A Challenge
Rapier7
Join Date: 2004-02-05 Member: 26108Members
Join Date: 2004-02-05 Member: 26108Members
Comments
<span style='color:orange'>large empty whitespace removed</span>
You, sir, <span style='color:orange'>needless insult removed</span>
An idea is to scale it for aliens and not for marines, but who knows how that might play out.
I believe Flayra once said that he intended to keep the resource tower system the way it was.
where is the difference in marines getting res from an RT
then to the alien team?
Except the fact that the whole marine team gets their res while each alien get his own res
Both teams get the same res at all
the difference is in the way players handle their res
I think the unbalance your talking about is a result from players being experienced or not
How do you want to get balance to this?
Its the same problem CS has
and by the way its a RT not an RT <!--emo&::nerdy::--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/nerd.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='nerd.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Natural Selection is fundamentally flawed in that it is impossible for it to be balanced from 6v6 to 15v15.
Proof:
An RT is an RT.
If you can disprove my thesis without disrupting the proof, you are a God.
Any takers? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Basically, you are stating the following.
"In Natural Selection, an RT is an RT. Therefore Natural Selection is fundamentally flawed in that it is impossible for it to be balanced from 6v6 to 15v15."
The proof is not really compatible with your thesis since balance is not wholly dependent on the differences of resource distribution between teams/players. Suggestion: restate your thesis and/or proof.
The proof you are looking for is that a marine is not a skulk. Marines have guns, skulks have teeth. In a hypothetical situation where all skill and playing ability is equal, marines would win 100% of the time due to range advantage. The best way to demonstrate this is to program perfect NSplayer bots with aimbot accuracy for both alien and marine teams.
On this note, please refer to this article to clear up any misconceptions about game balancing.
<a href='http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_GameBalancePart1.htm' target='_blank'>Sirlin: Game Balance I</a>
<a href='http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_GameBalancePart2.htm' target='_blank'>Sirlin: Game Balance II</a>
you hit the nail on the head. thats why NS is made to be 6 vs 6
if you have a large game like 12 vs 12, 6 smart marines could stick toghther and wreck havoc on anything
but I find no major problems in 6 vs 6 games and even up to 10 vs 10 aren't too bad if your just on pubs
Other possible factors in why NS is unbalanced:
The arms lab is simply just TO good in large games. it boils down to high priced, one time upgrade system compared to a low cost, pay as you go upgrade system. In large games skulks that upgrade greatly hinder the fades/hives/RTs/Upgrade chambers. Perhaps lowering or even eliminating upgrade costs for the skulk/entire alien team.
Motion tracking makes lone rambos viable even in large games. You can clearly pick safe routes through heavily guarded alien territory, and then predict exactly when and where to shoot when aliens actually do arrive. the way MT works is it "pings" alien movements many times a second. This is why the circles you see jump a bit when the creature your tracking is extreamly fast (think fade). I propose that MT either have it's "pings per second" decreased and/or is restricted to a certian area around marines. The first suggestion lower's MT's usefulness in CQC (IE: Knowing when and where to shoot exactly). The second suggestion lower's the incredible amount of intel MT provides currently. At least the com needs a rine in the area to know what the aliens are up to in a certian map location.
And finally... gorging costs. Alien RTs simply cost more then Marine RT. Dont even consider perma gorges... you'd have one max, they die pretty easily, and they get res SLOW. The solution would be to lower gorging costs, down to 2. It costs 2 to go skulk, it seems fair that the other base alien unit also costs 2. To compensate you'd likely have to lower starting costs down to 15-20, and possibly lower lerk costs as well (25 makes sense since fade is 50 and onos is 75).
These are simply here to point out exactly what somewhat questionable advantages marines hold over aliens other then their obvious long range advantage. Just keep in mind that other changes can be made to achieve balance while solve the above issues problems.
Example:
12v12
Aliens now has double health and armor since the marines have 12 players (versus 6 players making the multiplier 12/6 = 2). Likewise, the Marines have double health and armor for the same reason. The bonus for health and armor extends to structures as well for both teams. Damage remains unchanged meaning it takes twice as long for anyone to kill anything. This added time then gives that skulk just that much more time to close the distance before getting to attack. It still has its work cut out for it once it reaches its quarry, but at least it was able to get there in the first place.
It is still possible that for the overly large games that this still would make no difference whatsoever... ranged attacks have been historically proven to be far superior than even the strongest melee weapons unless met with overwhelming attrition (masses of forces that knowingly sacrifice a handful to remove the effectiveness of the weapons being used against them... guns run out of ammo eventually).
