Ghouls Balance Mod
GhoulofGSG9
Join Date: 2013-03-31 Member: 184566Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Reinforced - Supporter, WC 2013 - Supporter, Pistachionauts
Join Date: 2013-03-31 Member: 184566Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Reinforced - Supporter, WC 2013 - Supporter, Pistachionauts
Steam Workshop: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=768899664
Mod ID: 2DD47A50
This mod contains various prototype balance changes based on ideas of the NS2 discord balance channel.
Current changes can be found at https://github.com/GhoulofGSG9/NS2_BalanceMod/blob/ghoulsbalancemod/README.md
Updates are released at Monday. So we can watch the impact of new changes over the week and analyze/review them at the weekend.
In case something doesn't work out it gets immediately removed at the next update.
Code @ Github: https://github.com/GhoulofGSG9/NS2_BalanceMod/tree/ghoulsbalancemod
Feel free to leave feedback
Mod ID: 2DD47A50
This mod contains various prototype balance changes based on ideas of the NS2 discord balance channel.
Current changes can be found at https://github.com/GhoulofGSG9/NS2_BalanceMod/blob/ghoulsbalancemod/README.md
Updates are released at Monday. So we can watch the impact of new changes over the week and analyze/review them at the weekend.
In case something doesn't work out it gets immediately removed at the next update.
Code @ Github: https://github.com/GhoulofGSG9/NS2_BalanceMod/tree/ghoulsbalancemod
Feel free to leave feedback
Comments
Human behaviors generally adepts over time to the environment. This also applies for Natural Selection 2 players. The way people play differs based on the server, community and region. So I suggest to everybody to play/observe players at as many NS2 servers as possible to get a good understanding of how the game currently is played.
Some changes might not affect all players equally.
Ghoul pls.
Edit: Merged posts. No need to post twice at once ~Ghoul
Is this a typo maybe? If I understand it correctly, you DEcreased the spread of the SG, so the effective range increased, while at the same time aliens have bigger hitboxes. I would arrive at the opposite conclusion...
Duh. But that doesn't mean players who ignore gameplay elements should be factored in when balancing. You should't balance the game around niche strategies.
THIS IS A MOD.
Home pls.
Some of these ideas are being implemented as a mod to test how they would work and "if" the "could" work... there is no certainty behind any of it.
No there is no typo there, read it again please. The effect of changing the spread vector distance is very similar to changing the choke of the shotgun:
So in other words this mod turns the former improved cylinder shotgun back into a cylinder one
_________Improved choke:____Full choke:
10yds:___15 inch spread______9 inch spread
20yds:___26 inch spread______16 inch spread
30yds:___40 inch spread______26 inch spread
Which means, if the mod implements the latter, then at the same distance it has a smaller grouping (is it called grouping with SG too? or only with separate shots?
It's the other way around we decrease the spread pattern distance = spread increase at same distance.
Which bring the on shot distance back to were it was before the hit box change what the shotgun change is all about. The hit boxes were tweaked to make the single hit registration of the rifle and mg better but was never intended to improve the SG damage output.
Got it, these were the keywords... thx Ghoul x)
I know it is a mod, but it is a mod to for test things that COULD BE IMPLEMENTED in the base game. That is what I am talking about. Is there any date we can get on when UWE will stop to work on balance and gameplay. Because such a mod would not be needed then.
So you are going to increase the spread of Rifle, Pistol, Exo and every other weapon too?
But the hit reg didn't get any better, only the balance was changed.
Wrong, hitreg did get better.
Not a single person can say that playing marine doesn't feel better now, Is it perfect? no, does playing alien feel worse? sure, but that needs to be tweaked which is whats happening with the shotgun change.
the game had/has a lot of problems, A LOT OF PROBLEMS.... to fix said problems, shit needs to change. if you are someone that previously complained about hitreg or anything like that, you should embrace the changes, because they are addressing those exact problems, and when the game has its balance messed with, its to counter the fact that something that was broken is now fixed (or at least better).
shooting the rifle feels WAY better than it used to, fact... but it meant that other aspects of the game tipped the scale... so now they are rebalancing the scales, once the scales are realigned you'll see that the changes were for the better... but this shit takes time (especially with a small team that works part time), patience is a virtue bud.
Also I believe feelings can never be a fact.
The only fact here is that hitboxes are bigger than the model.
