What we have is a pve game winning move which is not fun... If you want a turtle breaking move give it to the players not the whips... Arcs are complete bullshit compared to this whip echo strat with contamination... Aliens have a semi insta game win move while the marine still need to protect the arcs and push the hive... Marine must end with pvp but aliens can win with only pve...
It's not a nuke, contaminate in it's own doesn't do much. You need to spend a lot of tres on whips, bonewalls, ruptures. Your team still needs higer lifeforms, and they still need to coordinate their attack. And even then, marines still have a chance to fend them off. In any case, when used correctly it can end games quickly, but it's not unfair in any way.
Aliens don't coordinate anything...alien comm just drops whips out of no where and the marine base is gone before marines have a chance to counter... And who puts arcs unused in the middle of base... If the game is a stailmate the marines are pushing out to take down this third hive but end up losing the game because the alien comm has the ability to make this game a pve instead of the pvp that was intended... Stupid mechanic that breaks marines chance of comebacks in one easy step...
Have you actually done a successful whip rush with contaminate? You're looking at spending:
20 res for shift
40x3 res for hives
20x3 + 30x 3 for biomass
10x5 (AT LEAST) for whips.
=340 team res in order to do this.
Plus whatever Contaminate costs, if it costs anything. I can't really remember because the only times I've ever used this strategy, resources were no object.
The marine counterpart? I think it's something like 50 team res. for a robo, the robo upgrade, and 3 arcs. You can add 50 more for the armory, obs, phase tech, and phase gate, and it's still not even coming close to what the aliens have to spend to accomplish the same thing.
*edit* calculated that wrong, you don't have to buy the first hive xD so that brings it down to 300
And yes I've used this strat many times due to the fact it's an easy move that wins the game with little to no players involved... Yes you need 3 hive and full biomass, but the move is as simple as placing whips... No skill involved and no coordinating with your team... Marines have arcs yes and they cost less but you still need a bunch of marines around to defend them, not so with this whip strat
What we have is a pve game winning move which is not fun... If you want a turtle breaking move give it to the players not the whips... Arcs are complete bullshit compared to this whip echo strat with contamination... Aliens have a semi insta game win move while the marine still need to protect the arcs and push the hive... Marine must end with pvp but aliens can win with only pve...
And what are ARCs then?
evp?
Marines need to push with the arcs or they are easily countered... Not so with this echo whip strat... Don't even need aliens to be there, just a couple clicks and gg plus arcs are slow and easily defended against if game is a balanced stalemate with equal skill level.
Aliens need to support contamination too... If there aren't any aliens pushing with the contamination then the whips will be easily killed by the marine team before they can do anything. Just like ARCs.
@Benson the cooldown is maybe a second now... It's very quick
Unless I missed something...did they reduce the cooldown on how often the Kahmm can echo in whips?
I thought it was 1 ~echo every 10 seconds, which isn't that fast considering its a base full of marines.
P.S. Flamethrower disables whips from using bombard, buying enough time to kill them by themselves.
There is a cool down but it's only a couple seconds if that... Meaning in the span of 10 seconds you have 5+ bile bomb whips popping up to take down your power in 10 seconds or less... The problem is with arcs aliens will see it coming and be able to put up a counter... Marines only get like 2 seconds to put up a counter then it's chaos and then your power and most of your structures are dead.
Aliens need to support contamination too... If there aren't any aliens pushing with the contamination then the whips will be easily killed by the marine team before they can do anything. Just like ARCs.
@Benson the cooldown is maybe a second now... It's very quick
I've used this many many times and never once needed aliens to help the whips... Maybe try for yourself once then come back and discuss... And I'm talking pub not competitive... Though I could see the problem there too as there is less people to shoot the whips
All I'm saying is that I would like a game winning turtle breaking strat that involved the players not just give the whips and alien comm the win button if they have 3 hives and 9 biomass
Aliens need to support contamination too... If there aren't any aliens pushing with the contamination then the whips will be easily killed by the marine team before they can do anything. Just like ARCs.
