Notes

[Breathe]

To kevlarman:
You were a very lucky person.

And the "ID 10 T" thing went straight over my head. Enlightenment appreciated.

---

To Steely Ann:
I got your hint, just wasn't sure how much of the story you knew. Most people don't go beyond the whole Lisa thing and Xenu, and they miss out on some delightfully manipulative tactics. Politicians should be studying this stuff, it's powerful.

[Metsjeesus]

Aliens winning more isn't necessarily my issue, it's the degree to which I see Tyrants dominating humans. The second Stage 3 comes around, there's two or three Tyrants. On ATCS, the human team always loses right then and there: the tyrants will all rush the base, charge their spawns and then get to hacking at everything else.

I have played ATCS in amsterdam unlimited, where human base has 3 turrets, 3 spawns arm and medi. Both teams had more then 10 palyers, half of them experienced, those tyrs never miss 3 headhits. And human won. Never underestimate power of organized human team. Yes, they rushed with 3 tyrants at same time, but if there are humans who block rushing tyrs with own life, tyrs will die while being in ramp. Well, if there are less players, its harder for humans at s3 vs s3 because lack of firepower and blocking bodys. Defensive meatshield is key element there. If you conviece to make a team of 4 players who follow teamleader nomatter what, its killing machine. Mostly, team who manages to drain evos/money from other team faster then own team feeds, wins. Its easier in alien team, harder in human. 1 alien player can take down on SD whole human base in suiciderushes, as a human, same tactic ends just behind first corner. Human needs teamwork, and if you got that, you drain evos until there is no tyrs left.

For topic, if you play only as alien, you never see how easy or how hard is to take down something.  Knowing weaknesses makes you stronger.

[Steely Ann]

InsanityQ

The tl;dr of it is that aspies tend to be very long-winded in conversation, often oblivious that their audience has been lulled to sleep.

IHaveWitnessed

I'm not sure where I've gotten a lot of praise, false or otherwise, to inflate this supposed ego of mine.  If you've ever seen me in a game you'd know I tend to defy the laws of physics, sucking & blowing simultaneously, and I acknowledge that all the time; it actually became quite an in-joke at AoD.

I never claimed to know about the clan scene now, only how I experienced it then.  Please stop putting words in my mouth.  That's what set off my troll detector, but you seem nice enough that it could be a false positive.

[Breathe]

To Metsjeesus:
I played with you a little last night, although the server was very much distasteful to me; you may have seen me, same name as my forum name and the level was Tremor? Yeah, that was a good human game. Lucifer cannons owned in the end. I still think aliens are a overpowered at the moment, though.

I tend to prefer smaller servers, so we don't see much body blocking. Either way, where there are tyrants you have the wannabes and the distractions, like me. Yeah, I was the marauder that catapulted into your base like 6 times and busted one of your medistations. Where tyrants can't go, they serve as giant meatshields themselves. Everyone focuses on the big roaring son of a bitch, only to get "ninja'd" by a basilisk or a marauder while they're tied up blasting the bejesus out of the Tyrants. Hell, I've seen sniping dragoons effectively use trapped tyrants to take fire for them while they wreak havoc.

As far as playing only alien is concerned, it's only until I know what I'm doing with aliens. Then I'm going to learn humans and not work on aliens until I'm decent with humans, and so on and so forth, slowly improving my skills.

---

To InsanityQ:
I'm a writer. My posts are made to affect and to be clear for the reader who is not me, not to be accessable to those who don't feel like putting in the time and effort to read a few forum posts longer than the norm.

---

To IHaveWitnessed:
Who are you and why are you eating my goddamn sandwich, you disgusting cock?

---

To Steely Ann:
"Very long-winded" is a bit of an understatement for me, don't you think?

And seriously, ignore IHaveWitnessed. That bastard is eating my sandwich.

---

To Kohrylite:
Make him give me back my damn sandwich.

---

To NiTRoX:
Why are you still here?

[Steely Ann]

Breathe

Long-winded is all it is for me.  I enjoy a good-sized read, particularly when it involves folks' feelings about things (except when they're overly dramatic), for whatever reason.

