First impressions. Why try playing aliens?
LittleLeezard
Join Date: 2010-10-15 Member: 74460Members
Join Date: 2010-10-15 Member: 74460Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Marines win 90% of the time.</div>So far after a number of games, I'm grossly disappointed. The short and sweet is that marines have way to many advantages. I <3 the aliens, but the only thing even remotely scary is a lerk.
If you don't feel like reading, the moral to the story is that marines are fun to play, because marines work with pug teams. Aliens need to all be masters to ahve a hope. That's unfair and makes the game feel 1 sided and un-fun.
Marines can teleport across the map with gates. Each has ranged attacks. Marine commander can heal anyone and everyone on the fly. Marines get lots o insta-death weapons. Potent static defences.
A marines dont fear a skulk. every skulk fears a marine. if the marines travel in pairs heaven forbid, they can destroy skulk teams. I get that skulks are supposed to be skulky, but a skulk cant two shot a marine, and if the game is more than 3 minutes in, they have shotguns. Skulk ambush has a slim chance of winning. Marines still get jetpakcs (an item that imo ruined NS1) and can kite all but... nm they kite all. and now marines get the exo suit to boot.
What do the aliens get in return that in any way compares to hte marines? no teleportation, no ranged, not enough speed to close the gap even with serenity or whatever its called. Onos is super underwhelming, and not even that scary in melee without devour. just run in circles around it. its to slow to catch a marine, and by the time your team can get its hands on 1 onos, there are 7 marines with jetpacks and grenade launchers. The hive reqs for alien techs are absurd. aliens are forces to spread resources, marines can pile everythng into an unbreakable nutshell. That's fair.
Everygame I've played has had a huge marine advantage, and the games generally feel like a 'delay the inevitable' than a fair fight. Aliense are slow to progress because they need to some defend multiple hives. but aliens can teleport between hives so if the marines feel like zerging, they win. Aliens can't zerg because their respawn is just as slow and their movement, mid to late game, is appalling.
Every marine gets to kick ass and its tons of fun to play. aliens feel like fodder, because its so hard to have anything but a bunch of skulks. skulks fail against those jetpacking, shotgun, ranged marines. "Leap" upgrade vs shotgun upgrade. how are these both peer techs? Did i mention mines?... And even if I miraculously get enough resources... and we control multiple hives, when I get to become an onos... its underwhelming. unless you have tons of support you fail. and if you have support, that means you ahve allies nearby, which means GL wipe you out.
Balance mayhaps? a simple marines run slower and fly less would make it infinitely more fair.
If you don't feel like reading, the moral to the story is that marines are fun to play, because marines work with pug teams. Aliens need to all be masters to ahve a hope. That's unfair and makes the game feel 1 sided and un-fun.
Marines can teleport across the map with gates. Each has ranged attacks. Marine commander can heal anyone and everyone on the fly. Marines get lots o insta-death weapons. Potent static defences.
A marines dont fear a skulk. every skulk fears a marine. if the marines travel in pairs heaven forbid, they can destroy skulk teams. I get that skulks are supposed to be skulky, but a skulk cant two shot a marine, and if the game is more than 3 minutes in, they have shotguns. Skulk ambush has a slim chance of winning. Marines still get jetpakcs (an item that imo ruined NS1) and can kite all but... nm they kite all. and now marines get the exo suit to boot.
What do the aliens get in return that in any way compares to hte marines? no teleportation, no ranged, not enough speed to close the gap even with serenity or whatever its called. Onos is super underwhelming, and not even that scary in melee without devour. just run in circles around it. its to slow to catch a marine, and by the time your team can get its hands on 1 onos, there are 7 marines with jetpacks and grenade launchers. The hive reqs for alien techs are absurd. aliens are forces to spread resources, marines can pile everythng into an unbreakable nutshell. That's fair.
Everygame I've played has had a huge marine advantage, and the games generally feel like a 'delay the inevitable' than a fair fight. Aliense are slow to progress because they need to some defend multiple hives. but aliens can teleport between hives so if the marines feel like zerging, they win. Aliens can't zerg because their respawn is just as slow and their movement, mid to late game, is appalling.
Every marine gets to kick ass and its tons of fun to play. aliens feel like fodder, because its so hard to have anything but a bunch of skulks. skulks fail against those jetpacking, shotgun, ranged marines. "Leap" upgrade vs shotgun upgrade. how are these both peer techs? Did i mention mines?... And even if I miraculously get enough resources... and we control multiple hives, when I get to become an onos... its underwhelming. unless you have tons of support you fail. and if you have support, that means you ahve allies nearby, which means GL wipe you out.
Balance mayhaps? a simple marines run slower and fly less would make it infinitely more fair.
Comments
I guess bads will just be bads.
I notice you didn't mention fades once, but they are the powerhouse unit for aliens right now. Onos are widely regarded as needing some rebalancing now that exos are out.
I notice you didn't mention fades once, but they are the powerhouse unit for aliens right now. Onos are widely regarded as needing some rebalancing now that exos are out.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yes, fades are decent. 1 decent unit OH wait! they don't come with blink so fail.
