Gorge is boring?
Imbalanxd
Join Date: 2011-06-15 Member: 104581Members
Join Date: 2011-06-15 Member: 104581Members
<div class="IPBDescription">don't be so sure...</div>I have seen many people say, in quite a self assured manner, that the current gorge is "boring to play". They want to make their concerns heard, so that the appropriate action might be taken. In the same spirit, I would like to voice my opinion; that the gorge is awesome to play and can currently make a large impact on a game.
I probably play aliens in 60-70% of all my games, and I go gorge in every single game I play. <b>If you enjoy playing gorge in the current build</b>, post your favourite parts of the new system here.
<ul><li><b>Always</b> being able to drop 3 hydras
I always go gorge at the start of a game in the hopes of securing an important location. Prospective tech expansion point, adjacent resource node, I would want to keep marines clear of it. In the past, I would go gorge, scamper to my intended fortification area, and begin building... a single hydra. Ye, marines would rue the day they had to spend one or two medpacks to kill me. Now, it doesn't matter where I am, or what I'm doing. If I think a threat is coming my way, I drop three hydras and bunker down.</li><li>DOS attacks
Nothing brings me greater joy than taking Computer Lab away from marines in Flight Control, Ventilation from marines in Datacore, Ore Processing from marines in Warehouse. Suddenly a sure thing becomes a bitter and painful fight. Sure, you can send an army of Skulks to keep it, or you can put a single Gorge in the right place.</li></ul>
If nobody else posts, I will simply convince myself that you are all to busy to do so, even though you share my sentiments regarding the Gorge's awesomeness.
I probably play aliens in 60-70% of all my games, and I go gorge in every single game I play. <b>If you enjoy playing gorge in the current build</b>, post your favourite parts of the new system here.
<ul><li><b>Always</b> being able to drop 3 hydras
I always go gorge at the start of a game in the hopes of securing an important location. Prospective tech expansion point, adjacent resource node, I would want to keep marines clear of it. In the past, I would go gorge, scamper to my intended fortification area, and begin building... a single hydra. Ye, marines would rue the day they had to spend one or two medpacks to kill me. Now, it doesn't matter where I am, or what I'm doing. If I think a threat is coming my way, I drop three hydras and bunker down.</li><li>DOS attacks
Nothing brings me greater joy than taking Computer Lab away from marines in Flight Control, Ventilation from marines in Datacore, Ore Processing from marines in Warehouse. Suddenly a sure thing becomes a bitter and painful fight. Sure, you can send an army of Skulks to keep it, or you can put a single Gorge in the right place.</li></ul>
If nobody else posts, I will simply convince myself that you are all to busy to do so, even though you share my sentiments regarding the Gorge's awesomeness.
Comments
As far as 208 is concerned there were marked improvements :
Slide is considerably more fluid and usable, it gives the Gorge a lot more mobility.
Healspray's quicker animation is much preferred.
My issues with the current system are :
Gorge peaks on One Hive (I'm always limited to 10 clogs 3 hydras ).
Gorge is too vulnerable to LMG, it needs to have a per bullet damage reduction so that it takes longer to kill.
Spit is too difficult to hit anyone with.
Overall, I feel like Gorge is fine in the beginning of the game (provided your Commander builds appropiately), but you quickly come to a point where you have 75 res and you can no longer justify being in the lifeform.
The only time I use it is when I'm comming or it's a close-positions game.
Also, without Hive Sight from DI, I find myself being even more cautious when traversing the map. This kind of suspense is great for immersion, hopefully not too stressful for Gorges :P
Plus, now that Nutrient Mist doesn't speed building growth up, a helping Gorge is definitely an important asset to the team.
Yes, it's an RTS game. Yes, there is building and map control. But it's also an FPS game - FPS games are about<b> moving and shooting at stuff</b>. If both of those fundamentals are weak, slow and rigid for the gorge, then the FPS side of the gorge will not be fun to play. You shouldn't have to play it for only half of its abilities (the build tool), but it certainly seems like that's all you can really do.
Slide is considerably more fluid and usable, it gives the Gorge a lot more mobility.
Healspray's quicker animation is much preferred.
My issues with the current system are :
Gorge peaks on One Hive (I'm always limited to 10 clogs 3 hydras ).
Gorge is too vulnerable to LMG, it needs to have a per bullet damage reduction so that it takes longer to kill.
Spit is too difficult to hit anyone with.
Overall, I feel like Gorge is fine in the beginning of the game (provided your Commander builds appropiately), but you quickly come to a point where you have 75 res and you can no longer justify being in the lifeform.
The only time I use it is when I'm comming or it's a close-positions game.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Most of this I 100% agree with. Even though I enjoy playing the gorge, it does have some not so awesome issues.
