The Skulk is the lower lifeform... a marine upgrades his weapons, the aliens upgrade their lifeform.... a marine with 0 upgrades against an alien with 0 upgrades is (in my experience) a 50/50 fight. the marine has the advantage at range yes, but the Skulk has the advantage in melee... you sneak up on a marine hit 1 good clean hit followed by 2 glancing blows and they die... if you sneaked up properly they shouldn't have time to react.
Problem is that this is hardly true anymore, since a marine can outmanoeuvre you in melee now and win some valuable time at the very least. It's great that you, being a new player, still enjoy skulk, though that's probably because you didn't play prior to the nerf and thus can't possibly miss the old movement, which I can assure you was quite a bit more fun .
As for spawn times, like I said earlier: spawning faster won't make the class itself more fun. Nobody wants to play a class in which you are just cannon-fodder for the largest part of the game. (It already gets bad lategame as a skulk, now it's not even that fun early on any more)
A lot of people in this thread seem to be forgetting that the primary complaint here is about the FUN of it all, not the balance. Yes skulks aren't necessarily UP in their current state, but they're definitely less fun than before, which is a huge problem in itself.
***A little offtopic about spawn time***
When I was respawning, the waiting time is usually around 12 seconds - thats my on-screen timer says, and then, when it reach "0 seconds left", i get "Waiting to spawn" message and respawn in a second or two ... but sometimes i have to wait, wait muuuuuuuuch longer than i can expect. Yesterday I waited 12 seconds on the timer, and then another 8-10 seconds looking on "Waiting to spawn". But our team everytime HAS 2-3 eggs and the teams did not need a balance.
Does anyone know whats the reason?
A lot of people in this thread seem to be forgetting that the primary complaint here is about the FUN of it all, not the balance. Yes skulks aren't necessarily UP in their current state, but they're definitely less fun than before, which is a huge problem in itself.
Ah, okay I misunderstood. I thought this was about balance... As for fun, I do agree. Skulks need work. They can be quite frustrating early on and VERY frustrating later on. I just considered this to be an "aliens need to be more tactical than marines" kind of thing.
After reading through the posts again I think the best idea is to increase acceleration of skulks.. not up to 100, but from 64 to say.... 85?... it will increase the skulk movement but not so much that marines feel nerfed surely.
A lot of people in this thread seem to be forgetting that the primary complaint here is about the FUN of it all, not the balance. Yes skulks aren't necessarily UP in their current state, but they're definitely less fun than before, which is a huge problem in itself.
No, I am sorry but that is incorrect. The primary complaint is balance.
"This thread is for 3 purposes:
1. The issue with Skulks vs. Marine b̶̶u̶̶n̶̶n̶̶y̶hopping has not changed a bit. But there hasn't been much talk about it lately. So... again, here it is
2. Given the latest dev blog entry about balance, to preempt people from saying "But we have 50% win rates now, what are you complaining about!!?? Whiners!"
3. To get the devs comment on the issue.
Are you aware of the issue?
Do you see this as a problem or is it working closer to what you always intended in terms of Marine vs Skulk gameplay?
Can we expect a change or is this just the "new Skulk" and we should get used to it?
Is the improved b-word (balance) worth it? (in my opinion, the improved game quality is a HUGE benefit, don't get me wrong)"
Your letting the digression of the thread get in the way. There will never be unanimous agreement on "FUN". Fun is completely subjective and a matter of opinion. Right now I think skulk is "fun" but also difficult for my level of skill.
It's not about balance
The OP part you posted is that players and devs might see "balance" improvements (50% win rates) and think there is nothing wrong, or to discuss whether the better balance is worth it.
This thread is about a specific new mechanic/situation that is not fun and frustrating for many Skulk players.
Of course some might say due to this "Skulk vs Marine is unbalanced", and of course it affects balance/win rates. But the complaints were never about balance itself, but un-fun-ness (is this a word? :P) of the new Skulk movement parameters. Nerf Skulks all the way, just don't keep a situation where it sometimes feels like you hit a wall and there's nothing you can do. This is a pretty objective variant of "not fun" for a game - being in a situation where it seems whatever you do, you can't really do much about the outcome and it feels unfair and cheap (of course this impression is subjective, but the numbers suggest there might be some truth to it).
Balance discussion here is, assuming the Skulks gets "fixed" somehow (which is what we'd like), how to preserve the noticeably improved overall gameplay since 240, and not go back to the terrible Alien stomps.
