Marine's Guide To Ns_bast
Ardesco
Join Date: 2002-11-09 Member: 7831Members
Join Date: 2002-11-09 Member: 7831Members
<div class="IPBDescription">or: how to win</div> <b>Disclaimer: this pub is written with well organized pubs, lan games, or even newbie clans in mind. Some of the methods discussed require team organization, and will obviously not work if your marine team cannot be coordinated. Do not use this guide on newbies, as their heads will explode</b>
(note: To all the good clannies (you know who you are), you will probably not learn anything from this guide, and you may even object to some of the ideas placed herein)
ns_bast. The bane of many marines. The marine start alone has 3 entrances of attack for the aliens, and the vent to the marine base cannot be permanently welded (gorge spit can open up the vent). With that in mind, the marines have a lot going against them given the deisgn of their base alone (compared to ns_eclipse, which has 2 doors and a very straightforward base design), defending the base at bast can be quite a task.
<b><u>Defending the Base</u></b>
Given the above disadvantage, plus the fact that the comm chair can only be accessible to a marine via an elevator lift (causing some close encouters with skulks who are attacking the CC), marines seemingly have a tough time on base with defense alone. However, there are a few things that can alleviate this issue.
<i>Base design</i>
ns_bast has a unique advantage of being one of the few marine starts that has stuff that you can build ontop of. For example: You can build an infantry portal ontop of the light fixture near the Command chair, making it difficult for skulks to immediately kill the marines popping out.
The second means of base design in base is hiding structures. Structures like the arms lab can be hidden in the dark crevices of one of the corners of the base, although a clever skulk will inevitably chomp down on the arms lab. the observatory usually end up being the best structure to hide, because it is almost always the most easily destroyed/first to go down structure on any marine team.
<i>Mine placement</i>
The vent in bast can be mined to buy yourself an additional cheap defense against incoming skulks Get a couple teammates to boost yourself into the vent, and mine up the small part of the vent where you need to crouch. Tripmine mode is preferred, although if you alternate between claymores on the ground and ceiling, that can also provide for an excellent vent defense.
The revolving door and the elevator are both difficult sections of the base to mine. One way to resolve this problem is to always keep the elevator up so that skulks can't take advantage of the wide open space it leaves your base exposed to. Secondly, mine up the ladders so that skulks can't try and easily go up into the base that way short of moving the elevator. Because the revolving door area has such a high ceiling, however, mining that part of the base can be difficult. Instead, you should mine the part of marine start leading out into the revolving door, or focus on mining structures (like the res node) near the double doors instead. Remember, if you drop your pistol or lmg onto a set of mines, they will IMMEDIATELY set the mines off, so be careful if your marines mine up your base and you're giving out equipment.
Also, putting the elevator up has another advantage besides making the ladder the only usable means of going up to the marine base from that direction--it makes all the vents that lead out to the elevator shaft useless, as the aliens will still need to use the ladder to get up into the marine base.
<b>Getting resources</b>
Resources on bast are organized in an interesting fashion. Every node is within reasonable walking distance to a neighbor node. Engine room + aft junction, all the refinery nodes, atmospheric / feedwater.
Therefore, your defense of your nodes should be organized flexibly. Take nodes that follow these pairings, and you won't go wrong. If you need to defend these nodes, send marines out on a patrol (patrol atmospheric and feedwater!) The marines only need be within earshot of the node to hear a skulk chomping down on it, or, if you notice the node's attacked, at worst, the walk to the attacked node is less than 20 seconds (faster if you bunny hop). The nodes in refinery can all be checked from a far away distance, but getting to each individual node is a task, as the refinery hive is quite large. Also, if a node gets constantly attacked, try getting your marines to mine up a particular node. It'll help ease up problematic skulk attacks at that particular node.
