Xenos told to suicide

[chocolate_bickie]

I don't quite understand why xenos are often told to suicide when there is no queen. I understand that sometimes admins want the round to end so that a new one can start, but with the hivemind death timer and the max limit to the number of queens per round it seems entirely unnecessary.

If the hivemind death timer is too long then this is an issue that should be raised with the developers instead of messaging all xenos to suicide into marines. I'd like to hear peoples opinions on the topic because marines don't receive similar messages from High Command telling them that they 'need to attack' because they evac'd with 'too many' marines.

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

It's mostly a case by case thing, but most of the time, xeno just feel like they need to keep on stalling, so that another larva could be queen, and maybe they'll get to prolong their round. If the xeno number is still strong enough that they can afford small skirmishes and still come out swinging, most of the time they'll be left alone. But if there's like 1 or 2 xeno left, and there's no chance in hell that they can fight against the marine force; them simply running around the giant maps (aside from LV, but even then the cave is huge) and just dodging every fight is boring.

Also, there's no queen limit. As long as the hive as a drone left, you can keep on evolving into a queen. Of course, this will slowly get to the point where xeno don't have any drone, larva, or even captured left; and forcing the combined xeno+marine players to wait for the current queen to die and 20 minutes after that is extremely boring, when you can just get into a new round, new RNG roll, and maybe a better chance of actually doing something aside from just talking shit in dchat.

We have all been asking for a limit on queens, like 3 max and that's it. We've also asked for marines to have better ways to search the rest of the Xeno once the situation is really fucked and there's absolutely no way they can fight back. But atm, it's just a "please be nice and end this soon so that we don't all suffer without being able to play" thing

[kastion]

i dont realy mind it when the round is all but over. What gets on my nerves is when marines meta evac with 80 marines and the admins dont tell them to go back down. Or when marines just sit in fob with 100 marines waiting for 15 xenos to attack and the admins dont do anything. Everything about this game is so one sided its annoying, things never apply to both sides.

[Grubstank]

The way I see it, 80 man evacs are almost entirely the xenos' fault. They have vastly more control of the information game than marines do, and 80 man evacs only happen when the xenos make the marines believe they're vastly stronger.

So yeah, if the xenos give up control of the information game and let the marines think they need to evac with 80 marines, then it's entirely the xenos' fault. If the xenos apparently effortlessly wipe a squad and keep massive pressure on the FOB, then is it any surprise that the CO would feel the need to evac? Keep in mind that once the FOB is breached, any evac attempt balloons into massive casualties. (And 15 smart xenos can easily look like 25 or 30 when assailing a FOB)

Going off the lore, the marines would just nuke the planet if they were forced to evac -- so it's the xenos' responsibility to either keep control of the information game, or to pursue a relentless offensive. If you fuck up enough to make the marines evac with a lot of marines, then be prepared to suffer the consequences.

[blingx3]

i dont realy mind it when the round is all but over. What gets on my nerves is when marines meta evac with 80 marines and the admins dont tell them to go back down. Or when marines just sit in fob with 100 marines waiting for 15 xenos to attack and the admins dont do anything. Everything about this game is so one sided its annoying, things never apply to both sides.

I relate to this on so many levels, RIP

[chocolate_bickie]

The way I see it, 80 man evacs are almost entirely the xenos' fault. They have vastly more control of the information game than marines do, and 80 man evacs only happen when the xenos make the marines believe they're vastly stronger.

So yeah, if the xenos give up control of the information game and let the marines think they need to evac with 80 marines, then it's entirely the xenos' fault. If the xenos apparently effortlessly wipe a squad and keep massive pressure on the FOB, then is it any surprise that the CO would feel the need to evac? Keep in mind that once the FOB is breached, any evac attempt balloons into massive casualties. (And 15 smart xenos can easily look like 25 or 30 when assailing a FOB)

Going off the lore, the marines would just nuke the planet if they were forced to evac -- so it's the xenos' responsibility to either keep control of the information game, or to pursue a relentless offensive. If you fuck up enough to make the marines evac with a lot of marines, then be prepared to suffer the consequences.

I heavily disagree. I see so many rounds where the marines throw all four squads at the xeno hives and if that dosen't work they just fall back to the FoB which takes xenos so long toc rack with their few numbers that the marines have plenty of time to evac.