But the issue there, hozz, is that determining what's fun really is subjective. I find skulks fun to play, and I don't really encounter the problems being described in this thread, and I especially never feel like I'm put in a combat situation where there's nothing I can do about the outcome (unless I put myself there, which is an entirely different issue, and one that's in no way dependent on any mechanics that've been changed recently).
Well either way. I think skulk speed is fine. I also think they should not have a friction penalty on walls or floors. I think that would make them feel a lot more fluid like they use to be while still keeping the fix on the erratic model and hit box movement. I still think a main reason why skulks are frustrating (and why marines seem to be more powerful) is because of the number and frequency of changes to skulk movement. It is hard and frustrating to continue to build skill when basic movement is always changed. It would be like always moving a basketball goal up and down or farther away. The changes seem small but have a larger impact. You could never consistently get better.
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@Nouswanderer : the skill ceiling has been lowered to a point that its frustrating to a certain level of player.
One could argue that the previous mechanic gave too much freedom and thus power.
This is why changing damage numbers will not help one bit for these level of players - they'd still be able to out position and juke a marine.
But one can also safely argue that against any halfway decent marine with a shotgun, even a one bite advantage (Which is not always possible) isn't enough to win the majority of the time now, as you cannot make up for a strafing marine's speed - instead of being based on who has a faster reaction.
So its not surprising that its now frustrating.
What must be preserved : the benefit of the predictable movement without twitchy/glitched animations that compound the issue.
What must change : the movement skill ceiling and ability to either counter a certain percentage of marine dodges, or have a very narrow reaction time window to do so.
I think its time for creative ideas..
What about earning a mini leap if you recently wall jumped? It would reward an encouraged action, require skill through planning and approach, could easily be explained by a hint, and fits the two criteria above? Its a new meta mechanic and feature though, and that is a downside..
@IronHorse: The skill ceiling has certainly been lowered with respect to air control/air movement in particular--I agree with this and have underscored this change throughout the discussion. Skulks can no longer use unpredictable movement to their advantage, at least not in the same way that they once could. While skulks can still be unpredictable in other ways, they can no longer change directions mid-jump without the help of leap, and they can no longer rely on glitched out animations to help them survive combat while doing so.
And so I can understand how this might be frustrating, especially if someone came to depend upon the older air control as the only effective way to play a skulk. While I formerly took advantage of what options were available to me, the changes aren't enough for me to state that skulks are "no longer fun at all" or that "it's impossible to kill marines if they have any ranged advantage whatsoever" or "marines are actually more effective than skulks in melee range." I consider these to be gross exaggerations which do more harm than good. If anything, I think that randomrope hits closest to the truth: the bigger problem here - especially for competitive players - is having movement mechanics changed at inopportune times, or changed too often to reasonably adapt to.
Everything else that wasn't a downright fix (e.g. things other than hitboxes while climbing, engine optimizations) more or less remains the same (which is to say that in matters unrelated to jumping after a juking marine, skulks retain the majority of their former capabilities). In my opinion, the skulk has plenty of other, innate movement capabilities to compensate for this loss, even if it means that the skill ceiling has been lowered in this one respect.
Contrary to the anonymous Farknut's claim, I'm routinely one of the top players on Voogru/KCABS/[insert-non-rookie-pub-server here]. I'd say I'm somewhere healthily in the 'good, not great' range. I'm not a competitive player in that I'm not on a competitive team, but I know my way around the game, and I've played with/against some top players in various rounds here and there without getting anything close to destroyed (well--my team might've been wrecked, but that's a different issue!).
So, all told, I feel like I'm in an okay place with respect to my perspective on the game. I see these changes as offering 1) a great deal of benefit to the game's balance without 2) a somehow inevitable, commensurate loss of 'fun'. But this latter point is totally subjective, and the former point is far more objective. While it's pretty clear that the game's flow feels better now overall than it did pre-Gorgeous, "fun" is something that people have to determine for themselves. I think it's just as fun. I'm really not having much more trouble as a skulk than I did before, and anecdotal examples which run entirely contrary to the prevailing hyperbole in this thread are common in my play experience.
While I understand that the lowering of the ceiling in any way is frustrating to players of a certain caliber, my contention throughout the thread has been that those players still have plenty of other options available to them (especially when considering that they're still playing completely free lifeforms). To further clarify by way of example, I don't find it problematic that an expert shotgunner can usually win against an average skulk, and I completely disagree that an expert skulk has no chance in the same situation.
