remiremedy [blu.knight]Join Date: 2003-11-18Member: 23112Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester
We've been watching the balance data and have been reading your responses to the Skulk HP change. We have some new changes in the works, which should be arriving on Friday:
We will be doing another "Play with the Devs" event tomorrow at 7:30pm EST where we will be testing these changes. Everyone is welcome to join. Hop on Discord for more info.
... and in the meantime, today we've pushed an update to UWEHotfix which reduced Skulk base HP to 75/10 (it was 85/10)
Wouldn't say changing speed is a band-aid it's just long overdue.
Should sneak speed increase with celerity? I say definitely no.
Through this we actually discovered a bug with how sneak speed is calculated, when it comes to celerity. The celerity bonus is actually being applied after the sneak speed modifier... so celerity Skulks were actually slowed down less proportionally by sneaking than non celerity (58% instead of 50%).
This is being fixed, while the sneak speed is also being buffed... At the current numbers, this means the buff will be a bit stronger for non-celerity skulks:
FrozenNew York, NYJoin Date: 2010-07-02Member: 72228Members, Constellation
@remi maybe sneak speed should be flat value that doesn't increase with celerity anymore. It infringes on the point of using silence as you near the marine base speed like it is now.
We've been watching the balance data and have been reading your responses to the Skulk HP change. We have some new changes in the works, which should be arriving on Friday:
... and in the meantime, today we've pushed an update to UWEHotfix which reduced Skulk base HP to 75/10 (it was 85/10)
Skulk speed and less jumps for max speed only benefits skilled alien players. HP boost benefits any alien player.
@remi maybe sneak speed should be flat value that doesn't increase with celerity anymore. It infringes on the point of using silence as you near the marine base speed like it is now.
Yeah, but with silence you can wall jump, leap, and do whatever else and remain completely silent. So while Celerity does improve skulk sneaking speed, it is overall much slower with celerity than with silence if you're trying to go around undetected.
So right now there is a tradeoff between the two upgrades, both are mainly built for their specified playstyle, but still retain some benefit in the opposite area.
@remi maybe sneak speed should be flat value that doesn't increase with celerity anymore. It infringes on the point of using silence as you near the marine base speed like it is now.
Yeah, but with silence you can wall jump, leap, and do whatever else and remain completely silent. So while Celerity does improve skulk sneaking speed, it is overall much slower with celerity than with silence if you're trying to go around undetected.
So right now there is a tradeoff between the two upgrades, both are mainly built for their specified playstyle, but still retain some benefit in the opposite area.
The main difference being that silence requires all 3 spur to work while celerity works with 1 or 2
maybe sneak speed should be flat value that doesn't increase with celerity anymore. It infringes on the point of using silence as you near the marine base speed like it is now.
Yeah, but with silence you can wall jump, leap, and do whatever else and remain completely silent. So while Celerity does improve skulk sneaking speed, it is overall much slower with celerity than with silence if you're trying to go around undetected.
So right now there is a tradeoff between the two upgrades, both are mainly built for their specified playstyle, but still retain some benefit in the opposite area.
The main difference being that silence requires all 3 spur to work while celerity works with 1 or 2
In all honesty, that's a pretty minor difference. The first 2 of an upgrade rarely make a big enough difference to be noticeable, and they're generally built all at once. On top of that, Silence has been regarded as one of the strongest upgrades in the game, so it being the weakest in the beginning seems like a fair tradeoff in it's own right.
maybe sneak speed should be flat value that doesn't increase with celerity anymore. It infringes on the point of using silence as you near the marine base speed like it is now.
Yeah, but with silence you can wall jump, leap, and do whatever else and remain completely silent. So while Celerity does improve skulk sneaking speed, it is overall much slower with celerity than with silence if you're trying to go around undetected.
So right now there is a tradeoff between the two upgrades, both are mainly built for their specified playstyle, but still retain some benefit in the opposite area.
The main difference being that silence requires all 3 spur to work while celerity works with 1 or 2
In all honesty, that's a pretty minor difference. The first 2 of an upgrade rarely make a big enough difference to be noticeable, and they're generally built all at once. On top of that, Silence has been regarded as one of the strongest upgrades in the game, so it being the weakest in the beginning seems like a fair tradeoff in it's own right.