The peaking at one hive thing is definitely a problem, and goes together with justifying being a gorge while you have 75 res. I'm sure that the new abilities promised for the gorge will remedy this problem, as I don't think it is necessary to increase the number of hydras or clogs one has. As many mods have stated, the ability to drop hydras and clogs is just that, an ability, and abilities do not get better, they are merely better aided by the new abilities gained (bite with leap, gore with stun).
Gorge being vulnerable to the LMG is a tough one. There are times when I see a marine appear 50 feet away, and he expends half a clip and kills me almost instantly. Unfortunately, it seems that, without carapace, even while surrounded by my hydras, I feel like I could be killed any instant I let my guard down. However, with carapace, I feel almost invincible. At least until the marines get at least level 2 weapons.
As for spit, I too find it difficult to hit marines with it, but I think of it as my gorge AWP. It is actually remarkably effective when it does hit, especially for a life-form not categorised as direct assault. In conjunction with hydras, I quite like it as it is.
<!--quoteo(post=1937132:date=May 19 2012, 12:44 AM:name=internetexplorer)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (internetexplorer @ May 19 2012, 12:44 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1937132"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I find it boring because the support role has been diminished over time (bellyslide is garbage, healing is too slow, no movement chambers/other way to rapidly gain energy, spit is geared toward being a snare rather than simply being a decent attack, clogs are a useless gimmicky minecraft reference). On top of that, gorges can't even drop mini cysts anymore - the only way to pretend you have any interest in your team's overall plan is to make hydras at a chokepoint and hope they shoot something so you can say "I'm helping!"<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yes, I can appreciate this. The concept of the "support gorge" has diminished over the last few builds. Even I can say that, when I play gorge, I do it to hold a position by myself, not to support skulks to do it instead. It doesn't phase me that much, as I've never been much of a team oriented player, but I can see how it goes against the concept behind the gorge.
<!--quoteo(post=1937132:date=May 19 2012, 12:44 AM:name=internetexplorer)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (internetexplorer @ May 19 2012, 12:44 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1937132"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Yes, it's an RTS game. Yes, there is building and map control. But it's also an FPS game - FPS games are about<b> moving and shooting at stuff</b>. If both of those fundamentals are weak, slow and rigid for the gorge, then the FPS side of the gorge will not be fun to play.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think this depends on your play style. There are those who want nothing more than to do back flips, getting head shots and multi kills, leaping at light speed biting jetpackers out of the air. Then there are those who like to contribute and play in other, more subtle ways. I personally find that, when I can play an FPS without having to aim too often, I am at my happiest.
Yes, it's an RTS game. Yes, there is building and map control. But it's also an FPS game - FPS games are about<b> moving and shooting at stuff</b>. If both of those fundamentals are weak, slow and rigid for the gorge, then the FPS side of the gorge will not be fun to play. You shouldn't have to play it for only half of its abilities (the build tool), but it certainly seems like that's all you can really do.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The rate of healing does seem a little slow (for buildings at least), bit I'm curious as to why you think bellyslide is garbage - I had heard it was better before I started playing, what exactly do you want bellyslide to be like?
It used to make you go a lot faster, and it could be used much more often (so you could use it rapidly to turn on arcs instead of just slowly plowing into a wall and getting killed)
There was nothing imbalanced about the speed or frequency of it, and I never saw any complaints, and then it just changed and made the gorge boring and weak.
<!--quoteo(post=1937134:date=May 18 2012, 06:44 PM:name=Imbalanxd)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Imbalanxd @ May 18 2012, 06:44 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1937134"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I think this depends on your play style. There are those who want nothing more than to do back flips, getting head shots and multi kills, leaping at light speed biting jetpackers out of the air. Then there are those who like to contribute and play in other, more subtle ways. I personally find that, when I can play an FPS without having to aim too often, I am at my happiest.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That's fine, but the hallmark (for me) of the NS games is that the classes are supposed to be able to do both (and to be effective, you do both). The Team Fortress games have 9 classes, but NS historically does the same things with 5 alien lifeforms - this is partly because the gorge is 2 classes at once (engineer and medic). If the 'medic' part of the gorge can't effectively go into combat with teammates and heal them through fights, it may as well not exist (after all, we already have crags, infestation and hives for healing). At that point, when the gorge is just about building, it's a crappy excuse for having more than 1 commander. It ends up to be a crutch for a lot of players who, for some reason or another, don't want to play an FPS game like it's an FPS game. If the gorge could heal and move effectively, the people who play it for the building aspect would still be satisfied (possibly moreso), but the people who aren't as interested in that would also have something to do when playing one of the core alien classes.
