[Comm] Electrify Resource Tower
_INTER_
Join Date: 2009-08-08 Member: 68392Members, NS2 Playtester, Reinforced - Shadow
Join Date: 2009-08-08 Member: 68392Members, NS2 Playtester, Reinforced - Shadow
Give Marine comms the ability to temporarly charge RT's so that biting liveforms take damage are stunned or do no / less damage. See NS1. This feature should cost Tres, need research, should be restricted to a single RT of choice and have a cooldown. It could additionally disable RT gathering for a while (from the RT it was used on). It should not appear in early game. This feature possibly needs a lot of testing to make it balanced and fair.
There are some maps where a Marine RT is extremly prone to skulk biting, also depending on Marine start. (Especially their naturals.) So atleast one Marine is bound to protect said RT which is often impossible to find in pups and veery frustrating for commanders.
What this means for Aliens: Communication and focus on an other defenseless RT.
Such RT's are:
- Veil: Skylight and Topographical
- Eclipse: Access Alpha
- Tram: Logistics
- Refinery: Chasm
- Mineshaft: Water Pumps and The Gap
- Biodome: Seeding and Canopy
- Descent: not that much an issue, mostly Energy Flow or Plaza.
- Docking: East Wing and Bar
Vote here: Feedback Forum
There are some maps where a Marine RT is extremly prone to skulk biting, also depending on Marine start. (Especially their naturals.) So atleast one Marine is bound to protect said RT which is often impossible to find in pups and veery frustrating for commanders.
What this means for Aliens: Communication and focus on an other defenseless RT.
Such RT's are:
- Veil: Skylight and Topographical
- Eclipse: Access Alpha
- Tram: Logistics
- Refinery: Chasm
- Mineshaft: Water Pumps and The Gap
- Biodome: Seeding and Canopy
- Descent: not that much an issue, mostly Energy Flow or Plaza.
- Docking: East Wing and Bar
Vote here: Feedback Forum
Comments
One A few additions I'd make is; make sure it is visibly and audibly clear, that the commander is executing this ability, and give the alien time to stop biting the rt. I don't like it to be an instant cast, it should have a windup time.
Its also next to impossible to explain a rookie how important defending an RT is. (A rookie alone is breakfast anyway.) A rookie wants to be where the action is no matter what. A veteran leaves System waypoint in the rarest of cases
Imo, the electrify should cause damage over time in a very small area around the RT (bite range) meaning that a gorge could continue to bile bomb the RT and remain unharmed. Balancing the DoT would be the main concern in theory.
There should be a visual queue to demonstrate that the RT is electrified.
There should also be a delay between command and RT electrification of about 0.5 seconds, during which an audio trigger will occur due to the RT overcharging, this will allow an alien player with fast reflexes to escape harm completely.
Hated electrified towers in ns1, would be disappointed to see them in ns2.
Just some ideas.
Soooo... nano shield then?
The main problem I see with comments like this is that, NS2 is becoming stale for many people, this is in large due to a lack of "new" things or options to play around with... in pub you have 2 game styles as marines... Fast PG or Fast upgrades... as aliens god forbid you should go shade hive, you get vote ejected and called a "troll comm" for actually using tactical thinking... In comp play its a little more varied, but not much.
We need to add more to the game, especially when it comes to what a commander can do, what tech paths are available etc.
By saying no to these ideas without allowing them to be discussed fully and potentially tested (and this is something I've seen a lot of people do) nothing will change... which is fine for some people, but it drastically slows progress... when was the last time the game saw a huge update? the introduction of biomass?... it was something around that time, because since then all thats happened is things have been moved around (upgrades to the hive instead of structures etc)... the game has ground to a halt, people are getting bored.
I understand not every idea is a "good" idea... but there are a whole hell of a lot of ideas that are being ignored that have a lot of potential, if people would just discuss instead of deny.
