Alien Survival

Marine0I · December 2002

<div class="IPBDescription">0 hives for 5 min = still alive</div> [i have searched for this topic and to my knowledge it has not been reported]
Aliens can survive after the last hive is destroyed, if they have defensive towers built in a vent or the like - they can hide there and it will keep healing them and thus prevent them from dying after the last hive dies, and thus making the marines do the old "hunt the cloaked lurk in the vents" business that 1.03 tried to end.

This could be fixed by making the damage done by the "beep" increase exponentially - ie first beep 2 damage, 2nd beep 4 damage, third beep 16 and so forth.

That way even if it was healing you eventually you would be killed by the one beep doing 70 odd damage

BOZO · December 2002

Yeh this has become a problem in recent weeks. Its just a lame tactic to prolong the game. I like your idea about exponentially increasing the damage of "No Hive Kill". Some other ideas being tossed around are that with out a hive alien sturctures will befall the same affact as alien players. But for now Scanner Sweeps and Sieges is all we can do.

FireStorm · December 2002

The autokill feature S-U-C-K-S. Marines can chase aliens with scanner sweeps and motion tracking. I think autokill is the first thing to remove in the next patch. Why should the aliens die and not the marines (who can hide too if they jave jetpacks)? They are both independent lifeforms.

coil · December 2002

Personally, I've agreed with almost every design decision Flay has made in NS... except the autokill. The occasional hiding alien could be dealt with, jetpacks or grenades. Now that aliens automatically die when the last hive falls... people feel like it's practically a DUTY to try and get around it, since it feels cheap to the alien whose health is dropping for no reason.

I think the autokill turned a small annoyance into a much larger one.

That said, the sound of defense chambers thudding away is a lot easier to track down than a skulk or gorge that makes no sound. Get yourself a jetpack and HMG and go vent-crawling - Captain Dallas did it, why can't you?

Secondly: linux servers currently don't have working motion tracking; once it is fixed, I imagine finding an alien in vents will become much easier. They can't sit still *all* the time.

Zuron · December 2002

sieges all over the place and problem solved

Aragaith · December 2002

the auto kill thing is bad...i've been in matches where the aliens had a chance to win but lost it due to everyone dieing cause the hive went.

i've been in a game where the CC on marines was destroyed and teh marines still won...barely had any equipment above the spawn stuff....not like they slowly died because they couldn't do certain thigns anymore...

its really unbalanced when you can have a group of marines win because they have no auto kill but you put aliens in the same situation of being criled they slowly die

Cyborgguineapig · December 2002

Yes I still don't like the hive thing when yuo still die when your halfway into building a new hive.

Ph0enix · December 2002

I hope that auto-kill does disappear. It just seems a bad/OTT in-game solution to something which isn't the games fault. It's been tested and isn't liked by most of the community. I'm holding out for it disappearing in 1.04.

BTW Coil, thanks for explaining why MT doesn't always work. I couldn't figure why it worked on some servers and not on others. Guess it should have been obvious really.

FireStorm · December 2002

another thing: aliens can rebuld a hive, marines can't build a new cc if they lost all of them... it's not logic.

Duder · December 2002

Aliens throw up the ingredients for hives, marines can't throw up cc's.

Well if the marines could call up a cc from the dropship, it would be a bit fun for the marines.

Kalias · December 2002

CC's cost only 30rp's compared to the aliens 80, and marines can have as many as they like, it is your own fault if you lose the lot, if you can't deal with that then that is your problem, not the games.

Akfeka · December 2002

I think a good compromise would be to wait at least a minute before applying damage, maybe even five minutes. Then apply damage - since it is water damage, I'm not sure if it could be exponentially increased, but if that were possible, that would work too.

People unable to track the last skulk are people not using sensor sweep.

I'm also against trigger death like that, but since some people don't know anything about the ultimate power of the observatory, I guess they need to win too...

BlueGhost · December 2002

I dislike the timeout to death.

Had a situation a while back where we rapidly blew up 3 of their hives (I was com) and we'd won.. Yippeee

But it felt cheap, they had a full assult team, it was slowly wearing down the base then they could easily have wiped us out in direct combat. We'd just sneaked in and sieged two hives and symltaniously had a rambo kill their 3rd.

But the siege had only 3 HA/HMG's covering it and everybody else was upgraded stock....

It would even help stop the un-fun marine rush as the gorge would have more time to get up a hive. I'm talking about a rush that isn't excecuted instantly but is more a 'oh **obscenity** we failed to grab two hives but someone sneaked to their first we'll slap a phase gate down and 3 more IP's and then just bundle in untill its dead.

