A grenade shouldn't be usable in close-range combat, it should be punishing.
The amount of time between when you click your mouse button and when the grenade is actually thrown, combined with the amount of time it takes for your weapon's deploy animation to finish, is quite a long time. So unless you're mortaring grenades from miles away, a Skulk can easily just walk up to you if he sees you with your grenade out and be able to bite you once or twice, before you can even deal damage to it. That sort of a tradeoff just isn't worth it.
Just a small update. The latest patch for the mod is nearly complete and will be ready for testing very soon, probably playable tomorrow. If all goes well it will be pushed to the live mod early next week.
Also alien commanders will be happy to know that the bonewall change has been revised, Bonewall will remain instant, and now scales @ 100hp/bio, so it starts with 300hp on biomass 3 and will gain 100 more for each biomass thereafter.
Just a small update. The latest patch for the mod is nearly complete and will be ready for testing very soon, probably playable tomorrow. If all goes well it will be pushed to the live mod early next week.
Also alien commanders will be happy to know that the bonewall change has been revised, Bonewall will remain instant, and now scales @ 100hp/bio, so it starts will 300hp on biomass 3 and will gain 100 more for each biomass thereafter.
Just a small update. The latest patch for the mod is nearly complete and will be ready for testing very soon, probably playable tomorrow. If all goes well it will be pushed to the live mod early next week.
Also alien commanders will be happy to know that the bonewall change has been revised, Bonewall will remain instant, and now scales @ 100hp/bio, so it starts will 300hp on biomass 3 and will gain 100 more for each biomass thereafter.
Seeing some rather big changes (instead of just tweaks) are still in makes me sad. Truly makes me wonder what ensl sees with 'no big changes'.
It falls more on the side of being un-able to fix core issues without larger changes. The way I see it, vanilla NS2 is dead. There is, at the moment, no hope of seeing any meaningful balance developments in the future with the official game.
So you have to ask yourself, do you like the vanilla game enough to play it forever? For competitive players this might get old, the vanilla game balance has already been stagnant for some time, with the same issues.
So, yes, while it really sucks to have to modify the game more heavily (and no one is denying that's exactly what we're doing, within reason), many people felt it's something that needed to be done.
DC_DarklingJoin Date: 2003-07-10Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
I can see the reasoning. I just think we are making 2 different games. Further lowering the chance of any public player wanting to dedicate time in comp.
Many who start with comp do so without the need for these changes.
(I will say as a mere div3 player I dont feel the need for many also)
So while I respect yours and the ensls view on the matter, I strongly and politely disagree with the actions taken.
I can see the reasoning. I just think we are making 2 different games. Further lowering the chance of any public player wanting to dedicate time in comp.
Many who start with comp do so without the need for these changes.
(I will say as a mere div3 player I dont feel the need for many also)
So while I respect yours and the ensls view on the matter, I strongly and politely disagree with the actions taken.
Comp players are more likely to leave due to the game remaining stale and terrible than pub players are to reject the comp mod due to it being different. So with you view we probably lose 2 old comp players for every new 1 we gain. Look at the whole situation.
Nothing is radically different for the individual player in terms of the skill sets so I don't really see what would be objectionable to a pubber?
Pubs already play differently from comp anyway. How many 12 player public servers are there? How many even have cross-spawns forced? If you are transitioning from public play to comp with zero experience you already have a lot to learn about how the game actually works. The core mechanics are still staying the same (I actually think that is kind of a mistake). None of the changes are difficult to understand on a basic level, understanding how they play out will require practice, but you would need to do that anyway.
The only real problem in my opinion with this is if you are a comp player who likes to play pubs you would probably want to play with this mod and will probably be disappointed in your server availability. Hopefully that will improve over time.
It looks like all(?) of the proposed changes are still there. Even some that seem like incredibly bad ideas.
Yes, almost all of the changes are still in there. I have yet to see a good argument against any change, with the exception of the bone wall change which was adjusted.
2. Egg drops should not be completely removed. Gorge eggs should still be allowed, and are quite strategic I'd say. It's one thing to lose your Fade and be given an egg and say, "Here, sorry you got killed. 2nd chance?" right away. A Gorge egg would allow you drop tunnels (Cheaper now, 2PRes) without hurting their current PRes as much. Leaving for more strategy.
The PRes adjustment is meant to help out with this. If you hold your res, your gorge can get a different lifeform up fairly quickly.
3. This looks like a great change, but from the current cost it seems the Aliens will have to dedicate more res for research again? 15 Leap/25 Xeno, 40 res; I don't remember Skulk upgrades costing this much before the tech res change. Not to mention, we're getting closer and closer to creating a different game from public games which was mentioned as an issue because it would alienate future players from joining since they have to relearn everything again.
The total cost may be more, but keep in mind that its a cost spread out over the entire game. I can't think of a situation where you would be getting leap and xenocide at the same time.
4. Bonewall is an incredible Alien commander mechanic that (If used offensively) can change the tide of battle. Adding a long wind-up animation would ruin that, and make it more difficult for life-forms to escape. Plus, cysts were nerfed in their health. If players are worried about getting bone-walled then destroy the damn cyst. No more bone-wall.
This change was adjusted. Bone wall now has no cast delay, but a far lower health. In games today, marines could easily burst the wall down if your engagement timing is a little off.
7. I'm unsure about the change, but it looks good. As it stands I almost never get to deal with a gorge that has bile-bomb mid/late game lately. If I do, we're usually about to lose anyways.
8c. Reducing web cost to 0 would make gorging up areas near impossible to get into unless one wants to (riskly) purchase a 25 res flamethrower (which would probably be focused by life-forms and quickly loss). Once cleared, the Gorge would just put the webs back up with no consequence as if nothing happened. However, leaving it at 1 res cost would also mean no one would want to touch it. Honestly, I'm not sure there is a way to make webs used more unless you allow some way other than a 25 res flamethrower to clear them. Maybe cluster grenades can destroy them, or nerve gas?
We're talking about something on biomass 7... shouldn't aliens on three hives start to take a giant lead?
