Various gameplay suggestions

[cephas]

I've been playing Tremulous almost a year now, and I have to say, it's a fun, even addictive, game.  That said, I've been getting annoyed at some of the balance issues in the game - I don't feel into matches anymore, they're all just another round. :cry:  I have noticed some of the more annoying gameplay problems that have I feel have emerged with time. (with emoticons for fun )

• Build Points/Sudden Death: I've found that often neither team can find the momentum to finish off the other until Sudden Death rolls around: I often find myself bored for the 10-20 minutes that it takes from when both teams reach s3 to SD.  I think part of this is due to the ability to rapidly reconstruct a destroyed base - build points are returned to the queue almost immediately after the building is destroyed.  This allows humans to rebuild turrets far too fast - until sudden death.  The same applies with aliens and egg spamming: when the aliens' base is raped by lucysuits, only one granger needs to escape to egg-spam until aliens can reach s3.
  Proposed alternative:  Have BP from destroyed buildings take longer to re-enter the queue.  I think the best method would be to have them regenerate at a constant rate, regardless of how many are destroyed: it would take time to re-build turrets completely (allowing aliens to continue a rush) and would prevent 8 different eggs from popping up within a minute of the alien's base being taken down by humans.  Obviously, deconstruction would immediately return the BP.
  
• Tyrants are overpowered: Tyrants aren't as ridiculously overpowered as they first appeared to be when I started playing (zomg tyrants !), but even a fairly novice 'rant can take out a bsuit with almost any loadout.  A couple tyrants healing after their last charge can easily take out a small rush of a bsuit or two.  I hope that the heal-only-on-creep changes on TJW's server will reduce this.
  
• Humans are less mobile: I've always found that humans in trem are particularly weak because they have to return all the way to their base to heal/rearm (I don't play on SST, there are rarely the necessary buildings - - outside of the human base).  Perhaps humans could heal on their own (more slowly than aliens, obviously) so that a single anklebite won't cause me to be killed in one hit at s1 three minutes later.
  Proposed alternative: It'd be hard to explain realistically, but maybe marines need a slight healing aura (which would encourage travel in groups).  At s1, humans have a lot of trouble going very far, as even in groups, they peel off to go back to base until there's only one at the alien base.  This aura wouldn't stop the dretch headbite or the goon headchomp (leave those), only make humans a bit more mobile.  As for ammo, I'm content going back to base once I've used 6 clips of rifle (or equivalent).
  
• Teslas are useless: Nobody uses them anymore (again, I don't play on SST).  I haven't seen teslas in a base on BeerGarden in quite a while.  The is far too vulnerable.  We could bump it's HP, but that doesn't solve the problem too much.
  Proposed alternative: Give teslas a boost (for their size and cost, they should easily do more DPS than a turret.  Also, make the DC a necessity to build teslas, but when it goes down, don't completely disable the teslas: knock them down to half power or so - so that the dretches are still discouraged (but not entirely stopped) from rushing.  This would buy time to put back up the DC (with the above alternative, humans might have to deconstruct something to free the BP for the DC as they regenerate ).
  

These are just some of my thoughts.  Anyone have other suggestions to throw out to make the game more fun/dynamic?

[Undeference]

Some of your suggestions seem like they would reinforce the whole "underdog always loses" thing.

The lights should flicker when teslas fire.
Just saying.

[David]

Nice to see some thought out suggestions for once.

Tesla's DO get used, sometimes, there are a few bases where they can be good, and I will normally put one by the reactor to scare away the marauders.

Tyrant power?  What are you meant to do with them? Every time I go tyrant I never hit the humans once.  Maybe its just me, but tyrants need auto fire :p

As for slow BP, that would be something nice to try out.  You'd have to balance the speed, but it could be good.

And human healing out of base? we need a med kit you can get instead of a gun that can heal team mates.  You should get creds for it, but not if you are near the base, so as to stop people using it for quick cash.

[NiTRoX]

Or instead of what you proposed the medikit could be use for a couple of times say 3 times instead of once.

[n00b pl0x]

Turret:
Health: 190
Range: 300
Damage: 4
Repeat: 100ms
DPS: 40


Tesla:
Health: 220
Range: 250
Damage: 9
Repeat: 250
DPS: 36

-----

going by this...i think telsas should at least equal turrets in dps. I would say the same for range, but it seems like telsas have a decent enough range already. I also think that telsas should work even when dc is down; at half power. So 40 dps, and 20 when dc is down.