Disclaimer: this isn't about airshots or speedcaps, and there's more to core FPS gameplay than that!
There was nothing imbalanced about the speed or frequency of it, and I never saw any complaints, and then it just changed and made the gorge boring and weak.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
There was little risk involved though, don't you think? Yes, there was nothing fundamentally "imbalanced" about it. The gorge wasn't going to belly slide around and kill 3 marines. However, when there was no cooldown on it, if you got into a sticky situation you could leave very quickly, typically much faster than a skulk could. I don't like that kind of mobility in the gorge's hands, it isn't his style.
<!--quoteo(post=1937139:date=May 19 2012, 12:55 AM:name=internetexplorer)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (internetexplorer @ May 19 2012, 12:55 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1937139"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->That's fine, but the hallmark (for me) of the NS games is that the classes are supposed to be able to do both (and to be effective, you do both). The Team Fortress games have 9 classes, but NS historically does the same things with 5 alien lifeforms - this is partly because the gorge is 2 classes at once (engineer and medic). If the 'medic' part of the gorge can't effectively go into combat with teammates and heal them through fights, it may as well not exist (after all, we already have crags, infestation and hives for healing).<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yes, I think the sign of an awesome and well thought out class/lifeform is the ability to shift from one style to a completely different one, almost seamlessly. I am reminded of the recon class from BF3, or the sentinel from Tribes. Hmmm... I think I play sniper too often...
You could still only bellyslide on infestation, which is exactly where gorges shouldn't be free kills. Why does there need to be risk involved in using your movement ability? What is the risk when I flap my wings, blink or leap? Sure, you lose a bit of energy, but even without adrenaline it's really easy to manage that in NS2. Risks should be associated with "what the opponent can do", and the old bellyslide didn't make it impossible for marines to kill gorges. It just meant that gorges in marine sightlines weren't always kills worth 10 pres.
<!--quoteo(post=1937140:date=May 18 2012, 06:58 PM:name=Imbalanxd)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Imbalanxd @ May 18 2012, 06:58 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1937140"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Yes, I think the sign of an awesome and well thought out class/lifeform is to shift from one style to a completely different one, almost seamlessly. I am reminded of the recon class from BF3, or the sentinel from Tribes. Hmmm... I think I play sniper too often...<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yeah, for me it's all about QWTF/TFC/TF2 analogies...NS1 fades are like the Soldier, skulks are like scouts/spies, onos are like heavies/demomen and so on. The roles are blurred together just enough that you don't need 9 different alien models, skins, sets of sounds, health/armor/speed balance numbers...
It's very telling if you try to map the TF classes to the NS2 lifeforms - the gorge is the engineer without shotguns/grenades, and the medic without mobility. The lerk is the scout without burst damage or proper mobility, and the demoman/pyro with very low damage output. The onos is the heavy with damage traded for annoying stun mechanics...
To address the PRes cap and 'need' to switch lifeforms mid/late game or lose the additional resources, going past these numbers would cost PRes to drop additional; they would still dissipate if you did swap to another lifeform for too long (encouraging dedicated Gorges to stay gorge, or lose the res) while still allowing quick deployment with the first three 'freebies' for temp-gorges, but still allowing extended fortification if it was needed/justified or for perma-gorges to put those PRes to use instead of just having them sit there.
Yeah this is where the gorge shines - setting up forward hydra positions and healing your buddies who stop by. Looking forward to getting bile bomb back, can once again pop out of these enclosures and bomb the marine base.
Me too! So glad the suggestion for downhill belly-slide was taken. Wheee sledding!
Love the portable buildings and not having to spend Pres. It was a bummer when you went gorge at the beginning of the game, knowing that when you die, you'll have 0 res. Now you have the option of re-gorging or picking a new class.
Thanks as well for adding the ability to build hydras off infestation. And for keeping hydras alive when you're a gorge-comm! Gorge-comming is very important now to help ward off base harassment.
Just need a bit more range on recycling! Building clog towers to reach those ceiling hydras is kind of silly.
A per-hive increase on buildings would be great too. 3/4/5 hydras and 10/15/20 clogs sounds fair.
I've had some pretty nice games today and there was one situation where I was fade and a teammate gorge. He did a good job setting up a small forward base to have a safe place to retreat to and heal up (was in reactor core, rine base in data core). He also set up some clogs in the doorway which was fine for the safety of the place. But I bumped into them while retreating several times eventually resulting in my death. Well.. I complained about the stupid clogs with my gorgeous friend feeling sorry. This felt somehow weird to me and I thought about it for a while.
