I like love the upgrade - but some few points I personally dislike:
MARINE SIDE: - MACs can no longer weld each other
Reason:
why? they are dying so damn fast...?
- multiple MACs are no longer able to weld the same target
Reason:
why? macs welding a bit to slow when they are alone. In combination with the “can not weld each other” option macs are now absolutely useless in my opinion. (why not limit macs to 4 per robotics to prevent spamming? if that was the problem?)
- marines can now build on infestation (25% slower) and all structures take damage to armor
Reason:
destroys the important team part: “you need to hold the position until the infestation is gone” also it is now MUCH easier to build very “nasty” phasegates when aliens do not monitor everything carefully...
- marines can now always sprint (no more fatigue)
Reason:
Who can endless sprint in real life? …
Then you can also make a setting “rine_always_sprint=true”...
who will ever “run in normal speed” again?
Maybe just increasing the possible sprint time is an alternative?
ALIEN SIDE: - crags no longer stack their healing with each other and can heal a maximum of 3 targets at once
Reason: I think that is not a really nice change when you read how fast the rines now getting nades and flames.
- whips no longer whack grenades
Reason: I think a littlebit more defence against the (now) nade and flame spamming marines is not wrong.
- cloaked players are always slightly visible
Reason: then camo is useless now ???
- alien structures auto build rate is reduced by 70%, drifters speed up build time to normal rate
Reason: Was it really that inbalanced when build speed stays normal and the drifters speed it up?
MISSING: - more usefull hydras and turrets (higher dmg / more life?)
They are both, in my opinion, still useless... I mean a hydra costs a gorge 3 res.... but the firerate is slow and the damage is minimum... not really defensive at all. nearly the same with turrets. costs much - but are not effective against anything.
But all in all still a nice upgrade for NS2!
... and of course if have to play more to see if I'm correct with my concerns.
They balance mod was in testing for months, it has been the biggest thread on the forums for months, there have been several posts on the unkownworlds.com/ns2 site about the balance test, what it is and how to play it so you can give feedback before it goes live. These same posts are also right there on the inital screen when you launch the game. Unless you have been living under a rock and dont read anything you cant claim there has been no warning/explanation or anything about these changes.
So just because I, any many other friends barely/don't read these forums now we suddenly it is my fault I know nothing about this update? I saw that it was released in the "main menu" and read the story provided. That's the thing most "pubbers" and "newcommers" do in this game... They don't wander around the forums/site all day long....
So please don't try to defend the fact that they released this patch with barely any information.
Also as was stated in the first line of the patch notes "Hugh normally writes up these posts, but is on a plane from Toronto right now, having visited Torn Banner Studios. So until he lands to tell you more, here is the raw changelog:". Its not really feasible to hold back a patch just because someone who writes the formal patch notes is busy for a day. As UWE said, he will tell you more with pretty pictures and explanations, this changelist is in a raw format so people actually know what has been changed.
As if waiting 2 days with a patch is such a disaster... Seriously marketing is worth way more then releasing a patch just for the sake of releasing it.....
And again. I'm not complaining about the patch. I only complained about the frequency of released patches and in this case the lack of information about it. Everything (including the broken explore mode) confirms the fact that they should have waited a couple more days releasing 250.
Movement system is not skill-based with depth, so what have all the movement changes actually achieved other than alienating a large portion of the playerbase? Bouncing gets boring quickly and looks ridiculous. Fades = Rabbits now.
Fade clipping against marine disables blink -> FIX!
I had some weird clipping issues in about the last week of BT as well though only noticed it as a skulk when I seemed to get stuck inside a marine on a couple of occasions and couldn't wallclimb up a wall that he was adjacent to.
I think you're interpreting comments made about the movement system in the wrong way, getting down routine map movement isn't supposed to be hugely difficult, the skill component is moving properly in combat, and in the case of skulks being able to get up to a high speed in a low number of jumps. Nobody wants it to be super hard just to keep your momentum going (which is what you're complaining about by the sound of it) because it is supposed to be an entry-level skill that you use as a foundation for doing more interesting stuff. I agree with you in principle that what we have now isn't ideal but it's definitely better than the previous system and has the advantage of being very intuitive for anyone who ever played a game with bunnyhopping.
One change that I would really like to see is a UI element for your current speed (either in absolute or just comparative terms), this was discussed for some time during the balance test but never happened even though it seems like a fantastic bit of feedback for players who are learning movement skills.
I for one would have loved a bit more story behind this update. The site is basicly listing not a single reason as to why NS2 got a complete overhoul.
what i know or heard is that the movement code which was written in NS2 "vanilla" had some big bugs in it. I would guess that fixing all these bugs in that movementcode would have taken to much time. So a rework on the movementcode to skip this silly bugs was a needed change.
the overallgameplay was stuck in basicly the same gameplay over and over again. Balance mod or better 250 is trying to open up the tech way, so more strategies and gameplay can happen.