@Benson the cooldown is maybe a second now... It's very quick
I've used this many many times and never once needed aliens to help the whips... Maybe try for yourself once then come back and discuss... And I'm talking pub not competitive... Though I could see the problem there too as there is less people to shoot the whips
I doubt this will ever have an effect on competitive matches. It's extremely rare to see the aliens reach biomass 9 without the game being called.
I look at it exclusively as a feature to reduce the effectiveness of marine turtling in pubs, where that has obviously been a major problem for a long time. By themselves the whips won't be able to beat a base full of marines (one flamer will shut them down pretty easily) but if the aliens keep the marines occupied the whips will have an easier time getting the job done.
When it boils down to it, it seems difficult to picture a game where the aliens are able to reach biomass 9 and then go on to lose... By that point the aliens have almost certainly won, it's just a matter of how long it takes. This new ability allows them to win much more quickly
@Blarney_Stone ok then lets just let aliens win every game that goes over 40 minutes... Might as well right because after 40 minutes marines and aliens are fully tech'd but marines don't stand a chance am I right... All this does is eliminate those truly awesome moments in ns2 where marines are able to come back against seemingly unbeatable odds... Now the second they leave base to push anything... Echo whip ftw... Seems unfair
Here's an idea make it a Gorge biomass 9 ability... This way the Gorge needs support and it makes it more pvp... Whips can still be echo'd and alien team needs to coordinate at least more.
Aliens need to support contamination too... If there aren't any aliens pushing with the contamination then the whips will be easily killed by the marine team before they can do anything. Just like ARCs.
@Benson the cooldown is maybe a second now... It's very quick
A single whip bombard does 300 structural damage (comm station has 3000 health) and is thrown once every 5 seconds (after which normal whipping takes place). Most structures are considerably weaker than a command station. You're looking at a base wide catastrophe in around 15 seconds.
Ye, contaminate reeaaally needs those other aliens pushing with it.
@Blarney_Stone ok then lets just let aliens win every game that goes over 40 minutes... Might as well right because after 40 minutes marines and aliens are fully tech'd but marines don't stand a chance am I right... All this does is eliminate those truly awesome moments in ns2 where marines are able to come back against seemingly unbeatable odds... Now the second they leave base to push anything... Echo whip ftw... Seems unfair
Thats enough desperate double posts out of you for one day thank you very much. As i said previously, let the free weekend dust settle, the fps and mouse bugs be resolved, then we can evaluate whether contaminate and whip spam is actually OP. In my experience, marines with exos will just rape the whips and that's that.
@Blarney_Stone ok then lets just let aliens win every game that goes over 40 minutes... Might as well right because after 40 minutes marines and aliens are fully tech'd but marines don't stand a chance am I right... All this does is eliminate those truly awesome moments in ns2 where marines are able to come back against seemingly unbeatable odds... Now the second they leave base to push anything... Echo whip ftw... Seems unfair
Thats enough desperate double posts out of you for one day thank you very much. As i said previously, let the free weekend dust settle, the fps and mouse bugs be resolved, then we can evaluate whether contaminate and whip spam is actually OP. In my experience, marines with exos will just rape the whips and that's that.
That's enough useless posts out of you. If I want to reply to people and share my ideas about balance in a product that I paid money for and want to be the best it can be I will. In addition I severely doubt that your experience is that great. Whips destroy exos if they pop up all around them doing 300 in one hit... In addition I'm not saying echoing whips is OP but allowing the comm to create the infestation and everything else is. I'll say it again just in case you missed it. Give the contamination ability to the gorge and turn this clearly pve game ending move into a pvp coordination needed move. Everybody wins.
P.S. I can go around disliking all of your post too, but if I don't give a good reason for it and share my opinion no one cares...
NarfwakJoin Date: 2002-11-02Member: 5258Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS1 Playtester, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Gold, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica PT Lead, NS2 Community Developer
edited September 2013
3 hives versus 2 CC is not equal footing. This really just comes down to that misunderstanding. If they have more tech point rooms that you, they are ahead. If they have more tech point rooms and more RTs, they're way ahead.
One guy with a flamethrower can completely stop this strat from working as well. That's literally all it takes.
