DI Discussion
Runteh
Join Date: 2010-06-26 Member: 72163Members, Reinforced - Shadow
Join Date: 2010-06-26 Member: 72163Members, Reinforced - Shadow
<div class="IPBDescription">Opinions</div>Right, here are the rules. Keep things nice and succinct for the Devs.
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• 3 Positives
• 3 Negatives
• Game Mechanics Only</b>
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Positives:
• Forces team play.
• Battle lines/areas are very clear now.
• Very atmospheric, can't wait for the polished version.
Negatives:
• Placing DI every few meters gets a little tiresome as Commander. Either a quicker way of accessing it, or pathing the growth may be better when you are not 'patching' areas.
• Needs to be clearer when placing DI so that I know it will connect up with the DI around it.
• Gorge placement has no 'flow' or 'feel' in relation to how you expect DI to be. Having it grow where you walk for a limited time based on charge would be better (imo).
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• 3 Positives
• 3 Negatives
• Game Mechanics Only</b>
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Positives:
• Forces team play.
• Battle lines/areas are very clear now.
• Very atmospheric, can't wait for the polished version.
Negatives:
• Placing DI every few meters gets a little tiresome as Commander. Either a quicker way of accessing it, or pathing the growth may be better when you are not 'patching' areas.
• Needs to be clearer when placing DI so that I know it will connect up with the DI around it.
• Gorge placement has no 'flow' or 'feel' in relation to how you expect DI to be. Having it grow where you walk for a limited time based on charge would be better (imo).
Comments
Adds more management tasks for alien commander
...failing to find anything else.
<b>Negative</b>
ns2_tram is nearly impossible to expand beyond main hive due to distance between hive and res node.
Makes flamers essentially instant end-game due to their DI killing capabilities.
DI growth doesn't make any sense since it just "blotches" wherever it wants.
Positives:
- Territorial distinction
- Atmospheric
- Good balance for auto-grown structures
Negatives:
- Large maps require more placements
- Can be created anywhere even without vision
- Gorge's Infestation Spray shouldn't wither even when connected to Hive
...it only takes half an eternity to destroy only a single patch of growth with a flamethrower.
And an eternity to remove two patches. :P
After testing DI for a few minutes, I have to say, I prefer the SC2 implementation of Creep, where each node of "infestation" is clearly marked (by a unit), as well as the fully grown area.
A few of quick suggestions:
1. Remove Harvesters' dependence on Infestation. Alien Harvesters are already quite fragile, and cost 30 energy (Drifter) from the hive. It is very difficult to pave a path DI to each Harvester early game, severely limiting alien expanding potential, unless with a Gorge tending each Harvester.
2. Increase the area (and cost?) of each Gorge placed Infestation node. Those looks very ugly due to their blotchy appearance.
3. Reduce the health of Infestation slightly.
+Already is and sure to be very visually appealing.
+Going to give Gorges a greater role on the alien team.
+Really is a unique and intuitive idea for the alien counterpart of the power node system that the marines have.
<b>The negative</b>
-At the moment. needs a visual indicator on how far DI that the commander places will spread.
-Gorges need to be more effective at placing DI, making the commander need to cooperate with the Gorges on the team in order to effectively infest the map.
-It needs to be easier, cheaper, more efficient to spread DI so that the aliens don't fall behind the marine team, since the marines start with the entire map already powered, while the aliens have to infest the map, slowly, and carefully.
+ Introduces cool territory control mechanics
+ Clearly defines battle lines and discourages ninjaing
+ Adds a nice element of gorge + comm interaction
Negatives:
- Full manual spreading of infestation is very tedious with such small patches. It's not going to be fun anymore after a handful of games. It should spread in much larger areas per click, or alternately see below.
- Not being able to build res nodes without infestation sucks. It's just very very restrictive and it feels like little more than a burden. IMO not only should res nodes be droppable anywhere, but they should act as an infestation source for at least that room. Res nodes were the de facto gauge of territory control in NS1 and it worked well.
- Infestation spawning in mid air looks bad, and it's annoying having to predict how far away from the nearest infestation you have to put it so it connects. You should only be able to spread infestation from within infestation, i.e. SC2 creep tumors.
Structures should only receive a percentage boost in health or efficiency, but shouldn't be restricted to DI.
Games slows down WAAAY to much.
+ Like how it adds a slightly more 3-d aspect. Sentries (and power packs) can still be placed on sufficiently high crates if the Alien comm places DI on the floor. That means a thoughtful Alien comm may consider placing DI on crates, too. Ditto stairs, ramps, and other elevation changes.
