' ability to deal with masses of Heavy Armor? I truly think that their lack of mobility should be their #1 hindrance. Make it so they're almost guaranteed to get parasited and spike-pelted if they stick around too long. I mean, they know where we are, (motion tracking) our weapons can't even hope to kill them, (290 armor) they can repair each other, (welders) and they can kill anything they see in 1-5 seconds. Explain to me again why we're LOWERING the amount of resources required to get to this point.
bring back push effect for acid-rocket. Make it push ha's 2 feet or so and la's a few times that. Perhaps the same for bilebomb, although it doesnt do any damage to the ha's it just pushes em around to mess up their formation. Messed up formation = less welding, with less welding, the ha's are much less powerful (though still is very potient)
I'm not sure you can really justify including Armory cost since you'd want to upgrade that for the other weapons too, so I included the cost without armory too. Time is in seconds. and costs are per marine.
It should not be that easy to get lots of HA though. Holding 3 res nodes and getting just advanced armory plus upgrades for HA should not be enough to get a nearly unstoppable group together. Also, although welders are required in a HA train, not everyone needs to have them. In a group of 6 people, 4 welders should be enough. I like the push-back idea.
You can't compare a 30 res lerk to a 30 res HA HMG because they appear at completely different times of the match. A 30 res lerk at the beginning of the game could be considered very expensive.
Ok that's just not true and you know it... "even with stomp" now that's just pushing it. The onos itself isn't supposed to attack head on into HA squads if that's what you're thinking. Just the other day I killed off a 10 man HA squad. Well, <i>I</i> didn't kill them more like I kept them all stunned with a movement or two nearby. But I did eat an HA or two that got too close.
Now if you want something to complain about, then complain about JPs ineffectiveness against onos in halls. <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->
Now this IS something to talk about. Too often I am seeing that the JP is a weapon to be used against really poor alien teams. When I command and am murdering the aliens, I give my marines the amusement of the jetpack.
Really, hands down the jetpack is an amusing piece of equipment that is fun for the entire family. It's downside is that it is amazingly useless in a wide variety of situations, enemy types and in plain old efficiency. Heavy armour on the other hand is just infinitely more effective from an overall point of view. Since this change to HA, I see no reason to ever even bother with JP. We'll look at it this way.
HA gives THE best overall survival mechanism to any soldier. From the most n00b n00b to the most skilled marine, heavy armour gives the best durability for your space dollars. 15 res each (really 20 as you need a welder) you get a marine that lasts more than 5x as long (based on skulk), and can stick it in combat against fades very well. The only real thing you have to worry about is an onos (but we'll talk about that shortly).
Now we look at the woeful jetpack. Unlike HA it is conditionally useful and open for massacring by ANY alien class. We've all seen the onos jump/devour l gore tactics. It does come in handy when aliens are in a vent or for the large hives like powersilo and waste handling. On the other hand it is useless in many sections of a map, almost lethal to have in some, difficult to use so only good players can use it and costs nearly as much as HA does to research and then deploy. All this for simply increased movement isn't a good bargain. We all know the JP does a woeful job at combating the onos, because you simply can't stay in the air long enough to avoid being stomped.
But then again, the onos shouldn't need to stop you as it should have friends around coming to my second point. HA is really only stoppable by aliens with good teamwork and an onos or three. Jetpacks are killable by virtually everything the aliens have: Fades (especially when they get AR), lerks (Hitscan spikes and importantly gas!), celerity skulks (except in the most open regions) and OC's. Web stuffs JPs up sooner than HA as well (welders can still remove webs). This creates a problem I see in ever seeing jetpacks being used.
We should all know by now that jetpacks are highly underused and IMO making HA this cheap isn't going to encourage their use. If anything the JP will be relegated to a useless piece of tech. Researched only to own a poor alien team or by new commanders. I don't see any point in researching JP because by researching HA I demand far more of an alien team in terms of teamwork and effort. When it then only costs a net 5 res more to field a team of HA/Welder/enter weapon here over a JP team, it is clearly going to make them undesirable <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
Which is a shame, because since I've gotton better at the game I find that JP's are one of the only truely 'fun' things the marines have. But their applications are so limited, and now with HA so cheap to field, they may no longer be used <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif'><!--endemo-->
Acid rocket come too late in the game to help against HA especially cheaper HA. You get acid rocket by the time you've already won.
Acid rocket come too late in the game to help against HA especially cheaper HA. You get acid rocket by the time you've already won. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
A push effect with bile bomb would help, though. Maybe make it so it only works against HA.
Just goes to show that HAs are tooo cheap... comm shouldnt be able to just drop a team's worth when aliens just barely have onos. (They also had 2 fades, but they got blasted faster than the onos) We even had enough left over to drop obs and armor at waste and RR, to keep out the nasty cloaking aliens...
Now that i think of it, the RFKs for all the heavys might have helped a bit afterwards
I suggested some changes <a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=5&t=45623&hl=jetpack,and,tier' target='_blank'>here</a>. If you don't want to click, the gist of it is that the JP is no longer top tech along with the HA; it becomes "tier 2" (something the marines don't have at the moment, which is probably why they're a bit dry to play) while the HA is "tier 3". In simple terms, JP becomes the marine Fade while the HA is the marine Onos.
I suggested some changes <a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=5&t=45623&hl=jetpack,and,tier' target='_blank'>here</a>. If you don't want to click, the gist of it is that the JP is no longer top tech along with the HA; it becomes "tier 2" (something the marines don't have at the moment, which is probably why they're a bit dry to play) while the HA is "tier 3". In simple terms, JP becomes the marine Fade while the HA is the marine Onos. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
I would be inclined to agree with your ideas, but it doesn't help the overall weakness of the jetpack in general. It would definitely help make the things at least appear at some point, but to be an actually useful item that can be relied on like HA? Probably that is still in the balance.
The only way we're going to find out for certain is if it's mucked about with. It took a while to get the Fade's balance right. I suspect the same is true for the JP.
I had my first experience with a fade vs a shotgun jetpacker and it was scary as heck; unlike normal jetpackers (the few times I see them) this guy was totally clued up and it was like fighting a superior version of the fade.... his shotgun waaay outdamaged me at close ranges and he could keep up with me easily when I blinked away (I take silence not adrenaline because I've never had this situation before o.O ).
Needless to say I got shotgunned in a vent... he even shotgunned me as a skulk by flying everytime he saw me and blatting me from above.
Really frustrating stuff <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo-->
It wouldn't be that hard to add some degree of fine tuning... HA upped to 17-19 res , JP decreased to 12 res , HMG upped to 16 res. Perfect balance imho.
Make welding speed of welders very slow. Maybe 1/10 of what it is now.
It only takes just a few seconds to weld 290 armors from 0. This is why HAs are so strong.
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Sure. Make them unable to use phase gates.
Its abit silly really, once HA has been researched they will pretty much always have it. its not like as soon as some one gets onos they always have it unless he gets redem but if he gets redem he is nothing too HA/HMG. Hell not even a regen onos is much against a few HMGs.
I wouldnt say JP is lower than HA. Its easy too take down a hive in an open area with a shotty and JP.