@Narfwak so instead of having that one guy assault a hive like he should be... Instead we have him turtling in base because the aliens have an OP ability that forces him to be defensive instead. Also marines have full tech at 2 cc and aliens have full tech at 3 hives. I understand that it makes sense that 3>2 but that does not mean that marines might not have the skills or ability to win. If the reverse was done and say marines had 3 cc (which is a waste of res at the current state), would it be fair if the marine comm could drop arcs in the middle of the alien hive out of no where? I mean one simple gorge could stop it right?
When I started this thread I hadn't considered arcs. Doesn't this solve the problem? If the kham has the res to whiponate the base then the common should have enough res for some arc defence.
Unless I missed something...did they reduce the cooldown on how often the Kahmm can echo in whips?
I thought it was 1 ~echo every 10 seconds, which isn't that fast considering its a base full of marines.
P.S. Flamethrower disables whips from using bombard, buying enough time to kill them by themselves.
It takes about 5-10 seconds to actually move the whip, but you are allowed to start another echo in less then 2, which means once the first whip teleports the second, third, fourth etc wont be far behind.
Between the time it takes to get that first whip in though, plus the time it takes for contaminate to actually spread enough infestation to place the whip at all, the marines have AMPLE time AND warning to deal with the threat. Keep in mind that infestation damages buildings, so you have that big flashing red sign on the map saying something bad is happening at base before it even begins, and plenty of time to beacon before the first whip appears.
And 2 arcs pretty much outright counter it, so if you aren't already pushed to the brink you have multiple ways of dealing with it. With 2 arcs and a beacon you can fight off a full alien push with contaminate and barely even notice the difference.
In fact, against the 1 base turtle, it's probably STILL not enough to make the difference. If the com prepares 2 arcs you are pretty much back to exactly where you were before contaminate was put in the game.
One interesting strategy I've been trying is a contaminate false alarm. Since the infestation alone (all of 5 res investment) damages buildings and looks an awful lot like a bile rush on the map, I've been trying to use it to either trigger a panic beacon or lull the enemy into a false sense of security for that time when whips or bile actually follow.
JektJoin Date: 2012-02-05Member: 143714Members, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
edited September 2013
I don't like a mechanic like "3 hives = alien win". The skill should decide which team wins. And if you have a balanced game even into late-game, than there shouldn't be a mechanic that just ends the game. balanced games are awesome. You don't need to end them just because they remain balanced until late-game.
Finally one team will make the winning move by tactic or skill. But it will feel much more rewarding than the hidden counter that is the 3rd hive.
If the aliens are on 3 hives the game isn't balanced. It's over. The situations that have allowed the aliens to get 3 hives haven't been balanced and it shouldn't suddenly become balanced either as the game lingers on. Let the round end. Turtling exosuits are a blight.
I don't understand what's fun about using pve structures to counter pve structures and abilities... Wasn't this game suppose to be centered around pvp? Arcs are supposed to be used offensively not defensively. I'm ok if the whips are echoed into the hive by use of cyst or have the contamination ability moved to the gorge, because then like the arc it won't succeed without a serious coordination from the alien team. How would the alien team feel if the marine comm was able to teleport arcs into the hive room with little to no warning just because they have 1 more cc than they have hives.
Once the alien team gets up to 3 hives and 5 rts they can contaminate-whip spam indefinitely, and it definitely is very crippling to a marine team. In a turtle situation this is fantastic for breaking, but for stalemates when both sides have 4-5 rts but aliens have 3 hives, marines WILL lose.
If marines even try to push out, the contaminate-whip combo will wipe out their main base, all their tech and upgrades. I've tried to defend against it with Arcs, but you need at least 3 to hold a base, and if you have enough arcs to hold 1 base, you will lose every other base and thus the game.
I think this should still be a valid strat to break marine turtles, but it should more expensive or be restricted somehow by e.g. number of active power nodes on the map, so that marines can push and not worry about having to beacon or leave half the team to defend. Right now, you pretty much have to beacon or you lose everything as marines.
@sotanaht we know that, problem for me is that it seems silly to have an offensive tool like arcs sitting in base being defensive... This ability force the marines to turtle which is the opposite of what they should be doing. Marines have essentially no chance in hell of winning any game after 40 minutes. Checked ns2stats last and after 252 every game after the 40 minute mark has been an alien victory. Now most games end before that, but I still feel like aliens were given a too powerful turtle buster.
