Xeno Mutator discussion

[kastion]

Side grades are the flavor that make a game in a state of perfect balanced "unbalanced". Its what makes games like Starcraft/tf2/ Lol, shine as games. Its what i think CM13 should strive for as well. Its the state of you know that if you just had "x" or "y", you'd be unstoppable, but theres just that nagging "z" that keeps it in check.

You may not want to take less armor/health to boost speed, but you may want to have less armor/health to boost speed and give you a longer pounce to go with it. Your taking a negative in one area to gain a stronger positive in another area.

Ya but marines all have guns which hit you from far away while you have to walk over and hit them (and have actual skill to hit them unlike starcraft/league) So if you don't have enough armor or health you die, if you are too slow you die, you have to have all of them. So that just leaves damage. So I can nerf my damage to not die then I have to tickle you to death for 10 minutes when I do get to you.

also what do you consider sidegrades in league or starcraft cause I cant think of any. StarCraft every upgrade just straight makes your units better and league you get every skill no matter what just different orders and all items just make you better.

[lurkermain]

Mutator ideas:

Faster healing: bit faster healing on weeds
or: Rejuvenating weeds (for drones): the center spot of weeds has a different color, resting on it heals faster than normal weeds
Improved resist: better chance of resist removing fire (and removing alien trap faster?)
Revenge: huge spray of acid when the xeno dies, or acid cloud
Silence: your attacks make less noise, you make no noise when you step on glass and you dont roar at 50% health
Ravenous: you can consume xeno corpses to heal quickly
Force: your attacks have a chance to push back enemies one tile (atm I'm not sure how this could be useful beyond the occasional cheese)

[Butlerblock]

all of those sound useless other than maybe ravenous

[FGRSentinel]

I just don't see the point of side grades. I cant think of any time I would take less armor or health to boost speed some. The only thing I could think of is going like full support on drone or hivelord or maybe praetorian and just nuking your combat stats to have better support stuff. Other than that you need every stat for combat especially for anyone that goes into melee fighting.

Like I wouldn't trade 1 speed for 1 armor. I might trade 2 speed for 1 armor or something where I am overall stronger, but I wouldn't just swap my stats around and become some glass cannon or something that's just dumb.

You're basically describing the decisions every Marine has to make when it comes to attachments: "if I take x I'm more likely to hit what I'm shooting, but I do less damage/fire less/have less shots per burst, while if I take y I do more damage/fire faster/shoot more rounds per burst but end up being less accurate. Are they worth it for me?"

At least one dev stated that they hoped mutators would be the xeno equivalent of attachments in that they'd encourage more specialized builds and playstyles, which would only be a reasonable comparison if mutators were something that made xenos stop to think about it. As a Marine, I wouldn't grab a Barrel Charger if I wanted to make a pulse sniper rifle because of the accuracy penalty, but I might grab it for a short-range weapon due to the damage boost. Mutators were superior to attachments for two reasons: they stacked (you can't combine certain attachments because they take up the same slot) and they had no real downsides (out of all the attachments the Marines have, only one, the laser sight, has zero stat penalties) which makes every mutator an outright upgrade compared to the attachments being more or less sidegrades.

[kastion]

You're basically describing the decisions every Marine has to make when it comes to attachments: "if I take x I'm more likely to hit what I'm shooting, but I do less damage/fire less/have less shots per burst, while if I take y I do more damage/fire faster/shoot more rounds per burst but end up being less accurate. Are they worth it for me?"

At least one dev stated that they hoped mutators would be the xeno equivalent of attachments in that they'd encourage more specialized builds and playstyles, which would only be a reasonable comparison if mutators were something that made xenos stop to think about it. As a Marine, I wouldn't grab a Barrel Charger if I wanted to make a pulse sniper rifle because of the accuracy penalty, but I might grab it for a short-range weapon due to the damage boost. Mutators were superior to attachments for two reasons: they stacked (you can't combine certain attachments because they take up the same slot) and they had no real downsides (out of all the attachments the Marines have, only one, the laser sight, has zero stat penalties) which makes every mutator an outright upgrade compared to the attachments being more or less sidegrades.

but attachments are a net positive and alot of the stats that get lowered dont matter on attachments (like the ones that only hurt you if you 1 hand the weapon)

Yall want these to literally keep at at the same power level by nerfing 1 the same amoutn as it buffs another. Its not comparable at all. Marines also can specialize weapons because they can carry 2 weapons. Xenos are the weapon and cant specialize in 2 different things at once. As a marine I can carry an m41a for medium range and a m37 for short range and lose NO effectiveness whatsoever on either one of them.

