Skulk Upgrades?
Aldor_Farren
Join Date: 2003-12-19 Member: 24557Members
Join Date: 2003-12-19 Member: 24557Members
In Classic games, I just don't see the point of evolving upgrades when I'm a skulk! I always just wait for a higher lifeform, so as not to waste 2 res on every spawn. Yet I see people evolving as skulks, so I have to ask: does it really do that much, at least enough to get you 2 kills in order to make the evolution worth the res? Cause I'd rather just save up and run back to the hive after getting injured!
Carapace: 20 more armour (not enough to bother?)
Regen: good only if you are lucky enough to survive the first encounter (plus you could run back to the hive to get healed anyways)
Redempt: you're risking losing those 2 res every time you take it
Silence/Cloak: cancelled by motion tracking
SoF: tells you whether or not to attack those footsteps you heard (is it 1 marine or half the team?), but won't help you to survive once you do attack
Adren: doesn't do squat until that 2nd hive is up
Focus: ok, maybe that's worth it, but if you're caught in a long corridor, you're screwed!
So what's the big bennefit to taking those early upgrades over saving for an early fade?!?
Carapace: 20 more armour (not enough to bother?)
Regen: good only if you are lucky enough to survive the first encounter (plus you could run back to the hive to get healed anyways)
Redempt: you're risking losing those 2 res every time you take it
Silence/Cloak: cancelled by motion tracking
SoF: tells you whether or not to attack those footsteps you heard (is it 1 marine or half the team?), but won't help you to survive once you do attack
Adren: doesn't do squat until that 2nd hive is up
Focus: ok, maybe that's worth it, but if you're caught in a long corridor, you're screwed!
So what's the big bennefit to taking those early upgrades over saving for an early fade?!?
Comments
The point is, not all upgrades are useful all the time, that's why you have a choice. Look at how the marines play, and choose your upgrades to suit. No MT? have fun with silence and cloak. Rambos? Focus and carapace. Lots of unelectrified RTs? Adrenaline for better building smashing. Save your fade for when they rush armor upgrades, or electrify their RT's.
I should also point out that I'm the guy who will spend a hundred res littering sensory chambers all over the map so that none of my teammates will have to spend 2 res for the upgrade. Perhapse that's a little bit of flawed judgement, but oh well.
A scent of fear skulk is the 2nd best scouter in the game (SoF lerk is the best imho, fade is too noisy).
A bhopping celerity skulk is faster than anything else in the game.
A regen skulk is probably the best early base harasser the aliens have in terms of benefit/risk.
Silence skulks change games.
A smart cloaking skulk will be able to camp you everytime.
Silence/cloak/SoF skulks are only effective should you be lucky enough to come up against a lone scouting marine.
Celerity might save you, but the important thing is to get the kills, not to be able to run away, right?
Regen is nice, but it won't help you *much* to survive your encounter when those rines come and try to stop you from taking out their buildings!
A gook skulk will allways take it adv of any kind of upgrade, thats why you can pwn co_ games in the beginning (just look what diff it makes wether you have carap or celerity in co_ games or not )
A smart cloaking skulk will be able to camp you everytime. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Please let me elaborate on theses :
Silence is the most effective at disrupting reinforcements. It doesn't contain the marines , but it greatly decreases their life span outside their starting area. Surprised marines have a hard time defending themselves , even with armor 1.
Being totally silent , a skulk can better hear noises , be them footsteps or structures being built. Marines busy covering the hive's entrances and building a TF/PG outpost will be totally surprised by a silent skulk. 360 ° visual cover is rare on pubs , just like movement first strategies.
Cloaking is the deadliest containment tool. Cloak in pairs , with a SoF gorge to tell you where the marines are heading to. With proper containment , the marines aren't leaving their spawn for a while , 99% alien map control.
1) You're not moving
2)You are cloaked from a sensory tower
3)You are cloaked by the sensory upgrade (you won't show up on MT if you are walking while cloaked)
Silence rips up marines. So does cloaking. Ambushing with silence/cloaking gets you an extra 1 bite in on good marines and 2 or even 3 or more on bad ones.