Comments like what? How is my comment not a valid point of discussion? Because I disagree that it's a good idea, i'm just flatly denying it? I brought up an example even of where I don't think it would work and why I think that. Additionally, the OP listed all marine NATURALS as rts that need to be protected... YEAH by marines who aren't more than 15 seconds away from their naturals. Aliens bite res for a reason. And again, considering the snowball effect... If this is tech that first needs to be researched and then is supposedly balanced by having steeper consequences for the comm... then where does it really fit in? If it's late game and rines are already rollin in res, then it's only going to give them an unneeded buff, preventing comeback attempts as I mentioned earlier (I've seen no response to that potential problem... who's discussing and who's denying?) If it's early game, and the comm is possibly going to lose more res electrifying than leaving it how it is, then why electrify? Spend lots of res or some other "cost" to save the little res you have? Seems like it doesn't really serve a purpose any better than the options which are already available.
Why do we need to add more to the game? Res biting can be boring... but it's a part of the game, just like defending rts. And as I mentioned, if you MUST have static defense on your rts, then there are already options for that as a marine. I honestly see this change as a needless buff, I don't see the value in it. Creating new things for the sake of creating new things is not a good way to design a game in which balance is scrutinized so severely, in my opinion.
Content, as evidenced by skin packs and recent map releases, is not what is stopping players from coming to ns2 or from getting the to return. I remember when the game seemed like it was going thru big changes every few months and I was having to relearn tech paths, commander functions, movement, etc. I was turned off far more back then by all the changes than I have been since after b249, and in fact that was probably the last time I was personally bored with ns2.
The way I see it, your attempt to invalidate my comment is just as "denying" of my thought as I am of the OP's idea, especially since I see no response to the concerns I posed. I thought about it. I don't like it. I shared my opinion. That's it.
So I think it's far too early to say this.
To pick an extreme example: Let's say it cost 10 tres and stopped gathering res for 60 seconds and only lasted for 10 seconds. That would obviously be a BAD ability and nobody would use it. It would be better just to recycle it and rebuild the rt. At this point I think it would be silly to say that it is punishing aliens.
So I see it like a spectrum. Some configurations would surely make it punishing for aliens, but I definitely see configurations where it could be an interesting and balanced ability. Likewise I see configurations where few would bother researching it in the first place (see nanoshield).
Those "veteran" players you talk about sound like some of the all aim, no brain kind of players. There are many of those. Eclipse sucks, nothing about that is balanced, so try not to think about that map. Veil, Tram and biodome are argueably balanced so lets keep it there. The problem with 1 marine running between topo and sky is that the marine is wasting time. Depending on the hive start you should go to either side and try to get all 3 RTs up and hold them. This is considered easiest on sub side, if the aliens do not have sub, due to system being a bottleneck which aliens have to pass through, or spend alot of time in a vent. You commit to a side. If they spawn sub, you commit to the other side, as overlook will be neigh impossible to hold, and would require 1-2 marines tied up there to hold it. If you, as a single marine, is sitting in system, denying aliens access to sub, overlook and sky, you are doing an amazing job holding 3 RTs. If the other side is having problems, rotate, and start commiting over there. You cannot be everywhere. Know what you can commit to, and leave the other marines to do their job. On tram you hold a line, usually tram/repair/access to elevator. Biodome is a bit more difficult, and unless you are 24+, which I hope youre not, you need someone (1-2) to hold a natural, while the rest commits to a side or harrasses.
TL:DR the point you bring up is, to me, one that should be fixed through gameplay, not adding more features.
I read most of what you wrote and realized you're taking every single sentence and picking it apart instead of reading the whole comment as... well... as a whole comment.
That pretty much means you're ignoring the meaning of my comment simply because you disagree with it.
Also, Please don't respond to my comments with quotes of 1 tiny portion of my comment at a time... anyone can take anything out of context and reply to it to make themselves sound right, instead quote the whole comment, or at least paragraphs... half sentence quotes are just cheap.
To answer a little of your comment i'll do this. you quoted 4 things of mine, and responded to them... so i'll do a numbered response.