The alien tech tree is rediculous. you shouldn't need to research you primary use. fade no blink. onos no stomp, no devour, skulk no jump... marines get 2 weapons. why not the aliens?
And an exo beat an onos hands down is rediculous.
58.33% alien win percentage. Chances you were on a server in which a bunch of skilled players were skill-stacking marines. Now that we have a nice selection of servers, the best option is to just jump on another server.
58.33% alien win percentage. Chances you were on a server in which a bunch of skilled players were skill-stacking marines. Now that we have a nice selection of servers, the best option is to just jump on another server.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It's a bit lower now, but I'm confused. Alien win rate was a few percentage points higher than it is now in 217, but Marines were nerfed with Aliens buffed in the last patch. Shouldn't it be even higher now?
The alien tech tree is rediculous. you shouldn't need to research you primary use. fade no blink. onos no stomp, no devour, skulk no jump... marines get 2 weapons. why not the aliens?
And an exo beat an onos hands down is rediculous.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Exo isnt supposed to be = to Onos, they're different.
Against exo you just skulkrush the welders and then the exo, or hide in vents and bilebomb as Gorge. NO OTHER LIFEFORM SHOULD TRY TO KILL THE EXO.
But yes, Onos needs a buff, but thats a different story.
There are a few things that determine if one side or the other is going to win, but mainly it comes down to which side has the most experienced players. Right now there are alot of new players and because there isn't a way to balance teams properly it usually means one side will have more new players and they are gonna lose most of the time. Also is the comm using a mic and does he know what he is doing? You can have a game where the comm is new and doesn't know what he's doing and just by replacing him with someone who does can mean the team has a chance. One team with just 2 or 3 guys who are using their mic and telling the others what to do and where to go can make all the difference. Recently I quite often experience that I am the only one using my mic because there are so many new players. So there are alot of factors in this and it's frankly silly to claim the game is utterly unbalanced when your playtime is limited, especially considering that the statistics are showing otherwise.
According to NS2stats, Aliens consistently have a higher winrate in both 217 and 218.
If it were only a matter of inexperienced players, then they should still be near 50/50 unless there's a ridiculous amount of stacking going on, but I don't think that's the case.
If it were only a matter of inexperienced players, then they should still be near 50/50 unless there's a ridiculous amount of stacking going on, but I don't think that's the case.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You cannot get 50/50 in NS2 at the moment. The fact that teamstacking is a real problem and there are so many new players makes it impossible. If the game had a good matchmaking system like SC2 then it could get 50/50.
Edit: The reason it's impossible is because a server will not be complately full of new players, there will always be at least a few experienced players on one team and that alone tips the scale. It is even worse when there is team stack involved since whatever team they are on will undoubtedly win. Unless they changed teams every round it cannot become 50/50, but many people have a favorite race that they play more often, thus scewing the stats even more.
My own experience is that when teams are reasonably balanced then marines and aliens are pretty even with regards to win rates. Also aliens might have a higher winrate on NS2stats, but it is nowhere near 90%, which is what OP is claiming marines have.
Edit: The reason it's impossible is because a server will not be complately full of new players, there will always be at least a few experienced players on one team and that alone tips the scale. It is even worse when there is team stack involved since whatever team they are on will undoubtedly win. Unless they changed teams every round it cannot become 50/50, but many people have a favorite race that they play more often, thus scewing the stats even more.
My own experience is that when teams are reasonably balanced then marines and aliens are pretty even with regards to win rates. Also aliens might have a higher winrate on NS2stats, but it is nowhere near 90%, which is what OP is claiming marines have.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well my experience, ns2stats asside, has been in the last couple days, 1 alien win out of 11 games. So my experience has been >90% loss rate to aliens.
As to NS2 stats, I don't think ns2stats reflects the post exo introduction win rates? additionally, are the alien wins generally only in short games, or if the aliens dont win by pure rush, do marines dominate?
Statistically, if the teams are a perfect 50/50, you will only see that perfect balance 15% of the time as a player. Maybe I'm just unlucky and on the hind end of the win/loss 1% fail teams. So if fast games are won by aliens, they have lots of little wins. but if marines tend to have an advantage after the immediate start, ns2stats will show epic alien domination! NS2stats wont see the time/win ratio. just game volume/wins. But in reality outside of those write-off quick wins, marines are superior. Its like most rts's. if the zerg can only win by a rush gambit, emphasis on gambit, they will suffer hardcore in real games. And to have fun, you want to play in those real long tug-of-war games.
Maybe time doesn't matter, and the 2 races are balanced even over time. If so, I havn't seen it. And if a player (me) is having a consistently losing experience, to quote south park ski instuctors, "You're gonna have a bad time." I play the aliens because im tired of generic FPSs. But everyone is good at FPSs, so marine 'nubs' kick the living snark out of new alien players. Frankly, I think the skulk is the hardest class to play, yet it is the primary unit. I hear peeps in voice chat dissing players for failing at onos: if you don't know how to use it, don't play it! But its impossible to learn given its cost and survivability. You see it maybe once a game if your aiming for it. its impossible to practice agaisnt talented marines or an exo. You just die. THe learning curve, because of that alone, is absurd for newbees! It takes some darned talent to be a decent skulk. Not so much talent required to shoot a gun, especially when a basic marine's attack's time-to-kill is 0.15 seconds, and a skulks, assuming no misses, is 2.0. Everyone cares about kdr, and the krhaal or whatever they call it, don't get to have decent kdrs. (and if the only way to have a good one is fade spam, there is a serious balance problem).