Mmh I get your point just saying silence is worthless without all 3 spurs.
Still I think Aura is slightly more powerful overall tho but anyway what's really broken now is that you can combine the 2 (before it was either pantom either aura) which makes playing alien extremely easy not to say stupidly easy.
I dont know, maybe the speed change will be a good thing with the increased hitbox, maybe not, i can remember when fast skulks was an issue, and were quite OP, but none the less, interested to see how this change pans out.
We've been watching the balance data and have been reading your responses to the Skulk HP change. We have some new changes in the works, which should be arriving on Friday:
... and in the meantime, today we've pushed an update to UWEHotfix which reduced Skulk base HP to 75/10 (it was 85/10)
Skulk speed and less jumps for max speed only benefits skilled alien players. HP boost benefits any alien player.
Regardless, please revert lerk hitbox.
*Revert all hitboxes because they are just sh.it now.
PDT are you going to do something about the abusable marine animation when changin directiong, spamming ADADAD or is it considered a gameplay mechanic now?
Cos u know... this isnt the exact definition of fun mechanics or good looking animations
dePARA, you don't understand. Maybe the speed change will work better with the new hitboxes than the old speed did, yes. But that does not make the hitboxes itself any better. And those are the problem that needs to be fixed instead of doing band aid fixing all around again.
PDT are you going to do something about the abusable marine animation when changin directiong, spamming ADADAD or is it considered a gameplay mechanic now?
Cos u know... this isnt the exact definition of fun mechanics or good looking animations
Dont make me say what I didnt I said the broken animation is not fun
Is the animation broken or is it hard to see a marine's movement smoothly depending on setup? This might be part of why it's difficult for skulks to hit their bites. I don't want to change how you can dodge though.
Everyone remembers how the skulks played when NS2 was 1st released - Flying demon dogs from outer space blink and you miss them, they then got nerfed so far to say that, if i pick up a brick and throw it, it only goes one direaction with very little movment in the air, at one speed that slows down.
So with the change of hitbox plus the skulks HP and speed, i am hoping that playing a skulk will be good and fun again, and not feel like a flying brick but not OP, as marines "should" be able to hit the skulks better now. so all in all, seems that these changes "MAY" be good.
Everyone remembers how the skulks played when NS2 was 1st released - Flying demon dogs from outer space blink and you miss them, they then got nerfed so far to say that, if i pick up a brick and throw it, it only goes one direaction with very little movment in the air, at one speed that slows down.
So with the change of hitbox plus the skulks HP and speed, i am hoping that playing a skulk will be good and fun again, and not feel like a flying brick but not OP, as marines "should" be able to hit the skulks better now. so all in all, seems that these changes "MAY" be good.
Now i shall wait and see.
Well it looks like the skulks hp is probably going back, but the speed is increasing and it's going to be faster to reach max speeds while wall jumping. It looks like good changes overall.
PDT are you going to do something about the abusable marine animation when changin directiong, spamming ADADAD or is it considered a gameplay mechanic now?
Cos u know... this isnt the exact definition of fun mechanics or good looking animations
@RevanCorana I would tend to agree that crazy fast animation changes are not fun, but I would be more convinced by a video showing how this looks in-game.
Just go thirdperson as marine and tab A and D really fast. If you manage to stay in one spot, you lower body is constantly turned by 90°, but that is fine. It's just nicely responsive.
Just go thirdperson as marine and tab A and D really fast. If you manage to stay in one spot, you lower body is constantly turned by 90°, but that is fine. It's just nicely responsive.
It is better to not stay in one spot anyway.
Yea but this might be dependent on how fast/accurate you are seeing the motion. Is the animation as smooth as it could be to allow everyone to see where the marine really is?
dePARAJoin Date: 2011-04-29Member: 96321Members, Squad Five Blue
edited August 2016
The only disatvantage of the faster skulks is this never fixed effect based on the weird frametimes in NS2:
Did you ever noticed how smooth NS2 is in youtube videos and how strange it can feel in real game?