NarfwakJoin Date: 2002-11-02Member: 5258Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS1 Playtester, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Gold, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica PT Lead, NS2 Community Developer
It is supposed to have a hitbox and not be so ridiculously hard to kill, by the way. The not having a hitbox thing is a bug, and it may get the HP lowered as well.
@sotanaht we know that, problem for me is that it seems silly to have an offensive tool like arcs sitting in base being defensive... This ability force the marines to turtle which is the opposite of what they should be doing. Marines have essentially no chance in hell of winning any game after 40 minutes. Checked ns2stats last and after 252 every game after the 40 minute mark has been an alien victory. Now most games end before that, but I still feel like aliens were given a too powerful turtle buster.
What's silly is to arbitrarily label a tool as "offensive" and refuse to use it in a way that might be more effective.
3 hives versus 2 CC is not equal footing. This really just comes down to that misunderstanding. If they have more tech point rooms that you, they are ahead. If they have more tech point rooms and more RTs, they're way ahead.
One guy with a flamethrower can completely stop this strat from working as well. That's literally all it takes.
Then marines should have an overwhelming advantage when they have 3 tech points and the aliens only have two. If that is the case, then when is the game ever in an equal state?
Between the time it takes to get that first whip in though, plus the time it takes for contaminate to actually spread enough infestation to place the whip at all, the marines have AMPLE time AND warning to deal with the threat. Keep in mind that infestation damages buildings, so you have that big flashing red sign on the map saying something bad is happening at base before it even begins, and plenty of time to beacon before the first whip appears.
So a smart commander, who doesn't drop infestation on structures, bypasses your argument completely?
@Narfwak ok that's good news... Next time we should bring that up earlier... I still think maybe it should be a 9 biomass gorge ability to bring it more into the pvp realm, but actually having a hit box and lower health is a step in the right direction.
@solanaht the fact that you think it's more effective as a defensive "turret" essentially proves my point. Arcs are meant to be a mobile offensive tank/turret, not a defensive structure similar to the current turrets in the game. Hell even those are meant to be used to help hold offensive positions.
Comments
And what are ARCs then?
evp?
And yes I've used this strat many times due to the fact it's an easy move that wins the game with little to no players involved... Yes you need 3 hive and full biomass, but the move is as simple as placing whips... No skill involved and no coordinating with your team... Marines have arcs yes and they cost less but you still need a bunch of marines around to defend them, not so with this whip strat
Marines need to push with the arcs or they are easily countered... Not so with this echo whip strat... Don't even need aliens to be there, just a couple clicks and gg plus arcs are slow and easily defended against if game is a balanced stalemate with equal skill level.
ARCs used to actually be a PvE solution, because they could quickly be spammed and deployed very quickly to a hive room.
This was fixed by making them build incredibly slowly, and have them move at what is essentially a stand still when moving on alien territory.
I thought it was 1 ~echo every 10 seconds, which isn't that fast considering its a base full of marines.
P.S. Flamethrower disables whips from using bombard, buying enough time to kill them by themselves.
Ex..
Xenocide splashes infestation
Drifters spray infestation
Both could work but personally by the time iv kammed enough to get bio 9, I'm ready to have some fun... Die you puny mariens die, ahaha!!
@Benson the cooldown is maybe a second now... It's very quick
There is a cool down but it's only a couple seconds if that... Meaning in the span of 10 seconds you have 5+ bile bomb whips popping up to take down your power in 10 seconds or less... The problem is with arcs aliens will see it coming and be able to put up a counter... Marines only get like 2 seconds to put up a counter then it's chaos and then your power and most of your structures are dead.
I've used this many many times and never once needed aliens to help the whips... Maybe try for yourself once then come back and discuss... And I'm talking pub not competitive... Though I could see the problem there too as there is less people to shoot the whips
I doubt this will ever have an effect on competitive matches. It's extremely rare to see the aliens reach biomass 9 without the game being called.
