Heavy And Jetpack Augmentation
Khaim
Join Date: 2002-06-28 Member: 841Members, NS1 Playtester, Constellation
Join Date: 2002-06-28 Member: 841Members, NS1 Playtester, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">They work well togather!</div> Recently, I've seen many commanders begin to press for longer and more drawn out games, as free upgrades help to destroy the marine early game advantage it seems comms are looking more for the top-teir tech against Hive-2 victory. Now, this is largely based on res nodes in many cases as to who is the victor, however, I have seen a number of heavy trains be wiped out by a single stomping onos with support, or waves of jetpackers slaughtered by carefully placed OCs and skilled lerks and fades.
My main point in this topic? Jetpackers and Heavies work wonders when used to augment one another. Say a team of 3 HA HMGs, 1 HA GL, and 2 JP HMGs and 1 JP Shotty or GL if you have a player left over; all have welders. These players can save each other from a horrid doom. Jetpackers can target onos and bring them down FAST even with stomp; especially if you have that 3rd JP. Obviously the numbers of these groups should vary depending on the makeup of your oppononet; more onos should cause you to drop more JPs to avoid the deadly stomp of death. A lot of lerk gas or Fades or OCs should lead to more HA's. Remember, even JPs can massively benefit from welders, especially if you have armor 3 which you *should* have unless you're doing some sort of nutty rush strat. : )
A group of HA's with a couple of JPs playing anti-onos support is infinately harder to kill, plus the JPs can always get good vantage points to cover when HA's are having trouble; or they can just play rear guard well by being able to move backwards quickly. On the other hand, HA's provide the punch and damage taking abilities that JP's lack, while also providing the immunity to gas which is crucial against a large-lerk alien team.
My *other* point I'm going to leave you with here is: Always remember to alter your strategies as the situation changes! In time the aliens will find counters against virtually any strat, so remember to cover your weaknesses and change your strengths as your enemy shifts too. The ability to adapt to your enemies weaknesses will *ALWAYS* beat a static strategy.
My main point in this topic? Jetpackers and Heavies work wonders when used to augment one another. Say a team of 3 HA HMGs, 1 HA GL, and 2 JP HMGs and 1 JP Shotty or GL if you have a player left over; all have welders. These players can save each other from a horrid doom. Jetpackers can target onos and bring them down FAST even with stomp; especially if you have that 3rd JP. Obviously the numbers of these groups should vary depending on the makeup of your oppononet; more onos should cause you to drop more JPs to avoid the deadly stomp of death. A lot of lerk gas or Fades or OCs should lead to more HA's. Remember, even JPs can massively benefit from welders, especially if you have armor 3 which you *should* have unless you're doing some sort of nutty rush strat. : )
A group of HA's with a couple of JPs playing anti-onos support is infinately harder to kill, plus the JPs can always get good vantage points to cover when HA's are having trouble; or they can just play rear guard well by being able to move backwards quickly. On the other hand, HA's provide the punch and damage taking abilities that JP's lack, while also providing the immunity to gas which is crucial against a large-lerk alien team.
My *other* point I'm going to leave you with here is: Always remember to alter your strategies as the situation changes! In time the aliens will find counters against virtually any strat, so remember to cover your weaknesses and change your strengths as your enemy shifts too. The ability to adapt to your enemies weaknesses will *ALWAYS* beat a static strategy.
Comments
You win the gorge of obviousness.... congrats.
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VERY few onos even WITH stomp will try rushing a full on 7-8 man heavy train. Its just mentally they go "Theres NO way..."
Jp aren't stompable. Hence why they work well as an augmentation to HA...
The two problems here are pretty obvious. Both upgrades are too expensive and take too long to upgrade to ever be realisitic together in any proper rush. This stratigey is fairly restricted those long epic games where you easily drop as many as 50 heavy equipment sets, and the aliens lose onos like yesterday's soup.
The other problem is just that NO DAMN MARINE TEAM KNOWS HOW TO USE THESE THINGS TOGETHER! HA and JP just do NOT mix in terms of skillsets. Whenever I drop both I always have my JP immedately fly off like rambos and the HA left in a small and weak marching group. To be used effectively the JP and HA need to stick together and stay in the same damn room. This probably means the JP stay behind the HA picking off ninja skulks until the HA run into and onos and need JP backup. It is also good to get the JPs welder as they can swoop in, weld up an HA, and swoop out before they are seriously at risk, which leaves the HA to concentrate on keeping themselfs and everyone else alive the way they should be. If you want to be real spicy, equip all the HA with shotties and the JP with HMGs, make the JPS kill onos and the HA kill everything else with thier less bothersome reload times and thier structure blasting weapons. Jps with HMGs can just fly somewhere safe when they need to reload, HMGs don't have that priviledge. Unfortuneatly I have yet to see a team that acctually works that effectively together.
Maby if the clanners ever have an epic long winded match...
Not to say the two don't work but theres FEAR there from just the fact aliens KNOW those heavies are loaded to kill.
In an ideal world, where we have the luxury and time to research both,yes, mixed arms in this sense is ideal. But then, if you have the resources to do this, you probably should have won it earlier with sg/hmg/mine/welder/siege.
TBH the way its working in the current build is that aliens can have an exceptionally powerful earlygame where they NEED to consolidate nodes in order to counter mid-late game marine tech. Even with 3 hives, a well executed jp rush can make a mockery of hive defence.
IMHO game balance always seemed to be about one team having the early game advantage, and the other time having the lategame advantage. Dunno if thats the intention, but its certainly how its always been.
If you can win hive2 kharaa with standard strategies or just with jp or ha, it means the kharaa are already off balance from having lost too many nodes or lifeforms at one go, or a hive is already under siege.
You win the gorge of obviousness.... congrats.
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You win the little retarded smiley.
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Top teched aliens are vastly superior to top teched marines. It would take to long to explain it, just trust me on this one.
However, not only is top-teched aliens better than top-teched marines, right now even early game aliens are better than early game marines. Mid game is like it has always been, Fade pwnage.
In short, aliens have the advantage at *all* times in this version.
HAs and Jps work extremely well together..
Well, actually your main force should consist of heavies..
If they get onos, just send out a few Jpser with Hmgs to chase down the onos..
don't forget to catalyst your marines and Med your jPers!
If the marines are working together and keeping their RT's so the comm cna constantly upgrade, marines can take the lead quite easily.
Now, yes, if both marines work in a tight unit, and aliens all work in a tight unit, aliens will win.
But the fact of the matter is, aliens tend not to walk around in squads, they tend to go out solo or groups of 2, so if the rines are properly upgraded and can aim atleast half decent, then they should technically have advantage.
Theres a lot of variables to play into it though. Location being the big one.
Long coridor, rines are going to be considered superior.
Tight rooms, aliens are going to.
I think it's really hard to say that one group is overpowered then the other. If the marines are playing like the devs designed them to play, then this version is a very balanced one.
It's VERY important you dont lose your JPer though, or the whole thing will fall together.
And you can really only advance after managing to kill th emajority of the large lifeforms, if you cant get those fades down for enough time (while it's re-evolving) to attack nodes before the onos arrives, you're done for.
Thinking about this.
If your able to afford to research both heavies and jetpacks, and equip your team with their pick, then you shouldn't be having any problems with RT's.
Hell, if you got that much res you should be able to win the game by then.
Jps are the perfect equipment for patroling and shooting down rt's. <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->