I think clogs are an interesting feature - they suit the gorge. They don't attack, stun or do anything else which makes them more subtle than other alien structures (e.g. I've used them to build some kind of armor for a hive today). But there's the obvious usage which is blocking marines. This kinda works but the problem is that aliens rely way more on being able to maneuver freely than marines do. A fade needs to be fast and bumping into walls often means death. Same is true for lerks, and also onis. So if a gorge builds up some blockade it will slow down marines pushing forward but at the same time hinder alien lifeforms to move around freely and sometimes even kill them.
So I think there should be some way for aliens to get past clogs easier than marines. Because if a gorge is doing a good job building up some nice blockade he shouldn't be punished by teammates complaining about it.
Yes, this is a tricky problem, and can't think of any easy solutions.
I have seen a single gorge hold off an army of rines in the mid game by mixing clogs with hydras. Not only keeping harvesters safe but making it very easy for skulks to sneak up behind and clean up the mess. Against shottys and rifles a gorge can do alot.
I haven't tried Gorge out yet, but you have to be really with stuff like this. Balance changes need to be well thought through, consider how any chance can be exploited under different circumstances. It doesn't take much for gorge rush to be very successful. Especially now that they can build hydras on areas without infestation (if I understand the patch notes correctly).
It wouldn't surprise me at all if in the current build you can get a full squad of gorges, rush the marine base and all drop hydras for a very high win ratio.
I've had some pretty nice games today and there was one situation where I was fade and a teammate gorge. He did a good job setting up a small forward base to have a safe place to retreat to and heal up (was in reactor core, rine base in data core). He also set up some clogs in the doorway which was fine for the safety of the place. But I bumped into them while retreating several times eventually resulting in my death. Well.. I complained about the stupid clogs with my gorgeous friend feeling sorry. This felt somehow weird to me and I thought about it for a while.
I think clogs are an interesting feature - they suit the gorge. They don't attack, stun or do anything else which makes them more subtle than other alien structures (e.g. I've used them to build some kind of armor for a hive today). But there's the obvious usage which is blocking marines. This kinda works but the problem is that aliens rely way more on being able to maneuver freely than marines do. A fade needs to be fast and bumping into walls often means death. Same is true for lerks, and also onis. So if a gorge builds up some blockade it will slow down marines pushing forward but at the same time hinder alien lifeforms to move around freely and sometimes even kill them.
So I think there should be some way for aliens to get past clogs easier than marines. Because if a gorge is doing a good job building up some nice blockade he shouldn't be punished by teammates complaining about it.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Maybe aliens could not clip on them or at least only be slightly slowed when walking though them. or at least fade can blink through them.
A clog wall would become more like a battle line instead of a just a closed passage.
But 208 is just to great to play as gorge.
I often place some hydras near the Marines and play really agressive, I team up with Skulks to tank alot of bullets and healing the Skulks at the same time.
Or just playing with the Marines, spitting around till one is hunting me only to bellyslide away and lead him in a Skulk/Hydra trap with alot of Taunting.
There are so many great situations I had with the Gorge, even healing a Hive can be fun if 3 marines try to kill you but all die on healspray.
I agree that Spitt is toooooo slow, it's really easy to evade, only usefull if the Marine is busy.
How about make it so you get 1 free one off the bat and 1+ every 1min with hydra's persisting after death..
The game looked super awesome when you walked deep into alien territory into a dark room filled with glowing hydra's really had that underwater garden look which UWE seem to be so passionate about achieving..
on the other hand, playing at 10 fps while some nerd lives out his simcity fantasy is boring as hell, and will drive away more players from this game than it attracts
(everyone but that gorge suffers from him making a bunch of dumb hydras all over the place)
we're getting that same 'look' by just having infestation go up vertical walls, without needing to wreck the gameplay for everyone
Turn off the hydra limit on each gorge and we'll see if that's true :)
But if you want a serious discussion about the pro's and cons about free limited hydras, please take it in <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?showtopic=118399" target="_blank">The Gorge Thread</a>
.
Like they were before they were free - never had a problem myself, and I usually played gorge. The only time my game have really lagged recently was in 207 when I was going to try out something with clogs and created a custom game. Not knowing better, I placed two mini cysts in warehouse. After getting tired of jumping out all of the time to heal them, cause I had placed a crag by one of them to keep it healed and then the cyst died and I got spammed by messages... I got two mini cysts up again, and spawned 5 crags at each. The cysts still died and the crags started chain healing. Never seen a game so choppy.
And don't say you're trying to reduce redundant threads, otherwise you wouldn't have bumped your 5 day old one to the front page.
This thread is about things that people like about the current gorge system, people will post in your thread if they want to.
You (the OP) made a post explaining why you think something is not boring, if people want to post and explain their reasons why they think otherwise, that's fine, that's how a forum works, people discuss things