Keep in mind that Natural Selection 2 is a multiplayer game. The hit box changes fixed those situation where a player hit the edge of a e.g. a fast moving skulk. You have to keep in mind that the client and world you see is about avg 200 ms behind the server and even a slight move of the skulk at high speed could cause edge shots to miss. As the server rules in these decisions the player even though he hit the skulk just fine from his view does not so from the servers view.
Players generally describe these situation as hit reg issues even though technically they are not.
Working around network delays with slightly larger hit box boundaries is common practice in games where the server decide if something is a hit or not.
"Fixing" technical problems or lag problems with things like that are non-solutions.
Also I would still like to know if there is any goal you want to achieve with that gameplay und balance changes before you call it finished or if there is any kind of deadline for that. Or are you just working so long on it until you think it is fine and have no time frame?
"200ms laggers" have it much worse...
he isn't taking about "laggers" as you put it... he is talking about the round trip of information going from client to server and back again which creates a delay in the game... on your screen it can look like you shot the alien model, but the server shows that you haven't... this comes out as a "no reg" which is infuriating to most players, especially in the competitive scene.
By increasing the hitbox size, you negate the delay effect... put simply by increasing the hitbox, you are more likely to have the server agree that you hit, when you "see" that you hit.
To say that this is not a legitimate way to fix a high speed FPS no reg issue, just shows how little you know about the topic at hand, were this a slow game I would agree, but the principles are not the same. increasing the hitbox size IS a fix.
Does that FIX mess with the balance of the game? yes, so now it needs rebalancing. "oh revert it, its a bad change", no it isn't, its a good change and has fixed a problem people complained about constantly... now its only complained about "occasionally" <--- that is an improvement... once the game is rebalanced, the game will FEEL better, and with it FEELING better people will enjoy the game more.
This isn't rocket science, I'm not sure at what point you're not understanding it, but feel free to point it out and i'll go more in depth and try to explain it more.
side note: Saying you don't care about how a game feels is just plain wrong, if you didn't care, you would play at 20fps, with 500+ ping and not care.
When you aim for perfect balance, you discover it's a moving target.
Perfect balance is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellent gameplay.
NS2 is a moving, breathing thing. We have to be willing to constantly evolve. Perfect balance is constant transformation.
I hope we don't see changes with the scope of b250, or the likes of healthbars and hitboxes. I also hope they keep trying to improve things as long as possible because work is never done.
One suggestion regarding Silence. I think silenced movement AND attack would be fine, if the damage feedback sound (eg "pain") is more noticeable, even when taking low amounts of damage.
Silence nerf is more punishing for less skilled alien players, as they miss their attacks more often and give away their position.
Also, may I suggest an a small increase (20-30%) to Lerk non-gliding air control (with just the strafe keys)?
This would also make silence prevent more "wtf potatoes" moment where a skulk would appear ~~"out of nowhere" (as the frequency a marine need to check his surrounding would decrease).
Alternatively, jumping could have its volume reduced, while not reaching 0, as it would do for movement/running.
Red
This would discourage people from ever learning walljumping. Thus I think it's a bad idea.
FYI the shadowstep's default res requirement was** quite high and iirc, higher than the default blink (like 18 energy or something like that)
**Source: NS2 Combat. Assumed the same
I am well aware that the activation costs for Shadow Step were higher (actually 11 last in vanilla). But Shadow step didn't have any usage costs at all.
Well seems like it's not. However, if this makes it into the game, I am out of this, thanks for games everyone.
What offends you so much in this mod?
The hope is that it won't only buff competitive players in direct melee without meta but every player in general. The question now is how much does it buff them because given on the impact the values possible need to be changed.
This mod exists to test out ideas a dedicated group though would make the game more balanced, fair and fun. We want to see how these ideas effect the overall game play and if those effects match with what we though they would do.
This mod buffs Fades heavily (blinking costs half!!!!) which is absolutely not needed.
Cloaking is now possible on crag Hive. Cloaking is terrible and has always been terrible when it was given from an upgrade, the only Way to cloak should be via a shade. But this makes it even worse, not even requiring a shade Hive for that anymore, having cloaking skulks together with carapace skulks, ye great idea. Also it makes vampirism now useless for anything else than skulk or maybe in certain Situation gorges. While before it was a valid pick for every lifeform, it is unusable for Lerks, Fades or Onoses in this mod.
HMG needs a buff, but even with the weight decrease it is still useless.
