AlmightyNu
Aug 20 2004, 09:23 PM
So, currently, the system as i understand it is:
A vanilla marine will usually kill a skulk if at a distance
A skulk will usually kill a vanilla marine if he gets in close
Overall you get about 50-50 in kills of one vs one
And, if one kills another, he gets 1-3 res for his team (or himself)
-------------------------
Now, lets think about this some, the TSA are actually sending humans into this ship, they do not have unlimited numbers to work with, and each marine is a full human being, putting his life on the line.
Skulks, on the other hand, are bred from alien hives created on the spot to kill the marines. They are semi-intelligent, ferocious killing machines, and are, lets face it, very expendable.
------------------------
It is my thought that this value on life should be reflected in gameplay, as it currently is not (a marine dying is a common occurence, and inspires as less emotion than a burnt out lightbulb)
So, to fix this, we must do the following:
No RFK for killing skulks. Period. Killing them is a matter of survival and simply eliminating a threat. The alien hive has nothing really invested in that skulk and this is the best way to reflect it. The skulks should be able to throw themselves recklessly at an attacker without worrying about giving the marines an advantage. If they do manage to bring down a marine, that should be made worth it with RFK, not the other way around.
Also, spawn time for aliens should be faster, give them more to throw themselves at the marines.
On the other hand, marines should get a bit more base health and armor, with med packs costing a bit more. Make it harder to kill them and more worth it to keep them alive. Make it more worth it for skulks to try new things and sacrifice themselves to bring each marine down.
Also, slightly increase marine spawn time to reflect their individual importance even more.
-------------------
I know this is a fairly large change and likely will not be accepted, but i want to hear your feedback anyway.
-------------------
One more step in my TSA are not Kharaa campaign.
Church
Aug 20 2004, 09:46 PM
RFK from skulks is one of the major reasons why medpacks can be afforded. If RFK for skulsk is removed, meds are completely fine. In fact, I'd say that ammo packs need to now restore twice as much ammo to compensate. Now don't forget also, if marine armor and health is increased, non-onos focus might not be a one-hit kill anymore, making sensories first even less useful.
I support removing RFK from the game totally, to bring back the importance of RTs. And then, buff skulks.
AlmightyNu
Aug 20 2004, 11:03 PM
| QUOTE (|ds|meatshield @ Aug 20 2004, 04:46 PM) |
| RFK from skulks is one of the major reasons why medpacks can be afforded. If RFK for skulsk is removed, meds are completely fine. In fact, I'd say that ammo packs need to now restore twice as much ammo to compensate. Now don't forget also, if marine armor and health is increased, non-onos focus might not be a one-hit kill anymore, making sensories first even less useful. |
Good points. First, for the lack of marine res due to no RFK for skulks, increasing their res flow from rt's slightly might compensate, or just get even more res from killing higher lifeforms.
I do agree that ammo packs restoring more ammo would work well with this.
The focus bit does seem to make sense, but if you leave med packs at a higher cost, then a severe drop in health in these new 'important' marines, would be approximately as bad as killing one of the old 'fodder' marines. Plus, if you got in the second hit and killed it, it would be even more important a kill.
Yedi
Aug 20 2004, 11:17 PM
I believe that those recs dont make enough diferense to not warry about rts, ho has a tactic that focuses on killing as much as posible to get recs?
Those little recs are meaningless as i see them, but they make the diference between having a skulk scouting & fraging and having a skulk ... i dont know.. pressing buttons...
As i believe it those things you want to change, are fine. suposedly xenoforms are trying to breed an entyre specie and if they are just big bag (

)hanging from the sky of a strange base every life spend is worth it. Plus, you make it sound like the only way to kill marines is to leap and let them kill you in the air so that your corpse hits them and damages them.... if guess you forget that there are ventilations and shafts.
Wyattx3
Aug 20 2004, 11:19 PM
Correct me if i am wrong, but if you have 2-3 marines in a squad moving around the map. And an equally strong team of skulks try to kill them. Most likely the marines take the most defendable spot for a room. Which usually means that unless you are playing with people right next to u, it is very hard to coordinate a good attack. This means for each of the 2-3 skulks that were killed they get 1-3 res. which can add up to 9 res. Now skirmishes like these dont happen very often. So, why eliminate rfk for killing a skulk when u hardly even get anything to begin with. Now if your complaining about noobs rushing marine start constantly and constantly giving the marines a constant res flow from their deaths, that is another story which has nothing to do with NS gameplay. But on the other hand, there is one thing that i have a problem with rfk gain off killing skulks. When you kill a skulk, where do the nanites come from? Obviously we all know that skulks are made from bacterium produced from the hive. Also, the marines do not have time to carefully take a skulk body and biologically or surgically or chemically create a very complex substance out of an incredibly alien substance. So, for rfk i vote... only when marines create a bio converter that takes 30 seconds to transform alien bodys into resources which have to be delivered to the marine base's Box o' Nanos
Ripur
Aug 20 2004, 11:44 PM
I'm in the 'take rfk out' camp
I think by this simple action, more balance comes to the game. Rfk doesn't seem that important, but when you think the average game probably has around 100 kills, that's any where between 100 and 300 extra res that just appears.
Tougher marines might be a bit overpowering start of game. Maybe it will balance out with the longer spawn times i don't know.
edit: the 50-50 chance of survival comes from games with bite-knockback :;shudders:: With knockback being taken out in the next update, skulks might be more effective killing machines than previously thought.
Church
Aug 21 2004, 04:41 AM
With knockback removed, and perhaps a slight boost in armor (make skulks 70/20 maybe, so skulks can take 2 extra shots) I believe skulks should be able to handle marines much better. But really, why have rfk for either side? This just encourages people to worry overly much about kills, and not about the greater good of the team. Remove it for Christ's sake. Without rfk, the skulks won't have to worry about giving the other team res when they sacrifice themselves to protect an area.
Kwil
Aug 21 2004, 05:28 AM
It's an interesting suggestion.
You could take it even farther.. make skulks, and indeed all alien life-forms, weaker, but greatly reduce spawn times and increase alien resource flow.
This would have the effect in game of making it seem like a never ending rush of aliens coming in.. each one individually weak, but together adding up to do some major damage unless the marines manage to get control of the situation.
As a side benefit, this fits with the story/background better as well.
It'd be a different game, that's for sure.
Zamovar
Aug 21 2004, 08:46 AM
Glockmeister
Aug 21 2004, 12:46 PM
Interesting ideas there AlmightyNu, it would also get the marine thinking more about tactical movement that save lives, not reckless charges.
AlmightyNu
Aug 21 2004, 07:05 PM
Yedi, i know full well that there are other ways to kill marines than just leaping at them. (I would know, i am a high-kill perma skulk that can't bunnyhop). However, the way i see it is that if a skulk should choose to leap at a marine in an attempt to kill him, he should be able to do so without worrying about losing anything more than a bit of respawn time. As well as try any other strange strats that might get him killed. The reason marines should kill skulks should not be res, but to stop them from killing you.
Also, it decreases the effectiveness of turtling in long games, so turrets plowing through skulks wont give you any significant gain besides time.
This is a "lo-fi" version of our main content. To view the full version with more information, formatting and images, please
click here.