[CABAL]

but attachments are a net positive and alot of the stats that get lowered dont matter on attachments (like the ones that only hurt you if you 1 hand the weapon)

Yall want these to literally keep at at the same power level by nerfing 1 the same amoutn as it buffs another. Its not comparable at all. Marines also can specialize weapons because they can carry 2 weapons. Xenos are the weapon and cant specialize in 2 different things at once. As a marine I can carry an m41a for medium range and a m37 for short range and lose NO effectiveness whatsoever on either one of them.

As a marine I can carry 4 primary weapons (one smg) and fuck ton of pistols. Should we balance game around that? I can specialise in 4 things! OP! "Xenos also can specialize playstyle becouse they can carry 3 mutators"
Marines can carry two pretty shitty weapons, but who will give them that much of attachements? It's so much better to be good at one thing, than be average in two and this is what you will get from taking Pulse Rifle and Shotgun/flamer both at the same time, but they won't specialise in any of it.

"attachments are a net positive and alot of the stats that get lowered dont matter on attachments (like the ones that only hurt you if you 1 hand the weapon)"

But they don't give that much positives. Most of them give slight, nearly meaningless "buffs" and they are LIMITED. Only grips, rail flashlight, underbarrel grenade launcher and laser sight have no "nerfs".

Nearly any other attachement gives severe "debuffs". "Specialising" in something means getting better at something, at the cost of something else. Straight boosts are straight boosts, as mutators are.

No side have Jack of all trades (besides Queen and maybe SADAR to lesser extent) while xenos have direct counters for marines weaponry (Rav/Queen to fire).
In "extended" game of "Rock, paper, scissors" it's unfair to have stone scissors with paper handle. While attaching BC to Pulse rifle, you are chaning it from "rock" to "scissors", while taking "mutators" you are just making better paper. Trying to have "Stone scissors" will get you nowhere. Lurker will never be good at anything besides ambushes and direct dmg and if he will be changed to cover more situations, then it's just stupid.

[Boersgard]

I understand that mutators at the moment are just here to prove a concept, but I think it should be considered to nerf or remove multi bursts or maturing stat boosts.
Also I think the speed boosts should be removed, armor and attack are ok, but not being able to hit xenos is broken. Leave speed as it is.

IMO, remove maturation statboosts, but buff mature to be a little stronger than they are now - not as good as elder, but better than current mature. As well, reduce the maturation time from young -> mature, but increase the time (at least equivalently) from mature -> elder.

Elder/Ancient for more powerful abilities (what mutators should really be), not stat boosts, and a coloration change so marines know to watch out for them the same way xenos know to watch out for flamers, shotguns, and rockets.

The game would be mostly marines vs mature xenos, with the odd round-start / good xenos lasting long enough to get more dangerous mutations/abilities as elders. Ancient honestly isn't even needed and might be best locked away as an admin thing.

[Boersgard]

In "extended" game of "Rock, paper, scissors" it's unfair to have stone scissors with paper handle. While attaching BC to Pulse rifle, you are chaning it from "rock" to "scissors", while taking "mutators" you are just making better paper. Trying to have "Stone scissors" will get you nowhere. Lurker will never be good at anything besides ambushes and direct dmg and if he will be changed to cover more situations, then it's just stupid.

Rock/Paper/Scissors balance has always been terrible.

The best balance comes from everything being OP. That way yes, you can die, but good players can also kill reliably. That's the difference between a shotgun and an M41.

Then the skill comes out, not from using the weapon, but getting into the position where you CAN use the weapon. For example, warrior's lunge is fantastic and very powerful - essentially a guaranteed kill on a lone marine. Do it in a group of marines and you're dead though.

That's what risk/reward actually means, but it's not what most xenos have now. There's way too much reward for way too little risk on the xeno side, and way too little reward for way too much risk on the human side. Or to put this another way - xenos getting more abilities and higher damage isn't a bad thing, but more health and speed is - and right now marines need to deal more damage than they presently do (or xeno health/speed needs to be nerfed from what it currently is) to keep the two sides more balanced.

[CABAL]

Rock/Paper/Scissors balance has always been terrible.

The best balance comes from everything being OP. That way yes, you can die, but good players can also kill reliably. That's the difference between a shotgun and an M41.