92% of statistics can be made to show whatever you want them to show. Grain of salt =/
My understanding is that NS2stats resets after every update. May not be true, but I remember the stats being reaaaally low after it went to 218.
Also, it does show how long each match went on for and every major event that happened. (RT construction, RT lost, research, etc).
I'm pretty sure that fully specced Marines are meant to be superior to the Aliens though, considering that it takes them almost three times the tres it takes the Aliens to cap out.
Edit: So NS2stats does reset after every update. In addition, it lets you look at past builds. Grouping together 216, 217, and 218 still gives you 60/40 in favor of the Aliens.
-One team is stacked. Then they win, no contest. They just rush the hive or command chair or just control the whole map within the first few minutes and decimate the opposition.
-If skills levels are more balanced, then at first marines spread like wildfire and control a lot of resource points. At this point it looks like they are winning, but the true test of how well are they doing is if they manage to push into the second hive. If all what they do is put out fires (rebuilding towers and repelling aliens) it spells doom.
-Now, if aliens can hold just 3 resource towers or so and make their second hive, fades sprout like mushrooms after a rain. Equipped with blink, cara/regen and adrenalin, they're as effective as they could be and unstoppable in the hands of a competent player, as they cannot be taken down unless they face very skilled or lucky and well equipped enemies <i>and</i> they commit a mistake. Marine advancement is halted, aliens push back aggresively. At this point it looks like aliens are going to be the winners, and is the source of most of the “fades are OP†threads.
-But it too many fade die or spend too much time healing and aliens don't quickly manage to reduce marines to one tech point, eventually they get jetpacks, level 3 armor/weapons and exos, all of which make fading much more complicated. Yes, a good fade or skulk can drop a jetpacker, but only a minority of pub players can do that <i>quickly enough</i>. At this point marines have the advantage of brute force, but it's actually a minor one as they're very vulnerable to hit and run tactics on buildings and exo trains means undefended bases.
Basically, right now all other things equal it's all about the fade.
Each patch improves performance -> good marine aim becomes more common -> more wins, I believe.
It doesn't "reset", it just switches default filters from the last patch to the current one. So when 218 cam out, it had 218 as the default filter so all the info from 217 and before that was hidden automatically.
Id like to see win % on games over a certain number of players, is there a way to see that? Reason i ask is that when i join a server to get it rocking with some players aliens will always just sneak in and win in less then 2 minutes, this is like 3v3 or 4v4 games.
theres no reason to use a Lerk or Onos, waste of res.
Id like to see win % on games over a certain number of players, is there a way to see that? Reason i ask is that when i join a server to get it rocking with some players aliens will always just sneak in and win in less then 2 minutes, this is like 3v3 or 4v4 games.
theres no reason to use a Lerk or Onos, waste of res.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Team size is a major influence right now. Alien's spawn system just doesn't work for larger game sizes. Try an 18 player server instead of 24. Its much better at that level.
Aliens win when marines have a bad comm or a massive skill imbalance.
Aliens stand almost no chance of coming back after a 2nd hive is taken down.
Marines dont suffer anywhere near as much losing 2nd CC.
They still have Phase tech but aliens lose leap....oh so they dont get Exo's or Jp's....not a massive loss if they already have w2 or better and GL's, shotties etc.
Marines keep full upgrades (weapons and armour) but aliens will have lost one of their crucial upgrades (unless you think running around balanced to marines at a0 w0 but actually carrying w2 a2 or better is fun)
The issue I think lies in that aliens suffer much more for their loses and as such cant fight back as easily as marines.
This is due to no Hive teleporting and as such cant respond quickly enough when hives are under attack.
Sorry but when a marine is attacking a hive every second is crucial, the additional time aliens must spend getting to the hive under attack is huge....marines after 2 min have phase tech and the movement advantage so succesfuly pushing into a hive is easier than defending the same hive (especially as you dont always spawn at the hive under attack) as the marines push in fully armed to the teeth.
The aliens spawn naked...no upgrades at all...so spwaning at a hive under attack is a waste of time and your going to die quickly a lot of the time.
Alien comm cant beacon players in to help with a base rush...or have them phase through from another hive after they grabbed some JP's and GL's.
Fix the ability for aliens to respond to a hive under attack and we wont see aliens losing that second hive as easily, for 40 res they go down too easily as aliens cant get back without running for ~20+ seconds.
Fix that and I think the game will feel more balanced...the reason aliens feel like they dont win as often is because they cant fight back as easily as marines can due to complete lack of mobility.
You have no hope of an onos getting back to a hive under attack unless he just walked out the door as they attacked....if he was trying to attack their CC at the time...no hope at all.