For example, i didnt play public at all because they started shift hive all the time. And celerity was quit uselss infight.
To sum it up, vanilla balance was stuck in a direction there was no easy way out.
Changing it week after week after week, would have made overall players (casual and comp) more angry and the game experience even worth.
And no one can denie that the player numbers was in a ciritical low level. There was a need to do/try something.
Think about trying to balance stuff out. Fixing thinks and then add new feature which completly break the balance again. Then start all over again.
People would have raged about gamebreakers and sewlek couldnt have tested so many diffrent kind of ways to balance this game.
Sewlek balance mod pushed the evolution of NS2 like 2 years into the future, if you compare it to the past balance tweak which have been made.
He was testing a million kind of changes, he got constantly player feedback ingame (mostly casuals who thought this was a fun project of him).
Something UWE never could have done with internal playertesters.
In regards to this, I think it's the best that could happen to NS2. To sad steamgraphs has no real values about the player count of NS2 anymore. Would be interesting to watch the changes in the next week.
I'm not quite sure how to land a kill safely with this new fade to be honest. Stopping to be more accurate, in my opinion, is a deathwish, so perhaps I should use blink to aim my strikes instead of jumping around hoping I'll eventually get him in my line of sight? Not raging just trying to figure out how to work my favorite class. ^_^
Blink swipe blink swipe blink swipe (at most 3 times or you'll run out of energy, preferably in random directions including vertical) then run away. If the marine is not dead, heal then come back and repeat.
Another strategy that works is to keep hopping around the map, swiping any marine that you come by but never stopping to fight them. Turn back if you find a large group of marines. Don't get yourself trapped.
Be extra careful vs. shotguns. Run away earlier vs. flamethrowers. Laugh at grenade launchers. Be scared (but not too much) of exos. Fades can solo exos just fine, but they need level 3 adrenaline to stay in the fight long enough, or lots and lots of running away and chipping their armor. Probably better to bring some friends or let skulks bite the thing down to bits.
The hardest part of fading is knowing when to run away.
most new players leave the game again, because they join a server and u will allways find a player that wont die, all players in enemy team have stats like 4:15 and in other team is one, sometimes two guys with 54:2 stats like this and the rest of his team has maybe just has 2 kills. i will not say its a cheater, and i know i am low at this game. but its wondering why allways one person is on a server that has such stats. no dieing players are allways frustrating. you try to kill him with 3 or 4 skulks, again and again...but allways all 3 skulks are dead and he is still allive. newcomers will frustrate that much.
In regards to this, I think it's the best that could happen to NS2. To sad steamgraphs has no real values about the player count of NS2 anymore. Would be interesting to watch the changes in the next week.
This is a crosspost from the Tactical Gamer forums, but I'll drop it here, in case it may help some.
Long post ahead! But I hope it's helpful.
I can definitely see how 250's massive changes would be overwhelming- I really do feel for some of the players on non TG servers (and those that weren't here during TG's balance test stint) that had no idea it was coming, and suddenly found that they had to relearn movement.
That said, I think a lot of the marine-biased issues are coming from the fact that the aliens have to relearn not only movement, but the team's overall synergy.
Alien synergy changes on a basic level.
On the player side of things: The Lerk has been re-designed essentially to become more of a mix between support and an offensive class (they were supposed to be that way on paper before, but we all know how talented lerks could kill large groups of pub marines solo in the right conditions in build 249). Lerks are still offensive and capable of dealing with 1 or maybe 2 non-shotgun marines by themself, but offensively, they are best off chipping away at health and armor with spikes from a distance, and then (carefully!) swooping in for bites. Charging in like you did before -will- get you killed versus good shots.
The biggest change for Lerks is in their support skills- you can get Umbra with a relatively low amount of biomass (on one hive) from a crag, and this changes the alien teamplay dynamic immensely. Umbra plus the newly buffed gorges and a few skulks makes for terrifying early game "pack" gameplay that you just aren't seeing on pubs yet, since most coms and players don't even know about the umbra swap. (As an aside, combine that with a regen upgrade that works in combat and comm drifter abilities, and it is borderline overpowered).
Skulks have the same role as before, but the rough idea is that they scale now, and "feel" much better in terms of control, and the ability to match up against marines with good aim. Movement tips go beyond the scope of this post (go here: http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/130762/my-basic-explanation-of-new-alien-movement-critique-for-betterment-of-community-p#latest for a good starter guide for skulks and fades), but when you incorporate even a basic form of the new movement and celerity, you end up with a lifeform that in skilled hands actually has a -chance- in a fight with mid-late tech marines, and has fantastic map mobility instead of being the cannon fodder of mid-late game in build 249. There are a few tricks to using the new walljump speed in combat to great effect, but know that charging head on into marines is a fantastic way to see yourself get killed quickly by marines with good aim.
