NS2 balance discussion as of build 266

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Comments

  • VetinariVetinari Join Date: 2013-07-23 Member: 186325Members, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Silver
    Give gorges webs to do!

    They could fulfill the same role of area denial as tunnels do currently, making tunnels a midgame tech. Also finally introduces webs.
  • BensonBenson Join Date: 2012-03-07 Member: 148303Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    @_INTER_‌
    Bio 2 for GT just so that its more of an investment to go fast GT, so its really just for timing/cost as they are VERY powerful.

    @IronHorse‌
    I wouldn't be opposed to Webs being unlocked, but I'd be concerned what the ability to make a marine immobile at the start of a round would do to the marine's ability to push and harass. On the same note, it would encourage more welder use, which is ALWAYS a plus :D

    Mainly, I'd prefer that something like webs (which are disposable by their very nature) would be free, but limited to only having 3 at a time, with a hefty energy cost to prevent spam, which would probably be too powerful for early game. I'd think they would need to come out around the same time as Bilebomb, but need two hives (so 4 biomass) to compensate for them being free.

    The reason I'd also prefer babblers over webs is that, if they become useful, it gives the gorge more offense/defense options (i.e. more to do) early on, meaning that a gorge would be more than a tunnel dispensing crag in the first couple min of a game.

  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    I think they are free in comp mod, aren't they?
    I like this approach.. free but only X amount allowed, like clogs.

    Welders do in fact make short work of them, and they are quite visible, so i'm not too worried about impeding marine's ability to push (especially compared to hydra farms, clog walls and corner whips)
  • DC_DarklingDC_Darkling Join Date: 2003-07-10 Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
    Yeh well I was 'talking with the crowd' on giving gorges more to do.
    I am well aware what gorges can do without gorge tunnels, as I only need to do that almost every comp match I play.

    :D
  • SaltlickSaltlick Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177347Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    Let exos stomp skulks. Fixed.
  • RadimaXRadimaX Join Date: 2013-02-05 Member: 182840Members
    edited July 2014
    ALIEN BEACON:
    Must have mature Shade hive and all aliens sucks into the ground just like teleporting structures or maby that watery cloak effect makes them dissapear and u all pop out near hive!
    - could be used to organize a tunnel rush or defend hive if people are way off making clogwalls and babblers instead of listening to orders lol
  • MouseMouse The Lighter Side of Pessimism Join Date: 2002-03-02 Member: 263Members, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    Benson wrote: »
    About Babblers:

    This is pretty much where the disscussion led:
    Racer1 wrote: »
    I feel this is stating the obvious, but make babblers...
    1. easier to create
    2. never die of old age (as long as they are not stuck/etc).
    3. move faster
    4. do actual damage to (or somehow otherwise interfere with) marines, even if they are moving around **gasp**

    Once you do all of that, then adjust for balance, without removing what was just added.

    Also, have the pheromone projectile act like spit (so its easier to use)

    There was also an idea (by Mouse?) to have babblers no longer need eggs, and rather be a chargeable spawning attack. tap for 1 babbler, hold for multiple. This was generally agreed to be a better method of spawning them

    Yup, that was my suggestion.
  • DarakianDarakian Join Date: 2004-09-03 Member: 31233Members
    +1 to letting gorges do more. Maybe buff clogs a bit so they can soak up more bullets before falling? Maybe buff them as biomass increases? They seem pretty pointless after the first 5 minutes of the game. Maybe give the gorge another structure to build? Not sure what or how to balance, but I love gorging and it's often either pretty boring or I run out of res in no time.
  • NordicNordic Long term camping in Kodiak Join Date: 2012-05-13 Member: 151995Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    _INTER_ wrote: »
    I really wish pre-reinforced balance was back, both for Exo and Gorge Tunnel. Exo pain-trains lead to great long basetrade games and researchable GT left the commander / team with choice of fast upgrades or Gorge Tunnel research... No sane commander gets Gorge upgrades before bio 2 or 3 nowadays, making it additionally linear as Alien comm.
    (Also Babblers are next to useless, but that was discussed extensively elsewhere)

    If I have good gorges as a khammander, and we have a decent res flow I will totally get gorge upgrades. Babblers will make a good gorge a lot better, by doubling the health. Also I have rushed bile on occasion where I get gorge upgrades shortly before getting bio 3. Viable strats giving certain game variables.
    That will not fix the 'give gorges something to do' because as I said before, babblers in their current state are not worth the res they cost.

