A New Trend I've Noticed
LoRDxDeMoN
Join Date: 2003-03-17 Member: 14636Members
Join Date: 2003-03-17 Member: 14636Members
<div class="IPBDescription">a different gorge rush</div> i'm seeing more and more mass gorging to cap res nozzles...
basically, on a medium-sized game (say, 6 on 6 or so), almost all skulks go gorge and cap all resource nozzles they can (skulks start with 25 res, 10 to gorge, 15 to drop a res).
this can happen very fast, and i often see the RT indicator state 1 to 6 active RTs (meaning marines hold 1 nozzle, aliens have 6);
i realize marines should attack, but with such a large number of towers, aliens can build up chambers/hives or even evolve into fade/onos rather quickly.
what do you guys think? any decent strategies that would work against such aliens?
basically, on a medium-sized game (say, 6 on 6 or so), almost all skulks go gorge and cap all resource nozzles they can (skulks start with 25 res, 10 to gorge, 15 to drop a res).
this can happen very fast, and i often see the RT indicator state 1 to 6 active RTs (meaning marines hold 1 nozzle, aliens have 6);
i realize marines should attack, but with such a large number of towers, aliens can build up chambers/hives or even evolve into fade/onos rather quickly.
what do you guys think? any decent strategies that would work against such aliens?
Comments
With the reduction in the power of the HMG (lower ROF, smaller clip, piercing) I believe that the shotgun will become the standard issue weapon for assulting, with the HMG reduced to long range support and defence, but that's a different topic.
Edited for correct damage values.
basically, on a medium-sized game (say, 6 on 6 or so), almost all skulks go gorge and cap all resource nozzles they can (skulks start with 25 res, 10 to gorge, 15 to drop a res).
this can happen very fast, and i often see the RT indicator state 1 to 6 active RTs (meaning marines hold 1 nozzle, aliens have 6);
i realize marines should attack, but with such a large number of towers, aliens can build up chambers/hives or even evolve into fade/onos rather quickly.
what do you guys think? any decent strategies that would work against such aliens? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
hmm
I have not read the changelog and am not sure how the res system works, except that gorges only get 1 share no matter what, and that you get money as alien for killing marines.
However I remember capping plenty of res before and still getting slow res, while attacking a bunch of marines got me like 40 res in 1 min. Maybe all the new res goes to the killers, cuz RTs don't seem to help much when I'm not killing.
To simply thwart the aliens,just go for the hive as soon as possible, just be sure to ask the comm to scan or you won't likely find it(Sensory chambers)
EDITED TO AVOID CONFUSION
Taken out in the last stages of PT'ing, see the final changelog.
Or, just drop a res tower, move around the corner, and watch the little orange +1.0 res pop up.
As far as counters, remember, the key is KNOWING this will happen. Then it's easy to counter. Assume, for the moment, 6/6. Hand out 2 shotties to a group of 3 marines, and send them off to smack aliens around. Get a tfac up in base with the other two, a few turrets, and then start capping res with them. Your lancer squad will cut through aliens like cake (and you can always reinforce them with anyone who dies while keeping the free shotgun in rotation). Two shotties chew through res towers in like 5 seconds. After a few rcs, the remaining ones will have ocs, but that's not too bad either. Meanwhile, your other squad will be capping res towers, maybe a hive, and if they die, you can reequip them with shotties and defend the res towers while they electrify.
After a few minutes, it'll be along the lines of 4:2 or 5:2, assuming your marines are about even skill, while you'll have a few electrified RCs, a base in a hive with tfacs and fun, phase gates coming, and 3 or 4 shotties in rotation and a secure base, while they'll probably have one slightly defended res tower.
Either that or you can shotty rush the hive.
The biggest problem is, of course, knowing they're doing this fast enough to counter. I like sending a scout marine out right away, and giving the other 2 members of my lancer squad shotties to meet up with him later (if he survives, if he dies, just group them up then).
However, proper recon is very hard at the beginning of the game.
Infact, the opening is the 'standard' spread out and try to cap a res point while some stay skulks to get the higher classes (like Fades but no Onos yet) and generally start to make life hell for the marines. Once the opening res capping is done, the gorges often have 2 res left, so they change back to skulks and go off and kill and gain res like that while one or two gorges stay as gorge and build up an upgrade chamber or another res point if the initial capping spree wasn't extensive enough. It's usually a Skulk that puts up the hive since they are doing the killing so when they gain enough res from the kills they just move off to a designated point and plop up the second hive then go back to the killing
Nope, this wasn't a clan heavy server. Just a normal pub. I'll be open to all suggestions on a possible method(s) to counter this style of growth, though from what I've read so far a few shotties and a hunting team could do the trick...
I'm usually a gorge and I don't know if it's me or the marine but I've had an unusually high success rate when defending myself from a nasty intruder on my happy gorging times. Anyone else found it tought to kill a gorge or something because I don't recall ever killing marines like I have been recently. The end result: I get 2 more res and I'm a bit closer to setting up the map wide cloaking field
Summary: Shotgun rushes smack rapid expansion around. Gorges are buff.
You can defeat the early node rush strategy by moving as a unit. One by one, the nodes will die. One by one, the fatties who try to stop you will get popped. (Make sure the WHOLE TEAM attacks the gorge together, or he'll skitter around the corner and start building OCs. If you hear him building OCs early game, rush around the corner and waste him, then his structures.)
The key is, right afterbuilding those res, the team is stuck as a bunch of gorges with 0 res apiece. If you destroy their res, they can't build more. If you kill them, they're stuck as skulks for a while. And once you cap a node with an electric RT, there's nothing they can do about it until they get a second hive up.
From this point on, the game is a struggle to prevent any one alien from getting 35 res in the gas tank. Keep claiming the nodes one by one with your squad of marines. Watch each entrence. Guard each others' backs while building. Soon you will have claimed half the nodes on the map. Then all of them. Maybe the aliens have a hive up by now. Go in there and start building crap. <i>Don't take an empty hive room.</i> <b>Do take an occupied hive room.</b> Early on in the game, an occupied hive has no webs, very few OCs, and maybe a Sensory or a def, but they <i>definitely</i> can't afford more than one. If there's just one OC and a sensory, set up an observetory nearby. If there somehow is a lot of stuff built here, siege it.
Some of this stuff is bound to help, if the marines stick together and focus on completing your objectives and holding an area.
as long as marines stick together, everything can be accomplished. isn't this what we all love about NS?