Re-Defining Exos: Heavy Marine vs. BattleMech
Benson
Join Date: 2012-03-07 Member: 148303Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
Join Date: 2012-03-07 Member: 148303Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
Right now Exos are a Huge liability. In fact, the best response to 2-3 Exos is to attack marine base since the marine team will be down by 2-3 players, and those Exos are skulkbait without support.
What I'm (Re)proposing is turning Exos more into Heavy Marines rather than BattleMechs. Exos now move faster based on weapon weight, and the Exo fist is now actually usefull, which opens up amazing opportunities for customizing Exo loadout.
First:
Allow the Exo to customize his loadout with whatever guns they want by using the ProtoLab as an armory:
**(Maybe even Dual Fist Exo as a base for 25 res)
-Each gun Costs 25 Pres
-- Let them have:
-- Dual Railgun
-- Dual Minigun
-- Mini/Rail combo
Have Base Exo research open up Miniguns and Railguns with a second research for Dual-Weapon support
Second:
Allow the exo to have a welder tool, unlockable by research, just like dual gun support
- Welder would take up Fist slot by default, so dual weapon support would not be required
-- Would function exactly like normal welder and allow Exos to build and weld eachother
Allowing Exos to have the option to weld eachother reduces their dependancy on their team to be actually useful, and would make up for their other drawbacks of not being able to phase or be beaconed.
Right now, the best response to 2+ Exos is to simply attack marine base and force a beacon, which then leaves those expensive Exos without their REQUIRED support, and is easy pickings for Bilebomb and Skulks. This would make Exos be able to at least survive on their own, unless they took dual guns, in which case there is an obvious tradeoff with having doubled DPS.
* For those of you saying that "Exos SHUOLD require support!", I would reply that the Onos does NOT require support to be effective, but is MUCH more useful with it, and with this setup, a lone Exo would STILL be useless.
* And for those who respond to this with "Asymetrical!", I would reply that a unit that has up to 75 res invested in it should be at least partially useful on its own, or at have the utility to make up for being useless on its own.
Anyways, whatchyall think
What I'm (Re)proposing is turning Exos more into Heavy Marines rather than BattleMechs. Exos now move faster based on weapon weight, and the Exo fist is now actually usefull, which opens up amazing opportunities for customizing Exo loadout.
First:
Allow the Exo to customize his loadout with whatever guns they want by using the ProtoLab as an armory:
**(Maybe even Dual Fist Exo as a base for 25 res)
-Each gun Costs 25 Pres
-- Let them have:
-- Dual Railgun
-- Dual Minigun
-- Mini/Rail combo
Have Base Exo research open up Miniguns and Railguns with a second research for Dual-Weapon support
Second:
Allow the exo to have a welder tool, unlockable by research, just like dual gun support
- Welder would take up Fist slot by default, so dual weapon support would not be required
-- Would function exactly like normal welder and allow Exos to build and weld eachother
Allowing Exos to have the option to weld eachother reduces their dependancy on their team to be actually useful, and would make up for their other drawbacks of not being able to phase or be beaconed.
Right now, the best response to 2+ Exos is to simply attack marine base and force a beacon, which then leaves those expensive Exos without their REQUIRED support, and is easy pickings for Bilebomb and Skulks. This would make Exos be able to at least survive on their own, unless they took dual guns, in which case there is an obvious tradeoff with having doubled DPS.
* For those of you saying that "Exos SHUOLD require support!", I would reply that the Onos does NOT require support to be effective, but is MUCH more useful with it, and with this setup, a lone Exo would STILL be useless.
* And for those who respond to this with "Asymetrical!", I would reply that a unit that has up to 75 res invested in it should be at least partially useful on its own, or at have the utility to make up for being useless on its own.
Anyways, whatchyall think
Comments
Basically it would be an egglocking machine of death.
More to the topic tho, I think exos are in a pretty solid position as is (except for the poor obsolete single mini exo), and without the ability to deal with them by forcing a beacon or by killing welders... well, they would probably become pretty damn unmanageable, pretty akin to a mass onos rush (you do NOT need gorges when your entire team is onos, maybe some crags).
The other thing is that alien pres is "more valuable" than marine pres, so putting exos roughly on par with onos is not a reasonable thing to do anyways.
And now that I said, that, I am going to compare them to onos, in that giving an exo a welder is like giving an onos healspray (which doesn't work on itself). Just imagine how crazy that would make multiple onos rushes. But on top of that, it gets the bonus ability to repair ARCs and forward PGs.