9. Don't reduce the time. It's already annoying to be an umbra bot as it is. Radius is understandable though.
I'm unsure about the change myself. Today, I felt as though I was super limited on energy during fights, couldn't even spike. But it may be one of those things that turns out fine once players get used to it.
I don't think so. After playing on it, you really need other lifeforms to clear the armor. For example, extractor armor isn't cleared until the extractor is at ~30%. And "no no no no no" isn't a very good argument for anything.
11. I'm not sure how metabolize work(s/ed)? I don't think I'd be okay with any higher-lifeform being able to regen in a pinched scenario without the use of crags/drifters/regen upgrade. Reduce the cost of Shifts from 13 back to 10 and reduce their total health cost. This would allow more Shifts to be used but also be easier to take out since they'd be vital structures in allowing Fades to regen energy.
Lifeforms already have this option if they have crag hive. The health regen on metabolize isn't available until biomass 5, needs to be purchased, and is 10 ? health every second (these figures are approximate, I don't know exactly).
12a. Yes.
12b. Yes.
12c. Yes.
12d. No. If at the very least, 95 damage. I'm not sure why this is an issue though. Are people not buying welders? Nerfing gorge bile-bombs will remedy this issue even more.
Seems like you agree with most of these. The point with this change is so onos can't just lawnmower through chipped marines that have been medpacked and haven't had a second to weld.
16. What was wrong with the double-jump? People too slow to press space-bar twice?
The jetpack could be very inconsistent about when it activated. It didn't always trigger when I would hit my jump key a second time, and if you just held jump it wouldn't activate until you lost all your upward momentum. I think you'll find the new jetpacks are much more maneuverable, while being less forgiving about wasting fuel.
17. Define combat. A grenade shouldn't be usable in close-range combat, it should be punishing.
I think every can agree the throw time was way too long to be used in any form of combat. You still can't just whip grenades out while skulks are biting you, if that's what you mean by "close-range combat"
22. I don't mind this, but guarding a weapon on the ground from a respawning marine should already guarantee they won't get it back.
Recovering shotguns happens very commonly when a) lifeforms have to go heal, or b) there's pressure somewhere else. The 5 second change makes it so that most shotguns have to be recovered or refreshed by another player on the field rather than the same player freshly spawned.
You should probably check out the changes before commenting on them further. I think you'll find that some of your initial instincts were incorrect.
twilitebluebug stalkerJoin Date: 2003-02-04Member: 13116Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue
edited April 2014
I like most of the changes, especially the alien PRes changes. Some of the changes, however, are too drastic for the good of the NS2 community.
The Fade ability changes are worrying. Shadow Step could have received some balance adjustment (longer cooldown, or higher energy cost) rather than being completely removed. The lateral movement it provides is fun and necessary against marines assaults.
Metabolize feels clunky to use with one-use-per-press. It feels like an ability that is meant to be spammed as often as possible. Having it activated by the movement modifier key also feels inconsistent.
Stab could have its movement penalty reduced, or removed, because activating it while on the ground feels like watching the old hand grenade animation, but much worse. An alternative could be to allow Blink to interrupt Stab animation.
I'd like to start by saying these changes are huge and I'm concerned about introducing them during the middle of a season. I don't think teams were aware of the scope of changes we were agreeing to when we gave our support for this early in the season, particularly given the first changelog we were shown when asked. One of the purposes of the Custom Map Cup was to figure out what maps were balanced and fun enough to include in the season, and there was a huge uproar last season about including many new maps, especially with limited time for teams to get used to them before they had to be played. Now we're introducing changes of a broader scope without similar caution, which worries me.
Comments on a few particular changes (I'll probably have more later):
12d) Reducing onos damage seems like a substantial nerf. With enough medpacks and catpacks, I worry that this could result in single marines being able to run circles around and kill an onos with just a TRes investment. Without the nerf, the onos can be sure if he can land hits, that marine will eventually die. However, now the onos may have to retreat even if he can land hits, and given the slow onos speed and fast catpacked marine speed, that onos may have trouble getting away, too. I think a marine on its own shouldn't have a chance against an onos unless he can wedge himself into a tight space that an onos can't get to.
Golden's justification doesn't sound particularly compelling to me; if you see an onos approaching, you could think to weld your buddies even a little bit, which would give them all (and yourself) the ability to survive a second hit. Even a single point of armor is enough to give a marine that extra hit without the nerf. It's a change that affects many onos encounters significantly for a single situation (onos versus groups of marines with no armor at all and no welders) that I'm not convinced is very common or even needs fixing.
That said, I've not tried it in action, so maybe my concern is unwarranted.
14) Adding a new Fade ability and removing shadowstep and vortex is pretty substantial. I wonder why a less drastic change couldn't have been tried first, like putting vortex on Movement Special so it could readily be used during combat.
22) I don't really have a problem with reducing weapon despawn time in principle, but I don't like that it will make an annoying component of the game even worse and would prefer to see this changed more substantially to improve quality of life.
1. Not knowing exactly when a weapon will despawn is immensely frustrating. You can get right up to the weapon only to have it despawn right in front of you. It may despawn as you start pressing the key to pick it up, causing you to drop your weapon, which is especially bad if there are aliens in the room.
2. Having to cycle weapons is a massive annoyance. You have to position yourself right by the weapon, deal with weapon priorities where you may not be picking up the weapon you intended to pick up, and make sure you didn't leave your ammo by the gun, since it's separate from the weapon. Surely I'm not the only one who will cycle a weapon only to find that I can't reload shortly afterward because my ammunition is lying on the ground. You also can't cycle welders if you're holding one unless you drop you current welder. Ugh.
3. Combining these issues, you need to watch the clock to know how frequently you need to cycle a weapon if another marine isn't nearby to pick it up in a timely manner.
This would all be solved if the weapon despawn timer were reset whenever a marine is very near the weapon. I'd love to also be able to actually see each gun's timer, but simply changing weapon camping to being purely about proximity instead of equipping the weapon would be a massive quality of life improvement, addressing pretty much every point above.
I like most of the changes, especially the alien PRes changes. Some of the changes, however, are too drastic for the good of the NS2 community.