Along the lines of attrition being the only effective counter to long range force it might be prudent to slightly increase the respawn rate of the aliens in general (no matter what size game it is)... this forces more expenditure on med/ammo drops in the field and possibly providing an ample enough of resource drain on the marines' almost insufferable supply of steamy ganja. It means a hell of a lot harder putting pressure on those sieges because the damned aliens just keep coming back no matter how many you kill.
Oh well... bed time for me... i've raved for too long.
Natural Selection is fundamentally flawed in that it is impossible for it to be balanced from 6v6 to 15v15.
Proof:
An RT is an RT.
If you can disprove my thesis without disrupting the proof, you are a God.
Any takers? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
You don't need to disprove the proof to disprove the thesis, because the proof is not logically related to the thesis ... And the proof is meaningless. It reminds me of the commonly used argument often comming from objectivists: "1 = 1, therefore <absurd statement>".
You can't expect us to take this one seriously.
And I think we all know b4 is a bit unbalanced by now ... let's play b5 this weekend and talk about balance afterwards <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo-->
1) Buff skulks
2) Remove marine RFK
3) Lower gorge cost
4) Unchain chambers
5) Scale RT production by the size of the team
Mix and match until you've balanced the game. GG.
What do I win?
if the aliens cant get a marauding group of marines down in a small group by rushing around corners, then you need to get people to get tactical. there are vents made for skulks and lerks to ambush the marines.
but, its the small game that requires more buffing. 2v2 to 4v4 aliens win almost every time. if all aliens go gorge and rush for an rt then the res falls in quickly for the aliens and then one or two gorges put up some defence and a hive, and others go fade and then without shotguns and at least 2 ips then its gg, aliens win.
but, i dont want to nerf aliens for this if it affects the other size games and/or co_.
So if the entire marine team sans one rambo attack your building second hive... and a PG is built at your main hive... and all the marines are in there, exactly how DO you get tactical?
If a marine is holding a res node untill it electrifies, and you have a extreamly long hallway with no vents to circumvent it, how DO you get tactical?
WHEN MARINES HAVE MOTION TRACKING... HOW <b><i>DO</i></b> YOU GET TACTICAL?<!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif' /><!--endemo-->
This game relies heavily on marines making mistakes... weather it's having a less then decent com, not listening for the sound of a single skulk step, Looking at possible ambush points, Covering the marine building, or checking his MT.
When i read your post it seems as though you think large games are balanced. I certainly hope I'm mistaken... for your sake.
Excuse me while I cough as if I were a chain smoker for 20 years.
More players on the marine side means a higher chance for a group of around 4 to stick together, which means that a skulk has about 0.5 seconds to survive once its been spotted by said group, which means usually another 2 res, which means 2 ammo packs and move on...
Equipment doesn't matter as much in larger games then smaller games, oddly enough, since the alien evolutions come later and are far more valuable, and thus they are less likely to take large risks, such as attacking a hive point or even take on that pack of 4-5 marines, who oddly enough are packing exactly 0 res worth of equipment. Thus you could go along just fine with ntohing but LMGs and the occasional shottie to take out a persistant Fade or a gren to flush a vent of a stupid lerk. If onos come out, it's probably too late anyhow (10-12 minute mark, by then you have a 2 hive lockdown and farms everywhere hammering on the last hive)
If anything, save up for a few seconds and drop a tonne of shotties and let the marines with their pack mentality go around and neturalise the fades. Or heck, if you're blessed enough to have 3 people who have a clue and who stick together like brothers, drop them a shottie each and let THEM go fade hunting ("Who's up for fade hunting?!? YEAH FADE HUNTING!!!")
More micro needed in large games for the comm? As if. If anything, it's easier since you can more or less expect certain conditions to become true because of the numbers and the fact that a cluster of LMGs counter everything that aliens can throw in your way for at least 5 minutes.
Microing would become more of a problem if ONLY 'strategy' was actually present in the games other than the tried and true method of expand to the nearest res points to MS, expand to double res, farm double, send a small contingent to a hive, hold both locations while phase tech comes online, fortify both locations while sending the lot in double - 1 to another valuable location and repeat. I find it that it's the MARINES who 'infest' the map rather than the aliens, using a vauge sense of group mentality in what to prioritise while the commander merely relays global info (Such as PHASE NOW HIVE UNDER ATTACK) and drops the stuff.
Nem Loves me... hes mine. <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
But assuming I understood Rapeir's original post, the spirit of it, and while ignoring the letter of it;
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Well, first of all, (this took me a long time to realize) the alien's res system scales perfectly with their teamsize.
Aliens needs a minimum of 1/3 of their team to drop nodes so they can tech faster than marines. They can drop more for even more res. Simple enough to understand.