<b>Launching the attack</b>
So, now that you have comfortable number of resources, how should you attack the hive? Well, one sensible means of attacking the hives is with jetpacks and heavy weapons. Both refinery (and to a lesser extent) engine hives have a lot of mobility for a jetpacker to fly around. If the aliens start at refinery, all the better. Its extremely difficult for aliens to mount any kind of defense in the refinery hive given its immense largeness. Engine is a little better, since it has a low ceiling and lots of pipes to get in the way of jetpackers. However, the vents can prove advantageous to a resourceful jetpacker in attacking engine hive. Feedwater is a little different. Not only does it have a low ceiling, but jetpackers are flying around in an extremely tiny room. This makes jetpacking in feedwater an all or nothing business--send 5 guys with hmgs + jetpacks to take down the hive in no time splat, or don't do it. Take another approach--seige, HA + hmgs, whatever floats your boat.
Also, it makes a lot of sense to cap nodes along the path of your offense towards the hive. Example: if you're attacking feedwater, capping atmospheric couldn't hurt, since you're mainly pressuring the alien hive which is in front of your forces.
Also, aft junction is a good place to organize many attacks, given that it cuts off 2 main avenues of attack to the aliens (the revolving door and the vent), and it also has paths to all the hives (engine hive thru the opening door, refinery thru either the ladder/lift or either one of the white doors, or feedwater thru the side emergency ladder to drop down into tram tunnel.--this last ladder is often overlooked by most players; its right next to the ladder/lift that leads down to refinery.
For all those seige enthusiasts:
You can put a turret factory in marine start, and build seige turrets in the vent that leads to engine to hit the hive (accessible thru the marine elevator vents)
a turret factory placed in the small vent next to atmospheric/feedwater can provide for simultaneous defense of atmospheric and seige of feedwater.
A clever jetpacker can actually build a turret factory ontop of one of the blue pipes in atmospheric. It is nearly impossible for any non-aware skulk to spot the tf this way.
In refinery, you can catch most aliens with their pants down by building seige up in the small connecting hallway that's next to the catwalk. That path ends up being unfrequently patrolled by skulks. Building in there affords 2 advantages: Its difficult for any skulk to approach the turret factory (given that you need to do some serious wallclimbing and jumping to actually get inside that small hallway--and most of the time, you'll be exposed, out in the open where marines can shoot you). Second, a seige turret from that turret factory can hit the refinery hive (although you might need to build out on the catwalk for it to hit the hive).
Again, that's all the ideas I have to contribute at the moment. If anyone wishes to add onto this guide, feel free. This is to help all those marines who have problems defending/winning on bast.
(note: To all the good clannies (you know who you are), you will probably not learn anything from this guide, and you may even object to some of the ideas placed herein)
ns_bast. The bane of many marines. The marine start alone has 3 entrances of attack for the aliens, and the vent to the marine base cannot be permanently welded (gorge spit can open up the vent). With that in mind, the marines have a lot going against them given the deisgn of their base alone (compared to ns_eclipse, which has 2 doors and a very straightforward base design), defending the base at bast can be quite a task.
<b><u>Defending the Base</u></b>
Given the above disadvantage, plus the fact that the comm chair can only be accessible to a marine via an elevator lift (causing some close encouters with skulks who are attacking the CC), marines seemingly have a tough time on base with defense alone. However, there are a few things that can alleviate this issue.
<i>Base design</i>
ns_bast has a unique advantage of being one of the few marine starts that has stuff that you can build ontop of. For example: You can build an infantry portal ontop of the light fixture near the Command chair, making it difficult for skulks to immediately kill the marines popping out.
The second means of base design in base is hiding structures. Structures like the arms lab can be hidden in the dark crevices of one of the corners of the base, although a clever skulk will inevitably chomp down on the arms lab. the observatory usually end up being the best structure to hide, because it is almost always the most easily destroyed/first to go down structure on any marine team.
<i>Mine placement</i>
The vent in bast can be mined to buy yourself an additional cheap defense against incoming skulks Get a couple teammates to boost yourself into the vent, and mine up the small part of the vent where you need to crouch. Tripmine mode is preferred, although if you alternate between claymores on the ground and ceiling, that can also provide for an excellent vent defense.