Gorges are cheaper and buffed overall. Early game, you're about the only lifeform that should be choosing carapace. The others should grab regen in most situations, which does stack with your healspray in combat to great effect. Remember to take advantage of pack gameplay, and push as a group to crush strategic positions of the map, while the rest of the team either bites RTs or attempts to snipe vulnerable upgrades in the enemy main. With gorges costing 5 res, it's even cheaper and easier to convince teammates to go for a sneaky bile rush multiple times throughout the game. Watch out for emergency powered structures, but 3-4 gorges with bile can cripple a base frighteningly quickly, even without adrenaline or enzyme.
Once movement is learned, fades benefit from slickly moving in and out of an existing engagement- popping in for a few swipes, sliding out and regening, before running back in for either finishes or to rinse and repeat until you do kill. Beware of shotguns even more so than before- their fire rate has increased, likely to provide marines with more of a defense against the "Fadesplosion" we saw in both pub and competitive matches in 249. The skill requirement to do well has actually been lowered as Fade, despite claims to the contrary, although I'm convinced that we haven't seen the best of what skilled players will be able to do with the new Fade yet.
Onos, to quote someone else, "is still an Onos". Gore range is decreased so jetpacks are a bit scarier and stomp isn't a giant screw you button for groups of marines anymore, but you are still a devastating lifeform when played intelligently (the most important thing being to avoid overcommitment; you should just about always leave a fight earlier than you feel you need to, even if your gorges mock you for it).
On the Khammander side of things:
The biggest thing that I have seen going wrong and that I have been scolded for following when commanding myself, is that very many commanders who play only in public games (and I do not mean that in an insulting way) have a skewed idea of how many RTs they need. Aliens can survive on roughly 2 RTs, and realistically would have about 3 RTs at most times in the game before the (hopefully) inevitable Fadesplosion. Aliens thrive on 4 RTs, are terrifying to marines on 5, and obviously either outskill or outplayed the marines if on 6 or more.
Public commanders were used to tentative marines in the past, and often cysted up two-thirds of the map before 5 minutes were up, and -attempted- to drop as many as 6 RTs, and expected to hold about 4 or more. Again, unless you feel like you've heavily outplayed or outskill your opponent- don't do that!!! Marines are both more confident because of improved hitreg and bullet size, and less likely to turtle because of the Armory-armor changes, so expect more fighting on -your- territory. Factor that in with the drifter (or gorge, or shift echo) limitation on building harvesters, and you should only be cysting to the harvesters in the closest or most defensible locations, and making it a priority for your team to protect them (instead of spreading thin the pack gameplay mentioned above, and trying to have your troops bounce between 5+ harvesters AND keep enemy extractors down).
Just because you now only seek to hold ~3 harvesters doesn't mean you are giving up map control. You still want to be biting down marine res towers and trying to keep their phases out of the key map locations- it's just that you're not burdening your offensive troops with defending half of the map at the same time. With 3-4 harvesters, you can still expect Fades up somewhere between 9 (maybe) to 12 minutes (if you lose a lot of res towers), which is perfect timing if you've been keeping their res down and delaying either their upgrades or other tech.
Overall, I'm extremely happy with the changes in 250 and think that once the new alien changes are incorporated into player gameplay, we will begin to see some stunning games. I don't claim that all of the words above are the gospel- I'm a competitive player but not the top player or on the top team by any means, I just mean to give advice from the perspective of someone that's been scrimming, playing games, and watching games that involve a lot of the changes from 250 (the balance test mod).
This version sucks. You die way too often. Everything have just turned out into a giant spamfest.
Before I always had that little thing that made me launch this game instead of another one. Now I'm just bored to tears and actively looking for something else without a second thought. It's sad.
I like love the upgrade - but some few points I personally dislike:
MARINE SIDE: - MACs can no longer weld each other
Reason:
why? they are dying so damn fast...?
- multiple MACs are no longer able to weld the same target
Reason:
why? macs welding a bit to slow when they are alone. In combination with the “can not weld each other” option macs are now absolutely useless in my opinion. (why not limit macs to 4 per robotics to prevent spamming? if that was the problem?)
- marines can now build on infestation (25% slower) and all structures take damage to armor
Reason:
destroys the important team part: “you need to hold the position until the infestation is gone” also it is now MUCH easier to build very “nasty” phasegates when aliens do not monitor everything carefully...
- marines can now always sprint (no more fatigue)
Reason:
Who can endless sprint in real life? …
Then you can also make a setting “rine_always_sprint=true”...
who will ever “run in normal speed” again?
Maybe just increasing the possible sprint time is an alternative?
ALIEN SIDE: - crags no longer stack their healing with each other and can heal a maximum of 3 targets at once
Reason: I think that is not a really nice change when you read how fast the rines now getting nades and flames.
