People should start streaming any organised games on the BT mod and posting them imo. I'm very interested seeing how certain controversial changes play out. How the cheap and low hp extractors work, tres egg drops, 1 cc jetpacks, drifter building, cheap gorges etc. etc.
There is a BT cup coming up in June, plenty of matches that will be streamed then, also Goðar is now trying to find PCW quite often in the BT mod as well, I will be trying to stream those matches as often as I can when works lets me have time
there are some BT mod games from a while back on bigrustyred's youtube and twitch channel.
some feedback.
fade movement:
why not make the air friction kick in after the first jump, so that it the optimal becomes blink, jump, blink rather than blink, jump, jump, blink. this way the new general fade movement technique stays basicly the same as in vanilla, without really changing what the changes do to the fade in terms of new options.
I also think that the fade should only be able to crouch when on the ground. being able to crouch whilst blinking and jumping will just result in people perma crouching to gain the obvious advantage of being a smaller target. the fade movement in general is much less 'springy' than vanilla aswell, so theres less need to crouch to avoid or duck under overhead obstacles. otherwise you could make crouch not crouch the model, but increase his downward velocity, a bit like the vanilla lerk.
skulk:
perhaps the acceleration could be given exclusively from dropping vertically, rather than from clipping the walls. clipping the walls could perhaps give a bit of an upward 'bounce' allowing skillful skulks to gain and maintain high speeds over longer distances, whilst also giving them a direct incentive to get up on the walls and ceilings more, something that i miss alot from vanilla - the speed is fun (though a bit exaggerated imo) but horizontal. it would lead to alot more diversity and creativity in terms of picking your route, something that could maybe become static and mechanical with the way it is now.
jetpacks:
i think the vanilla JP's could perhaps maybe have used a bit more 'zoom', but i think this is way too much. the bigger vertical 'kick' off the ground is nice, but a bit too strong. the increased fuel tank size also seems like a bit much. one or maybe two of these things would be ok, but all 3 is too much i think.
powersurge:
for what it does, i think its way too cheap at 5 res. im sure we will see loads of people using it to establish sneaky aggressive phase gates or if its a lone marine in an unpowered room etc. it also means that to some extent power coverage awareness on the alien side also becomes less important as marines are able to circumvent it at any time.
phasegate hp nerf:
not sure this was needed - PG's are already quite susceptible to getting ganked or harassed when the marines are out of position. the only way to counter a meatgrinder is to group up and go through together, i think this will make those moments more difficult as there will simply be less time.
armory:
perhaps surprisingly, i dont really like the armory change :P I think doubling its cost and giving it less HP would be better, making them less cost effective and more susceptible when unguarded. you could also make the heal rate lower if needed. this would also make the whole 'but will the pubbers weld?' a non-issue as it allows casual players to look after themselves if their teammates dont, while organised players get all the benefits of the welder changes + a viable and powerful but risky and vulnerable option to fortify a position.
general:
loads of changes, infact way too many to properly comment and analyse what the impact of any one of them will be. I think that if this or even 50% of this would go live in vanilla, there might be alot of ongoing tweaking and changing needed as people get experience of what works well and what doesnt.
RT's felt less important so the focus was a lot more on attacking specific areas of the map and holding map control then chasing after recappers and defending RTs.
I haven't played the BT mod yet, but what you've described sounds like a good change to me.
I get tired of constantly hearing "Skylights!" and "Ventilation!" and "Observation!" and having people running off to go rescue or rebuild them. I try to tell my teammates that the way to save Skylights is to take and hold Overlook. If the current BT makes running after RTs less valuable and encourages tactical play to secure territory, then I'm all for it.
thats not clear yet. i keep the RT scaled down to 8 t.res for ~2 more days and see what its does to the game play.
perhaps the acceleration could be given exclusively from dropping vertically, rather than from clipping the walls. clipping the walls could perhaps give a bit of an upward 'bounce' allowing skillful skulks to gain and maintain high speeds over longer distances, whilst also giving them a direct incentive to get up on the walls and ceilings more, something that i miss alot from vanilla - the speed is fun (though a bit exaggerated imo) but horizontal. it would lead to alot more diversity and creativity in terms of picking your route, something that could maybe become static and mechanical with the way it is now.
