I Have Figured It Out !
Shadowics
Join Date: 2002-11-07 Member: 7652Members
Join Date: 2002-11-07 Member: 7652Members
<div class="IPBDescription">the reason for the 2.01a,b&c patches</div> When I first played NS 2.0, it seemed like it was great. The most balanced of any NS version yet. Aliens won a little more than they lost, but I attributed that to the fact that the old stand-by of marine strategy, the HMG rush, was no longer as effective.
When someone said they were releasing a patch for 2.0 I though he was joking. Now here we are not even 2 weeks after release and there have been 3! patches. What happened to all that time that went into playtesting 2.0?
I couldn't figure out why Flayra would want to nerf aliens so badly. Then, last night, I realized the truth.
Think of every alien movie you've ever seen, ever book you've ever read, what do they all have in common? It's simple, Humans win. In all the Alien movies, Humans win.
So what's that's have to do with NS? simple, 2.0 was balanced. 2.0c is balanced so that, just like the movies, Humans win. After all, who would want to live in a universe ruled by Kharra? Go go TSA!
When someone said they were releasing a patch for 2.0 I though he was joking. Now here we are not even 2 weeks after release and there have been 3! patches. What happened to all that time that went into playtesting 2.0?
I couldn't figure out why Flayra would want to nerf aliens so badly. Then, last night, I realized the truth.
Think of every alien movie you've ever seen, ever book you've ever read, what do they all have in common? It's simple, Humans win. In all the Alien movies, Humans win.
So what's that's have to do with NS? simple, 2.0 was balanced. 2.0c is balanced so that, just like the movies, Humans win. After all, who would want to live in a universe ruled by Kharra? Go go TSA!
Comments
Rah rah sis-boom-bah!
<!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif'><!--endemo-->
Not everytime. If marines won everytime then it wouldn't be much of a game. More like watching a movie that you already knew the ending to. I'm thinking he's going for something like a 75% marine win rate - so if a really good alien team scrapes together they could still pull off a win on a pub server. Then the purpose of the game becomes simple - go marines to shoot stuff and blow stuff up and have fun - go aliens if you want a serious challenge where you'll probably just end up dying over and over.
We all tend to think of the people higher up as just n00bs themselves, since answers seem so obvious when we are basking in ignorance. However, in the big scheme of things, Flayra knows what he's doing, so give him the respect he deserves.
Personally I think he is going for whatever gets everybody <b><i>whining about everything and making insulting sarcastic posts</i></b>. Seems to be working...
Aaron - If I wanted to whine about everything I would probably pick electrifing TFs or something. I'm not whining, insulting, or sarcastic. At what point did I say that what Flayra's doing is a bad thing or that the game was better off in 2.0 when it was balanced? What I'm doing is equivalent to stating a fact - it's just the explaination for the changes that have been made. There's no reason for you to make posts like that.
JRP - While she wasn't exactly human, she still beat the aliens so the humans won.
First, it's not a bug. They added this because res activation time was DULL.
Second, the game is horrifically imbalanced in terms of clan play... Not because it's overall problematic, but because the problem is so early on right now, which just screws up the rest. It's almost completely balanced, let Flayra play around with it... He'll figure out the solution.
Commie - ooo, Independance Day, good one, I hadn't thought of that. That's kinda like the old 1.04 days where aliens would be kicking butt, then a lone JP+HMG would fly into the hive and take it out. Oops, marines win. Starcraft is kind-of the grey area in between, but that's another game, not a book or a movie.
It has to do with early alien tech rate... A bunch of things were changed at the last minute to make the game more fun, and the testers only had 4 days to test that version. As a result, there are problems with time to first fade, time to second hive, time to onos, etc... It's all wrong. And it's all connected to rfks and alien tech rate. Or, I do believe that's the most popular hypothesis right now (there is no unanimous agreement).
The fact is, though, pub play is simply the error-prone version of clan play. It's almost Platonic like that. That also means, over time, as pub players get better, things become clearer, and the bad ones get culled out, the game steadily approaches clan play (though never reaches it). Thus, clan problems are pub problems.
2.01a is still unbalanced, but not so much so, although it is also less fun for aliens.
2.01b is balanced imho, without losing any of the fun.
2.01c is a joke :/
Actually I think 2.01c was an attempt to try some new things rather than balance the game.
