Mid game and large server egg problems

Marshall_DrumminMarshall_Drummin Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
The movement at this very moment, this patch, is very balanced. I think the entire game is very balanced, except for a few issues that I will get to. Development team should keep experimenting with ideas in sewlek's mod, but to change up basic movement is unwarranted. Its been tweaked every patch since 239, (whether they said anything about it in the changelog or not), and its at a good point, fine and tuned. If I were the dev team, I would concentrate on a few little things and not huge things to shake up a very good foundation. Once that is done, add ons and features can be added, but shaking up foundations like movement mechanics is unwarranted, as it is pretty good atm.

Different build orders. Of course marines are going to have a pretty set pattern of what to do, but aliens have three choices to make. Crag is a pretty strong choice and standard on anything but 24 player servers. Forcing shift to make eggs on large servers is a game flaw not a player skill flaw. Egg spawning rate and egg start amount need to scale with player count.
-bigger egg count at map start for aliens according to how many alien players are on team, calculated at map start
-increase egg spawn rate for every player on aliens. A check can be made every spawn wave; decrease egg spawning time for every additional player on aliens.
-celerity not working in combat was unwarranted, but its ok (comp play adrenaline is the go to 2nd hive trait)

Camouflage needs to be reworked in two ways. The first player model of deactivation is opaque and green, when it could just be a normal skulk model. The threshold for deactivation is too sensitive, in instances like when you fall off a very small ledge.

Lerk tracers cause too much visual clutter and should be taken out. This might be THE most important issue of all, and here are the reasons why.
1. Tracers prevent tracking
-tracers were implemented to give away their position, but ironically if the lerk is moving tracers reveal their general position and obscure their true position
2. Tracers force visual clutter and negates a marine's aiming
-Why not let the players use aim against aim? not allowing an even playing field needs to be warranted
3. Not being able track a lerk effectively causes more team resource damage than before tracers from increased med pack drops
4. Lerks come out before the MOST important hive, the 2nd hive, and decreasing marine's effectiveness vs lerks at the MOST pivotal stage in the game isn't good
*the 2nd hive is the most important because you can get leap and blink. A fade without blink is a lot easier to kill and blink increases fade effectiveness exponentially, same for skulk.
5. It negates the use of perching, the lerk's shift key ability. Every class uses their shift key except lerk
-I CANNOT imagine the devs envisioning lerks not perching and shooting and being awesome. They made perching a shift key ability! This was a change probably implemented to appease a lot of rookie complaints.

Adding tracers on to rookie mode server could be a route to go. Tracers might seem like a small factor, but it adds up to a very big factor when you consider everything stated. Once the earlier stages are balanced, you will have a very strong base to which you can add on any change you want in the late game, with very minimal consequence.
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Comments

  • amoralamoral Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177250Members
    shift egg problem,I think.I've seen this thread before, camp has and will always remain second to silence, I don't research that or Regen unless people say they want it when I ask my team. lerk tracers aren't an.issue, never faced a lerk where tracers made a difference in the encounter.
  • Marshall_DrumminMarshall_Drummin Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
    THEBUSFROMSPEED thinks tracers need to be taken out.
  • Blarney_StoneBlarney_Stone Join Date: 2013-03-08 Member: 183808Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    Going SC first has always been gimmicky, I don't see that as a big problem. It's fun to do every now and then.

    I think the problem with alien tech lacking complexity that you are noticing is a result of the fact that alien tech was never meant to be as complex as the marine tech. Aliens had a much more basic, decentralized system of teching up in NS1 to contrast the more complicated and diverse marine tech.

    Personally I think going either movement or defense works just fine as a first hive in this game. Using shifts to hatch eggs is viable in situations other than egglock - on big maps it is great for locking down areas you want to control. And if you're on a pub chances are 50% of players won't listen to where you tell them to go, so corralling them with the egg hatch is a great tactic.

