Looking For Skulk Playing Suggestions
Wile_E_Coyote
Join Date: 2003-02-06 Member: 13198Members, Constellation
Join Date: 2003-02-06 Member: 13198Members, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">Skulk - Challenged</div> Okay I tried seaching the forums but the search function seems to not work right at the moment <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif'><!--endemo-->
Anyway, I am asking for help playing skulk. I really blow at it. As a marine I have trouble hitting the little things, which I think is perfectly normal. It seems it not SUPPOSED to be easy to hit them. But then they jump and kill me in ONE BITE and the map has been running for less than 2 minutes - so I know they don't have upgrades. Okay, I say to myself, I need to get better, that's all.
So I play as a skulk, and I am doing EVERYTHING I can think of to avoid incoming bullets, and yet the marine will fire a small 3 round blast and it seems God himself directed all the bulets right to me. Now wait a sec - I had a hard time hitting them as a marine and my aim is above average in most half-life mods. Obviously they had a few moves I am unaware of. Plus, when I do get close enough, I jump at a marine and bite, and this guy is SQUARELY in the middle of my screen, and next thing I know I'm past him. WTF? I know there have to real explanations for this, maybe somebody can tell me how to do things the right way.
Please don't bother responding "it's just cause j00s suXor" or some crap like that. I think the one bite thing and the 3 magic bullet thing both might be due to net-play\code (ie, they actually bit or shot longer than I saw, thanks to packet loss). But even that aside, I think I am missing some basic understanding of how to perform as a skulk as I have seen MANY other players do.
PS There have been occassions where I am certain they were using 3rd person, but I still think there are a whole lotta people who play waaay better skulk than me.
Anyway, I am asking for help playing skulk. I really blow at it. As a marine I have trouble hitting the little things, which I think is perfectly normal. It seems it not SUPPOSED to be easy to hit them. But then they jump and kill me in ONE BITE and the map has been running for less than 2 minutes - so I know they don't have upgrades. Okay, I say to myself, I need to get better, that's all.
So I play as a skulk, and I am doing EVERYTHING I can think of to avoid incoming bullets, and yet the marine will fire a small 3 round blast and it seems God himself directed all the bulets right to me. Now wait a sec - I had a hard time hitting them as a marine and my aim is above average in most half-life mods. Obviously they had a few moves I am unaware of. Plus, when I do get close enough, I jump at a marine and bite, and this guy is SQUARELY in the middle of my screen, and next thing I know I'm past him. WTF? I know there have to real explanations for this, maybe somebody can tell me how to do things the right way.
Please don't bother responding "it's just cause j00s suXor" or some crap like that. I think the one bite thing and the 3 magic bullet thing both might be due to net-play\code (ie, they actually bit or shot longer than I saw, thanks to packet loss). But even that aside, I think I am missing some basic understanding of how to perform as a skulk as I have seen MANY other players do.
PS There have been occassions where I am certain they were using 3rd person, but I still think there are a whole lotta people who play waaay better skulk than me.
Comments
Dont bite all the time when attacking - Bite when needed
Use carpace
Jump while attacking
Use crouch key if attacking a hitbox lamer
Strafe and jump while going down corridor
combining attack types (i.e LEAP and in mid-air switch back
to BITE for when you land)
Simple strat's are:
Let the Marine come to you, unless you have back-up.
NEVER attack on long corridors unless your weaving skills
are second to none.
Weave around a marines' legs. There's nothing harder for a
Marine than having to look straight down and spin around trying to hit you.
Try not to jump too much, it causes excess noise and makes you ALOT
easier to hit.
Stay on blind corners, Marines are noisey + nosey so chomp
them as they come to you.
LEARN THE MAPS!!!!! Whenever you know you're out
of your depth and outnumbered you're gonna have to run,
and run very fast! At times you'll need to use vents to your advantage
and you'll need a variety of paths to escape.
Be realistic... Can you really dodge those 4 turrets, the 12 mines and
the 3 Marines whislt trying to chomp on the Commander's Chair? Be patient
they'll seperate soon enough, and thats when you strike.
1. you can climb walls, do so!
2. you have a 180degree firing arc, use it!
First off, use those strafe keys. You can strafe for a reason. Pretend you're a bouncy ball and try to bounce around (unpredictably). Suddenly you are MUCH harder to hit. Close that distance quickly but also weigh the fact that it helps if you are still alive when you get there. Thus, straight lines get you killed. Zigzags get you killed... slower. And strafing around while climbing the walls and everything means you might still get killed, but the marine had to at least break a sweat.
Cool, so you are in bite range, what to do now? You can either jump and bite, or just bite his ankles. I personally do not jump and bite. It might look cool, but only for the marine as he guns you down at the last second. Remember, the higher you are as you close the less the marine has to adjust for distance. (IE: if you're coming straight on, he just has to remember to hold down the trigger, if you are level. If you are slightly below/above him, he has to track). I will occaisionally jump and bite, but that is dependant on my surroundings. When attacking try to keep track of where you are, and where the marine is. I don't like to track the marine, because that generally makes you more predictable. I want to instead run circles around him and turn and bite when my next bite is "ready".
So how to be effective at killing marines? Be awake. Use parasite alot, it helps. And mainly try to make it as hard as possible for the marine to hit you. If that means moving on more axes than you thought possible, do so. Use terrain to your advantage. And straight lines will leave you dead. Do NOT run straight.
-Some basic info when biting at a marines ankles: Bite, back out, strafe, bite again, back out. It might be easier to just press up and bite them twice, but if they have armor, this may be harder so you need to strafe and back out. It's obvious why you have to strafe, but backing out is to help you track the marines movements. At point blank, the marine can suddenly disappear and get a nice shot at your behind. REMEMBER THIS! VERY IMPORTANT!