1. I never said "you're comment", I said "comments like this"... its a generalized statement, meaning all comments as a whole that have the same feeling as the one you made.... so your 6 sentence answer to that was wasted... (side note, mines cost pres and tres to research and as such are a fairly large investment... as is getting a robo, then sentries - 25 tres for the battery and sentries alone - which again is a substantial investment... what is the issue with having a third option where the commander can spend a lower amount of tres with less of an investment to cause a delay in the alien res biting and giving his team the time to respond if they previously were unable to)
2. adding depth to a game isn't a bad thing... "a needless buff", no, it is an alternative, an option... and the bottlenecking that people have forced into NS2 is ridiculous, there are 2 acceptable tech paths for a marine comm, if you try anything else you either put yourself behind in the typical meta-game and lose or you outaim your enemy by such a large degree that it doesn't matter how behind on tech you get. adding more options is a good thing.
3. you are one of the very few that feel that way... NS2 has been in population decline for a long time, and the reason for that is a lack of new content... playing the same game in the same way with the same people is only fun for so long... people get bored... people move on... the only way to keep people playing is to evolve and progress... which is something NS2 has been lacking for quite some time, and steam charts shows this well enough.
4. that is a typical "turning the tables" argument... YOU are flat out denying, you even said so yourself... its the discussion based equivalent of blocking your ears and saying "lalalalala"... I on the other hand am saying that even if I disagree with someone, I try to find merit in the idea they are bringing forward, how could it be used? how could I change that idea into something I would consider beneficial? etc... Personally rather than going with the gut response of "NO!" I like to be more open to the idea of change, by asking/encouraging you to do the same I am not denying you anything.
Either way, there is plenty that can be added to NS2, i've made lists of things that would be welcome imo, I don't expect everyone to love every single idea, but I do like to think people can say "its interesting, I just don't think it would work very well" and then give constructive reasons as to why.... all you said was "well, you can use mines" (which are entirely dependent on the field players to buy and place - meaning a tres investment + players actually using that investment appropriately) "or sentries" (which require a structure - 10 tres - to unlock and then 25 res per location to fully utilize the tech, which can be easily countered with bilebomb)... this electrified RT isn't a "buff" idea... its an "option" idea.
Your other argument towards it is that its "punishing aliens for doing what aliens are supposed to be doing and rewarding marines for not doing what they should be doing."... this I can kind of understand your point, but I will counter it with this... marines should be laneblocking yes, unless they are hive pushing, applying double pressure, applying pressure while you have respawners or a plethora of other situations where laneblocking will have gaps (rotating, trapping, engaging to name a few more). This is a nice little delay tactic that the commander can use to further support his team, bare in mind that while he is electrifying an RT, he isn't aiding his marines in combat, just a little something to keep in mind... "punishing aliens"... its not punishing aliens, (on veil for instance) the alien is biting skylights, comm electrifies the RT, alien moves to overlook and starts biting there instead, overlook RT would result in 1 of 3 situations... 1. a marine has to rotate back to stop the alien 2. a marine has to rotate forward to stop the alien 3. overlook rt dies. in situation 1 and 2, the alien can hear the marine approaching and leave via the vent to go back to skylights knowing that it is no longer electrified and cannot be re-electrified for X amount of time due to the abilities cooldown.
You're also not looking at the idea that aliens could bait marine comms to spend res... a fade swiping an RT is a waste of time, unless he makes the comm think its under threat and makes him waste res unnecessarily electrifying it.
Anyway, this comment is pretty huge now... there is plenty more to this discussion, I'm just not wanting to do it all in 1 comment :P
Really, that's not what I did. I only deleted about 2 sentences of your entire... comment, wasnt trying to take anything out of context, but reply to the things I felt I could reply to and in a format to make it easy to do so. And I did you the courtesy of reading your whole post... which if you would have read my previous comment, I feel that I was trying to explain my reasoning even more. But can't force people to read I guess.
So every bad idea should be expected to be molded in a good idea.. just because it someone thought of it?
Is that all I said? Hmm....
Honestly I was gonna go into this more, but it's clear you don't care to even read it. One way or the other, I highly doubt this would be introduced into the game anyways... So, enjoy this thread!
