Why is the human team so bad?

[temple]

I have tried to hold off and not bring it up. I know it has been debated over and over.


I don't think the Human team, by design, is poor.  I think the human team should *in theory* be more powerful and flexible than the alien team.  But in reality, the human team's players alway ruin the games and hopes to win.  

People say that humans are easier to play than aliens but I disagree.  Due to the design, aliens better suited for the overall game.  They are good anti-structure or anti-personnel.  Humans are more refined, more specific, but better at individual aspects of playing.  The problem is that human weapons requires more know-how and skill than aliens over the course of a game.


My conclusions are simple:


Turrets create weaker, less skilled human players.  Turrets are better at defending the base than a lot of the players.  Many human players do not improve because turrets are effective at defending them and prolonging a game when one side should lose.


The weapon selection and variety confuse players.  Players end up killing each other or more generally, people use weapons in the wrong situations or in the wrong way and it hurts the effectiveness of the team.  

My suggestion is simplifying human weapons or the weapon selection some how.  I know how people like to flame noobs and suggestions but I'm just speaking from frustraion of seeing the same issues every game.






Detailed feedback (added after thread started)

The whole coordination myth is what pisses me off and signifies the issue at hand.  

Alien classes are a lot more straight forward.  The hardest thing to learn is dretch'ing and pouncing without getting killed.  Outside of that, there is no learning curve about swiping people.  Bonus if you can swipe the head.  That's the barebones of aliens.

Humans on the other hand have more nuances.  The devil is in the details.[/size]

The lucifer cannon and the flamer are the most retarded weapons to use in defending the base.  But there is no feedback or way to understand that without a lot of experience.  A chaingun and even a 150 credit shotgun (both S1 weapons, might I add) is better at defending a base from goons or tyrants than a luci or a flamer.  Its hard to learn that without knowing the underlying mechanics of the game.  Its not obvious.  For aliens, its is obvious that advanced goons and tyrants are better than basiliisks or maraders.  And hell, its isn't that hard to play the S3 aliens, anyone can snipe or swipe.  But compare that to using a lucifier cannon well or a Battlesuit/painsaw/grenade rush and you should be able to agree that humans require something more at the same stage as aliens.  

Using the DPS values of a weapon makes a lot more sense in terms of attacking alien bases.  The pulse laser is the best bang for you buck in killing alien bases due to its DPS AND the range AND the clip size.  A painsaw or a flamer can dish out a lot of DPS (in raw numbers, so can the chaingun).  But alien bases can have aerial structures that make those weapons useless.  And the chaingun, despite its dps, has too much spread to be effective.  The luci is definitely good at base attacks but the clip size, cost, and limited offensive use makes it relatively as good as a pulse laser.  Its highly variable and it takes experience to choose the best weapon/armor combination in regards to credits.  So, even when you know some of the mechanics of the game, its still not obvious in terms of weapon choices.  

Take the human S1 weapons.  The lasgun is IMO the most flexible weapon at S1 hands down.  Damn near hitscan (if not hitscan), large clip, no reload, range, and good dps.  A shotgun has the most bang for your buck at close range.  The major reason why I prefer the lasgun is simply the clip size and range, which the shotgun is completely weak in comparison.  The Massdriver is only good for camping and killing dretches, but in a long hallway, the basic rifle is nearly as effective in skilled hands (in fact, the rifle has more DPS than the massdriver).  The MD is just faster at killing dretches.  The chaingun has the best DPS against larger aliens than any weapon but the need for time in order to unleash the DPS causes it to be a high cost/high loss weapon against skilled aliens.  For the money, a shotgun and a lasgun is just as good considering playing against skilled people and flexibility over a chaingun.  And that's just S1.

Like I say, aliens aren't better at coordination and humans are worst in terms of players.  Humans have more to coordinate.  Aliens make the best use of their team due to their classes being easier to choose and use.  Humans have a lot of potential in terms of weapons or armor but that advantage is easily wasted by less than experienced players.

My suggestion is simplify weapons.  Such as combining some weapons as having an primary and alt fire like the lucifier instead of having an individual version of each.  Like combine the rifle and the mass driver or the lucifer and the flame thrower.   Maybe combine the shotgun with a grenade launcher.  These are just examples to illustrate the idea.


Would those improvements make humans more powerful... hell yes.  But at this point, only high skilled players would exploit the advantage of the change but they are the ones that already know how to win.  Its the noobs that need the extra help so the games are closer and more competitive.  Otherwise, its camp fests with 1 or 2 good human players carry the whole weight because people are getting owned and not realizing why.  I'm not going into specifics because this isn't about that, its just about why humans suck so bad.  I'm just pointing a possible solution.