As far as Witnessed goes, I'm perfectly comfortable with giving him the benefit of doubt.  It's kind of obligatory for me now anyway, since I reacted in an extremely hypocritical fashion (i.e. taking the Internet seriously) and feel like an ass for it.  What's this about a sandwich now, though?  I'm guessing I skimmed over something again.

[Dracone]

"The troll is in the sky, in the ground and everywhere "

:-}

FUCKING TROLL IS UNDER MY BRIDGE ABOUT TO EAT MY THREE BILLY GOATS GRUFF!

Anyhow, the days we see people so new take in depth notes as such have become increasingly rare, but then again, it's been rare for a long ass time now.

Welcome to Tremulous.

[Despairation]

Ugh...I hate reading long ass threads. Which is why I haven't even read this thread, I just noticed Breathe is making a ton of posts that people might bother to read if they were shorter.

[your face]

To your face:
Human camping actually makes it a little harder on the tyrants...

The point is to make sure the aliens don't get S3... tyrants are S3... and goons can easily be taken down with a well-footworked shotgunner...

And of course humans last longer when aliens are S3 if they camp.  It doesn't mean they're ever going to win though...they have to mount an attack sometime or another or they will slowly die...especially when SD arrives...

[_Equilibrium_]

Ugh...I hate reading long ass threads. Which is why I haven't even read this thread, I just noticed Breathe is making a ton of posts that people might bother to read if they were shorter.

This is a forum, not a chat program. I like it when people make good solid posts with a lot of thought. It's much more annoying when people post 4 words pointless threads. Reading is something you will have to do your entire life. Get used to it.

[Kohrylite]

This is a forum, not a chat program. I like it when people make good solid posts with a lot of thought. It's much more annoying when people post 4 words pointless threads. Reading is something you will have to do your entire life. Get used to it.

OMG, first writing, now reading?  It's almost like you want to succeed at life, Equilibrium.

But seriously, I would agree.  It was refreshing to read a few posts that actually had some effort put into them.

[blood2.0]

some reason all the noobs go humans and the good players who don't care what team they are on go aliens.  A good team of humans beats a good team of aliens but a good alien beats a good human.  So by communicating with your teammates and not camping you will be able to rush the aliens base winning the game.

[Breathe]

To Steely Ann:
Yeah, that's you, though. I belong in a whole different order of magnitude.

As for the sandwich? That was my attempt to be funny and stop a perceived troll at the same time.

---

To Dracone:
GIVE THE GOATS EXPLOSIVES.

And yeah, I'd have guessed I'm the only one ever to do all this on my second-third day. It's one of my peculiarities, but not the biggest or the worst by any means. My worst one is that I plan elaborately for things that I can't do. Like mapping: I have an awesome map idea and couldn't use GtkRadiant if someone uploaded the skills of every mapper in the history of FOREVER into my skull.

---

To Despairation:
I'd like to point out that in two days this thread has 40+ posts, despite my "long-ass posts that nobody bothers to read." (Paraphrased.)

lol sockpuppets ftw amirite \o/

---

To _Equilibrium_:
I totally sympathize. But the worst are threads where the only content is "nt". If I had a forum of my own, there would be a minimum post size of twenty words; at least 200 for new topics. Anything else would be deleted.

My forum probably wouldn't last long, but you can be damned sure there'd be fewer illiterates, fewer newbies, fewer children (literal and otherwise) and fewer rule violations than the average forum.

---

To Kohrylite:
Since that is the general consensus, I'm sure I'll enjoy this place.

---

To blood2.0:
I think the newbies go human because that's what they're good at, Counter-Strike and Half-Life and other "normal" first person shooters. But they suck because they lack teamwork, they don't know the unwritten "rules", how the game plays, etc.

That could be a factor, but I still think there's more behind the scenes, a lot of balance to be picked at.

[Lava Croft]

I think I'm done talking to Breathe:D She belongs to the group of people who talks more than they play Tremulous.

PS: Here are the TremStats for our server. (Yes you can click the word here, woman.)

[Breathe]

To Lava Croft:
I also belong to a group of people who don't have the time to play games because they're in the process of moving.

Circumstances dictate that constant gameplay is not an option. Consider momentarily that the average Tremulous game, in my experience, lasts about a half hour. Then consider that for my first post I only needed 15 minutes to type it all out, and that I haven't posted a single one even half as long since.

A math problem to solve: I require efficiency of time. Which is more time efficient judging by the above numbers? Talking or gaming?

