Marines are weaker than Aliens
solree
Join Date: 2013-09-10 Member: 188091Members
Join Date: 2013-09-10 Member: 188091Members
Hello!
Have been playing for some time and realy enjoyed this game untill update have been released with bonus for the Aliens.
First and major point is why do Marines can't regain armor after visiting the Armor station, instead each marine have to buy welder and renew armor, but in the fight welder is pointless and Aliens can kill with ease.
Second point is that Aliens have huge advantage in the beginning of the game by capturing resorses faster than oposition, therefore gaining uper hand allready early in the game.
I realy like the game and undersand winning comes with the team effort and comunication for both sides, but still even if you play with good team as Marine it is hard to win. So basicaly bad Alien team can still win the good Marine team.
P.S.
I'm not a skilled player and have tried 3 days in the row to play as a Marine - always lose but as Alien almost every game is win.
Have been playing for some time and realy enjoyed this game untill update have been released with bonus for the Aliens.
First and major point is why do Marines can't regain armor after visiting the Armor station, instead each marine have to buy welder and renew armor, but in the fight welder is pointless and Aliens can kill with ease.
Second point is that Aliens have huge advantage in the beginning of the game by capturing resorses faster than oposition, therefore gaining uper hand allready early in the game.
I realy like the game and undersand winning comes with the team effort and comunication for both sides, but still even if you play with good team as Marine it is hard to win. So basicaly bad Alien team can still win the good Marine team.
P.S.
I'm not a skilled player and have tried 3 days in the row to play as a Marine - always lose but as Alien almost every game is win.
Comments
In addition some of the marine stuff seems really poor now, like shotgun, you can't even oneshot skulks all the time with W3 cause of the HP bonus, because with lag and whatnot pelles are bound to miss, and you're stuck with 6 rounds, mines seem barly worth the res, because again of the HP boost they are much more likely not to kill skulks anymore, plus 15RES is a lot when you can have other, more useful stuff for less.
There is more to the list, I might post that later in a sperate thread.
However, I feel like 2v2 or more, the marines are stronger. The marine advantage comes from spacing and teamwork. Unless all aliens go to different targets (very unlikely, especially in public games), there will be at least 1 marine shooting at his buddy's feet (thats where skulks tend to congregete when trying to kill).
At this point, the aliens either split up, or stay and try to kill, but either way, 1 marine gets a few extra seconds to shoot non-dodging skulks, and it only takes ~13 bullets to kill a skulk.
In short, marines need to use each other as bait (Live bait works best!), then weld the survivors of each engagement. A squad of marines can be back at full hp after each fight in under 15 seconds with meds and welders. Marine power stack exponentially as more marines are involved.
Also, if ur not buying welders, ur doin it wrong. What else are you spending ur money on? Can't get Exos if you cant win engagements, and welders give armor back in the field.
Aliens are generally more powerful, however, the goal is to try and have fun (and win, marines can win too).
If you play on rookie servers with rookie coms marines have a bad time for sure.
But the same happen on aliens-side if 3/4 of the teams didnt know what todo.
After the last fade-nerf marines are in good position right now and game feels much more balanced to me.
Rookie coms
- didnt drop ammo and meds
- doing the wrong upgrades
- wasting res on turrets
Rookie marines
- didnt use theyr maps to defend stuff
- have no aim and positioning
Thats why marines losing.
Having an armory heal armor or having a welder really makes no difference while you are "in the fight", because in either instance, you are not going to heal your armor while shooting at something.
The thing I don't like about having no armory healing armor is that I am pretty much forced to buy a welder and run around trying to weld stuff just to get my armor back since you can't rely on pub players to heal your armor whenever you need it.
For example I started to work on positioning - I suppress my urge to rush into fights, and always ask myself first - where are the enemies coming from? What is the best line of fire offered by my immediate surrounding? Do I have teammates around me? And I started to methodically work on maximizing my chances - always back up a bit and try to lure the skulk to long, open space, never rush alone to an unexplored territory recklessly, before attacking tricky/fortified positions, ask for scans.