Solution to skulk: low air friction
Strafing accels mixed with wall hopping (strafe should be the most important factor, because that's the whole skilled part of it)
Also the fade is jump>blink>jump>blink, there is no double blinking; if you want to keep the momentum you simply strafe and jump, shadowstep keeps your momentum in the air, however use it on the ground and you'll lose your momentum, shadowstep doesn't make you gain any momentum you only go fast for the duration of the step
Need to play a few rounds today to see this new RT stuff
RT's felt less important so the focus was a lot more on attacking specific areas of the map and holding map control then chasing after recappers and defending RTs.
I haven't played the BT mod yet, but what you've described sounds like a good change to me.
I get tired of constantly hearing "Skylights!" and "Ventilation!" and "Observation!" and having people running off to go rescue or rebuild them. I try to tell my teammates that the way to save Skylights is to take and hold Overlook. If the current BT makes running after RTs less valuable and encourages tactical play to secure territory, then I'm all for it.
thats not clear yet. i keep the RT scaled down to 8 t.res for ~2 more days and see what its does to the game play.
Hopefully RTs are still important, that's one of the only ways to slow down the winning team's momentum and make some awesome comebacks, especially when they've got the territory control totally secured (they can cover their PGs, but they stretch too thin if they try to cover the nodes as well).
perhaps the acceleration could be given exclusively from dropping vertically, rather than from clipping the walls. clipping the walls could perhaps give a bit of an upward 'bounce' allowing skillful skulks to gain and maintain high speeds over longer distances, whilst also giving them a direct incentive to get up on the walls and ceilings more, something that i miss alot from vanilla - the speed is fun (though a bit exaggerated imo) but horizontal. it would lead to alot more diversity and creativity in terms of picking your route, something that could maybe become static and mechanical with the way it is now.
Solution to skulk: low air friction
Strafing accels mixed with wall hopping (strafe should be the most important factor, because that's the whole skilled part of it)
Also the fade is jump>blink>jump>blink, there is no double blinking; if you want to keep the momentum you simply strafe and jump, shadowstep keeps your momentum in the air, however use it on the ground and you'll lose your momentum, shadowstep doesn't make you gain any momentum you only go fast for the duration of the step
Need to play a few rounds today to see this new RT stuff
I dont think there is anything innately skillful about strafing (though it seems that this is a common assumption around here), and the point of my suggestion was to encourage the skulks to get back on the walls somehow. this movement is really horizontal, what you are suggesting wont have any effect on that. also, the skulk bunny growls NEED to more than clientside - it seems completely stupid to give elite players an approximation of celerity and silence through their movement. i hope someone else has pointed that out...
re the fade, i think you are able to do 2 jumps while conserving your momentum following a blink. people will naturally do that as it saves them energy in the long run. it seems to me the abilities of the fade have been changed in order to make the base fade a bit less 1 dimensional without the 2nd upgrade. ok, if thats what you want to do go ahead, i was just trying to suggest a way that would not undermine that while also maintaining basicly the same mechanics as in vanilla, thus minimizing any possible disruption to the existing player base while also changing the fade. the bunnyhop on fade is boring anyway and looks really stupid besides.
The fade combat has a lot less depth with blink being the primary movement. The fact that you have to be looking in the direction that you're traveling eliminates a lot of great ways of attacking from vanilla.
The fade combat has a lot less depth with blink being the primary movement. The fact that you have to be looking in the direction that you're traveling eliminates a lot of great ways of attacking from vanilla.
Hmm that's a fair point actually, but I can't say I've ever really used horizontal shadowstep so I won't miss it.
The fade combat has a lot less depth with blink being the primary movement. The fact that you have to be looking in the direction that you're traveling eliminates a lot of great ways of attacking from vanilla.
The new fade just kind of sucks imo. Shadowstep first was so much better... and the old shadowstep was better, too. If we have to keep blink first, why not let shadowstep work the way it used to? It'd be useful for getting around the map faster and would probably take less energy.
