Suggestion for Hypermutation replacement.
Deadalious
Join Date: 2012-08-31 Member: 157081Members
Join Date: 2012-08-31 Member: 157081Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Making the upgrade useful!</div>Hypermutation in it's current state is almost completely useless; You could argue the point it is viable in .00001% of situations, even then it's hard to make the decision as a commander to upgrade that over Adrenaline or Celerity.
<b>I propose you change Hypermutation into an upgrade which allows use of abilities with -(minus) 1 hive, as example.
or
Hypermutation grants the next unteched ability to be used (Skulks gain Leap until Leap is researched, then gain Xenocide)
</b>
If a gorge upgrades Hypermutation with only the starting hive, he has access to Bile Bomb.
If a skulk upgrades Hypermutation with a starting hive and one expansion it gives him access to Xenocide.
I feel Natural Selection 2, currently does not make effective use of having over two hives, most games Aliens get three hives not many of the Commanders bother upgrading Lvl3 abilities seem to be less useful than a forward Crag base for pushing Fades/Onos/Lerks.
This also makes a fair trade off vs Celerity/Adrenaline.
A gorge would be able to bile bomb with one hive, but without Adrenaline, just how effective could it be? It might open up some fun possibilities of Cyst pushing and dropping a forward Shift to help out an early push with Gorges bile bombing. When Aliens get put on the back burner in terms of map control and expansions, It feels almost impossible to come back some times, this would, as a commander really make dropping that extra shift upgrade feel worthwhile.
A fade without adrenaline? He can blink with one hive but just how well would he go!
Thanks.
<b>I propose you change Hypermutation into an upgrade which allows use of abilities with -(minus) 1 hive, as example.
or
Hypermutation grants the next unteched ability to be used (Skulks gain Leap until Leap is researched, then gain Xenocide)
</b>
If a gorge upgrades Hypermutation with only the starting hive, he has access to Bile Bomb.
If a skulk upgrades Hypermutation with a starting hive and one expansion it gives him access to Xenocide.
I feel Natural Selection 2, currently does not make effective use of having over two hives, most games Aliens get three hives not many of the Commanders bother upgrading Lvl3 abilities seem to be less useful than a forward Crag base for pushing Fades/Onos/Lerks.
This also makes a fair trade off vs Celerity/Adrenaline.
A gorge would be able to bile bomb with one hive, but without Adrenaline, just how effective could it be? It might open up some fun possibilities of Cyst pushing and dropping a forward Shift to help out an early push with Gorges bile bombing. When Aliens get put on the back burner in terms of map control and expansions, It feels almost impossible to come back some times, this would, as a commander really make dropping that extra shift upgrade feel worthwhile.
A fade without adrenaline? He can blink with one hive but just how well would he go!
Thanks.
Comments
However, what happens on 2 Hives and they haven't teched the ability? Hypermutation still gives the next one? So if Leap isn't researched and you have 2 Hives you still get Leap as a Skulk? And if Leap is researched you get Xeno?
The biggest problem is Fades imo. Early Blink Fades, even without Adrenaline, can be pretty darn powerful. Or Massive Gorge Rush w/ Bile Bomb and a Shift nearby to regen their Energy.
However, what happens on 2 Hives and they haven't teched the ability? Hypermutation still gives the next one? So if Leap isn't researched and you have 2 Hives you still get Leap as a Skulk? And if Leap is researched you get Xeno?
The biggest problem is Fades imo. Early Blink Fades, even without Adrenaline, can be pretty darn powerful. Or Massive Gorge Rush w/ Bile Bomb and a Shift nearby to regen their Energy.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I'm not too sure on the actual feature of the upgrade yet, perhaps making it give the next tier in abilities would be more beneficial.
Example Fade gets Hypermutation which allows him Blink, when Blink is upgraded allows use of Vortex, this would allow Hypermutation to be extremely effective early on and somewhat useful mid game.
I can see where you're coming from about Fades, however, usually the time a team has the resources to Fade, most games(unless they are going pear shape) will have Adrenaline or Celerity and blink coming up soon, this would allow for Alien teams that are far behind in map coverage and Res tower control to have the ability to make fades to help the skulks on the front line, A gorge rush could be lethal but a Marine commander should be able to sense when that is coming, however even the idea of it being a legitimate strategy is a prime reason this change should be implemented.
Can you name me any effective strategies using Hypermutation currently?
Hypermutation is good when the commander has a solid 4 rt's early, and starts mass dropping lerks. Each lerk becomes a +30 pres bonus, allowing for very fast fade/onos. Once you get hyper, de-evolve for your pres, and re-evolve, you can snag a new ability (adren/celerity). Onos can come out as early as 5-7min, and with the new 1100health/600armor, they pack a big punch even w/o stomp. 5-7min (1 hive) fades + onos' can be game-ender, but if the marines can hold it off it puts the aliens far behind.
