Upkeep
Matt4
Join Date: 2010-11-22 Member: 75199Members
Join Date: 2010-11-22 Member: 75199Members
I know the game isnt balanced yet and whatnot, but as a general thought...
In NS1 the game clearly has a snowball effect. The best example is aliens losign their second hive, or gaining thier third. With some epic exceptions, these are generally gamebreaking thing, which is sad, especially for the third hive abilities which dont really ever get tacticly used except in killing marine spawn. So in my mind something that aways pushed a game towards a "centre point" would be benificial. The most immediate thing that comes to mind it for every hive/control point/watever your team has, take away one res per tick of all your rts. Clearly everything here is subject to balance, escpeically given res means nothign atm, but you can see my point. Or maybe the second hive takes away 1 res per tick, the second 2 more, that way theres stratagy to when you take a hive. is it worth the upgrades with no lifeforms?
No doubt many other good centring ideas can be come up with. But i feel the "hive died readyroom now" attitude is one of the biggest problems with the game.
On a side note i think the hive should be able to strangle marines that walk under it.
In NS1 the game clearly has a snowball effect. The best example is aliens losign their second hive, or gaining thier third. With some epic exceptions, these are generally gamebreaking thing, which is sad, especially for the third hive abilities which dont really ever get tacticly used except in killing marine spawn. So in my mind something that aways pushed a game towards a "centre point" would be benificial. The most immediate thing that comes to mind it for every hive/control point/watever your team has, take away one res per tick of all your rts. Clearly everything here is subject to balance, escpeically given res means nothign atm, but you can see my point. Or maybe the second hive takes away 1 res per tick, the second 2 more, that way theres stratagy to when you take a hive. is it worth the upgrades with no lifeforms?
No doubt many other good centring ideas can be come up with. But i feel the "hive died readyroom now" attitude is one of the biggest problems with the game.
On a side note i think the hive should be able to strangle marines that walk under it.
Comments
If a team makes a comeback, it should be because they outplayed the other team in some battle/strategy (like losing a hive but then coming back with wiping out several res towers and successfully pushing back the other team with a strong defense). I think providing more strategic options to teams is the proper solution to this, not giving the winning team a handicap. Giving commander triggerable abilities, siege to both teams, turrets, power node/dynamic infestation, and command points is the way to go.
What you're talking about it natural gameplay effects that inhibit snowballing. So, you're talking about altering the slippery slope topography of the game. Some are already built in. Map territory means that as you gain more of the map there are more regions you have to protect. That is, until you have a stranglehold around the enemy spawn at which point you're secure and can just finish them off.
In my opinion there shouldn't be innate game mechanics that injure the winning team. Instead, there should be suitable counters. Civ4 does this beautifully. Someone can fast tech up to Chariots, a powerful 2-move unit that's great for harassing and lighting blitzs on the enemy. However, a few techs back in a branch exist Spearmen. Their base strength isn't too great, but they get bonuses against Chariots. Plus, they cost fewer hammers. However, they typically only have even odds against Chariots if they have been garrisoned in a city for several turns. So, we have a cheaper unit that can stand up to a more powerful unit, but you had to sacrifice something else to get them (production and tech time). Plus, you have to know the Chariot rush is coming and prepare for it. This allows players to stay in the game and potentially eat away at the opponent's advantage, but it also carries a risk and cost. Spearmen get destroyed by Axes, a similarly advanced unit as Spearmen. Plus you spent tech and hammers on something that may not be in your original plan, allowing your opponent with Chariots to maintain their lead.
For NS1 there weren't very many side-step counters. However, in NS2 with the wider variety of options provided by Alien Commander and more distinct but not innately progressively powerful Aliens I think we can achieve this.
I know it's satisfying to deliver the killing blow, but unless UWE delivers some kind of post round reward for completing the game (like CoD's experience points) I don't see how you can prevent this. In SC2 people almost always surrender before their base is destroyed (or even attacked) when they know they're going to lose. Admittedly, it's easier to rebound in NS because your army will respawn for free, but implementing something like this will punish people resource-wise for expanding/teching (they've already invested resources into the hive and securing the area), and that's just a bad idea. If the team still has a fighting chance, the comm (or a smart player) should be able to raise morale among the team by devising some strategy.