    Egglocking on 24 man servers is a problem though. It makes them nearly unplayable. It's been known for quite some time but so far no adjustments have been made. Hopefully soon they will, but they seem to be focused on other things, especially considering that this game wasn't developed with more than 8v8 or 9v9 in mind.
  • XaoXao Join Date: 2012-12-12 Member: 174840Members
    I think the fix to horrible egg spawn rates in high pop servers was to increase IP costs and make the marines suffer spawn queues too.

    If they fixed the lerk spike to send a trace out every 3rd or 5th spike would be nice I guess, dunno if it should be turned off completely so much as toned down heavily.
  • ScatterScatter Join Date: 2012-09-02 Member: 157341Members, Squad Five Blue
    Ahh the memories of that one thread where literally every single person claimed tracers were a lerk nerf.
  • amoralamoral Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177250Members
    is a Nerf to suboptimal.lerking. once you realize how atrocious spikes are at taking things down, you become a better lerk.
  • Marshall_DrumminMarshall_Drummin Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
    @scatter
    Tracers are a nerf and a buff, I don't see why that would be confusing. They eliminate the use of perching during combat, and they heavily obscure marine vision/aim. Weakening marine's ability to aim at a lerk, needs to be warranted. For example if the lerk was too weak, give them a handicap, but they have NEVER been weak.

    When fighting a lerk I get frustrated with the game, it won't let me go aim for aim cause of stupid stupid tracers.
  • ScatterScatter Join Date: 2012-09-02 Member: 157341Members, Squad Five Blue
    Perch spiking is only effective against terrible players and this was the case prior to the tracer introduction, hence my bemusement at people considering it a lerk nerf.
    amoral wrote: »
    is a Nerf to suboptimal.lerking. once you realize how atrocious spikes are at taking things down, you become a better lerk.

    Spikes are pretty fantastic at taking down marines if you can learn to compensite for the up and down lerk hovering movement.

  • hakenspithakenspit Join Date: 2010-11-26 Member: 75300Members
    Scatter wrote: »
    Perch spiking is only effective against terrible players and this was the case prior to the tracer introduction, hence my bemusement at people considering it a lerk nerf.
    amoral wrote: »
    is a Nerf to suboptimal.lerking. once you realize how atrocious spikes are at taking things down, you become a better lerk.

    Spikes are pretty fantastic at taking down marines if you can learn to compensite for the up and down lerk hovering movement.

    There are a lot of us out there that are at best suboptimal lerks so it was a nerf for those people.
    Its like saying that reducing splash damage on grenades was only a nerf for suboptimal GL spammers.

    But back on topic...
    Larger servers do perform better with egg numbers than they used to, though they still have a way to go before you would think about something other than shift first on 24 players servers.

    The lerk comes into the game without any real weapons that can be used to do anything other than annoy.
    Early game lerks can be devestating...but so can early game marines.
    Spores need to be 1st hive ability along with spikes and umbra 2nd hive.
    Spikes are a nuisance at best...now even more so as you have a clear indicator for even the most unitiated in NS2 to follow...no more franticaly looking around for a lerk.
  • ResRes Join Date: 2003-08-27 Member: 20245Members
    Scatter wrote: »
    Perch spiking makes everyone sub optimal, hence why it has been called a sub optimal way to use the lerk. We're actually helping you by telling you this but in your mind you see this as some horribly offensive thing to say, instead of as a learning tool.

    It's like a bunch of ground walking lerks complaining about a reduction in the ground walking speed and then me coming along and saying "yeah walking on the ground is a suboptimal use of the lerk" to which you would respond "but being a ground lerk is all I can ever be !".

    There are instances in which perch spiking is the best thing to do. Such as when a large group of marines are all going through 1 entrance to hit a hive and they are preoccupied with the other aliens in front of them, so none bother to hit the lerk sitting on top of the hive spiking them. Assuming you don't have spores yet of course.
  • hakenspithakenspit Join Date: 2010-11-26 Member: 75300Members
    Scatter wrote: »
    Perch spiking makes everyone sub optimal, hence why it has been called a sub optimal way to use the lerk. We're actually helping you by telling you this but in your mind you see this as some horribly offensive thing to say, instead of as a learning tool.