-When closing the distance at a far away target, oh, maybe down the hall. Try to be as erratic as possible. Like someone said, just zigzagging is no good.
-Use cover effectively. This can be a pillar, column, marine buildings, even marines themselves. Let the fool empty his clip or halfway empty it. Chances are the half clip won't kill you. Using marines as a meat shield is a very good tactic. I'll explain later.
-Only jump + attack if you are facing his back. It just makes it easier since you will cling to his back and assure 2 bites. If you do this while he is looking at you you basically are jumping right into his barrel.
-A croucher, is a little harder to hit, but you do the same thing as you would biting a standing marines ankles, but only against a stationary target. Other aliens get killed by crouchers because they don't use the right tactics and call them hitbox abusers. The only difference is that the marine no longer needs to look straight down to track you well, but is now stationary. Not hard.
-Group tactics. Never attack head on. If they are looking at you don't attack. Strafe around and see if he tracks you. If he does, try not to attack and let another skulk have a free meal. Also be on the look out for marines tracking another target other than yourself. You'll contribute to the effort best this way by at least taking down one guy without a sweat.
-Group tactics. If they are moving out, always try to use the other marines as cover. In other words, try to be in less direct fire as possible. Which means, don't strafe too much. If you flank them, cling onto the back of the last marine. They'll end up putting bullets into their friends instead of you.
Regen on a skulk is useless. Many people tend to think regen is the best upgrade since you can regenerate yourself. But overtime you'll learn carapace is much better. Especially for small units. a regen skulk is a dead one. a carap skulk can survive at least twice as long (yes even with only +20 armor)
Remember you're hit and run. You hit, then you run and heal yourself <i>if needed</i>. (65 health 27 armor is not needed to be healed)
Oh and don't tend to think you're really strong. you're not. A marine team should always beat a skulk in normal circumstances. Even a lone marine (in the case of deffing, not ramboing I mean)
Oh yeah, here's one last tip.. Use hive sight efficiently.. parasites are so useful. when they are ABOUT to pop out the corner, go eat them. They will not expect this unlike expecting you hanging off the ceiling. parasites not only help you in this timing, it informs you on their advancement and gives the gorge an opportunity to hide and call for extra backup when needed.
I think I summed it up about.. and read the other posts.
try staying skulk for whole games and improve like that...
Here are my skulk upgrades
carap, adren, scent of fear when I feel suicidal... Leap in there, chomp the weak, leap out of there.
carap, silence, cloaking when I feel lurker...
There are two basic ways of playing skulk as a hunter - you either ambush your prey (which I don't do) or you chase them down and kill them. I couldn't tell you how to ambush effectively, but when it comes to chasing down it's a matter of learning to close (see above) and learning to dodge gunfire. It's not easy. Be under no illusions that it's easy. It takes a very, very long time to become adept at dodging gunfire but you'll get it eventually and once you've got it you never lose it (no matter what game you're playing).
Anyway, if you're really no good at netting kills, you can be EXTREMELY beneficial to your team as a scout. Find marines and marine installations and parasite them. Parasiting marines tells the more experienced hunters where they are, and lets even you help defend your hives. Parasiting outposts alerts the gorges to the fact that the area is not safe, and alerts the hunters to an available target. How you parasite bases is up to you - some people say you should only parasite the TF and PG to minimise visual spam, but I personally prefer that every structure is parasited so that I can gague how big the outpost is.
Stick with it. It's difficult, but the skills you pick up will help you in other games as well.
Ironically, as was mentioned in the post above I really have discovered on my own that I was much better off parasiting for our team. Not hiding and cowering, mind you, but suiciding into their stronghold and zapping as many as posible before the black screen of death. I rarely attack (bite) as skulk unless we are in force.
Thanks again
I like to parasite the sentryguns first.
I mean, knowing where they are makes it so much easier to stay out of the line of fire trying to find blind spots.
EDIT:
About the hitbox-thing. Some people have been experimenting and found out that there is a slight glitch in the hitbox when a marine crouches and when a skulk is in "wallwalk mode". The skulks bite is raised and the marine hitbox is lowered (or something like that) so it is easy to accidentally bite above the marine. This is remedied however by holding crouch (so you are not in "wallwalk mode").
Ok, this is just what I have gathered off the forums. Dunno if it is 100% accurate tho.
/EDIT
On your first points about when you're marine you can't hit skulks and then when you're skulk you can't kill marines. I know EXACTLY what you mean. It's not down to netcode, lag or anything (I usually have a sub 50 ping) it's just perception. I bet if you got the stats it wouldn't look so bad. But I know what you mean, I say the same to myself while playing <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
What everyone else says applies too. Generally though, I tend not to be bothered about dying. I do it a lot. When I'm skulk (which is most of the time), I just become suicide skulk. I usually just leg it straight to the marine base and cause as much hassle as possible. Time and time and time again. I die lots! <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo--> But it's fun.
A quick tip for taking out those Turret Factories. The marines usually build them in a corner or whatnot. This means they don't have all round turret protection and there's usually a blind side on them. Find this and take down that TF without dying. Nice.
Cheers.
This makes a very tempting target for him but it is almost impossible to hit, because an average reflex time is about 1/5 of a second so by the time he reacts you are already back behind cover. I have been on both ends of this and it is very frustrating for the marine. After a full clip from him and 6 or 7 parasite hits from me, he will have only hit me with 2 or 3 bullets!
This is the best tactic to end standoffs I have learned. Much better then charging in wildly and praying you can dodge his bullets.