I'm also not really convinced that the majority of people expressing concern in this thread are the "high caliber" players we're describing, though. In fact, some of the familiar top clan names in this thread are some of the people claiming that the changes were made for a reason, and that the concerns are overstated (even if they also agree that the changes might be frustrating for one reason or another).
As for potential solutions, I agree with you: I think that an improved walljump is the key. I'm not exactly sure what the best option is, but I'd be a fan of momentum gained via walljumping being somehow less resistant to friction/slowdown. Even fractional changes in this regard would have dramatic effects in-game. An alternate and/or supplemental solution would be offering some form of diluted celerity effect in combat (this would have to be approached very delicately).
To be fair, I think the skill floor has also been increased, it's notably harder for new alien players to be successful with skulks too.
Which again is a fun issue, not necessarily a balance one.
But the issue there, hozz, is that determining what's fun really is subjective. I find skulks fun to play, and I don't really encounter the problems being described in this thread, and I especially never feel like I'm put in a combat situation where there's nothing I can do about the outcome (unless I put myself there, which is an entirely different issue, and one that's in no way dependent on any mechanics that've been changed recently).
But the issue there, hozz, is that determining what's fun really is subjective. I find skulks fun to play, and I don't really encounter the problems being described in this thread, and I especially never feel like I'm put in a combat situation where there's nothing I can do about the outcome (unless I put myself there, which is an entirely different issue, and one that's in no way dependent on any mechanics that've been changed recently).
you're not playing against competent marines
Various members of Nexzil or All-In aren't competent? Of course they're competent, which I'm sure you'd agree with, considering who you are. :P
That doesn't mean I've ever been in a situation where there was nothing I could do to change the outcome in a combat situation when up against one of them (in a pub, mind you, since I don't play for a team). It's very silly to suggest otherwise. If you have some other standard of competent, I haven't had the pleasure of playing a game with those sorts of marines. The players with the strongest reputations I can think of are the Archaea folks, and I'm pretty sure Fana and Tane don't make pub appearances in my timezone/area.
Does this mean that I win the majority of the time against that absolute top-tier of players who are demonstrably better than me by virtue of their clan affiliations, K:Ds and professional histories?
Of course not.
It would be absurd if I expected that I would, or should, and at that point we'd be discussing skill rather than balance.
But I do win a reasonable amount of the time against players who are on my play level, and that play level is certainly well above average as far as pubs are concerned, and pubs house the vast majority of NS2 games. If you're talking about strictly competitive play being the only useful barometer by which the game should be measured, the majority of the comments in this thread can be discarded outright.
Also note that what I'm most directly arguing for is something other than a reversion to the former level of air control skulks enjoyed. If UWE is going to tackle this because they think it's a problem, I'd prefer to see them do something less uninteresting than what they've done with walljumping, especially if it's supposed to be the skill-based alternative to NS1's bhop. Other than that - and maybe a slight bump to skulk accel directly or indirectly - I don't see changes being necessary.
I don't want to cause any offense by my next statement so try to remember that while you read. It is also directed at everyone not just you Gliss, I've only quoted you to show what I'm answering.
Have you ever considered that you are in fact an incompetent Skulk?
I have been playing for a week... A WEEK!... and while it can be frustrating being a Skulk sometimes. It is NOT difficult to kill a marine. I'm far from a "great" player and I've taken down 3 marines alone.... I've also seen a single marine take down 3 skulks alone. it means NOTHING. you cannot compare individual skill levels and state that something is imbalanced. you could be having an off day, they could be having a great day. latency and FPS issues can cause variable results, they could simply be a better player than you etc.
"you're not playing against competent marines"...... really, wth... If you know what you're doing, taking out a marine in 1v1 is easy. if the marine is currently repairing or building something (or similar) he is vulnerable to attack and can be taken down before he realizes he is being attacked... If you see a marine down the corridor looking around and moving around...avoid him. Because you will lose.
The only problem I see so far is that people are trying to play Skulks the same way they play marines. if you do that, you will lose.
Playing a Skulk is about picking your targets wisely. moving through vents and staying quiet. and even then if you do everything perfectly, their is always the chance that they may just get lucky (turning to see you approach just in time/getting help at the last second from the commander with health packs etc.)
I'm sorry but I just think this is a "L2P" situation...
Finally, I would just like to say that I agree that Skulks do currently feel... sluggish (for want of a better word) and I agree that something should be done about movement. But I honestly think that the alterations should have zero effect (if possible) on combat.
