Marines With Balls

Nordo

<div class="IPBDescription">Nonstop marine attack vs panicked aliens</div> Ever since the first patch, I've seen marines lose EVERY game, except for two recent ones. The first marine win happened almost by accident. Not even 5 minutes into the game, the commander sent a group of about 3 of us to go check out one of the hive site near a resource spot we were farming. It just happened to be the main hive! A moment later, we had every marine on the team there hosing the place down with lead.

It was a lame win, but the commander really took it to heart because the next game we played intense offense. We put some turrets down in the base, then grabbed a resource spot and continued on after it to take the nearest hive. All game long we just moved in to a new place, threw up some turrets, and moved on. It was really frentic, and a lot of fun, especially because it paid off. The commander really heavily favored minibases decked out with armory, sentries and sieges over quickly handing out fancy weapons and upgrades. A lot of commanders seem to try to cap resource spots and then expend a ton of energy and marines trying to protect them, this time it seemed that the alien team didn't have a spare moment to take out our resources because they were so busy dealing with us and our forward bases.

This happened on the map with the double doored marine base, but can it work on every map? What are some commanders' thoughts on the whole whirlwind attack plan?

Sirus

im sure uve heard "the best defense is a good offense", the funny thing is that most of the time its not true, especially in true RTS'. but in NS it seems to be particularly true, i agree with you as to putting the pressure on early in game, my only problem is when all marines go to the hive, and all aliens go to the marine spawn point. then its just whoever gets lucky and catches someone offguard cuz the hive and the CC are gone. i suppose sending a large number of marines to the hive and a keeping 2 marines building in the spawn is a good idea. frankly ive never really tried that becuz people are so damn uncooperative.

mwells

The marines have to be aggressive to win, they can't turtle up, because the Kharaa will crack them open like a cashew.

I've been witness to many marine victories, with and against. <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo--> The commander should know what he or she is doing, and should deny the aliens their hives, the only way to do that is to strike hard, fast and coordinated. Sitting back in base and hoping the aliens will get bored and sleep in a coal furnace won't solve a thing.

Speaking of which, I was just under a commander today from [TG], I forget his name.. It didn't occur to me at the time, but when the game ended, I realized that I had never been issued heavy armor, a jetpack, any sort of premium weapon... Then I thought back, and nobody did! The commander handed out <b>maybe</b> two HMGs when the fades were getting thick, but his organization and complete control of the map eliminated the need for armor and heavy guns. We won, and damn was it sweet.

Injury

You must have had one hell of a commander to achieve that, I can imagine the red faces on the alien team..

Out of curiosity, turret farms all over the place, or no?

Tomten

I played a couple of games today, as commander. The trick is to be on the offense the entire time, and deny the Kharaa resources.

I usually expand the locations where I can create chokepoints, where the Kharaa will have problem going through. I build up a decent defense there, and then build a number of unprotected resource towers between the chokepoint and the mainbase. This usually works well, and most of the time, the aliens just keep on attacking the well defended chokepoint <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->

When attacking, I always leave a marine or two on defense. In a 6vs6 game, I would let 3 marines attack and 2 defend and build. If I see that our team has an advantage, I would switch all marines to attack, preferably on different locations, to confuse the Kharaa.

One thing I really like doing is setting a small group of marines to build artillery on some sneaky location just outside the alien hive. Quite often i've managed to take out the Kharaa even before they managed to build a second hive <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo-->

Narfwak

Marines trying to play "simbase" will die. Always. There is no way to win a completely defensive game, especially as marine. In fact, this is the way I've seen most marine teams lose - not because the alien players outskilled them, because they took the initiative. This is why repelling the initial skulk rush then <i>moving on</i> is so important.

mwells

<!--QuoteBegin--Injury+Nov 23 2002, 06:24 PM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Injury @ Nov 23 2002, 06:24 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->You must have had one hell of a commander to achieve that, I can imagine the red faces on the alien team..

Out of curiosity, turret farms all over the place, or no?<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Nope. We had adequate turret coverage, but not overcrowding. He kicked **obscenity**, even though he called me a "fuckign n00b" for dying a few times.

MrBatman

Of the five last games I've been in (on different servers), Marines have kicked **obscenity** all five times. The first 4 I played alien, but the last time I was a marine. I was playing on a pub and it became readily apparent that there were a lot of kids. Nobody was listening to orders, everyone was running off alone being Rambo, and getting killed. They would see an alien, and all scatter afraid instead of fighting as a team. I tried to take the command chair but when I saw everyone running off in 5 different directions I said "f*** this." I turned the command chair over to one of the other marines and did what I do best: field command. I told the commander, "just follow us, support us, work on upgrades and put things where I tell you we need them." Then I got the kiddies together and we rushed Maintenance (this was on Eclipse). We got there just as a gorge was putting up a hive ... we took out the Gorge and the hive and put up a base. I told one guy to stay behind and the rest to follow me, and we rushed the computer core hive, which turned out to be their spawn. We met minimal resistance, and after our squad got wiped out about 3 or 4 times we finally took control of computer core. By this time I had my squad working as a team, as they saw they were kicking **obscenity** they became much more eager to follow orders and stay together. I said "ok, one person volunteer to stay behind, the rest, with me!" and we struck out after Eclipse command. We ran into some problems in Triad, but we kept the pressure up, and by this time we had heavy armor and weapons. I knew they were getting desperate when they started hitting us as lerks, using up their precious resources and time. Just as we were about to take Eclipse command, I got a call over my comm from the man I left behind in Computer core that that base had fallen. I told my group to continue the assault and take out this hive, and apparently the rest of my fighting force which had respawned, now acting as a group, went to Computer core and finished off the bugs. <!--emo&::asrifle::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'><!--endemo--> <!--emo&::skulk::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'><!--endemo--> The key to my gameplan was simple: keep moving. Don't let up, don't turtle, don't take time to build turret farms around every resource point. Keep the aliens on the run and off balance, keep them on the defensive, never let up on the heat. And it worked. <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->