Marines have a massive information advantage in that they know that as soon as they evac xenos have to go to the Almayer no matter their numbers. And they use it, repeatedly. Xenos are often accused of metaing but marines do it far more and abuse it in far more difficult to prove ways. And once again, if xenos refuse to send their 15 vs marines 80 they get an admin message they they need to go the Alamyer.

As for nuking the planet, what do you think the OB on LZ1 is?

[Sulaboy]

We have access to information that the players don't during the round. Whichever side seems to be in a better position is put into the attack. The marines can get announcements from high command, or their commander could be subtle messaged about organizing a redeployment if the Xenos are in no position to board the Almayer.

I don't think anyone would have a problem with us telling the last runner that he's the only member of the hive still alive, so he should try to speed up the end of the round.

All and all it's about preserving the flow of the round.

[Grubstank]

I heavily disagree. I see so many rounds where the marines throw all four squads at the xeno hives and if that dosen't work they just fall back to the FoB which takes xenos so long toc rack with their few numbers that the marines have plenty of time to evac.

Marines have a massive information advantage in that they know that as soon as they evac xenos have to go to the Almayer no matter their numbers. And they use it, repeatedly. Xenos are often accused of metaing but marines do it far more and abuse it in far more difficult to prove ways. And once again, if xenos refuse to send their 15 vs marines 80 they get an admin message they they need to go the Alamyer.

As for nuking the planet, what do you think the OB on LZ1 is?

If the xenos don't assail the LZ (even if it's just 15 xenos), then the marines will virtually never evac. If they have 60 or 80 marines and you give them any sort of time to regroup, they will soon enough form into patrols for you to pick off. If you're seriously going to fault the marines for unga rushing, then you should have the perspective to see what a folly a concerted an LZ attack is for the xenos if they don't have the numbers to finish the job.

That is *not* an information advantage. That's you trying to present possible metagaming as an information advantage -- which it really isn't, unless you have players metacomming information to the CO/queen from observer, which is easy for admins to spot and stop.

*Any* xenos at any time can pull up the hive status and get as much information about the hive as an SO can about their squad from the overwatch console -- numbers, composition, location, etc.. They can see through darkness, AND WALLS. They can move at extremely high speeds, even when gravely wounded, permitting ludicrous scouting runs without a significant amount of risk. The smaller T1s and T2s can vent crawl, and scout out the entire marine deployment within moments from almost absolute safety (particularly if the engineers just weld vents, instead of detaching pipes). Paired with the scans every 30 minutes and basic communication skills, a STANDARD XENO has as much, or more knowledge of the battlefield than than the CO does in a fully staffed CIC. To top it all off, you have the Queen in ovi, who has literally nothing else to do BUT maintain a strategic knowledge of the marines' deployment and strength.

A small core of decent xenos players can force a marine retreat at 80 marines, BECAUSE the marines don't have the information the xenos do. They don't know there's only 15 xenos out there. They can't go out and count them without grave danger; all they can do is infer it by how hard they're being attacked, and how fast their FOB cades start to go down. You can't send out lone PFCs to scout, because they'd get picked off in a heartbeat. The CO can only make ham-fisted actions with their squads before the ungas have their way, so a late-game scout with a full squad is really only useful as a way to initiate an engagement.

If you consider an OB to the LZ to be a nuke (or even, effective, since only a dumbass would stand still on the Alamo to get hit with an OB (which even if it does hit you, will likely not kill you from full HP)) then you need to get your head checked, man. Even modern day nuclear weapons are capable of leveling small countries. Our OBs are about as effective as a shot from a modern day howitzer or basic artillery piece. Modern nukes have a kill zone of dozens of square kilometers, not several dozen square meters. It's not a far stretch to say that nukes from 150 years into the future should be capable of wiping out continents -- and the marines wouldn't have to stop at just one, either. But that's all a digression from the main point -- xenos have far more map awareness than the marines do at any given time

tl;dr: 80 man retreats only happen because the xenos are stupid enough to push the LZ with bad odds. Being asked to suicide into the Almayer is just the xenos suffering for *their* mistake. The marines shouldn't be asked to redeploy, because the aliens should be the one to suffer for their OWN strategic failure. The marines can be excused for thinking that there are a lot more aliens than there are; the xenos can't, because they CHOSE that LZ push which led to the marines evaccing with unfavorable odds.