- whips no longer whack grenades
Reason: I think a littlebit more defence against the (now) nade and flame spamming marines is not wrong.
- cloaked players are always slightly visible
Reason: then camo is useless now ???
- alien structures auto build rate is reduced by 70%, drifters speed up build time to normal rate
Reason: Was it really that inbalanced when build speed stays normal and the drifters speed it up?
MISSING: - more usefull hydras and turrets (higher dmg / more life?)
They are both, in my opinion, still useless... I mean a hydra costs a gorge 3 res.... but the firerate is slow and the damage is minimum... not really defensive at all. nearly the same with turrets. costs much - but are not effective against anything.
But all in all still a nice upgrade for NS2!
... and of course if have to play more to see if I'm correct with my concerns.
Marines:
1) I don't think it's a big deal, especially since multiple MACs can't weld the same target. Most marines will have welders at all times anyway and it is now mostly their responsibility. Do you go forward and push or weld your MACs/structures/teammates, potentially saving them?
2) I like this change since multiple MACs on an exo can be too powerful. Again, welding is now mostly the player's responsibility, forcing you to keep tabs instead of pushing without worry. Welding may be tedious at times, especially during bile bomb spam. You have to decide whether it's best to shoot or weld and I think that adds excitement during confrontations.
3) If a marine or two bypass the front lines and ninja a PG in an important location, I think aliens deserve to be punished. This stresses the importance of scouting and splitting up teammates throughout the map. Checking your minimap is still as important as ever. The khamm has the option to keep uncloaked drifters in areas that are unguarded.
4) Lack of realism isn't a good argument in this game since it's based on the sci-fi genre. Plus, nanites can explain any mechanic that seems strange. :P Infinite sprint is good for marines that need to defend RTs/structures/base asap. Sprinting is still a gamble since you might get caught unawares by an alien or react late to a retreating, lit-up one.
Aliens:
5) I like this change since healing is now more of the gorge's responsibility now. Multiple crags surrounding a hive made for too much insurance and a dull res sink. Forward crags were a bit too strong for aliens assaulting a tech point. Gorges are now forced to juggle between healing and bile bombing. Crag-hive drifters are now an option for khamms that want to actively heal lifeforms.
6) Whips didn't whack grenades in b249 either and I actually like this aspect. GLs are very useful now since they're mainly for killing structures. Aliens are forced to counter-attack instead of biding their time.
7) Camo as been replaced by phantom, which merges camo and silence. I don't have a problem with a slight nerf in light of the merge.
8) I suppose this is the answer to marines/MACs having to spend valuable time building. It frees up some gorge responsibility so that they can fortify far-away rooms earlier.
9) Hydras are supposed to be healed by gorges. If left alone, they still tie up marines that work on clearing them or at least put some damage on runners. Put 2-3 gorges in one room and it results in an effective barricade, especially in early game with skulks killing softened marines. Hydras have always been less useful in mid/end-game due to GLs and I think less focus on static defenses is a good thing.
I am very happy with the performance fixes (here, NS2 is now playable). And the speedier exos.
But fades are really overpowered now, JP / GL and Flamer are too good too early (if there are no good fades in the alien team), and a lot of other things are wrong or wrong-er than before.
Basically, it now seems to take even less good players to completely break a pub game...
Bullet reg seems to be worse than in BT (I didn't read that bullets have volume in the changelog)
Also no panting skulks means it can be incredibly hard to prepare for the super fast skulks. So what if people thought it was a "silly" sound. It worked and people only thought it was silly for the first 2-3 hours of playing it and then they got over the sound really.
I noticed that the explore mod is still not updated. Tooltips tell me that drifters are cloaked scouts and that armories heal armor, and the new alien upgrades don't seem to be working. The explore mod is really the only playground this game has for new players testing stuff out and old players wanting to see the changes, and at the moment it's full of complete bull.
Patch 9/10
Introduction 2/10
You can do what I did and host a passworded listen server and then type cheats 1. That allows the game to start without the minimum 2 players, after which you can play through every little detail normally. Doesn't help new players so much but it's perfect for testing.
@ the people complaining about this "sudden change," they've been posting stuff about bt for a while, mentioning that it would be implemented and to familiarize yourself w/ it. Also, I think it's pretty funny how many people are saying "ns2 is dead!" Obviously it's alive enough for you to come and post on the forums. Cant tell you how many people I've seen in FULL SERVERS saying ns2 is dead... methinks if it was dead, you'd not find any servers. I know some people have trouble in their area finding playable servers. To that, I say force all your friends to play and you won't have that problem
Same game, plays different, small learning curve to adjust, don't toss out the baby w/ the bath water. You'll get used to it.
As it seems, Aliens have two ways of seeing Marines:
- players
- uncloaked Drifters, which cost 5 tres now (instead of 3), have half of their former HP, and make a loud noise so everyone knows they are there
Marines have:
- players
- Obs which covers a big range
- Scan which can be used anywhere on the map
AND THEY CAN NOW BUILD PG ON INFESTATION!!!