First time I encountered this scenario, not a long time player, next time round though, I was more careful and set up sentries asap. This was at the cost of allowing the aliens to take 3 hives, pushed back one of the hives though and ended up winning the game. But this is an example of how a losing scenario (3 hives) can be flipped and equally how a good winning scenario can corner your enemies completely (aliens first round).
Having addition cost on the CCs would have just expedited my loss and probably would have enforced my loss in the second round had I not been able to get the 2nd CC up asap.
I'm not sure you've been playing/paying attention to the Civ4 MP games I have (Realms Beyond), because this isn't the case except when someone does a stellar rush kill at which point you're dead anyways.
In one sterllar case, I know of a game where one player has lost ALL HIS ORIGINAL CITIES. But he's still in the game. And manipulating diplomacy. That's right, his 3 original cities are dead, he ran a settler to friendly territory, still lives, and is still an influencial player. That's badass.
As many have noted, surrendering when it's obviously over is a good thing. However, we should provide methods to close the gap that don't involve direct punishment on the winning team. If chess was over after the first piece exchange, it'd be lame. But it isn't. Territory, position, piece power all play a role. Sacrificing one piece for a gain somewhere else is what makes chess so interesting. You could be "losing" but still clinch the victory.
<!--quoteo(post=1809446:date=Nov 23 2010, 12:51 PM:name=spellman23)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (spellman23 @ Nov 23 2010, 12:51 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1809446"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Upkeep in WC3 forced players to make a choice. Build up large army and have no income, or expertly use small army. Basically forcing players to push out and be focused on micro and not death balls from StarCraft, or only have their uber large standing army for a small period of time.
What you're talking about it natural gameplay effects that inhibit snowballing. So, you're talking about altering the slippery slope topography of the game. Some are already built in. Map territory means that as you gain more of the map there are more regions you have to protect. That is, until you have a stranglehold around the enemy spawn at which point you're secure and can just finish them off.
In my opinion there shouldn't be innate game mechanics that injure the winning team. Instead, there should be suitable counters. Civ4 does this beautifully. Someone can fast tech up to Chariots, a powerful 2-move unit that's great for harassing and lighting blitzs on the enemy. However, a few techs back in a branch exist Spearmen. Their base strength isn't too great, but they get bonuses against Chariots. Plus, they cost fewer hammers. However, they typically only have even odds against Chariots if they have been garrisoned in a city for several turns. So, we have a cheaper unit that can stand up to a more powerful unit, but you had to sacrifice something else to get them (production and tech time). Plus, you have to know the Chariot rush is coming and prepare for it. This allows players to stay in the game and potentially eat away at the opponent's advantage, but it also carries a risk and cost. Spearmen get destroyed by Axes, a similarly advanced unit as Spearmen. Plus you spent tech and hammers on something that may not be in your original plan, allowing your opponent with Chariots to maintain their lead.
For NS1 there weren't very many side-step counters. However, in NS2 with the wider variety of options provided by Alien Commander and more distinct but not innately progressively powerful Aliens I think we can achieve this.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I'm not opposed to having Civ4-style rock-paper-scissor counters in NS2, but I think there is still room for an upkeep system. Civ4 is actually a good example of this, because it had an upkeep system (city and unit maintenance costs) in addition to their unit counters. Civ5 does something similar with its happiness system. In fact, the upkeep system is kind of crucial to both Civ4/5 to ensure that one civ couldn't tech so much faster than others because of a favorable starting geography. I still remember Civ2 matches where I would be able to tech fast enough to get tanks with which I could steamrole puny civs with only phalanxs/swordsmens. Upkeep helped ensure that all of the civs were close enough in tech so that the rock-paper-scissor counter system would be effective.
In NS1 the game clearly has a snowball effect. The best example is aliens losign their second hive, or gaining thier third. With some epic exceptions, these are generally gamebreaking thing, which is sad, especially for the third hive abilities which dont really ever get tacticly used except in killing marine spawn. So in my mind something that aways pushed a game towards a "centre point" would be benificial. The most immediate thing that comes to mind it for every hive/control point/watever your team has, take away one res per tick of all your rts. Clearly everything here is subject to balance, escpeically given res means nothign atm, but you can see my point. Or maybe the second hive takes away 1 res per tick, the second 2 more, that way theres stratagy to when you take a hive. is it worth the upgrades with no lifeforms?