My 2 cents.
Regardless of whose Pres is more "valuable", anything costing 75 Pres should be on par (as much as asymetrically possible), in this case, Onos for 75 Pres gets an enormous health pool and good mobility, while Exo gets utility.
Forcing a beacon would still be one of the most effective ways to deal with Exos, and they still wouldn't be able to phase, so there are still HUGE drawbacks to using them.
i dont think it should be a 50res exo...
The reason Alien PRes is more valuable, is because once you've lost your Onos, you need to wait a LOT longer to be useful in game again. Generally, once enough time has passed for Onos to be available to players, Marines will be too powerful/armoured for a Lerk/Fade to make much of an impact. Heck, even Skulks become pretty useless unless you're co-ordinated.
Whereas a Marine can lose an Exo and buy a Shotgun / Jetpack / both much sooner (if not immediately) and become a strong fighting force once again, with the full benefit of the Armour and Weapon upgrades.
So many times I will accrue enough PRes to buy an Exosuit (usually if the Commander researched them before Jetpacks -- I never buy an advanced weapon without a Jetpack) and will jump in one and do some damage without a care in the world, knowing if I go down it doesn't really matter because I can buy a Jetpack and be much more useful shortly afterwards. But then, I'm a player who, if given the choice, would choose Jetpack+Shotgun+Welder twice over a single Dual-Exo every time. Purely because it suits my play style.
Welder is an interesting idea for exo, but to fit the theme of exos wielding scaled-up weapons, I would think a welder combined with a flamethrower as one device would be much more interesting combination.
On the other hand, full customization would bring awesome things like dual fist exo, a hulking monstrosity that could KO onos and stomp everything in its path.
I could go for this too. If Exos were made even harder to crack, it would be fair that they cant be beaconed, use PGs, or be effective without support.
Maybe a 15 res heavy suit (read as just more armor), but otherwise a normal marine. But then this would be kind of redundant since the Exo is supposed to fill the "heavy" role on its own.
Heavy Marine would be more of what you are proposing. A durable front-line solider. Hes more armored than other marines but can still repair, beacon, phase. Hes a marine that can easily take on fades and munch on skulks, but have problems with an Onos. It would act as a natural progression for marines mid-game. Its tradeoff can be that the "heavy suit" takes the same item slot as the jump pack. Which btw, it consequently gives the jet pack a tradeoff...imagine no autobuy jp, and theres a choice to be made.
Emphasize the EXO to be more of a assault/shock unit. The ultimate base crushers and onos counter. However it still has problems unsupported versus smaller life forms (though rail gun helps), can't beacon, can't phase and can't repair. The problem I see now with the exo, is that its TOO expensive and can TOO easily be taken out by measly 0 pres skulks or 10 pres gorge with bilebomb. It frankly is not worth its res cost for what it can do even under ideal situations imo. Over costed.
Make a base exo with dual fist and wielding capacity for 25 PRES.
Buy a weapon for right arm for the next 25 PRES, choosing between minigun, railgun, grenade launcher and flamethrower (maybe not GL tho, no idea how that'd work)
Buy second weapon for another 25 PRES.
What would that change ? Exo would have more utility, no more power. People would enjoy more playing their style, and the wielding part would allow Exos not to be so Marines dependant.
They shouldn't have a combination that can handle every situation.
Flamethrower would be way too powerfull as it would allow Exo to get rid of small forms and completely burn out cyst net and structures on their way.
There is no combination that could handle everything.
GL: powerful from a ranged/clearly defined frontline, very weak as close range
FL: powerful against stacked structures, enemies, very weak and borderline useless in any other situation
RG: powergul against skulks, and structures, weak against higher lifeforms
MG: the jack-of-all-trade, master of none. Good in every situations, but never excellent, nor useless.
Small forms ? FL barely scatches them, that thing does close to no damage. It's power hides in its aera of effect component, allowing easier attacks on stacked structures/lifeforms.
Exos that could weld each other could just completely lock down a room indefinitely, in the current game they have to fall back once their support is destroyed and it takes them a long time to walk back to base and then return to the front lines, this is the drawback that makes them fair imo.
The main flaw with the no welding EXOs is that aliens can and will simply rush Marines main base and have them teleportate there, leaving EXOs alone. It is simply too easy to separate EXOs from welders, especially when two gorges will melt EXOs in 15 seconds.