It feels unfair to give Marines more attack possibilities and drastically reduce Alien scouting. Are they supposed to have a Skulk on scouting duty all the time just to have the previous level of Marine detection?
What was wrong with cloaked Drifters?
Hiding them in good spots was fun as Alien Comm.
Suspecting a Drifter must be watching you, trying to find it by AR spam or asking the Comm for a scan was fun as a Marine.
Can we make Drifters cloaked again? (even the ***** semi cloak would be something)
And please give them a "follow" option like MACs that have "weld and follow".
As it seems, Aliens have two ways of seeing Marines:
- players
- uncloaked Drifters, which cost 5 tres now (instead of 3), have half of their former HP, and make a loud noise so everyone knows they are there
Marines have:
- players
- Obs which covers a big range
- Scan which can be used anywhere on the map
AND THEY CAN NOW BUILD PG ON INFESTATION!!!
[/b]
Actually drifters cost 3 tres not 5. Also PG on infestation? How different is that from a gorge tunnel right outside of a marine base that doesnt need infestation?
JektJoin Date: 2012-02-05Member: 143714Members, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
edited June 2013
Drifters being cloaked was always a bad mechanic. It requires zero thought, management or skill to place the max limit of drifters in every corner of the map. It was free scouting that often made what should be the parasites primary function obsolete.
Drifters can still be used for scouting, however the alien commander is required to be more aware of drifter locations and react accordingly to the risk / reward of losing the drifter. I think it's a much better system this way.
Well there we go game died at version 250 Onos Bar signing out
thanks god ! thats like the best part of 250
I Stopped reading here tbh. I bet you are on of those guys that if you don't like a TV show, nobody else should watch it either.
The 32 Onos Bar was a great server, I enjoyed it just like I enjoyed the 16 player servers. If you don't like it, don't play it. I am hoping it comes back.
As for the new patch, I played fade, didn't like it the first time, but didn't understand how to move. I'll reserve judgement until I get more time in the game.
Basically, it now seems to take even less good players to completely break a pub game...
seriously think fades are op? riiiight..
in my experience so far, there have now been a lot of good back n forth games, all generally lasting longer too. of course once khamm has figured out new duties, that is. just a new system to adjust to, it's the saaaaame gaaaaame! give it more than twelve hours before you all bail out ffs.
All these people saying fades are better now, thats very interesting. Please remind me why they were changed. For what "balance" purpose was everything about them swapped, with apparantly the same result? Just to piss people off? because it worked.
Well you finally did it, from the first Alpha to 250 - and now I hate the game, what a pile of utter rubbish. Taken the core and twisted it to the worst experiance from the 2fps engine demo. Remove this awful update for the love of god!
Comments
MARINE SIDE:
- MACs can no longer weld each other
Reason:
why? they are dying so damn fast...?
- multiple MACs are no longer able to weld the same target
Reason:
why? macs welding a bit to slow when they are alone. In combination with the “can not weld each other” option macs are now absolutely useless in my opinion. (why not limit macs to 4 per robotics to prevent spamming? if that was the problem?)
- marines can now build on infestation (25% slower) and all structures take damage to armor
Reason:
destroys the important team part: “you need to hold the position until the infestation is gone” also it is now MUCH easier to build very “nasty” phasegates when aliens do not monitor everything carefully...
- marines can now always sprint (no more fatigue)
Reason:
Who can endless sprint in real life? …
Then you can also make a setting “rine_always_sprint=true”...
who will ever “run in normal speed” again?
Maybe just increasing the possible sprint time is an alternative?
ALIEN SIDE:
- crags no longer stack their healing with each other and can heal a maximum of 3 targets at once
Reason: I think that is not a really nice change when you read how fast the rines now getting nades and flames.
- whips no longer whack grenades
Reason: I think a littlebit more defence against the (now) nade and flame spamming marines is not wrong.
- cloaked players are always slightly visible
Reason: then camo is useless now ???
- alien structures auto build rate is reduced by 70%, drifters speed up build time to normal rate
Reason: Was it really that inbalanced when build speed stays normal and the drifters speed it up?
MISSING:
- more usefull hydras and turrets (higher dmg / more life?)
They are both, in my opinion, still useless... I mean a hydra costs a gorge 3 res.... but the firerate is slow and the damage is minimum... not really defensive at all. nearly the same with turrets. costs much - but are not effective against anything.
But all in all still a nice upgrade for NS2!
... and of course if have to play more to see if I'm correct with my concerns.
So please don't try to defend the fact that they released this patch with barely any information.
As if waiting 2 days with a patch is such a disaster... Seriously marketing is worth way more then releasing a patch just for the sake of releasing it.....
