Biomass

2

Comments

  • Mr.GreedyMr.Greedy Join Date: 2012-07-21 Member: 154270Members
    edited July 2013
    xen32 wrote: »
    It sucks that you can't rush xenocide anymore. 2 rather fast hives -> leap -> xeno, that's like 135 res? And you don't need no upgrades for xeno! just get shift and spam eggs.
    But now... uh oh, gotta get so much biomass, it just doesn't worth it.

    In 620 h of gametime I never saw or heard about a "Xeno-rush" lol.
  • DaxxDaxx Join Date: 2002-04-16 Member: 460Members, Constellation, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited July 2013
    Mr.Greedy wrote: »
    xen32 wrote: »
    It sucks that you can't rush xenocide anymore. 2 rather fast hives -> leap -> xeno, that's like 135 res? And you don't need no upgrades for xeno! just get shift and spam eggs.
    But now... uh oh, gotta get so much biomass, it just doesn't worth it.

    In 620 h of gametime I never saw or heard about a "Xeno-rush" lol.

    Xeno has never been worth it. Low damage + long respawn and long run times to get wherever the fight is. Suicide by biting anything you can til death almost always nets a better return. As far as I'm concerned, if it's a top teir ability (3 hives/biomass), it should one shot fully upgraded light marines at the blast center. At least now you get res while dead I suppose.
  • SUPER_SARSSUPER_SARS Join Date: 2013-02-13 Member: 183039Members
    amoral wrote: »
    i dislike building limits for aliens, the res cost should be limit enough, why add an additional constraint?

    or at least make it so i can suicide a building more easily, or up the damn walk speed. oh, wait, i can echo it can't i? still, i don't like the building limits. no such limit on marine side.

    Yes you can echo almost anything alien related other than gorge tunnels. If you want suicide something and no marines are around, walk something off of infestation. Also marines DO have a build limit, same as aliens.
  • SUPER_SARSSUPER_SARS Join Date: 2013-02-13 Member: 183039Members
    Daxx wrote: »
    Mr.Greedy wrote: »
    xen32 wrote: »
    It sucks that you can't rush xenocide anymore. 2 rather fast hives -> leap -> xeno, that's like 135 res? And you don't need no upgrades for xeno! just get shift and spam eggs.
    But now... uh oh, gotta get so much biomass, it just doesn't worth it.

    In 620 h of gametime I never saw or heard about a "Xeno-rush" lol.

    Xeno has never been worth it. Low damage + long respawn and long run times to get wherever the fight is. Suicide by biting anything you can til death almost always nets a better return. As far as I'm concerned, if it's a top teir ability (3 hives/biomass), it should one shot fully upgraded light marines at the blast center. At least now you get res while dead I suppose.

    There isnt a long respawn with xeno. If you xenocide you almost instantly respawn back. Combine that with a gorge tunnel from whatever hive you're spawning at and the commander spawning more eggs and you can xeno to your hearts content.
  • RoobubbaRoobubba Who you gonna call? Join Date: 2003-01-06 Member: 11930Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    The only thing I don't like about biomass is that some of the abilities aren't worth being where they are in the fixed order. Vortex, xeno for example. It only needs a bit of tweaking to fully open up the tech tree (allow abilities to scale with biomass, maybe?) for it to be perfect. It's a big improvement than 249 in that regard.

    Now if only we can get those aliens to work together...
  • amoralamoral Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177250Members
    amoral wrote: »
    i dislike building limits for aliens, the res cost should be limit enough, why add an additional constraint?

    SUPER_SARS wrote: »
    amoral wrote: »
    i dislike building limits for aliens, the res cost should be limit enough, why add an additional constraint?

    or at least make it so i can suicide a building more easily, or up the damn walk speed. oh, wait, i can echo it can't i? still, i don't like the building limits. no such limit on marine side.

    Yes you can echo almost anything alien related other than gorge tunnels. If you want suicide something and no marines are around, walk something off of infestation. Also marines DO have a build limit, same as aliens.

    dividing buildings by walking off creep takes forever...
  • soccerguy243soccerguy243 Join Date: 2012-12-22 Member: 175920Members, WC 2013 - Supporter
    Roobubba wrote: »
    The only thing I don't like about biomass is that some of the abilities aren't worth being where they are in the fixed order. Vortex, xeno for example. It only needs a bit of tweaking to fully open up the tech tree (allow abilities to scale with biomass, maybe?) for it to be perfect. It's a big improvement than 249 in that regard.

    Now if only we can get those aliens to work together...

    the order isn't fixed is it? I don't have to research the lower biomass options to get a higher one right? Biomass only unlocks the ability to research the trait?
  • KamamuraKamamura Join Date: 2013-03-06 Member: 183736Members, Reinforced - Gold
    I still have a few questions about how biomass works exactly. What contributes to biomass increase? Hives, infestation + cysts, utility buildings, whips, upgrade buildings, harvesters? Or all of the above?