No doubt many other good centring ideas can be come up with. But i feel the "hive died readyroom now" attitude is one of the biggest problems with the game.
On a side note i think the hive should be able to strangle marines that walk under it.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The problem you are worried about doesn't exist in NS2. Both teams ascend technology tiers in the exact same way. Also, they do not need to keep tech expansions once their first hive/command station has been upgraded.
Furthermore, your proposed solution would not fix the problem. Furthermore, what it <i>does</i> solve, it solves poorly. If the technology of either team is too powerful, make it less powerful instead of more costly.
The winning team should keep winning. If they have a higher tech, they have already invested resources in dropping additional hives/command stations and upgrading their first hive/command station. Nerfing their resource rate after that makes no sense. If acquiring higher tech tiers was too cheap, just make throwing down tech expansions and upgrading main buildings more expensive.
If instead you wanted to make higher tech abilities/weapons/classes more expensive, just make the jetpack or onos more expensive. Tweaking the resource rate indirectly makes those options more expensive. It could work. It could be balanced. But since it is indirect, it would be <i>much</i> more complex and thus difficult to balance for the developers and also hard to learn for us players.
Frankly, I think your solution is too indirect/complex for a nonexistent problem.
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Civ5 is horribly broken and we shall not speak of it again until they fix their basic mechanics. Oh gawds infinite city sprawl.
Civ4's maintenance mechanics are a combination and response to a few things. First, city maintenance was instituted to prevent Civ3 Settler Spam. Every time you place a city, it is a negative drain on your economy until you can develop it. However, every city is eventually a positive value to your total economy, so this isn't the upkeep system you speak of.
Unit maintenance is a soft upkeep in Civ4. Sure it ensures you don't have units gallivanting around, but more often than not it doesn't become a huge factor unless you're a moron or stationing them in foreign lands. And if you are that big of a moron you'll lose anyways since you're not developing cities and taking advantage of multipliers. Contrast this to say EU3 where unit maintenance is a HUGE problem, especially if you go over your allowed limit. However, EU3 allows you to reduce the maintenance you pay, but all your stacks get lower morale, and it takes time to ramp back up to full morale even with max maintenance spending.
Also, tech in Civ4 is more balanced due to other mechanics that don't involve upkeep. Primarily the fact that there is an exponential growth in beaker cost. Therefore every time you progress there is an incentive to backfill with cheaper techs, or better yet trade your shiny new tech for another shiny new tech another civilization just researched. Also, you get neighbor bonuses. The more neighbors have a tech, the cheaper it is for you to research it. This way most of the time people stay around tech parity (in same age), unless someone has a strictly better position than the other and can leverage their economy.
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he's right ---^
games aren't supposed to go on forever.
this is a totally different game.
neeeext
Games are supposed to be to some extend challenging to have that fun or good feeling for when you succeed, isn't that why we play games? "OMG did you see that", "How the hell did we manage that" or "Oh wow we actually won!" You know stuff like that...
You know, I'm kinda sick and tired of some (if not most) current gen games that seem to handhold the gamers, because they could be annoyed by the fact of losing... Back when I started playing FPS games, there was no such things as a HUD that shows you enemies (nametag server *shudder*). A camper out on the battlefield was a force to be feared, until our team found him and he stupidly didn't move around. The artillery or flanking snipers took him out.
Besides, even if the aliens for instance have their third hive up. A good marine team could perhaps hold them off long enough for a last stance, while your sneaky teammates set up a final last resort base somewhere in a hidyhole. To perhaps with a slim chance to siege that third hive with some luck and get the base/team back in action and kill their upgrades. Before that steamrolling team comes along and leaves <b><!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro-->a crater of revenge<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></b> at your "last stance" base. I actually remember grinning from ear to ear when we either set up this base or LMAO when we got stomped at that new base <img src="http://members.home.nl/m.borgman/ns-forum/smileys/tongue.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />
THAT is what I want to see, crushing defeats with a slim chance of a comeback! Not a, oh sorry your team isn't doing very well, here let's nerf the other side who has more punching power so we can grind everything to a halt until you get back on your feet and maybe win. Meanwhile the other team is also being held by their hand in a similar "evening out the odds" kind off way, when they suddenly start to lose...