I typically don't like to take a L2P argument, but I think it has merit here. Marines are being punished for poor lane blocking by losing their res. The fact that most of the OP's examples are marine naturals only emphasize that it is a lane blocking issue. I think marines should be punished for leaving open lanes.
I also really agree with 2cough in that it will probably buff late game marines more, consequently preventing comebacks. I don't see how this, or at least this alone, would provide an alternative to fast upgrades or fast phasetech. How does this even make another tech path?
This. Is the problem with the majority of the counter arguments here. You keep assuming that this change somehow will make it so marines are no longer punished for poor laneblocking.
What op is describing, is an ability that you will want to use very rarely. It's not unlike the beacon mechanic. If beacon was suggested today, somebody could just as easily say; "well that's just rewarding marines for poor laneblocking. Base rushes should punish the marines poor laneblocks". The problem with that argument of course, is that it DOES punish marines, it's 10 tres every time, and it disrupts their presence on the map, leaving everything else vulnerable.
Similarly, this ability should not replace or excuse bad laneblocking. There should be a res penalty for using the ability. The severity of that penalty can of course be adjusted.
Besides noone has assumed marines no longer are punished. Its a smaller punishment, but unlike mines, which you can do something about, this is untouchable. This is why mines are OK, and this, compared to it, isn't
1. I DID read your whole comment... I responded to the whole thing... what I said was that I after reading most of your comment I realized what you were doing... I didn't say that I ONLY read "most" of your comment.
2. No, not every idea has merit, but most ideas can stimulate discussion which will lead to a good idea... outright refusal to partake in discussion is idiotic.
3. and here again is the perfect example of picking a quote and responding to only that tiny portion of a comment... you literally removed the fact that I addressed everything you pointed out, and you do it to try to make me look a fool... here, I'll quote it so you can read it again...
You end by saying that I clearly don't read so you won't go into it more... you say that after you misinterpret what I write, you cherry pick quotes and you aren't even reading my whole comment (or if you are, you are intentionally ignoring parts to give your argument credence).
Either way, I agree that it is unlikely to be introduced, but that doesn't stop the fact that the idea is a good one and deserves to be discussed and considered.
I would very much appreciate proper punctuation please.
Turn it around Ixian - You as a team, await the perfect moment and get behind enemy lines and now you're finally in the enemy base, you perform the perfect base rush to stop the snowballing aaaand beacon.... How BS is that? Now you're getting punished for trying to "anti-snowball". (I know, I know, they should be biting the Obs down... but damnit, the marines were snowballing so hard... they had a backup obs damn them!)
Okay, enough paraphrasing...
Mines serve a purpose, correct, thats obvious... but that skulk that was biting the RT only to have the RT overcharge can simply jump onto the powernode instead, he could reroute to a different RT, he could wait in ambush, he could go base and provide intel to the comm by parasiting structures or try sniping the arms lab/IP forcing the comm to jump out, or depending on the mechanic of the "overcharge" he could continue to bite it.
And unlike the mines, this cannot be used to instantly kill a skulk, or catch lifeforms off guard inside a vent en route to escape.
personally I don't feel the need for it to be in the game but I am open for experimental stuff anyway
Win.
You could also implement a similar system using Pres than that would atleast be rewarding and emphasis the support.
It takes around 27 - 28 seconds to bite an RT down from 100%... so we can assume that an RT will produce 5 Tres during the bite down process...
The cooldown would have to be applied to the RT imo, not the ability, so a single RT cannot be overcharged more than once during a 30 second period.
I honestly don't see the point in only making the overcharge reduce the time to kill the RT... we already have nano shield for that, which is also spammable more-so than what you're suggesting... if overcharge were to be implemented, it should be an area of effect damage over time (not a lot of damage... it should take about 3 - 5 seconds to kill a skulk) and the area should be the distance of the bitecone from the RT. meaning you can still bite the powernode, gorges can still bile the RT, lerks can spike (if they so wish) and an onos would be fairly uneffected by it.
The purpose behind overcharging an RT imo is an early game tech route for low skill teams, allowing them to apply more pressure than they usually would, but at the cost of delaying upgrades.
