Basing Your Tactics Around The Jp Rush?

Grendel · February 2003

<div class="IPBDescription">Start trying new strats BEFORE 1.1</div> It's beginning to sicken me the amount of COMMANDERS who are simply jetpack rushing.

Unfortunately, due to time constraints, unless you chaps wanted to wait another 2 months for NS, we were pushed to release NS before we tested the last parts of the techtree as much as we liked. As a result, jetpacks are somewhat unbalanced (SOME testers already suggested this).

1.1 will be tested until we feel that the game is properly balanced. As a consequence, rapid teching to Jetpacks will not be feasible as a winning strategy. So start trying other stuff. Mini-bases. Controlling resources. Gorge hunting. Pinning aliens down in their hive. Using HA. Crazy stuff like that. Otherwise, when 1.1 comes out, you'll be totally screwed.
<img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif'>

TeoH · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>
It's beginning to sicken me the amount of COMMANDERS who are simply jetpack rushing.
</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

<b>Simply</b> jetpack rushing?

That's funny, because i thought what we were doing was pressurizing alien hive/res/gorges, taking down defense chambers with tactical aggression while we use the diversion as a means of capping multiple res nodes without excessive defence. Controlling the map by attempting to put the aliens on the defensive and delaying them enough, while also accelerating our own tech as quickly as we can to finally achieve a "jetpack rush" before the game slides heavily into the aliens favour.

Because in an organised clanmatch, 6v6, with a competant alien team... if you aren't delaying them as much as possible, and capping a substancial amount of res, you aren't going to get a shot at the hive before your base is overrun. The "Jetpack rush" is actually a tech and resource war. The game is fought over the entire map with both teams attempting to hide res nodes, while finding and destroying eachothers res, and both attempting delay tactics by eating protolabs/knifing DCs. With each attempting to reach their game ending tech before the other team destroys them. Should we complain about alien teams "fade rushing"?

This style of gameplay is actually much more dynamic and interesting than the previous "Phase in each hive, attempt to secure 2 hives" gamestyle. good teams use the most effective strategy available to them, and thats what they are doing, and they'll continue to do exactly that no matter what you 'fix'. And with that attitude to gameplay, they will never be screwed.

SO what is it you are really whining about? You don't like people jetpacking because....

You were playing aliens on a pub once and someone with a JP killed your hive?

You try to JP rush when you play marines and can't pull it off, because you don't understand that the most important part of the strategy is how you work towards the JP attack in terms of delay, distraction and expansion, not the attack itself?

You don't play marines and falsely believe that there is a massive race imbalance, and that simply dropping JPs ensures you can never lose?

You don't know how to use a lerk?

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>
So start trying other stuff. Controlling resources. Gorge hunting. Pinning aliens down in their hive.
</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

If you "Jetpack rush" without doing any of that, you're playing at a laughably low level, and need to try playing against a real alien team. Or you're playing with large teamsizes, which is the REAL issue you should be testing and fixing.

V_MAN · February 2003

Hmmmz I have yet to see a marine team win a clan match without rushing, be it with jetpacks and HMGs or with shotguns right at the start. It makes use of the marines early advantage in fire power. An organised alien team can get the hive up really fast by just capping some res nodes then saving, the jetpack hmg rush came about I would immagine as a direct counter to this.

Grendel · February 2003

ROFLMAO.

You can happily tech to jetpack before aliens reach their 2nd hive off one or two nodes.

Providing you aren't a total incompetent.

I play both sides, not just Kharaa. It's one of the requirements of being NS's Lead PT.

But thanks for the unprovoked flame. I watch the tactics forums as a way of selecting the new PTs for NS 1.1 and such behaviour helps me determine who is and isn't suitable. Pity, because based on your tactical skills, you were on the shortlist.

TeoH · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>
You can happily tech to jetpack before aliens reach their 2nd hive off one or two nodes.
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This isnt about reaching JP/HMG before the 2nd hive, its about reaching JP/HMG before they have the means to easily stop it. Lerks, full carapace and OCs in both their hive and their future second hive. Which you will not prevent unless you are aggressive throughout the early game.