I guarantee to you that very few COs or XOs give the evac order because they want as many marines as possible for the Almayer defense. At that point, they already consider the numbers/odds to be unwinnable, and see themselves at imminent risk of losing far more marines should the LZ be breached.

[chocolate_bickie]

If the xenos don't assail the LZ (even if it's just 15 xenos), then the marines will virtually never evac. If they have 60 or 80 marines and you give them any sort of time to regroup, they will soon enough form into patrols for you to pick off. If you're seriously going to fault the marines for unga rushing, then you should have the perspective to see what a folly a concerted an LZ attack is for the xenos if they don't have the numbers to finish the job.

That is *not* an information advantage. That's you trying to present possible metagaming as an information advantage -- which it really isn't, unless you have players metacomming information to the CO/queen from observer, which is easy for admins to spot and stop.

*Any* xenos at any time can pull up the hive status and get as much information about the hive as an SO can about their squad from the overwatch console -- numbers, composition, location, etc.. They can see through darkness, AND WALLS. They can move at extremely high speeds, even when gravely wounded, permitting ludicrous scouting runs without a significant amount of risk. The smaller T1s and T2s can vent crawl, and scout out the entire marine deployment within moments from almost absolute safety (particularly if the engineers just weld vents, instead of detaching pipes). Paired with the scans every 30 minutes and basic communication skills, a STANDARD XENO has as much, or more knowledge of the battlefield than than the CO does in a fully staffed CIC. To top it all off, you have the Queen in ovi, who has literally nothing else to do BUT maintain a strategic knowledge of the marines' deployment and strength.

A small core of decent xenos players can force a marine retreat at 80 marines, BECAUSE the marines don't have the information the xenos do. They don't know there's only 15 xenos out there. They can't go out and count them without grave danger; all they can do is infer it by how hard they're being attacked, and how fast their FOB cades start to go down. You can't send out lone PFCs to scout, because they'd get picked off in a heartbeat. The CO can only make ham-fisted actions with their squads before the ungas have their way, so a late-game scout with a full squad is really only useful as a way to initiate an engagement.

If you consider an OB to the LZ to be a nuke (or even, effective, since only a dumbass would stand still on the Alamo to get hit with an OB (which even if it does hit you, will likely not kill you from full HP)) then you need to get your head checked, man. Even modern day nuclear weapons are capable of leveling small countries. Our OBs are about as effective as a shot from a modern day howitzer or basic artillery piece. Modern nukes have a kill zone of dozens of square kilometers, not several dozen square meters. It's not a far stretch to say that nukes from 150 years into the future should be capable of wiping out continents -- and the marines wouldn't have to stop at just one, either. But that's all a digression from the main point -- xenos have far more map awareness than the marines do at any given time

tl;dr: 80 man retreats only happen because the xenos are stupid enough to push the LZ with bad odds. Being asked to suicide into the Almayer is just the xenos suffering for *their* mistake. The marines shouldn't be asked to redeploy, because the aliens should be the one to suffer for their OWN strategic failure. The marines can be excused for thinking that there are a lot more aliens than there are; the xenos can't, because they CHOSE that LZ push which led to the marines evaccing with unfavorable odds.

I guarantee to you that very few COs or XOs give the evac order because they want as many marines as possible for the Almayer defense. At that point, they already consider the numbers/odds to be unwinnable, and see themselves at imminent risk of losing far more marines should the LZ be breached.

These concentrated attacks you refer to are often just one boiler taking a shots at LZ1. Full evacs often occur before cades even start to fall because marines refuse to defend them, instead assuming 'regroup at LZ1' means 'full evac'. Whilst you can argue that xenos should 'account' for this when deciding when to attack, the fact of the matter is marines often evac when there is no real pressure simply because they don't want to organize a counter attack or because their initial attack failed.

Xenos also don't have the ability to count how many marines there are. There isn't just a lurker in LZ1 tallying the number of marines coming and going.

As for maps awareness SOs have just as much map awareness of the queen, probably more since there can be up to four of them. You can argue that xenos can 'be anywhere' so that gives them more map view, but that dilutes any attacking force xenos have. With four squads that's a lot of map awareness not to mention each of them is capable of being individually directed by a SO.

Nuking the planet is a whole other issue. First of all I somehow doubt a commander could justify destroying a whole colony and making it uninhabitable because of 15 or so xenos hiding in a cave. Second, if marines did have access to nuke everyone round would be 12:30 evac, nuke, GG.