- Maybe exploitable since it goes through walls. For instance, DI from Aux Node reaches into Marine start; DI from Central access reaches into West. I've managed to place a crag on top of the West power node using DI from Central. It also has the same issue as other structures, where you can place it inside walls, inside columns, etc.
- I'll add to the chorus: it would be really nice if the GUI showed whether a DI patch will be connected, before you place it.
- Seems like it forces Alien to go 2nd hive right away, due to difficulty reaching nearest Harvester on starting Energy.
- Maddeningly loud for Alien comm.
<b>Disclaimer</b> - I know that the game is in a beta and there requires a lot of testing (playing of the game) to see how things work before any changes should be done but regardless I want to post my ideas in case it makes sense and sounds reasonable for the future if changes are needed.
Again we'll have to see how things work in the game but I want to post these so it gets to appear on the first page >.>.
IMO I do not think structures should not require infestation/growth and they shouldn't die from not having infestation (they're already kind of squishy and flamethrowers aren't too rare). They should simply be handicapped for not having infestation (or buffed from the infestation).
<b>1. Possibly make it so structures do not require infestation but they are handicapped</b>. Examples can be they receive no energy regeneration rate (for active abilities) and they take 50% more damage (or something like that).<b> Just make it any handicap (or buff) that means the aliens "want" to have their structures on infestation but isn't "required" to have their structures on infestation.</b>
<b>Result and reason of the change -</b> This makes it so infestation isn't too much of a limit on alien tactics and strategies. Basically what Commie Spy said also.
<b>2.</b> Make it so gorges can "maintain and connect" infestation from a hive (with its own infestation) but only allow gorges to place a limited amount of infestation <i>(like make it so gorges have a second energy type that is used solely for infestation but recharges really slowly. Increase the speed and radius of infestation growth in return and allow it to be connected to the hive)</i>.
AND/OR
Make a new structure (alternative to a hive and doesn't require infestation) that the gorge and/or commander can build that simply creates infestation around it (or any direction) and "maintains" the infestation (any infestation connected to that structure stays as long as the structure is alive). Basically a way to help speed up infestation growth.
The structure should be limited in a sense that it shouldn't be able to be built everywhere but allows quick way to create infestation.
If the structure is destroyed before it connects with a hive's infestation, the infestation recedes. If it connects, the infestation stays until that hive is destroyed or the connection is terminated.
AND/OR
Harvesters do not require infestation and they also create infestation themselves.
<b>Mix and match any of these, just throwing out some ideas to make it so infestation isn't required to be connected to a hive and/or structures do not require infestation.</b>
<b>3.</b> Aliens should not require infestation to heal (they should still heal but more slowly). Rather infestation should grant either increased regeneration and/or energy regeneration and/or other buffs.
<b> Anyway again we'll want to see how the game feels and works with the current infestation system but in case it doesn't "feel right", here are my ideas :).</b>
<ol type='1'><li>Makes the teams much more asymetrical</li><li>Adds depth to the game</li><li>Great atmosphere</li></ol>
Negative:
<ol type='1'><li>Maps not adapted for it, restowers are too far away from hives, aliens have a hard time to expand</li><li>Too much dependance on the DI pathways that are VERY vulnerable to flamethrowers. As soon as FT are built, aliens lose (really)</li><li>Gorge infestation is useless, there is no point in using it if 2 minutes after the DI network is gone and the structures on it die</li></ol>
and here the third point:
Sollutions:
<ol type='1'><li>Resnodes should not need DI to live</li><li>Gorge infestation should be permannent, if connected to a hive</li><li>commander should be able to see disconnected DI patches quickly. perhaps color them?</li></ol>
+1 for independently growing DI that doesn't need babysitting.
+1 for more focus in gorge spread DI.
+1 for independently growing DI that doesn't need babysitting.
+1 for more focus in gorge spread DI.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
gorges should be able to detect damaged DI paths to the hive and isolated patches and repair/connect them with their DI growth ability
<a href="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/130/commandern.png/" target="_blank"><img src="http://img130.imageshack.us/img130/1908/commandern.png" border="0" class="linked-image" /></a>
Feedback:
1) I had to hotkey my 3 hives and having to press 1-3 to find a hive with enough energy to lay Infestation was a tad annoying, perhaps a global hotkey to select a suitable hive (or just pull all Ingest features from all hives as needed) would be great
2) I didn't like how I pressed 1-3 to select the hive and I jumped to the hive. Could it be changed so that alt+1 (or something) would jump to the target, but otherwise your current view is unchanged?