Blink offers additional depth via allowing for 3d movement, something you couldnt do with shadowstep. The omni-directional movement is lost, however that is something that you can do later once you have the shadowstep upgrade. Part of the benefits of the changes is to make fades less powerful initially. A fade solely using blink moves much more predictably, and as such needs to be much more careful with engagements, lessening the impacts of the fade ball. As for map navigation and energy management, the current balance of blink is better than LIVE simply because moving at high speed around the map is energy intensive, where in LIVE you could do it with little cost. However it is also still completely possible to travel the map at ~18 speed with blink and maintain good energy levels, it just takes practice (like shadowstep doublejump did for players initially).
People need to have a little persistence with fade - Most people spent a long time learning the current LIVE fade, and now expect to jump into the BT mod and learn it in a couple rounds.
Blink offers additional depth via allowing for 3d movement, something you couldnt do with shadowstep. The omni-directional movement is lost, however that is something that you can do later once you have the shadowstep upgrade. Part of the benefits of the changes is to make fades less powerful initially. A fade solely using blink moves much more predictably, and as such needs to be much more careful with engagements, lessening the impacts of the fade ball. As for map navigation and energy management, the current balance of blink is better than LIVE simply because moving at high speed around the map is energy intensive, where in LIVE you could do it with little cost. However it is also still completely possible to travel the map at ~18 speed with blink and maintain good energy levels, it just takes practice (like shadowstep doublejump did for players initially).
People need to have a little persistence with fade - Most people spent a long time learning the current LIVE fade, and now expect to jump into the BT mod and learn it in a couple rounds.
3d movement doesn't mean much when it comes to actual combat, in which case you have to actually approach a marine. The shadowstep upgrade with higher energy demands and no double jump loses a lot of the neat movement options you have to attack marines with that make the combat much more dynamic in vanilla.
unfortunately, very few fades seem to actually realize the movement depth of base ns2; i have yet to see comp players really utilize them at all.
3d movement means a lot both in and out of combat, its all about how you use it. Most people I watch playing the BT fade blink straight into combat, they havent mastered using the air control and 3d movement to curve their movements and be evasive during approaches, let alone evading mid combat.
And there are quite a few comp players that really mastered the live fade, i'm not sure what point your trying to make there.
3d movement means a lot both in and out of combat, its all about how you use it.
And there are quite a few comp players that really mastered the live fade, i'm not sure what point your trying to make there.
There are precisely 0 comp players that have mastered base ns2 fade. Most of them still simply shadowstep into marines' faces and swipe 3 times and then run away. I have yet to see any replicate many of the tricks I employ to regularly beat some of the best jp/sgers in the game, and they all die far more often than they should.
Blink as a primary is pretty clunky. Most of the time you end up just blinking straight up to the guys face and start whacking him, whereas with shadowstep you can consistently go around his sides and over his head in such a way to really mitigate his shotgun accuracy. Because of shadowstep's range limitations, this creates a strong positioning skill that is lacking with blink. This is also not touching on double jumping, which allows you to chain shadowsteps and jumps in pretty unique ways.
Decreasing the shadowstep energy cost would go a long way to making it better, but these changes feel pretty unnecessary and really don't seem to add anything to the game. There are other ways to make the fade weaker early on.
i find that the fade is ok with blink first, i can see why people would say that it opens up the options for players because they are able to add vertical play straight away. i just find this fade bunnyhopping really doesnt add anything.
If your talking about beating comp players on a pub using tricks, i dont really see that as relevant to this at all... Most fades I know don't just swipe spam people, fading at a higher level is all about not ever stopping in front of a marine. You always want to shadowstep past marines while swiping them, and then start chaining those maneuvers. However saying that is inherently more skillful then using blink in a meaningful way is quite untrue, as blink, like shadowstep when it was first added, is new to many players. The fade on LIVE has many problems that need to be addressed, and this movement is an attempt at fixing some of them. Whether it proves to be more or less skillful is yet to be seen, as no one has even begun to master it yet. There is much more control in the blink, so saying its 'clunky' tells me you have not played it very much yet.