    Lets specify that!
    Babbler armour: Single use, so only worth it for a big push in a area you must hold. (if you put it on someone else) Situational at best and on such a big push a gorge has plenty work on heals. On the gorge? Any gorge early game taking THAT kind of damage to warrant babbler armour is doing it wrong. Also I said single use yes? I also can imagine a lot of different things I can do with that res lategame. (onos save, gorge flash on rushes & jp etc)

    Babbler attack:
    seriously? Except making the enemy die from laughter or not pay attention due to said laugh attack, babblers are not remotely suited for damage in any realistic sense.

    Babblers are a little underpowered, but early game a good gorge can battle gorge like crazy with them. This is not in servers filled with rookies.
  • moultanomoultano Creator of ns_shiva. Join Date: 2002-12-14 Member: 10806Members, NS1 Playtester, Contributor, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Gold, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
    I would love it if somehow the optimal strategy for a fleeing gorge was to send your babblers at the marines and run while they occupy them. It just feels cool, babies protecting mama.
  • RapGodRapGod Not entirely sure... Join Date: 2013-11-12 Member: 189322Members
    IronHorse wrote: »
    Benson wrote: »
    Give gorges back babblers without needing research, and make tunnels avilable at biomass 2 with gorge upgrades!
    I agree regarding biomass 2, but idk about babblers.

    What do you think about webs instead? We never get to see them used, and it goes along well with early route blocking mechanics like Hydras and clogs

    That might work. Gorges can still run somewhere and web it up until they get tunnels. It may hurt on veil (without a quick tunnel to nano). But it can be tested. Maybe lower cost for hydras so that aliens can still help hold off marines a little better without tunnels. But they could end up being overused... meh, worth playing around with.
  • DC_DarklingDC_Darkling Join Date: 2003-07-10 Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
    While a gorge can battle early on with babblers it still a res use best spend elseway. @Ironhorse to early OP gorge tunnels are such a way. ;)
  • RaZDaZRaZDaZ Join Date: 2012-11-05 Member: 167331Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    I'd like to see a couple of changes for testing regarding babblers

    - Double babbler damage
    - Increase hp to 30, hp reduced to 10 when used on a lifeform
    - Reduce res-cost to 0.5
    - Remove upgrade requirement

    Game is pretty balanced at this point but if anyone is covering balance and looking for feedback, I recommend tackling abilities/weapons/etc that don't seem viable in the meta. Stuff like railguns/exos, babblers, shade ink, flamethrowers, webs, vortex and stab. Would like to see a bit more variety in strategy and res invesments. Atm its cookie cutter lifeform builds vs a large focus on jetpacks/shotguns.
  • ruprechtruprecht Join Date: 2013-03-16 Member: 184022Members
    Give Exos self nano shield at 5 pres cost, and let them pick up catalyst for a 10 sec boost without overheating.
  • CalegoCalego Join Date: 2013-01-24 Member: 181848Members, NS2 Map Tester
    edited July 2014
    Webs are a good idea, but when you combine them with hydras you get a seriously deadly combination. This would need to be tested considerably before committing to a change. But I'd not be overly opposed to having Tunnels take the place of babblers (or perhaps with babblers) on Bio 1, webs from the start, and bile hanging out at 3.

    Makes an early res investment decision for Aliens (as it is now the only thing to do is get an upgrade rolling, this might diversify the tech tree). At the same time, would anyone ever not research tunnels?
  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    edited July 2014
    Just putting it behind bio mass 2 would be enough. It delays gorge tunnels by 27 seconds if a commander chooses to research it immediately for 20 tres.

    I like that *early* tunnels become a strategy based on commander choice, with actual benefits and downsides, instead of a gaggle of gorges on their own program. Webs can definitely keep them busy, too.
  • DC_DarklingDC_Darkling Join Date: 2003-07-10 Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
    I am very inclined to boost use of webs.
    Right now webs are useless. Way to high biomass. By the time you have webs, rines have flames, explosions or nonstop welders and are not impressed with webs.

    But it is quite true that webs are strong. A carefully placed web can make a marine soak much much more hydra and whip damage then without a web.
    However webs in ns2 are green and strongly visible compared to its n1 counterpart. So we can not fully rely on old ns1 webusage as that was a far bigger webbing fest with OCs.

    I would say its worth it to test.
  • RoobubbaRoobubba Who you gonna call? Join Date: 2003-01-06 Member: 11930Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    Ppfff all this talk of what upgrades to have available at what biomass...

