How would you slow down the rounds?

[GenericUsername]

Currently, rounds are going WAY too fast. Either xenos jump marines from the start or marines rush as soon as they have full map acess, and for me this is a problem, because this kills both fun and RP. For a while it might feel fun, to win quick, but eventually it will grow stale.
So, how would YOU change this? What's your opinion on this?

Personally, I think that the xenos need some way of reacting fast too. Perhaps combat hugging needs to come back, perhaps they should be stronger, I don't know. I believe this would work because, in my view, marines are rushing more because its a good gamble. Sure, you could lose a few marines, but you drive xenos back very quick. Mass stuns like the old neuro-cloud and combat hugging were what prevented marines from running face first and shooting everything.

[DrPng]

I've heard before that buffing xenos isn't the way to go. Instead, new features and mechanics for the xenos is the best bet.

Take crusher for example, it became pretty useless as a fort and line breaker. Now, crushers are only useful for guarding retreating sisters or meat shielding boilers.
I liked it in the old days when crushers could effective tunnel their way through maps using their charge, which did immense damage, or they use a radial stomp (which was OP)
They could bring back the radial stomp, but make it less prominent than queen screech.

Combat hugging used to be overpowered as shit when I played around a year ago, it resulted in xeno pop being super large. Round start larva also used to be larger. Maybe bringing back bigger pops would help?

Just some ideas. I'm really fond of the crusher one, because crushers used to be the meta.

[Casany]

Marines are rushing because the longer they wait the less chance they have to win. The devs made it so that the marines get weaker over time and the xenos get stronger over time. Therefor marines don’t really wanna wait.

[GenericUsername]

Marines are rushing because the longer they wait the less chance they have to win. The devs made it so that the marines get weaker over time and the xenos get stronger over time. Therefor marines don’t really wanna wait.

Yes,that is true too.
Thinking about it, it seems that a lot of changes, If reversed, would bring back the quality.
I mean, we did almost reach a point where the balance was perfect, but these latest changes... I don't know

[Potato Masher]

Every marine in the back of their minds knows that supplies are going to run low quickly; no time for idle RP. Rush or be stomped two hours later.

I'm not 100% sure how to fix this, but I feel like giving the xenos a bit of their old variety and usefulness back. Some abilities are useless due to shifting metas or gameplay changes (Crusher, Carrier's Hugger throw, Boiler Neuro gas, etc.), and some xenos don't seem to have all that much going for them due to their lack of difference from T2 counterparts (Preatorian).

In the end though, I feel like the overall amount of RP has lowered. As soon as the Marines touch down they go straight for known xeno spots and waste no time for RP. Xenos know that the Marines are going to rush, so in turn they also throw RP out and don't care if they ruin a spooky atmosphere by running headlong into an entire squad.
This here is a problem that I'm not sure we can fix all that easily. I'm not sure if its because we keep bringing in people who are looking for a team deathmatch or what, but there certainly is something changing in the general feeling of CM.

[jalen earl]

Maybe a chance of the alamo crash landing during the op. Marines then have to scrounge parts from engineering robotics sites while also dealing with xenos or ditching and relying solely on the normandy.

Xenos could be controlled with tweaks to the evolution rates

[x31stOverlord]

From what i've seen over the last few days is in line with what Potato Masher has said, with the new changes to reqs, it can quickly become too expensive to field metal for proper fortified positions. Given that marines used to operate by pushing and then creating a fallback point for a further push. This can't happen as much now so marines tend to just go ham and push as hard as possible trying to cripple the xenos before they can get too strong and simply outlast the marines.

A round in the last few days with me as RO made me strip down the chairs in briefing. Completely strip canteens of tables and chairs just because I was dry on points and kept getting orders for more and more metal in an attempt to get a decent fob, not even coupled with other orders where metal crates were going to cost 45 points plus for a single stack of metal.