OBs are the closest comparison marines have to nukes in game and they are often used a such, to hit the landing zone after an evac or when the Alamo has been taken, to try and prevent further conflict.

Tl'dr: Everything you have said is true for marines except even more.

[Grubstank]

These concentrated attacks you refer to are often just one boiler taking a shots at LZ1. Full evacs often occur before cades even start to fall because marines refuse to defend them, instead assuming 'regroup at LZ1' means 'full evac'. Whilst you can argue that xenos should 'account' for this when deciding when to attack, the fact of the matter is marines often evac when there is no real pressure simply because they don't want to organize a counter attack or because their initial attack failed.

in my experience, you must absolutely eviscerate a squad or two of marines in the field and keep sustained pressure on the LZ for the marines to call an evac. PFCs barely listen to a retreat order, let alone an evac order unless they themselves are convinced they're being fucked. Evacs are really only called when the xenos make the commander think they're outmatched. Things must be very different between our two time zones if what you claim is true.

Xenos also don't have the ability to count how many marines there are. There isn't just a lurker in LZ1 tallying the number of marines coming and going.

see literally everything I said about scouting. You can get an extremely good idea of how many marines are in an LZ by how many marines are on the front lines when you poke it. And if you're pushing an LZ with 15 benos in early game, then you really ought to know better in the first place.

As for maps awareness SOs have just as much map awareness of the queen, probably more since there can be up to four of them. You can argue that xenos can 'be anywhere' so that gives them more map view, but that dilutes any attacking force xenos have. With four squads that's a lot of map awareness not to mention each of them is capable of being individually directed by a SO.

no, because an SO's marines are only in one location at once and are limited by lighting and walls. You can use rambos to see other parts of the map, but not enough to build a full picture. An SO's map awareness extends only to their squad, and if you've spent a round in CIC you'd know that the small minority of SO's provide frequent sitreps to the other CIC staff--especially unprompted ones. Given the massive LOS limitations on marines, it is extremely easy for an SO to overestimate how many xenos there are, especially as they witness their strung out marines being eviscerated in a retreat. If anything there being more SOs increases the communication issues; and that's entirely beside the point, because the average PFC doesn't have an overwatch console tab.

Nuking the planet is a whole other issue. First of all I somehow doubt a commander could justify destroying a whole colony and making it uninhabitable because of 15 or so xenos hiding in a cave. Second, if marines did have access to nuke everyone round would be 12:30 evac, nuke, GG.

OBs are the closest comparison marines have to nukes in game and they are often used a such, to hit the landing zone after an evac or when the Alamo has been taken, to try and prevent further conflict.

the 'closest comparison' being irrelevant in this instance, as they don't even touch upon the one-sided, guaranteed extermination of the xenos that a nuke would imply, and which would be employed upon the marines' retreat in the lore. The fact that they are not present in the game because they'd be fucking boring is a different matter entirely. Most of these maps are remote, depopulated colonies with no strategic importance, and limited financial value even by Wey-Yu's bottom line -- a commander would nuke these in a heartbeat if their ground intervention failed.
In any case, the point is that if the xenos go to the point of driving the marines off the planet, then OOCly the onus should remain on them to finish the job, since concessions were already made to them in the form of not-nuking and permitting them the use of the Alamo in the first place.

Tl'dr: Everything you have said is true for marines except even more.

I'm sorry, I forgot that the average marine could see through walls and ignore darkness, or access the rough equivalent of an overwatch console at any given moment. Virtually none of the factors I've listed are also true for the marines. That was the point of my argument.


Your anecdotes suggest you've been playing a completely different game than I have, so I'm not sure if anything I can say would convince you. The average xeno has far more tactical and strategic information available to them at any given time than a marine does, and that's a fact.

Long story short, don't push the LZ if you don't want marines to evac with as many marines as they might have in the FOB.

[lurkermain]

If the admins tell you to stop delaying you probably dont have a chance anyway, I typically ahelp myself to ask if I am delaying.

It'd be better if the death of the queen would leave the hive status somewhat useable, killing the hivemind chat is ok.

[chocolate_bickie]

in my experience, you must absolutely eviscerate a squad or two of marines in the field and keep sustained pressure on the LZ for the marines to call an evac. PFCs barely listen to a retreat order, let alone an evac order unless they themselves are convinced they're being fucked. Evacs are really only called when the xenos make the commander think they're outmatched. Things must be very different between our two time zones if what you claim is true.

