The Diff Between Alien And Marine Res
Frogg2
Join Date: 2002-11-02 Member: 4867Members, Constellation
Join Date: 2002-11-02 Member: 4867Members, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">Am i getting this wrong?</div> Apperanty the amount of marines on a team affects how fast they get res? I've heard that marines with larger teams get more res with each click, and and marine teams with fewer players get less res with each click.
So basically a small alien team gets res faster than a small marine team, and a large alien team gets res slower than a large marine team?
I'm wondering if the marine res is backwards?
It seems fine at a certain amount of players though.
So basically a small alien team gets res faster than a small marine team, and a large alien team gets res slower than a large marine team?
I'm wondering if the marine res is backwards?
It seems fine at a certain amount of players though.
Comments
Or I'm wrong. Not sure.
since marines don`t need res, only the comm then it seems they need less for like stuff but aliens get the same but it goes into their res pool y`know that thing and then gets split up.
me making prog to calculate it, nearly done.
P.S. their is that handicap thing in server options. u see res nodes have +1 coming out of it, if handicapp is on and ur team has fewer players i makes it +2.
if its switched on
[Edited - it's 1, not 10, in base].
The marine side gets it all into one pool, while the Kharaa shares it out among all living aliens, gorges getting three times as much as other aliens. The net effect is that each Kharaa is getting the same amount of resources no matter the teamsize, while marines sees their resources multiplied by the number of players on the team.
This works fairly ok for the Kharaa, as they have lots of per-alien costs. It works less well for the marines, as they don't have any real per-person costs until they get HA/HMG's. All marine teams needs to build the same buildings and do the same research... which means that the game time needed to do that is about 4 times as long in a 4v4 game vs a 16v16 game.
In reality, it means that only servers in the range of 6v6 to 10v10 is balanced- any smaller, and the marines don't have much of a chance. Any larger, and the Kharaa is pretty much done for. Fortunately, the skill of players vary so much that this isn't all that obvious on public servers. A bad commander can take down just about any marine team, no matter how many resources he has.
X = num players on your team
Y = num players on other team
res = (X) * (Y/X) * (num of res nozzles) * (some other stuff I forgot)
res = (Y) * (num of nozzles) * (some other stuff I forgot)
So, how fast you get res depends upon the number of players on the OTHER team, no matter
how many players are on your team. That's why Marines, in large games, get res so damn fast.
However, because of the Alien model where:
X = total number of aliens
Ng = number of gorges
No = number of aliens OTHER than gorges
Nu = number of alien 'units'
Y = number of marines
R = total res for the aliens
No = X - Ng
Nu = No +(3*Ng)
R is still proportional to Y. However, the amount of res a gorge gets is:
(R / Nu) * 3
So, with 1 alien and that alien being a gorge, that gorge would get all alien resources.
With 10 aliens total and one gorge, that gorge would get (R / 12) * 3, or 3/12 of the total
alien resources !! Thus, the gorge only gets 1/4 of the total alien resources until the non-gorges
start "filling up". That's why, early game, a large alien team has a difficult getting resource towers
put up. The gorge is collecting resources very slowly. That's why large games favor the marines.
Both sides get the exact same amount of ressources per ressource node. Also, both sides get a multiplier applied to the ressources they get, and as a result having more players does not benefit a specific team ressource-wise. In addition to that both sides have a certain other multiplier factored in the ressource model which gives any team with less players additional ressources. Now it's possible that at high player count games (and therefore at high ressource games) the game won't be completely balanced, but that hinges on factors that are dependent on ressources, rather than ressources themselves.
For the marines, all the ressources they get per turn goes straight to the commander pool and he uses it how he wishes.
For the aliens it's a little different. All the ressources they get per turn goes into their ressource pool. That ressource pool distributes the ressources equally between every kharaa, except for gorges who get 3 times as many ressources as the other kharaa. If any player maxes out on ressources (like for instance a skulk has 33/33 ressources with one hive) he will not be given ressources from the ressource pool for the next turn (and all other players will hence get more).