EDIT:
General data
Games Played   28326
Alien Wins   15912
Human Wins   11863
Tied Matches   551

I would assume your server is fairly high in skill on both sides. The aliens have, as a whole, a notable superiority to humans; this judging by -your- stats.

I'd also like to note that I saw the stats for the maps Tremor and ATCS. Tremor is nearly perfectly balanced between aliens and humans. ATCS is, as suspected, dominated by aliens and has a higher amount of ties than Tremor.

Call me crazy, but to me it seems that my observations are, in fact, correct.

Have a seat.

EDIT: I just looked at the stats for all the maps. Look at the top 8, the most commonly played 8 maps:

    Map Name   A.T.C.S.   
Position   1
Times Played   7836
Alien Wins   4013
Human Wins   3730
    Map Name   Tremor   
Position   2
Times Played   5385
Alien Wins   2673
Human Wins   2674
    Map Name   Niveus : Outpost 652   
Position   3
Times Played   5338
Alien Wins   3255
Human Wins   2029
    Map Name   Uncreation   
Position   4
Times Played   2165
Alien Wins   950
Human Wins   949
    Map Name   Arachnid 2   
Position   5
Times Played   2145
Alien Wins   1448
Human Wins   674
    Map Name   Karith Station 2   
Position   6
Times Played   2112
Alien Wins   1343
Human Wins   735
    Map Name   Transit Station   
Position   7
Times Played   1590
Alien Wins   1097
Human Wins   474
    Map Name   Nexus 6   
Position   8
Times Played   1583
Alien Wins   1047
Human Wins   519

As you can see, every map that is commonly played has alien dominance or a perfect balance.

To me that's an example of imbalance.

My point has been proven.

[Lava Croft]

Our server is not high on skill, we are very high on the serverlist, which means we have a high influx of new players, something we welcome, since we rather have them pick up on Tremulous on our server, than on some 500bp fucked up server. I admit that I was somewhat surprised by the stats, since I personally expected the Alien wins to be much higher, certainly if you take into account that most new players join the Humans, and most settled players tend to choose the Alien side, because it makes them less dependant on (possibly retarded) teammates.

Calling Tremor nearly perfectly balanced only shows how little you know, and saying ATCS is dominated by Aliens while the actual stats say Alien Wins 4013 - Human Wins 3730 is a bit weird... I have not even taken into account on of the wicked base-layouts we have on Tremor that heavily favors the Aliens.

So yes, like so many newcomers who think they have it all figured out after a few games, you are just as crazy and incorrect as the rest.
Just like has been said to the rest, play more Tremulous and whine less about things you do not comprehend.

PS: I'm still standing...

EDIT: I'll say it again, it has been said by a multitude of people, a multitude of times to a multitude of people such as yourself: New players tend to join the Human team because they are familair with it. Most settled Tremulous players take the Alien team, since this allows them to operate mostly alone, not having to rely on a possibly newbie team. This, combined with the utter retardation of most Tremulous players, evident in the complete lack of cooperation among the Human players, results in something that might look unbalanced to people who do not exactly know what they are seeing.

[kevlarman]

you've proven nothing, any server near the top of the list is overrun with noobs. many of them will refuse to play aliens (reverse-stacking the teams). way back when i could actually get away with it i wrote a patch that forced players to select their team at random, and the server that patch ran on instantly went from 80% alien wins to 56% alien wins (ignoring tie games, so about as perfect as you could ever expect balance to be with such different teams).

[Breathe]

To Lava Croft:
I was going by the stats when I said Tremor is balanced... One win difference out of a couple thousand plays? ...Yeah, okay, TOTALLY unbalanced.

I'm not used to the EXTREMELY HIGH differences shown in some of the maps lower on the list: ATCS alone shows a significant enough imbalance for me to wonder about it, the others just cement in my mind that there is a massive discrepancy in power between aliens and humans.

I acknowledge that new players joining humans more could be a factor, but it shouldn't be that large of one. If it is, then your server probably is not a good source of statistics for finding out whether or not I am incorrect.

---

To kevlarman:
As far as I'm aware, 56% is still a pretty big discrepancy, and one that should really get looked at. Admittedly, the teams are different enough that perfect balance is an impossibility, but the statistics should at least fall within margin of error (48%-52% would be an ideal balance, I would think.)