    I have also noticed that you can invest 30 something T-res as a commander for a biomass upgrade. I have also noticed that biomass goes down when alien buildings get destroyed, so when it happens and biomass goes down, do alien team preserve the biomass upgrade and have constantly biomass = ( sum of relevant building values + upgrades invested ), or is it gone? How exactly are HP scaled with each biomass upgrade, linearly, faster, slower?

    Thank you in advance.
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Biomass is crucial to the whole system now. You can't just remove it.
  • kalakujakalakuja Join Date: 2012-09-11 Member: 159045Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter
    As a side effect aliens mid-game is ridiculously predictable. . .

    wut hek. Can you open this up a bit?
  • SamusDroidSamusDroid Colorado Join Date: 2013-05-13 Member: 185219Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, Subnautica Playtester, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
    edited July 2013
    nsguy wrote: »
    Thanks! But there's obviously going to come a point when us playing on those 249 servers will miss out on new and wanted features and will then have to upgrade to the biomass rubbish.

    If an update comes out I will try my best to keep the "249 mod" up to date with the new features. So basically it will become a "balance mod reverter"

    I also think biomass limits aliens in a way. It is better in some ways, but still has it's flaws.
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Require 3 for what? The only reason they NEED 3 is for onos egg drops, and that's no different to 249.
  • SamusDroidSamusDroid Colorado Join Date: 2013-05-13 Member: 185219Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, Subnautica Playtester, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
    Ghosthree3 wrote: »
    Require 3 for what? The only reason they NEED 3 is for onos egg drops, and that's no different to 249.

    Then the com didn't know he could upgrade past 6 biomass with 2 hives, or something.
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    You don't NEED passed 6 biomass.... it takes 5 to drop fade eggs, and the 3 more levels of health you'd get on your life forms is eh.
  • XariusXarius Join Date: 2003-12-21 Member: 24630Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Really need to give more flexibility to ability choices again. Sometimes it IS more sensible to get bilebomb over leap, spores over bilebomb, etc. Fixed orders are bad and largely negate the deeper and more varied gameplay that 250 otherwise tries to achieve.
  • TheriusTherius Join Date: 2009-03-06 Member: 66642Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Supporter
    @Kamamura

    Biomass is only provided by hives. One hive can have a maximum of 3 Biomass levels, and with a maximum of 4 hives (in a 5TP map) the maximum level of Biomass is 12. Each hive starts with level 1 Biomass and can be upgraded twice with the respective costs of 20 and 30 resources for levels 2 and 3.
  • RoobubbaRoobubba Who you gonna call? Join Date: 2003-01-06 Member: 11930Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    Roobubba wrote: »
    The only thing I don't like about biomass is that some of the abilities aren't worth being where they are in the fixed order. Vortex, xeno for example. It only needs a bit of tweaking to fully open up the tech tree (allow abilities to scale with biomass, maybe?) for it to be perfect. It's a big improvement than 249 in that regard.

    Now if only we can get those aliens to work together...

    the order isn't fixed is it? I don't have to research the lower biomass options to get a higher one right? Biomass only unlocks the ability to research the trait?

    Yeah that's not what I meant, you don't have to research them in that order, but there is an order linked to biomass to say what you can have and when. I'd like to see that completely unlocked, and scale the quality of the ability on biomass upgrades (so 1 biomass allows you to get 1 upgrade, of your choice). I think that abilities should scale with biomass, with perhaps the most powerful abilities scaling more, ie starting weaker, and the ones we view as 1-hive upgrades starting a bit stronger and scaling to a lesser degree with biomass. So for example, on 1 biomass you can research xenocide, but it will be pretty weak until you've got say 6+ biomass. On the other hand, you can get leap, which will be pretty decent (and get marginally better the more biomass you have).
    When buildings are destroyed, the abilities should be removed in the reverse order they were researched (ie most recent lost first).

    This would allow a khamm to do genuinely different strats, rather than not being able to rush one ability (for example), which if it's a 3-hive ability is obviously not a rush...

