After Many Long Nights And Very Careful Research
Justin1
Join Date: 2002-11-17 Member: 9127Members
Join Date: 2002-11-17 Member: 9127Members
<div class="IPBDescription">My colleagues and I have discovered that</div> MARINES = ALIENS
ALIENS = MARINES
There is no > or <! One is as strong, good, whatever as the other. Please, please, please, please, please, please, please STOP crying about sucking. Work together and you will discover that either team is fun, and neither has an advantage.
Tip: Teamwork is going to decide which team will win.
Scenario: All 5 marines run seperate directions. Commander can't get anything built, aliens rush commander. CC lost, portals lost, seek and destroy marines, game over.
Scenario: All 6 aliens go skulk and rush base taking different routes, each one gets slaughtered by prepared marine team. Skulks try again, marines win again, so on. Marines finally get hmg / ha while a skulk finally decides to go gorge, game over.
Scenario: Can't decide on a commander, nobody builds anything. During the arguing, swarm of skulks overwhelms base, game over.
Scenario: Everyone goes gorge, game over.
Scneario: One hour into the game, the marines decide all they need is ha / hmg and they're invincible. They seperate. Game over.
Scenario: Aliens decide onos are l33t and can take out entire marine base, even alone. Game over.
Anyway, I think you get my point. If you're going to run around like a moron, and ignore your team, you will lose regardless of what side you chose. Unless of course it's 7 on 4 in your favour.
I remember my, "Stupid marines are way too powerful! Siege cannons are ghey!" post. I regret it now. Please, follow in my footsteps and learn about the game you are playing before nitpicking. Most importantly, understand that you aren't playing CS anymore. This is a new game with different mechanics. Your BS headshots with the AWP doing backflips aren't going to save you in NS.
Nite!
[edited typo]
ALIENS = MARINES
There is no > or <! One is as strong, good, whatever as the other. Please, please, please, please, please, please, please STOP crying about sucking. Work together and you will discover that either team is fun, and neither has an advantage.
Tip: Teamwork is going to decide which team will win.
Scenario: All 5 marines run seperate directions. Commander can't get anything built, aliens rush commander. CC lost, portals lost, seek and destroy marines, game over.
Scenario: All 6 aliens go skulk and rush base taking different routes, each one gets slaughtered by prepared marine team. Skulks try again, marines win again, so on. Marines finally get hmg / ha while a skulk finally decides to go gorge, game over.
Scenario: Can't decide on a commander, nobody builds anything. During the arguing, swarm of skulks overwhelms base, game over.
Scenario: Everyone goes gorge, game over.
Scneario: One hour into the game, the marines decide all they need is ha / hmg and they're invincible. They seperate. Game over.
Scenario: Aliens decide onos are l33t and can take out entire marine base, even alone. Game over.
Anyway, I think you get my point. If you're going to run around like a moron, and ignore your team, you will lose regardless of what side you chose. Unless of course it's 7 on 4 in your favour.
I remember my, "Stupid marines are way too powerful! Siege cannons are ghey!" post. I regret it now. Please, follow in my footsteps and learn about the game you are playing before nitpicking. Most importantly, understand that you aren't playing CS anymore. This is a new game with different mechanics. Your BS headshots with the AWP doing backflips aren't going to save you in NS.
Nite!
[edited typo]
Comments
Even if there are minor balance glitches they should still be able to be compensated for through gameplay. People will complain about balance all the time, and I usually shrug it off and say, "If you're that good, you wouldn't worry about such things."
......now just a few more good posts and ill be set
The attack was unbelievably nasty just as we activated the siege that would take down their second hive. Fades burst in along with lerks that spewed umbra everywhere. They hit the turret factory first, with two fades and a lerk constantly using umbra on them. They won the game with that attack since none of us could get to the first hive to build the new base the comm had put there. They would have lost with their second hive down.
Those who complain that either side is too weak should really find a better group to play with. Or, they should try listening to teammates for once, that's really all it takes.
Every game must be balanced under the assumption that all players play a perfect game. Only then will it be balanced for all combinations of player skill, be it low or high.
Now pit a perfect team of marines against a perfect team of aliens, have the marines rush hives under constant sensor sweeps and ammo and health drops and describe how the aliens can win.
If we do in fact pit perfect teams versus one another, we might see that the aliens win with a rush everytime. There might not be a chance for ammo and health drops because the marines can't gain enough resources. This, of course, is completely hypothetical.
I have no idea if NS is balanced in a perfect world, I know it's balanced in my day to day world.. and that's what's important to me and everyone else that plays NS.
You're very likely looking too deeply into this.
In a few months from now, we'll see when #1 ranked clan plays #2 ranked clan best of 101.
Further, since I'm not really doing anything, I wasn't describing optimal playing conditions so much as I was explaining that good teamwork can overcome most obstacles. Most losses are because the team wasn't playing well together, ill communication, lack of co-operation, that sort of thing. It was not because the other team has overwhelmingly powerful weapons, etc.
Maybe in a perfect world cars would drive 1 million miles on a tank of fuel that has absolutely no adverse side effects. But again, who lives in a perfect world?
