An Article On Ns Fun
Maian
Join Date: 2003-02-27 Member: 14069Members, Constellation, Reinforced - Gold
Join Date: 2003-02-27 Member: 14069Members, Constellation, Reinforced - Gold
<div class="IPBDescription">not concerning balance</div> <u><b>Introduction</b></u>
Balance and fun are separate concepts. Fun logically implies balance, but balance does not logically imply fun. NS may become very balanced in the future (if it already isn't right now), but it could still be made more fun.
Note: I'm going to be making some comparisons to FT (Warcraft III: Frozen Throne), because I consider that a fun and fast paced game.
<u><b>Point 1</b></u>
There are 3 fundamental strategies in RTS games: expanding, teching, massing. I've heard other names for these strategies, such as rushing for massing, but it's all the same concept. It's tried and true for RTS games that involve real-time base constructing and combat. Since NS is an RTS of this type, this concept applies here.
Generally, the standard NS game goes like this:
1) set up base and capture res nodes quickly
2) while capturing res nodes, tech up
Within 5 minutes, all the res nodes are generally taken and both teams are moderately teching (aliens probably are building the 2nd hive, marines are getting upgrades). The problem here is that two fundamental strategies are being merged into one: expanding and teching are very intertwined. This limits strategic depth.
The other strategy is massing (rushing), which is very risky for marines. If the marine rush fails, they're screwed. In FT, it's a different story. The rushing force can retreat. This can't be done in NS right now. However, <i>making the distress beacon recall all forces back to base, would allow the marines retreat.</i> Thankfully, this is being done for NS v2.1. Some may see this as abusable. I disagree - it should be a valid tactic, making rushing more viable.
Back to the point about the fundamental strategies. In NS, expanding takes place all the time. In FT, expanding is a strategy. The good thing about NS is that there has to be a strategic decision on where to expand. The bad thing is that expanding is not really a stand alone strategy, since it's so intwertwined with teching. Thus, <i>expanding should take more effort.</i>
<u><b>Point 2</b></u>
Endgames in NS are flawed. Not only are marine defeat endgames last too long, there's a sense of hopelessness. This feeling should never arise in the game until the last minute or so, not the last 10 minutes. When the situation is hopeless, it's no fun. Marines feel hopeless when they lose all their nodes and aliens have 3 hives or fade/onos. Aliens feel hopeless when they see HA/JP, have only 1 hive, and lack resources.
For aliens, the problem is the linkage of territory to teching, namely hives. I'm not suggesting to remove the hive system - after all, the hive system makes NS unique. Rather I think the problem is with the marines taking their time, since they know they're going to win. <i>There needs to be some mechanism to encourage the marines to end the game swiftly.</i>
For marines, the rapid respawning and turret farming is the problem. This is especially evident when the marines relocated to a hive. The alien seige weapons in this case are limited to:
1) the gorge, which is too weak to bile bomb effectively
2) the onos, which can be repelled by level 3 weapon upgrades and shotguns/HMGs, even with lerk support
3) mass defense chambers, which can be destroyed by seige turrets
I think the same mechanism that would encourage marines the finish aliens off quickly could be applied here to make marine defeat endgames faster.
<u><b>Point 3:</b></u>
NS is a fun FPS at low tech. Marines vs. skulks battles are very intense and fun. The lerks of 1.x were also fun. However, when marines get HA or when aliens get onos, units are much harder to kill, so in a way, they're less intense.
A marine in HA doesn't really fear skulks, lerks, fades, and OCs. They're practically invincible if they travel in a group and don't encounter a force of oni and lerks. GLs render WoLs obsolete. Basically, HA with GL support are too hard to counter.
You may think that this is reasonable, since after all, HA are the most high tech unit in the force, and if they're nerfed, it would unbalance the game. However, balance can be brushed aside by nerfing some aspect of the alien race, so let's not talk about balance. Let's just assume that if something is changed, it will be balanced somehow. An unit/weapon that's too hard to counter is a "superweapon." The game then becames a race to reach the superweapon(s). Every unit in the game should have some sort of risk associated with them, and superweapons don't have enough risk. Without risk, gameplay becomes less intense, and therefore less fun.