I understand where the devs are trying to go with their decision as a ship can't hold infinite supplies and wouldn't be able to sustain constant orders for equipment that it just doesn't have. But with the changes as they are, the longer a round goes on the marine win chance goes down exponentially.

Although as with all updates and changes it does take time for both teams to adapt and change the meta to fit their teams strengths and weaknesses, perhaps the marines will find a way to combat the hindered supply situation and or for Xenos to know how to combat an early push from marines.

[Kesserline]

There were 2 possibilities :
Buff Xenos : enhancing certain abilities, or fixing/balancing weak abilities/castes
Nerf Marines : reducing Marines abilities to win battles easily

The recent nerf towards RO broke completely marines ability to sustain attrition war. Now, it's blitzkrieg, from Paris to Moscow, or, if it fails, from Moscow to Paris.

I know that Devs have a higher plan, I'm just waiting for it.

[Heckenshutze]

As I said it many times before, Queen needs a nerf and xenos in general, a buff.

Queens should be like the Chest figure: powerful but at the same time can end killed by a mere pawn

[Gnorse]

I'm just going to echo what everyone said :
-On the Xeno side, Aliens depend too much on the queen. They started off well by making her a commander of the hive, but messed it up once more by giving her charge/neuro and all that jazz, Forgetting about the rest of the castes.
-What you can do : Nerf Queen, Buff the rest, Simple as that. And I don't mean buff their stats, I mean give them more features.
-On the Marine side, It's obvious. Marines are pretty much forced to blitz the hive if they want to win
-What you can do : Revert that god-aweful Req nerf.

[TheDonkified]

Power should be distributed from the queen to the other xenos, so that the xenos don't need to rely on a queen at the 13:00 - 13:30 mark to deal with the marines.

Increase number of round start xenos to account for the baldies that take up a xeno slot, while also not making it so high that we get 50 xenos at the 13:00 mark like we used to get.

Add some forced variation to the marine side per round, whether it's giving them a toy in exchange for preventing them from getting other toys or making certain req items have more varied prices per round. Marines will be forced to rethink their strategies every round. While RNG might produce bad combinations for marines, in the long run, rounds won't be stale with the same strategy for every map and xenos will get some more breathing room as marines figure out what tools are available to them.

[KingPhilipIII]

Problem is you can't just give ways to combat rushes. You need to prevent them in the first place. When the xenomorphs successfully halt a marine rush it often leaves both sides crippled, with the marines down a squad and a half on average and the xenomorphs having lost half their hive. Then we're in for an inevitable xeno victory after a grueling two or three hour war of attrition.

I don't neccesarily think the Queen should be made weak, but she shouldn't be so powerful compared to her fellows and her benefits on the ovipositor that she MUST get off her ovi. If we balance because we noticed a spike in xeno wins after another buff to the Queen, then we're further entrenching them by balancing around a single player carrying the round for one side.

[TheDonkified]

Good points.

After thinking about this a bit more, I think that marines should definitely have some sort of incentive to being more patient and establishing a FOB before deciding to rush the xenos. Something that mechanically stops marines from pushing like fog is not what I'm suggesting. Hard barriers like that aren't fun for both sides, in my opinion. It's just waiting, whether it be alt-tabbing or doing some pointless stuff behind the fog, until you can finally fight the opposing side. I also don't think marines should be forced to build a FOB or else face being completely wiped, because like hard barriers, forcing marines to do a specific action for an arbitrary reason isn't fun either.

Perhaps have crates cost more unless marines have some sort of beacon being held at the planet that is secure in the FOB. RANDOM and VARIED side objectives that have actual in-game benefits would also spice up rounds and could be used for giving marines a person or equipment from High Command or Wey-Yu that is sent for completing that objective. In the long term, marines will have penalties for not completing these objectives, so all four squads cannot just completely focus on zerg rushing the xenos. Anything that gives marines other things to focus on would benefit gameplay for both the marines and the xenos in my opinion.

