Catpacks
civman2
Join Date: 2002-11-03 Member: 6116Members, Constellation
Join Date: 2002-11-03 Member: 6116Members, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">Relatively unused. How to fix.</div> Alrite. It's 4 minutes into a game and you've got an arms lab, armor 1, an armory, and 3 rts. You have 35 res in your pool. Do you:
A) research weapons 1
B) upgrade the armory
C) drop a obs and get phases
D) research catpacks
If you said anything except D you're correct. Let's look at another example.
It's 12 minutes into a game and you've got an arms lab, weapons 3 armor 2, an upgraded armory, a proto lab, and heavy armor. You have 4 RTs, two heavies with hmg/welder, 2 sgers, and a guy running around like a monkey with a welder. You have 50 res in your pool. Do you:
A) Drop two more sets of HA/HMG
B) Get armor 2 and drop a pack of mines and a shotgun to defend base from constant fade assults.
C) Get a phase up to a hive and build a TF.
D) Research catpacks.
If you said D, you must have the aliens cornered in their hive with no chance to escape. The pressure from fades at this point in the game is starting to subside as you get HA and manage to kill a few, but its only a couple minutes until onos start rolling out to clear the third hive and start ripping up your res nodes. If you get catpacks now, you'll be able to defend against the onos, but its a large res commitment, and it will stop you from getting armor 3 for a while longer.
Your heavies are pushing on the hive, an onos, a fade, and a gorg attack them. Do you:
A) spam medpacks for your marines.
B) tell them to back off and set up a tf/phase
C) scramble frantically to drop them catpacks (it's 4 res a miss) as the onos closes the gap and the fades start swiping.
The problem with catpacks is they need to be dropped as soon as your marines start getting attacked. If you're lucky enough to be over them when that happens then you can hit them cats. (but assuming you're good enough to hit three marines with 3 cats in under 2 seconds then you're pretty good, and its still 12 res spent.) You better bring something down, because you've already invested about the same amount of res as a phase gate in these rines.
Why I think catpacks suck.
1) Make them cost less! A ten res upgrade on the proto sounds fair. You're really only wanting to drop them on HMG marines, and HMG is from the adv armory anyway. Besides, this way it won't suck up valuable time at the arms lab. Then make each pack cost like 3 res and leave in the 25% damage.
2) Give them a larger area of effect. Right now you need to actually step on the catpack to pick it up. Maybe you could make it like where you just need to be close to it to get it, so that way the comm doesn't need to be leet++ to make good use of them.
An interesting way to make them work would be to make it like the medarmory plugin where the marine just calls for one (a new impulse) and poof he gets one. If you did this I'd make it so they still cost 4 and don't do the damage. The comm would still need to research them so that prevents abuse. I mean they're really ineffective in pubs because pub comms aren't really good with dropping stuff fast, much less stuff without having to ask for it.
The biggest problem with catpacks is that they rely on the skill of the commander. Make them too weak and they're be ok in organized play and suck in pubs, make them too strong and they're be ok in pubs and pwnify in organized play. That's why I like the automated catpack idea. Maybe you could have them like in combat where a kill gets a pack, but usually you want a pack to score the kill. Maybe up them to 30 res to research and have them auto drop after kills and have them still droppable by the comm. I like that plan.
A) research weapons 1
B) upgrade the armory
C) drop a obs and get phases
D) research catpacks
If you said anything except D you're correct. Let's look at another example.
It's 12 minutes into a game and you've got an arms lab, weapons 3 armor 2, an upgraded armory, a proto lab, and heavy armor. You have 4 RTs, two heavies with hmg/welder, 2 sgers, and a guy running around like a monkey with a welder. You have 50 res in your pool. Do you:
A) Drop two more sets of HA/HMG
B) Get armor 2 and drop a pack of mines and a shotgun to defend base from constant fade assults.
C) Get a phase up to a hive and build a TF.
D) Research catpacks.
If you said D, you must have the aliens cornered in their hive with no chance to escape. The pressure from fades at this point in the game is starting to subside as you get HA and manage to kill a few, but its only a couple minutes until onos start rolling out to clear the third hive and start ripping up your res nodes. If you get catpacks now, you'll be able to defend against the onos, but its a large res commitment, and it will stop you from getting armor 3 for a while longer.
Your heavies are pushing on the hive, an onos, a fade, and a gorg attack them. Do you:
A) spam medpacks for your marines.
B) tell them to back off and set up a tf/phase
C) scramble frantically to drop them catpacks (it's 4 res a miss) as the onos closes the gap and the fades start swiping.
The problem with catpacks is they need to be dropped as soon as your marines start getting attacked. If you're lucky enough to be over them when that happens then you can hit them cats. (but assuming you're good enough to hit three marines with 3 cats in under 2 seconds then you're pretty good, and its still 12 res spent.) You better bring something down, because you've already invested about the same amount of res as a phase gate in these rines.
Why I think catpacks suck.
1) Make them cost less! A ten res upgrade on the proto sounds fair. You're really only wanting to drop them on HMG marines, and HMG is from the adv armory anyway. Besides, this way it won't suck up valuable time at the arms lab. Then make each pack cost like 3 res and leave in the 25% damage.
2) Give them a larger area of effect. Right now you need to actually step on the catpack to pick it up. Maybe you could make it like where you just need to be close to it to get it, so that way the comm doesn't need to be leet++ to make good use of them.
An interesting way to make them work would be to make it like the medarmory plugin where the marine just calls for one (a new impulse) and poof he gets one. If you did this I'd make it so they still cost 4 and don't do the damage. The comm would still need to research them so that prevents abuse. I mean they're really ineffective in pubs because pub comms aren't really good with dropping stuff fast, much less stuff without having to ask for it.
The biggest problem with catpacks is that they rely on the skill of the commander. Make them too weak and they're be ok in organized play and suck in pubs, make them too strong and they're be ok in pubs and pwnify in organized play. That's why I like the automated catpack idea. Maybe you could have them like in combat where a kill gets a pack, but usually you want a pack to score the kill. Maybe up them to 30 res to research and have them auto drop after kills and have them still droppable by the comm. I like that plan.
Comments
Catpacks + shotguns + hive = Team One won the game
I prefer dropping shotguns, getting a ninja rine to phase by the enemy hive, and spamming cat packs at the hive entrance. The marines walk over them on their way in and proceed to tear down the hive in seconds...
Catpacks + shotguns + hive = Team One won the game
I prefer dropping shotguns, getting a ninja rine to phase by the enemy hive, and spamming cat packs at the hive entrance. The marines walk over them on their way in and proceed to tear down the hive in seconds... <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
You're talking to a skilled VETERAN...
Good anaylsis, civ. However, I don't think your solutions would do much. Most commanders have trouble dropping packs timely. It's no wonder catpacks are so unpopular. This problem has to be directly addressed.
And for the record, it is possible to be in a veteran clan and not be a veteran yourself, such as myself who is currently taking a year long vacation on the opposite of side the world from where my clan is based.
On the other hand, I think catalysts can be improved by taking an idea from starcraft's stimpack. Make catalyst a button you can click when you have marines selected. That way, a commander would never miss, and can mass catalyst a whole team (over-powahed?)
I suggest making the upgrade cost like 25, and then you get a free catpack with a kill, or the comm can drop them for 4 each.