Look at FT: there are no "superweapons" in that game. <i>Every unit has at least 2 counters, and every unit has at least one specialized counter that's lower tech than it.</i> This lower tech counter in turn is a specialized unit. There are 2 types of units: versatile units and specialized units. Specialized units are very powerful against what units they're designed to counter. Versatile units are less powerful, but make that up with their flexibility. No unit should be both versatile and powerful. I define powerful to be "too hard to counter." Why must these rules be obeyed? Because they increase strategic depth and avoids the pitfalls of superweapons.
On the alien side, onos don't really fear LMGs, and with stomp, can kill marines with shotguns and HMGs with ease. So the onos is also a superweapon. It's a very powerful and versatile unit: support (stomp), massive damage dealer (gore/devour/charge), damage soaker (high HP), and seige (high HP/gore). Devour should incur more of a penalty on the onos to allow more rescues (which are fun), and stomp needs to be nerfed (since it's so frustrating to marines).
Fades are also a problem, but not as much as one. The flying fade problem has to be addressed.
<u><b>Conclusion</b></u>
I'm not going to give specific suggestions, because that would be venturing too far into the S&I realm. I just want you all to think about this issues and how NS can be made more fun. Remember, I'm not talking about balance here. True, balance is necessary for fun, but a balanced game is not ncessarily fun.
Balance and fun are separate concepts. Fun logically implies balance, but balance does not logically imply fun. NS may become very balanced in the future (if it already isn't right now), but it could still be made more fun.
Note: I'm going to be making some comparisons to FT (Warcraft III: Frozen Throne), because I consider that a fun and fast paced game.
<u><b>Point 1</b></u>
There are 3 fundamental strategies in RTS games: expanding, teching, massing. I've heard other names for these strategies, such as rushing for massing, but it's all the same concept. It's tried and true for RTS games that involve real-time base constructing and combat. Since NS is an RTS of this type, this concept applies here.
Generally, the standard NS game goes like this:
1) set up base and capture res nodes quickly
2) while capturing res nodes, tech up
Within 5 minutes, all the res nodes are generally taken and both teams are moderately teching (aliens probably are building the 2nd hive, marines are getting upgrades). The problem here is that two fundamental strategies are being merged into one: expanding and teching are very intertwined. This limits strategic depth.
The other strategy is massing (rushing), which is very risky for marines. If the marine rush fails, they're screwed. In FT, it's a different story. The rushing force can retreat. This can't be done in NS right now. However, <i>making the distress beacon recall all forces back to base, would allow the marines retreat.</i> Thankfully, this is being done for NS v2.1. Some may see this as abusable. I disagree - it should be a valid tactic, making rushing more viable.
Back to the point about the fundamental strategies. In NS, expanding takes place all the time. In FT, expanding is a strategy. The good thing about NS is that there has to be a strategic decision on where to expand. The bad thing is that expanding is not really a stand alone strategy, since it's so intwertwined with teching. Thus, <i>expanding should take more effort.</i>
<u><b>Point 2</b></u>
Endgames in NS are flawed. Not only are marine defeat endgames last too long, there's a sense of hopelessness. This feeling should never arise in the game until the last minute or so, not the last 10 minutes. When the situation is hopeless, it's no fun. Marines feel hopeless when they lose all their nodes and aliens have 3 hives or fade/onos. Aliens feel hopeless when they see HA/JP, have only 1 hive, and lack resources.