In the xeno side, perhaps the queen shouldn't be made weak. However, she shouldn't be made this all powerful being that is the anchor in a xeno victory. Her loss, while devastating, shouldn't mean GG for xenos completely. While she should be essential for evoing and larva spawning in the back-end, T3s should be leading the way in the front and only use her in emergencies instead of as a crutch. For this, I think that screech should only be permitted around the locations of her ovis with a high tile radius. That way, while her defensive capabilities are still there, she can't consistently use her screech back and forth at the front. To compensate, other xenos, like the crusher and maybe the prae, have AOE abilities that can be used in the front lines. Personally, I like the suggestion that the prae plays a "mini queen" or "SO" role for the aliens, while the xeno leaders are the "SLs". I also like the idea of a perk system to make xeno gameplay less monotonous and making T1s a little stronger or decreasing their upgrade time so that people will be willing to play as xenos more, even if they cannot get a T2 or T3 slot.

[Toroic]

Good points.

After thinking about this a bit more, I think that marines should definitely have some sort of incentive to being more patient and establishing a FOB before deciding to rush the xenos. Something that mechanically stops marines from pushing like fog is not what I'm suggesting. Hard barriers like that aren't fun for both sides, in my opinion. It's just waiting, whether it be alt-tabbing or doing some pointless stuff behind the fog, until you can finally fight the opposing side. I also don't think marines should be forced to build a FOB or else face being completely wiped, because like hard barriers, forcing marines to do a specific action for an arbitrary reason isn't fun either.

Perhaps have crates cost more unless marines have some sort of beacon being held at the planet that is secure in the FOB. RANDOM and VARIED side objectives that have actual in-game benefits would also spice up rounds and could be used for giving marines a person or equipment from High Command or Wey-Yu that is sent for completing that objective. In the long term, marines will have penalties for not completing these objectives, so all four squads cannot just completely focus on zerg rushing the xenos. Anything that gives marines other things to focus on would benefit gameplay for both the marines and the xenos in my opinion.

In the xeno side, perhaps the queen shouldn't be made weak. However, she shouldn't be made this all powerful being that is the anchor in a xeno victory. Her loss, while devastating, shouldn't mean GG for xenos completely. While she should be essential for evoing and larva spawning in the back-end, T3s should be leading the way in the front and only use her in emergencies instead of as a crutch. For this, I think that screech should only be permitted around the locations of her ovis with a high tile radius. That way, while her defensive capabilities are still there, she can't consistently use her screech back and forth at the front. To compensate, other xenos, like the crusher and maybe the prae, have AOE abilities that can be used in the front lines. Personally, I like the suggestion that the prae plays a "mini queen" or "SO" role for the aliens, while the xeno leaders are the "SLs". I also like the idea of a perk system to make xeno gameplay less monotonous and making T1s a little stronger or decreasing their upgrade time so that people will be willing to play as xenos more, even if they cannot get a T2 or T3 slot.

Prae are pretty great right now between pheromones and sticky resin spit, so I don’t feel they need additonal buffs.

Crusher on the other hand is barely worth a t2 slot right now due to their lack of utility or combat prowess, and queen didn’t need to frontline nearly as much back when crushers still had their stomp. A crusher and a boiler could hold a narrow choke pretty effectively between boiler glob + stomp + t1 rush combos and back then the queen could focus on pumping out eggs for carriers to throw.

Queen used to share features with t3 castes while not being superior to them even in their own role. Fireproof like rav, aoe stun like crusher but without the mobility, good armor/pheromones like prae but without the spit. Queen now just gets every t3 perk (except boiler) without any tradeoffs and it just makes her a monster in any combat scenario.

When the queen changes came out that gave her ovi I thought “Fantastic, we’ll see queen actually be a command role” but instead games hinge on queen surviving to empress and then carrying the team in combat because young or even mature t3 can’t do even some of what she can do as well.