Celerity + bhopping = hard to hit skulk = dead marines
Adren + leap = hard to hit skulk that takes less skill to pull of = dead marines
You can think of it in terms of rfk. If for each upgrade you spend 2 res for, you get 1 kill (1-3 rfk, average 2), then you're breaking even. If you get two more kills thanks to the upgrade (I sure as hell do with silence or adren leap!), then it's definately worth it!
Also, if you get 2 upgrades instead of none, and it allows you to kill one marine in a fight rather than not killing any, that isn't necessarily a waste. You lose 2 res, but the marines have a dead player, which will slow them down. If you aren't saving for anything expensive, then this is probably worthwhile.
A) They've researched tracking,
B) You're moving,
C) You're not cloaked, and
D) You're not in the same room with the marines.
I don't know about you, but when I'm a marine, I track skulks as much by sound as I do by sight. Lose sight of a silenced skulk and you're probably dead.. either that or left injured, lower on ammo, and RFK-less as it takes off back to its hive to heal. Either situation isn't good for your team.
I've also found carapace can make the difference between going to the hive under my own power to heal or going to the hive via the spawn queue. So for me it's actually a net benefit, as I'd effectively lose the two resources anyway if I were in the queue.
Regen I find is generally only good for a skulk when the marines are bad shots. Nip in, nip out. Repeat.
If we get early movement, I will very occasionally go for adrenaline if I'm planning on playing a scout role. Lighting up the whole marine team can be fun. This is more helpful for my team on the darker, twistier maps. (eg, mineshaft). I don't get celerity as a skulk as a general rule.. I find I lose control of where the heck I'm going.
I don't tend to use redemption unless the marine team happens to be a bunch of rambos, and even then as more of an annoyance tactic than anything else. But to really work as that, it has to go off multiple times, which means never engaging a group of marines. (Of course, after the third or fourth time being redeemed, I can just imagine the curses the team is having to put up with.)
Personally, I don't like focus. I can see its use, but I'm not a good enough aim to use it effectively. The extra wait time kills me. SoF and Cloak as a skulk can be oodles of fun. SoF tells you who to ambush, Cloak lets you ambush more effectively.
So there are reasons. You just have to balance them out with what the teams are doing.
At 2 hives .. cara+adren is my choice :-)
On topic, I regen skulk if I'm in a vent (this is for NS) I cara skulk if I think about it, which is never and redemption, -no-.
This is how I see the upgrade choices for a skulk:
DC: Worst chamber for skulk.
MC: Good but still can get better...
SC: Woooo! Be scared marines.
DC: Cara is 4 bullets, which is....not that great for me personally. Regen: I get it sometimes, redemption: -no- never get this besides gorge and I usually cara gorge though, I hate redempt fades in NS as they are useless in this version compared to a regener.
MC: Silence, speaks for itself. Adrenaline: I get this when I kill RTs a lot, I get this at hive 2 as well, celerity is decent but silence is better in my opinion unless you cannot stalk at all (walk in the middle of a large room idiotically)
SC: Cloak........delicious. Focus: .......Be afaid SoF: Be very afaid.....
SC+Focus=angry commander.
The problem with the chambers is though:
DC: Benefits only high level life-forms
MC: Helps everyone but not anyone specially (besides gorge and lerk at hive 2)
SC: Makes skulks and gorges happy, lerk with focus is something to scream at, fade isn't that bad with focus (provided you are rushing another hive) onos with focus is frightening.
On the topic of SC upgrades...
Most people think focus reduces building damage effectiveness, I don't do the math but do this in-game.
Focus Swipe: 2 bars from a turret
Swipe: About 3-4 swipes for 2 bars from a turret
So, onos with focus still have their building damage ability and this will allow them to gain vital adrenaline if you are more of a support onos. (Shockwave....mmmm)