    It's like a bunch of ground walking lerks complaining about a reduction in the ground walking speed and then me coming along and saying "yeah walking on the ground is a suboptimal use of the lerk" to which you would respond "but being a ground lerk is all I can ever be !".

    Sorry but for lerks who cant shoot and fly its optimal to perch and shoot, and in most situaitons is safer to shoot down power from a distance...now the marines entering the room know exactly where you shooting from even if you have silence.
    To say perching and shooting is suboptimal is both elitist and incorrect depending on the actual situation it can well be the better choice for even a good lerker.

    Perching was only ever limited to a few practical situations, to say it was suboptimal is wrong if I am trying to take out the power at the warehouse hive on tram then sitting at the node munching is far from optimal (your both blind and weak), floating around trying to spike similarly so (as movement is easier to see)...the optimal approach was to hide up in the rafter as it would buy you the time to scoot out the door whilst they tried to work out exactly where you were.

  • Marshall_DrumminMarshall_Drummin Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
    Perch spiking is sub optimal WITH tracers, moving while shooting will always be make your aim less than optimal. With tracers, perch spiking is, for all intents and purposes, not viable. Being unable to perch is a side effect of tracers, and I'm unsure if the dev team thought that perching would no longer be a viable option. Going further, I'm also unsure if the dev team thought that tracers would obscure marine vision and aim so much. Try attacking the newly built 2nd hive with three or four lerks shooting down a ramp. You cannot see anything.
    1. Cannot use perching in combat
    2. Obscures marine vision and aim, creating an unwarranted, uneven playing field marine vs lerk

    Sincerely,
    thebusfromspeed
  • amoralamoral Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177250Members
    taking down the power isn't your job as a lerk, spiking even pre"Nerf" was more for annoyance than anything else, vs structures. lerks pre shotgun can be fearless vs one or two marines. optimal play is to delay the hell.out of pushes anduse your mobility to kill reinforcements and sow confusion.
  • BULLET WIZARDBULLET WIZARD Join Date: 2013-01-05 Member: 177702Members
    Scatter wrote: »
    Perch spiking makes everyone sub optimal, hence why it has been called a sub optimal way to use the lerk. We're actually helping you by telling you this but in your mind you see this as some horribly offensive thing to say, instead of as a learning tool.

    It's like a bunch of ground walking lerks complaining about a reduction in the ground walking speed and then me coming along and saying "yeah walking on the ground is a suboptimal use of the lerk" to which you would respond "but being a ground lerk is all I can ever be !".

    Perch spiking is only sub-optimal if you do it in a situation where it isn't optimal. Obviously the same goes for ground lerking, sometimes it IS optimal.

    The straw man here is that the people who want to perch-spike without giving away their position, will ONLY perch spike if able to do so stealthily.
    That is simply untrue, before tracers it was just another tactic you could choose to employ, making the lerk as a whole more dynamic.

    Optimal or not isn't the issue here, the issue is that knowing when to perch-spike and when not to was itself a skill and removing the option lowers the lerk skill ceiling by limiting possible tactics.

    If tracers are here to stay, I suggest removing them when evolving camo, silence or both.
  • ScatterScatter Join Date: 2012-09-02 Member: 157341Members, Squad Five Blue
    edited April 2013
    hakenspit wrote: »

    Sorry but for lerks who cant shoot and fly its optimal to perch and shoot, and in most situaitons is safer to shoot down power from a distance...now the marines entering the room know exactly where you shooting from even if you have silence.
    To say perching and shooting is suboptimal is both elitist and incorrect depending on the actual situation it can well be the better choice for even a good lerker.

    Perching was only ever limited to a few practical situations, to say it was suboptimal is wrong if I am trying to take out the power at the warehouse hive on tram then sitting at the node munching is far from optimal (your both blind and weak), floating around trying to spike similarly so (as movement is easier to see)...the optimal approach was to hide up in the rafter as it would buy you the time to scoot out the door whilst they tried to work out exactly where you were.

