Balancing Kharaa Late Game
Vile | Frisky
Join Date: 2012-11-04 Member: 166873Members
Join Date: 2012-11-04 Member: 166873Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Removing the ease of spamming Onos</div>For those of you who don't know, it is possible for a Kharaa commander to rush an early second base while taking resource nodes, sit on earned resources, drop an Onos egg, hop in it, evolve, and then gather his team to make a near unstoppable rush on the Marine base. Keep in mind that all of this can occur in just the first few minutes of the game, at which point most marine commanders are just now moving to expand and more than likely have nothing other than phase tech and a weapon or upgrade available at this point.
As it currently stands, there is no effective counter to this rush and even if it somehow manages to fail, the marines will have a VERY tough time recovering and it's quite common for the commander to be able to drop a second egg to initiate a "clean up" rush.
As a result, I am petitioning UWE to either remove the Onos from the egg list or make it so that it can ONLY be dropped if the commander has three hives. Naturally, it may be an intelligent move to do the same for Marine commanders.
If UWE were to adopt the three base requirement, this could add more depth to commanders taking a third base and make the third expansion more of a decisive maneuver instead of a precaution.
Thoughts?
As it currently stands, there is no effective counter to this rush and even if it somehow manages to fail, the marines will have a VERY tough time recovering and it's quite common for the commander to be able to drop a second egg to initiate a "clean up" rush.
As a result, I am petitioning UWE to either remove the Onos from the egg list or make it so that it can ONLY be dropped if the commander has three hives. Naturally, it may be an intelligent move to do the same for Marine commanders.
If UWE were to adopt the three base requirement, this could add more depth to commanders taking a third base and make the third expansion more of a decisive maneuver instead of a precaution.
Thoughts?
Comments
<ul><li> A second hive (obviously) which is 40 res of investment.</li><li> In cases where the marines haven't already lost the game from the start, it requires that the aliens have <b>no upgrades</b>. A single crag or shift upgrade will cost you 45 resources. Expending this amount will prevent you from fulfilling the next requirement.</li><li> It must be a rush. If the Onos doesn't appear within the 6-7 minute sweet spot, its effectiveness when it does finally appear rapidly declines after that.</li></ul>
What does all of this add up to? Well, first things first, if the aliens want to do this, the second hive must be the very first thing that is dropped, literally within the first 10 seconds of the games start. If you watch some competitive games, you will see that very frequently, the hive is dropped only for marines to welcome it with open switch axes, with it being destroyed within the minute, very easily. Things don't always go this well for marines, its true, but the point is that its a massive predictability risk.
Next, the no upgrades thing. Typically aliens are on the defensive in the first minute or so of a game, then, when their upgrades kick in, they are able to offensively go after marine territory. This will prevent the marines from taking every resource nozzle on the map, and quickly overrunning your team with technology. If you aren't upgrading your skulks, you are massively delaying this offensive period in the game, even to the point where the offensive window (where skulks have upgrades while marines do not) never opens at all, and skulks never have their moment to shine. If you do decide to go leap + Onos egg, then keep in mind the amount of time your Onos runs around with absolutely no upgrades is extended.
Lastly, the time constraint is very important here, for both marines and aliens. For aliens it is a countdown. Miss the event by too much, and your chances drastically decline. Probably more importantly, for marines, its a timer to get <b>into a position to stop the Onos</b>. Is your team running havoc all over the map? Are the aliens simply falling by the wayside against your weapons? What are you going to do with this advantage? Are you going to spend all your time and resources dropping every node on the map and building outposts to protect your investment, while you laugh all the way to the bank? Then chances are, when that Onos does come, he is going to walk all over your marines, and your outposts. On the other hand, you could identify that the lack of upgrades is indicative of an Onos rush, and go the cautious route of dropping some extractors, but focusing heavily on the upgrades needed to counter said Onos. Heres a tip: if you think an Onos is coming at 6 or 7 minutes, rush weapons 2. Don't waste time on armor if you can't afford the wasted time. The lack of armor can be compensated for by proper positioning, the inability to out damage the gorge healing the onos cannot.
I gaurentee you, 3 light marines with level 2 weapons against a vanilla Onos stand an <b>extremely </b>good chance of winning.