Just by having better position when actually starting to fire, I realized that I win combats more often with greater confidence. I advise you to try similar approach. I don't say that the game is balanced this or that way, because when a competent player comes to a server, he mows down regulars both as a marine and as an alien. That indicates skill matters quite a lot, more than balancing nuances, at least in pubs where I suppose you play.
Also, as of recent version 254, marines were introduced to strafe jumping that greatly increases their dodging capabilities and allow you to survive sometimes even when being engaged up close with a skulk. If anything, the basic marine combat capabilities have increased since the last patch.
Experienced skulks know this and exploit it. Skulks are quite good at dodging when they are not approaching, but when they close on their target for a killl, they are quite vulnerable. When marine shoot continuously from the first moment, they run out of ammo all at the same time, so the skulk just dances a bit, and closes in for the kills in that safe window when everybody reloads.
How to counter it? With inner discipline. Remember WW2 fighter pilots - they had only tens of seconds worth of ammo for their cannons and machine guns, and therefore had to make their shots count. Marines have four clips, but in reality, it's difficult to survive a reload when you are unprotected. So, if you are running alongside your greener marine buddies, try this - keep a bit back, behind them. When skulks start to appear, do not shoot blindly and on instinct. Open only when you see a skulk in these situations:
- waiting in ambush, oblivious to you - due to lag, you will pump quite a few bullets in him before he realizes being hit and moves. Therefore, experienced players never ever stop moving.
- running straight at you, or just jumping - this is when he presents the best target
- when skulk ambushes and starts chewing your less cautious buddies before you - because this is the best defense against skulks, to shoot them off someone else while they attack. The victim sees only fast moving enemy too close to aim at, but you, few meters away, have a comfortable target. To continue attacking, the skulk has to stay close to his victim. If he dodges your fire, his victim will get an opportunity to shoot himself. That's why it is so important never to go alone!
Because you have restrained yourself, you will still have bullets in your clip while all your buddies have run out simultaneously, and when those clever skulks run out of their hiding places to chew your team up, you will open fire and kill some of them, or at least slow them enough to give your team time to reload.
Always remember to shoot only in bursts, especially at range, and when you notice you start missing, stop firing immediately, readjust aim, follow with a burst. Never aim while spraying wildly, you will find out that when you reacquire your target, your clip is empty.
Also, practice with your pistol. It does light damage, so it's not good to open with against targets that still have armor, but for finishing the job, it packs quite a punch, especially if you learn to fire rapidly and accurately.
At extreme close range, try to stay calm still, confuse the skulks with erratic strafe jumps while still trying to track him. When you put some distance between him, pump him full of lead.
Last thing - don't attack cysts needlessly while in enemy territory. New players feel the urge to "inflict damage", so they hack at everything, but consider this - time spend hacking harmless cysts means you are missing at an important combat elsewhere. Cysts are cheaply and easily rebuilt. Moreover, you are signalling to every alien your exact position, while you are defenseless, crouched with your axe out. Don't be surprised when you get ambushed seconds later! Attacking cysts is better done with welder (or flamer), and only in cases you are cutting important cyst chain, depriving the enemy building of bacterium - like isolating Nano that has two harvesters, but relies on cyst chains to survive. By cutting important chains, you force aliens to come to you and fight on your terms. By hacking every cyst you see, you lower your team efficiency and present an easy target.
Try to stay calm in combat and follow some of the mentioned recommendations - even if you don't magically improve overnight, you will see progress here and there, you won't die in situations you did before, you sometimes pick off a clever skulk, you will start seeing patterns in enemy movements, you will be able to predict and adapt. The few moments of success owed to a rational thinking and discipline will immensely increase the enjoyment you get from playing, and will encourage you to become even better player.
From 1 tech point they can get everything except dual exo's... That means you can have shotgun/flame thrower Marines with jetpacks wrecking everything. - That already gives them a HUGE advantage... Aliens can only get 1/3 of their upgrades with 1 tech point.
Shotgun Marines are able to one shot Skulks, Gorges, and Lerks far too easily. No Alien life form can one hit kill a Marine under ANY circumstances. Only 2 shotgun hits to kill an upgraded Fade (55 p.res) - Give them a Jetpack and they become stupidly hard to kill to kill. It usually takes a good Lerk or Skulk with leap to take them down, and even then it's a struggle.
