You can't have 2 balance changes (one for comp and one for pubs) When you change the game to facilitate a lower skill group, no matter how large, the higher skilled players will have more of an advantage than they already do by understanding how to play the game.
Let's suppose you buff the Fade as you suggest. Faster energy regen, more hp, and more structure damage. Yes, you make it make it easier for newer and less skilled players to adapt and perform well as a fade. However, imagine how higher skilled players will perform considering they already excel at fade at its current iteration. You would see more complaints of "Fade OP" than you already do.
For the balance thing, I know it wouldn't work unless the devs were total geniuses at figuring it out. As for the fade thing, I meant that say both teams were of near-equal skill, the fade still cant maintain a large enough presence in teamfights. Also I didn't suggest those things. I suggested giving more agility so that fades have a larger window to do damage, give them very high hp regen outside of fights so that they don't have to keep wasting time healing at base, or doing something that could increase the amount of damage they can do in their limited time window since they are single-target killers and that means have to kill marines one at a time which doesn't let them do as much damage in teamfights because of their limited window to deal damage. Currently the fade is best at 1v1 fights or chasing/cleaning up but it should be able to do more for the res it costs to the khamm and to the player.
Alright so I checked out one of the matches on twitch. The biggest differences I saw was better communication and better teamwork, but I kind of already expected that and I still see that sometimes in pub matched (depending on server). However, gameplay-wise, it still looked a lot like a regular NS2 match. Each individual fight still looked like the ones I see in pub matches, albeit maybe more organized than the majority of pub matches. I don't see any special gameplay for individual players, just more refined from experience, which a good number of pub players can do too.
Fade upgrades definitely need a lot of help..... Even if your team is completely dependent on Fades, they simply don't need upgrades.
Aren't those two sentences contradicting one another?
I agree with the second one, for the record.
Not really.
Fades can get by without upgrades in their current form and still be effective. That doesn't necessarily mean that they shouldn't have upgrades (decent ones) as long as it doesn't make them too overpowered.
Alright so I checked out one of the matches on twitch. The biggest differences I saw was better communication and better teamwork, but I kind of already expected that and I still see that sometimes in pub matched (depending on server). However, gameplay-wise, it still looked a lot like a regular NS2 match. Each individual fight still looked like the ones I see in pub matches, albeit maybe more organized than the majority of pub matches. I don't see any special gameplay for individual players, just more refined from experience, which a good number of pub players can do too.
Alright so I checked out one of the matches on twitch. The biggest differences I saw was better communication and better teamwork, but I kind of already expected that and I still see that sometimes in pub matched (depending on server). However, gameplay-wise, it still looked a lot like a regular NS2 match. Each individual fight still looked like the ones I see in pub matches, albeit maybe more organized than the majority of pub matches. I don't see any special gameplay for individual players, just more refined from experience, which a good number of pub players can do too.
Right, let's just imagine you didnt mention a random game you watched on twitch, and let's just pretend no one wants to know what or who played, for everyones sake. Please.
In response to the original topic, yes they should be more advanced and that should be by their upgrades. The main problems fades face as games go on longer is that their damage/health/utility remains the same through out the whole game, in common the fade gameplay is based on hit-n-run due to them being easier to hit, having cara/celerity only helps so much to either let you get into fights faster or giving you more health to work with, but if you're not able to win those fights, you are forced away from the fights to heal up at crags/hives/etc. Now this is perfectly fine at 8-12mins in, before onos's pop out because marines usually don't have an upperhand through upgrades. But if you just turtle up and tech up, fades become very frustrating to play with.
Personally i like shadowstep, but it serves a very small purpose for a fade, you already have your movement ability and it makes little sense in having another one unless it's greatly superior to the normal one(ie. vastly reduced energy cost and no movement reduces, perhaps even increasing movement).
Vortex is just silly, another movement ability that is way too clumsy to use will get you killed more than actually being useful. You'll do the same damage with just blinking rather than this.
Stab, another ability that could be alright without the movement reduce and the ridiculous biomass requirement.
My 2 cents:
- Scrap Vortex completely, give metabolize back from ns1(basicly ability that regens energy+hp at x-rate, can be tuned to be "ok") to replace it.
- Change Stab so fades do normal damage to structures with it, remove the movement penalty all together essentially you would use Stab instead of Swipe 'once you get it'.
- Shadowstep can either stay as it is, or reduce energy requirements(if you would change the above abilities, then the current shadowstep could be good enough tho), one alteration would be to make it completely free to use, but give it a cooldown.