    EDIT

    Do whatever you think is best as a lerk. I literally don't give a crap to be quite frank.
  • hakenspithakenspit Join Date: 2010-11-26 Member: 75300Members
    amoral wrote: »
    taking down the power isn't your job as a lerk, spiking even pre"Nerf" was more for annoyance than anything else, vs structures. lerks pre shotgun can be fearless vs one or two marines. optimal play is to delay the hell.out of pushes anduse your mobility to kill reinforcements and sow confusion.
    Sorry I disagree, as a highly mobile unit being able to cause marines to push back would slow any pushes as they have to backtrack.

    If I happen to be the other side of the map to most of my team and the tech points undefended I can provide great assistance to my team by tacking out the power or atleast diverting enemy forces.

    Whilst you may say spiking was more of a nuisance....it does work and can help turn the tide on battles the other side of the map. Marines dont know who or how many are attacking an area (unless pinging) so have to send 1 or 2 to clear any problem.
    The slower mobility of a marine compared to a lerk means that lerk can more quickly move to another battle front than th emarine.
  • ResRes Join Date: 2003-08-27 Member: 20245Members
    hakenspit wrote: »
    Sorry I disagree, as a highly mobile unit being able to cause marines to push back would slow any pushes as they have to backtrack.

    If I happen to be the other side of the map to most of my team and the tech points undefended I can provide great assistance to my team by tacking out the power or atleast diverting enemy forces.

    Whilst you may say spiking was more of a nuisance....it does work and can help turn the tide on battles the other side of the map. Marines dont know who or how many are attacking an area (unless pinging) so have to send 1 or 2 to clear any problem.
    The slower mobility of a marine compared to a lerk means that lerk can more quickly move to another battle front than th emarine.

    If you're talking about pub play sure. However, in comp play, the comm will notice how quickly (or not quickly) the health of the structure is going down and can tell if its a lerk spiking and will relay that to the team to just ignore it because it takes forever to lerk spike kill a structure.
  • TheriusTherius Join Date: 2009-03-06 Member: 66642Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Supporter
    Res wrote: »
    hakenspit wrote: »
    Sorry I disagree, as a highly mobile unit being able to cause marines to push back would slow any pushes as they have to backtrack.

    If I happen to be the other side of the map to most of my team and the tech points undefended I can provide great assistance to my team by tacking out the power or atleast diverting enemy forces.

    Whilst you may say spiking was more of a nuisance....it does work and can help turn the tide on battles the other side of the map. Marines dont know who or how many are attacking an area (unless pinging) so have to send 1 or 2 to clear any problem.
    The slower mobility of a marine compared to a lerk means that lerk can more quickly move to another battle front than th emarine.

    If you're talking about pub play sure. However, in comp play, the comm will notice how quickly (or not quickly) the health of the structure is going down and can tell if its a lerk spiking and will relay that to the team to just ignore it because it takes forever to lerk spike kill a structure.

    Whenever I see a lerk spiking down a power node in whatever room I just tell the team to ignore it, they're just wasting a lerk there and it's now easier to push elsewhere. Spiking power nodes is literally the stupidest thing you can do with a lerk, unless the marines a dumb enough to send people to investigate it.

  • hakenspithakenspit Join Date: 2010-11-26 Member: 75300Members
    Res wrote: »
    hakenspit wrote: »
    Sorry I disagree, as a highly mobile unit being able to cause marines to push back would slow any pushes as they have to backtrack.

    If I happen to be the other side of the map to most of my team and the tech points undefended I can provide great assistance to my team by tacking out the power or atleast diverting enemy forces.

    Whilst you may say spiking was more of a nuisance....it does work and can help turn the tide on battles the other side of the map. Marines dont know who or how many are attacking an area (unless pinging) so have to send 1 or 2 to clear any problem.
    The slower mobility of a marine compared to a lerk means that lerk can more quickly move to another battle front than th emarine.

    If you're talking about pub play sure. However, in comp play, the comm will notice how quickly (or not quickly) the health of the structure is going down and can tell if its a lerk spiking and will relay that to the team to just ignore it because it takes forever to lerk spike kill a structure.