Marines can recycle structures for 75% of the cost while Aliens cannot. This allows Marine commanders to recycle structures in order to build forward bases or second tech points up faster. Plus they can recycle extractors under attack in order to save resources. End result, Marine commander can do a lot more on less resource towers.
Then there's things like the Marine strafe jump, which gives them a distinct edge over Skulks in melee range, or the new default "off" alien vision that makes it harder to track targets up close.
Since this latest build, every Alien win I've seen is an extremely hard fought battle where we had to coordinate and work together, plan our strikes, and struggle for victory over the course of 45 minutes or longer.... Every Marine win I've seen was a walk in the park, over in 15-20 minutes tops.
58 to 42 .....
Also depends on servers:
At dev.ns2stats.com we have 62% marine wins
This plus marines not welding each other.
On a lot of servers, especially with new players, most players don't even buy a welder.
If they do the love welding structures and in the end game exos, but almost never other marines.
For me it's extremely annoying and a waste of time to run around welding everything
and everyone I see, just to get some armor.
NS2 stats aren't really a reliable indicator of balance imho.
There are simply too many variables that lead to victory. Like how new players prefer to choose Marine, or how 2-3 Skulks can sometimes base rush and win the game in 1-2 minutes, or how a bad commander can lose it for their team.
Even if the stats show 50/50... When Alien wins take alot of effort and time, while Marine wins are easy and short... that's not balanced.
When the aliens get lerks/fades out, a couple of waves of marines will die and the aliens instinctively go chompy chomp on the RTs, the phase gates, whatever.
However I too often see marines suddenly at an advantage due to w/a upgrades or SGs or whatever, and they do nothing with it. They could go take out upgrades or a few harvesters or a hive or something, but instead they use the advantage to reeeeally safely turtle and only try to hold onto what they have, which is impossible in most cases and soon enough the next hive upgrades/ fades etc come out and the marines have wasted the window of opportunity to secure a win.
It's an instinctive thing, unless marines have a commander telling them very loudly over mic to go and do something productive, they tend to be a wee bit passive
True that. But anecdotal evidence is an even worse one. Or how did you know that marines are winning more often now?
It isn't really difficult to win as aliens. You just need to deploy the smallest possible bit of teamplay and meet up before attacking something important. Aliens get much more powerful by teamplay. Most people simply don't try it.
So from my experience marines lose most games because of their own broken gamestyle. But if you have a marine team playing as a team, with a commander that does not play tower defense all day long, marines will be on top of aliens. The marines power increases then with their aim and positioning, leaving aliens behind.
And sure, aliens have bad commanders and tower defense players too. Not to talk about people that do not know what a drifter can do for you. But somehow aliens do not depend so much on their coms res spending on the lower skill levels and their impact on fights.
So I would say that if more people on a server (more then 6 per team) and with a increasing skill level of the players... the more likely you will have a marine win. So from the balance point of view on public servers (with their 9vs9 gameplay) I see marines in a huge advantage over aliens, if people know what they do.
Uh, no. Exos are almost useless. Having all tech on one tech point does help in theory, but doesn't win you the game when you sit there with one extractor all game. JPs are useful, but still, it doesn't win you the game.
And now the most incorrect part, shotguns can't oneshot anyhing but skulks and in rare, VERY RARE circumstances lerks. First, hitreg and stuff is odd enough that you have to hit ALL or the MAJORITY of pellets which usually DOES NOT HAPPEN EVEN WITH PERFECT AIM.
First, shotgun damage numbers:
Shotgun W0: 17 * 10 = 170
Shotgun W1: 17 * 11 = 187
Shotgun W2: 17 * 12 = 204
Shotgun W3: 17 * 13 = 221
Even without taking perfect aim that into consideration, you need W3 to oneshot a lerk and it only works if aliens have <=3 biomass, and that's with a full 221 DMG hit which you'll never pull off unless the lerk is afk sitting somewhere. If the lerk has cara, it won't work at all, because effective HP becomes 245.
Gorges can NOT be oneshot at all, they have 310 effective HP without biomass/upgrades, this is at least 2 hits, or more if you don't magically hit all bullets.