@Kasharic: To offer you some context and a bit of a history lesson -
Gliss is one of the best players in the game, and he plays for Nexzil (which is arguably the best NA clan). Competitive play tends to be far more aggressive and fast-paced that typical pub play, and as such, highly refined movement skills are especially rewarded in that very twitchy environment.
NS1 was on the H1 engine (GoldSrc), and bunnyhopping was a part of that experience. In NS1, skulks had a very high skill ceiling with respect to player movement, and top speeds were blazing (but required increasingly refined controls in order to maintain). TFC is probably the other GoldSrc-based game best known for advanced movement, and it, too, had a very high skill ceiling in that regard.
NS2's skill ceiling wasn't lowered to the extent that something like TF2's was as compared with TFC, and this game remains quite competitive. What's being lamented here is that one of the twitchiest aspects of skulk movement in NS2 - and the one with the highest skill ceiling - was effectively nerfed recently. This led to many players asserting that the skulk has been effectively "bricked".
Some of your points are right, and I agree with them in spirit. There are plenty of ways for skulks to thrive, especially in public servers, and even against 'competent' marines who know what they're doing (and especially against bad-to-average marines who play this as if it were CoD in space). I've been arguing this perspective throughout the thread.
The issue winds up being how much the recent changes detract from "fun," and my argument is that it's ultimately an entirely subjective call. I still love the game, and while there's a lot I miss from NS1, NS2 feels more balanced now than it ever has. The nerf did take place, and it did lower the skulk skill ceiling with respect to a very specific and highly valued range of movement, and that does affect competitive players more than others. That said, adaptation is entirely possible (as is demonstrated by the fact that people are still playing and enjoying the game in both public and competitive environments, and that - as far as I can tell - the win rate is so much better than it has been in quite awhile).
Some people are mistaking people like me - those who see these changes as a general fix that has improved the game - with those people who simply don't understand the context / what actually changed / why it's an issue. I understand what happened, since it happened to me too. These people then respond with "it's not a balance issue - it's a matter of fun" or "you suck" or "you're not playing at the levels where this makes a difference." My response is that I don't really find skulks that much less fun, if any less fun, in any context I've played in. I just don't think it's the hyperbolic, overblown, game-destroying, impossible-to-surmount issue people are making it out to be. The skulk's skill ceiling is still sufficiently high for me to enjoy the game when playing as one. It's not ideal - I never claimed it was. I simply hold that it shouldn't go back to what it was before.
If skulks are going to experience a skill ceiling raised from its current state with respect to movement, what I'm arguing is that it should happen via the walljumping system - a system that I understand to be UWE's attempt at capturing some of the bunnyhopping magic via the maintenance of an additional level of manual input on top of 'normal' movement. As of right now, the magic isn't really there and walljumping is a bit unspectacular, but perhaps everyone can be made happy if the system is sufficiently tweaked.
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so in essence. the complaints are happening simply because people feel like skulks are less fun to play due to a nerf...A "nerf" that resulted in a more balanced win/lose ratio....okaaaay :S
A little off topic here:-
my only complaint (other than respawn rates of aliens) is that the camera doesn't change when I'm on the walls or ceiling, so it doesn't really feel like I'm on the wall/ceiling. if that could be changed I don't think I'd play any other game ever again :P
On topic:-
As I'm very new to the game I'm not sure if my input would help in any way tbh. I didn't experience the nerf let alone NS1, So I can't really comment on it. Maybe having a minor boost to your acceleration when jumping off a wall/ceiling would help. (Not sure if thats been mentioned before.)
Ladies and gentlemen, we have now seen it all. I was waiting for this payoff. Can we please get more complete noobs in here, because it's comedy gold!
Well done for taking something I specifically said was not intended to insult and twisting it. I also stated that it was not directed specifically at you but at everyone making similar points as yourself... congrats.
while it can be frustrating being a Skulk sometimes...
If you know what you're doing, taking out a marine in 1v1 is easy...
Finally, I would just like to say that I agree that Skulks do currently feel... sluggish (for want of a better word) and I agree that something should be done about movement. But I honestly think that the alterations should have zero effect (if possible) on combat.
It's been pointed out a few times on this thread, but I'll say it again.
Overall balance right now is pretty good. Players at the same skill level 1v1 is not terrible, Skulks still win fights. The issue is Skulk is not as fun as Marine, and 1v1 they don't seem quite equal to marines with that only getting worse and worse as the game progresses (and marine upgrades start coming out).