    As comp play is 6v6 (or at most 8v8 for gathers) and pub play does predominantly occur on 18+ servers (safety in numbers for us "noobs") the strats are all together different and the lerk becomes more powerful in comp play due to lower player count.
    In pubs a lerk struggles if they run into 2+ ppl with lmg's that can shoot, which is more common so "optimal" lerking is highly dynamic/situationaly dependant and why I called bs on the phrase.
    I have seen clever lerks cause 3 + marines to waste time trying to kill him instead of going on to where the real fight is.


  • tarquinbbtarquinbb Join Date: 2012-11-03 Member: 166314Members
    edited April 2013
    i disagree with everything except the camo and egg problem... which are known issues already.

  • Marshall_DrumminMarshall_Drummin Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
    Its time to take the training wheels off kids.
  • TinkerTinker Join Date: 2003-03-11 Member: 14395Members
    Serious, lerk spikes are great for harassing dmg, approach damage, finishing damage and getting the parasite effect to improve your next pass.

    They are not good for building, killing healthy marines.

    I swear the number of times I've seen lerks spend multiple minutes spiking down some building just to have a marine warp in and heal it up in 15 seconds. Just stay skulk if you don't want to learn how to use a lerk, but don't come crying when they implement a system into play to both punish you for doing something stupid and bring a class more in line with it's intended function.
  • Marshall_DrumminMarshall_Drummin Join Date: 2012-12-04 Member: 174115Members
    Lerks are not playing at their intended function. If they were, perching would be a viable OPTION. The devs conceded perching to appease players who could not find lerks. Its time to take the training wheels off now, the game has been out long enough. Lets play without tracers and the blinding handicap they give and see who has better aim.
  • Metal HandkerchiefMetal Handkerchief Join Date: 2012-11-09 Member: 168697Members
    As a 'career lerk' I sure wouldn't mind losing the tracers. I only ever approach marines from a blind spot anyway, I only spike late enough in my approach that they will not turn in time to shoot me before my bite hits. Then once the bite goes in, I quickly scoop into a vent/ behind cover and relocate out of sight, and approach from a different angle to finish them off before their comm can scramble a medpack.

    Tracers don't affect me one bit, except during pre-spores hive defenses.
  • tarquinbbtarquinbb Join Date: 2012-11-03 Member: 166314Members
    Lerks are not playing at their intended function. If they were, perching would be a viable OPTION. The devs conceded perching to appease players who could not find lerks. Its time to take the training wheels off now, the game has been out long enough. Lets play without tracers and the blinding handicap they give and see who has better aim.

    what makes you think that the sole purpose of perch is to use spikes?

    i use perch all the time, and i even use it with spikes in some group fights when the marines are shooting at skulks and/or i want to stay at a safe distance where i can retreat if needed. (i'm attuned to the interp delay and unperch instantly when the marine turns towards me)

    also, what blinding handicap are you talking about? the tracer is subtle and doesn't effect my vision in the slightest.
  • CrushaKCrushaK Join Date: 2012-11-05 Member: 167195Members, NS2 Playtester
    Tracers are no problem, especially if you use alien vision.
  • matsomatso Master of Patches Join Date: 2002-11-05 Member: 7000Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Squad Five Gold, Reinforced - Shadow, NS2 Community Developer
    edited April 2013
    tarquinbb wrote: »

    what makes you think that the sole purpose of perch is to use spikes?

    It would kinda suck for lerks not be able to cloak anywhere except when standing on flat surfaces

    Of course, there is an element of suckage in camo itself, but at least you can enjoy it from a high vantage point.
  • TinkerTinker Join Date: 2003-03-11 Member: 14395Members
    edited April 2013
    Serious. Perch is rad but not because I sit there spiking marines for minor damage.

    Take the training wheels off? Not having tracers was training wheels for lerks and it led to terrible play.
  • tarquinbbtarquinbb Join Date: 2012-11-03 Member: 166314Members
    edited April 2013
    Tinker wrote: »
    Serious. Perch is rad but not because I sit there spiking marines for minor damage.

    Take the training wheels off? Not having tracers was training wheels for lerks and it led to terrible play.

    i agree in principle, although wouldn't say spikes do minor damage - the dps is insane with good aim (i think almost as high as LMG on average due to the reload time). :)
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