I don't think its a bad idea, I think it has its merits and as an option is welcome...
"buy grenades" - again, that requires Pres and for the marines to actually utilize them correctly...
It still amazes me that people want more RTS elements for the commander because being a commander can be quite limiting and in some cases pretty boring, but when suggestions come up people counter them with "but the field players already do X, what use would this be"
The purpose behind overcharging is as an early game tech route for low skilled teams allowing them to apply more pressure than they already would. Thank you, I was looking for a comment like that.
I am really curious as to where @SantaClaws thinks this might be interesting. I don't doubt it could be balanced. I could be wrong, but I see this buffing late game marines more than anything else with the ultimate effect of preventing "valid" alien comebacks. This is why I am want to know what might be interesting about it.
I am failing to see the gameplay value. This is a tech path for low skilled teams. Low skilled teams probably won't use it because they are stuck on phase first always. It is to allow them to apply more pressure. In the OP he described this as an idea to keep his res because marines were not defending and applying too much pressure.
By itself I don't see how it would really be an alternative tech path, at least on its own. It is there to slow and prevent aliens from biting back res. Mines make it harder. Sentries if placed well could prevent it as well. Nanoshield also slows res biting down. There are options available. To me it seems simpler to adjust what we have then add a new feature. Nanosheild could easily be made to last 2x as long on structures. Sentries could be made cheaper. You could give 4 mines in a pack. I am not saying those are good ideas, but alternative ideas with the same function. At the electrifying rt's sounds like adding features for the sake of adding new features to play with.
Another argument I often dislike is that the game needs to be balanced starting from the top and then at the bottom. I think it also has merit here. This idea has been proposed as an alternative tech path for low skilled marines. I hope someone can argue against this point.
I am not really good with my logical fallacies but I am getting hints of ad hominem. You don't need to be so defensive. Tell us why we are wrong, not why you think we are against the idea.
I agree with the fact that you could just alter other things, so far the most likely case is nanoshield, its currently balanced around applying it to a marine... maybe altering the effect when applied to any structure would give a similar outcome... but surely by adding a secondary function to the "power surge" ability could be considered the same thing.
e.g "Power surge, when used on an unpowered structure, the structure will be temporarily powered, when used on an already powered structure, it will become overcharged causing damage to any living thing withing X meters"
But the reason I get so defensive in situations like this is because back before 249, people welcomed change, they encouraged it and regularly put in ideas of their own... now that the game has progressed to a state of "balance" people don't want anything to change... ever... for fear of it altering balance... which means people are welcoming stale gameplay... if the game isn't progressing and evolving, it will stop growing (which we've already been seeing).
I posted 2 threads a while ago stating things that I wanted the devs to consider, I didn't expect everything to be accepted or thought of as a good idea, I just wanted to stimulate discussion and get people involved in making the game move forward again... because I honestly believe everyone here can agree that the game is currently at a standstill, or at least moving very VERY slowly.
I'm defensive because people don't want anything added to the game... and its always the same argument I see "you're just adding for the sake of adding"... no, I'm wanting to add to the game because providing more options results in more varied games/gameplay, which leads to a longer lifetime for the game.
more often than not the most complained about aspect of NS2 is the commander, which many consider boring because there "isn't enough to do"... but everytime someone says "what about X" people respond with "ooo, but balance", which, correct me if i'm wrong, but, people would test and rework to balance before releasing anything new... soooo, balance isn't an issue, the problems would be ironed out before its release... all that people need to say is if they like the idea or not... and if the reason for not liking it is "balance" then you're thinking about it in the wrong way.
+@Nordic
No, if the comm is electrifying the rt, the economical damage is already done. You won. Now comes the decision making part: Do I set up an ambush for the marine that is coming to clear the rt while it's electrified - and that way add to the economical damage that I've already done, or do I move on to the next rt and return later?
Now I happen to think that this is an ability that will rarely be researched by the top teams. And it doesn't have to, to be a valuable mechanic imo.
Yep. So we are in agreement then. It's not necessarily in favor of the marines using this.