Thanks
I was thinking about this last night. I feel like it would be awesome to re-purpose the alien nightvision view for this. So if a gorge activated the view, in addition to the standard nightvision they would also see a different distinct color for DI on the ground. Maybe it would appear in a grid view or hexes or something. Something like this would make it easier to see the one patch wasn't connected to another patch and fix it. The comm would need something similar to understand where the breaks are but that could maybe just integrated into the comm UI. Also this would have to couple with the idea that gorge infestation connected to a hive doesn't die out.
Thanks<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Most other RTS games have it as a double tap to jump to the selected unit/building and single tap just for selecting them, while staying in your current location as commander.
I seem to have a bug though, that as soon as I select a hive trough a hotkey, I always jump towards the north east on the edge of the map :/
And yes I have that weird bug as well.
As for the harvester expansion problem, I think there is a compromise that many gorge players would be happy with. Make the placement of a harvester require only a small patch of gorge placed DI. Once the harvester is placed and active, it should be a DI sustaining node that can be used for further expansion. If the harvester section of DI is isolated from the main DI network (as in not connected to a hive), it should have a limited subset of capabilities. If this unconnected patch of DI is cut-off from a supporting harvester (or the harvester is killed), the DI will wither. I think this system could make balance easier to achieve.
It would encourage gorge/comm coordination for a quick expansion. It would also allow for comm/gorge to create sustainable outposts away from hives. These outposts would be vulnerable because the only support would be from a weak harvester (or perhaps 2 harvesters). This is similar to the marine outposts being vulnerable to losing a power node. In this way, the hive and CC each contribute to a more robust control of a territory, but outpost can still be established that have a distinct vulnerability (until a nearby hive/CC is built and connected).
Great work on the DI mechanic devs. Can't wait to see it refined over time.
-> Infestation should decrease in size when it gets damaged, now it seems to just disappear when it's killed. (Especially when it goes 3d)
-> The Alien commander can also put infestation everywhere, even in black area's, this should be limited somehow.
-> I liked it more how the infestation kinda grow like a root, I hope it goes back in when it's 3d, but those 2d projections don't really represent the final infestation, so kinda difficult to prototype.
Instead of the commander 'linking up' areas of the map, it should instead automatically path / grow between selected hives and nodes within a hive's infestation radius.
For example:
# You start with your initial hive, this gives access to two RTs within its infestation radius.
# When you send a drifter to build an RT, whilst building the DI grows between the hive and the RT (which would look very cool, like a snake through the level).
# Hives can be built anywhere, which give access to more RTs.
The commander should be able to use the 'infest' button, as well as the Gorge. But perhaps this costs a lot more energy to infest a room completely, and reduces spam.
The <b>GREAT</b> thing about this, is that it does not matter how big or small the map is. It will effectively work in the same way by just linking up RTs within range.
It also means commanders can't spam infestation as much, and the fights would orientate round the res towers instead of the DI itself. So it would only link up once you have taken down an RT and then placed one there.
I think this would be a hell of a lot better tbh.
Positive (with current implementation)
-DI adds a lot of depth to the gameplay, makes the maps even more interesting.
-Forcing alien structures to be build on DI encourages gorge-commander communication and strategy to rush RTs using the gorge's temporary DI and then have the commander give it permanent DI links. Very cool idea.
-It gives a reason to have a second alien commander, having a DI co-com makes a lot of sense now that there is room for lots of micro and maintenance of DI links. Extremely cool idea.
Negative (with current implementation)
-Present system for manually placing the DI is a little bit confusing. Because you can place DI wherever, it is hard to tell if the blobs are linked properly. Right now you kind of have to shotgun it and use a lot of energy to make sure you have your links covered. A meta-ball overlay like how you have for marine squads (But do the computation statically to save performance, DI isn't going to be moving around) to show links would be AWESOME for many reasons.
-Perhaps DI should extend to walls by default, even if its just a little ways. Not sure how you want that to work, but if a gorge wants to put a hydra on a wall he has to manually place temporary DI and then can put stuff on it. Perhaps there can be an exception to the gorge's temporary DI if its on a wall connected to real DI. Not a big deal though, a consideration for later.
-Tricky to tell if a building or node is in DI or not. It would be nice to highlight buildings or RTs or power nodes if they are on DI to help alien commanders know if they have to grow more DI.
It is an excellent system even now, and with more feedback so players can know whats going on the strategy and gameplay will be much better for it. Keep it up!
It would reduce the flamethrower spam of the forward base defense.
It would reduce the flamethrower spam of the forward base defense.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It should just do that by default. Marines need SOMETHING that can kill DI before flames are out. Once res nodes are covered in DI, marines can't put a res node on it even if they control the whole area.
I noticed my marines stopped trying to kill it simply because they didn't had the ammo for it or even when I supported they just thought it took to long.