As for the build point thing, I agree. BP should come back at a rate of 2 per sec when a structure is destroyed, which would insure that it takes 5 secs for each egg to come back, even if there are 5 grangers going around trying to egg spam.

[Stof]

Unfortunately, BP returning slowly would probably have little effect of eggspam endgames since when that happens, the alien team spends most of it's time at around 80 BP left.

[cephas]

Or instead of what you proposed the medikit could be use for a couple of times say 3 times instead of once.

I like the idea of a multi-use medkit: maybe a human could carry 2-3 medkits that do under 100 (perhaps instantly - FEAR manages to balance this).  It does seem crazy that humans are able to treat themselves for injuries, which was why I suggested the squad healing technique.  What would be even more effective in enforcing teamwork would be bumping damage from humans in groups up a bit, but that's another thread.

As for the build point thing, I agree. BP should come back at a rate of 2 per sec when a structure is destroyed, which would insure that it takes 5 secs for each egg to come back, even if there are 5 grangers going around trying to egg spam.

The idea for the slowly regenerating BP would be that the BP from the eggs would come back slower than they are destroyed.  I was thinking more a scale along the lines of at least 30+ seconds for 10 to come back, maybe even a minute per egg.  Fast rebuilding really halts finishing rushes before sudden death.

Some of your suggestions seem like they would reinforce the whole "underdog always loses" thing.

Well, some of this is what I'm looking for.  Trem as a whole seems far too 'balanced' for me.  Even one good player on a team can hold off the other team until at least sudden death.  I've seen it done on BeerGarden a lot.  I, for one, would like to see fewer games going to sudden death (45 minutes for a match consumes my time quickly).  I don't think sudden death should be the solution for ending the game (can someone pull stats on what percentage of games end in sudden death?)

[Harry Joe]

I could maybe agree with these changes if you did something to counterbalance it. So far your suggestions are all for improving humans, and as far as I can tell, the humans biggest problem isn't game balance, but their own playing skills.

Now, get a human team that knows what it's doing and aliens (even with damn good players helping them) get raped, it's almost guaranteed.

Really, the balance as it is now is surprisingly good. The problem being humans want to play as if they were an alien (going solo and expecting to be able to tear through half the alien team, and make it back to base) instead of working together and using, o i don't know, actual strategy.

As it is there is nothing aliens can do against a coordinated human rush except hope the humans need to return to base before the alien base is completely fucked. The mighty tyrant will last only a few seconds against 5-6 humans (as long as they have moderate aim anyways) and anything else dies even quicker. Humans in groups mean increased firepower, aliens in groups usually just get in each others way more often then not.

My suggestion to make the game more fun and dynamic is that humans should stop being so god damned scared of dying. I can't even count the number of games humans lost because they just never even tried to attack, or never bother chasing aliens assaulting their base. The reason games usually last until SD is because most of the human team is little better then a slightly mobile turret, and instead of trying to win the game, they are content camping and doing their best to prolong a game aliens should have allready won.

It's actually the main reason I usually hate playing human. I can't stand camping, and when the majority of the team is just sitting in base doing fuck all, attacking on your own won't do much else but feed.

[Stof]

I could maybe agree with these changes if you did something to counterbalance it. So far your suggestions are all for improving humans, and as far as I can tell, the humans biggest problem isn't game balance, but their own playing skills.

Now, get a human team that knows what it's doing and aliens (even with damn good players helping them) get raped, it's almost guaranteed.

Really, the balance as it is now is surprisingly good. The problem being humans want to play as if they were an alien (going solo and expecting to be able to tear through half the alien team, and make it back to base) instead of working together and using, o i don't know, actual strategy.

As it is there is nothing aliens can do against a coordinated human rush except hope the humans need to return to base before the alien base is completely fucked. The mighty tyrant will last only a few seconds against 5-6 humans (as long as they have moderate aim anyways) and anything else dies even quicker. Humans in groups mean increased firepower, aliens in groups usually just get in each others way more often then not.

My suggestion to make the game more fun and dynamic is that humans should stop being so god damned scared of dying. I can't even count the number of games humans lost because they just never even tried to attack, or never bother chasing aliens assaulting their base. The reason games usually last until SD is because most of the human team is little better then a slightly mobile turret, and instead of trying to win the game, they are content camping and doing their best to prolong a game aliens should have allready won.