    My idea (I've put it up here before a few times a while back) is to unlink upgrades from biomass, but instead to have upgrade slots, into which ANY upgrade can be researched. The power/utility of that upgrade is then linked to the current biomass. You want xeno at 1 biomass? Sure. It just only does 10 damage in a small radius, but gets more powerful/wider ranging the more biomass you have. Similarly, 1 biomass leap would be slow and not take you very far, but would improve with biomass.

    This would give alien comms COMPLETE flexibility about what upgrades to get for their team.

    The one drawback which would need to be worked out is how much better should each ability get with biomass? Should they have a number of levels (say 4 levels), and increase from the point at which they were first researched, or should the overall level be linked only to total current biomass? You would want to avoid having ridiculously OP abilities at high biomass levels, while ensuring that, at low/medium biomass, they're still effective.
    Those details I haven't yet fleshed out, but with some thought and testing, I'm pretty sure it could work. One option would be to impose the restriction that individual life-form upgrades need to be done in order (no xeno without leap etc), though I think that rather goes against what I'm trying to achieve here.

    What I'm trying to avoid is the linear X biomass = Y ability situation that we have partially got now. I say partially because you have to research the ability separately but that's a minor detail, really. Removing that linearity would help to diversify the alien game - and perhaps allow them better to react or counteract marine strategies with their own a little more than they currently can.
  • _INTER__INTER_ Join Date: 2009-08-08 Member: 68392Members, NS2 Playtester, Reinforced - Shadow
    @Roobubba I really like your idea. Especially that you could better counteract certain Marine strategies, because now it depends on if you "know" he Marine commander. (e.g ModestMouse commands, get BileBOMB asap !!!).
    However I think those changes would need so much preliminary implemention work, testing and finetuneing, that the CDT shouldn't try it now. Also UWE would have the last word in this.
    Basically it's too late for the biig changes. :(
  • CalegoCalego Join Date: 2013-01-24 Member: 181848Members, NS2 Map Tester
    edited July 2014
    Roobubba wrote: »
    Ppfff all this talk of what upgrades to have available at what biomass...

    My idea (I've put it up here before a few times a while back) is to unlink upgrades from biomass, but instead to have upgrade slots, into which ANY upgrade can be researched. The power/utility of that upgrade is then linked to the current biomass. You want xeno at 1 biomass? Sure. It just only does 10 damage in a small radius, but gets more powerful/wider ranging the more biomass you have. Similarly, 1 biomass leap would be slow and not take you very far, but would improve with biomass.

    This would give alien comms COMPLETE flexibility about what upgrades to get for their team.

    The one drawback which would need to be worked out is how much better should each ability get with biomass? Should they have a number of levels (say 4 levels), and increase from the point at which they were first researched, or should the overall level be linked only to total current biomass? You would want to avoid having ridiculously OP abilities at high biomass levels, while ensuring that, at low/medium biomass, they're still effective.
    Those details I haven't yet fleshed out, but with some thought and testing, I'm pretty sure it could work. One option would be to impose the restriction that individual life-form upgrades need to be done in order (no xeno without leap etc), though I think that rather goes against what I'm trying to achieve here.

    What I'm trying to avoid is the linear X biomass = Y ability situation that we have partially got now. I say partially because you have to research the ability separately but that's a minor detail, really. Removing that linearity would help to diversify the alien game - and perhaps allow them better to react or counteract marine strategies with their own a little more than they currently can.
    @Roobubba‌ Make a thread about this. Because this sounds highly interesting and needs more theory crafting. (How do you scale tunnels?)

    I would definitely like to see this as a modded game-mode.
  • RapGodRapGod Not entirely sure... Join Date: 2013-11-12 Member: 189322Members
    edited July 2014
    Roobubba wrote: »
    Ppfff all this talk of what upgrades to have available at what biomass...

    My idea (I've put it up here before a few times a while back) is to unlink upgrades from biomass, but instead to have upgrade slots, into which ANY upgrade can be researched. The power/utility of that upgrade is then linked to the current biomass. You want xeno at 1 biomass? Sure. It just only does 10 damage in a small radius, but gets more powerful/wider ranging the more biomass you have. Similarly, 1 biomass leap would be slow and not take you very far, but would improve with biomass.

    This would give alien comms COMPLETE flexibility about what upgrades to get for their team.