JektJoin Date: 2012-02-05Member: 143714Members, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
edited May 2013
Using shadow step in combat in live is really just swiping during the shadow step so that when the shadow step jump is over you are at a maximum distance from the marine. Then either using (double)jump momentum to escape or repeat. The movement its self is hardly complicated, and more dependent on the players ability to judge if the situation is worth shadow stepping into. It's unfortunate that you can't properly judge a players looking direction from their orientation in game, as the animation delay thread pointed out a few days ago.
The blink first fade has the advantage of both being predictable when maximizing speed, but also allows for vertical movement during combat. How does that not mean much? It's only the most effective way of dodging bullets and quickly assessing if it's worth staying in.
I'm not saying the fade BT movement is perfect, and this is also coming from the perspective of someone who really enjoys vanilla fade movement. A single engaging fade just isn't viable in BT mod currently, even less so than in vanilla due to the predictability and being able to actually see the life form. These factors lessen the impact of the fade packs we've been seeing lately. But as pres sinks are put in that consistently break up the resources among the alien team, fade packs should be getting less and less common, and so the viability of lone fade engagements should be looked at in the future.
The fade movement in BT isn't perfect, (it's HP values probably aren't either), but I think having simple access to that vertical component is worth the growing pains.
I dont think there is anything innately skillful about strafing (though it seems that this is a common assumption around here), and the point of my suggestion was to encourage the skulks to get back on the walls somehow. this movement is really horizontal, what you are suggesting wont have any effect on that. also, the skulk bunny growls NEED to more than clientside - it seems completely stupid to give elite players an approximation of celerity and silence through their movement. i hope someone else has pointed that out...
I dare you to play against me and say there is no skill in strafing. Though, strafing speed should be higher for both marine and skulk. In NS1 strafing was work of art.
tane - what i mean is that he seems to think that strafing should be the primary mechanism through which skill is expressed in ns2. while i know perfectly well that learning to strafe is a skill, i dont see why the default assumption should be that the foundation of a movement system should be strafing based for it to be skillful. if one of the primary reason's you are a high skill skulk is that you are a good strafer, i think that actually make's the movement system quite superficial. when you consider the other drawbacks of such a system: that its really ground based, and that strafe mechanics have represented a serious barrier to entry for numerous games - i think that this assumption is not only wrong but also doesnt produce that great a movement system, other than the fact that it allows you to go fast.
RT's felt less important so the focus was a lot more on attacking specific areas of the map and holding map control then chasing after recappers and defending RTs.
I haven't played the BT mod yet, but what you've described sounds like a good change to me.
I get tired of constantly hearing "Skylights!" and "Ventilation!" and "Observation!" and having people running off to go rescue or rebuild them. I try to tell my teammates that the way to save Skylights is to take and hold Overlook. If the current BT makes running after RTs less valuable and encourages tactical play to secure territory, then I'm all for it.
thats not clear yet. i keep the RT scaled down to 8 t.res for ~2 more days and see what its does to the game play.
Hopefully RTs are still important, that's one of the only ways to slow down the winning team's momentum and make some awesome comebacks, especially when they've got the territory control totally secured (they can cover their PGs, but they stretch too thin if they try to cover the nodes as well).
I would make them easy to destroy and costly to rebuild. That puts the emphasis on territorial control. They're important to have because you need res, and they're important to protect because they're costly to rebuild, but by being easy to destroy they have to be protected via territorial control and interdiction rather than by running to the rescue. You have to stop the enemy BEFORE they get there, not WHILE they're doing their dirty work.
A change like that would tilt the balance in favor of aliens. Their mobility gives them an advantage in getting to extractors, and the marines are more dependent on res. So marines would need some other buff someplace else to compensate.
In fact, this might be an interesting place for further asymmetry. Maybe extractors are weak and expensive but valuable, while harvesters are tough and cheap but not worth much (i.e. they produce res less quickly) AND are quick to die when the cyst chain is cut. Alien strategy is to strike behind the lines and bite down extractors fast while planting forests of harvesters; marine strategy is to control territory to prevent extractor strikes while killing infestation to deny harvesters.