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>
you were on the shortlist.
</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

OH NOS! The forum was a giant popularity contest to get on the test team and nobody told me!!!11

</sarcasm?>

Intruder · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>But thanks for the unprovoked flame. I watch the tactics forums as a way of selecting the new PTs for NS 1.1 and such behaviour helps me determine who is and isn't suitable. Pity, because based on your tactical skills, you were on the shortlist.</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

Now that was not very nice, your first post was slightly attackive, but understandable, and I totally agree with it, and I immidiatly saw the "PT" next to your name and thought, better listen to him.

But then you post a personal attack on someone, no matter what people say to you, if you have a position of power, no matter how small or big, with that position comes responsability and restraint. Unfortunatly you abused the power you have been given by comming back with that reply.

I gather they gave youthat job because of who you are, and your qualities, learn to not bite back, or lower yourself, and never abuse your position, for that is how to lose your position.

Hope this helps

CoStryker · February 2003

Stop argueing - this isnt a CS board <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'>

I'm glad they are looking into jetpacks, I think there are a lot better ways to even out the marines witht he aliens.

Malicious_Dub · February 2003

Honestly don't Marines, and Aliens, have to rush something at some point. This isn't a game about rambos, well most the time it isn't. In every game there will be a point where the commander drops some high tech for people to take down the hive, I thought that was the point of the game.

Vimstl · February 2003

I agree with Grendel that something has to be done about the JP rush. The problem as I see it is that if marines JP rush as soon as they have enough res to build proto, research JP, and buy 3 or 4 JPs, the aliens are still pretty much at the skulk stage. As a result, the JPers are tough to attack. I believe that most people want JPs early in the game, not for mobility, but for skulk defence. When you see or hear a skulk, simply fly up so the little doggie can't attack you.

I agree with JP rushers that it is a powerful strategy and tough for the aliens to counter. As a result, it gets pretty boring.

Sifo25 · February 2003

I once welded two skulks together and sold it for $35 at a New York art gallery.

...

Sorry, just trying to distract everyone. Thanks for the heads up, Grendel.

S

Grendel · February 2003

I replied honestly. TeoH WAS on my list of people to approach to help with 1.1 testing. Mentioning the fact WAS petty, but sometimes I get irritated. I guess staying up till 4AM writing up test reports on the 1.1 map selection, then getting up at 7am to organise the new PT server, getting people to work on a new piece of marine tech for 1.1 and then organising work on an analysis tool for 1.1 playtesting will do that to a person. It would be nice occasionally to get a smidgen of respect for the work I do.

I'm not entirely sure how my original post attacked anyone, given it was starting a thread and mentioned no one. I didn't even suggest that JP rushing is lame. Just that it might be an idea for people to try and avoid getting used to a strategy that will be nerfed in 1.1

littlewild · February 2003

If you are not feeling well, go get some rest rather than screw up and diss people off.

And yes, JP rushing is a balance issue.

TeoH · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (littlewild @ Feb 26 2003, 10:25 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> And yes, JP rushing is a balance issue.  </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> 
Based on the map and starting hive, our team often plays a JP tech style tactic. We keep up an offensive to try and hold the opposing team in their hive, we cap nodes in remote locations and defend them with only mines, the JP attack comes after we have the research and the res to equip several marines with JP/HMG at once, usually going straight after a LMG attack, if not maintained pressure, we all hit the hive. Despite being very fast, and being accompanied by offensive pressure tactics, this attack is still stopped quite frequently. We have also had teams perform very similar strats against us and have a pretty good success rate of stopping the attack at 1 hive, after delaying it significantly by chomping proto and arms labs.

The strategy is not a 1 hit wonder move, it is a gameplan that has to be executed properly to have a good chance of success. When it comes down to it, if you don't either prevent the aliens from defending the hives, or hit before they have chance to, you are going to have a very hard time JP'ing a hive full of OCs while lerks spike you. I'm sure on a public server, with abnormal team sizes, and aliens who run around the map minding their own business with no real overview of what th marines are about to try, it is quite easy to perform a JP kill without any attempt at res control or pressure. But consider a situation with organised teams, you will know a few minutes into the match what the marines are attempting to do, and your team collectively knows how they should go about defending against it. You see things you aren't going to get in a typical pub, group raids on marine buildings for example, and aliens organised around a hive to recieve a party of jetpackers, the situation is very much different when aliens actually make the effort to defend specifically against the JP strat, the match can still go either way.