Its just sad that i never got an answer from guru3d.com.
I asked them ages ago if they can do a FCAT benchmark for us.
Just go thirdperson as marine and tab A and D really fast. If you manage to stay in one spot, you lower body is constantly turned by 90°, but that is fine. It's just nicely responsive.
It is better to not stay in one spot anyway.
That would show me how the animations can look wonky, but not what it would actually look like to another player while doing that.
PDT are you going to do something about the abusable marine animation when changin directiong, spamming ADADAD or is it considered a gameplay mechanic now?
Cos u know... this isnt the exact definition of fun mechanics or good looking animations
@RevanCorana I would tend to agree that crazy fast animation changes are not fun, but I would be more convinced by a video showing how this looks in-game.
I see 2 issues the main is the lack of blending between walk left and walk right the 2nd one is the jerky iddle (of all character models) not as important.
Comments
- https://trello.com/c/WLb0NT3j/404-307-potential-skulk-changes
We will be doing another "Play with the Devs" event tomorrow at 7:30pm EST where we will be testing these changes. Everyone is welcome to join. Hop on Discord for more info.... and in the meantime, today we've pushed an update to UWEHotfix which reduced Skulk base HP to 75/10 (it was 85/10)
#crestfallen
Wouldn't say changing speed is a band-aid it's just long overdue.
Should sneak speed increase with celerity? I say definitely no.
This is being fixed, while the sneak speed is also being buffed... At the current numbers, this means the buff will be a bit stronger for non-celerity skulks:
Skulk speed and less jumps for max speed only benefits skilled alien players. HP boost benefits any alien player.
Regardless, please revert lerk hitbox.
Yeah, but with silence you can wall jump, leap, and do whatever else and remain completely silent. So while Celerity does improve skulk sneaking speed, it is overall much slower with celerity than with silence if you're trying to go around undetected.
So right now there is a tradeoff between the two upgrades, both are mainly built for their specified playstyle, but still retain some benefit in the opposite area.
The main difference being that silence requires all 3 spur to work while celerity works with 1 or 2
In all honesty, that's a pretty minor difference. The first 2 of an upgrade rarely make a big enough difference to be noticeable, and they're generally built all at once. On top of that, Silence has been regarded as one of the strongest upgrades in the game, so it being the weakest in the beginning seems like a fair tradeoff in it's own right.
Mmh I get your point just saying silence is worthless without all 3 spurs.
Still I think Aura is slightly more powerful overall tho but anyway what's really broken now is that you can combine the 2 (before it was either pantom either aura) which makes playing alien extremely easy not to say stupidly easy.
*Revert all hitboxes because they are just sh.it now.
How does playing with the devs change the hitbox size?
"maybe the speed change will be a good thing with the increased hitbox, maybe not"
Cos u know...
It's called dodging and it is fun.
Is the animation broken or is it hard to see a marine's movement smoothly depending on setup? This might be part of why it's difficult for skulks to hit their bites. I don't want to change how you can dodge though.
So with the change of hitbox plus the skulks HP and speed, i am hoping that playing a skulk will be good and fun again, and not feel like a flying brick but not OP, as marines "should" be able to hit the skulks better now. so all in all, seems that these changes "MAY" be good.
Now i shall wait and see.
Well it looks like the skulks hp is probably going back, but the speed is increasing and it's going to be faster to reach max speeds while wall jumping. It looks like good changes overall.
@RevanCorana I would tend to agree that crazy fast animation changes are not fun, but I would be more convinced by a video showing how this looks in-game.
Just go thirdperson as marine and tab A and D really fast. If you manage to stay in one spot, you lower body is constantly turned by 90°, but that is fine. It's just nicely responsive.
It is better to not stay in one spot anyway.
Yea but this might be dependent on how fast/accurate you are seeing the motion. Is the animation as smooth as it could be to allow everyone to see where the marine really is?
Did you ever noticed how smooth NS2 is in youtube videos and how strange it can feel in real game?
Its just sad that i never got an answer from guru3d.com.
I asked them ages ago if they can do a FCAT benchmark for us.
That would show me how the animations can look wonky, but not what it would actually look like to another player while doing that.