[_Equilibrium_]

people like variety. i guess i am one of those people too.

[kozak6]

Simplifying human weapons?  How?

They are already pretty simple.

I think what the humans (and Trem as a whole) lack is coordination and communication.

[next_ghost]

The answer is that they usually lack the most important thing: clue. Making the human weapons any simpler than they're now won't make humans smarter, it'll just increase the level of stupidity in human team. :roll:

[Henners]

I think its because as noted so many times before the "good" players tend to escape to the alien team...

[Panda]

simplifying human weapons? Aren't they quite simple already? Only shoot and reload button.

Also in all your retardiness what the fuck do you think about "turrets being better at defending" ? ofc they are. When placed well these super accural thingies are quite imba.

[[EVIL]Unknown]

only reason humans end up sucking is because of "lack of skill"

this game is already completely balanced.

skill is the only balance issue here. and cant be balanced in itself.

 :wink:

[Plague Bringer]

Humans, individually, are weak, however, in numbers, they are a very formidable force. Humans lack the communication, coordination, and stategy required to work as a team. More teamwork = more human wins. Aliens, individually, are strong, and they are stronger in groups. Tremulous is a team vs team game, most of the time, humans dont play as a team and that is what cripples them and makes them weak. Oh, and were you suggesting that we remove turrets from the game? If we were to take out turrets, then we would most definitely have to remove acid tubes also, for balance reasons.

[MiDiaN]

Also in all your retardiness what the fuck do you think about "turrets being better at defending" ? ofc they are. When placed well these super accural thingies are quite imba.

True that... their hit % is 100%. the power of imbalance.

[janev]

Another reason the humans have a hard time is because almost all humans are afraid to lose their credits by attacking enemy base. If more people made use of the human stage 2 advantage humans would win more.

[Paradox]

On any good game on any server, if there are players who have played a long time together on the human team, versus a team of aliens that is equally skilled, the humans will always win, usually before s3. Humans are more powerful than aliens.

[temple]

On any good game on any server, if there are players who have played a long time together on the human team, versus a team of aliens that is equally skilled, the humans will always win, usually before s3. Humans are more powerful than aliens.

I said that.

[Ryker]

Humans aren't weak, it's the people who are playing them who are "weak", or better unskilled. i can kill dragoons and tyrants easily with chaingun and pulse rifle,ask anyone i played against and they'll tell you how easy i take em out. Most humans i see play aren't good with those weapons, and they can't strafe to avoid being hit. Also, most choose to use the luci, which i find to be a poor weapon for killing.

[Paradox]

Here is what i use for weapons on the human team, i hope it is useful for you.
Luci Cannon: Best used for taking out bases, not much use against anything larger than a goon.
Chaingun: Sucks for bases, but can mow down anything bigger than a granger.
Pulserifle: A mix between the luci and chaingun. More accurate, slower shots.
Flamer: Just for being an ass and killing dretches.
Grenade: Dont leave home without one of these
(m)Ass Driver: Useless after s1, unless you want to be a jacktard that bothers aliens, but never kills them. This is the campers gun of choice, because it allows you to project your vision out of the base, without leaving the base.

[Mispeled]

I think its because as noted so many times before the "good" players tend to escape to the alien team...

This is quite true.

[techhead]

Perhaps the weapon descriptions should be a little more noob-friendly.

[Xonya]

It isn't... Skill needed...

E V O

[Stof]

On any good game on any server, if there are players who have played a long time together on the human team, versus a team of aliens that is equally skilled, the humans will always win, usually before s3. Humans are more powerful than aliens.

Didn't the alien team win a comparatively much bigger number of games during the treamleague?

[Neo]

Yeah, but that doesn't mean anything.

the reason being the good players started as human, got bored of feeders and went alien. Which they became more comfortable using and less skilled as humans. The problem now is that the reverse is happening, thanks to all the brainless 'omg aliens = teh win' threads every noob and his dog want to play alien for extra kill points.

[M&m&M]

Nothing is too broke in Tremulous if you ask me.  Humans suffer more from lack of cooperation in that conflicting builders will make junk or worse....decon the reactor without cooperating/prebuilding "Oops I didn't think they'd attack that fast".  Aliens still suffer it in suicide dretches feeding the enemy to S3 too fast.

The only thing bad about the weapons is the advanced ones aren't always clear-cut better, and they're too wacky/cartoony.

I'd prefer MORE customability to the human weapons like ammo types and mounted features.  No reason to dumb the game down for every newcomer.