BlueGhost

Hobo_Bob · December 2002

i think that the autokill idea had good intentions, but as was stated earlier, it turned a nuisance into an even bigger annoyance. i think that aliens should have the chance to rebuild or have a chance. i mean, the marines with jetpacks can do the same thing. i think the gorge should have the ability to "call"back the dead aliens just like the observatory has. if the gorge could have that option, that would be amazing. of course it would cose all their energy, and like 10 resources or something. because what this does is it eliminates the possibility of aliens returning if they have no resource towers. and better yet, i think the trigger should be set on resource towers, and not so much on hives. like if the aliens have no hives, and no resource towers, then they will get the autokill. this makes the marines work harder to kill the resource towers, and the aliens can still rebuild themselves if the gorge "calls" them back, and he starts to build resource towers elswhere.

TheGlow · December 2002

I say allow a lone marine to build a comchair.
Make it cost like 100 res. Theyre used to making them all the time, maybe they got the design memorized by now. Or last person commanding is the only one authorized to build a chair.
Then lose the alien death timer and you got a good old game of wc, where a peon slipped through and you dont know if its hide the farm, or find the new , BIGGER base.

WraithOfDark · December 2002

Endgame death for the aliens is definately unfair. Too many times have I seen a swarm of welder/shotty/jetpack hive assassins send the aliens tumbling down.
You can get jetpacks pretty early, they are cheap along with welders and shotties, such a cost efficient rambo kit.

stinc-Eagle · December 2002

just b/c the mariens have the ablitly to take out an alien hive and things quickly dosent mean you have to wine about it if you havent noticed trying to shoot the aliens can get qutie intersting at times when rushing for a hive or reasource tower. and end game loss for aliens are only fair its not like im going to sit there and let the aliens come back and come back over and over again when i have basicly killed viturly all of them it would be unfair for the mariens

KMGor · December 2002

Marines should either also have autokill when they have no CC/spawns, or aliens should lose theirs. Oh yeah, and I think the welder+jetpack is stupid. Mostly because of how the hive blocks shots as if it had an invisible wall around the upper part of it. It makes it impossible to build a real defense against it - unless maybe you build a giant stack of towers reaching to it, but you shouldn't have to do that...

Urza · December 2002

Tonight I had great fun as a Gorge: The marines had just shot our only hive early on in the game, but I had built 2 def towers along with some offense ( went gorge pretty late, it wasn tmy faultwe couldnt get a second hive). So I just waited near the defense untill I had enough res for building a hive (which is pretty quick, all my teammies being dead). After that, I ran back to my offense & defense towers for extra healing. Marines shot down the new hive i was making (Generator), but in the meantime I had sneaked back to our starting hive, and started to build a new hive. After that, I ran to Sewer, and started to build a hive overthere. The marines spotted that hive, and eventually killed me. The new hive was up and running already, and skulks started to pour out.
Amazingly enough, after that it was quite easy to take the sewer hiveloc quick. Marines had been upgrading in the meantime, but we managed to cut down their resources and eventually build another hive, before we actually won the game.

So:
1) hide next to 2 defense chambers
2) be sneaky
3) never ever give up
4) pick a noobish commander as your enemy

Ensign_Deadmeat · December 2002

The purpose of auto-kill is to prevent the lone skulk or lurk from hiding for an hour after all the hives are killed. As we're all complaining about though, many times the aliens are still in good shape when that happens (about to build or building another hive, etc...)

A good solution would be that no one could evolve without a hive and auto-kill only happens if there is no gorge. As long as there's a gorge, it's possible for the aliens to recover. If the gorge(s) are killed and still no hive, auto-kill starts. This way, the aliens still have an opportunity to recover and it also prevents the hunt and kill searches if there is no gorge.

SilverHorse · December 2002

How about just remove autokill all together and use sensor sweep to find those hiders?! Like we should have done in the first place!!!!!!

kaxman · December 2002

I think that if the auto kill must stay in place (and I don't really see why it should, as it has been mentioned, if it's just one skulk hiding out, you've only got so many places to cover and by that point in the game you have practically unlimited resources, just spam sensor sweep all over the place till you find him), it should have at least a minute or two delay before it kicks in. I'm also pretty sure, though I can't remember for certain, that if a hive is <i>building</i>, no one takes damage. If that's correct, then it's fine. If you're still taking damage while a hive is under construction, it should probably be changed.