[Karmac]

The problem I'm having is "Why would I *want* to slow down the rounds?" currently there's absolutely no reason I can think of to extend round length, sure some shipside roles miss out on the only RP you're garunteed to get on CM, but at its core we're a combat server, and ideally the combat isn't a stalemate for 2 hours. Currently, short rounds don't benefit xenos very much if at all, I feel this is something to think about changing, rather than thinking of ways to extend rounds.

[trustscience44]

A lot of great suggestions! Going to throw in some things I've been noting down awhile!

Incentives for Marines:

Giving marines a randomly generated pick['POD/Crate/Fax Machine/Data Disk']. IMO, these randomly generated priority tactical resources would be gathered for high command. High Command surely has financial incentives to recover information / data stores / hard evidence. These collected resources would act as a decrease for the accumulated increases experienced by Requisitions. When I say that I basically mean, lowering the increases experienced by all items, yet for a set quantity. IE: if metal / ap box / sentry have all increased. This could affect either all increases by lowering them all to their previous or decrease 1-2 ordered items that have seen much higher accumulations from ordering more of it.

Squad objectives:

Maybe there's a lot of data that needs to be recovered,unfortunately command does not know which data-terminal is working and can uplink the data. The Squads are sent out to recover this yet only a single squad will find this. Perhaps that squad can get a small care package of 100 metal / flares/ food / 1 AP round / non-tactical binos / webbing / large mag pouch / large general pouch / very rare black-webbing. Definitely not all in one box of course, but another rng, 1-3 rewards of each depending on weight of items value to the marines etc. These could be every round.


Map Stuff:

I know working with maps sucks but I think if we had a dozen or spots on every map to RNG closures / oil leaks / coolant leaks / cave ins / floods / cave-ins on Ice,Big-Red, etc / maybe bring back the old M577 personal carrier and have it smashed or stuck at some small hallway exit/entrance, as if the survivors were trying to escape and crashed it permanently blocking said passageways. Even instead of closing, random openings or even a mix.
Marines are used to doing their setup at all the openings, and they will only get more efficient at covering those limited number of openings every time.


Xeno Stuff:

Crusher is no longer the tunnel maker, you are not as fast and have no stun but blunt impact.
Give crusher the freedom to create openings where they want by having most tiles be destructible again. This used to be possible, I am unsure if it was changed due to atmos or other things.

Xeno Stuff; Some new abilities?

Xenos: All xenos can hide in tunnels created by hivelords or natural map tunnels and view the area outside of the tunnel.

Ravager:

For always half plasma and a 5 min cooldown rav can charge as they usually charge, however, this time they go in a frenzy and quickly slash the 3 people in front of their charge,or the nearest directly to their sides if the charge is one tile ahead. Always, do not allow the 3 tiles slash if more then 1 tiles apart and this only applies to a maximum of 3 marines that could be attacked directly next to the charge spot, in case of marine movement or something. The other 2 slashed/affected wouldn't be pushed back at all but continue to have chance to delimb, however a ZERO chance of side decapitation.

Crusher:

Area Stomp: 80 plasma 70 second cooldown - could slow marine movement in directly adjacent tiles. Slowing half the movement penalty amount from sticky resin for 3-5 seconds rng. Doing no damage and not a stun, just a weak slow to let tier 1's move up and help their leaders/t3s.


Boilers:

Deep Dig: Can dig itself half-way into the ground reducing damage by 10-30%(dependant on weapon). This digging is separate of normal dig and requires 20 seconds to enter and exit similar to queens ovi timer.

Hunter:

Hunters "stealth" mode has 15-20% chance of ignoring an actual registered hit from a weapon while in their hidey mode. Does not affect their frontline ability, yet slightly increases their survivability while off screen / a screen away / behind a t3 / and incentives to learn to use their abilities better.

Prae:

Prae pheromones could increase to the middle tier once prae reaches elite instead of ancient or some small adjustment in their pheromone buffs at elite level.