And again. I'm not complaining about the patch. I only complained about the frequency of released patches and in this case the lack of information about it. Everything (including the broken explore mode) confirms the fact that they should have waited a couple more days releasing 250.
I had some weird clipping issues in about the last week of BT as well though only noticed it as a skulk when I seemed to get stuck inside a marine on a couple of occasions and couldn't wallclimb up a wall that he was adjacent to.
I think you're interpreting comments made about the movement system in the wrong way, getting down routine map movement isn't supposed to be hugely difficult, the skill component is moving properly in combat, and in the case of skulks being able to get up to a high speed in a low number of jumps. Nobody wants it to be super hard just to keep your momentum going (which is what you're complaining about by the sound of it) because it is supposed to be an entry-level skill that you use as a foundation for doing more interesting stuff. I agree with you in principle that what we have now isn't ideal but it's definitely better than the previous system and has the advantage of being very intuitive for anyone who ever played a game with bunnyhopping.
One change that I would really like to see is a UI element for your current speed (either in absolute or just comparative terms), this was discussed for some time during the balance test but never happened even though it seems like a fantastic bit of feedback for players who are learning movement skills.
what i know or heard is that the movement code which was written in NS2 "vanilla" had some big bugs in it. I would guess that fixing all these bugs in that movementcode would have taken to much time. So a rework on the movementcode to skip this silly bugs was a needed change.
the overallgameplay was stuck in basicly the same gameplay over and over again. Balance mod or better 250 is trying to open up the tech way, so more strategies and gameplay can happen.
For example, i didnt play public at all because they started shift hive all the time. And celerity was quit uselss infight.
To sum it up, vanilla balance was stuck in a direction there was no easy way out.
Changing it week after week after week, would have made overall players (casual and comp) more angry and the game experience even worth.
And no one can denie that the player numbers was in a ciritical low level. There was a need to do/try something.
Think about trying to balance stuff out. Fixing thinks and then add new feature which completly break the balance again. Then start all over again.
People would have raged about gamebreakers and sewlek couldnt have tested so many diffrent kind of ways to balance this game.
Sewlek balance mod pushed the evolution of NS2 like 2 years into the future, if you compare it to the past balance tweak which have been made.
He was testing a million kind of changes, he got constantly player feedback ingame (mostly casuals who thought this was a fun project of him).
Something UWE never could have done with internal playertesters.
So think about 250 as a leap into the future ....
but i saw some new errors in my client console when try to connect
Error: gamestrings/frFR.txt:667:Expected '='
http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/884112065007341774/171319447160B256E4468ABCC44FEF0B947616D5/
http://steamcharts.com/app/4920
Blink swipe blink swipe blink swipe (at most 3 times or you'll run out of energy, preferably in random directions including vertical) then run away. If the marine is not dead, heal then come back and repeat.
Another strategy that works is to keep hopping around the map, swiping any marine that you come by but never stopping to fight them. Turn back if you find a large group of marines. Don't get yourself trapped.
Be extra careful vs. shotguns. Run away earlier vs. flamethrowers. Laugh at grenade launchers. Be scared (but not too much) of exos. Fades can solo exos just fine, but they need level 3 adrenaline to stay in the fight long enough, or lots and lots of running away and chipping their armor. Probably better to bring some friends or let skulks bite the thing down to bits.
The hardest part of fading is knowing when to run away.
Woah! Thanks. This site is a lot cooler.
Long post ahead! But I hope it's helpful.
I can definitely see how 250's massive changes would be overwhelming- I really do feel for some of the players on non TG servers (and those that weren't here during TG's balance test stint) that had no idea it was coming, and suddenly found that they had to relearn movement.
That said, I think a lot of the marine-biased issues are coming from the fact that the aliens have to relearn not only movement, but the team's overall synergy.
Alien synergy changes on a basic level.
On the player side of things: The Lerk has been re-designed essentially to become more of a mix between support and an offensive class (they were supposed to be that way on paper before, but we all know how talented lerks could kill large groups of pub marines solo in the right conditions in build 249). Lerks are still offensive and capable of dealing with 1 or maybe 2 non-shotgun marines by themself, but offensively, they are best off chipping away at health and armor with spikes from a distance, and then (carefully!) swooping in for bites. Charging in like you did before -will- get you killed versus good shots.
The biggest change for Lerks is in their support skills- you can get Umbra with a relatively low amount of biomass (on one hive) from a crag, and this changes the alien teamplay dynamic immensely. Umbra plus the newly buffed gorges and a few skulks makes for terrifying early game "pack" gameplay that you just aren't seeing on pubs yet, since most coms and players don't even know about the umbra swap. (As an aside, combine that with a regen upgrade that works in combat and comm drifter abilities, and it is borderline overpowered).