- Figure out the most acceptable biomass levels for Metabolize/Stab, as it stands 5 biomass/8 biomass is too high, the hive requirements alone make them unaccessable.
ps. this is all from comp pov, you could let everything be biomass 1 for pub games, thats how irrelevant they are.
I personally think fade should be much harder,should be that lifeform in NS2 that has more skill-oriented gameplay.
Fades already have a very high skill ceiling. A skilled fade can significantly outperform an unskilled fade. It takes a lot of time to master the fade. The consequences of being an unskilled fade are that you tend to die very quickly or have a low rate of enemy kills. If you are unsure or don't believe some or all of this, I can dig up some videos of first-person fade play which demonstrate all of the above. Just let me know.
Right now, the fade is less useful compared to other lifeforms.
Have you considered the cost of the fade in comparison of other lifeforms?
Have you considered the earliest possible time a fade can arrive on the battlefield compared to other lifeforms?
Have you put that in context of a normal round of NS2 (15-25min).
Have you considered even the competitive team do not use one particular life-form exclusively? (though this was once the case, and guess which lifeform they chose...)
Do you understand the role of the fade? (see next paragraph)
It is mainly used for drawing fire and assisting phase gate destruction from my experience as the other lifeforms are often better in other cases (onos still draws fire better, but not as good at escaping to make it useful enough).
This characterisation is actually pretty fair if you have some mastery of movement but have difficulty landing swipes on moving marines. As your swipe accuracy improves, you will discover the fade is a kind of tanky-ninja-assassin. The fade's blink and later shadowstep/vortex are all geared towards mobility. At the pinnacle of fade play, the fade appears immediately beside an unaware marine and deals devastating damage, disappearing before the marine can respond. Obviously for us mere mortals, we take a bit of damage blinking in and out of combat, as well as missing some of the swipes. None the less, the Fade is the best lifeform for killing a lone marine (aka rambo) AND the best at hit and run tactics, all thanks to its extreme mobility.
@Ots you summed up a lot of what I said, but put it in a better way. I commend you on that.
@Khyron, I seem to have explained what I meant to say wrong (I'm not always good with explaining myself), and so you might be misunderstanding what I was trying to say. I have considered all those things. Also I usually see most NS2 rounds last longer than 15-25 minutes, but maybe that's just in the servers I play in? I didn't find the fade that hard to play after I got most of NS2 down, but maybe it is for others and that's why I wouldn't know if it's hard for others (I have played many different games, so I have gotten used to picking things up a bit quickly). I know the fades role and my swipe accuracy is good. All those things you mentioned is for the most part, true. However, like Ots explained, fade's usefulness tends to drop later in the game. They are good at 1v1 and 1v2 (1v1 only if they have good equipment), and working away from the rest of the team. However, this quality is a lot less useful as the game goes on because marines get enhanced mobility and changes in map control only happen with groups of players. They cannot have as much presence in teamfights because they attack targets one at a time and I explained why they aren't very useful in team-fights for the res they consume (compared to lerk, gorge, and onos).
Basically, the fade's role isn't as useful during late game.
Soul_RiderMod BeanJoin Date: 2004-06-19Member: 29388Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue
The fade is not meant to be toe-to-toe in team fights, it is meant to be picking off the marines running away from the team fight, or sitting just a little too far away from their team-mates. You blink in, do some damage, and get out.
The fade isn't always about killing. In team fights it is the other life-forms who should be in doing the killing, the fade should be lowering marine health and armor for skulks and lerks to mop up. The fade role is amazing outside of big team fights. If you make it also good at team-fights, you have an OP weapon.
The fade is and always has been (especially in NS1 with blocking) about single player combat and not group fighting. You are essentially asking for the fade to become a super-warrior capable of killing marines in any situation. If that is the case, why not get rid of all the other alien classes and just have the fade?
This is a team game. To attack marines you need a balanced mixed of alien classes, not one class to dominate them all, which is exactly what you are asking for.
In combination with all of what has been said, the current game balance is pretty neat currently, fade upgrades and hallucination are the only aspects of the game that are not worth it, and could bring the game more depth when fixed. And as far as i know, hallucination changes are coming up in next builds, unless i missed them already.. So with that, fades are in a good spot atm, but they can be better(and should) in the lategame.
@coolitic, i hope my narrative is enough to end this topic and let you go promote some idea or thoughtline on the ideas&suggestions forum.
@coolitic
Whatever your particular experiences are, evidence suggests about 90% of matches end within 30 mins, as you can see here. Acknowledging the length of 'normal' games is important because it puts context on the arrival of certain lifeforms on the battlefield. Getting a good fade in play earlier gives the aliens an advantage. If the arrival of the first fade is quite late in the game, that advantage is diminished. This is a universal property of NS - the advantage gained by earlier access to any technology, lifeforms and upgrades diminishes as the game progresses. Both sides are in a race.