You may consider it 'unbalanced' in the sense that other marine strats might not be worth considering, but the same situation could be said some time ago about phase lockdowns to 2 hives, and im sure after however long playing 1.1, a limited number of 'most effective' strategies are going to emerge. No matter what how you try to avoid them.

littlewild · February 2003

Balance issue as in the sense when <b>pub</b> players can pull it off regularly and consistently on a 16 player server to win a game when all they have is one resource node.

If you execute the "most effective" strategy and nothing is able to stand in your way, then you have a balance issue.

XCan · February 2003

I just played 3 games as kharaa, lemme tell you this, the marines had jp/hmg before we had 3 DC..... It was on a 16 player server. And no the marines didn't kill our gorge a single time, they didn't push, they just sat on their 3 capped RTs and shot everything that came near. Then suddenly all marines defending the RT are gone and you chomp the RTs happily when suddenly your hive is underattack and beep beep beep u die. <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'>

PvtLohne · February 2003

See...THIS is what happens when huge sweeping changes are made in the over used, under understood raped-description of a word like "Game Balance".

I'm not trying to take this the wrong way, but from what that first post said, it looked for all the world like "I just found out a tactic that works, and becuase of that, it's out." I'm trying to take this as intelligntly as possible, since it IS the head play tester, and thus one would assume would know what he was talking about, but for godes sakes, how else /can/ I take it?

It sickens you? What, that commanders are using their abilites and options, and it's /working/? It'd be one thing if you were talking about an exploit, but this isn't just fair, it's what the marines are supposed to do. Try to win. In what way do you see this as something to be taken out? Why is it, in your opnion, not fair? Should we be looking for other things that work to be taken out? Perhaps HA? Perhaps guns?

Come on. I'm not trying to be an ****, but nothihng gets me upset faster than people that decide from on high that an entire strategy isn't fair, and is thus both invalid and in need of erasing. Espically as if the marines were walking war-gods as it stands. Tell you what. If you want it to be fair, remove the skulk rush too! That works. That's effective. That's annoying. Never mind how it's realistic, fun, and challenging. Just glue all skulks to the floor for the first 10 minutes of every game. Then, with no more jet packs, or neuterd jet packs, both sides are forced to wait until they've both upgraded themselves, forcing the entire game to become "Who can out tank the other faster" even more than it is /allready/.

Maybe Grendel is on to something, and in years to come I'll have a post it note on my monitor that says "Thank you Grendel for making NS better than it was". We'll see.

Aminal · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (XCan @ Feb 26 2003, 11:19 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> I just played 3 games as kharaa, lemme tell you this, the marines had jp/hmg before we had 3 DC..... It was on a 16 player server. they just sat on their 3 capped RTs and shot everything that came near.  </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> 
Then your gorge sucked, I can get four res towers, 2DC's and be well on the way to 2nd hive before marines get JP's.

Number of gorges I see doing 1DC straigth away - they deserve to get JP rushed.

anyways - thats Kharaa strategy. This thread is about JP rushing.
I would consider JP rish to be a rush to equip two marines (and two marines only) with Jetpacks & hmg as soon as possible. With L1 weapons upgrades it takes two HMG clips to kill a single hive with no DC's so you could do it with one good jetpacker if necessary.

a battle across the map over several res points isn't a JP rush, thats controlling resources, which always seems to be the best tactic imo.

FlatlineUTD · February 2003

Thanks for the heads-up Grendel. I get tired of being told to JP rush every time I'm on a pub, so I usually try to vary my tactics a bit. It's all about the versatility, you know?

The resource denial/gorge hunting tactic is a personal favorite of mine, but I've only had a competant group of marines who were able to pull it off <b>once</b>. <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif'>

Grendel · February 2003

My point is that it's well nigh impossible to defend against with a competent jetpacker. The Kharaa do not have access to the tech tree required to effectively combat against it by the time marines can have a JP/HMG. It's analogous to a situation in an RTS where one team can build aircraft before the other has access to Anti-Air technology. If the marines only got there by capping a load of nozzles, that would be fair enough. But it's possible to reach that point in the tech tree of ONE NOZZLE. Ask any member of sYn. Better yet, watch one of their demos.