The Fade ability changes are worrying. Shadow Step could have received some balance adjustment (longer cooldown, or higher energy cost) rather than being completely removed. The lateral movement it provides is fun and necessary against marines assaults.
Metabolize feels clunky to use with one-use-per-press. It feels like an ability that is meant to be spammed as often as possible. Having it activated by the movement modifier key also feels inconsistent.
Stab could have its movement penalty reduced, or removed, because activating it while on the ground feels like watching the old hand grenade animation, but much worse. An alternative could be to allow Blink to interrupt Stab animation.
Shadowstep was gimmicky at it's core in every iteration I've seen of it. The lateral movement is not fun in my opinion and not necessary as a fact proven in pretty much every 6v6 match so far at any point in a game versus marines in the NSL S3 onwards. Blink with metabolize and 3D movement are much more superior and more enjoyable to play with.
The changes are hardly drastic or hard to grasp.. and if you just spam metabolize.. you're either blowing all your energy in one go.. (which is bad in most cases) or you're doing it wrong.
12d) Reducing onos damage seems like a substantial nerf. With enough medpacks and catpacks, I worry that this could result in single marines being able to run circles around and kill an onos with just a TRes investment. Without the nerf, the onos can be sure if he can land hits, that marine will eventually die. However, now the onos may have to retreat even if he can land hits, and given the slow onos speed and fast catpacked marine speed, that onos may have trouble getting away, too. I think a marine on its own shouldn't have a chance against an onos unless he can wedge himself into a tight space that an onos can't get to.
Golden's justification doesn't sound particularly compelling to me; if you see an onos approaching, you could think to weld your buddies even a little bit, which would give them all (and yourself) the ability to survive a second hit. Even a single point of armor is enough to give a marine that extra hit without the nerf. It's a change that affects many onos encounters significantly for a single situation (onos versus groups of marines with no armor at all and no welders) that I'm not convinced is very common or even needs fixing.
That said, I've not tried it in action, so maybe my concern is unwarranted.
Lol, the first thing you should be thinking is 'shoot the Onos' while you have time before he gets to you with the entire alien team. If your first thought is.. let's weld each other :3ccc then you're wasting valuable DPS in a scenario where this is no time to weld realistically. If you see him, it's already too late to weld in most cases.. just a tip.
Hit two gores in a row.. it's not hard for the most part (barring weird prop dodging/catpack enhanced dodging). It's just like complaining about medpacks as a skulk. If you hit two bites in a row it doesn't matter. It only matters if you miss. In most cases the Fades would be picking off the runners anyways.. while the Onos is on the phase gate or something else of importance.
DC_DarklingJoin Date: 2003-07-10Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
Yes I realised many comp players disagree with my view. I already accepted that. Does not mean however, I would need to agree. I truly do not see the need for such big changes. Yes I still see them as big. Swapping in abilities is big. But we shall see where it ends, nothing I can say what will change this.
In another point, I fail to see the use of the gorge tunnel change in regards to which tunnel gets nuked first. I thought about it, and nope. Cant see it.
Atm in live you either go as a skulk to a high risk area, clean it up with a pack, go gorge, spit out a tunnel and hike back.
In a less risky situation you make your first tunnel before you gorge hike to a medium risk 2nd spot.
In example 1 you probably would not want to change any tunnel entrance before a tunnel entrance dies. You Didnt invest the whole teams effort just to nuke it right away. So which tunnel gets replaced first is not remotely a problem.
In example 2 you still keep your 'more risky' non hive tunnel while you replace the very safe hive entrance. (to swap it to another hive for example) Removing the riskier side from remote would not be needed in most cases as it would either get shot down regardless. Gorge tunnels shouldnt be placed on a whim.
If the change on tunnel entrances goes live, your 'risky' tunnel entrance will most likely be replaced first. Which is just the one you dont want to replace given the effort it took to put up.
Sure you can argue you want to replace that tunnel entrance and move it to somewhere else but that only displays e lack of insight on your tunnel placement early on.
Lol, the first thing you should be thinking is 'shoot the Onos' while you have time before he gets to you with the entire alien team. If your first thought is.. let's weld each other :3ccc then you're wasting valuable DPS in a scenario where this is no time to weld realistically. If you see him, it's already too late to weld in most cases.. just a tip.
Hit two gores in a row.. it's not hard for the most part (barring weird prop dodging/catpack enhanced dodging). It's just like complaining about medpacks as a skulk. If you hit two bites in a row it doesn't matter. It only matters if you miss. In most cases the Fades would be picking off the runners anyways.. while the Onos is on the phase gate or something else of importance.
If people want an extra hit from the onos, they should consider welding instead of just mindlessly shooting. If doing a fraction of a second of welding isn't worthwhile for the second hit, then I question why it's worthwhile in general. They could do that welding before the onos shows up, since chances are they know it's in play and they should be able to hear it approaching. If they really never have a chance, it sounds like the aliens played the encounter well. Saying 'land two gores' disregards my concern that a TRes investment of meds and cats may make a single marine too much for a single onos, who can't even run away effectively because he's so slow. A smart marine will use props and catpack speed to dodge, so I don't think landing two gores in quick succession is necessarily as easy as you claim. And yes, medpacks are great at keeping a marine alive in an engagement against a skulk, but a skulk doesn't cost 60 pres and can use his maneuverability and small size to escape.
The changelog explains the result of nerfing the onos damage, but it doesn't explain the reasoning. I'm not convinced the onos needed that nerf and I see some serious potential downsides to it. Admittedly, it may not be a real problem in practice, but I'd like to see some justification before we have to play with it in the league. Changes to actual balance should be made because there's a real need for them rather than at a whim. Trying to offer help to armorless marines who won't weld and arguing that people should deal with it because it's not hard seems to be counter to the point of discussing these very issues.
The changelog explains the result of nerfing the onos damage, but it doesn't explain the reasoning.