It's actually the main reason I usually hate playing human. I can't stand camping, and when the majority of the team is just sitting in base doing fuck all, attacking on your own won't do much else but feed.

I've already lost quite a few games because the humans where attacking instead of defending the base. And before you ask, no it wasn't that the humans were feeding the aliens. If was because when the human base stayed undefended more than a few seconds, an adv goon came and killed armory and telenodes.

I've lost a LOT of games where we were able to completly cripple the alien base at stage 1 only to come back to base and find a few goons eating at a smoking reactor with nothing else left.

Humans have to defend their base to win, and they have to attack too at the same time. In fact, when all debutant human players attack, most often it ends up with them losing in the operation.

[Harry Joe]

I've lost a LOT of games where we were able to completly cripple the alien base at stage 1 only to come back to base and find a few goons eating at a smoking reactor with nothing else left.

Humans have to defend their base to win, and they have to attack too at the same time. In fact, when all debutant human players attack, most often it ends up with them losing in the operation.

There is a huge difference between defending the base and having the majority of the team being afraid to get outside of a 10 foot radius of it. Obviously leaving the base completely on it's own is a dumb mistake, it is the same with the aliens, only worse because alien static defenses aren't nearly as effective as the humies. Luckily for the aliens, humans aren't attacking nearly enough so it usually doesn't result in a dead alien base.

I'm not saying the entire human team should always be attacking, that would be retarded. Two or Three humie defenders can more then adequately defend the base from all but the strongest alien rushes, and if the majority of the human team is on the offense, the odds of getting massively rushed are pretty much nil.

Anyone who doesn't notice the problem with the human team being too afraid to be offensive just hasn't played enough of each side.

[M&m&M]

@Cephas

I like your first idea a lot. I agree about the slow downs in normal games (some servers just change up the bp's even having unlimited bp's for a few minutes at odd times).  Making the destroyed points take longer to build with is an elegant solution.


I disagree on 'rants.  What the problem is that n0Obs need to learn to move their base coherently (not as an unplanned gaggle) to a spot that's at least protected from one of either 'rants or adv. goons.  A really well placed, ambush-style base with hidden Teslas is 'rant proof, at least until the n0Obs can afford Lucis (and destroy their own base).  
    Rants aren't instant BS killers, especially if you factor in a lot of chaos of big battles and some lag.

With your new #1 idea, 'rants might suddenly be overpowered though, since 'rant packs are great for picking off pieces of a base and then running for cover, one by one. The base wouldn't rebuild fast and guerrilla rants would make it hard for a base to come back without picking off the 'rants.  So if the base wasn't done by S3, it'd be an even quicker ALiens win.

Humans are supposed to be fundamentally weak outside their base, unless they have really good squads (until 'rants).  A large, tight squad can slaughter dretches in the tunnel in ATSC for example.  Instead of making 'rants weaker, I'd like unarmored humans to be more agile to avoid hits.  And maybe a 3rd body armor type in between light and BS armor.  A medic class or tool might help humans make an extended hunt too.

Teslas work great if used at an entrance to a room, but blocked from sight.  That's the only way to use them since Adv goons will snipe them,

         Room
   
   Telsa           Tesla
  _____           _____

          |      ^   |
          |       |   |
               'Rant

[holyknight]

what I would like is how when you just join the game, you join a team and it averages their evo points/credit and makes the new player start with that point/credit.

but after they waste it and die, you dont get any more extra money.

[Lakitu7]

I really like the idea to slow the regen of buildpoints. Perhaps you could even continually slow the regen linearly with gametime until SD where there's (obviously) no regen.

I wouldn't really mess with the tyrant or general human mobility. Teslas are crap. Whether that's an issue our not is debatable. Same for barriers. You can make them better but that just makes bases better and games last until SD more.

[Mad_Joe]

Good ideas, most are worth consideration.

I don't like the idea of a human healing aura, though. One of the disadvantages of humans is the need to return to the base. I do admit that it can be a little frustrating at times. However, instead of giving humans a healing aura, I'd suggest doing things to encourage building forward medis and arms. Any suggestions for this?

[cephas]

Good ideas, most are worth consideration.

I don't like the idea of a human healing aura, though. One of the disadvantages of humans is the need to return to the base. I do admit that it can be a little frustrating at times. However, instead of giving humans a healing aura, I'd suggest doing things to encourage building forward medis and arms. Any suggestions for this?