For a gameplay point of view, I also am not particularly keen on the readily available nature of JPs, since they devalue teamwork. The only reason why they are so cheap is for a fairly dumb reason I am not going to go into now. They worked better when they cost the same as HA. The idea of the marine tech is that each item is useful for a particular role. As it stands, jetpacks are simply a bit too uber. It's not like they'll be removed or made useless. But there's something wrong where JPs are more popular than HA, regardless of resources.

matso · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Aminal @ Feb 26 2003, 12:00 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> </span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (XCan @ Feb 26 2003, 11:19 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> I just played 3 games as kharaa, lemme tell you this, the marines had jp/hmg before we had 3 DC..... It was on a 16 player server. they just sat on their 3 capped RTs and shot everything that came near. </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>
Then your gorge sucked, I can get four res towers, 2DC's and be well on the way to 2nd hive before marines get JP's.
 </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> 
LOL - you don't know what you are talking about!

Understand the concept of RUSH here... the marines build IP, Armory, arms lab, armor upgrade, RT, RT, armory upgrade, weapon upgrade, Prototype lab, jetpack upgrade.

That's ALL (well, an unsecure marine builds a second IP and drops a couple of mine packs). And that's 276 resources. Subtract the 100 starting res, and you only need to earn 176 resources. With three RT's and 8 players, that's only 3 minutes. At the 4 minute point, the JPs are done, and the marines now save up on res to get 3 JP/HMG's, which takes a further 1.5 minutes.

At the 4 minute point, the gorge has JUST finished building his first RT.

When the jetpackers hit the hive at the 6 minute point, the gorge has JUST built the second RT.

The only way to have built 4 RT's and 2DC's and have 40 res left over is if you are playing on a vogruu server. Which is not what we are discussing here.

Ph0enix · February 2003

Some quotes. And yes, quoting myself is egotistical <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif'>

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>Yep, jetpacks are going to take longer to get and be a bit more expensive in NS v1.1. They are going to be the official counter to the Onos. </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

- Flayra.

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>I have no problem with rush wins. As long as there's an adequate counter, and there isn't any reasonable counters against an earlier JP/HMG rush ATM.

Have you played StarCraft ? It's like Paper/Scissors/Stones.

An early rush strategy will beat an early economy strategy. However an early defense will beat a rush strat. A earlier economy will beat an early defense. In SC.

These kind of matchups aren't quite in NS yet.
</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

- -_Phoenix_-

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>[off-topic]Well i'm not sure what the defination of balance is but I can define un-balanced.

When something is so good you (as in the player) wouldn't not do it (or take it), its unbalanced.

So as an example, 2-hive lockdown was unbalanced in 1.03. There was no point in doing anything else. It was fairly easy to do and pretty much guaranted the game.

Actually i'll have a stab at balance as well. That would be when each tactical and strategic option has advantages and disadvantages which balance i.e. big risk = big reward, small risk = small reward.

Again for example, 2-hive lockdown is a pretty big risk in 1.04. If it works, you've got a good chance of winning, but its not guaranted. If it fails you probably lose because a 2nd hive will come up and you'll be un-upgraded vs. fades, which is very bad

If you lock one hive and upgrade, it's the safe option. You'll probably be able to do it, and keeps you at least on even footing with the aliens, but isn't going to win you the game by itself [/off-topic]</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

- -_Phoenix_-

In 1.04, HMG/JPs falls into the 'it's so good why bother doing anything else category'.

Shadow_Hunter · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>In 1.04, HMG/JPs falls into the 'it's so good why bother doing anything else category'. </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>
- -_Phoenix_-

And I think thats the big idea behind changing JP's.