The reasoning: So that you don't get one-shotted by an Onos... You can't always have armor. You can't always stop to weld. So not having armor should be instant death? lol
Lol, the first thing you should be thinking is 'shoot the Onos' while you have time before he gets to you with the entire alien team. If your first thought is.. let's weld each other :3ccc then you're wasting valuable DPS in a scenario where this is no time to weld realistically. If you see him, it's already too late to weld in most cases.. just a tip.
Hit two gores in a row.. it's not hard for the most part (barring weird prop dodging/catpack enhanced dodging). It's just like complaining about medpacks as a skulk. If you hit two bites in a row it doesn't matter. It only matters if you miss. In most cases the Fades would be picking off the runners anyways.. while the Onos is on the phase gate or something else of importance.
If people want an extra hit from the onos, they should consider welding instead of just mindlessly shooting. If doing a fraction of a second of welding isn't worthwhile for the second hit, then I question why it's worthwhile in general. They could do that welding before the onos shows up, since chances are they know it's in play and they should be able to hear it approaching. If they really never have a chance, it sounds like the aliens played the encounter well. Saying 'land two gores' disregards my concern that a TRes investment of meds and cats may make a single marine too much for a single onos, who can't even run away effectively because he's so slow. A smart marine will use props and catpack speed to dodge, so I don't think landing two gores in quick succession is necessarily as easy as you claim. And yes, medpacks are great at keeping a marine alive in an engagement against a skulk, but a skulk doesn't cost 60 pres and can use his maneuverability and small size to escape.
The changelog explains the result of nerfing the onos damage, but it doesn't explain the reasoning. I'm not convinced the onos needed that nerf and I see some serious potential downsides to it. Admittedly, it may not be a real problem in practice, but I'd like to see some justification before we have to play with it in the league. Changes to actual balance should be made because there's a real need for them rather than at a whim. Trying to offer help to armorless marines who won't weld and arguing that people should deal with it because it's not hard seems to be counter to the point of discussing these very issues.
I'm just going to skip over most of that because it's not worth responding to.. not trying to be arrogant but it's mostly irrelevant argument. If you find yourself missing gores like crazy due to distance or unable to close the distance on the marines maybe you should think about your positioning more/be engaging with your team more often.
Yes, shooting is definitely mindless in a first person shooter. I'll definitely have to put that one down in my guide to playing NS2.
Not sure if serious.. it was explained to you how marines can be lawnmower'd by an Onos once chipped by other lifeforms in a group engagement.. what more reasoning do you need?
When you're being spiked down or have taken chip from other lifeforms or WHIPS in the middle of an engagement and the Onos is in.. you're not going to take the time to weld.. that extra hit earned by welding like an idiot with an Onos in your face is going to be less damage before you die anyways.. pretty stupid decision and quite MINDLESS to take the time to weld at that point when you could be putting 600+ damage into the Onos from firing your rifle for a few seconds.
An Onos walking into a room and lawnmowering 3-4 marines because they have no armor I find pretty silly.
You're not always going to be given the time to weld for free by good aliens. I don't know what alien team let's you weld in the middle of combat but it can't be a great one if that's the case.
If you think this change was on a whim and not well thought out by Dragon, Grissi and Rantology.. I don't know what to tell you.
Yes, almost all of the changes are still in there. I have yet to see a good argument against any change, with the exception of the bone wall change which was adjusted.
I should put more of my thoughts on these proposed changes then. I didn't at first due to my status and more than likely being overlooked because of it, however if I want to prevent some of these changes then I should at least put more effort into it.
There are some changes I definitely don't agree with, like removing TRes eggs, but can't really come up with some viable argument on them so I'll keep those out.
7c Changing the cost of webs to 0 PRes would definitely encourage more use of it. However, with little to no consequence, they can place these webs in combat, in marine bases, and (never tried it before) around/in an IP. They could just keep spamming it. Yes, it is a bio7 ability, which requires +3 Hives. However, using "Aliens should take a giant lead." isn't a good argument on why Aliens need another incredibly strong ability. With the existence of xenocide, stomp, and contaminate already available at 3 hives, it seems like the Aliens already have many abilities there. What's the logic behind adding another rather strong ability with the only counter being a 25(20) PRes investment against a 0 PRes ability. Not to mention, the flamethrower's DPS is so minimal that you're nothing but complete support. Unlike the Gorge, which is not only support but if needs to can combat rather well.
A suggested change here, if webs are to be introduced as 0 PRes, is to both either limit the amount of webs to something lower(5) or if the game allows it, be destructible by welders. The amount of time spent trying to kill webs with a welder, with 3 hives, cyst everywhere, is already punishment enough but still allows you to clear them without having to dump 25(20) PRes and still being able to help your team when the lifeforms come and attack.
9 The duration should not be reduced. It's going to be far more brainless to use now since (As Golden stated, he barely had energy to spike) you'll do nothing but sit back and spam it. While not a proposed change, if umbra were say, a 15sec buff then the Lerk's thoughts would be, "Okay, what do I do now? I should probably contribute to the fight by spiking armor or biting and reuse umbra in 14sec." as compared to something like, 4sec buff, "Okay, what do I do now? I'm going to try and spi-... shit, umbra is down. Reuse it! Okay, let's go for a bi-... damn it re-umbra! Alright, let's tr-... I'm out of energy. Okay, I'll just ledge myself here to reduce flapping and spam umbra and get the occasional 2-3 spikes." Which sounds more "brainless" to you? Flapping in place/ledging yourself to spam umbra, or using Umbra and going in to attack and coming back to use umbra.
If players are upset over umbra being used all the time, then maybe we should look into reducing the cost of the Flamethrower even more to match the grenade launcher.
10 The Fade's role (from what I've gathered) is to pick-off marines and clear lanes. However, this turns the Fade from someone who clears lanes for his team mates into something that also can finish off the structures that their team mates failed to clear. A Fade should be a player killer, not something to finish off structures. Not mention this will probably make killing off marine structures a faster process than it already is with 5 Aliens on it.
11 (Re)Adding metabolize. This is an entirely new mechanic, far from tweaks and number adjustments. Now we're starting to create a new game(mode). This is what I(and a few others I know) fear. If we start going too far into changing the game for competitive play, it will make it harder to get into from vanilla play. I'd also be pretty frustrated camping a Fade in a vent only for him to come out with +100 more health from his previous 35.