I don't understand why you think fades aren't as useful in the late game. Is that because of armour upgrades or jetpacks or something else?
After all this, it's not clear to me if you still want your original suggestion or if your goals have changed.
Fades can get by without upgrades in their current form and still be effective....That doesn't necessarily mean that they shouldn't have upgrades (decent ones) as long as it doesn't make them too overpowered.
See this is where i believe IF they are truly effective without them... then giving them anything extra by definition makes them overpowered.
I can see the argument for making something more fun and not affecting balance... but anything you'd typically consider "decent" or really just the typical usage of "upgrade".. i would suggest it is not needed
As you said they are already effective without it.. so what would be more than effective? Overpowered. Needlessly so. *stares at winrate*
Basically, the fade's role isn't as useful during late game.
Dude, do you not read or comprehend what I and others have said several times in the past? The Fade's role is practically the same and just as important in the mid-game as it is in the late game. I'm not going to write another novel for a post explaining its purpose and why its important because I have already explained it twice and others have corroborated it as accurate. Just because they don't do physical damage to RTs doesn't mean they are less effective than say a Lerk. Each lifeform has it's purpose and if played properly, a fade will have just as much of an impact in the late game as an Onos.
As far as i understand, and what i responded with is in gametime sense rounds after 15-20mins, where you have your basic 2hive aliens going against 2/2 marines. In the current meta we use onos'es to try finish the games be it either clearing pg's, or rushing base power/arms/cc etc. If we are not able to do so already with skulk/lerk/fade's. As per suggestions i said earlier, the 'balance' we have now wouldnt be affected at all, but games where marines opt to turtle out to outtech, aliens would be able to do those game ending pushed with fades easier, ie. grind pgs/powernodes/arms/ip's. As it is now, lifeform deaths make and break the game, and it's hellava lot easier to accumulate res for your 2nd fade/lerk, than it is for an onos.
I don't agree changing the fade except its abilities, all other life forms are worth researching but every commander knows he can save 35 res not researching fade upgrades because not only are they useless, but no one uses them which correlates to the first problem.
Therefore, I present a list of possible changes to the abilities fades may have which would make the abilities worth researching:
* Pretty much anything.
Every alien ability upgrades is to counter something, gorge is self explanatory, skulk is to counter jet packs and getting in close faster once upgrades start coming out. Lerk to counter weapon upgrades, onos to make enough damage and get away without dying. (yes, there's more, no need to point it out)
Fades get another movement ability which drains tons of energy, and a useless stab which, can be trained to be sort of effective, but statistically speaking increases your chance of getting instagibbed by a shotgun with 30%
@NeXuS, I read your post, I simply disagree with you, and have said why. Maybe I'm just not good at explaining myself, hence why you may not understand my argument. I guess I'll let others argue that point then.
@coolitic
Whatever your particular experiences are, evidence suggests about 90% of matches end within 30 mins, as you can see here...
Erm, I noticed that the site you have shown uses the kingkahuna games server quite alot, which may have a different community than the servers I play in. Also, long games will show there less often since the long time means less frequency, but still the different community's might be it.
At this point I would be happy to drop the current fade abilities (although I do use SS when it's available) and just have the fade get a percentage of the non chosen upgrades. For example, evolving adren would also give you 20-30% of the speed boost that choosing celerity would have.
I did enjoy the old vortex though. Was there ever an official reason for removing it given?
Erm, I noticed that the site you have shown uses the kingkahuna games server quite alot, which may have a different community than the servers I play in. Also, long games will show there less often since the long time means less frequency, but still the different community's might be it.
What is the average length of an NS2 game in your experience?
Just had a god awful 70 min round on 24slot server last night with just horrendous players on both sides with 3hives against 3/3/jp/exo marines for more than half of it, and i sure as hell couldve more than halved of that time if my fade would at least at some point do normal damage to structures. Was so beat i couldnt play ns2 after it, yet when the round ended all the scrubs went "WOW GOOD GAME GUYS". >_<
The site linked is NS2Stats.com, the site that records ALL the stats that are sent in via the shine admin plugin, which is most gaming sites around the US and Europe. It is the site that records more stats data than anything else in NS2, and is the most accurate site available for NS2 statistics. Why pick 1 server out of the
80+ that sent data in the last few days?
I just don't understand that despite the fact you are the only person in the world that agrees with your point, you can't stop for 2 seconds and go, hang on, maybe some of these people who have 1000's of hours experience in this game, and have been playing it for the last 3 years or so, might know something you don't.