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>It sickens you? What, that commanders are using their abilites and options, and it's /working/? It'd be one thing if you were talking about an exploit, but this isn't just fair, it's what the marines are supposed to do. Try to win. In what way do you see this as something to be taken out? Why is it, in your opnion, not fair? Should we be looking for other things that work to be taken out? Perhaps HA? Perhaps guns?</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>
- Pvt|Lohne

Yes, it works, but its become an almost exclusive strategy. It seems to me that the whole point in changing JP's is to open up other viable options for winning, none of which are as uber as the JP rush is now. Yes, as either side a rush is inevitable. But i it really that much fun to do the same thing every time? And I read something else about Fade rushes. If you have nothing but Fades coming at you, you're not in that much trouble. With HMG's, teamwork, and a competent comm, a force made up of only Fades isn't at all impossible to take on. Given, the teamwork and competence things are rare on most pubs, but it can be done. But I digress. The point of this isn't to cripple the marines, its to open up gameplay the same way as the mini-nerf of PG's in 1.04 did. And yes, new "best strategies" will come up. But its much more fun to have "strategies" than a "strategy."

rebo · February 2003

Once again TeoH is the only one speaking sense in this thread. An Effective JP rush is a combination of strong resource contol and zone managment. Sure its a 'tad' too cheap, maybe up the JP cos and improve lerks somewhat but its not a broken strategy, its a VERY advanced strat that requires strong team work to pull of on a good alien side.

uscmDarkFox · February 2003

Thing is, pheonix, that sometimes a tactic can be perfectly well balanced and still be the *only* tactic worth even considering. This is when all other strategies are not good enough.

From the limited amount of NS I've played (started on 104), I've never ever seen marines win in any games where some kind of quick jetpack rush strategy was not used. Out of at least 30 games, marines have only won 1 in my experience. Now, I understand that public and clan games are a different kettle of fish, but it might be worth thinking about the implications a jetpack nerf would have on public servers.

Oh, and BTW, I've played with some experienced players, I'm not just here to whine about imbalances. I will say this much though - I always play the 'alien' races in computer games. NS is the only game where I play the humans given a choice, why? Because I much prefer a desperate cliffhanging battle to a stomping ego mission. In the many public games I jump around, picking aliens or marines at the start is basically picking winners or losers.

I'd like to see heavy armour, shotguns etc all brought up to the level where they rival the jetpack/hmg combo, rather than JPs being nerfed.
As a public-server-hanging, moderately new player, you might want to dismiss this opinion. There again, public servers do make up a significant portion of the NS community, and players like me frequent them.

~DF
ps. First post, BTW. Hi everyone. I've been reading these boards for about a fortnight, very interesting stuff, lots of players that can actually grasp grammar *and* computer games. Very nice to see. If you want to know about me, I'm a mad FPRTS game fan, having gone through the ropes with spacehulk -> battlezone -> battlezone2 -> C&C renegade, and ending up here. Battkezone 2 is still a big faveourite of mine.
I run my own NS server, and the ping advantage has so far let me sit at the number one spot with a nice kill/death ratio. Not many mega-vets come in there though. Stats are here:
<a href='http://www.uscm.fsnet.co.uk/uscm/games/ns/stats.html' target='_blank'>http://www.uscm.fsnet.co.uk/uscm/games/ns/stats.html</a>

Khaim · February 2003

Jetpack rushing= a problem, now unfortunatly comm has been taken from a skill to a monotonous clicking on jetpack and hmg for some people, i pride myself in being one of few comms who does not jetpack rush ever. Let 1.1 seperate the commanders from the clickers.
-Khaim

Nicator · February 2003

JP rushing from one node can only be done if the gorge tries to get very early DCs. If the gorge does that, well, getting rushed is his own fault. JP rush is a tad overpowered at the moment, but not by so much as people seem to think. The problem is people still play as if they're trying to counter a two hive lockdown, IE early DCs, no lerks. This is a very good way to get JP rushed in 1.04. 1.04 is more about controlling res. <i>Never</i> let the 'rines hold 3 nodes. Get as much res as possible before getting DCs. Get a couple of people to go lerk when the hive starts building. Consider a second gorge after the second hive starts to build to get extra res/put offies up[ around the hives. You might even consider getting defences up at the hives before building them, because it doesn't take much in the way of defence to stop a jper (depending on the hive, obviously) [note that I have never tried this last one, but I've been thinking about it]. Get a load of dcs up under the hive if you have spare res.