The higher skill floor and lower skill ceiling results in new Skulks getting torn to shreds (how many fights in the free weekend did you guys manage to jump over and over and over the new Skulks?!), and old Skulks hit a point where they feel they're struggling to get any better, and all Skulks just feel much more slow and sluggish.
Have you ever considered that you are in fact an incompetent Skulk?
Ladies and gentlemen, we have now seen it all. I was waiting for this payoff. Can we please get more complete noobs in here, because it's comedy gold!
You should endeavor to be more helpful, Mystery Player. We should all be hoping that we get more new players here, even if they make the mistake of not knowing who one of the top clan players is. For many of the skulks in this thread, it probably is an issue of not knowing how to maximize the lifeform's efficacy even under current conditions. The fact that we're talking about a lowered skill ceiling in the first place is absurd when considering how few people complaining about these changes are anywhere near the current skill ceiling, and that's the point being made by a number of people who don't swallow the OP in one big gulp.
Remember kids, when something is a game overnerfed or unfun to play, just say the skill floor on it was raised.
One of former problems was that marine movement scaled so poorly, and that there wasn't much you could do with it even when prepared. Not much has changed regarding the actual mechanics with the exception that there's now one decent maneuver that isn't completely obliterated by a skulk pulling 135 degree turns mid-air. This change is thus bothersome to many people. When a marine and skulk engages, the marine just has a chance if he gets his juke off once the skulk closes the gap. This doesn't mean that the skulk is now somehow inferior as compared to the marine in melee combat, but rather that the marine has a fighting chance to avoid XX damage, whereas formerly it was a matter of relying on as much burst damage in the shortest amount of time possible (i.e. total reaction / twitch).
If we're talking about air control, what's the solution? Maybe a little bit more wiggle room would work, but do we really want the skulk to be able to curve-jump to the point that they catch the juking marine? If so, we're back where we were. If not, the skulk might be able to evade a bit more easily, which wouldn't be awful. The goal should be to keep a movement technique that scales well with skill but isn't completely OP given the way marines work in this game. I'll repeat some suggestions I've made in this thread:
WALLJUMP: Skulks might benefit from a marginally improved walljump. Maybe an additional 5-10% speed boost on the initial jump, and perhaps a smoother way to chain jumps together; it may be better if the speed boost took slightly longer to wear off once ground friction applied, meaning that ambushes would be more effective and momentum accumulation would be less impacted by unhelpful map geometry.
CELERITY #1: Alternately, drop celerity to a flat 25%-35% of its original effect in combat (rather than 0% of its original effect, as things are now).
CELERITY #2: Alternately, have celerity diminish gradually in combat as function of damage taken in a short period (determined by how much life is lost as a % of overall health) rather than the current, strict drop to 0% when any damage is given or taken. Taking a lot of damage would drop you down to 0% celerity bonus, but the more damage you evade, the more celerity momentum you keep.
What shouldn't happen is a return to the previous situation. It's my personal opinion that things are fine now, but this is obviously a polarizing issue.
So what if you had a movement control upgrade from the Hive?
You could gain back all of the old skulk weirdness except the hitbox/model thing would still be fixed. You could curve jump, fly through halls, and ping pong off walls. And you can be a happy skulk again.
edit: But the base vanilla skulk would stay exactly as it is right now from the start of the round.
Comments
Especially when you are killed over and over again despite your "right play".
As for spawn times, like I said earlier: spawning faster won't make the class itself more fun. Nobody wants to play a class in which you are just cannon-fodder for the largest part of the game. (It already gets bad lategame as a skulk, now it's not even that fun early on any more)
A lot of people in this thread seem to be forgetting that the primary complaint here is about the FUN of it all, not the balance. Yes skulks aren't necessarily UP in their current state, but they're definitely less fun than before, which is a huge problem in itself.
When I was respawning, the waiting time is usually around 12 seconds - thats my on-screen timer says, and then, when it reach "0 seconds left", i get "Waiting to spawn" message and respawn in a second or two ... but sometimes i have to wait, wait muuuuuuuuch longer than i can expect. Yesterday I waited 12 seconds on the timer, and then another 8-10 seconds looking on "Waiting to spawn". But our team everytime HAS 2-3 eggs and the teams did not need a balance.
Does anyone know whats the reason?
Ah, okay I misunderstood. I thought this was about balance... As for fun, I do agree. Skulks need work. They can be quite frustrating early on and VERY frustrating later on. I just considered this to be an "aliens need to be more tactical than marines" kind of thing.