MasterEvilAce · December 2002

i think auto-kill should be done-away with.

again, i play on FoR, and a majority of the time the marines actually LOVE hunting down the last alien.

besides, marines have motion tracking. if the alien moves, marines will know. and a grenade can get almost anywhere. and jetpacks.. but if you don't have jetpacks, team stacking is a great advantage, too.

Wormtail · December 2002

I think the autokill is a good idea. In the manual, it said that the hive feeds them. SO if you kill all their hives, they're gonna starve to death!!

phr34k · December 2002

And what feeds you Marines? I am fairly sure that the arrmory only spits out ammo <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='tounge.gif'>

JoltGris · December 2002

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Duder @ Dec 19 2002, 11:05 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>Aliens throw up the ingredients for hives, marines can't throw up cc's.

Well if the marines could call up a cc from the dropship, it would be a bit fun for the marines.</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>
lol <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='biggrin.gif'>

btw: The game is good as it is, if you don't want to die protect your hive

Asraniel · December 2002

common, its sooo easy to solve the autokill problem. Just make that the aliens are visible as waypoint, even if they dont move. Its like motion tracking, but they dont have to move.. the rest is the marine problem. (buildings shouldnt show up with that view, because you could hide somewere in a wood of turrets... you know what i mean. Just do it, its easy

jacksonjO4 · December 2002

Logic says this:

According to the manual the hives feed the aliens, but surely they can go for a while without food (Similar to the marines...). The manual also says that the bacteria feeds the hive, but cannot live without it. Thus, when all 3 hives are gone the bacteria breaks down and the nanogrid comes back online, revealing all the alien positions. You could then get rid of autokill completely. Give gorges a 'flood nanogrid' option which renders the nanogrid useless for around 10 - 20 seconds, no movement sensing or waypoints. It would also make for interesting attack moves when suddenly marines can't sense anything...

Bounty_Hunter1 · December 2002

I Play at a server called sniper lust and i was playing bast we had all 2 hives refinary and feed we started to move on engine and boom our feed water hive get under attack <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'> so me just being spawn at refinary goes underwater and goes gorg <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/pudgy.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='pudgy.gif'> i end up building a long line of defence towers along the water tunnel and offence at either end i told my team what i had dont and almost straight away i saw fades going by me under water in the end the marine <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'> had taken the hive before the fades got there and had started to move up to refinary but in which time i had got enuth res to rebuild the feed water hive which the fades had just cleard again and i placed hive and then <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'> refinary went down so the fades used the water tunnel to get back to refinary while i built at feed i heard marines <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'> coming into feed so i went and hid under water the fades were dying one by one we ending up have 1 hive and 0 fades every one but me was skulk <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'> so i waited under water using the defence to heal me till marines had moved on after they kill <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/asrifle.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='asrifle.gif'> the hive so the auto kill starts ouch it hurts but doesnt bother me much cos the defence towers so i swim up and place feed water again by which time i am the only one left the marines kept saying were are u come out and die but i stayed with my d towers waiting for the hive to build when it did all the skulks <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'> just stayed at feed while i went and tried to secure refinary again with offence towers when i had done so the skulks <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/skulk.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='skulk.gif'> moved on the marines base and pow the marines lose a cc but they had another in the same room that was unbuilt so we didnt attack it by which time we had a second hive so the skulks started to change to fades half of which got wiped out by one marine and a lmg with no ha at the rotating door so i told ma fades to move on engine so we could get a third hive running they did so and the marines didnt even try to build the cc so by which time we now have onos and they got like 7ha's & hmg's and the rest of their team were lmg guys so the onos just stomped em all just shows what a single gorg <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/pudgy.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='pudgy.gif'> can do if he knows what he is doing

i am still oposed to the auto kill system tho as it draws away from the gameplay that got me intrested in ns

From ya friendly Alien Bounty Hunter

and i also think the gorg <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/pudgy.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='pudgy.gif'> should have some kind of wall climb even if it is a limited one as it could improve the game to a new level i am not saying let them climb all the way to the top of the room just like a few meters as it gets anoying when ya a gorg <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/pudgy.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='pudgy.gif'> and ya get stuck in a vent

Scythe · December 2002

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (coil @ Dec 19 2002, 12:53 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>Get yourself a jetpack and HMG and go vent-crawling - Captain Dallas did it, why can't you?</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>
'Cause he got <b>et</b>.

Possible solution: <a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=5&t=18150&hl=' target='_blank'>http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/in...f=5&t=18150&hl=</a>

--Scythe--

P.S. I thought of this idea so any accusations of plagiarism will be met with a wet, fishlike object.

Alien Survival

Comments