[Lava Croft]

I think 56% for a game with two radically different teams is a damn good balance. This 56% is including all the new people that go Humans, and all the settled people who go Aliens. Imagine if the Humans would be made up of 'good' players that actually work as a team...

In my experience, Tremor heavily favors the Humans, with it's long hallways and big, open default Alien base. Much more so even than ATCS, which is also a map that favors the Humans. We even made a layout for Tremor to make the map more interesting for Aliens, and less easy to win for the Humans.

Every Tremulous server that welcomes new players suffers from the fact that people tend to join the team they are most familiar with. The Human team closely resembles a 'normal' FPS game, whereas the Aliens are somewhat different from what people are used to. Because of this difference, the people who have been playing for a while longer have developed a familiarity with the specific Alien classes and they (hopefully) know better how to apply them to any given situation. Combine this with most Humans playing the game like they are stuck in a game of Quake3 DM, and you get lone Humans venturing out their base, being instakilled by a Dragoon and whining about imbalance.

On a side note, if you think the Aliens are so overpowered, what would you think of the Aliens getting the Advanced Dragoon at Stage2? And the Basilisk having silent footsteps and a healing aura? The Marauder having a zap that lasts as long as you stay close to your target?

[Henners]

I'm bored so I'm going to point out a radical if obvious point.

The teams dont have to be balanced. It actually doesnt matter in the slightest if they are perfectly balanced. The game play experience is very different on either side, so who actually cares if one side provides slightly more challenge than the other. The only play where balance is "required" would be a clan match, and if clans have any sense they will play a map from both ways before declaring a victor, thus balance is assured.

[Lava Croft]

But balance is a magic value that will fix everything, even my own lack of competence!

[Breathe]

To Lava Croft:
The 56% balance was on a server where what team you joined was randomized (see kevlarman's post). Tremor DOES favor the humans, I know. It's a very good map for the humans IF THE HUMANS DON'T SUCK, -or- the aliens aren't overpowered.

I concede the fact that humans are likely saturated with newbies, but the massive discrepencies in those statistics for, say, Transit... They're just terrible and I feel that there's gotta be more than just human incompetence behind that.

As far as those upgrades, it would depend on human changes and if the other aspects of the aliens were nerfed. With the game as is, adding the changes would be the worst idea ever, with the exception of the advanced marauder zap. I say that because I see it forcing you to be pretty damn close, nearly touching. Marauders doing that would not be able to use their greatest strength, the wall jump, and therefore would die faster if they relied solely on their "zap aura".

Advanced Dragoons are already gotten in stage 2, I believe: correct me if I'm wrong. If they aren't, then making them available earlier could only serve to cause devastation unless the damage of those spines was lessened or some other means of nerfing the dragoon was used.

The basilisk having silent footsteps and a healing aura might be okay if the aura was small enough, but just smacking the tyrant's double-regen on it would be horrifying. Also, I personally think that should be an advanced basilisk thing, or the basilisks should stop being able to hold their enemies (which makes them not basilisks anymore, in my opinion.)

Of course, this all depends on human balances still. If the humans have similar increases and rearrangements of power, then it could easily be balanced out.

---

To Henners:
I disagree, balance is very important, otherwise the game loses its appeal (for me, at least.) As far as slight imbalance goes, that's unavoidable: but it should be minimized to within the margin of error.

I never claimed it was required, but it certainly would help make the game more dynamic and engaging if you ask me.

---

To Lava Croft:
-My- lack of competence? I'm sorry to say, I'm not whining about getting my ass kicked. I'm complaining that it's too damn easy for my teammates to kick ass with a certain unit. (If I used tyrants, it would be too easy for me too.)

[Metsjeesus]

To Metsjeesus:
I played with you a little last night, although the server was very much distasteful to me; you may have seen me, same name as my forum name and the level was Tremor? Yeah, that was a good human game. Lucifer cannons owned in the end. I still think aliens are a overpowered at the moment, though.