JektJoin Date: 2012-02-05Member: 143714Members, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
edited May 2013
Need people scrimming this. The play on the public BT servers is consistently of the lowest level I've seen since the free weekend. 30 second phase gates, armories at every corner, walker fades. You really can't get any useful or even relevant feedback from being a part of these rounds.
You should elaborate in detail how so that it may be addressed, if need be.
I haven't played with it quite enough to do a full breakdown or anything, and the mod is changing constantly. Last time I tried it though, it seemed like every time you pressed blink it was taking a huge chunk of adrenaline, to the point where it wasn't really practical to travel around the map that way. It made it so you couldn't effectively travel quickly around the map and still have enough energy to safely engage marines. That would probably be fine if you could research shadowstep in order to travel around the map more efficiently, but shadowstep doesn't give you any momentum anymore so it doesn't really seem viable as a way to get around.
Granted I've probably only spent 30 minutes as fade in the balance test so I might just not know what I'm doing or something, but I have the bhop mechanic down and i'm still not being able to cruise around as quickly as I can in the vanilla build.
When I went onus today in BT I lost control of my onus it was turning and moving randomly and attacking randomly. I wasn't running a log or recording video sadly , Can't seem to find a repro
Need people scrimming this. The play on the public BT servers is consistently of the lowest level I've seen since the free weekend. 30 second phase gates, armories at every corner, walker fades. You really can't get any useful or even relevant feedback from being a part of these rounds.
That cup can't come soon enough.
The matches are terrible, and don't really contribute actual values to win/lose stats. I essentially give up once I see my team is awful and we're no longer able to progress (zero voice com/afk players/people who are new to ns2 in general not even the mod)
I'd love to participate in 6v6 pugs with people who play the mod, or in this cup which I obviously can't
at law
If you're a good skulk you're a good skulk, however there is limits on what you can do with the vanilla skulk since he really has no form of movement; adding in a strafeless wallhop is the same thing as vanilla skulk except you can just go quicker, what we had in previous versions was a skulk that could not only do move maneuvers with the strafeaccel, but they could combine it in combat and it was really something; idk if it's back but it was gone for a while that I've been playing the BT and it stinks cause I got to experience it then it's gone. I'd even vouch for it to be on the marine but I don't think that part will ever happen
Need people scrimming this. The play on the public BT servers is consistently of the lowest level I've seen since the free weekend. 30 second phase gates, armories at every corner, walker fades. You really can't get any useful or even relevant feedback from being a part of these rounds.
For win rates maybe, or at the far end of things what skill ceiling can be reached - but it still speaks volumes as to whether something is intuitive enough /easy to access, and therefore should not be discounted.
As well as provide a sneak peak of the incoming skill gap between players.
Watching almost every skulk in today's hour and half of games jump around in the air, helpless and flailing at a slow speed... and every now and then see one zooming by at mach speed... really tells me that "L2P" isn't :
a) a static gradient
b) always possible
c) sufficient enough of an answer always - implementation can definitely impact this gradient negatively.
tldr: All feedback is worth analyzing for different purposes.
Comments
There is a BT cup coming up in June, plenty of matches that will be streamed then, also Goðar is now trying to find PCW quite often in the BT mod as well, I will be trying to stream those matches as often as I can when works lets me have time
some feedback.
fade movement:
why not make the air friction kick in after the first jump, so that it the optimal becomes blink, jump, blink rather than blink, jump, jump, blink. this way the new general fade movement technique stays basicly the same as in vanilla, without really changing what the changes do to the fade in terms of new options.