Skulks, especially late game can have up to 151 effective HP, which often makes it impossible to oneshot them. Why? Most of the time you won't hit all pellets, and you must hit the majority in order to kill it (12/17 pellets with W3, 16/17 with W0), and keep in mind that late game they also get celerity and silence as well as leap making the way more agile and harder to hit.
Fades have 410 HP without upgrades, so the only time you can 2-hit them is if you have W2/W3 and aliens have no upgrades, and if you have PERFECT aim and PERFECT hitreg. Once fades get upgrades and biomass, it's 490HP with cara and 515HP with biomass 6 and cara. So you need at least 3 hits in NORMAL game situations. In reality, without perfect aim and perfect hitreg, you'll end up using 4 hits or maybe 5.
These calcuations don't even take umbra into account which reduces damage by 1/3 (actually reduces the number of hits by 1/3).
As for jetpack, yes, JP is good, and it should be. It's endgame tech - JPs are really fine, but there should be some adjustments to alien, i.e. old/GOOD fade movement, so fades can pick off JPs too (along with a slight HP/armor nerf for fade!), less leap energy usage, so it be comes more viable again as for trying to hit jp users, but also definely less skulk HP scaling with biomass, feels over the top atm.
Exos are almost useless?!? I really don't wanna see the paper work that explains that
Too your paper work on shutguns. If you move out without at least one other teammate, you should be considered going down very easy, even with the use of a JP. And still you will not one hit many people, but what people really wanna say when speaking about the "one hit shotgun" is that you need to engage it and on the way towards it, you most likely will get some damage already and then in most cases the "one shot" from the shotgunner you engage will finish you. On that topic a death view, showing you exactly the damage source that killed you, would be helpful to make people stop calling "one shot" for things that are not "real".
Also what people tend to not consider at all is that you kill a alien, and his personal resources are all gone (for higher lifeform and upgrades to it). If you kill a marine, the weapon is still on the floor. So in many cases a shotgun (as an item / weapon) gets more then one chance to kill a fade or lerk, even if the player holding the gun changed.
And finally the huge difference between costs of eggs and weapon drops. With the need to upgrade your lifeform with even more personal resources, even if it's a dropped egg. And yes this is considering the different amount of income the teams have, it's still a bonus on the marine team.
Currently marines just lose many games because of their own weakness in playing as a team and defending stuff, while doing damage (and not killing zero resource skulks). They really invite the aliens to win the game in most cases. People (and this is including aliens and marines) still did not got it that this game is not about KDA (and that's whats really bad about the new HIVE stats, because it focus on that topic). It's only matters to take down P and T resources... But I think most people think killing someone gives you PRes or something else important.
So on a rookie server, marines might seem weaker than aliens. But for medium to high skilled players, marines are probably a bit stronger after the recent fade nerf and marine movement buff
Marines can be very strong. You just need a comm who has at least a minimal clue hows its done & that comm needs to press his/her marines to do stuff correct also.
In NS2 it has a MUCH harder and more complex command chair than a lot of other games in the series, but this cannot be solved from a development perspective just by simplifying commander mechanics, because then you simply lose your competitive players (the ones that actually matter to the game by the way).
I've seen many games try this formula with this particular hybrid genre and fail, and NS2 is pretty much down that road already (mark my words, with veterans leaving, no amount of Steam sales will save this game, I know from experience).
There are a few options I've thought of to attempt to solve this issue, although they may not work they each tackle a different aspect of the game:
1. Add an AI commander by default; removable in the server settings, and disabled when someone is in the chair. This solves the most important problem of positions of responsibility in public matches for newer players. Every one of the games I've played in this hybrid genre has suffered from a waiting time before the game starts, due to lack of commander, and having a troll or incompetent commander usually ends in a vote kick/impeach then your team is still worse off because it's commander-less.
2. Squads: This is present and EXTREMELY important to gameplay in Nuclear Dawn and Savage 1/2, squads allow for teamwork in small groups to be micro-managed by both the commander and squad leaders, as well as spreading out responsibility throughout the team, instead of everything being blamed on the commander. Some games have squad leaders gain buffs and abilities that are integral to the team dynamic and create strategic situations between small groups of players across the map.