Thanks!  If you really want to encourage forward medis and arms, you're going to need more BP.  Most servers I play on have the standard 100ish.  At that level, it's all needed for defenses (even on aliens).  I'm mostly talking about the annoying situation where a dretch manages an anklebite on you at s1 before you kill it.  Then you either have to use your medi or go all the way back to base (which is a long way, usually).  I don't think my solution was a very clean idea, but it's something we need.  Maybe it only works while stopped (and slowly at that).

Another thought is that barricades   need about 2-3x the HP they have to be really useful for anything.  Not enough to justify wrapping the OM in them, but enough to stop a fair amount of punishment.

I really liked Lak's idea for linearly scaling the regeneration of buildpoints.  It makes a lot of sense, and removes a lot of the stigma of 'ZOMG sudden death'.  I'm really sick of waiting for SD for all the decent rushes to come around.

[player1]

Cephas,

What I really like is the idea of the rolling squad for the attacking humans. As soon as you commit to attack and not defend, you try to get as far as you can with your health without returning to base (realizing that tight areas can mean dretch headchomp or goon pounce death). When you have to go back to base so as not to feed too much, you slide in, heal, reload, re-equip only if essential (no bumping into people on the medi, hipcheck their camping butts to one side; no playing with loadouts when your buddies are dying, grab a helmet and let's go) and get right back to the squad. So if anybody peels off, somebody else should already be heading back to the attack line, to keep a press on the aliens. A good squad of dedicated humans sticking together can push into an alien base even in S1 (especially during long spawn-queues).

Maybe one human could have something like a ckit, and just a blaster, and as long as he's alive this healing device would have a total amount of health available to the squad. (Yeah, I know, the hated medic option). But just like building, people have to choose to pick those roles. Only by offering the humans "classes" does the game produce teamwork (attack, defend, build*, repair). Why not a healing class?

As it is, I think the thing for attackers to do is communicate with one or two squadmates, choose complementary loadouts, and stick together, or agree to suicide on enemy structures.

*also, by build I mean move and decon with teammates as well as build thoughtfully, skillfully and knowledgeably

P.S. The "medic" would be just like the builder. The healkit would be free, just sell your rifle. Then the humans outside base would have to keep the medic alive, just like the humans back at base better keep a builder alive. Or he'd have to know how to actually use that blaster.

Final note: I don't think that this would be thematically incorrect in the next version, with the aliens using the basi as a medic. The question is, will it even be necessary then?

Also, healkit could be available to work at later stage only, and then near repeaters only (somewhat nerfs/defeats purpose).

Edit: sorry one last thing - to really get the "medic" out of base, maybe have healkit work only beyond the "build line", that is, beyond reactor range (maybe it's battery-powered, and the reactor interferes with the powercells). The "build line" is that magical distance where turrets are not green icons ever, only red. "There is no power here..." (The healkit message would be something like "Interference from a nearby Reactor - or if available, Repeater - is causing the Healkit to Malfunction. Move farther away.")

Ckits and Adv Ckits work inside the "build line" (reactor/repeater range), while Hkits (if you will) would only work outside the "build line". Where you can't build turrets, you would be able to heal people. Either: A) the medic heals you using the healkit (messy for the medic without some binds?); or, B) anybody within X distance of the healkit, outside of reactor/repeater range, presses medkit key, uses healkit health instead, gets 25 health (or something along those lines, maybe a different key, maybe more/less/faster health, maybe just instant health instead of the slow health regen startup, maybe just increased healing rate, etc.). All parameters would have to be play-balanced, of course.

I haven't even thought about the alien counterbalance. I just read your post and thought of this. I'm sure the medic idea has already been beaten back to zombie death already.

PlayerOne used the search feature
and found what he'd missed
http://tremulous.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2608&highlight=medic
No increased health for medic.
No special weapon or poison or tesla cannon or gauss gun.
Just a squad-sized pack of health instead of a rifle, some skills with a blaster and the ability to dodge. Make him like the El Presidente from TeamFortress (burn the unbeliever!). No seriously, if squadmates keep him alive, he conveys some benefit to them. If you've got the stones to leave base with nothing but a blaster for armament, your team gets a boost as long as you can stay alive. No? OK.... Thx if u read all of that