Balancing Some Issues
MadmanMSU
Join Date: 2004-01-24 Member: 25645Members
Join Date: 2004-01-24 Member: 25645Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Are Aliens slightly overpowered?</div> First off, I'll only be commenting about Combat maps in this post. Secondly, apologies for ground already covered <!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif' /><!--endemo-->
After reading a bit in the forums, it seems there is at least a bit of sentiment that the Aliens are currently slightly overpowered. At the least, this is how I feel when I play the game. For example, as I think this was mentioned earlier, Marines need to attain levels faster than aliens to win. In an even match, where aliens have as many players/as many levels as the marines, I've found that the Marines spend the majority of their time in the base. Reasons for this: 1) Onos. This is to be expected. Onos are supposed to be large tanks. 2) Gorges. Its annoying when gorges web the marine base. Not unbeatable, to be sure, but annoying nevertheless. 3) Fades. The largest reason. In my opinion, they are just too overpowered for Combat right now. For example, I myself have chosen the Carapace, Adrenaline, and Regeneration abilities (usually with Focus) and been able to just blink into marine base, kill as I please, and leave when the going gets rough. I have been able to do this for extended periods with no real danger of dying. Even further, if I purchase the Metabolize ability, I can heal even faster. As a Marine defending against said tactics, Fades are usually the hardest thing for me to kill, mostly because its hard to hit a Fade that doesn't sit still for that long.
My suggestion: Bring back the delayed spawn times that were in Beta 1. i.e. Skulks spawn every 8 sec, Lerks/Gorges 9 or 10, Fades take 11 or 12, and Oni take 13-16 seconds.
Other items of lesser note: I've seen some posts that claim its unfair that the gorge is useless in combat when marines only have to spend one point for a wielder. I think that's untrue. When I'm playing marine, one point makes a large difference in the build I'm going for. I suspect his is why a lot of people don't want to wield. Perhaps there should be an increased experience gain for wielding the CC/Hive? That might encourage more people to be a support character.
Continuing on this idea, perhaps combat could use more abilites that enhance the support character role? For example, provide for level 3 upgrade of mines (costs more points, but you spawn with more mines). Or maybe a super wielder that can heal the CC faster (again, costing more points). On the flip side, allow gorges a faster/more powerful healing spray? Perhaps these would be too powerful of additions, but it could be an interesting idea.
Lastly, as to Marine Grenade spamming, I personally have not had a problem with this playing as an alien. Its not that big an issue, and I have dealt with it sucessfully as a Lerk/Fade/Oni.
Here are *some* clips of the posts I read that I used to form my opinion (as well as playing NS Combat quite a bit <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif' /><!--endemo--> ):
Flayra posted this in one post I read earlier:
I'm making a lot of changes to directly address your concerns for beta 2, including beefing up fades/oni, adjusting electricity, and changing the Combat spawn system.
Also by Flayra:
Aliens are soundly beating marines in 9 out of 10 competitive games, and this is due to a couple last minute changes we made at the end of our private beta
By Badboy:
Then I can say the same thing about the fade as you say about the jp...
A good fade can just blink in kill a marine and blink out and so OVER and OVER and OVER again without getting killed ONCE ONLY the best marines can kill him WITH luck
By Darten:
Aliens are too powerful. The only way marines seem to win is if they get higher levels faster than the aliens. The other option is to grenade spam.
After reading a bit in the forums, it seems there is at least a bit of sentiment that the Aliens are currently slightly overpowered. At the least, this is how I feel when I play the game. For example, as I think this was mentioned earlier, Marines need to attain levels faster than aliens to win. In an even match, where aliens have as many players/as many levels as the marines, I've found that the Marines spend the majority of their time in the base. Reasons for this: 1) Onos. This is to be expected. Onos are supposed to be large tanks. 2) Gorges. Its annoying when gorges web the marine base. Not unbeatable, to be sure, but annoying nevertheless. 3) Fades. The largest reason. In my opinion, they are just too overpowered for Combat right now. For example, I myself have chosen the Carapace, Adrenaline, and Regeneration abilities (usually with Focus) and been able to just blink into marine base, kill as I please, and leave when the going gets rough. I have been able to do this for extended periods with no real danger of dying. Even further, if I purchase the Metabolize ability, I can heal even faster. As a Marine defending against said tactics, Fades are usually the hardest thing for me to kill, mostly because its hard to hit a Fade that doesn't sit still for that long.
My suggestion: Bring back the delayed spawn times that were in Beta 1. i.e. Skulks spawn every 8 sec, Lerks/Gorges 9 or 10, Fades take 11 or 12, and Oni take 13-16 seconds.