If anything, maybe a 'blueprint' 3Dvisualization/communication tool for the Human team to vote on a base layout?  Or give 'naked' Humans more agility to help when running around away from their turrets?  Like maybe trick wall-jumps/cartwheel flips/kung-fu to help dodge?

[temple]

The whole coordination myth is what pisses me off and signifies the issue at hand.  

Alien classes are a lot more straight forward.  The hardest thing to learn is dretch'ing and pouncing without getting killed.  Outside of that, there is no learning curve about swiping people.  Bonus if you can swipe the head.  That's the barebones of aliens.

Humans on the other hand have more nuances.  The devil is in the details.[/size]

The lucifer cannon and the flamer are the most retarded weapons to use in defending the base.  But there is no feedback or way to understand that without a lot of experience.  A chaingun and even a 150 credit shotgun (both S1 weapons, might I add) is better at defending a base from goons or tyrants than a luci or a flamer.  Its hard to learn that without knowing the underlying mechanics of the game.  Its not obvious.  For aliens, its is obvious that advanced goons and tyrants are better than basiliisks or maraders.  And hell, its isn't that hard to play the S3 aliens, anyone can snipe or swipe.  But compare that to using a lucifier cannon well or a Battlesuit/painsaw/grenade rush and you should be able to agree that humans require something more at the same stage as aliens.  

Using the DPS values of a weapon makes a lot more sense in terms of attacking alien bases.  The pulse laser is the best bang for you buck in killing alien bases due to its DPS AND the range AND the clip size.  A painsaw or a flamer can dish out a lot of DPS (in raw numbers, so can the chaingun).  But alien bases can have aerial structures that make those weapons useless.  And the chaingun, despite its dps, has too much spread to be effective.  The luci is definitely good at base attacks but the clip size, cost, and limited offensive use makes it relatively as good as a pulse laser.  Its highly variable and it takes experience to choose the best weapon/armor combination in regards to credits.  So, even when you know some of the mechanics of the game, its still not obvious in terms of weapon choices.  

Take the human S1 weapons.  The lasgun is IMO the most flexible weapon at S1 hands down.  Damn near hitscan (if not hitscan), large clip, no reload, range, and good dps.  A shotgun has the most bang for your buck at close range.  The major reason why I prefer the lasgun is simply the clip size and range, which the shotgun is completely weak in comparison.  The Massdriver is only good for camping and killing dretches, but in a long hallway, the basic rifle is nearly as effective in skilled hands (in fact, the rifle has more DPS than the massdriver).  The MD is just faster at killing dretches.  The chaingun has the best DPS against larger aliens than any weapon but the need for time in order to unleash the DPS causes it to be a high cost/high loss weapon against skilled aliens.  For the money, a shotgun and a lasgun is just as good considering playing against skilled people and flexibility over a chaingun.  And that's just S1.

Like I say, aliens aren't better at coordination and humans are worst in terms of players.  Humans have more to coordinate.  Aliens make the best use of their team due to their classes being easier to choose and use.  Humans have a lot of potential in terms of weapons or armor but that advantage is easily wasted by less than experienced players.

My suggestion is simplify weapons.  Such as combining some weapons as having an primary and alt fire like the lucifier instead of having an individual version of each.  Like combine the rifle and the mass driver or the lucifer and the flame thrower.   Maybe combine the shotgun with a grenade launcher.  These are just examples to illustrate the idea.


Would those improvements make humans more powerful... hell yes.  But at this point, only high skilled players would exploit the advantage of the change but they are the ones that already know how to win.  Its the noobs that need the extra help so the games are closer and more competitive.  Otherwise, its camp fests with 1 or 2 good human players carry the whole weight because people are getting owned and not realizing why.  I'm not going into specifics because this isn't about that, its just about why humans suck so bad.  I'm just pointing a possible solution.

[[A]]

Why players are better in alien ?

Human have to aim (too hard for many people)
Alien have to touch (more easy cose human aim as shit, so it's simple to reach them)

So what is the normal reflex ?

"Turret aim better than me, i stay behind them."

Where is the probleme with that ?

You can have turret EVER and ever and ever, just the sd could fixe this probleme, but, to wait sd to end a game or just to make some frag to have a stage ...

Solution ?

Change building systeme to a systeme where structures like turret need part of "kills" to buy it, so if you don't frag you can't rebuild turret ever !

exemple : turret still need 8 buildpoints AND 150 cred. So if you camp and dont frag, you can't buy again the turrets.