The revolving door and the elevator are both difficult sections of the base to mine. One way to resolve this problem is to always keep the elevator up so that skulks can't take advantage of the wide open space it leaves your base exposed to. Secondly, mine up the ladders so that skulks can't try and easily go up into the base that way short of moving the elevator. Because the revolving door area has such a high ceiling, however, mining that part of the base can be difficult. Instead, you should mine the part of marine start leading out into the revolving door, or focus on mining structures (like the res node) near the double doors instead. Remember, if you drop your pistol or lmg onto a set of mines, they will IMMEDIATELY set the mines off, so be careful if your marines mine up your base and you're giving out equipment.
Also, putting the elevator up has another advantage besides making the ladder the only usable means of going up to the marine base from that direction--it makes all the vents that lead out to the elevator shaft useless, as the aliens will still need to use the ladder to get up into the marine base.
<b>Getting resources</b>
Resources on bast are organized in an interesting fashion. Every node is within reasonable walking distance to a neighbor node. Engine room + aft junction, all the refinery nodes, atmospheric / feedwater.
Therefore, your defense of your nodes should be organized flexibly. Take nodes that follow these pairings, and you won't go wrong. If you need to defend these nodes, send marines out on a patrol (patrol atmospheric and feedwater!) The marines only need be within earshot of the node to hear a skulk chomping down on it, or, if you notice the node's attacked, at worst, the walk to the attacked node is less than 20 seconds (faster if you bunny hop). The nodes in refinery can all be checked from a far away distance, but getting to each individual node is a task, as the refinery hive is quite large. Also, if a node gets constantly attacked, try getting your marines to mine up a particular node. It'll help ease up problematic skulk attacks at that particular node.
<b>Launching the attack</b>
So, now that you have comfortable number of resources, how should you attack the hive? Well, one sensible means of attacking the hives is with jetpacks and heavy weapons. Both refinery (and to a lesser extent) engine hives have a lot of mobility for a jetpacker to fly around. If the aliens start at refinery, all the better. Its extremely difficult for aliens to mount any kind of defense in the refinery hive given its immense largeness. Engine is a little better, since it has a low ceiling and lots of pipes to get in the way of jetpackers. However, the vents can prove advantageous to a resourceful jetpacker in attacking engine hive. Feedwater is a little different. Not only does it have a low ceiling, but jetpackers are flying around in an extremely tiny room. This makes jetpacking in feedwater an all or nothing business--send 5 guys with hmgs + jetpacks to take down the hive in no time splat, or don't do it. Take another approach--seige, HA + hmgs, whatever floats your boat.
Also, it makes a lot of sense to cap nodes along the path of your offense towards the hive. Example: if you're attacking feedwater, capping atmospheric couldn't hurt, since you're mainly pressuring the alien hive which is in front of your forces.
Also, aft junction is a good place to organize many attacks, given that it cuts off 2 main avenues of attack to the aliens (the revolving door and the vent), and it also has paths to all the hives (engine hive thru the opening door, refinery thru either the ladder/lift or either one of the white doors, or feedwater thru the side emergency ladder to drop down into tram tunnel.--this last ladder is often overlooked by most players; its right next to the ladder/lift that leads down to refinery.
For all those seige enthusiasts:
You can put a turret factory in marine start, and build seige turrets in the vent that leads to engine to hit the hive (accessible thru the marine elevator vents)
a turret factory placed in the small vent next to atmospheric/feedwater can provide for simultaneous defense of atmospheric and seige of feedwater.
A clever jetpacker can actually build a turret factory ontop of one of the blue pipes in atmospheric. It is nearly impossible for any non-aware skulk to spot the tf this way.