I look at it exclusively as a feature to reduce the effectiveness of marine turtling in pubs, where that has obviously been a major problem for a long time. By themselves the whips won't be able to beat a base full of marines (one flamer will shut them down pretty easily) but if the aliens keep the marines occupied the whips will have an easier time getting the job done.
When it boils down to it, it seems difficult to picture a game where the aliens are able to reach biomass 9 and then go on to lose... By that point the aliens have almost certainly won, it's just a matter of how long it takes. This new ability allows them to win much more quickly
A single whip bombard does 300 structural damage (comm station has 3000 health) and is thrown once every 5 seconds (after which normal whipping takes place). Most structures are considerably weaker than a command station. You're looking at a base wide catastrophe in around 15 seconds.
Ye, contaminate reeaaally needs those other aliens pushing with it.
Thats enough desperate double posts out of you for one day thank you very much. As i said previously, let the free weekend dust settle, the fps and mouse bugs be resolved, then we can evaluate whether contaminate and whip spam is actually OP. In my experience, marines with exos will just rape the whips and that's that.
That's enough useless posts out of you. If I want to reply to people and share my ideas about balance in a product that I paid money for and want to be the best it can be I will. In addition I severely doubt that your experience is that great. Whips destroy exos if they pop up all around them doing 300 in one hit... In addition I'm not saying echoing whips is OP but allowing the comm to create the infestation and everything else is. I'll say it again just in case you missed it. Give the contamination ability to the gorge and turn this clearly pve game ending move into a pvp coordination needed move. Everybody wins.
P.S. I can go around disliking all of your post too, but if I don't give a good reason for it and share my opinion no one cares...
One guy with a flamethrower can completely stop this strat from working as well. That's literally all it takes.
It takes about 5-10 seconds to actually move the whip, but you are allowed to start another echo in less then 2, which means once the first whip teleports the second, third, fourth etc wont be far behind.
Between the time it takes to get that first whip in though, plus the time it takes for contaminate to actually spread enough infestation to place the whip at all, the marines have AMPLE time AND warning to deal with the threat. Keep in mind that infestation damages buildings, so you have that big flashing red sign on the map saying something bad is happening at base before it even begins, and plenty of time to beacon before the first whip appears.
And 2 arcs pretty much outright counter it, so if you aren't already pushed to the brink you have multiple ways of dealing with it. With 2 arcs and a beacon you can fight off a full alien push with contaminate and barely even notice the difference.
In fact, against the 1 base turtle, it's probably STILL not enough to make the difference. If the com prepares 2 arcs you are pretty much back to exactly where you were before contaminate was put in the game.
One interesting strategy I've been trying is a contaminate false alarm. Since the infestation alone (all of 5 res investment) damages buildings and looks an awful lot like a bile rush on the map, I've been trying to use it to either trigger a panic beacon or lull the enemy into a false sense of security for that time when whips or bile actually follow.
If the aliens are on 3 hives the game isn't balanced. It's over. The situations that have allowed the aliens to get 3 hives haven't been balanced and it shouldn't suddenly become balanced either as the game lingers on. Let the round end. Turtling exosuits are a blight.
If marines even try to push out, the contaminate-whip combo will wipe out their main base, all their tech and upgrades. I've tried to defend against it with Arcs, but you need at least 3 to hold a base, and if you have enough arcs to hold 1 base, you will lose every other base and thus the game.
I think this should still be a valid strat to break marine turtles, but it should more expensive or be restricted somehow by e.g. number of active power nodes on the map, so that marines can push and not worry about having to beacon or leave half the team to defend. Right now, you pretty much have to beacon or you lose everything as marines.
What's silly is to arbitrarily label a tool as "offensive" and refuse to use it in a way that might be more effective.
Then marines should have an overwhelming advantage when they have 3 tech points and the aliens only have two. If that is the case, then when is the game ever in an equal state?
So a smart commander, who doesn't drop infestation on structures, bypasses your argument completely?
@solanaht the fact that you think it's more effective as a defensive "turret" essentially proves my point. Arcs are meant to be a mobile offensive tank/turret, not a defensive structure similar to the current turrets in the game. Hell even those are meant to be used to help hold offensive positions.