See the viciously circle of hand-holding silliness here... This is not being elitist, this is forcing players to become better. There is a saying that people learn from their mistakes for a reason <img src="http://members.home.nl/m.borgman/ns-forum/smileys/biggrin.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<b>One final note:</b>
<i>The trick is to make the game still be fun for the losing team, with still having that slim chance or glimpse of hope that you could still come back with a sneaky tactic. In TF2 they captured this last part of the game pretty well, if the last base goes down the other team wipes the floor with the remaining spawners. But because TF2 maps are linear those final pushes are the final one, while NS maps have that slim chance of a comeback... Striking a balance for this is hard, but doable...</i>
-Techpoints make a comeback harder though if not impossible... So defeating that final push team is where a comeback is at, which is similar improbable!
<i>The trick is to make the game still be fun for the losing team, with still having that slim chance or glimpse of hope that you could still come back with a sneaky tactic. In TF2 they captured this last part of the game pretty well, if the last base goes down the other team wipes the floor with the remaining spawners. But because TF2 maps are linear those final pushes are the final one, while NS maps have that slim chance of a comeback... Striking a balance for this is hard, but doable...</i><!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
However, this undercuts your whole concept. Losing is rarely fun. In fact, the only time I find losing remotely fun is when I still believe I have a chance to win. I'm not opposed to letting the winning team dominate the losing one, but I find that its really hard to do in practice and actually reduces the overall fun of a game. I think the best example of this is the skulk rush. 4-5 skulks rushing marine start and slaughtering the IP is about the most dominating you can get in Build 158, however, I wouldn't call this fun even for the winning team. If done repeatedly, people will either leave or start stacking the alien side because they don't want to lose 5 matches in a row.
I think the only viable method of ensuring regular, balanced, and fun matches is to artificially restrict the skill gap between teams. Skill can still be a major component of deciding the winner, but it shouldn't be the dominating component. Otherwise, NS2 will dwindle to a group of hardcore supporters because most new players will be turned off by being regularly destroyed by veteran players. Upkeep is one of many methods to accomplish this.
On another note, how does that part nullify my point... "<i>In fact</i>" didn't I say there has to be some-kind of chance of a comeback, like you yourself just said? <img src="http://members.home.nl/m.borgman/ns-forum/smileys/biggrin.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />
Anyway, NS2 already has a few skill-gap counters or safe-zones as I like to call them. The Crag and attack buildings give the Aliens an edge in their area of the map, in this case a lower skilled player can indeed win from a higher skilled player. And this is not artificial, because those buildings have to be present and built. Same goes Dynamic infestation or for the marines and their Turrets (once they work better :P)
I'd rather see stuff like that, being obvious to a player looking towards such an area. Hmm, would it be a good thing to go in there and shoot them aliens? Or should I wait for our team to get sieges or a bigger attack squad before going in there... Instead of throwing randomcrits, ubers, or an invisible behind the scenes upkeep in there...
A game should NEVER be balanced around skill gaps!
I think the early part of any game should revolve around skirmishing, you kill enemies and try to capture areas, but you cannot practically put enough pressure on the enemy to seriously inhibit them unless they are really terrible. In the early game your gains and losses should be minimal, you fight because there isn't anything else to do, and because any advantage is helpful. Also possible at this point is the idea that you can see what the enemy is doing, try to work out their plan, their tech direction, that sort of thing.
As the game progresses, you should start making more impact, you should be able to push further into enemy territory, you should start being able to destroy enemy frontline defences, and you should gain the ability to advance your frontline further, your weapons get more powerful to reflect this and you also find it harder to change your tech approach entirely, unless you went for a very general strategy.
At the late game weapons should be highly destructive and the stabilisers should be removed, the game gets progressively more unstable at the it goes on to make a resoluition more likely. If you have been playing consistently better than the enemy you should have some advantage at this point, which should start to multiply and force a victory, but this should only happen in the later stage of the game, when the game has basically been played, and now you want to end and start again.
For some reason most games seem to do it backwards, with the early game being the time to cheap shot the enemy and secure an easy win, which is stupid, there's no fun in it. Who wants to fight against a gimped enemy who never stood a chance because you rushed the winning location and got there first because your team had an extra player at the start? Why are you even required? The game is already resolved.
Better a game which starts stable and ends volatile, not vice versa. Losing is not fun because it means you don't get to play, you don't get to have a proper match because you don't get half your side's gear, so make it impossible to lose until you have at least had chance to play a game.