In refinery, you can catch most aliens with their pants down by building seige up in the small connecting hallway that's next to the catwalk. That path ends up being unfrequently patrolled by skulks. Building in there affords 2 advantages: Its difficult for any skulk to approach the turret factory (given that you need to do some serious wallclimbing and jumping to actually get inside that small hallway--and most of the time, you'll be exposed, out in the open where marines can shoot you). Second, a seige turret from that turret factory can hit the refinery hive (although you might need to build out on the catwalk for it to hit the hive).
Again, that's all the ideas I have to contribute at the moment. If anyone wishes to add onto this guide, feel free. This is to help all those marines who have problems defending/winning on bast.
Comments
As the hive builds the marines charge out through the revolving door and everything goes 'boom'
BlueGhost
Seige in the marine base will no longer eliminate all the defenses necessarily at engine. Defense structures placed underneath the hive, as well as offense chambers placed ontop of the "plateau" will remain in place, as will the hive. Although, knocking out that many defenses via seige might be a good time for your marines to rush in and take control of engine.
ns_bast is actually one of the easiest maps to play on as marines.
Defendint marine base is actually a very ez task to acomplish.
Have someone rush the revolving door with mines in hand.
Just put a set of mine in the vent and simply have the lone marine guard the revolving door.
And the elevator shouldnt be much of a problem if u keep it all the way up.
Simply put a set of mines on the 2 ladders.
Also, unlike other maps, whenever a marine leaves the main base in bast, he/she has to either crawl thru a vent go thru a revolving door or up a ladder in order to return to spawn. This just ends up delaying any defensive response if there are a lot of marines scattered across the map. With phasegates weakened and made more expensive in 1.04, a coordinated group of skulks can rush in, take out the phase/base guard, and chomp down while the marine team is forced to hussle back.
Also, if the aliens start in engine room, they're already in aft junction by the time you give the mines to the marines who are placing them.
If the aliens start anywhere. Relocate to atmospheric for the two resource nodes. If feed is clear, make for feed and you get another extra two RTs. Both RTs at feed can be covered easily. Tech and steam roll them. If they occupy feed, it should not be a problem to immediately siege them from the outside hallway.
Bast=one of best marine maps ever. Can we say JP + REFINERY +holding one other hive (engine for example)=marine win?
Also, if no one else has noticed this, placing OC chambers anywhere on bast while tournament mode is on seems to make the OCs slowly self-suicide every time they fire (i.e. they self-damage until they dissapear).
Feedwater is hard as heck to jetpack around, and engine with the pipes is not much better when aliens get a lot of chambers up.
Feedwater has the exact same hive entrance design as engine, sans the vents. A smart skulk, however, can navigate the vent in feedwater/tram tunnel to go around and hit marines from the vent access in atmospheric.
You actually can jump under the cc and press use to enter it. Then when the cc is under attack you can click eject and you will be able to shoot the skulks from below through the grate.
the other day i was on LGSO or wutever the server is wif Zerg!!
and he was comm
we were losing due to another "awesome" commander who we finally kicked out... well they had fades and i chased a fade by myself.. emptied 1 clip lmg and 1 pistol.. and as he ran past the furnace on his way back to feedwater from atmosphere... i reloaded my lmg and let it all rip as he tried to jump over a Wall of lame his teammate made... rofl.... quite amazed i kliled him cuz there were quite a few DCs too <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'><!--endemo-->
then another time l8r on zerg gave me a HMG and i hid on the way to feedwater.. as 3 other teammates lured a fade into atmosphere.. then i back stabbed him and we cornered him... lmg bullets flying along wif my HMG.. 100 bullets of pure hell for him <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo--> hahahah... well i didnt officially get the "kill" but im quite sure it was mainly cuz of my heavey machinery <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo--> hahahahah
bast.. i used to hate the map.. but now ilove it more and more.... extremely possible for comebacks.... especially wif hives like refinery where huge battles can take place.... but the only thing i reccomend is getting rid of some of the vents that go to PORT engine and not make it so easily siegable.. or make it so the vents are all small tight ones... therefore no building can be built inside <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo-->