I may be used to it from L4D2. However, I saw the effect it had on the community. The difference between vanilla and confogl was rather huge, especially where it is now. That's incredibly intimidating for newer players looking to try something new.
12d There is no reason for this change, especially when bilebomb is being nerfed. If marines are unarmored then they should be welding. If they aren't welding and focusing on damaging (or just out-right not paying attention) then that's their choice/fault. The Onos is the cleanup crew. While a Onos being solo'd by a marine with medkits/catpacks seems a bit surreal, but it's been done before without the damage nerf. I don't see Onos being solod, but the only argument for this change is that Marines were losing their armor too much.
Finally got to play a few scrims yesterday on the new iteration of the mod. Fades and lerks come out a bit earlier and metabolize is fun to use. Tunnels were useful and far less aggravating to try to kill. No more super-cyst-PvE-fortress-of-fcking-doom. Regen buff + mucous healing seemed extremely strong with lerks... almost felt overpo... but I am going to wait a while longer before slapping the 'op' stamp on it Anyway, the regen really made crag hive feel viable again.
The patch introduces a lot of new changes but overall, I didn't really notice them without someone mentioning it.
I should put more of my thoughts on these proposed changes then. I didn't at first due to my status and more than likely being overlooked because of it, however if I want to prevent some of these changes then I should at least put more effort into it.
There are some changes I definitely don't agree with, like removing TRes eggs, but can't really come up with some viable argument on them so I'll keep those out.
I'm glad to see you putting some effort into your arguments.
7c Changing the cost of webs to 0 PRes would definitely encourage more use of it. However, with little to no consequence, they can place these webs in combat, in marine bases, and (never tried it before) around/in an IP. They could just keep spamming it. Yes, it is a bio7 ability, which requires +3 Hives. However, using "Aliens should take a giant lead." isn't a good argument on why Aliens need another incredibly strong ability. With the existence of xenocide, stomp, and contaminate already available at 3 hives, it seems like the Aliens already have many abilities there. What's the logic behind adding another rather strong ability with the only counter being a 25(20) PRes investment against a 0 PRes ability. Not to mention, the flamethrower's DPS is so minimal that you're nothing but complete support. Unlike the Gorge, which is not only support but if needs to can combat rather well.
A suggested change here, if webs are to be introduced as 0 PRes, is to both either limit the amount of webs to something lower(5) or if the game allows it, be destructible by welders. The amount of time spent trying to kill webs with a welder, with 3 hives, cyst everywhere, is already punishment enough but still allows you to clear them without having to dump 25(20) PRes and still being able to help your team when the lifeforms come and attack.
This mod isn't adding webs. It's adjusting the cost so maybe we'll actually see it used. Ever. I'm certain that if webs get out of hand at all then they'll be limited.
9 The duration should not be reduced. It's going to be far more brainless to use now since (As Golden stated, he barely had energy to spike) you'll do nothing but sit back and spam it. While not a proposed change, if umbra were say, a 15sec buff then the Lerk's thoughts would be, "Okay, what do I do now? I should probably contribute to the fight by spiking armor or biting and reuse umbra in 14sec." as compared to something like, 4sec buff, "Okay, what do I do now? I'm going to try and spi-... shit, umbra is down. Reuse it! Okay, let's go for a bi-... damn it re-umbra! Alright, let's tr-... I'm out of energy. Okay, I'll just ledge myself here to reduce flapping and spam umbra and get the occasional 2-3 spikes." Which sounds more "brainless" to you? Flapping in place/ledging yourself to spam umbra, or using Umbra and going in to attack and coming back to use umbra.
If players are upset over umbra being used all the time, then maybe we should look into reducing the cost of the Flamethrower even more to match the grenade launcher.
When I said I was unsure about the change, I was judging it from my limited experience (2 games or something like that) where I used umbra exactly the same way I was before, by spamming everything in the room. I think that with these changes lerks will actually have to be thoughtful about their umbra usage if they ever want to do anything else in a fight. A good change in my opinion.
10 The Fade's role (from what I've gathered) is to pick-off marines and clear lanes. However, this turns the Fade from someone who clears lanes for his team mates into something that also can finish off the structures that their team mates failed to clear. A Fade should be a player killer, not something to finish off structures. Not mention this will probably make killing off marine structures a faster process than it already is with 5 Aliens on it.
Yes, a fade's role is as a player killer. However, they shouldn't be limited to only doing this. I don't see a problem with fades being able to finish off weak structures if marines don't absolutely win a fight. If the fade is still there swiping something, maybe everyone else on your team can pinch him? It's not like the fade instantly kills a burning extractor.
Fade damage is less than in the current balance mod, while structures have armor. So a pack of aliens will kill structures even slower.
11 (Re)Adding metabolize. This is an entirely new mechanic, far from tweaks and number adjustments. Now we're starting to create a new game(mode). This is what I(and a few others I know) fear. If we start going too far into changing the game for competitive play, it will make it harder to get into from vanilla play. I'd also be pretty frustrated camping a Fade in a vent only for him to come out with +100 more health from his previous 35.
Yes, it's a new mechanic. The balance team now has the freedom to take some steps that they've been trying to take for a while. The vanilla fade upgrades have never been in a good spot and some of the mechanics simply don't work well.
I may be used to it from L4D2. However, I saw the effect it had on the community. The difference between vanilla and confogl was rather huge, especially where it is now. That's incredibly intimidating for newer players looking to try something new.
Comp players are more likely to leave due to the game remaining stale and terrible than pub players are to reject the comp mod due to it being different. So with you view we probably lose 2 old comp players for every new 1 we gain. Look at the whole situation.
I agree with Scatter here. I don't think a separate mod will severely impact competitive growth.
12d There is no reason for this change, especially when bilebomb is being nerfed. If marines are unarmored then they should be welding. If they aren't welding and focusing on damaging (or just out-right not paying attention) then that's their choice/fault. The Onos is the cleanup crew. While a Onos being solo'd by a marine with medkits/catpacks seems a bit surreal, but it's been done before without the damage nerf. I don't see Onos being solod, but the only argument for this change is that Marines were losing their armor too much.