I tend to prefer smaller servers, so we don't see much body blocking. Either way, where there are tyrants you have the wannabes and the distractions, like me. Yeah, I was the marauder that catapulted into your base like 6 times and busted one of your medistations. Where tyrants can't go, they serve as giant meatshields themselves. Everyone focuses on the big roaring son of a bitch, only to get "ninja'd" by a basilisk or a marauder while they're tied up blasting the bejesus out of the Tyrants. Hell, I've seen sniping dragoons effectively use trapped tyrants to take fire for them while they wreak havoc.

As far as playing only alien is concerned, it's only until I know what I'm doing with aliens. Then I'm going to learn humans and not work on aliens until I'm decent with humans, and so on and so forth, slowly improving my skills.

So i play on 2 servers, both of them are kind of special. On amsterdam unlimited, 999 bp, no om no healing, better turrets, can place turrets on more places, tyr has no healing aura, hovelports, short stages. Top of that, experienced players. Humans tactic is spread nearer to alien base so much they can, alien tactic is to not wait until sd and then suicide each turret.

On Pornserv, alien heal near eggs, tripleheal near booster, tyr has shorter hit range, 350 HP max and rush throws humans away + does multiple hits. poison takes more hp and healthpack wont cure poison, goons get faster barbs, maras zap is easyer, On other hand, lucyballs fly faster but splash damage are is shorter, chainguns spread more and are slower, jetpackers cant fly forever, turrets do more damage, but are slower, teslas wont need def comp, def comp heals all buildings, you can make arms, medis and def comps on SD, react does hell of damage to aliens and ofcorse, more bp then 100.  Both human and alien need to make outpost near other teams base to get fast heals. So they battle for bases.

[Sakura-chan/Tsunade]

.......You should know my sister we girls don't play so often... shes in {AmA}=amazons=girl clan.....
I don't play tremulous anymore but i signed up here to help my sister post problems......I'll tell you others...(in secret)if i meet you ingame.... (i mean my sister will probaly meet you ) her ingame nick is .... {AmA}Sakura. 

[Lava Croft]

To Lava Croft:
-My- lack of competence? I'm sorry to say, I'm not whining about getting my ass kicked. I'm complaining that it's too damn easy for my teammates to kick ass with a certain unit. (If I used tyrants, it would be too easy for me too.)

How come even the most blatant form of sarcasm completely eludes you?

[NiTRoX]

I think I'm done talking to Breathe She belongs to the group of people who talks more than they play Tremulous.

PS: Here are the TremStats for our server. (Yes you can click the word here, woman.)

And yet you didn't stfu..

[Steely Ann]

I never really lurked there at all so I have to ask: Does SATGNU run Unlagged on there?  I've always found it a bitch to play alien with Unlagged on if I don't use either guerrilla tactics on my own or ambushes with at least one combat buddy.

If you take into account that newbies always saturate the human team (seriously, clan matches are practically the only exception), 51-47 actually makes it sound like the humans are built stronger than the aliens.

[Breathe]

To Metsjeesus:
Yeah, it was PornServ. I only played Tremor, but it was damned terrible there.

---

To Sakura-chan/Tsunade:
When I'm done packing and getting ready for the move I'll have no net (losing it today, in fact) so I'll look for you/her on the 10th.

---

To Lava Croft:
Tell me how I was supposed to take what you said. Explain it word for word.

Please.

---

To NiTRoX:
Shutting up in the middle of a disagreement tends to be A Bad Idea. The opposing party tends to be a jackass and say "OH LOOK THEY RAN FROM THE TRUTH" or the like.

---

To Steely Ann:
I played on satgnu a bit, I don't think it has Unlagged. Unlagged gives me REALLY stupid connection glitches, like being connected but completely unable to move... I didn't get any on satgnu.

ATCS IS strangely balanced in favor of the humans, as opposed to Transit, which tends to be more wide open and iwthout any particularly awesome alien base. Maybe it's familiarity on the part of the newbies? (See: Team Arena)

[NiTRoX]

To NiTRoX:
Shutting up in the middle of a disagreement tends to be A Bad Idea. The opposing party tends to be a jackass and say "OH LOOK THEY RAN FROM THE TRUTH" or the like.

This is not politics my friend ..

[Sakura-chan/Tsunade]

Btw breath .... well.  My sister is korean and british...        (my sister plays most often on atcs playground  )

[NiTRoX]

Btw breath .... well.  My sister is korean and british...        (my sister plays most often on atcs playground  )

I think I know your sister