Normally what will happend ? If human know they can't have turret again and again and again, they will try to block alien in map and make enought kills to buy again some turret in case of aliens reach and destroy some turret. Or ... The will camp and they will not have the cred to build again the destroyed turrets. So players will have the choice : "with my money, will i buy a weapon or a turret ?"

Weapon are not to complicated, just players are nubs, they can't aim and use turret to to the job.

ps : Sry for my bad english.

[Stof]

Now, this is too radical, even for me It would completly annihilate the ability for humans to move their base, not counting the fact that you cannot have a dedicated builder anymore since he would need money to build the base.

[[A]]

i just said the "basic" system, it could be extend like :

decon a "non dead" turret = recap 150 cred
possibility to /share the builder or turret structure could be buy in armory and deployed by anyone, ect ...

but the base is turret need creds.

The fact where human can ever have turret must be changed.

[Neo]

That won't change anything as humans will just take the safe money earning method and camp turrets, then go rebuild.

All it does is mean that humans can't make a fast base move, leaving them locked in a single area and letting them get wiped out more often, and guess what that will lead too...

[temple]

"]Why players are better in alien ?

Human have to aim (too hard for many people)
Alien have to touch (more easy cose human aim as shit, so it's simple to reach them)

So what is the normal reflex ?

"Turret aim better than me, i stay behind them."

Where is the probleme with that ?

You can have turret EVER and ever and ever, just the sd could fixe this probleme, but, to wait sd to end a game or just to make some frag to have a stage ...

Solution ?

Change building systeme to a systeme where structures like turret need part of "kills" to buy it, so if you don't frag you can't rebuild turret ever !

exemple : turret still need 8 buildpoints AND 150 cred. So if you camp and dont frag, you can't buy again the turrets.

Normally what will happend ? If human know they can't have turret again and again and again, they will try to block alien in map and make enought kills to buy again some turret in case of aliens reach and destroy some turret. Or ... The will camp and they will not have the cred to build again the destroyed turrets. So players will have the choice : "with my money, will i buy a weapon or a turret ?"

Weapon are not to complicated, just players are nubs, they can't aim and use turret to to the job.

ps : Sry for my bad english.

I agree totally about humans using turrets to do the fighting for them.  

I disagree about the whole thing that humans can't aim.  Humans can aim.  The problem is that humans aren't good ENOUGH at aiming.  If you see a dretch, you have less than 5 seconds to put 5 bullets in them (assuming using a basic rifle).  That's hardly any learning curve.  Good 'aiming' means being able to kill a dretch nearly on sight.

Learning how to run from dretches or aliens in general is just as important as aiming because evasion buys you more time to aim and kill them.

[techhead]

Make the turrets have more spread if no DC is built.
That way, turrets won't be the guaranteed best shooters on a s1 human team.

[M&m&M]

I agree with you about the nuances of the weapons---they aren't clear cut.  The more money = better weapon for your play style isn't true for the Humans. Straightening that out would help.  Your suggestion of combining weapons for less money would help.

I still disagree  with you on coordination issues.   I've seen many a game end short due to humans doing stupid stuff in terms of building/deconing.  Coordination/communication doesn't have to be total but it protects against an experienced aggressive Alien force.  But having a good base as humans isn't everything, and skilled players is the other part of winning.

I wonder if some kind of promotion system (strictly started fresh each game---no BF2 style permanent promotion) to limit some play functions to the players with the most kills, so 'noobs' can't suicide feed wouldn't help?  "You need a leader to leave 10 steps from the turret, noob".

The whole coordination myth is what pisses me off and signifies the issue at hand.  


Humans on the other hand have more nuances.  The devil is in the details.[/size]


My suggestion is simplify weapons.  Such as combining some weapons as having an primary and alt fire like the lucifier instead of having an individual version of each.  Like combine the rifle and the mass driver or the lucifer and the flame thrower.   Maybe combine the shotgun with a grenade launcher.  These are just examples to illustrate the idea.

[holyknight]

I agree with Temple.
One thing I think should be changed is that when the Mass Driver is described, it should say "act as a sniper rifle"
and for Flame Thrower, it should say "Could attack the player" or something like that. That way, new players won't ask for a sniper rifle, and they won't panic when they get hit while using flamethrower.

[n00b pl0x]

I agree with Temple.
One thing I think should be changed is that when the Mass Driver is described, it should say "act as a sniper rifle"
and for Flame Thrower, it should say "Could attack the player" or something like that. That way, new players won't ask for a sniper rifle, and they won't panic when they get hit while using flamethrower.

and luci would say "dont use near your base or teammates if you suck"