Drifters are invisible. INVISIBLE. Looks like Ghoul can't remember the glorious times when they were used as mobile observatories, impossible for marines to spot. And yes, I know it is only on shade Hive.
The by far most terrible change in this however is the biomass research option on first hive lol. Bio 4 on hive 1, Bio 7 on 2 hives. Even worse, the last biomass research is incredibly expensive with 60 Tres, makes it completely inconsistent with the other biomass research costs. This thing is trying to give aliens an advantage where they don't deserve one and where they should not have one. Oh, you fail to get second hive? Well then there is no second hive tech for you!! But as always, UWE doesn't like a game following consistent gameplay rules and better fucks it all up.
This mod is the reason why I can't play pub at the Moment, because populated servers run it.
Actually, trying to fix problems with evasion was tried first. UWE gave lerks more air control and made the control key a more evasive dropping maneuver. The problems with lerk persisted. I can't think of much more that could be done to improve evasiveness without increasing speed. I am personally reluctant to increase speed because it would make hitreg, interp, and network related issues worse. I think increasing lerk eHP is preferable to increasing lerk speed. Skulk eHP was adjusted twice after the hitbox was enlarged. The first value they tried was too high, but the second value works well. As I understand it, the lerk HP buff in this mod is not just because of the enlarged hitbox.
One of the most discussed balance topics is Onos explosions. This problem stems from multiple recent changes that have affected lifeform accessibility and survivability. The hitreg improvements in b279, the introduction of healthbars, and the increased size of hitboxes have all hurt lifeform survivability significantly. This has increased the difficulty of playing Lerks and Fades for lesser skilled players, hurting lifeform accessibility and therefore pushing players to instead save for the safer to utilize Onos more than they did in the past. By improving the accessibility and survivability of these lifeforms, would reduce the frequency of Onos explosions.
Of all lifeforms, the Lerk has been affected the most, as their most important role in the round is during a crucial and fragile period where marines are currently dominating precisely due to said changes. There have been a few ideas that would improve Lerk survivability, which in turn would improve accessibility:
1) Increase lerk eHP from 215 to 240. This would be done with an increase in base HP from 125 to 150. Health per biomass would also be reduced from 3 to 2 so that Lerks are strongest early game. Armor would would be left as is because veterans typically disengage when they run out of armor and NS2 should not increase engagement times, just escaping survivability. This increase in eHP makes its so marines have to land 2 more LMG bullets to kill a lerk.
2) Better communicate when a lifeform’s armor hits 0. When armor hits zero there should be an audio cue and visual cue. This should lower the skill floor on all lifeforms because more players will know when to disengage.
3) Fix Lerk animations so that really good Lerks are easier to track and kill - many of these oddities (arguably animation exploits) are what separate average Lerks from really good Lerks.
Together, these 3 changes should improve accessibility and survivability of Lerks without making strong Lerks even stronger, and hopefully by increasing said viability, will reduce the need and occurrence of Onos explosions.
Ghouls balance mod seems to have only included idea #1. I think this is a necessary change. Increasing speed is not a preferable alternative. There are limited options to further increase the evasiveness of the lerk. If an eHP buff is can not done, then the lerk needs a role change because it no longer fits its traditional role in NS2.
and regarding to you Nordic: You mentioned the onos explosion. I want to add a few thoughs to this. Imo it has not really to do wie balance. It is more that:
-Rookies think onos is the hyper, mega, best , super lifeform ever that can kill everything. it costs the most and from much games we learned: highest cost= best upgrade or lifeform. So poeple always want an onos.
- rookies cant handle lerks and fades probably. Onos is way easier to master.
We should try to get more rookies in other lifeforms than onos. Make lifeforms easier to handle and to learn.
And i have to agree with Home that cloaked drifter were removed because of good reasons. dont bring them back pls. A 8res mobile, invisble obs is too powerfull.
Although i know that competetive is a different balance than pub i would suggest you to take a look at the current comp mod in terms of balance.
The question is: For whom are you balancing for? The newbies that die against skulks not because of balance but because of skill? Or are you balancing for the elite that knows the game better than their own home?
The measurment should always be made on the maximum and the balance should focus at the maximum possible.
Always think: What should a "perfect" marine be able to do? And balance it around it.
Some things the ENSL-Comunity would change are:
Remove Contamination FFS!!!
REmove the buff of boneshield. Really.
Strenghten the hmg.
Add bunnyhop for gorges.
Remove healthbars.