Ns_hera
BlueGhost
Join Date: 2002-11-30 Member: 10337Members
Join Date: 2002-11-30 Member: 10337Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Could you MAKE a more unbalanced map?</div> Can we just get a complete re-make of NS_Hera please that or just scrap it intirely from the 'offical maps'
Its quite frankly rediculas when the intire map is quite so hidiously marine biased:
1) <b>Double siege location</b>
Which, whill hit two hives even in 1.04 put enough siege cannon there and you can take down two hives with one JP spotter and not much time. (particularly problematic when added to point 4.
2) <b>Double res node</b>
Always a bonus for the marines two nodes held for the price of two!
3) <b>Two res nodes in base!</b>
Whey open up the door to general cargo storage and you've got another 2 res node place held with just one lot of def and its ALSO your base so you've gotta defend it anyway!
4) <b>Lack of bottle necks</b>
Unlike many maps where most hives can be held (and siege proof) with only two major WOL the miriad levels and wealdable vents and doors make JP marines capable of sneaking anywhere with abit of know how.
The tactical options on this map make it too easy for the marines, the aliens have to watch 3 hive locations 1 double res area AND processing to have a hope in hell because if they lose any one of them the marines get a serious advantage. Contrast this with my favourite map: eclipse.
o) Res node in each hive to give the aliens a solid easy to defend res node.
o) Easy to defend marine base at the start prevents silly rushing from aliens.
o) Res nodes spread accross the map with various levels of dificulty for marines to hold:
Station access alpha - Easy
Horse Shoe - Hard
o) Nice number of vents to give JPers the ability to 'do their thang' and skulks a movment advantage. No siege locations that can hit two hives.
While the siege bug in eclipse is annoying I just give someone a GL now if the marines are competent. Each location feels good marines ability to move around the middle of the map sneakily is still not too bad.
So what do you'll think? Hera need a re-write or is it balanced already?
BlueGhost
Its quite frankly rediculas when the intire map is quite so hidiously marine biased:
1) <b>Double siege location</b>
Which, whill hit two hives even in 1.04 put enough siege cannon there and you can take down two hives with one JP spotter and not much time. (particularly problematic when added to point 4.
2) <b>Double res node</b>
Always a bonus for the marines two nodes held for the price of two!
3) <b>Two res nodes in base!</b>
Whey open up the door to general cargo storage and you've got another 2 res node place held with just one lot of def and its ALSO your base so you've gotta defend it anyway!
4) <b>Lack of bottle necks</b>
Unlike many maps where most hives can be held (and siege proof) with only two major WOL the miriad levels and wealdable vents and doors make JP marines capable of sneaking anywhere with abit of know how.
The tactical options on this map make it too easy for the marines, the aliens have to watch 3 hive locations 1 double res area AND processing to have a hope in hell because if they lose any one of them the marines get a serious advantage. Contrast this with my favourite map: eclipse.
o) Res node in each hive to give the aliens a solid easy to defend res node.
o) Easy to defend marine base at the start prevents silly rushing from aliens.
o) Res nodes spread accross the map with various levels of dificulty for marines to hold:
Station access alpha - Easy
Horse Shoe - Hard
o) Nice number of vents to give JPers the ability to 'do their thang' and skulks a movment advantage. No siege locations that can hit two hives.
While the siege bug in eclipse is annoying I just give someone a GL now if the marines are competent. Each location feels good marines ability to move around the middle of the map sneakily is still not too bad.
So what do you'll think? Hera need a re-write or is it balanced already?
BlueGhost
Comments
I've also won it as a marine, but I wasn't an alien then.
So basically the res node is of stratigic importance to the aliens soley for the fact that it is damn usefull for the marines.
I have won many games on hera as aliens, and as marines its just a very un-stasiftying map its THE best map to kill the com chair, its the best map to hide a gorge away and spam turrets closing off the com chair and then skulking it both these tactics are hellova annoying for the marines.
Its the best duel siege map, its also the easiest map for the marines to 'out res' the aliens.
My major complaint is that the map allows for both easy fast ressing AND easy siegeing for the marines.
As for hiding in dark corners to stop them taking holo-room wtf are you talking about? You can take the vent there directly from the marine base.
General storage at a cost of 9 res per attempt they can afford to send 2 marines there mebbi 4 times befor it was a waste at some point them two marines WILL get through and instantly the marines have a 'free' easy to def res node.
Hell if they have two spawns and no one else is really dieing (cos they're all just holding holoroom while it builds up) assuming they kill one skulk per trip each you'd need 3 skulks in maint to stop em and chances are on one of the trips they'll be capable of killing 3 skulks with one of them left alive.
Its also a doddle for someone with a JP to reach data-C hive or archving hive which gives you yet another avanue of attack.