Congrats, you killed an overcommitted fade and an unsupported onos that should've just left. Lifeforms that play like that should die.
I think a lot of players that are arguing against the damage change are overlooking the movement change. With charge being a much easier upgrade to obtain and onos acceleration increasing, I think you'll find that onos will hit more gores.
Theorycrafting will only get you so far. Ultimately you should try to test the mod and maybe scrim a bit.
Comments
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OK, this feedback doesn't really help us...
Whenever you need to throw a grenade, you're probably in combat. You wouldn't throw grenades while you're out of combat...
The amount of time between when you click your mouse button and when the grenade is actually thrown, combined with the amount of time it takes for your weapon's deploy animation to finish, is quite a long time. So unless you're mortaring grenades from miles away, a Skulk can easily just walk up to you if he sees you with your grenade out and be able to bite you once or twice, before you can even deal damage to it. That sort of a tradeoff just isn't worth it.
Also alien commanders will be happy to know that the bonewall change has been revised, Bonewall will remain instant, and now scales @ 100hp/bio, so it starts with 300hp on biomass 3 and will gain 100 more for each biomass thereafter.
What other changes made it through?
You can read the finalized change-log here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oIsqF--0homZgnzLgSlrqckQM2R4f0tRcx9ZLPyPwno/edit?usp=sharing
The test-mod is here for anyone who wishes to see them before they get pushed into the main mod: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=247834990
It falls more on the side of being un-able to fix core issues without larger changes. The way I see it, vanilla NS2 is dead. There is, at the moment, no hope of seeing any meaningful balance developments in the future with the official game.
So you have to ask yourself, do you like the vanilla game enough to play it forever? For competitive players this might get old, the vanilla game balance has already been stagnant for some time, with the same issues.
So, yes, while it really sucks to have to modify the game more heavily (and no one is denying that's exactly what we're doing, within reason), many people felt it's something that needed to be done.
Many who start with comp do so without the need for these changes.
(I will say as a mere div3 player I dont feel the need for many also)
So while I respect yours and the ensls view on the matter, I strongly and politely disagree with the actions taken.
Comp players are more likely to leave due to the game remaining stale and terrible than pub players are to reject the comp mod due to it being different. So with you view we probably lose 2 old comp players for every new 1 we gain. Look at the whole situation.
Nothing is radically different for the individual player in terms of the skill sets so I don't really see what would be objectionable to a pubber?
The only real problem in my opinion with this is if you are a comp player who likes to play pubs you would probably want to play with this mod and will probably be disappointed in your server availability. Hopefully that will improve over time.
Incredibly good ideas that unlock gameplay from the stale PvE meta and gives more options across the board.
Yes, almost all of the changes are still in there. I have yet to see a good argument against any change, with the exception of the bone wall change which was adjusted.
From your earlier post:
The PRes adjustment is meant to help out with this. If you hold your res, your gorge can get a different lifeform up fairly quickly.
The total cost may be more, but keep in mind that its a cost spread out over the entire game. I can't think of a situation where you would be getting leap and xenocide at the same time.
This change was adjusted. Bone wall now has no cast delay, but a far lower health. In games today, marines could easily burst the wall down if your engagement timing is a little off.
Not sure why it was added originally. But enzyme is far too powerful with both an attack speed and movement buff.
Try it out and see how it looks.
We're talking about something on biomass 7... shouldn't aliens on three hives start to take a giant lead?
I'm unsure about the change myself. Today, I felt as though I was super limited on energy during fights, couldn't even spike. But it may be one of those things that turns out fine once players get used to it.
I don't think so. After playing on it, you really need other lifeforms to clear the armor. For example, extractor armor isn't cleared until the extractor is at ~30%. And "no no no no no" isn't a very good argument for anything.
Lifeforms already have this option if they have crag hive. The health regen on metabolize isn't available until biomass 5, needs to be purchased, and is 10 ? health every second (these figures are approximate, I don't know exactly).
Seems like you agree with most of these. The point with this change is so onos can't just lawnmower through chipped marines that have been medpacked and haven't had a second to weld.
Seems like you like this one.
The jetpack could be very inconsistent about when it activated. It didn't always trigger when I would hit my jump key a second time, and if you just held jump it wouldn't activate until you lost all your upward momentum. I think you'll find the new jetpacks are much more maneuverable, while being less forgiving about wasting fuel.
I think every can agree the throw time was way too long to be used in any form of combat. You still can't just whip grenades out while skulks are biting you, if that's what you mean by "close-range combat"
It's a bandaid fix so maybe they'll be used against umbra/drifter abilities. Hopefully they'll be adjusted a future patch.
Yay.
I haven't noticed a big difference. Granted we haven't seen bile bomb much in test games.
Recovering shotguns happens very commonly when a) lifeforms have to go heal, or b) there's pressure somewhere else. The 5 second change makes it so that most shotguns have to be recovered or refreshed by another player on the field rather than the same player freshly spawned.
You should probably check out the changes before commenting on them further. I think you'll find that some of your initial instincts were incorrect.
ModID - ec5a96e
The Fade ability changes are worrying. Shadow Step could have received some balance adjustment (longer cooldown, or higher energy cost) rather than being completely removed. The lateral movement it provides is fun and necessary against marines assaults.
Metabolize feels clunky to use with one-use-per-press. It feels like an ability that is meant to be spammed as often as possible. Having it activated by the movement modifier key also feels inconsistent.
Stab could have its movement penalty reduced, or removed, because activating it while on the ground feels like watching the old hand grenade animation, but much worse. An alternative could be to allow Blink to interrupt Stab animation.
Comments on a few particular changes (I'll probably have more later):
12d) Reducing onos damage seems like a substantial nerf. With enough medpacks and catpacks, I worry that this could result in single marines being able to run circles around and kill an onos with just a TRes investment. Without the nerf, the onos can be sure if he can land hits, that marine will eventually die. However, now the onos may have to retreat even if he can land hits, and given the slow onos speed and fast catpacked marine speed, that onos may have trouble getting away, too. I think a marine on its own shouldn't have a chance against an onos unless he can wedge himself into a tight space that an onos can't get to.