Hivelord:

Hivelord tunnel cooldown cut in half. Hivelords can make as many tunnels as they want and on most tiles. (Haven't played hivelord in months don't know if they can do that now)

Queen:

Queen plasma regen increased by 5 more plasma per tick while in ovipositor, slightly lowers chained abilities times when in ovipositor form and imobile.

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

snip

I agree with a lot of this, but Rav and Boiler changes I don't like at all. Rav is not a problem right now, and that "Deep Dig" will never be used by any boiler worth their slot since you're already having to greed for a shot if rines know how to CAS already. Having to wait for 20 seconds just to dig yourself in will just be useless. Also, boilers already have problem with rines just rushing em down. If they have to stay there for 20 seconds just to move, they will absolutely 100% positively die. It's basically a noob trap.

Hunter is already powerful on its own and someone good can already robust the entire Almayer if let on, or at least take 30 rines with them. They shouldn't be rewarded for just having stealth mode on while running away, when they already have a short cooldown pounce and amazing speed.

And about the ability to hide in tunnels. Can they all do this ? Or can only one beno hide in there ? Do they work like vents where if you're the only one left, you're not counted as one and rines win ?

[Jonesome]

Perhaps combat hugging needs to come back

DEAR GOD NO

[James5734]

Perhaps we could buff barricades? Giving them more durability might encourage marines to play a bit more defensively which should draw out rounds for a good bit longer though it probably wouldn't do much alone.

[Aestel]

Maybe a chance of the alamo crash landing during the op. Marines then have to scrounge parts from engineering robotics sites while also dealing with xenos or ditching and relying solely on the normandy.

How to 100% make marines lose every round.

How about you re-add some of the late-game stuff for the marines like research, proper grenades, chems. Provide some ability for the marines to take a game late, otherwise it is 100% objectively worse to go late against the xeno team, and anyone who is a decent SL knows that and will attempt to push the xenos ASAP.

Perhaps we could buff barricades? Giving them more durability might encourage marines to play a bit more defensively which should draw out rounds for a good bit longer though it probably wouldn't do much alone.

Cades could be indestructible and it wouldn't matter. Defensive due to the way the game is laid out means that marines will always lose to attrition on the defensive.

[Jonesome]

How about you re-add some of the late-game stuff for the marines like research, proper grenades, chems.

and while we’re at it readd the engineering toys. I don’t care if it’s power gaming for the CE to superheat the vents on the ship to kill ayys, you should be able to defeat them with your intellect as well as bullets.

[Aestel]

and while we’re at it readd the engineering toys. I don’t care if it’s power gaming for the CE to superheat the vents on the ship to kill ayys, you should be able to defeat them with your intellect as well as bullets.

Its not power-gaming though. Ripley literally vented the xenoqueen at the end of Aliens. Use every advantage you got, and its expected the CE knows how to do it.

[Jonesome]

Its not power-gaming though. Ripley literally vented the xenoqueen at the end of Aliens. Use every advantage you got, and its expected the CE knows how to do it.

It’s not metagaming because the CE or any MT would have the knowledge, correct. But it could be construed as powergaming because it’s one player turning the tide against the other team singlehandedly, or at least that’s how some devs explained it. But I vehemently disagree with this reason to remove an engineer’s abilities.

Imagine if Ripley went to open that airlock at the end of the film and got the message “access denied” lol

[Aestel]

It’s not metagaming because the CE or any MT would have the knowledge, correct. But it could be construed as powergaming because it’s one player turning the tide against the other team singlehandedly, or at least that’s how some devs explained it. But I vehemently disagree with this reason to remove an engineer’s abilities.

Imagine if Ripley went to open that airlock at the end of the film and got the message “access denied” lol

Or an admin message ree'ing, the cargo loaders should also be unchained for combat on red-alert.

[Blade2000Br]

and while we’re at it readd the engineering toys. I don’t care if it’s power gaming for the CE to superheat the vents on the ship to kill ayys, you should be able to defeat them with your intellect as well as bullets.

And this is why we can't have nice things.