3. Maps: Apart from the Savage series, which has 10-20 maps in a very varied pool... games in this genre are almost always released with a severe lack of maps. In NS2's situation it doesn't help that maps are very hard to make due to the emphasis that is put on details and environmental "beauty" (this already takes away from a game that is supposed to be focused on teamwork and tactics). More maps and more interesting, rule-breaking maps are required by games of this genre.
4. Classes: Games like DotA/LoL/Smite/etc have one incredibly strong feature; hero variety. Hybrid games that draw from FPS/RTS and hack&slash follow the route of Battlefield and Call of Duty in the sense that they have an incredibly limited number of classes, and that therefore makes gameplay stale after a long time (this is probably only applicable for players who have played a lot and get bored, then leave, so it's one of the least important factors).
5. The dreaded server browser: Yet another common denominator between these games; the server browser is a MASSIVE problem for games of this type, as they confuse new players, frustrate experienced players (who prefer a specific server or game mode) and they don't serve any purpose beyond giving players a choice of server location/type/size. I've seen it work in DotA style games and I have been convinced that matchmaking (with party-play functionality) is the way to go. This is because most of the issues these games have is when players spend half their time switching between servers on the browser list, trying to find a game that isn't mid-way through or has just ended (at which point the players leave). Matchmaking is simply BETTER for this formula, given the ability to select filters and preferences, dynamically creating games is better because matches will start faster (little to no warmup time).
6. Replays: The replays in NS2 are a joke. What is currently implemented is NOT a replay system, it is a cheap fraps rip off and it is practically useless. For games with a high skill curve it's very important to have some way of watching/learning from pros/famous players, YouTube videos and vods have never and will never provide this important feature.
/rant
As for the OP; to answer it very simply, marines are extremely strong at the moment due to how easy it is to kill aliens with even abysmal aim. The only reason aliens might seem OP to anyone would be terrible team balance in pubs. It takes only a couple of half-decent marine players to totally dismantle an alien pub team, but it is a lot harder to do from the alien side due to how easy it is to lose your res investment as aliens. Good fade players got nerfed and lerks might have high attack speed, but with the new marine movement they are pretty easy to dodge, and it is very easy to kill a lerk with a single clip of the rifle. The only reliable unit on aliens I can think of are gorges and onos (the new shield is pretty meh, but at least it wasn't a nerf). Gorges with hydras and spit are the only things keeping marines from stomping aliens into the dust these days.
ahhh... here's a hint... don't go out alone with a shotgun if your a bad shot.
Now that that's out of the way, one shot'ing can be easily done against skulks if you have good aim, and with a partner who can shoot you can take down lerks like butter if they fly into you. Fades will go down quick as well if you get 2 full hits when they approach and one half hit if he retreats. What it comes down to is L2P. It takes time to get good aim, but we shouldn't nerf aliens until you can hit stuff with a shotgun. In the higher level play where the teams are mostly even skill wise, the marines have no problem taking higher lifeforms out, or at least pushing them back. And I've played against enough pub lerks and fades to know it is definitely easy to kill them.
I'll say it again, this is a L2P issue and we should not nerf aliens because you can't aim well.
Marines are not weak, they seem to be winning a lot more than in the past according to ns2stats. A good marine player vs a good skulk? I say the marine wins.
Unless I'm mistaken, Stab vs. A0 is an insta-kill.
Granted, this won't happen in normal games (unless arms lab is down), but it IS possible.
Sorry but hell the **** NO!!! The server browser and player rented servers is one of the BEST things about this game. If this game had launched with that matchmaking garbage, it would have already died off long ago.
There is absolutely NOTHING good about removing control and choice from the player and placing us at the COMPLETE MERCY of a computer algorithm.
Matchmaking is a horribly broken system at the very core, was designed for consoles that couldn't handle servers with browsers, and should be abolished as soon as possible. (especially since the next-gen consoles can handle servers and browsers)
Every game I have that has matchmaking is virtually unplayable.
Modern Warfare 2
Modern Warfare 3
Black Ops 2
Ghost Recon Future Soldier
Ghost Recon Online
Farcry 3
Splinter Cell Conviction
Splinter Cell Blacklist
Marines vs Skulk is broken! FIX IT!!!!!!