JP rush is extremely powerful, but it's also quite easy to counter. The problem is that most people are very slow to create counter strategies to new strats. I suspect that by the time 1.1 comes along JP rush will be perceived as somewhat less uber, because by the time it gets here the best counter strategies will have had time to circulate the community.

To be honest, I think maybe nerf the jetpack so that everyone gets about the same ability as the 55-60 fps people do atm (I get 70 at the res I play at, and it is a bit too good), and increase the cost to 13. That would probably do it.

Khaim · February 2003

13? why 13? o.O? but yeah *if* its possible all fps to gameplay issues should be removed.

Mythr1l · February 2003

Rushing in most strategy games is the most effective tactic. almost all strat games are based around securing resources and important locations at the start of the game, and then teching/attacking the enemy with upgraded units, and NS is no differnt. Rushing is a very effective tactic because it hits the enemy when they are not prepaired for it, in NS case when aliens do not have carapace thus making them easy targets for the first few mins of a game, thus rushing in NS and keeping aliens DC/Gorge dead is the best way to win a game.

However, if you are to sit back, secure res points hive's ect.... well in my experiance, by the time you have secured the first hive and have it defended with a couple of sentrys + mines, aliens should have a number of lvl 3 carapace skulks, in the second hive area, if not backed up by OC's. this means while marines are trying to defend both their main base (vital) and the hive they have secured (also important) they are also trying to secure the 2nd hive, all the time costing the marines res to be put into sentrys and siege guns, because againsted a good alien team if you leave any area undefended it will be destroyed, unfortunatly this means marines must spend lots of resources on sentrys, 5 sentrys = 100 res nearly + TF costs, and phase gate ect... they cant get their tech tree fully going, sure maybee lvl 1 guns will go up, but not much else. Now aliens have what 14 + 14 + 14 to reach the skulks maximum tech for the first hive, which is 42 res total, marines must spend 120 res + 45 res for an arms lab to match this.

Killing the jetpack rush wont stop rushing, there will always be new ways for marines to rush, because if you sit back and wait, within 5 mins aliens will have carapace lvl 3, and you will be lucky to get out your base (unless your teams players are superior to them in which case why not go own a newbie server?)

on some maps, tanith and bast especially it may be viable to secure the double res node and 1 hive then tech up and pit your HAHMG's vs fades, but again if you spend time securing area's of resources you will be the ones being attacked, and leaving the enemy gorge(s) to their own devices. Simply the most effective target of any marine team should be to keep pressure on the aliens hive, right from the starting buzzer. and as the start advantage for marines makes skulks so much weaker, they will probably need at least double the marines numbers to hold them off, meaning that while aliens are pinned in the hive fighting for their life, the other half of the marine team can wander around the map unchecked and securing areas.

Nicator · February 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Khaim @ Feb 26 2003, 03:20 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> 13? why 13? o.O? but yeah *if* its possible all fps to gameplay issues should be removed.  </td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'> 
just a number I pulled out of thin air. Even so, I think the costs need to be increased somewhat due to the currently oft-ignored strat of the JP/lmg rush. Kit the whole team out with JPs, and lmg that hive down. It's cheap, extremely effective (particularly if the aliens have basic offense chamber defences up. It's better to have them targeting one cheap player out of many than a lone expensive one), and more importantly it's <i>sustainable</i> off very little res. If the JP gets nerfed the improved flight characteristics of the lmg JP (I'm pretty sure that the weight affects characteristics of the jp, at least it feels that way) will counter this somewhat. An increased cost will make this strategy (and I've seen it work exceptionally well) slightly less godly.

tsabrak · February 2003

In my humble opinion, changing jet packs and the method to get them is not the optimal solution to this imbalance. A better change (in my opinion at least) has already been mentioned for 1.1, and that is the change to the way lerks can fly, and making them less awkward. Adding that small change would allow the strategy to be viable, but not overly potent, as (as someone else mentioned) "anti-aircraft" weaponry would now be available. In any case, I do appreciate the fact that the playtesters work very hard, and look forward to the changes in 1.10. Keep up the good work.

Akuma · February 2003

*nod*

On a map like Eclipse or I think maybe Nothing you can hold 2 or 3 res nodes VERY VERY easily.

With those res you can blaze to JP/HMG and POP goes hive

Basing Your Tactics Around The Jp Rush?

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