Much like xenos marines generally behave how other marines around them behave. It only takes a few marines to start leaving defenses to trigger a rush of marines from the frontline.

see literally everything I said about scouting. You can get an extremely good idea of how many marines are in an LZ by how many marines are on the front lines when you poke it. And if you're pushing an LZ with 15 benos in early game, then you really ought to know better in the first place.

no, because an SO's marines are only in one location at once and are limited by lighting and walls. You can use rambos to see other parts of the map, but not enough to build a full picture. An SO's map awareness extends only to their squad, and if you've spent a round in CIC you'd know that the small minority of SO's provide frequent sitreps to the other CIC staff--especially unprompted ones. Given the massive LOS limitations on marines, it is extremely easy for an SO to overestimate how many xenos there are, especially as they witness their strung out marines being eviscerated in a retreat. If anything there being more SOs increases the communication issues; and that's entirely beside the point, because the average PFC doesn't have an overwatch console tab.

The only relevant parts of the map are where conflict is going on, which requires both xenos and marines. With a few exceptions (melting points into tcomms etc, hive location) the areas of most importance are where marines are or where marines are being sent too. Watching marines get eviscerated is not just an issue that effects marines, queens order evacs after a handful of deaths as well, except xenos can be chased back to their hive. When marines evac there is a delay before the shuttle can be called back down, launched and crash, with marines getting ample warning.

the 'closest comparison' being irrelevant in this instance, as they don't even touch upon the one-sided, guaranteed extermination of the xenos that a nuke would imply, and which would be employed upon the marines' retreat in the lore. The fact that they are not present in the game because they'd be fucking boring is a different matter entirely. Most of these maps are remote, depopulated colonies with no strategic importance, and limited financial value even by Wey-Yu's bottom line -- a commander would nuke these in a heartbeat if their ground intervention failed.
In any case, the point is that if the xenos go to the point of driving the marines off the planet, then OOCly the onus should remain on them to finish the job, since concessions were already made to them in the form of not-nuking and permitting them the use of the Alamo in the first place.

Strategic importance is not the only factor. Your argument is we lost the ground war therefore nuke. Nukes are expensive, so is a colony, why destroy it and the surrounding area if the species is contained on the planet? You wouldn't, it would be a political nightmare. CLF recruitment drive: Join us, the USCM wants to nuke you at the first chance it gets.

I'm sorry, I forgot that the average marine could see through walls and ignore darkness, or access the rough equivalent of an overwatch console at any given moment. Virtually none of the factors I've listed are also true for the marines. That was the point of my argument.

Xenos can see through walls and in dark, but that doesn't give them an idea of the numbers they face unless they are right in the middle of the marines. Whilst xenos have an idea of their own numbers, it takes a while to process that into Tier makeup, age and skill of each xeno. Also it's no 'eqivalent' to on overwatch console, overwatch's main advantage is vision, which hivemind dosen't provide.

Your anecdotes suggest you've been playing a completely different game than I have, so I'm not sure if anything I can say would convince you. The average xeno has far more tactical and strategic information available to them at any given time than a marine does, and that's a fact.

CIC has the same if not more information that xenos have. No they cannot see through walls and yes there is more communication required. But COs/XOs/SOs ordering evac, wether because their push failed or because marines won't defend or do what their told is an issue.

Attacking LZ1 is often not a choice. If marines choose to move everyone there and not counter attack, even when they heavily outnumber xenos, there isn't alot of other choices xenos have.

But your right, we seem to have played different games, so I'm not sure what else there is to say.

[CABAL]

I will only add that Queen can "overwatch" xeno and see beyond his range of view. Nearly every map has a point that is close to the marines, but they can't access it. Order a xeno to get there and you can count marines easly.

Xenos have the information advantage, no denying it. As a PFC I never know when to evac, frist barricade being breached is the best time becouse you can be sure as hell that Queen will access trough that breach, screech and fuck off while other xenos will melt other cades. At this point only the fastest marines will evacuate and if PO is a coward, or experienced then Evac will be successful. Otherwise Queen will lock the dropship and it's over.

Xenos can always "evac" to caves, where they have adventage, but they are not "closed". CO can't "click" cave's console to lock xenos from retreating. Marines has to spread to chase xenos and then they can be picked off.