Other items of lesser note: I've seen some posts that claim its unfair that the gorge is useless in combat when marines only have to spend one point for a wielder. I think that's untrue. When I'm playing marine, one point makes a large difference in the build I'm going for. I suspect his is why a lot of people don't want to wield. Perhaps there should be an increased experience gain for wielding the CC/Hive? That might encourage more people to be a support character.
Continuing on this idea, perhaps combat could use more abilites that enhance the support character role? For example, provide for level 3 upgrade of mines (costs more points, but you spawn with more mines). Or maybe a super wielder that can heal the CC faster (again, costing more points). On the flip side, allow gorges a faster/more powerful healing spray? Perhaps these would be too powerful of additions, but it could be an interesting idea.
Lastly, as to Marine Grenade spamming, I personally have not had a problem with this playing as an alien. Its not that big an issue, and I have dealt with it sucessfully as a Lerk/Fade/Oni.
Here are *some* clips of the posts I read that I used to form my opinion (as well as playing NS Combat quite a bit <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif' /><!--endemo--> ):
Flayra posted this in one post I read earlier:
I'm making a lot of changes to directly address your concerns for beta 2, including beefing up fades/oni, adjusting electricity, and changing the Combat spawn system.
Also by Flayra:
Aliens are soundly beating marines in 9 out of 10 competitive games, and this is due to a couple last minute changes we made at the end of our private beta
By Badboy:
Then I can say the same thing about the fade as you say about the jp...
A good fade can just blink in kill a marine and blink out and so OVER and OVER and OVER again without getting killed ONCE ONLY the best marines can kill him WITH luck
By Darten:
Aliens are too powerful. The only way marines seem to win is if they get higher levels faster than the aliens. The other option is to grenade spam.
Comments
My understanding was that comabt was there to compliment NS in situations where there were only a handful of players on a server and the like. But it seems that too much of the focus has been put on Combat, and trying to balance out combat, and it's just completely hosing NS.
If I may be so bold as to offer my opinion: Balance NS, worry about combat later.
- Zues
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Aliens are soundly beating marines in 9 out of 10 competitive games, and this is due to a couple last minute changes we made at the end of our private beta<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
...is left over from when the 2.01 betas went public, and has no bearing on the current situation.
Now to move away from that topic, I have to agree with Bob on this. <b>Imbalances in classic right now are a bit heftier than those in co_</b> - ns_maps only work at a level of about 6v6 competitive matches right now. Get larger, or god forbid public, and marines dominate on the fast track.
BUT my point in this post was to address the issues in combat. While it may be that Classic needs more work, that DOESN'T mean the errors in Combat should be overlooked.
Perhaps in the future I'll look at Classic NS more closely.
I play Combat as a means to fill up the server for a real game. Now I'm starting to think I had more fun screwing around in small Classic games than small Combat.
On topic (combat).
Both teams win (once again servers with 18+ players). There is no way to deny that combat made it to a full game mode. It is in no way a server fill measure to get enough players for classic anymore.
If those shotgun issues and fade hitbox problems get sorted out (if they really exist^^) I am sure we will see marines win much more games than they already do.
I don't think it's even that good at doing that; I'm finding that those who prefer co generally don't like ns, and will just leave the server when ns rolls around. Also, since co is much more demanding, people don't feel up to a game of ns straight after. If I want to play ns, then I usually find that it's best to go to a ns specific server rather than a mixed one.
So, bizarrely, co games (designed for smaller numbers) see a good number of people join, and ns maps (designed for a bigger numbers) see a good number of people leave. :/
That's my experience, anyway.
Combat forever
The only balance issue in combat is spawning, classic has more issues than my family <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Exactly and completely. They ARE different games. Armor, damage of weapons, health levels, health of hives and CC, 3rd hive attacks, multi chamber upgrades, all these imbalancing factors for both gametypes go away if you start balancing them seperately rather than together.
Hah! You should make that your sig <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Further, and I think I may find some agreeance here, Combat has developed its own following. Perhaps fans of only the Classic version are slightly bitter that the development team is splitting time between the two, but now that Combat is gaining popularity, it can't be ignored.
I personally am a fan of both, but I play combat more often than classic for reasons I mentioned earlier.
clan play is fun but (if the other clan is not much better) the aliens win. It's not that the aliens are overpowered but in 6vs6 fades and onos appear too early IMHO.
217.158.183.181:28016 TW@ Clan NS Server v3.0 Beta CD Optional Classic Only
trust.