The OFFICIAL Twitter Discussion Thread, For all news/topics/ideas related to the Twitter feed. Options

[Flayra]

just make it so the teleport only works when aliens aren't near the squad you are teleporting to. If your squad is in a safe place you can teleport in, if they are in the thick of it, the aliens can still take them down with out them being reinforced

This might be the way to do it. Halo-style.

[BreadMan]

I think somebody had the idea of there being a sort of "teleport beacon" item you would have to pick up and carry with you if you want to allow marines to spawn on you, sort of creates a squad leader / rally class. I also like the idea that infestation inhibits teleporting in.

All in all though I think phasegates add much more in the way of strategy, and I share the fears of others that they'll just be outmoded by this. Don't dumb down the gameplay by over-streamlining.

[Xerond]

I think somebody had the idea of there being a sort of "teleport beacon" item you would have to pick up and carry with you if you want to allow marines to spawn on you, sort of creates a squad leader / rally class. I also like the idea that infestation inhibits teleporting in.

All in all though I think phasegates add much more in the way of strategy, and I share the fears of others that they'll just be outmoded by this. Don't dumb down the gameplay by over-streamlining.

I like the squad leader idea, however that is handled I'm not sure but it is something to think about non the less.

It's natural to want to shy away from a feature that hasn't been put to the test with NS1... but don't disregard it just yet. It is a pretty good solution to solo marines and enhances marine coordination. I think it's a cool feature as long as it is pretty nerfed as in, can't phase in infestation, no aliens right near by, there is a warm up period(not completely instantaneous), and there is a visual indication that another marine is gonna phase in, like a ghost silhouette glows before it the marine is physically in, the marine has to be still... a bunch of ideas. The use of phase gates for mass transportation of marines needs to still be an essential part of game-play though.

[steppin'razor]

"Charlie added scripting hooks so mods can customize which entities get sent to which players (anyone remember AddToFullPack()?)."

Can someone explain that

[Harimau]

I hate the squad leader idea. The way they're planning to do squad spawning is fine, imo.

[Zek]

All in all though I think phasegates add much more in the way of strategy, and I share the fears of others that they'll just be outmoded by this. Don't dumb down the gameplay by over-streamlining.

It's not the same. Phase gates are only useful when you've settled into an area, squad spawning is about keeping up with your squadmates on the move which is critical for a successful squad system. Squads are meaningless in NS because they can't stay together, every time somebody dies they respawn back in base and get reassigned.

I also like the idea of there being a squad spawning item(not really a leader) that allows spawning around the person carrying it as long as he's not taking damage, but he can be clearly distinguished by both marines and aliens. It adds a lot of teamwork getting one guy to be the squad backbone who needs to be covered to keep reinforcements coming.

This post has been edited by Zek: Mar 8 2009, 08:51 AM

[Xerond]

You know what, after thinking about it some more I do like the "squad item". It adds a different dimension to the ability, res, handing the item off to certain players, etc. Rather than just determining a squad leader...

You know its so hard to try to give a solid opinion on these ideas and game mechanics that keep coming up. I don't wanna fully support or disregard all of them, I just wanna play the game and decide after.

[Fraxinus]

I think somebody had the idea of there being a sort of "teleport beacon" item you would have to pick up and carry with you if you want to allow marines to spawn on you, sort of creates a squad leader / rally class. I also like the idea that infestation inhibits teleporting in.

All in all though I think phasegates add much more in the way of strategy, and I share the fears of others that they'll just be outmoded by this. Don't dumb down the gameplay by over-streamlining.

I think that would be a bad idea. Especially if the "squad leader" is retarded. I like the idea of +use on the IP to teleport back to your squad, all you need to do is use the map to make sure they aren't being attacked i.e. blinking red.

[Pyromaniac]

Requiring a person with the item to deploy it on the ground and having the squad (or one person for a longer time) build the item to teleport the player and picking up the item again is another option, although that is essentially building and recycling a phase gate. Just making the squad all use the item with no build time would work too. Not allowing the teleported person to use a weapon for a short while after teleporting can also stop the squad from getting stronger in combat.

[Harimau]

Or... you could just spawn near your last squad. Provided:
There still *is* a squad (ie. 2 or more players).
The Aliens aren't attacking that squad (it's safe).

[Flayra]

Neat ideas here, thanks for them.

[locallyunscene]

# Max is doing some major Editor refactoring to allow all kinds of different objects to be manipulated (hopefully including Lua ones) about an hour ago

I was scratching my head at this one. Was this a joke and he's talking about expanding Decoda, or are you actually building an overarching editor that includes Decoda?

[badtrip]

I was scratching my head at this one. Was this a joke and he's talking about expanding Decoda, or are you actually building an overarching editor that includes Decoda?

I think he's talking about the map editor.

Edit : http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/news/2008...rlds_podcast_26

This post has been edited by badtrip: Mar 9 2009, 11:50 PM

[INKEDOUT]

"Charlie is looking at map layout prototypes from Andrew with names like "Spread Offense", "6x8 Double", "Inverted" and "Figure 8+ Freebies"."

Any one want to MS Paint what they think these layouts will be like?

This post has been edited by INKEDOUT: Mar 10 2009, 02:55 AM

[Squeal_Like_A_Pi...]

Any one want to MS Paint what they think these layouts will be like?

Ok, fine, we were going to wait and maybe do a blog post about it, but I guess we might as well show one of the layouts right now. So...here you go, one of the layouts for a new NS2 map. You saw it here first, folks.

 NS2maplayout.jpg ( 178.6K ) Number of downloads: 89


--Cory

[Doushibag]

Ok, fine, we were going to wait and maybe do a blog post about it, but I guess we might as well show one of the layouts right now. So...here you go, one of the layouts for a new NS2 map. You saw it here first, folks.

 NS2maplayout.jpg ( 178.6K ) Number of downloads: 89


--Cory

The map looks great! The commander mode view looks a little rough though, guess you're still working on that. Are all of those dots glowies? Seems like a lot of glowies. I guess playtesting will help balance that out.

[Bacillus]

Ok, fine, we were going to wait and maybe do a blog post about it, but I guess we might as well show one of the layouts right now. So...here you go, one of the layouts for a new NS2 map. You saw it here first, folks.

 NS2maplayout.jpg ( 178.6K ) Number of downloads: 89


--Cory

Weird enough, someone has already done that for NS. It didn't exactly copy the pacman layout, but there was MS in the middle and 4(!) hives, one in each corner.

[Xerond]

Which ones, and why are they interesting? What are you considering? Not asking for a "yes we're doing this" ... but just curious what is going on in your head.

[Comprox]

Weird enough, someone has already done that for NS. It didn't exactly copy the pacman layout, but there was MS in the middle and 4(!) hives, one in each corner.

And can be still found here: http://www.readyroom.org/content/view/15/37/

I totally forgot about it till you mentioned it, heh.

[aeroripper]

Ok, fine, we were going to wait and maybe do a blog post about it, but I guess we might as well show one of the layouts right now. So...here you go, one of the layouts for a new NS2 map. You saw it here first, folks.

 NS2maplayout.jpg ( 178.6K ) Number of downloads: 89


--Cory

Omg these new levels are too small!!! I'M SCARED OF CHANGE AND FREAKING OUT?!

This post has been edited by aeroripper: Mar 10 2009, 08:06 AM