That is why it is always good to max out as a skulk (33/33). If enough skulks do this you'll see your gorge's ressources start shooting up, making it much easier to get a hive. Most smart gorges will time this little event in their build order, so that by the time they get to their second hive after putting up a couple ressource nodes and def. chambers, they'll be able to put their second hive up.
Again, both the marines and the aliens get their ressources multiplied by how many players they get. Their ressource pool has the same ressource model.
That's why it's always good to have one gorge early on. He gets a larger share of the ressource pool than he would with 2 gorges AND the other skulks max out (33/33) much more quickly.
If EVERY player on the alien team is maxed out, the ressources acquired per turn will simply be stored in the resource pool until any player needs more ressources (that's why sometimes if you join a game as a gorge you'l see your ressources shoot up super fast)
a) assume 7 skulks, 1 gorge
Nu = 7 + (3 * 1) = 10
(3 * 1) / 10 = 3/10
gorge gets 30% of the total alien resources
b) assume 6 skulks, 2 gorges
Nu = 6 + (3 * 2) = 12
(3 * 2) / 12 = 1/2
gorges get 50%
each gorge gets 50/2 = 25% of the total alien resources
With 12 aliens:
c) assume 11 skulks, 1 gorge
Nu = 11 + (3 * 1) = 14
(3 * 1) / 14 = 3/14
gorge gets 21.5% of the total alien resources
d) assume 10 skulks, 2 gorges
Nu = 10 + (3 * 2) = 16
(3 * 2) / 16 = 6/16
gorges get 37.5% of the total alien resources
each gorge gets 18.8% of the total alien resources
So, going with 2 gorges vs. 1, each gorge only gives up (21.5 - 18.8) = 2.7% of the alien resource pool, or 12% of the resources he would have gotten had he been the only gorge.
What I have not factored in is the total effectiveness of the Aliens, since 1 skulk going gorge means 1 less skulk to parasite/harass/kill Marines.
1) both teams gain resources in the same way - that is, if teams are even, both teams are getting the same rate.
2) The rate of RP draw increases as the number of players increases; a larger game will have faster resources than a smaller game.
3) A team with fewer players on it will gain a bonus to its RP draw rate to account for the numerical disadvantage.
Getting weapon/armor upgrades for a 5 man team costs more per unit than it does for a 10 man team.
I don't know the cost per upgrade, but assuming level 1 costs like 20 rps:
20 rps/ 5 marines = 4 rps/marine
20 rps/ 10 marines = 2 rps/marine
Since the amount of resources the comm gets is proportional to the number of marines on his team, this means upgrades can be bought much sooner since they cost less per marine.
Aliens have to pay the same amount to buy upgrades regardless of team size since they're on a per unit basis.
True.. but building the structures themselves is the same finite amount of resources, as is building new hives - and since the aliens are gaining RPs faster in a larger game, they get access to their upgrades and higher evolutions relatively sooner. So it balances out. The only real imbalance, IMO, is the respawn rate. But that's not what's being discussed here.
The "skulk bank" drains off 80% (or rather 11/14) of the available resources in a 12v12 games, and only lets the aliens use this for something useful once the 2nd hive is up. If the 2nd hive never comes up ... well, then it will never be used for anything useful. Note that the smaller the game, the smaller the bank drain - in a 4v4 game, the bank drain is only 3/6, or 50%.
This of course means that the game is speeded up tremendously for the marines as the game gets larger, while it basically stays still for the Kharaa in the first 10 minutes.
Do note that you can turn this around, and say that the marine first 10 minutes are getting slower the smaller the game, while the Kharaa is building their hive at the same time as always. Thus, smaller marine teams are getting the shaft, while larger can float to victory on a tidal wave of resource points.