<span style='color:black'>i wish they had this smile on the forums. I wouldn't have to link it that way</span>
I still love the muffins outta plain' ol' 2.0, though <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->.
I do, however, think he shouldn't change so many variables at once. It's really difficult to tell why the game plays differently when there's 4 different things that could be causing it. I don't know if Flayra is trying to get balancing over with or what- but a slower process where he changes one variable at a time might be more accurate.
Then again with one thing at a time the changes might not be noticeable, but would gradually add up over time to have bigger effects. This would leave you a ways down the line with an inbalanced game and a bunch of things contributing to that- but no way to tell what exactly is wrong.
Bah, whatever. I think Flayra is doing fine and he probably knows more about balancing than me. =/
-JohnnySmash
if you want it to be like the movies, with the marines winning all the time why not just...
giv3 th3m t3h ulim4te w34pon!!! - wat h4ppens is the marines are ti3d into the ships main fram sumhow and wh3n they all die the WHOLE SHIP BLOWS UP, KILLING ALL THE ALI3NS!!! - OMG THIS WOULD RULE, MARINES WOULD NEVAR LOOSE!!!
We should assume that a "marine loss" is actually the codephrase that the government uses to refer to "Spent $5 billion on a nuke to nuke the Khaara, but we want to be politically correct".
In 1.04, Marines had the advantage over aliens. A lone marine could JP+HMG in the hive and take out the aliens. Everything is right in the NS universe. (Where 'right' means TSA is beating back the Kharra, just like in the movies)
So for 2.0, Flayra gives the aliens neat stuff, like being able to be any lifeform, and giving lerks spore from the start, and Fade's metabolize, etc... Obviously the purpose of this was to make the game more interesting for aliens so they would keep playing even though marines were still winning. But the changes were to much, and worked too well, and aliens started winning a little. So Flayra has to come back and nerf the aliens back down so marines can still go and destroy them easily.
And if anyone else wants to write about "I'm sure Flayra knows what he's doing", keep in mind that's I'm not arguing here. I haven't said it was better before he went and nerfed the aliens. This is just my idea as to why he nerfed the aliens.
2.0 still rocks though <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo-->
I never said NS was like a movie, it's just the idea of Humans winning in movies, books, and games. After all, who would want to see their own species getting destroyed? You're right about marines turrets farming - stalemate. That's why we're probably going to get a NS 2.01d sometime soon, then aliens will be nerfed even more and marines will have no reason to turret farm.
And you're right <u>2.0</u> rocks.
Yay for the English-Kharaa dictionary! (Coming soon to all good bookstores last Thursday the 56th of Januember. Second dimension on the right.)
<!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'><!--endemo--> For the zerg yes. The ol' queen of blades laughing and slaughtering the remaining humans (yey).
[sarcasm]Yea Flayra wants marines to win Jus7 1ike tah m0vies[/sarcasm]
I love to read about the different testpatches (and they <b>are</b> just tests, as said before no real patch has been released yet) but if people keep getting upset because of them then it might be better if the beta forum is closed. Flayra doesn't have any responsabilty to answer and defend things he is just experimenting with so please give it a rest. Maybe the moderators should start locking all threads like this one that takes place outside the beta forum...
That said...
Communist, finaly someone else who understand the glory of starshiptroopers and the depth it actually have. <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif'><!--endemo--> Read the book if you haven't allready. It enchanses the facist tendencies with humans nukeing civilians from a second alien race. I think that most miss Heinleins criticism against military societies when they see the movie.
Give Flayra some credit... And if you can't, I invite you to try and do a better job of creating a mod. Almost like a bus-load of back-seat drivers who don't have their licenses yet trying to tell the bus driver which pedal is the accelerator.... Except of course they can't agree on which one it is...
I too prefer playing Kharaa, simply because the extremely varied alien abilities allow smart players to employ smart tactics. Marines are relatively limited in terms of being able to exercise their think-muscle until difficult to use weaponry such as GLs and JPs come along. However that being said being part of a well organised and succesful marine team can be equally, if not more, gratifying.
As for the filmability of the long marine endgame, you could (with the right cutting and editing) turn it into one of the many movies the invariably end with the humans holding out at their last bastion of peace and humanity blah blah blah.... Cmon even Saving Private Ryan did it... The movie started with the allies breaking through the axis attempt to drag out a long end game (camping at the beaches firing explosives randomly), and ended with the allied squad drawing out their round by camping the bridge...
Camping does make good movie material....