Onos have a huge drawback, they cost 75 res, so they play really cautiously or they die, because they're huge and cumbersome so 3-4 marines can cut them to shreds. I have never seen an onos have an impact unless well supported by the rest of the team, provided 2 teams of comparable skill. Likewise for an exo, well supported they are killing machines, on their own they are extremely vulnerable to a group of aliens.
Of course costing 75 PRES is a drawback; but it's the same as EXO, so you cannot count that. You're saying 3-4 marines can kill an Onos. Two skulks will kill an Exo. We're talking 2000 HP vs 580 HP. Well supported, both are very good. Not supported, Onos are deadly killing machines, EXO are good at best. That's the very largely agreed upon opinion, and I am sorry if you don't feel that way.
EXOs are lackluster, Onos are not that. Lots of Marines prefer to go JP+shotgun/GL, which is fine for diversity, but for 75 PRES ? It should feel powerful and useful. Else, I don't see the point of having them in the game.
We're actually talking 3100 effective HP (carapace onos) against 1160 effective HP (armor 3 exo), but marines put out damage way faster than skulks, considering it's pretty damn hard to miss an onos. I think you are exaggerating when you say 2 skulks take down an exo - that can happen, but 2 skulks would normally die very fast against an exo unless they can get on him/her before he/she realises, whereas a pair of 3/3 marines can actually force an onos to retreat quite easily if he/she has to cover more than a few metres to get to the marines (2 level 3 rifle clips = 41.8% of a carapace onos' effective HP).
I'm not saying that exos are as 'good' as onos, but they are generally easier to get since marines generally have more res nodes than aliens. What I am saying is that it is false to say that exos need to be made better/cheaper to balance them against onos. Both units have big drawbacks, the exo's are different to the onos', but this is meant to be an assymetrical game. Neither unit can do much without support and that is how it should be.
Any lifeform or marine with proper support is a killing machine (SG marine with nano shield and medspam)
An unsupported Onos with celerity and regen is far from useless. He becomes an effective harassment tool that cant be ignored, opening up other areas on the map to attack.
Exos are the only unit in the game that have SERIOUS drawbacks, and no option to reduce them in any way (They cant phase, can't be beaconed, can't build, can't be repaired without a teammate/MAC. Oh yeah, and a dual mini EXO costs 75 res, cause thats a drawback). At the very least, an Onos can run back to the hive to heal.
While rare, it can happen that the only marine left alive after the power goes out is an Exo. Its just like being res-locked, there is no way out of that situation, and this type of situation needs to be avoided at all costs.
I don't see why, it's rare but it's checkmate. No big deal.
The EXO is better at defence, yet it's supposed to be an assault vehicle. That's the big problem here.
True it is extremely rare, but its still a bad situation when all marines have to do to stay in the game is get the power back up. But this might be a problem with Power Nodes in main base.
You obviously play on a way better public servers than I do, in the majority of public games I've played in where exos made a significant showing (by which I mean there were exos on the field for any length of time), the aliens just run around getting mowed down one by one or two by two while a couple of more experienced players plead with them to organise a base rush. Either that or the marines are stupid and have 4 exos on an 8-man team so they are asking for trouble.
In comp games no team ever really gets more then 1 exo so there are 4 marines (usually 3/3 by that point), that can be beaconed back if the aliens get a surprise base attack. Normally the exo has enough time to get back near a PG so a marine can get back to him quickly, if he is caught stranded in alien territory and dies, good for the alien team, their surprise base rush paid off at least in some part.
As long as you don't get too many exos (need at least 2 marines for each exo I would say) the marines should be able to fight off a base rush unless the comm completely misses it, in which case having more marines wouldn't help anyway. If the marines have to beacon and the exos are stranded, that's what is meant to happen - how else do aliens counter exos? You have to get rid of their support somehow. The answer to exos being a liability is - don't have too many of them.
I would agree that an alien team that is mostly onos is better than a marine team with mostly exos, but that would never happen unless that alien team was way better than the marine team anyway - because the only way you get onos (asuming teams are evenly skilled) is by some players sacrificing their pres to go gorge/lerk/fade to keep the aliens in the game long enough against steadily upgraded marines. I don't think it's sensible to directly compare the exo to the onos just because they are the top of the tech tree for each team - the teams are completely different - marines are meant to rely on teamwork more than aliens - so their top tier unit should be less effective on it's own than the aliens'.
So we can repair the exo/powernode or build.
One second to activate said mode, one another to leave it. With the rate of healing equal of one welder.