So even if the onos gets killed, it usually only happens after a long time and with a lot of effort from the marines, which results in them being at a considerable resource and time disadvantage which makes it easier for aliens to wait it out until they can evolve more oni. I've had them do this to me so many times, I expect it every time and even then it's very hard to counter. All I can hope for is the onos makes a mistake early on and dies so the marines can focus on securing extractors again.
Otherwise a typical scenario is that five aliens never evolve at all, save up for onos and all evolve at the same time, creating an unstoppable onos force than can deal with anyhing, even five or six exos and the marines covering them. I've seen it happen. Granted, all on public servers, but it's really frustrating nonetheless. Usually just seeing two oni already means it's GG for most matches. They can't rush the main marine base, but they can stop the marines from advancing and can constantly harass fortified marine positions, allowing the rest of the alien team to save up for onos as well.
I think this early onos must at least be delayed, it allows the aliens to keep the marines at bay too easily too early. So moving the onos egg to a three hive requirement seems like the right way to go. May also give the RTS part more depth if the marine dual exo is also moved to a three CC requirement. Right now having more than two CC's means little and having three hives also isn't nearly as decisive as the second hive.
As it currently stands, there is no effective counter to this rush and even if it somehow manages to fail, the marines will have a VERY tough time recovering and it's quite common for the commander to be able to drop a second egg to initiate a "clean up" rush.
As a result, I am petitioning UWE to either remove the Onos from the egg list or make it so that it can ONLY be dropped if the commander has three hives. Naturally, it may be an intelligent move to do the same for Marine commanders.
If UWE were to adopt the three base requirement, this could add more depth to commanders taking a third base and make the third expansion more of a decisive maneuver instead of a precaution.
Thoughts?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
TESTIFY!!!!
Instead of nerfing Onos by restricting it to X number of hives, I say make shotguns cheaper, and or make flamethrowers stronger. The problem right now is the lack of weapon diversity or efficiency for Marines. Shotguns have a huge cost ratio: each one bought means a delayed Exosuit. Yet it takes multiple shotguns just to create an effective force, unlike Fade or Lerk. Sure shotguns are recoverable, but again the risk vs reward is high compared to before. Marines need better or cheaper weapons to fight Onos. Perhaps the flamethrower should be more powerful? It already seems to be quite ineffective against almost everything unless it isnt moving. Grenade Launchers are decent but again, it costs 25 resources and requires marines to defend it. Marines simply dont have effective 1:1 comparisons (again Exos require support marines to weld, which is subpar compared to Onos gorge combo. Did I mention 1 Onos beats 1 Exo?).
In short, NS2 is fun, but requires a lot more balancing. I hope to see patches weekly to address balance so that Onos rushing gets fixed, and marines have more options to fight WITHOUT having to go to Prototech. The fact that Marines are screwed without 2 CCs is ridiculous in a pub game without coordination. Also Veil is not balanced for NS2 just by design, this map should have been reworked. If Marines need 2 CCs to do anything against Onos, all amps need at least 5CC locations, and perhaps electrification needs to come back.
See your marine tears then.
Early onos breaks games, most people dont use it to rush a base thats far too risky.
A good early onos will <b>never</b> die because they will engage on their own terms and just keep hitting the marines where they are moving in small groups (2-3) thus being affective as 2-3 players on their own. They are able to destroy all the marines res towers safely and quickly, disrupt/completely deny any pushes on the hive with ease until the upgrades/other lifeforms/NEXT onos egg is dropped. This is essentially the entire alien game plan at the moment...
Be careful with your onos till another is dropped, then another, then another: till your entire team is onos/ the marines are dead.
Rushing an Onos /=/ Lategame
Hell people treat 10mins "late game" in NS2. Why? Because Fades are nearly meaningless against good marines...so aliens have no "mid game". Mid game is basically just lerks with spores and leap skulks (which is rushed anyway).
But really this is what happens in most games where onos are "spammed" in my experience:
1/ Aliens have almost the entire map and very little to spend res on...so the only option is onos eggs (since fades suck at pushing into bases)
2/ Marines have lost momentum and map control, so they cannot push fully.
Otherwise it tends to be the other way where marines control most of the map and aliens are scrapping together "desperation" onos just to stay in the game. But since Aliens can't hole up as well as marines can (especially with GL spam) this is usually quicker for marines