For aliens, the problem is the linkage of territory to teching, namely hives. I'm not suggesting to remove the hive system - after all, the hive system makes NS unique. Rather I think the problem is with the marines taking their time, since they know they're going to win. <i>There needs to be some mechanism to encourage the marines to end the game swiftly.</i>
For marines, the rapid respawning and turret farming is the problem. This is especially evident when the marines relocated to a hive. The alien seige weapons in this case are limited to:
1) the gorge, which is too weak to bile bomb effectively
2) the onos, which can be repelled by level 3 weapon upgrades and shotguns/HMGs, even with lerk support
3) mass defense chambers, which can be destroyed by seige turrets
I think the same mechanism that would encourage marines the finish aliens off quickly could be applied here to make marine defeat endgames faster.
<u><b>Point 3:</b></u>
NS is a fun FPS at low tech. Marines vs. skulks battles are very intense and fun. The lerks of 1.x were also fun. However, when marines get HA or when aliens get onos, units are much harder to kill, so in a way, they're less intense.
A marine in HA doesn't really fear skulks, lerks, fades, and OCs. They're practically invincible if they travel in a group and don't encounter a force of oni and lerks. GLs render WoLs obsolete. Basically, HA with GL support are too hard to counter.
You may think that this is reasonable, since after all, HA are the most high tech unit in the force, and if they're nerfed, it would unbalance the game. However, balance can be brushed aside by nerfing some aspect of the alien race, so let's not talk about balance. Let's just assume that if something is changed, it will be balanced somehow. An unit/weapon that's too hard to counter is a "superweapon." The game then becames a race to reach the superweapon(s). Every unit in the game should have some sort of risk associated with them, and superweapons don't have enough risk. Without risk, gameplay becomes less intense, and therefore less fun.
Look at FT: there are no "superweapons" in that game. <i>Every unit has at least 2 counters, and every unit has at least one specialized counter that's lower tech than it.</i> This lower tech counter in turn is a specialized unit. There are 2 types of units: versatile units and specialized units. Specialized units are very powerful against what units they're designed to counter. Versatile units are less powerful, but make that up with their flexibility. No unit should be both versatile and powerful. I define powerful to be "too hard to counter." Why must these rules be obeyed? Because they increase strategic depth and avoids the pitfalls of superweapons.
On the alien side, onos don't really fear LMGs, and with stomp, can kill marines with shotguns and HMGs with ease. So the onos is also a superweapon. It's a very powerful and versatile unit: support (stomp), massive damage dealer (gore/devour/charge), damage soaker (high HP), and seige (high HP/gore). Devour should incur more of a penalty on the onos to allow more rescues (which are fun), and stomp needs to be nerfed (since it's so frustrating to marines).
Fades are also a problem, but not as much as one. The flying fade problem has to be addressed.
<u><b>Conclusion</b></u>
I'm not going to give specific suggestions, because that would be venturing too far into the S&I realm. I just want you all to think about this issues and how NS can be made more fun. Remember, I'm not talking about balance here. True, balance is necessary for fun, but a balanced game is not ncessarily fun.
Comments
I agree that aliens need more anti turret farm abilities.
As for the rest, um... I don't want to dig in, but I had my reserves on agreeing. Anyway, keep on the chaloopas.
Actually, I was a bit unclear on that part. I don't think the aliens need any more seige capability. There just has to be some mechanism that gives aliens a great advantage at the end, the same mechanism that would make aliens weak enough at the end that marines can wipe them out quickly.
This can't be fully replicated in NS, because of the alien's unique hive feature, but the "tech tree" represented by alien lifeforms (i.e. onos) is sufficient. The added benefit for aliens can't be too artificial like HP increase. I'm thinking more of some sort of res increase, but I'm not sure under what conditions this should happen.
But you run into problems if you try to fix it by making a 'minimum stamina required to blink'.
Swipe is a stamina hog. So is blink.
So a fade blinks into some marines to kill them. The initial blink alone will usually drain an unknown amount of stamina, somewhere around 33%. A few swipes will reduce that even more.
Basically, if you make it so you need a 'minimum stamina' to blink, then the fade becomes useless. He might not be able to blink in, attack, and blink out anymore. He'll blink in, attack, and have to run away on foot because blink doesn't work.