It would seem pretty evident that you need to flatten the resource income for the marines some .. increasing it a bit for smaller teams, decreasing it some for larger teams. It IS true that larger teams need more resources .. but doubling the teamsize doesn't mean they need twice as many res.
True.. but building the structures themselves is the same finite amount of resources, as is building new hives - and since the aliens are gaining RPs faster in a larger game, they get access to their upgrades and higher evolutions relatively sooner. So it balances out. The only real imbalance, IMO, is the respawn rate. But that's not what's being discussed here.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Actually the gorges get res slower due to the fact that resources are split between all of the aliens. This means the gorge can build less structures, and the comm can build more structures in the early game with large numbers of players. The gorge will only see a significant increase in his rate of resource gain when the skulks max out (33/33), but by that time the comm has already been able to take advantage of his significant resource increase.
Looking at "(10 + num_own_players * num_resnodes * 0.23) * num_enemy_players / num_own_players"
Assume even teams 5 vs 5, 1 res node:
(10 + 5 * 1 * 0.23) * 5 / 5 = 11.15 rps per tick
11.5 / 5 = 2.23 rps per tick per alien
Assume even teams 10 vs 10, 1 res node:
(10 + 10 * 1 * 0.23) * 10 / 10 = 12.3 rps per tick
12.3 / 10 = 1.23 rps per tick per alien
Not only does the gorge get less resources, but it will take longer for the skulks to max out.
<edit>Yah, what matso42 said</edit>
It should be <!--c1--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>CODE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='CODE'><!--ec1--> (num_own_players * num_resnodes * 0.23) * num_enemy_players / num_own_players<!--c2--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--ec2-->
I mean, look at it... in a 5v5 game with no gorges (yet) are you getting 2 res a tick? (A tick in NS is 5-6 seconds) I think not.
I made a calculator (check out my topic in General Discussion) using the (num_own_players * num_resnodes * 0.23) * (num_enemy_players / num_own_players) formula (just for the basic calculations not including gorges). I was going to PM Flayra asking him some questions, but his inbox was full, so I can't get a true answer about the resource model, but I am pretty sure I got it correct.
you sure? cos i done tests, but if 0.23 is what it says in the code ?
P.S. for one node i estimate it takes 315.78 seconds to make 100 res for marines same for aliens but it goes into their pool instead, but u can`t see how much the pool has.
you sure? cos i done tests, but if 0.23 is what it says in the code ?
P.S. for one node i estimate it takes 315.78 seconds to make 100 res for marines same for aliens but it goes into their pool instead, but u can`t see how much the pool has.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
In a 5v5, 4 skulks 1 gorge, 1 node makes 2.3 res a tick. The gorge gets ~.98res while the skulks only get ~.33 res a tick.
How did you figure that number? So many things go into res calculations, mostly # of players on each team and total and the # of gorges (for the alien team).
EDIT: Last paragraph was wrong.... n/m I think there is a error in my coding with 1v1s. I am sure that 4v4 and higher are correct though.
It should be <!--c1--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>CODE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='CODE'><!--ec1--> (num_own_players * num_resnodes * 0.23) * num_enemy_players / num_own_players<!--c2--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--ec2-->
I mean, look at it... in a 5v5 game with no gorges (yet) are you getting 2 res a tick? (A tick in NS is 5-6 seconds) I think not.
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Arg ... yea, sorry. Mixed up the per minute and per tick resources. It's
<!--c1--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>CODE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='CODE'><!--ec1-->(10 + num_own_players * num_resnodes * 2.3) * num_enemy_players / num_own_players<!--c2--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--ec2-->
income PER MINUTE, or 10 ticks. Or
<!--c1--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>CODE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='CODE'><!--ec1-->(1 + num_own_players * num_resnodes * 0.23) * num_enemy_players / num_own_players<!--c2--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--ec2-->
per tick, if you like.
Sorry about that. You do get a minimum of 1 res per tick per team though.
The marines get 100-110, and each alien gets around 10-13 (at least on the server I play on).