Golden's justification doesn't sound particularly compelling to me; if you see an onos approaching, you could think to weld your buddies even a little bit, which would give them all (and yourself) the ability to survive a second hit. Even a single point of armor is enough to give a marine that extra hit without the nerf. It's a change that affects many onos encounters significantly for a single situation (onos versus groups of marines with no armor at all and no welders) that I'm not convinced is very common or even needs fixing.
That said, I've not tried it in action, so maybe my concern is unwarranted.
14) Adding a new Fade ability and removing shadowstep and vortex is pretty substantial. I wonder why a less drastic change couldn't have been tried first, like putting vortex on Movement Special so it could readily be used during combat.
22) I don't really have a problem with reducing weapon despawn time in principle, but I don't like that it will make an annoying component of the game even worse and would prefer to see this changed more substantially to improve quality of life.
1. Not knowing exactly when a weapon will despawn is immensely frustrating. You can get right up to the weapon only to have it despawn right in front of you. It may despawn as you start pressing the key to pick it up, causing you to drop your weapon, which is especially bad if there are aliens in the room.
2. Having to cycle weapons is a massive annoyance. You have to position yourself right by the weapon, deal with weapon priorities where you may not be picking up the weapon you intended to pick up, and make sure you didn't leave your ammo by the gun, since it's separate from the weapon. Surely I'm not the only one who will cycle a weapon only to find that I can't reload shortly afterward because my ammunition is lying on the ground. You also can't cycle welders if you're holding one unless you drop you current welder. Ugh.
3. Combining these issues, you need to watch the clock to know how frequently you need to cycle a weapon if another marine isn't nearby to pick it up in a timely manner.
This would all be solved if the weapon despawn timer were reset whenever a marine is very near the weapon. I'd love to also be able to actually see each gun's timer, but simply changing weapon camping to being purely about proximity instead of equipping the weapon would be a massive quality of life improvement, addressing pretty much every point above.
Shadowstep was gimmicky at it's core in every iteration I've seen of it. The lateral movement is not fun in my opinion and not necessary as a fact proven in pretty much every 6v6 match so far at any point in a game versus marines in the NSL S3 onwards. Blink with metabolize and 3D movement are much more superior and more enjoyable to play with.
The changes are hardly drastic or hard to grasp.. and if you just spam metabolize.. you're either blowing all your energy in one go.. (which is bad in most cases) or you're doing it wrong.
Lol, the first thing you should be thinking is 'shoot the Onos' while you have time before he gets to you with the entire alien team. If your first thought is.. let's weld each other :3ccc then you're wasting valuable DPS in a scenario where this is no time to weld realistically. If you see him, it's already too late to weld in most cases.. just a tip.
Hit two gores in a row.. it's not hard for the most part (barring weird prop dodging/catpack enhanced dodging). It's just like complaining about medpacks as a skulk. If you hit two bites in a row it doesn't matter. It only matters if you miss. In most cases the Fades would be picking off the runners anyways.. while the Onos is on the phase gate or something else of importance.
In another point, I fail to see the use of the gorge tunnel change in regards to which tunnel gets nuked first. I thought about it, and nope. Cant see it.
Atm in live you either go as a skulk to a high risk area, clean it up with a pack, go gorge, spit out a tunnel and hike back.
In a less risky situation you make your first tunnel before you gorge hike to a medium risk 2nd spot.
In example 1 you probably would not want to change any tunnel entrance before a tunnel entrance dies. You Didnt invest the whole teams effort just to nuke it right away. So which tunnel gets replaced first is not remotely a problem.
In example 2 you still keep your 'more risky' non hive tunnel while you replace the very safe hive entrance. (to swap it to another hive for example) Removing the riskier side from remote would not be needed in most cases as it would either get shot down regardless. Gorge tunnels shouldnt be placed on a whim.
If the change on tunnel entrances goes live, your 'risky' tunnel entrance will most likely be replaced first. Which is just the one you dont want to replace given the effort it took to put up.
Sure you can argue you want to replace that tunnel entrance and move it to somewhere else but that only displays e lack of insight on your tunnel placement early on.
If people want an extra hit from the onos, they should consider welding instead of just mindlessly shooting. If doing a fraction of a second of welding isn't worthwhile for the second hit, then I question why it's worthwhile in general. They could do that welding before the onos shows up, since chances are they know it's in play and they should be able to hear it approaching. If they really never have a chance, it sounds like the aliens played the encounter well. Saying 'land two gores' disregards my concern that a TRes investment of meds and cats may make a single marine too much for a single onos, who can't even run away effectively because he's so slow. A smart marine will use props and catpack speed to dodge, so I don't think landing two gores in quick succession is necessarily as easy as you claim. And yes, medpacks are great at keeping a marine alive in an engagement against a skulk, but a skulk doesn't cost 60 pres and can use his maneuverability and small size to escape.
The changelog explains the result of nerfing the onos damage, but it doesn't explain the reasoning. I'm not convinced the onos needed that nerf and I see some serious potential downsides to it. Admittedly, it may not be a real problem in practice, but I'd like to see some justification before we have to play with it in the league. Changes to actual balance should be made because there's a real need for them rather than at a whim. Trying to offer help to armorless marines who won't weld and arguing that people should deal with it because it's not hard seems to be counter to the point of discussing these very issues.
The reasoning: So that you don't get one-shotted by an Onos... You can't always have armor. You can't always stop to weld. So not having armor should be instant death? lol
I'm just going to skip over most of that because it's not worth responding to.. not trying to be arrogant but it's mostly irrelevant argument. If you find yourself missing gores like crazy due to distance or unable to close the distance on the marines maybe you should think about your positioning more/be engaging with your team more often.
Yes, shooting is definitely mindless in a first person shooter. I'll definitely have to put that one down in my guide to playing NS2.
Not sure if serious.. it was explained to you how marines can be lawnmower'd by an Onos once chipped by other lifeforms in a group engagement.. what more reasoning do you need?