Skulks have the same role as before, but the rough idea is that they scale now, and "feel" much better in terms of control, and the ability to match up against marines with good aim. Movement tips go beyond the scope of this post (go here: http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/130762/my-basic-explanation-of-new-alien-movement-critique-for-betterment-of-community-p#latest for a good starter guide for skulks and fades), but when you incorporate even a basic form of the new movement and celerity, you end up with a lifeform that in skilled hands actually has a -chance- in a fight with mid-late tech marines, and has fantastic map mobility instead of being the cannon fodder of mid-late game in build 249. There are a few tricks to using the new walljump speed in combat to great effect, but know that charging head on into marines is a fantastic way to see yourself get killed quickly by marines with good aim.
Gorges are cheaper and buffed overall. Early game, you're about the only lifeform that should be choosing carapace. The others should grab regen in most situations, which does stack with your healspray in combat to great effect. Remember to take advantage of pack gameplay, and push as a group to crush strategic positions of the map, while the rest of the team either bites RTs or attempts to snipe vulnerable upgrades in the enemy main. With gorges costing 5 res, it's even cheaper and easier to convince teammates to go for a sneaky bile rush multiple times throughout the game. Watch out for emergency powered structures, but 3-4 gorges with bile can cripple a base frighteningly quickly, even without adrenaline or enzyme.
Fades now punish overcommitment to a fight and trying to kill multiple marines head-on without any sort of plan, the element of surprise, or backup. Again, tips for the new movement are here: http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/130762/my-basic-explanation-of-new-alien-movement-critique-for-betterment-of-community-p#latest. With videoguides here: http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/130369/video-tutorial-build-250-skulk-fade-movement-beginner-to-advanced/p1. Note that the mouse sway he mentions is not necessary (only a smooth change in one direction when turning corners or strafe jumping), and the high speeds he reaches aren't as easy (or possible?) to achieve without celerity and leap.
Once movement is learned, fades benefit from slickly moving in and out of an existing engagement- popping in for a few swipes, sliding out and regening, before running back in for either finishes or to rinse and repeat until you do kill. Beware of shotguns even more so than before- their fire rate has increased, likely to provide marines with more of a defense against the "Fadesplosion" we saw in both pub and competitive matches in 249. The skill requirement to do well has actually been lowered as Fade, despite claims to the contrary, although I'm convinced that we haven't seen the best of what skilled players will be able to do with the new Fade yet.
Onos, to quote someone else, "is still an Onos". Gore range is decreased so jetpacks are a bit scarier and stomp isn't a giant screw you button for groups of marines anymore, but you are still a devastating lifeform when played intelligently (the most important thing being to avoid overcommitment; you should just about always leave a fight earlier than you feel you need to, even if your gorges mock you for it).
On the Khammander side of things:
The biggest thing that I have seen going wrong and that I have been scolded for following when commanding myself, is that very many commanders who play only in public games (and I do not mean that in an insulting way) have a skewed idea of how many RTs they need. Aliens can survive on roughly 2 RTs, and realistically would have about 3 RTs at most times in the game before the (hopefully) inevitable Fadesplosion. Aliens thrive on 4 RTs, are terrifying to marines on 5, and obviously either outskill or outplayed the marines if on 6 or more.
Public commanders were used to tentative marines in the past, and often cysted up two-thirds of the map before 5 minutes were up, and -attempted- to drop as many as 6 RTs, and expected to hold about 4 or more. Again, unless you feel like you've heavily outplayed or outskill your opponent- don't do that!!! Marines are both more confident because of improved hitreg and bullet size, and less likely to turtle because of the Armory-armor changes, so expect more fighting on -your- territory. Factor that in with the drifter (or gorge, or shift echo) limitation on building harvesters, and you should only be cysting to the harvesters in the closest or most defensible locations, and making it a priority for your team to protect them (instead of spreading thin the pack gameplay mentioned above, and trying to have your troops bounce between 5+ harvesters AND keep enemy extractors down).
Just because you now only seek to hold ~3 harvesters doesn't mean you are giving up map control. You still want to be biting down marine res towers and trying to keep their phases out of the key map locations- it's just that you're not burdening your offensive troops with defending half of the map at the same time. With 3-4 harvesters, you can still expect Fades up somewhere between 9 (maybe) to 12 minutes (if you lose a lot of res towers), which is perfect timing if you've been keeping their res down and delaying either their upgrades or other tech.
Overall, I'm extremely happy with the changes in 250 and think that once the new alien changes are incorporated into player gameplay, we will begin to see some stunning games. I don't claim that all of the words above are the gospel- I'm a competitive player but not the top player or on the top team by any means, I just mean to give advice from the perspective of someone that's been scrimming, playing games, and watching games that involve a lot of the changes from 250 (the balance test mod).
Before I always had that little thing that made me launch this game instead of another one. Now I'm just bored to tears and actively looking for something else without a second thought. It's sad.
Build 250 is an epic fail.