After reading through the posts again I think the best idea is to increase acceleration of skulks.. not up to 100, but from 64 to say.... 85?... it will increase the skulk movement but not so much that marines feel nerfed surely.
The OP part you posted is that players and devs might see "balance" improvements (50% win rates) and think there is nothing wrong, or to discuss whether the better balance is worth it.
This thread is about a specific new mechanic/situation that is not fun and frustrating for many Skulk players.
Of course some might say due to this "Skulk vs Marine is unbalanced", and of course it affects balance/win rates. But the complaints were never about balance itself, but un-fun-ness (is this a word? :P) of the new Skulk movement parameters. Nerf Skulks all the way, just don't keep a situation where it sometimes feels like you hit a wall and there's nothing you can do. This is a pretty objective variant of "not fun" for a game - being in a situation where it seems whatever you do, you can't really do much about the outcome and it feels unfair and cheap (of course this impression is subjective, but the numbers suggest there might be some truth to it).
Balance discussion here is, assuming the Skulks gets "fixed" somehow (which is what we'd like), how to preserve the noticeably improved overall gameplay since 240, and not go back to the terrible Alien stomps.
One could argue that the previous mechanic gave too much freedom and thus power.
This is why changing damage numbers will not help one bit for these level of players - they'd still be able to out position and juke a marine.
But one can also safely argue that against any halfway decent marine with a shotgun, even a one bite advantage (Which is not always possible) isn't enough to win the majority of the time now, as you cannot make up for a strafing marine's speed - instead of being based on who has a faster reaction.
So its not surprising that its now frustrating.
What must be preserved : the benefit of the predictable movement without twitchy/glitched animations that compound the issue.
What must change : the movement skill ceiling and ability to either counter a certain percentage of marine dodges, or have a very narrow reaction time window to do so.
I think its time for creative ideas..
What about earning a mini leap if you recently wall jumped? It would reward an encouraged action, require skill through planning and approach, could easily be explained by a hint, and fits the two criteria above? Its a new meta mechanic and feature though, and that is a downside..
And so I can understand how this might be frustrating, especially if someone came to depend upon the older air control as the only effective way to play a skulk. While I formerly took advantage of what options were available to me, the changes aren't enough for me to state that skulks are "no longer fun at all" or that "it's impossible to kill marines if they have any ranged advantage whatsoever" or "marines are actually more effective than skulks in melee range." I consider these to be gross exaggerations which do more harm than good. If anything, I think that randomrope hits closest to the truth: the bigger problem here - especially for competitive players - is having movement mechanics changed at inopportune times, or changed too often to reasonably adapt to.
Everything else that wasn't a downright fix (e.g. things other than hitboxes while climbing, engine optimizations) more or less remains the same (which is to say that in matters unrelated to jumping after a juking marine, skulks retain the majority of their former capabilities). In my opinion, the skulk has plenty of other, innate movement capabilities to compensate for this loss, even if it means that the skill ceiling has been lowered in this one respect.
Contrary to the anonymous Farknut's claim, I'm routinely one of the top players on Voogru/KCABS/[insert-non-rookie-pub-server here]. I'd say I'm somewhere healthily in the 'good, not great' range. I'm not a competitive player in that I'm not on a competitive team, but I know my way around the game, and I've played with/against some top players in various rounds here and there without getting anything close to destroyed (well--my team might've been wrecked, but that's a different issue!).
So, all told, I feel like I'm in an okay place with respect to my perspective on the game. I see these changes as offering 1) a great deal of benefit to the game's balance without 2) a somehow inevitable, commensurate loss of 'fun'. But this latter point is totally subjective, and the former point is far more objective. While it's pretty clear that the game's flow feels better now overall than it did pre-Gorgeous, "fun" is something that people have to determine for themselves. I think it's just as fun. I'm really not having much more trouble as a skulk than I did before, and anecdotal examples which run entirely contrary to the prevailing hyperbole in this thread are common in my play experience.
While I understand that the lowering of the ceiling in any way is frustrating to players of a certain caliber, my contention throughout the thread has been that those players still have plenty of other options available to them (especially when considering that they're still playing completely free lifeforms). To further clarify by way of example, I don't find it problematic that an expert shotgunner can usually win against an average skulk, and I completely disagree that an expert skulk has no chance in the same situation.
I'm also not really convinced that the majority of people expressing concern in this thread are the "high caliber" players we're describing, though. In fact, some of the familiar top clan names in this thread are some of the people claiming that the changes were made for a reason, and that the concerns are overstated (even if they also agree that the changes might be frustrating for one reason or another).