I also think that the fade should only be able to crouch when on the ground. being able to crouch whilst blinking and jumping will just result in people perma crouching to gain the obvious advantage of being a smaller target. the fade movement in general is much less 'springy' than vanilla aswell, so theres less need to crouch to avoid or duck under overhead obstacles. otherwise you could make crouch not crouch the model, but increase his downward velocity, a bit like the vanilla lerk.
skulk:
perhaps the acceleration could be given exclusively from dropping vertically, rather than from clipping the walls. clipping the walls could perhaps give a bit of an upward 'bounce' allowing skillful skulks to gain and maintain high speeds over longer distances, whilst also giving them a direct incentive to get up on the walls and ceilings more, something that i miss alot from vanilla - the speed is fun (though a bit exaggerated imo) but horizontal. it would lead to alot more diversity and creativity in terms of picking your route, something that could maybe become static and mechanical with the way it is now.
jetpacks:
i think the vanilla JP's could perhaps maybe have used a bit more 'zoom', but i think this is way too much. the bigger vertical 'kick' off the ground is nice, but a bit too strong. the increased fuel tank size also seems like a bit much. one or maybe two of these things would be ok, but all 3 is too much i think.
powersurge:
for what it does, i think its way too cheap at 5 res. im sure we will see loads of people using it to establish sneaky aggressive phase gates or if its a lone marine in an unpowered room etc. it also means that to some extent power coverage awareness on the alien side also becomes less important as marines are able to circumvent it at any time.
phasegate hp nerf:
not sure this was needed - PG's are already quite susceptible to getting ganked or harassed when the marines are out of position. the only way to counter a meatgrinder is to group up and go through together, i think this will make those moments more difficult as there will simply be less time.
armory:
perhaps surprisingly, i dont really like the armory change :P I think doubling its cost and giving it less HP would be better, making them less cost effective and more susceptible when unguarded. you could also make the heal rate lower if needed. this would also make the whole 'but will the pubbers weld?' a non-issue as it allows casual players to look after themselves if their teammates dont, while organised players get all the benefits of the welder changes + a viable and powerful but risky and vulnerable option to fortify a position.
general:
loads of changes, infact way too many to properly comment and analyse what the impact of any one of them will be. I think that if this or even 50% of this would go live in vanilla, there might be alot of ongoing tweaking and changing needed as people get experience of what works well and what doesnt.
other than that i still think this is madness.
thats not clear yet. i keep the RT scaled down to 8 t.res for ~2 more days and see what its does to the game play.
Solution to skulk: low air friction
Strafing accels mixed with wall hopping (strafe should be the most important factor, because that's the whole skilled part of it)
Also the fade is jump>blink>jump>blink, there is no double blinking; if you want to keep the momentum you simply strafe and jump, shadowstep keeps your momentum in the air, however use it on the ground and you'll lose your momentum, shadowstep doesn't make you gain any momentum you only go fast for the duration of the step
Need to play a few rounds today to see this new RT stuff
Nobody was close enough to respond immidietly? You will just have to rebuild it later.
Sounds really good. Especially that build time and prices are lowered.
It will no longer be like: "Y U NO DEF MAH RTS", it will be more like: "Would you kindly rebuild those RTs when you happen to pass by?"
Must. Obey.
I dont think there is anything innately skillful about strafing (though it seems that this is a common assumption around here), and the point of my suggestion was to encourage the skulks to get back on the walls somehow. this movement is really horizontal, what you are suggesting wont have any effect on that. also, the skulk bunny growls NEED to more than clientside - it seems completely stupid to give elite players an approximation of celerity and silence through their movement. i hope someone else has pointed that out...
re the fade, i think you are able to do 2 jumps while conserving your momentum following a blink. people will naturally do that as it saves them energy in the long run. it seems to me the abilities of the fade have been changed in order to make the base fade a bit less 1 dimensional without the 2nd upgrade. ok, if thats what you want to do go ahead, i was just trying to suggest a way that would not undermine that while also maintaining basicly the same mechanics as in vanilla, thus minimizing any possible disruption to the existing player base while also changing the fade. the bunnyhop on fade is boring anyway and looks really stupid besides.
The new fade just kind of sucks imo. Shadowstep first was so much better... and the old shadowstep was better, too. If we have to keep blink first, why not let shadowstep work the way it used to? It'd be useful for getting around the map faster and would probably take less energy.
People need to have a little persistence with fade - Most people spent a long time learning the current LIVE fade, and now expect to jump into the BT mod and learn it in a couple rounds.
unfortunately, very few fades seem to actually realize the movement depth of base ns2; i have yet to see comp players really utilize them at all.