Then the skill comes out, not from using the weapon, but getting into the position where you CAN use the weapon. For example, warrior's lunge is fantastic and very powerful - essentially a guaranteed kill on a lone marine. Do it in a group of marines and you're dead though.

That's what risk/reward actually means, but it's not what most xenos have now. There's way too much reward for way too little risk on the xeno side, and way too little reward for way too much risk on the human side. Or to put this another way - xenos getting more abilities and higher damage isn't a bad thing, but more health and speed is - and right now marines need to deal more damage than they presently do (or xeno health/speed needs to be nerfed from what it currently is) to keep the two sides more balanced.

Well... RPS works in RTS games. You are right, but we do have Rav that is like rock for flamer scissors.

[kastion]

does mutating pheromones on queen actually make queen pheromones stronger or do they just hit the cap faster? also does hive pheromones and personal pheromones stack?

[KingPhilipIII]

Mutator idea. Change the Praetorian's cone into the spray the boilers get. Same windup but different pattern.

[Build_R_]

Mutator idea. Change the Praetorian's cone into the spray the boilers get. Same windup but different pattern.

I think the cone spray is a better shape for attacking than a line tbh

[KingPhilipIII]

Line has better range though. That's the idea though. Tradeoffs.

[kastion]

Line has better range though. That's the idea though. Tradeoffs.

ya but its not worth a mutator especially if it has the same shitty ass wind up that makes acid spray completely useless unless marines are retarded or someone stunned them. Also good luck aiming a 1 tile wide acid spray that takes 2 seconds to fire. You aint gonna hit anyone except in a doorway.

I would be tempted to pay a mutator to get the real boiler acid spray with no windup and short recharge though.

[RuAlastor]

Small addition about current mutators. If you deploy after 12:30 benos steamroll you in 10 minutes. It happened like 4 times during 2 days. that's a bit broken, I suppose.
Also, I want to admit, if admins are watching only at pure numbers, that can lead them to the wrong conclusion that marines still have decent winrate. They don't. Marines win only on Almayer due to early evac (as it's really easy to assault any fob with just crushed + boiler (unkillable crusher + huge cloud)) or other "cheese" strategies. There're few exceptions where benos were extremely bald and lost planetside however (they managed to lose Ice Colony today).
I play only lowpop and midpop and that's an absolute disaster.
Mutators are good, but benos need to be nerfed before mutator buff. Benos already were stronger than marines.

[kastion]

Small addition about current mutators. If you deploy after 12:30 benos steamroll you in 10 minutes. It happened like 4 times during 2 days. that's a bit broken, I suppose.
Also, I want to admit, if admins are watching only at pure numbers, that can lead them to the wrong conclusion that marines still have decent winrate. They don't. Marines win only on Almayer due to early evac (as it's really easy to assault any fob with just crushed + boiler (unkillable crusher + huge cloud)) or other "cheese" strategies. There're few exceptions where benos were extremely bald and lost planetside however (they managed to lose Ice Colony today).
I play only lowpop and midpop and that's an absolute disaster.
Mutators are good, but benos need to be nerfed before mutator buff. Benos already were stronger than marines.

They added mutators because xenos were losing too much. They wanted to buff xenos. Maybe they over did it who knows. Yall need to realize it was meant to be a buff though.

[CABAL]

Elder Defender with Armor, health and pull speed is what I call "Saviour of vulnerable xenos". With crest downed I can tank normal bullets from rifle and even despite lack of message "thick exoskeleton deflected bullet..." they do no damage to me. I can stand in front of marines with pulse rifle for 5+ seconds and just take a little bit damage.
With "Fortify" Defender can take nearly everything besides AP, but with pheromones and mutations nothing will harm that boiler behind him. I can heal resting faster than marines can do damage = 20 seconds of defending + 10 seconds resting.

Armor, health and speed means that if you have place to run, you can't be killed as defender. It is not possible.

Cool when I'm playing Def, but uncool for marines that are helpless. Without spec, they can't stop boiler from launching cloud.

[GenericUsername]

How about we make mutator points not gained by maturing... in fact, remove maturing, let xenos gain more points by doing stuff such as killing marines or whatever and have the Queen gain hive points by growing the hive with captures. After all, one would think mutators are related to mutation, and that's what xenos are all about if you consider the black goo and dna reflex and whatnot. They kill and infect to enhance the species' biological perfection.