BlueGhost
Basically the marines we played against went for reception and got up a phase gate.
They then all moved to holo-room meanwhile sending people into processing as a distraction. Held holo-got up turrets ect.
After this they got the general cargo storage res point (without wealding the door) and build turrets there.
All the while we are facing continual assults on processing which we have to defend against and which stops us harrasing their res. We get up two hives, and start on a third as we do this they walk into us with massive groups of HA/HMG who just KEEP ON COMMING.
I mean at this point they had 5 res nodes if they'd also rushed a hive aswell as holo and we'd not managed to hold them (as is often the case) they could easily have had 6 res nodes or even 7 if they took maintinence and vent.
Marines were not ment to easily be taking 7 res nodes befor they'd looked at there 2nd hive look at EVERY other map.
With 8 res comming in per tick it takes 42 seconds to get enough res for an arms lab. You can produce a HMG every 24 seconds.
BlueGhost
Eater.
A change I'd like to see is a weldable vent for the marine base. Too many NS maps have a VERY easy route into the marine base for the aliens (usually a vent). This coupled with the existing entrances really skew the game in the aliens' favor early on, especially when executing even a sloppy skulk rush. Not fun. :/
The surviving marine is already at a hive befor any of them respawn and the marines all respawn get up a phase gate befor the next wave of non-carapice skulks plunge headlong into the meat grinder.
Hera is infact one of the easiest start locations to cover, open up the door and point a pistol down it, stick one person just round the bend looking down the other corridor enterance on a big game put 2 people in each of these locations.
Everyone else builds stuff untill an alien starts biting the vent, assuming the com doesn't clog up your LOS to the vent with buildings it'll be pure murder for any skulk who even THINKS about coming in via that way (big empty room marines at the edges skulk in the middle).
The big error people make is in not opening the door, skulks run upto the door and poor out of it in a big wave that is already right on top of you.
As for vents into the marine base, they're only really a problem if you can build in em like caged.
Invincible from anything but GL or siege regen for carapiced aliens <b>right</b> on top of your base is just plain wrong.
Trick is to just not build anywhere near or in view of the vent, even caged a rush from the vent should be shredded you just build/defend from next to the res tower and under the com chair.. big empty space marines at the edge skulks in the middle getting mowed down from two directions no less.
BlueGhost
The "posting a guard to watch down a hallway" is easy to beat as well. More than likely there will be, as you say, just one guard. Skulks can spread apart though. Running down the ceiling, down a wall or whatever. It takes a marine with nerves of steel to not panic and get more than one or two max. But most often, people run along in single file, hoping the guy in front will be their personal meat shield. THAT DOES NOT WORK.
Anyway, I can't change your opinions, but hopefully these tips will help you.
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->How is rushing for res nodes any different than marines on eclipse rushing the two empty hives? The only difference is that with 7 res nodes marines have to defend 7 locations instead of 3<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The problem is exactly the reverse, on eclipse the marines marines have to rush and hold 2 of 3 locations, the aliens have to defend 2 of the 3 locations, and thats it.
On Hera there isn't just 3 locations you have:
Holo-Room
General Cargo Storage
Vents
DataCore Delta
Archiving
Processing
And the aliens have to hold them all. The marines still only have 3 bases to defend:
Mainbase + general cargo
Holo-room
Processing
With these three locations not only do they lock down the same number of hives as eclipse they also get 5 fully defended res nodes.
To achive the same setup on eclipse the marines have to take and hold:
Mainbase
Station access alpha
Subjunction
Triad Array
Eclipse Hive
CompCore Hive
(or any other 2 hives and 3 res nodes)
The worst thing is a two hive phase rush is already considerd 'too easy' on eclipse
BigDXLT:
If the attacking marines all die in maintiance corridor then quite frankly they suck. Even if they do all die but manage to kill afew of the skulks they can just keep on coming out, beating you with respawn.
Plus there's nothing that says they have to go out that way they can climb the vent into holo if they like. Once one is out they'll have a phase and can move out from eather location and your stuck on the defencive trying to hold the key areas, there are too many key areas to hold so you just have to be lucky really.
If you manage to rush in and kill the com chair without the com just plonking another one down at the position of his main offencive wave, they suck.
So the 'change of tactic' is to pull off a skulk rush on their base anihilating it all when the marines first move out well I suppose it stops them grabbing two res nodes in base but its very much not easy to do as you'll have to get the timeing just right: After they've all acctually left base (and are a decent distance away) but befor they acctually get a phase up in base.(otherwise the com ploncs a phase at the main advance who build it in seconds and leap through)
Afterall this is a BIG game we're talking about (8vs8) if you've got 5vs5 then the aliens really aren't ever going to achive a rush against non-sucky marines.