The problem is, with larger teamsizes, 1/3 of your team as gorge means more nodes are required to be capped in order to stay competetive with the marine team.
This means more map control!
However, who has better map control at the start? Marines do. By far and large. It is very difficult to kill marines as aliens, especially in the early game. You basically have the hold marines back for fades and the second hive.
So the reason larger games are so unbalanced is simply because marines are better at taking the map than aliens are, yet at the same time aliens need more map control with larger teamsizes in order to have a decent res flow.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=75872&view=findpost&p=1178540' target='_blank'>Quoted</a>
Flayra wants to keep the whole a RT is a RT principle down intact, so we must realize that the inherant problem with NS is not the RT, but res distribution instead. This is easily fixed by scaling other things on the marine side along the aliens' side as well.
Flayra wants to keep the whole a RT is a RT principle down intact, so we must realize that the inherant problem with NS is not the RT, but res distribution instead. This is easily fixed by scaling other things on the marine side along the aliens' side as well. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
There should be a community faq for these types of discusions... that being one of the answers.
What exactly do you mean by "scaling" then? Something dynamic that changes do to team size, or just changeing things staticly? I agree that there must be a change, but I believe it should be lowering the RT cost for aliens and lowering initial start res. I believe this will balance both the small and the large games.
when there are enough people to start the game. (6 on 6 or 15 on 15)
a trigger will randomly select the winning team.
thus ends the game and makes it fair for both teams
and an rt is still an rt
you didnt say you had to leave anything in or make it fun <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo-->
The problems with NS mode are:
o The Arms Lab (more "bang for your buck" as team sizes increase for the same set price)
o The Res system (non scaling, which is bad for aliens, not so bad for marines)
o The Onos and its role in the game (poor confused space cow...it's a giant skulk that thinks it's a fade)
Fix those, and the game will follow.
The current onos seems more like a big bully who is actually a big cry baby. He acts all mean and tough, but the second someone can shoot at him... he dies or runs away!
But yea... Giant skulk... I'd agree with that definition of the onos to. <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif' /><!--endemo-->
I hardly attack anymore as onos. i ALWAYS get adrenaline and regen, and make sure the 2nd hive is up for good. Stomp spam <b>IS</b> the onos. if you dont do it your a hollow shell of a onos, and you should be ashamed for wasting 75 res.
Since vanilla marines typically have little problem taking out skulks, this means that they normally grow to control more of the map. This is made worse during large games, where there are more marines, and their advantage is more accentuated as the teams grow larger (say, one marine counts for 1.3 aliens. Compare team "sizes", and notice how large games make it hell for aliens).
Okay, so in bigger games, marines tend to control more of the map.
Now, aliens are fare more resource hungry during large games.
Arming marines with weapons is resource hungry, but in larger games (as Seph pointed out), commanders tend to research weapon upgrades, which costs just as much resources as small games. As a side note, this difference offers diversity to marine strategy: small games tend to feature a few marines weilding lvl1 shotguns, while larger games may have a lot of marines with lvl3 LMGs. This means that while marines are slightly more resource-hungry than large games, it's not nearly as much as the Kharaa.
So, aliens need the resources in larger games and they aren't getting it, because the marine strength advantage grows when the teams get larger.
<b>Opinion Section</b>
The best way to fix this would be to buff the skulk just a wee bit (I say maybe 80/20 health/armor would be a good starting point), and reduce the OC cost to about 7. Both of these would discourage lone rambos, forcing the marines to group together, and then marines wouldn't conquer quite as much territory in the opening stages of the game.
However, that doesn't quite deal with the Onos' identity crisis. Now, I will be the first to tell you that the Onos is quite deadly. This opinion grows from my experience on both sides of that thing's horn. His main tools are stomp and devour. The onos doesn't have quite the strength to maul a heavy train, but stomp can render the train vulnerable to fades and skulks. The onos can also delay a train by picking a few out with devour.
However, I don't like that strat. While it is quite effective, it's VERY frustrating to the marines. Have you ever been in a heavy train, to be stomp-spammed into oblivion? Or maybe you were chasing an onos and he stomped his escape? I think that instead of the onos being a stomping utility, stomp should be replaced by some other attack and the onos should be given a nice, hefty armor and health bonus to help deal with higher-up marines. If that ends up being overpowered early-game, a different approach can be taken by increasing the hive two and three armor bonuses (I'll explain if I need to) instead of the onos armor rate. This would have the side effect of boosting other aliens, noteably the fade, later in the game.
Now, the Onos balance could be heavily effected by the small balance changes I suggested for early game, as the marines would be shorter on resources.
Of course, all of these theories are subject to intense playtesting, reviewing, flaming, etc.