[RuAlastor]

They added mutators because xenos were losing too much. They wanted to buff xenos. Maybe they over did it who knows. Yall need to realize it was meant to be a buff though.

Well, I’m talking about lowpop mostly and before mutators xenos were winning 70% of the games. (Or it felt like that)
Even though xenos were vulnerable to early rushes, proper queen or decent coordination between t3s could turn marines and gain some time to mature. The problem was queen who said “free evo” and didn’t listen to anyone.
Marines also had pretty low chances to win if they deployed after 12:25, but at least xenos were far from LZ.
Another thing, before this buff, there could be no starting queen or second generation was like 3-4 new larvas and 24 burrowed so xeno numbers were bad, but now it can be like 20 xenos by the time marines only approach ETA, if we’re playing big red. 20 xenos from 70 players.
Now xenos require little effort to win. Queen can be bald af, crushers can ram into 2 full squads of marines and get back with like half hp and so on

[kastion]

Well, I’m talking about lowpop mostly and before mutators xenos were winning 70% of the games. (Or it felt like that)
Even though xenos were vulnerable to early rushes, proper queen or decent coordination between t3s could turn marines and gain some time to mature. The problem was queen who said “free evo” and didn’t listen to anyone.
Marines also had pretty low chances to win if they deployed after 12:25, but at least xenos were far from LZ.
Another thing, before this buff, there could be no starting queen or second generation was like 3-4 new larvas and 24 burrowed so xeno numbers were bad, but now it can be like 20 xenos by the time marines only approach ETA, if we’re playing big red. 20 xenos from 70 players.
Now xenos require little effort to win. Queen can be bald af, crushers can ram into 2 full squads of marines and get back with like half hp and so on

you are just having bias because xenos were getting dominated on low pop. I play on low pop too. It was easily 70-30 marines on low pop because yall just unga rush every single match. Yall were yelling shit like speedrun in ooc after every match. Low pop is never going to be balanced because they refuse to scale anything. They wont scale specs/ap ammo/attachments/larva/monkeys/anything so its never gonna be balanced.

[RuAlastor]

you are just having bias because xenos were getting dominated on low pop. I play on low pop too. It was easily 70-30 marines on low pop because yall just unga rush every single match. Yall were yelling shit like speedrun in ooc after every match. Low pop is never going to be balanced because they refuse to scale anything. They wont scale specs/ap ammo/attachments/larva/monkeys/anything so its never gonna be balanced.

Yea, now xenos are yelling speedrun in ooc after because they destroyed everyone in 30mins after deployment. Unga rush is a thing, because marines have no other way to win. They don’t have “comeback mechanisms” like xenos have. If they wait = they lose. And unfortunately, most marine mains rather go unga die to have a chance to win. Mostly, I play as SL and try stick to original objectives but than: ...(SO):”Delta have almost died in hive, go help them”
Yes, also apply everything I’ve said to lowpop, because it’s like 5am for me when it’s highpop

[KittyHawkpilot019]

As of now mutators dont have tradeoffs which we can hope they do in the future instead of outright stat buffs. They need to be so if you choose this you'll be worse at this.

[kastion]

we have personal mutators, and hive mutators, so why not galactic mutators that queen mother can give us. These would be for hillarious mutations for like events and stuff to make the round zany and fun.

[GoliathTheDespoiler]

Honestly so far it just seems there's 2 or 3 mutators that are stupid OP in comparison to the rest due to the current meta:

Speed
Health
Pull speed

Anyone who isn't a warrior or boiler that runs this becomes considerably stronger, compared to using anything else like armor or damage.

Maybe instead of a damage buff mutator it can be a tackle buff that is actually useable?

Also it kinda sucks a few mutators were removed because they were so badly balanced >:L

[kastion]

Honestly so far it just seems there's 2 or 3 mutators that are stupid OP in comparison to the rest due to the current meta:

Speed
Health
Pull speed

Anyone who isn't a warrior or boiler that runs this becomes considerably stronger, compared to using anything else like armor or damage.

Maybe instead of a damage buff mutator it can be a tackle buff that is actually useable?

Also it kinda sucks a few mutators were removed because they were so badly balanced >:L

pheromones + leaders is legit but everyone hates on me when I do it. You know how strong lurkers and runners are with very strong warding 24/7? People be dumb as shit though.

im also thinking about taking maturation from now on to stop the meta rush bullshit.