When you're being spiked down or have taken chip from other lifeforms or WHIPS in the middle of an engagement and the Onos is in.. you're not going to take the time to weld.. that extra hit earned by welding like an idiot with an Onos in your face is going to be less damage before you die anyways.. pretty stupid decision and quite MINDLESS to take the time to weld at that point when you could be putting 600+ damage into the Onos from firing your rifle for a few seconds.
An Onos walking into a room and lawnmowering 3-4 marines because they have no armor I find pretty silly.
You're not always going to be given the time to weld for free by good aliens. I don't know what alien team let's you weld in the middle of combat but it can't be a great one if that's the case.
If you think this change was on a whim and not well thought out by Dragon, Grissi and Rantology.. I don't know what to tell you.
I should put more of my thoughts on these proposed changes then. I didn't at first due to my status and more than likely being overlooked because of it, however if I want to prevent some of these changes then I should at least put more effort into it.
There are some changes I definitely don't agree with, like removing TRes eggs, but can't really come up with some viable argument on them so I'll keep those out.
7c Changing the cost of webs to 0 PRes would definitely encourage more use of it. However, with little to no consequence, they can place these webs in combat, in marine bases, and (never tried it before) around/in an IP. They could just keep spamming it. Yes, it is a bio7 ability, which requires +3 Hives. However, using "Aliens should take a giant lead." isn't a good argument on why Aliens need another incredibly strong ability. With the existence of xenocide, stomp, and contaminate already available at 3 hives, it seems like the Aliens already have many abilities there. What's the logic behind adding another rather strong ability with the only counter being a 25(20) PRes investment against a 0 PRes ability. Not to mention, the flamethrower's DPS is so minimal that you're nothing but complete support. Unlike the Gorge, which is not only support but if needs to can combat rather well.
A suggested change here, if webs are to be introduced as 0 PRes, is to both either limit the amount of webs to something lower(5) or if the game allows it, be destructible by welders. The amount of time spent trying to kill webs with a welder, with 3 hives, cyst everywhere, is already punishment enough but still allows you to clear them without having to dump 25(20) PRes and still being able to help your team when the lifeforms come and attack.
9 The duration should not be reduced. It's going to be far more brainless to use now since (As Golden stated, he barely had energy to spike) you'll do nothing but sit back and spam it. While not a proposed change, if umbra were say, a 15sec buff then the Lerk's thoughts would be, "Okay, what do I do now? I should probably contribute to the fight by spiking armor or biting and reuse umbra in 14sec." as compared to something like, 4sec buff, "Okay, what do I do now? I'm going to try and spi-... shit, umbra is down. Reuse it! Okay, let's go for a bi-... damn it re-umbra! Alright, let's tr-... I'm out of energy. Okay, I'll just ledge myself here to reduce flapping and spam umbra and get the occasional 2-3 spikes." Which sounds more "brainless" to you? Flapping in place/ledging yourself to spam umbra, or using Umbra and going in to attack and coming back to use umbra.
If players are upset over umbra being used all the time, then maybe we should look into reducing the cost of the Flamethrower even more to match the grenade launcher.
10 The Fade's role (from what I've gathered) is to pick-off marines and clear lanes. However, this turns the Fade from someone who clears lanes for his team mates into something that also can finish off the structures that their team mates failed to clear. A Fade should be a player killer, not something to finish off structures. Not mention this will probably make killing off marine structures a faster process than it already is with 5 Aliens on it.
11 (Re)Adding metabolize. This is an entirely new mechanic, far from tweaks and number adjustments. Now we're starting to create a new game(mode). This is what I(and a few others I know) fear. If we start going too far into changing the game for competitive play, it will make it harder to get into from vanilla play. I'd also be pretty frustrated camping a Fade in a vent only for him to come out with +100 more health from his previous 35.
I may be used to it from L4D2. However, I saw the effect it had on the community. The difference between vanilla and confogl was rather huge, especially where it is now. That's incredibly intimidating for newer players looking to try something new.
12d There is no reason for this change, especially when bilebomb is being nerfed. If marines are unarmored then they should be welding. If they aren't welding and focusing on damaging (or just out-right not paying attention) then that's their choice/fault. The Onos is the cleanup crew. While a Onos being solo'd by a marine with medkits/catpacks seems a bit surreal, but it's been done before without the damage nerf. I don't see Onos being solod, but the only argument for this change is that Marines were losing their armor too much.
The patch introduces a lot of new changes but overall, I didn't really notice them without someone mentioning it.
More testing pl0x.
Lifeform timings are the same.
I'm glad to see you putting some effort into your arguments.
This mod isn't adding webs. It's adjusting the cost so maybe we'll actually see it used. Ever. I'm certain that if webs get out of hand at all then they'll be limited.
When I said I was unsure about the change, I was judging it from my limited experience (2 games or something like that) where I used umbra exactly the same way I was before, by spamming everything in the room. I think that with these changes lerks will actually have to be thoughtful about their umbra usage if they ever want to do anything else in a fight. A good change in my opinion.
Yes, a fade's role is as a player killer. However, they shouldn't be limited to only doing this. I don't see a problem with fades being able to finish off weak structures if marines don't absolutely win a fight. If the fade is still there swiping something, maybe everyone else on your team can pinch him? It's not like the fade instantly kills a burning extractor.
Fade damage is less than in the current balance mod, while structures have armor. So a pack of aliens will kill structures even slower.
Yes, it's a new mechanic. The balance team now has the freedom to take some steps that they've been trying to take for a while. The vanilla fade upgrades have never been in a good spot and some of the mechanics simply don't work well.
I agree with Scatter here. I don't think a separate mod will severely impact competitive growth.
Congrats, you killed an overcommitted fade and an unsupported onos that should've just left. Lifeforms that play like that should die.
I think a lot of players that are arguing against the damage change are overlooking the movement change. With charge being a much easier upgrade to obtain and onos acceleration increasing, I think you'll find that onos will hit more gores.
Theorycrafting will only get you so far. Ultimately you should try to test the mod and maybe scrim a bit.
I don't understand.