As for potential solutions, I agree with you: I think that an improved walljump is the key. I'm not exactly sure what the best option is, but I'd be a fan of momentum gained via walljumping being somehow less resistant to friction/slowdown. Even fractional changes in this regard would have dramatic effects in-game. An alternate and/or supplemental solution would be offering some form of diluted celerity effect in combat (this would have to be approached very delicately).
Which again is a fun issue, not necessarily a balance one.
That doesn't mean I've ever been in a situation where there was nothing I could do to change the outcome in a combat situation when up against one of them (in a pub, mind you, since I don't play for a team). It's very silly to suggest otherwise. If you have some other standard of competent, I haven't had the pleasure of playing a game with those sorts of marines. The players with the strongest reputations I can think of are the Archaea folks, and I'm pretty sure Fana and Tane don't make pub appearances in my timezone/area.
Does this mean that I win the majority of the time against that absolute top-tier of players who are demonstrably better than me by virtue of their clan affiliations, K:Ds and professional histories?
Of course not.
It would be absurd if I expected that I would, or should, and at that point we'd be discussing skill rather than balance.
But I do win a reasonable amount of the time against players who are on my play level, and that play level is certainly well above average as far as pubs are concerned, and pubs house the vast majority of NS2 games. If you're talking about strictly competitive play being the only useful barometer by which the game should be measured, the majority of the comments in this thread can be discarded outright.
Also note that what I'm most directly arguing for is something other than a reversion to the former level of air control skulks enjoyed. If UWE is going to tackle this because they think it's a problem, I'd prefer to see them do something less uninteresting than what they've done with walljumping, especially if it's supposed to be the skill-based alternative to NS1's bhop. Other than that - and maybe a slight bump to skulk accel directly or indirectly - I don't see changes being necessary.
I don't want to cause any offense by my next statement so try to remember that while you read. It is also directed at everyone not just you Gliss, I've only quoted you to show what I'm answering.
Have you ever considered that you are in fact an incompetent Skulk?
I have been playing for a week... A WEEK!... and while it can be frustrating being a Skulk sometimes. It is NOT difficult to kill a marine. I'm far from a "great" player and I've taken down 3 marines alone.... I've also seen a single marine take down 3 skulks alone. it means NOTHING. you cannot compare individual skill levels and state that something is imbalanced. you could be having an off day, they could be having a great day. latency and FPS issues can cause variable results, they could simply be a better player than you etc.
"you're not playing against competent marines"...... really, wth... If you know what you're doing, taking out a marine in 1v1 is easy. if the marine is currently repairing or building something (or similar) he is vulnerable to attack and can be taken down before he realizes he is being attacked... If you see a marine down the corridor looking around and moving around...avoid him. Because you will lose.
The only problem I see so far is that people are trying to play Skulks the same way they play marines. if you do that, you will lose.
Playing a Skulk is about picking your targets wisely. moving through vents and staying quiet. and even then if you do everything perfectly, their is always the chance that they may just get lucky (turning to see you approach just in time/getting help at the last second from the commander with health packs etc.)
I'm sorry but I just think this is a "L2P" situation...
Finally, I would just like to say that I agree that Skulks do currently feel... sluggish (for want of a better word) and I agree that something should be done about movement. But I honestly think that the alterations should have zero effect (if possible) on combat.
For leap.
Gliss is one of the best players in the game, and he plays for Nexzil (which is arguably the best NA clan). Competitive play tends to be far more aggressive and fast-paced that typical pub play, and as such, highly refined movement skills are especially rewarded in that very twitchy environment.
NS1 was on the H1 engine (GoldSrc), and bunnyhopping was a part of that experience. In NS1, skulks had a very high skill ceiling with respect to player movement, and top speeds were blazing (but required increasingly refined controls in order to maintain). TFC is probably the other GoldSrc-based game best known for advanced movement, and it, too, had a very high skill ceiling in that regard.
NS2's skill ceiling wasn't lowered to the extent that something like TF2's was as compared with TFC, and this game remains quite competitive. What's being lamented here is that one of the twitchiest aspects of skulk movement in NS2 - and the one with the highest skill ceiling - was effectively nerfed recently. This led to many players asserting that the skulk has been effectively "bricked".
Some of your points are right, and I agree with them in spirit. There are plenty of ways for skulks to thrive, especially in public servers, and even against 'competent' marines who know what they're doing (and especially against bad-to-average marines who play this as if it were CoD in space). I've been arguing this perspective throughout the thread.