Toodles for now!
Word! i bet theyre just crying bout OGC not working anymore ;-)
so true, so true..
The Reason i say that about the phase gate is only becuase of the speed at which it is built, like 10 seconds or less for 1 marine. 2-3 marines like 2 seconds and its up. Then its pretty much like the marines spawning there. Phase gate are a VERY powerful tool for marines, just think they should take longer to build maybe like a TF or siege cannon does.
Grenades, i hate them so much. Especialy on maps like tanith or nancy where its 4 foot hallways, its impossible to get thru the spam of 2 marines and if you do you have 20 health left. One solution maybe, not that great of an idea, make grenades cost resources to use, like 1 resources for every 4 you take out of the armory. Or make the reload time longer.
Word! i bet theyre just crying bout OGC not working anymore ;-)<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
nice sig
::drool::
Balance has nothing to do with skill. You have to remove skill from the equation in order to judge balance in a game. If a well organized team plays against a badly organized team the well organized team will win in this game--bar none. But what happens when teams of equal skill and having equal luck play each other? Then it's all up to the game, and basically I believe that this game is not balanced. Excessive skill on the part of the aliens is required to make it balanced.
Let's look at it from this standpoint: what happens when too bad teams play each other?
Scenario: Both teams fortify their bases with turrets and never build outside. They only attack disjointedly. Who wins? Marines, because marines have the better starting weapons and can upgrade without leaving their base.
Scenario: Both teams rush leaving their base relatively unbuilt. Who wins? Marines, because they spawn faster and have better initial weapons.
Scenario: Both teams get 1 extra hive location and fortify on a battle line. Who wins? Marines because they keep upgrading their guns until they get a decisive advantage and eventually they build siege which takes down the aliens battle line.
If players do something stupid (like all going gorge or the commander recycling the comm chair) then they're going to lose and that's just that. However, if they don't do stupid things that's when you talk about balance. Who is more likely to win given all is equal besides what the game brings to the table.
Look at it like this: if we were two marines duelling and you had 100 life and I had 50, you would probably win. However, if I was good (OR you were bad) I could still pull out a victory. Was the challenge balanced though? No. It wasn't balanced because it wasn't fair. It was winable, but only through skill and luck--not balance.
Because this is a team game and you have to rely on other people, you don't want to *hope* you get skilled players all the time just to counteract your disadvantage in balance.
--Frahg
So instead of creating a formula for the "perfect" or "worst" or "normal" skill, look at the game as it is played:
by people with different skills. And that's where it is so amazing. Example: I am a CS player with a bad aiming. Just cant get the crosshair in the right spot. So I suck as a marine. But as a skulk, I pretty much rock the game (yeaah, I know, crossing the line here <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo--> .... I am doing good, ok??). BUT the game allows me bring in my individual skills. As a com I have a decent record. So am i skilled or not??
The point is, when players get together with their different skills and they avoid making obvious mistakes, the game will most likely be open very long and the turnout is unpredictable. Thats what I call balanced.
Protagonist
If, on the other hand, you said Player A has to tie his hands behind his back when he fights player B, then the fight is totally unbalanced. What happens when player A is ted and player B is bob. Ted loses. Or when Player A is bob and Player B is bob's clone. Player A loses cause he was inhibited.
The point is, looking at the game without skill involved tells you who the game favors. Yes the game CAN be balanced. But all other things equal, it is not. And you can't rely on skill to fill in for what the game lacks.
--Frahg
Look at the objectives of the 2 teams:
Aliens - Destroy CC and wipe out soldiers, to increase survival chances take hives
Marines - Destroy Hives controlled by aliens, to increase survival chances have comm dedicate resources to upgrade.
So as you can see the hives are important to aliens for survival. They know that sitting back and defending the 1 hive is not what the aliens are supposed to do and therefore the likely-hood of that happening is slim (especially in a perfect game where both teams know exactly what has to happen in order to win)....whereas for the marines this is a viable strategy, stay cooped up until you get HA/HMG and then start walking.
I think that you have to look at the game for what it is. Sometimes the aliens rush and win, sometimes the marines rush and win, sometimes the aliens take 3 hives, go onos and win, sometimes the marines take 2 hives and siege rush the 3rd for the win. Every game is different.
I don't think balance can be black/white either. Because every game (regardless of perfect play or not) will play differently. Some times the aliens may try for the far hive first, sometimes the closer one. That's one of the beauties of this game, it never plays the same way twice.
So how can we tell if the game is balanced or not?? We can't, there is no way to... If the marines win 95% of the time on server a, win 50% of the time on server b, and win 5% of the time on server c, does this make the game balanced?? Of course not, because every round is different, every server is different.
If sieges are over-powered to you, think about your choices as aliens and act accordingly. Tired of fades and onos's ruining your fun, then maybe its time for a different look at things.
I've had successes and failures trying many different things, I've never had success 2x in a row with the same strategy because the other side adapts...
This isn't tic-tac-toe where you have 9 possible moves, the number of variables that you can control are uncountable, nevermind the variables you don't (team-mates etc).
My 2 cents..