Without being funny you sound very much like a young me, but I have an excuse to be like that, as I have aspergers...
^^
I guess it would be nice and it would be funny for marines when that marine unexpectedly (to the fade at least) goes into a room with sentries/exos and the fade gets screwed. Like blink dagger.
Comments
For the balance thing, I know it wouldn't work unless the devs were total geniuses at figuring it out. As for the fade thing, I meant that say both teams were of near-equal skill, the fade still cant maintain a large enough presence in teamfights. Also I didn't suggest those things. I suggested giving more agility so that fades have a larger window to do damage, give them very high hp regen outside of fights so that they don't have to keep wasting time healing at base, or doing something that could increase the amount of damage they can do in their limited time window since they are single-target killers and that means have to kill marines one at a time which doesn't let them do as much damage in teamfights because of their limited window to deal damage. Currently the fade is best at 1v1 fights or chasing/cleaning up but it should be able to do more for the res it costs to the khamm and to the player.
I agree with the second one, for the record.
Not really.
Fades can get by without upgrades in their current form and still be effective. That doesn't necessarily mean that they shouldn't have upgrades (decent ones) as long as it doesn't make them too overpowered.
Oh man. I lol'd
In response to the original topic, yes they should be more advanced and that should be by their upgrades. The main problems fades face as games go on longer is that their damage/health/utility remains the same through out the whole game, in common the fade gameplay is based on hit-n-run due to them being easier to hit, having cara/celerity only helps so much to either let you get into fights faster or giving you more health to work with, but if you're not able to win those fights, you are forced away from the fights to heal up at crags/hives/etc. Now this is perfectly fine at 8-12mins in, before onos's pop out because marines usually don't have an upperhand through upgrades. But if you just turtle up and tech up, fades become very frustrating to play with.
Personally i like shadowstep, but it serves a very small purpose for a fade, you already have your movement ability and it makes little sense in having another one unless it's greatly superior to the normal one(ie. vastly reduced energy cost and no movement reduces, perhaps even increasing movement).
Vortex is just silly, another movement ability that is way too clumsy to use will get you killed more than actually being useful. You'll do the same damage with just blinking rather than this.
Stab, another ability that could be alright without the movement reduce and the ridiculous biomass requirement.
My 2 cents:
- Scrap Vortex completely, give metabolize back from ns1(basicly ability that regens energy+hp at x-rate, can be tuned to be "ok") to replace it.
- Change Stab so fades do normal damage to structures with it, remove the movement penalty all together essentially you would use Stab instead of Swipe 'once you get it'.
- Shadowstep can either stay as it is, or reduce energy requirements(if you would change the above abilities, then the current shadowstep could be good enough tho), one alteration would be to make it completely free to use, but give it a cooldown.
- Figure out the most acceptable biomass levels for Metabolize/Stab, as it stands 5 biomass/8 biomass is too high, the hive requirements alone make them unaccessable.
ps. this is all from comp pov, you could let everything be biomass 1 for pub games, thats how irrelevant they are.
Fades already have a very high skill ceiling. A skilled fade can significantly outperform an unskilled fade. It takes a lot of time to master the fade. The consequences of being an unskilled fade are that you tend to die very quickly or have a low rate of enemy kills. If you are unsure or don't believe some or all of this, I can dig up some videos of first-person fade play which demonstrate all of the above. Just let me know.
Have you considered the cost of the fade in comparison of other lifeforms?
Have you considered the earliest possible time a fade can arrive on the battlefield compared to other lifeforms?
Have you put that in context of a normal round of NS2 (15-25min).
Have you considered even the competitive team do not use one particular life-form exclusively? (though this was once the case, and guess which lifeform they chose...)
Do you understand the role of the fade? (see next paragraph)
This characterisation is actually pretty fair if you have some mastery of movement but have difficulty landing swipes on moving marines. As your swipe accuracy improves, you will discover the fade is a kind of tanky-ninja-assassin. The fade's blink and later shadowstep/vortex are all geared towards mobility. At the pinnacle of fade play, the fade appears immediately beside an unaware marine and deals devastating damage, disappearing before the marine can respond. Obviously for us mere mortals, we take a bit of damage blinking in and out of combat, as well as missing some of the swipes. None the less, the Fade is the best lifeform for killing a lone marine (aka rambo) AND the best at hit and run tactics, all thanks to its extreme mobility.
The ideas & suggestions forum is over here. But I hope after reading some of the above you reconsider the merits of the changes you propose.