    The one drawback which would need to be worked out is how much better should each ability get with biomass? Should they have a number of levels (say 4 levels), and increase from the point at which they were first researched, or should the overall level be linked only to total current biomass? You would want to avoid having ridiculously OP abilities at high biomass levels, while ensuring that, at low/medium biomass, they're still effective.
    Those details I haven't yet fleshed out, but with some thought and testing, I'm pretty sure it could work. One option would be to impose the restriction that individual life-form upgrades need to be done in order (no xeno without leap etc), though I think that rather goes against what I'm trying to achieve here.

    What I'm trying to avoid is the linear X biomass = Y ability situation that we have partially got now. I say partially because you have to research the ability separately but that's a minor detail, really. Removing that linearity would help to diversify the alien game - and perhaps allow them better to react or counteract marine strategies with their own a little more than they currently can.

    As said above, it may be too late to implement all that. Not on the up and up so I could be wrong. Only issue I see with the idea is pub aliens spamming xeno. It wouldn't do much, but it'd be annoying. And I see the new guys just using xeno or some other upgrade and not know how to use it or what to do (ohhhhhh the choices of attack.. so.. many..). That's really just an issue with new guys, though.

    Gotta also see how it'd affect comp play.

    I still like the ns1 version where you got upgrades with each hive. But that would make it so aliens would have to secure a second hive immediately... idk, it's difficult to make any big changes without rebalancing everything around it.

    If it is possible to do (your idea), then I'd be willing to try it. Hell, I'd try any variation of the game (just no av changes (although I hate it, but I'm over it) or marine jump).

    Edit : I want babblers to automatically attack webbed marines. Spiders! :p
  • KungFuJVKungFuJV Join Date: 2003-04-03 Member: 15167Members
    Marines can still shoot while webbed in NS2 right?

    What if webs were free, earlier biomass, only allow x amt out on the field(like clogs).

    Or if it is going to be kept at biomass 7, make it like NS1 webs. (White/clear color, instant disable/slow, stacks)

    Look at most tier3 alien tech(biomass7-9), xeno, stomp...and then you have web....and stab. Lol.
  • SantaClawsSantaClaws Denmark Join Date: 2012-07-31 Member: 154491Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    Yea, it does feel like they added webs just so they could call it a 'content patch' - even though they clearly never intended it to be used in a real game, public or competetive.

    I say, give webs a shot, put them in early biomass and see how it goes.
  • meatmachinemeatmachine South England Join Date: 2013-01-06 Member: 177858Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Supporter
    First thing I'd do as a gorge is put 3 hydras above a doorway, put a bunch of clogs all over the place and then cover the floor in webs. I can picture that being completely OP
  • joshhhjoshhh Milwaukee, WI Join Date: 2011-06-21 Member: 105717Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester
    Early webs is just a bad idea. Early gorge PvE spam is already bad enough in pubs. I'd rather not have more.
  • IeptBarakatIeptBarakat The most difficult name to speak ingame. Join Date: 2009-07-10 Member: 68107Members, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow
    Couldn't we have the number of webs scale up with the Biomass level? If you get 1 web per biomass you should at most see an average of 3 webs across the map at the start of the game.

    Also inclined to say the 2nd Gorge tunnel should be locked behind Biomass level 2 as well. This gives the gorge the opportunity to plant the gorge tunnel and get to the destination in time for a fast biomass upgrade.
  • OnosFactoryOnosFactory New Zealand Join Date: 2008-07-16 Member: 64637Members
    Exo: Needs a Jeldinforj Ninja too be effective. Is this why in 6v6 it doesn't work?
  • RapGodRapGod Not entirely sure... Join Date: 2013-11-12 Member: 189322Members
    Honestly, I feel that jps need a little nerf to keep balance if you make exos better. I'm necro-ing to an extent, so my b.
  • Laosh'RaLaosh'Ra Join Date: 2011-12-09 Member: 137232Members
    development tracker mentions "balance changes" in "fixes to be tested".
    so i guess this is not final, but could we get a few keywords which units/structures/abilities/whatever are being looked into? :)
  • CalegoCalego Join Date: 2013-01-24 Member: 181848Members, NS2 Map Tester
    Laosh'Ra wrote: »
    development tracker mentions "balance changes" in "fixes to be tested".
    so i guess this is not final, but could we get a few keywords which units/structures/abilities/whatever are being looked into? :)
    @WasabiOne‌ ^
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