BlueGhost
After the map was finished early the siege settings changed.
hera is a good map, especially with experienced players because of much useful weldables (the security doors are jsut great) , vents and the great 3 level hall.
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You should get some better commanders.
Marines get a man in Processing or Holoroom and a phase gate...
Normally hints at an easy marine win.
Aliens hold them off at Hera Entrance/Reception, and keep them out of Processing...
Normally hints at an even easier alien win.
There are strategic positions in hera, and they must be held/taken. That's how the map plays, that's how ya gotta play it.
People should realize that they cant always go the Defense>Movement>Sensory routes. It does have its disadvantages. One of those is being unable to adequately guard a room.
1) Holo room (double res node) as a gorge, personally, I've gotten two nodes up for the entire game (never taken down) before. a good team of skulks can keep the marines in their base.
2) double siege location ... i've personally never seen any commander do this (although I do know where this place is) and you can't take it out both with one alone.
the main reason marines lose on this map is pretty simple -- they waste too much time on holo room.. hmm..
They then all moved to holo-room meanwhile sending people into processing as a distraction. Held holo-got up turrets ect.
After this they got the general cargo storage res point (without wealding the door) and build turrets there.
All the while we are facing continual assults on processing which we have to defend against and which stops us harrasing their res. We get up two hives, and start on a third as we do this they walk into us with massive groups of HA/HMG who just KEEP ON COMMING.
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looks like they just had a good commander... you may not believe this, but marines DONT need to lock aliens out of 2 hives immediatly to win. looks like you lost because aliens didnt do their job (well enough) to keep rps away from marines, not because the map is unbalanced. if anything, the map is unbalanced in the aliens favor
you were complaining about how cargo storage is so easy to defend from the marine base, yet in your example, they didnt even weld the door!
I've seen that map swing either way in terms of balance... I usually play aliens, and I've been on the losing side of things and winning side of things numerous times.
TO ME, it seems like if the aliens start out in Archiving, they're at the biggest disadvantage. Archiving is fairly isolated from the other two hives, and is semi one-way into holoroom. I believe you can take one of the vent routes into Data Core, but typically you don't really want to hold Data Core itself... but Processing. So, it's a long walk from Arch to Processing... and long walks tend to entail a greater chance of bumping into random enemy opposition... either in holoroom, or DC, or any place really.
If aliens start in Datacore or Vent, you're in good shape. They're so close together, it seems almost unbalanced in favor of aliens. Vent (ducts) and Data both lead straight into Processing, so it's easy to reinforce and defend.
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Nullzero
I haven't seen this suggestion.. Make your own map and see how hard it is to balance out game-play. Building a map is one thing but making it even for both teams with completely different strategies is another topic. Usually when a person makes a map they have to compensate and hypothesize what game-play issues may come at hand, even with a fully detailed sketch and idea. If the maps were-to be created where each side of the map was exactly the same as your opponents(team fortress styled) then NS would be quite boring and unrealistic. Ns mappers try to create maps that are unpredictable and less tiled, cloned, or unifrom . As in the real world, locations such as city streets, factories, and office complexes, are nothing close to uniform in placement or construction. In conclusion, there will never be an "even" NS map because each team's locations differ from the other's. So this is where strategy comes to play.
Hera for instance has three locations out of the marine spawn if you count the vent and a JP marine. The marines have three choices at the start of the game, therefore this randomizes game-play. Same goes with aliens, the game strategy is randomized by placing the aliens in a random hive at the beginning of the round. Therefore, almost a million different strategies can be played by both teams. Some strategies by teams are better than others resulting in either a marine or an alien win, depending on the randomized game. Its kinda hard to explain.
For example, lets say the first move the marines make is by heading to Hollowroom and securing it there, while at the same time the aliens have been placed in the Ventilation hive. The marines decision has given the aliens somewhat of an early game advantage since the skulks can easily rush from the ventilation hive while the marines keep trying to secure hollowroom, mind that the two locations are far from one another but the ventilation hive is rather close to the marine spawn. Lets just say the aliens win this round because they were able to get the data core hive up and had fades destroy the marines who were too concentrated on the Archiving hive location. Now lets just think, what may have the game ended like if the marines had chosen to go for processing first through the foggy corridor near ventilation. How would the game have ended?
Now mix the idea that a random hive is given to aliens and marines are given the choice on the location to overtake, actually depends on the commander more than the marines. and since your more than likely to have a different commander each game the map is completely randomized giving both teams either an advantage one round and a disadvantage another round.
<span style='color:red'> THIS!</span> my community Friend is why we have so many marine players complaining about NS_HERA losses while we have the same amount of alien players complaining about alien losses. It all depends on strategy and chosen paths throughout the round. One little thing can alter the round such as a skulk player missing a hive killing marine. If that skulk had killed the marine the round could have been completely different. Now throw in a mix of Newbie players and rather good ones like you see on most casual servers and the game becomes completely randomized depending on players and their skills. Anyway I think you get the idea.
