Is NS2 really being geared for 16v16

Jonacrab

<div class="IPBDescription">or is it a pipe dream...</div>Is NS2 really planning on being 16v16? I just wonder if that is even plausible. I remember playing on large servers in ns1 and marines were just ridiculously OP even when aliens had good players. It seems to me that balance is only met at something around a 6v6. I would hope more than that can be expected for NS2 because in 6v6 just 1 or 2 bad/new players can ruin a game. I suppose its a little early to speculate whether it will work, but since the game seems to be basically ns1+extras I think its reasonable to be skeptical about the future...

Any thoughts?

IeptBarakat

Should be near that in late stage of development. Once server optimizations and overall performance boosts have been added.

Played on some smooth 16 or 20 player servers so 32 players shouldn't be an impossibility.

IronHorse

<!--quoteo(post=1863057:date=Jul 24 2011, 10:15 AM:name=Jonacrab)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Jonacrab @ Jul 24 2011, 10:15 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1863057"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><u><b> I suppose its a little early to speculate whether it will work</b></u><!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Shilorius

The builder gorge and thus the alien team in NS1 was only balanced with the marine team on a 6v6 game. If there were less players alienteam had the advantage and if there were more players the marines had.
But now we have the alien commander the game will be balanced from 2vs2 up to 16vs16

At least.. this is the plan.

Align

It was because of the resource system, with more aliens everyone had less resources to use individually so there was no hope of keeping up with the marines tech-wise on the big servers.
NS2 has fixed this with its unified/symmetrical resource system, which was one of the main goals.

TheLord

Marines will still be much better in big games because of the melee vs ranged weapons paradigm and because of teamplay.

1 skulk vs 1 rine -> skulk wins
2 skulks vs 2 rines -> even
3+ skulks vs 3+ rines -> rines win

Huge games -> rines win

TrC

Game being balanced for 4v4-16v16 is a pipedream, it being playable not so much.

MaGicBush

Having enough lag issues with 6v6 at the moment, I honestly don't see how a game like this would support up to 32 very well because of the server resources that would be required for that many people and having all the buildings in place. UWE will have to really crack down on optimizations before that's even a thought.

wulf 21

maybe a 16 vs 16 would be balanced on really huge maps, so marines will have to split up in small groups if they don't want to give the map control to aliens?