1) I don't think it's a big deal, especially since multiple MACs can't weld the same target. Most marines will have welders at all times anyway and it is now mostly their responsibility. Do you go forward and push or weld your MACs/structures/teammates, potentially saving them?
2) I like this change since multiple MACs on an exo can be too powerful. Again, welding is now mostly the player's responsibility, forcing you to keep tabs instead of pushing without worry. Welding may be tedious at times, especially during bile bomb spam. You have to decide whether it's best to shoot or weld and I think that adds excitement during confrontations.
3) If a marine or two bypass the front lines and ninja a PG in an important location, I think aliens deserve to be punished. This stresses the importance of scouting and splitting up teammates throughout the map. Checking your minimap is still as important as ever. The khamm has the option to keep uncloaked drifters in areas that are unguarded.
4) Lack of realism isn't a good argument in this game since it's based on the sci-fi genre. Plus, nanites can explain any mechanic that seems strange. :P Infinite sprint is good for marines that need to defend RTs/structures/base asap. Sprinting is still a gamble since you might get caught unawares by an alien or react late to a retreating, lit-up one.
Aliens:
5) I like this change since healing is now more of the gorge's responsibility now. Multiple crags surrounding a hive made for too much insurance and a dull res sink. Forward crags were a bit too strong for aliens assaulting a tech point. Gorges are now forced to juggle between healing and bile bombing. Crag-hive drifters are now an option for khamms that want to actively heal lifeforms.
6) Whips didn't whack grenades in b249 either and I actually like this aspect. GLs are very useful now since they're mainly for killing structures. Aliens are forced to counter-attack instead of biding their time.
7) Camo as been replaced by phantom, which merges camo and silence. I don't have a problem with a slight nerf in light of the merge.
8) I suppose this is the answer to marines/MACs having to spend valuable time building. It frees up some gorge responsibility so that they can fortify far-away rooms earlier.
9) Hydras are supposed to be healed by gorges. If left alone, they still tie up marines that work on clearing them or at least put some damage on runners. Put 2-3 gorges in one room and it results in an effective barricade, especially in early game with skulks killing softened marines. Hydras have always been less useful in mid/end-game due to GLs and I think less focus on static defenses is a good thing.
But fades are really overpowered now, JP / GL and Flamer are too good too early (if there are no good fades in the alien team), and a lot of other things are wrong or wrong-er than before.
Basically, it now seems to take even less good players to completely break a pub game...
Also no panting skulks means it can be incredibly hard to prepare for the super fast skulks. So what if people thought it was a "silly" sound. It worked and people only thought it was silly for the first 2-3 hours of playing it and then they got over the sound really.
Paradigm shifts?
Discovery of gravity changed a whole lot of things and it's not as if the world fell apart...
You can do what I did and host a passworded listen server and then type cheats 1. That allows the game to start without the minimum 2 players, after which you can play through every little detail normally. Doesn't help new players so much but it's perfect for testing.
Yeah since I really hate it.
Actually a lot of popular games do this on a regular basis.
Same game, plays different, small learning curve to adjust, don't toss out the baby w/ the bath water. You'll get used to it.
As it seems, Aliens have two ways of seeing Marines:
- players
- uncloaked Drifters, which cost 5 tres now (instead of 3), have half of their former HP, and make a loud noise so everyone knows they are there
Marines have:
- players
- Obs which covers a big range
- Scan which can be used anywhere on the map
AND THEY CAN NOW BUILD PG ON INFESTATION!!!
It feels unfair to give Marines more attack possibilities and drastically reduce Alien scouting. Are they supposed to have a Skulk on scouting duty all the time just to have the previous level of Marine detection?
What was wrong with cloaked Drifters?
Hiding them in good spots was fun as Alien Comm.
Suspecting a Drifter must be watching you, trying to find it by AR spam or asking the Comm for a scan was fun as a Marine.
Can we make Drifters cloaked again? (even the ***** semi cloak would be something)
And please give them a "follow" option like MACs that have "weld and follow".
Actually drifters cost 3 tres not 5. Also PG on infestation? How different is that from a gorge tunnel right outside of a marine base that doesnt need infestation?
Drifters can still be used for scouting, however the alien commander is required to be more aware of drifter locations and react accordingly to the risk / reward of losing the drifter. I think it's a much better system this way.
I Stopped reading here tbh. I bet you are on of those guys that if you don't like a TV show, nobody else should watch it either.
The 32 Onos Bar was a great server, I enjoyed it just like I enjoyed the 16 player servers. If you don't like it, don't play it. I am hoping it comes back.
As for the new patch, I played fade, didn't like it the first time, but didn't understand how to move. I'll reserve judgement until I get more time in the game.
in my experience so far, there have now been a lot of good back n forth games, all generally lasting longer too. of course once khamm has figured out new duties, that is. just a new system to adjust to, it's the saaaaame gaaaaame! give it more than twelve hours before you all bail out ffs.