Encouraging Teamwork
Raneman
Join Date: 2010-01-07 Member: 69962Members
Join Date: 2010-01-07 Member: 69962Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Not enough of it in a game all about it.</div>I (and the devs) would like to know; what your ideas are to increase teamwork between the players? My idea is to engineer the gameplay around working together, not going rambo. Rambo should be a good way to get yourself killed, no matter what you have. An Onos without other aliens around should fall quickly. A heavily armored marine with a minigun should be no match for a decent team of 3 players, and the comms need the final say in everything, and the ability to reward and punish players.
Comments
Whatever can be made to make this game easier to understand for newcomers should be done.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I will say that I'm not a huge fan of the worker units for the commander. For some things, I can understand, sure- but I liked that marines had to put up resource nodes themselves. It created intensely intimate moments of teamwork where you're both listening as hard as you can between the electrical sounds of putting the device up, hoping to hear the click of a skulk's claw long before you heard the bite.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think it's even more tense defending a MAC while he sets up an expansion. It's pretty much like it was in NS1 except for the "press and hold E part" which I never really found very exciting...
Seriously :V
Commander: Do this
Marine: lol gtfo
After the best update ever
Commander: Do this
Marine: lol gtfo
Commander: *electrocutes marine repeatedly*
Marine has left the game.
in ns1, When a fade pops up, or someone gets the first shotgun/hmg, the rest of the team follows that player around to get the most out of the fade or shotgun. Instead of just one person going rambo. That is because that fade or shotgun represent precious resources that cannot be lost if you want to win.
in ns2, when a fade or shotgun comes out, no one gives a rats ass, because there are already probably 4-5 fades and flamethrowers are probably researched so who wants a shotgun anyways......
What i'm getting at is, ns2 is just too easy, its simple, and there is no more "Early Game" The <b><u>BEST</u></b> part of ns1, is the early game, the fist 5 minutes when its only skulks, gorges, and marines with lmgs. When the game is fair for everyone, and TEAMWORK reigns because if your not working as a team in the first couple minutes, people call you out in ns1, saying, hey come help me build this, or hey come help me hold this resource node. Now it's like RAMBO MODE ACTIVATED, If i want to run out to the other teams base and die 5-6 times in a row, what is to stop me? commander cannot punish me by not giving me weapons, and I will still be able to waste team resources on fade as soon as anyone else without punishment. There has to be a person of authority to hand out orders and be obeyd, as of now, no one respects the commanders on either side, cause they dont have any power. And resources are WAY WAY WAY WAY WAY WAY WAY WAY WAY WAY too easy, and too fast to get. Make resources the most important thing again, and make resource nodes in Key areas on the map, not just tech points. AND GET RID OF THIS STUPID "canal" ability to make resource nodes more powerful that is the root of the problem right there, turtling should be frowned upon not encouraged.
I've played full 30-40 minute games of ns1 as a marine, and NEVER ONCE touched a shotgun or a heavy armor, or anything fancy, and i would consider those types of games THE BEST, when you are stretching it thin making the most of your resources and playing ALWAYS as a team, following orders and listening on the mic.
or for an alien side example
I've played 30-40 minute games where All my resources were spent on Chambers and Resource nodes. and Replanting resource nodes and planting new hcamebrs when new hives came up going back to skulk cause i couldn't afford lerk or fade, but I'd let my teammates go fade because they dont have to spend their resources on chambers now, and they get free upgrades because of me. Now thats teamwork. People will say too, thx for dropping all 3 chambers fast, or gj dropping early hive etc, or you can jsut tell when your team is doing really well that everyone did their part, and no one is wasting resources etc. But that is fun, because we won as a team or lost as a team.
now it feels like, RAMBO, and ME I, I myself, me and my friend MYSELF, is the only person who matters, and everyone wants to get the "High score" and be the best. Which was a problem in ns1 as well, when you got too many rambo's on one team thinking it's all about what my score is or my score needs to be the highest, teamwork gets thrown out the window, and it is bad for game balance too because theres no large battles its all 1v5 or 5v1 all the times and guess who loses.(unless that one has a flamethrower of course then the 1 wins) there has to be punishment for not working like a team, otherwise people will go rambo, it's just out of habit. Thats what most games tell you to do, go be rambo, and be the superhero and win the game. That needs to be frowned upon and punished in this game.
In the early game, teams should not be able to afford anything really, for marines side you should be able to pick from an armory, extra IP, or a resources node. Alien side should have to pick crag, whip or resource node.(NOT ALL 3 AND AN EXPANSION RIGHT OFF THE BAT thats crazy the games right now just skip right over early game and go straight to fade vrs flamethrower, and that is dumb) And slowly go from there, with shotguns and lerks showing up at about the 5 minute mark, with each team being able to afford 1 max2. (on marine side this could easily be done by giving players "wallets" and the comm gets all the cash, and when he sees a player doing well he can easily give him cash, and then the player can go buy a shotgun etc)
tl;dr
There are too many resources for everyone, there needs to be restrictions on how fast a team can get soo many resources, The early game has disappeared, there should not be late game weapons so fast. A whole team should NEVER be able to afford flamethrowers, a whole team should NEVER beable to get 6-7 fades at once in a 14 player server. That is dumb, If we can afford to keep wasting resources, then people dont care what they do with them, and the whole point of the game is lost.