EDIT: Tried this last night, and it turns out you can no longer de-evolve comm eggs for pres. Its official now guys, hyper has no useful function.
<b>I propose you change Hypermutation into an upgrade which allows use of abilities with -(minus) 1 hive, as example.
or
Hypermutation grants the next unteched ability to be used (Skulks gain Leap until Leap is researched, then gain Xenocide)
</b>
If a gorge upgrades Hypermutation with only the starting hive, he has access to Bile Bomb.
If a skulk upgrades Hypermutation with a starting hive and one expansion it gives him access to Xenocide.
I feel Natural Selection 2, currently does not make effective use of having over two hives, most games Aliens get three hives not many of the Commanders bother upgrading Lvl3 abilities seem to be less useful than a forward Crag base for pushing Fades/Onos/Lerks.
This also makes a fair trade off vs Celerity/Adrenaline.
A gorge would be able to bile bomb with one hive, but without Adrenaline, just how effective could it be? It might open up some fun possibilities of Cyst pushing and dropping a forward Shift to help out an early push with Gorges bile bombing. When Aliens get put on the back burner in terms of map control and expansions, It feels almost impossible to come back some times, this would, as a commander really make dropping that extra shift upgrade feel worthwhile.
A fade without adrenaline? He can blink with one hive but just how well would he go!
Thanks.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
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Will we see the return of upgrades in whips I wonder?
I think removing the upgrade @hive feature for abilitys will happen, too.
To have Leap so early would require a very large portion of the resources to go towards teching for it, starting off with it is a very swing and miss chance, You would lose dominance over the map but gain an offensive ability.
Shift Hive Res Cost
Shift Upgrade Building
Shift Upgrade
Starting off with this would damage the rapid expand strategy that alot of Alien commanders seem to be utilising.
However It marines managed to cut off a second hive expansion and the game had already been going for some time I feel this upgrade would be a great utility in helping the Aliens come back, especially with Fades / Lerks- A single hive fade is pretty much a death sentence against a well rounded marine team.
You hit the nail on the head with the changes to upgrades, If a fade evolves with Hypermutation, he can help his team work towards a second hive, If he manages to stay alive up until then his upgrade will be alot less viable when they finally upgrade Blink due to not being able to get Adrenaline(Or Celerity for you weird people).
If Aliens get to 50 res and they don't have a second hive there probably isn't much chance of them winning anyway.
Your idea is very interesting. But I guess, in early game its to strong. I mean u get 2-3 Upgrades(leap,bile and maybe spores) for the price of one. On the other side, in lategame this evolution will be useless if all upgrades are researched. = against this plan :>
As far as balance is concerned, perhaps if the upgrades were weakened in some way, such as damage, frequency, range...
As far as balance is concerned, perhaps if the upgrades were weakened in some way, such as damage, frequency, range...<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I like your suggestion of nerfing the upgrade somehow, giving it a bigger tax on the abilities however I feel would make it still useless - The closest thing I can think of without completely ruining the idea is giving it an upgrade cost of 5-10 res.
A gorge without Adrenaline cannot bile many times without wasting energy, a Lerk/Fade without Adrenaline is still going to be <b>alot</b> less effective and after getting a second hive perhaps we might see the use of Xenocide.
On the point of it still being useless after obtaining the third hive and gaining all the upgrades, I'm not too sure what to do with that really !
If aliens want a short game they can skulk rush already!
Good things about this idea is that losing second hive will not be the end of the world - you can get hypermutation and carry on with blink or bile to prevent the marine slaughter. Also early game evolutions that get their upgrades late can skip ahead - gorge and lerk mostly.
However its quite powerful, and I would see it as a no-brainer to get hypermutation immediately. Skulk map control with leap is superior to celerity since its useful in combat aswell. We will see 1 minute leap again, albeit at a higher cost than it was.
In addition to better balancing the upgrades, it would also address the issue of 'lifeform explosions' (i.e multiple players going fade at the same time in the game, etc), since some players make opt not to get upgrades to get to another lifeform quicker, where as others may get the upgrade to max out that lifeform's performance.
You could even make the upgrade cost a one time cost for skulks, until you want to change the upgrade or evolve to a higher lifeform. (This would also solve the annoyance of having to re-evolve upgrades after every death as a skulk)
I agree that this should cost res to evolve, too. I was surprised when upgrade evolutions became free again. With costs attatched, you felt more attatched to your early lifeforms and had to think a bit more. The only problem I see is in tuning res costs for upgrades. It felt good at 1res for each. Combined with not getting res while dead, anything more might hurt aliens too much, but getting leap for 1pres sounds wrong in my head.
Although it sounds like the unlocked abilities/attacks needs a penalty until the commander researches it. Like doubled energy consumption.
The problem is when all the alien abilities are researched with the third hive up. what does hyper do?
Maybe it could unlock the possibility to change the other 2 upgrades whenever you want