    My other point was that most of the 3-hive level abilities are a total waste of time. These really need some love.
  • Cannon_FodderAUSCannon_FodderAUS Brisbane, AU Join Date: 2013-06-23 Member: 185664Members, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    @Roobubba
    Man that is more confusing than the current biomass system. I do like to see more unhooks for for abilities eg. have leap and bile on biomass 3, so I can get leap on 1 hive (useful), but would cost me an extra 50 res for the pleasure (biomass level 3 for 1 hive), then have nothing for biomass 4 and the next upgrade at biomass 5. The exact order needs some thought, but it would be nice to get upgrades choices, rather than definatly needing 2 hives for leap - though this would give aliens a buff in that regard (early 2nd hive vs. early leap - I would take leap first). But the point is you are given a choice.
  • NeokenNeoken Bruges, Belgium Join Date: 2004-03-20 Member: 27447Members, NS2 Playtester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Silver, Subnautica Playtester
    I agree with @Xarius and @Roobubba. While it's probably easier to balance abilities when set up in a lineair unlock path, it's also less interesting because it limits the amount of strategic choices you can make.
  • RadimaXRadimaX Join Date: 2013-02-05 Member: 182840Members
    zombiehub or ZM for short will always host a 249 version mod, WITH the old docking even :) in one week there will be around 5 or so servers ranging from 24 - 40 man player servers :)
    250 is a joke, you have to click fifty structures just to research and instead of clicking hive for all upgrades all u can get now is biomass or driftors...
  • ScatterScatter Join Date: 2012-09-02 Member: 157341Members, Squad Five Blue
    BRB killing myself
  • MavickMavick Join Date: 2012-11-07 Member: 168138Members
    RadimaX wrote: »
    zombiehub or ZM for short will always host a 249 version mod, WITH the old docking even :) in one week there will be around 5 or so servers ranging from 24 - 40 man player servers :)
    250 is a joke, you have to click fifty structures just to research and instead of clicking hive for all upgrades all u can get now is biomass or driftors...

    Good luck with that. All you're doing is losing time getting used to the changes like most other players. Once the game gets to a point where these mods aren't viable in keeping with newer content you might like right from the start you're going to end up being right back where you started.
  • Ghosthree3Ghosthree3 Join Date: 2010-02-13 Member: 70557Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Honestly 20 seems somewhat high.
  • DestherDesther Join Date: 2012-10-31 Member: 165195Members
    I played SC2 to mid/high masters with 100apm and most of that is purely from routine actions like making workers. Khamm has plenty of tasks to focus your attention, it's just a little harder because entities don't appear instantly when you move around, especially lategame.
  • xen32xen32 Join Date: 2012-10-18 Member: 162676Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Mr.Greedy wrote: »
    xen32 wrote: »
    It sucks that you can't rush xenocide anymore. 2 rather fast hives -> leap -> xeno, that's like 135 res? And you don't need no upgrades for xeno! just get shift and spam eggs.
    But now... uh oh, gotta get so much biomass, it just doesn't worth it.

    In 620 h of gametime I never saw or heard about a "Xeno-rush" lol.

    Well then, community you are playing with might be too serious about build orders, tactics and wins.
    Xeno rush is tons of fun. So much rage from marine side.
  • RoobubbaRoobubba Who you gonna call? Join Date: 2003-01-06 Member: 11930Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    xen32 wrote: »
    Mr.Greedy wrote: »
    xen32 wrote: »
    It sucks that you can't rush xenocide anymore. 2 rather fast hives -> leap -> xeno, that's like 135 res? And you don't need no upgrades for xeno! just get shift and spam eggs.
    But now... uh oh, gotta get so much biomass, it just doesn't worth it.

    In 620 h of gametime I never saw or heard about a "Xeno-rush" lol.

    Well then, community you are playing with might be too serious about build orders, tactics and wins.
    Xeno rush is tons of fun. So much rage from marine side.

    It's harder now you can't spawn eggs anywhere you want, though. Xeno rush is extremely limited by the long spawn times, the crapness of xeno in isolation, and the fact that it usually ends up losing you map control. I'd personally love to see the back of xeno and get a genuinely useful/powerful '3rd hive' ability in there for skulks.
  • RabidWeaselRabidWeasel Join Date: 2002-11-02 Member: 5337Members
    All the alien lategame abilities suck, maybe if they were better we wouldn't have such huge stalemates when aliens have massive map control and can't win.
  • xen32xen32 Join Date: 2012-10-18 Member: 162676Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Roobubba wrote: »
    xen32 wrote: »
    Mr.Greedy wrote: »
    xen32 wrote: »
    It sucks that you can't rush xenocide anymore. 2 rather fast hives -> leap -> xeno, that's like 135 res? And you don't need no upgrades for xeno! just get shift and spam eggs.
    But now... uh oh, gotta get so much biomass, it just doesn't worth it.

    In 620 h of gametime I never saw or heard about a "Xeno-rush" lol.

    Well then, community you are playing with might be too serious about build orders, tactics and wins.
    Xeno rush is tons of fun. So much rage from marine side.

    It's harder now you can't spawn eggs anywhere you want, though. Xeno rush is extremely limited by the long spawn times, the crapness of xeno in isolation, and the fact that it usually ends up losing you map control. I'd personally love to see the back of xeno and get a genuinely useful/powerful '3rd hive' ability in there for skulks.

    You can Echo eggs actually. Also, spawn time after xeno are reduced. You respawn within few seconds. Also, you can bite now while you are charging for explosion! Woot!
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