And there are quite a few comp players that really mastered the live fade, i'm not sure what point your trying to make there.
Blink as a primary is pretty clunky. Most of the time you end up just blinking straight up to the guys face and start whacking him, whereas with shadowstep you can consistently go around his sides and over his head in such a way to really mitigate his shotgun accuracy. Because of shadowstep's range limitations, this creates a strong positioning skill that is lacking with blink. This is also not touching on double jumping, which allows you to chain shadowsteps and jumps in pretty unique ways.
Decreasing the shadowstep energy cost would go a long way to making it better, but these changes feel pretty unnecessary and really don't seem to add anything to the game. There are other ways to make the fade weaker early on.
The blink first fade has the advantage of both being predictable when maximizing speed, but also allows for vertical movement during combat. How does that not mean much? It's only the most effective way of dodging bullets and quickly assessing if it's worth staying in.
I'm not saying the fade BT movement is perfect, and this is also coming from the perspective of someone who really enjoys vanilla fade movement. A single engaging fade just isn't viable in BT mod currently, even less so than in vanilla due to the predictability and being able to actually see the life form. These factors lessen the impact of the fade packs we've been seeing lately. But as pres sinks are put in that consistently break up the resources among the alien team, fade packs should be getting less and less common, and so the viability of lone fade engagements should be looked at in the future.
The fade movement in BT isn't perfect, (it's HP values probably aren't either), but I think having simple access to that vertical component is worth the growing pains.
lotsaedits
I dare you to play against me and say there is no skill in strafing. Though, strafing speed should be higher for both marine and skulk. In NS1 strafing was work of art.
A change like that would tilt the balance in favor of aliens. Their mobility gives them an advantage in getting to extractors, and the marines are more dependent on res. So marines would need some other buff someplace else to compensate.
In fact, this might be an interesting place for further asymmetry. Maybe extractors are weak and expensive but valuable, while harvesters are tough and cheap but not worth much (i.e. they produce res less quickly) AND are quick to die when the cyst chain is cut. Alien strategy is to strike behind the lines and bite down extractors fast while planting forests of harvesters; marine strategy is to control territory to prevent extractor strikes while killing infestation to deny harvesters.
100% agree with Jekt's post.
That cup can't come soon enough.
I haven't played with it quite enough to do a full breakdown or anything, and the mod is changing constantly. Last time I tried it though, it seemed like every time you pressed blink it was taking a huge chunk of adrenaline, to the point where it wasn't really practical to travel around the map that way. It made it so you couldn't effectively travel quickly around the map and still have enough energy to safely engage marines. That would probably be fine if you could research shadowstep in order to travel around the map more efficiently, but shadowstep doesn't give you any momentum anymore so it doesn't really seem viable as a way to get around.
Granted I've probably only spent 30 minutes as fade in the balance test so I might just not know what I'm doing or something, but I have the bhop mechanic down and i'm still not being able to cruise around as quickly as I can in the vanilla build.
The matches are terrible, and don't really contribute actual values to win/lose stats. I essentially give up once I see my team is awful and we're no longer able to progress (zero voice com/afk players/people who are new to ns2 in general not even the mod)
I'd love to participate in 6v6 pugs with people who play the mod, or in this cup which I obviously can't
at law
If you're a good skulk you're a good skulk, however there is limits on what you can do with the vanilla skulk since he really has no form of movement; adding in a strafeless wallhop is the same thing as vanilla skulk except you can just go quicker, what we had in previous versions was a skulk that could not only do move maneuvers with the strafeaccel, but they could combine it in combat and it was really something; idk if it's back but it was gone for a while that I've been playing the BT and it stinks cause I got to experience it then it's gone. I'd even vouch for it to be on the marine but I don't think that part will ever happen
As well as provide a sneak peak of the incoming skill gap between players.
Watching almost every skulk in today's hour and half of games jump around in the air, helpless and flailing at a slow speed... and every now and then see one zooming by at mach speed... really tells me that "L2P" isn't :
a) a static gradient
b) always possible
c) sufficient enough of an answer always - implementation can definitely impact this gradient negatively.
tldr: All feedback is worth analyzing for different purposes.