Augmentation
TheIcarusKid
Join Date: 2012-03-23 Member: 149258Members
Join Date: 2012-03-23 Member: 149258Members
It's been said many times that the current version of augmentation is a bit boring from a strategy perspective. When the abilities were tied to the second hive, it was great to get them all at once, as defending the building hive was of great strategic importance. Just waiting for a timer to expire isn't much fun. Having to choose between energy usage for cysts/drifters/mist is a step in the right direction, but augmentation is just something you check off the list as khammander.
Why not have the khamm research the second and third tier abilities individually? This has been suggested before and someone from UWE was behind it. With alien upgrades being tied to specific hives, killing one hive could remove certain upgrades but not all of them. Having the second hive would be an advantage to start researching more abilities faster.
Once we get third tier tech, aliens could finally have some real options in their tech tree besides just crag/shift/shade. The team could rush gorge upgrades for an early victory, support a couple of pro fades, or go for a more balanced approach. Also, anything we can do to make the second hive more important and give the khamm more options right now would be a step in the right direction.
Third tier could also open the possibility of doubling the maturity time and allowing 2-tier abilities to be researched at 50% maturity, with 3-tier abilities researched at 100%.
Thoughts and ideas?
Why not have the khamm research the second and third tier abilities individually? This has been suggested before and someone from UWE was behind it. With alien upgrades being tied to specific hives, killing one hive could remove certain upgrades but not all of them. Having the second hive would be an advantage to start researching more abilities faster.
Once we get third tier tech, aliens could finally have some real options in their tech tree besides just crag/shift/shade. The team could rush gorge upgrades for an early victory, support a couple of pro fades, or go for a more balanced approach. Also, anything we can do to make the second hive more important and give the khamm more options right now would be a step in the right direction.
Third tier could also open the possibility of doubling the maturity time and allowing 2-tier abilities to be researched at 50% maturity, with 3-tier abilities researched at 100%.
Thoughts and ideas?
Comments
Since augmentation, the second hive has played too small of a role. Which takes a very fun element out of the game. The territorial battle for a key location seems a bit absent in the current patch. Right now, the second hive gives the alien team (this list is not exhaustive):
1) An insurance policy incase the hive gets ninja'd
2) Gives them a second upgrade, essentially regen
3) More energy
As nice as these things may be, it's not imperative for the aliens to win. As many of have experienced, even if you contain the aliens within one hive with 2-3 harvesters and have a distinct territorial advantage, at 12-13mins there will be an onos train. IMO the onos problem, thoroughly discussed recently, is the direct result of the diminishing role of the second hive. All these outcries about the onos didn't seem as prominent before the introduction of Augmentation.
IMO, augmentation is too powerful and the second hive is a bit too weak. (Yes, tier 3 abilities haven't been introduced, but aliens have all the necessary abilities to turn the tide of the game with tier 2). Augmentation has virtually no opportunity cost and comes a bit too early in the game.
Some potential solutions:
a) Make tier 2 abilities a bit weaker, particularly onos stomp (or move it to tier 3).
b) Slow down hive maturity
c) Increase the opportunity cost to augmentation (increase cost of structures+upgrades making it more of a choice or make augmentation an upgrade similar to carapace/regen and only 1 per hive)
d) Have augmentation as a separate structure to the hive, allowing marines an opportunity to target and kill it.
I agree with you, but I think there's a bit more to it than that. Imagine if there was one upgrade the marines could do that gave them shotguns, welders, mines, and phase tech all at once. Not very interesting for the commander.
<!--quoteo(post=1937857:date=May 21 2012, 01:44 AM:name=TheIcarusKid)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (TheIcarusKid @ May 21 2012, 01:44 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1937857"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I agree with you, but I think there's a bit more to it than that. Imagine if there was one upgrade the marines could do that gave them shotguns, welders, mines, and phase tech all at once. Not very interesting for the commander.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I'm not sure if it will work, having a parallel resource system in addition to tres is a bit weird. Also hives are really big fat extractors: they cost a lot, they take long to build or to kill and there is not many tech points on the map. It's a very coarse-grained resource system.
Personally I think that when abilities where linked to second hive it was working well, the second hive was important but not over-critical like when fades were linked to it.
Anyway, probably with some tweaking the current can work, but it seems a bit overcomplicated.
There should still be augmentation to beef up a single hive's HP and energy, but the 2nd hive should be what unlocks things. It's not only better for gameplay it's basically easier to understand, more intuitive. The word augmentation suggests something getting bigger, not something that'll unlock a whole new set of abilities.
1) make hive take much linger to mature. Like 15-20 minutes if a few mists are used.
2) make augmentation cost more Res, maybe 50.
3) make 2nd hive also unlock tier 2 abilities
This pushes augment to be a back up, only used when 2nd hive is not acheivable. I really like the NS1 focus on 2nd hive and would like yo see that reinstated;a hybrid system like I outline can achieve that with some work.
<!--quoteo(post=1937894:date=May 21 2012, 01:05 PM:name=peregrinus)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (peregrinus @ May 21 2012, 01:05 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1937894"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I miss needing the 2nd hive - it gave aliens something to <i>aim</i> for not <i>wait</i> for.
There should still be augmentation to beef up a single hive's HP and energy, but the 2nd hive should be what unlocks things. It's not only better for gameplay it's basically easier to understand, more intuitive. The word augmentation suggests something getting bigger, not something that'll unlock a whole new set of abilities.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Exactly. This also restores the fight for map control and the need for alien expansion.
1) make hive take much linger to mature. Like 15-20 minutes if a few mists are used.
2) make augmentation cost more Res, maybe 50.
3) make 2nd hive also unlock tier 2 abilities
This pushes augment to be a back up, only used when 2nd hive is not acheivable. I really like the NS1 focus on 2nd hive and would like yo see that reinstated;a hybrid system like I outline can achieve that with some work.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
this sounds like a decent thing to try in an upcoming build!