@Khyron, I seem to have explained what I meant to say wrong (I'm not always good with explaining myself), and so you might be misunderstanding what I was trying to say. I have considered all those things. Also I usually see most NS2 rounds last longer than 15-25 minutes, but maybe that's just in the servers I play in? I didn't find the fade that hard to play after I got most of NS2 down, but maybe it is for others and that's why I wouldn't know if it's hard for others (I have played many different games, so I have gotten used to picking things up a bit quickly). I know the fades role and my swipe accuracy is good. All those things you mentioned is for the most part, true. However, like Ots explained, fade's usefulness tends to drop later in the game. They are good at 1v1 and 1v2 (1v1 only if they have good equipment), and working away from the rest of the team. However, this quality is a lot less useful as the game goes on because marines get enhanced mobility and changes in map control only happen with groups of players. They cannot have as much presence in teamfights because they attack targets one at a time and I explained why they aren't very useful in team-fights for the res they consume (compared to lerk, gorge, and onos).
Basically, the fade's role isn't as useful during late game.
The fade isn't always about killing. In team fights it is the other life-forms who should be in doing the killing, the fade should be lowering marine health and armor for skulks and lerks to mop up. The fade role is amazing outside of big team fights. If you make it also good at team-fights, you have an OP weapon.
The fade is and always has been (especially in NS1 with blocking) about single player combat and not group fighting. You are essentially asking for the fade to become a super-warrior capable of killing marines in any situation. If that is the case, why not get rid of all the other alien classes and just have the fade?
This is a team game. To attack marines you need a balanced mixed of alien classes, not one class to dominate them all, which is exactly what you are asking for.
@coolitic, i hope my narrative is enough to end this topic and let you go promote some idea or thoughtline on the ideas&suggestions forum.
Whatever your particular experiences are, evidence suggests about 90% of matches end within 30 mins, as you can see here. Acknowledging the length of 'normal' games is important because it puts context on the arrival of certain lifeforms on the battlefield. Getting a good fade in play earlier gives the aliens an advantage. If the arrival of the first fade is quite late in the game, that advantage is diminished. This is a universal property of NS - the advantage gained by earlier access to any technology, lifeforms and upgrades diminishes as the game progresses. Both sides are in a race.
I don't understand why you think fades aren't as useful in the late game. Is that because of armour upgrades or jetpacks or something else?
After all this, it's not clear to me if you still want your original suggestion or if your goals have changed.
I can see the argument for making something more fun and not affecting balance... but anything you'd typically consider "decent" or really just the typical usage of "upgrade".. i would suggest it is not needed
As you said they are already effective without it.. so what would be more than effective? Overpowered. Needlessly so. *stares at winrate*
Therefore, I present a list of possible changes to the abilities fades may have which would make the abilities worth researching:
* Pretty much anything.
Every alien ability upgrades is to counter something, gorge is self explanatory, skulk is to counter jet packs and getting in close faster once upgrades start coming out. Lerk to counter weapon upgrades, onos to make enough damage and get away without dying. (yes, there's more, no need to point it out)
Fades get another movement ability which drains tons of energy, and a useless stab which, can be trained to be sort of effective, but statistically speaking increases your chance of getting instagibbed by a shotgun with 30%
Erm, I noticed that the site you have shown uses the kingkahuna games server quite alot, which may have a different community than the servers I play in. Also, long games will show there less often since the long time means less frequency, but still the different community's might be it.
From the post you said summarized your thoughts.
I did enjoy the old vortex though. Was there ever an official reason for removing it given?
The site linked is NS2Stats.com, the site that records ALL the stats that are sent in via the shine admin plugin, which is most gaming sites around the US and Europe. It is the site that records more stats data than anything else in NS2, and is the most accurate site available for NS2 statistics. Why pick 1 server out of the
80+ that sent data in the last few days?
I just don't understand that despite the fact you are the only person in the world that agrees with your point, you can't stop for 2 seconds and go, hang on, maybe some of these people who have 1000's of hours experience in this game, and have been playing it for the last 3 years or so, might know something you don't.
Without being funny you sound very much like a young me, but I have an excuse to be like that, as I have aspergers...
So if you use it, and you've slashed a marine within the last 10 seconds or whatever, it teleports you to that player.
So swipe, swipe, blink away and dont get caught.... vortex, swipe, get kills, tee hee.
Could be useful for avoiding pinches, and also useful as an offensive move. Possibly OP, what do you think?
I guess it would be nice and it would be funny for marines when that marine unexpectedly (to the fade at least) goes into a room with sentries/exos and the fade gets screwed. Like blink dagger.
Nah I'm just saying kingkahuna games showed up quite often.