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=111606" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/in...howtopic=111606</a>
Also what is your association with the devs?
Punishments (based on objectives/way points) could be:
Lack of access to higher upgrades for X minutes if task not completed in X minutes
Less resources income for X minutes if task not completed in X minutes - this could also go to other players instead
Reduced moral - a player in a squad has a higher 'moral' and takes less from an attack / fires 'slightly' quicker / whatever
Player rating - :/ :| :) ;) 8D
Rewards
Instant Health (Depending on task a %)
Instant Ammo (Depending on task a %)
Improved Sight
Improved Hearing
Faster Speed (Could go up / down depending on how squady he is)
Improved R.O.F
Improved relationship with commander (Comm knows you are doing better for him, so is made more aware of you)
You know when comm is watching or has selected you
Some ideas.
EDIT: I could see that being abused mind you.
Aliens killed whilst @ location within X minutes
I mean, these are very complicated. But there are probably ways of doing it effectively.
Hold position - task
Stay within X meters for X minutes.
However you could just make it so:
Bonus not repeated within X minutes.
Easy, and they could just stack over time during 1 life or maybe 5 before resetting... depending on the balance and frequency.
2) Institute a steep point penalty for deaths (3-4x point reward for tier 1 unit kills?), mitigated if within squad distance of another teammate.
3) give points for completing a structure by assist-building. Make macs build 1/2-1/3 speed if outside of comm chair range. Marines can assist build to make the structure go up faster. Same with drifters and gorges.
I did ask a comm for orders once and I got a way point objective from him which showed up on my screen with a pointer to where he wanted me to go. Haven't played marine comm much, I hope the devs have made it easy for comms to give orders and select marines etc.
The transponder infantry upgrade makes marines stay in squads. So that's one.
I think the "Lock down" mode of the exoskeleton gives it a limited firing arc. Which means they need their back covered or "lol skulk rush nom nom nom".
For aliens, not as much. Onos have Bone Shield, which roots them lets them still turn, so that obviously does very little on its own and work great for protecting team mates. There's the gorge healspray for sure. It's a little weak so just running to a crag or hive seems faster (this might change when we get normal sized maps though).
Other than that, can't think of much.
benefits of being with a squad include
*you cant get rifleman upgrades to your kit without more then 4 people in your squad
*your squad leader can place rally points(respawn points) every 2 minutes
*you die incredibly easy on your own
*each person fits a critical role
eg. rifleman specialist is your main means of difficult terrain navigation and breaching(they have grappling hooks and shotguns), medics are critical for stopping bleeding(one shot causes bleeding and inevitable death without medic) squad leader starts construction of buildings and outposts, rifleman build construction and are your main fighting units often armed with extra ammunition and powerful scopes)
*better awareness when you can look in four directions whilst advancing(this thing already applies to ns2, 4 marines can check more corners for skulks better then 1 speeding down a hallway on his own.)
What i see in ns2 atm is no one fits in a critical role, everyone goes the most powerful gun and its the most effective strat. this is GL and flamethrower + fade and lerk.
Gorge does not fit its critical role of support
fades dont fit thier roles as assassins(possibly due to higher amounts of hp and no onos)
Lerks fit thier role perfectly as of right now in my opinion
skulks are replaced due to how damn cheap fades are
Marines
flamethrower-too much initial damage not enough damage over time,swap the damage to low intial damage and medium damage over time. this would get rid of flamethrower spam, making 1 only effective
Gl- to much power against enemy aliens and not enough against buildings
MG- not enough defensive power, alien fades will rush you and tear you up and blink away, alas you gl your feet when it does that for instant win but thats another story
Shotgun- too good against skulks, not good enough against fades or lerks(alt fire anyone?) isn't useful enough to be a proper asset to the team, should fit in a role of steady damage.
what i'd honestly do is put in a defensive ability for mg as its alt fire, a medium blind effect to flamethrower as well as the suggested ideas above, GL would have to have radius halved atleast against enemy alien lifeforms. Shotguns i have no idea what we could do to make it more teamwork based.
For aliens i'd increase cost of fade, reduce thier health and armor abit but increase effectiveness of the fade's blink itself. and something has to be done to fix tht horrible mega attack(possibly a counter to the marine defensive ability for mgs?). make gorges using healing spray emanate an aura of the spray that heals much more with the crouch key as well as their spit slowing marine movement down aswell.(causing hydra traps to be fatal)
of course im extremely specific here, and i am prolly wrong about some of these ideas, they arn't even real ideas but the main problem with ns2 teamwork is that the aliens and marine weapons dont fit thier specific roles, or dont rely on other roles to help them enough