I have been playing NS recently for days on end on one single server and have come to the randomized theory sice I have tallied many many games and am now suffering from INSOMNIA just to prove this point. SO far this is the tally. Marines have won=23 rounds
Aliens have won=31
So marines have less wins, so what, that still won't prove marines are lacking in the fight. Very strange, the first day I started tallies on random maps such as a server will go through regularly but these are basically from one particular server. Other servers I played on were not counted in the tally, just from one server. Many days in a row I may add that some of the same players showed up. The strange thing is that on my first day of tallies, it seemed almost as if aliens won every round I played, but the next day aliens were being whooped round after round. So I still stand by my conclusion that NS is pretty balanced and that simple random game-play is what leads to a win for one side. Random(blah I said it enough already)
And again it all depends on a maps layout and its artist. For instance, Eclipse seems to be favored for aliens while Hera for marines. But it is quite simply impossible to make a map so even unless it was a unreal tournament1, teamfortress type map where the only difference between sides of the map is color. <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo--> Theres a reason why the maps are not uniform in NS.
We've all seen unbelievable kills before... where one marine takes out 4 skulks, or 1 skulk takes out 4 marines... these scenarios are rare, almost random, but can have a huge impact on the future of the game. Of course individual skill comes into play in a situation like that, but even still, nobody is able to do it on a consistant basis, so of course there must be some kind of random luck involved with it... such as player positions, health, awareness, and any number of other factors...
I think the randomness of it is a good sign that the gameplay is well balanced. Teamplay is the great equalizer of the random factors... a good team can overcome disadvantages, and greater utilize advantages.
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Nullzero
I've won a hell of a lot more games (percentage wise, I usually play alien) as marines than as aliens on hera. If the comm isn't willing to take the cheap option of a double siege point, it seems to require a different type of comm to succeed - a comm who is willing to rush for res rather than (necesarily) hives. Every time I've had a comm who res rushed, I've won that game of hera - the amount of res the marines can hold is obscene =).
Eclipse is my favourite map too (closely followed by caged...as an alien you have to love that map <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' valign='absmiddle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->) - it gets locked down which side will win at a much later stage of the game.
I am aware of this, the day befor we were toasted on NS_Hera by this com I wrote a stratagy shockingly similar to the one used on the marine strat board. Its a tech rush, I know this this is why I'm annoied at Hera its too easy for the marines to tech rush then storm processing.
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->I VERY rarely see marines win on this map-- it's a real fun map when the marines actually do though.. for BOTH teams.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
And yet the marines are getting reduced in early game effectivness and hence ability to phase rush, and the siege from processing will also be much less effective. You might wana find a server with better marines.
<!--QuoteBegin--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Aliens and Marines have almost equal odds of winning that map, trouble is that it becomes painfully evident early on if one side is going to lose.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Er they do? How exactly did you calculate this? In my experiance marines on pubs lose more often than aliens because few good players will command continually. Hera is a map you will lose FAST without a good commander because skulks really will tear you appart if you cant move out of your base quickly as a group and secure a location propperly, if the com just moves you all out to reception and gets bogged down there thinking *we'll just build this res node then we can move on to holo and get a phase up* he's got the wrong idea.
As for using cloaking to hold processing they can still win, they just need to grab holo-room, open the door to general-cargo and hold eather maintience or datacore-alpha (the res outside archivng) assuming they hold datacore-alpha they can now walk into processing with all the available tech hold from fades just long enough to get a phase up and your toast, don't forget the com will be able to spam.
To hold them in base effectivly you need to hold:
Holo-room
Hera-reception
Maintinence
(So your aliens have to be able to kill all their marines with only 1/3 of your team on the job)
BlueGhost
If you don't like it, don't play it. There are obviously enough people in its favor to justify the official status.
That was until I played a game last night. The key to Hera is the door to General Cargo Storage. That door opens access to the entire level via Processing (Not the part you siege from, the other part). Otherwise it's a long slog to other parts of the map. I played two games in a row - one where the Aliens wiped the Floor with the Marines and one where the Marines creamed the Aliens. It was almost the same batch of players, many on the same teams. The two games were so different, it knocked my metaphorical socks off. Now Hera is one of my favorite maps.
I think that Hera is one of the harder maps to learn. With all the twist and 180 turns, it can be hard to understand the layout unless you have a map. Also, as and Alien, Ventalation does not have good access. You have to go through Processing for both entires, making it hard to assault if processing is held.
Anyway. **** and moan. As has been stated several times in this thread, I think Hera is pretty gosh darn balanced and a heckuv a lot of fun to play.