The issue winds up being how much the recent changes detract from "fun," and my argument is that it's ultimately an entirely subjective call. I still love the game, and while there's a lot I miss from NS1, NS2 feels more balanced now than it ever has. The nerf did take place, and it did lower the skulk skill ceiling with respect to a very specific and highly valued range of movement, and that does affect competitive players more than others. That said, adaptation is entirely possible (as is demonstrated by the fact that people are still playing and enjoying the game in both public and competitive environments, and that - as far as I can tell - the win rate is so much better than it has been in quite awhile).
Some people are mistaking people like me - those who see these changes as a general fix that has improved the game - with those people who simply don't understand the context / what actually changed / why it's an issue. I understand what happened, since it happened to me too. These people then respond with "it's not a balance issue - it's a matter of fun" or "you suck" or "you're not playing at the levels where this makes a difference." My response is that I don't really find skulks that much less fun, if any less fun, in any context I've played in. I just don't think it's the hyperbolic, overblown, game-destroying, impossible-to-surmount issue people are making it out to be. The skulk's skill ceiling is still sufficiently high for me to enjoy the game when playing as one. It's not ideal - I never claimed it was. I simply hold that it shouldn't go back to what it was before.
If skulks are going to experience a skill ceiling raised from its current state with respect to movement, what I'm arguing is that it should happen via the walljumping system - a system that I understand to be UWE's attempt at capturing some of the bunnyhopping magic via the maintenance of an additional level of manual input on top of 'normal' movement. As of right now, the magic isn't really there and walljumping is a bit unspectacular, but perhaps everyone can be made happy if the system is sufficiently tweaked.
Ladies and gentlemen, we have now seen it all. I was waiting for this payoff. Can we please get more complete noobs in here, because it's comedy gold!
A little off topic here:-
my only complaint (other than respawn rates of aliens) is that the camera doesn't change when I'm on the walls or ceiling, so it doesn't really feel like I'm on the wall/ceiling. if that could be changed I don't think I'd play any other game ever again :P
On topic:-
As I'm very new to the game I'm not sure if my input would help in any way tbh. I didn't experience the nerf let alone NS1, So I can't really comment on it. Maybe having a minor boost to your acceleration when jumping off a wall/ceiling would help. (Not sure if thats been mentioned before.)
Well done for taking something I specifically said was not intended to insult and twisting it. I also stated that it was not directed specifically at you but at everyone making similar points as yourself... congrats.
It's been pointed out a few times on this thread, but I'll say it again.
Overall balance right now is pretty good. Players at the same skill level 1v1 is not terrible, Skulks still win fights. The issue is Skulk is not as fun as Marine, and 1v1 they don't seem quite equal to marines with that only getting worse and worse as the game progresses (and marine upgrades start coming out).
The higher skill floor and lower skill ceiling results in new Skulks getting torn to shreds (how many fights in the free weekend did you guys manage to jump over and over and over the new Skulks?!), and old Skulks hit a point where they feel they're struggling to get any better, and all Skulks just feel much more slow and sluggish.
One of former problems was that marine movement scaled so poorly, and that there wasn't much you could do with it even when prepared. Not much has changed regarding the actual mechanics with the exception that there's now one decent maneuver that isn't completely obliterated by a skulk pulling 135 degree turns mid-air. This change is thus bothersome to many people. When a marine and skulk engages, the marine just has a chance if he gets his juke off once the skulk closes the gap. This doesn't mean that the skulk is now somehow inferior as compared to the marine in melee combat, but rather that the marine has a fighting chance to avoid XX damage, whereas formerly it was a matter of relying on as much burst damage in the shortest amount of time possible (i.e. total reaction / twitch).
If we're talking about air control, what's the solution? Maybe a little bit more wiggle room would work, but do we really want the skulk to be able to curve-jump to the point that they catch the juking marine? If so, we're back where we were. If not, the skulk might be able to evade a bit more easily, which wouldn't be awful. The goal should be to keep a movement technique that scales well with skill but isn't completely OP given the way marines work in this game. I'll repeat some suggestions I've made in this thread:
What shouldn't happen is a return to the previous situation. It's my personal opinion that things are fine now, but this is obviously a polarizing issue.
Yes.
You could gain back all of the old skulk weirdness except the hitbox/model thing would still be fixed. You could curve jump, fly through halls, and ping pong off walls. And you can be a happy skulk again.
edit: But the base vanilla skulk would stay exactly as it is right now from the start of the round.
Limitations of animation system i think