Playing as aliens a bit more.

[Nubs]

I play alot of alien and a fair bit of marine, although mostly in doctor, or command roles, because a depressingly low amount of people play those roles.

One of the reasons i don't like playing as a base marine is that it feels too.. easy? I'm not that great at fighting or whatever, but I can still easily take down an alien with the standard rifle, the majority of the time. As any tier of alien, I usually find myself running away, hiding or seeking cover more than anything else, the bullets to me have such long range and damage (i do not know if there is damage fall off) This is a particular problem in the prison, i've seen boilers killed in seconds from bullets spammed a screen and a half away, from marines no-one could even see. Don't get me started on how much easier it is when behind even a flimsy table.

There was some talk about this in deadchat during a round in which the aliens did really well, but got stomped by a huge ball of marines and pmc that retreated from the fob super early. My suggestions for this would be that no pmc can be called until the queen first touches the shuttle controls, with the pmc arrival being sped up if needed. I don't know what the ratio is for the ability to send a distress beacon, but i have definitely seen one launched where there are 30-40 marines still alive, and only 10 aliens which seems pretty silly to me. Others have suggested that there should be some sort of gameplay mechanic for holding the fob longer, or a deterrent for hiding on the sulaco with 50% of your force still intact, but i can't think of one that would be fair.

special snowflake is certainly a thing. I enjoy playing a doctor with a normal name who does doctor stuff. I don't have a nickname, ego or silly character description (you'll note that a large amount of marine character descriptions describe them as 6 ft -6 ft 4 bad asses, even the women!) This type of egotism always annoys me slightly, especially when you see at the end of the round half the marines boasting they killed 5 or more aliens- guys, there were only 15, you can't all have killed all 5!

Someone made a point that there is no xeno distress beacon, so to speak. If marines assault the caves or whatever and whittle the aliens down to a few left, there is no event they can call where they can get additional help. (yes, i know about xeno hijack erts) Someone else suggested that for every 3 later joiner marines, another ssd larvae should spawn, or that late arrivals would be delayed from entering the game for a time as they 'defrosted'

The worst thing for me is the slowness of all the castes, bar runner/hunter. damage values being what they are, it's extremely hard for any other caste to run up to a marine and infect, harm or drag them away without being gunned down on your approach or retreat. accepted, it makes sense for drones, queens, boilers and hivelords to be slow, but sentinels and spitters, who are meant to protect the hive being so slow makes no sense! It just seems nuts that every alien bar runners and hunters walk slower than a marine loaded down with a million clips of ammo, weaponry and equipment!

What if the number of weapons in the marine vendor was reduced? i've played plenty of high pop, long long rounds, and i've never seen the marine vendors run out of anything except 10 mm clips on occasion. Just a suggestion, maybe it's a bad one.

[Steelpoint]

I've had more fun playing as a Alien on that prison space map than on the planet, in fact I've not had that much fun since old Boxstation. Let's face it, wide open spaces do not go well with the way Aliens work.

While I somewhat dislike the idea I do think looking into personalizing Alien players would be a good step, it does not need to be some obnoxious thing every Marine has to read, it can be a small name that only other Aliens can read. Keeping track of someone is impossible when their name and number designation changes constantly.

I'm more of a Marine centric player however, but that's my quick opinion.

[Ninjah!]

I think the waiting for evolutions has something to do with it. I write this as I am waiting for people to evolve, doing nothing, waiting, waiting, waiting.

[Fritigern]

So, let's talk about balance changes which allow us to improve the overall alien experience. While CM is a medium role play server, the core of the experience is a team vs team game. As such we should probably incorporate some design philosophies from other, seasoned developers.

One of the majors tenants of any PVP focused game is the idea that lack of agency or loss of control of your character is considered a no-no. Obviously debilitating wounds that need medical treatment are apart of the SS13 experience, and something that drew a lot of us here today to the game in the first place -- that level of mechanical detail -- but things that can't be reasonably countered, predicted or require minimal skill to achieve, are development pitfalls.

First of all, facehugger perma-stun is ridiculous. It is so strong, and so at the core of the alien's combat repertoire, that it has to be the first thing addressed. Unless you're a T3 alien capable of removing a limb or head in 1-2 melee hits, the entire core of your caste is to facehugger people. It's your only real chance to win. If we reduce the stun duration (right now you can pretty much drag a hugged marine from one end of the map to the other and still have time to nest them), and give marines a chance to remove the hugger on their own before they've been implanted, then suddenly the entire alien power base is freed up and can be shifted into other aspects of their combat. Throwing a facehugger at someone should be a form of short crowd control, not the start and end of combat for that marine.

This removes the most un-fun part of alien combat for everyone, human and alien alike, and lets us rebalance the power.

Now we have a shorter stun at the start of combat, but now we increase that towards the end of the fight. For a marine, being brought to the nest and hung up on a wall should basically be the end of that marine's life. Ideally they've done some combat, but ultimately lost, and now they have 1 chance to turn things around. Assuming the marine is in otherwise good health, they have 1 breakout attempt and then they're dead. This reduces the need for a large portion of the alien players to have to sit on a marines chest for 5-10 minutes (depending on server lag) and babysit them. This is another pitfall in alien gameplay design, it's a lot of sitting around and doing nothing as a form of necessity. Even the most mildly observant alien player can keep a group of 3-4 marines nested without ever really working for it, given their instant knockdown push, so why are we forcing those alien players to sit there and perform this menial task in the first place if the outcome is basically predetermined?

So, now aliens need to more quickly nest the marines in order to take them out of the fight instead of relying on the instant-death facehugger, but once they're safely cocooned they can basically be left alone with only a very minimal nest presence. Combat has now completely opened up for alien buffs in health, speed, and other unique and special abilities which make them both more fun to play, and more fun to play against.

And this design philosophy should extend to the marines as well. Being clicked on by someone with a SADAR, being knocked immobile and then killed is just as anti-fun for aliens as the facehugger is for humans. If you remove the SADAR crutch for marines, then you can funnel strength into other weapons. For example, each squad could get 3 special marine lockers that hold flamerthrowers in them, increasing their presence on the battlefield, or more shields or different types of shotgun ammo that come from the locker by default. These are just some random ideas, but it should give you an idea of shifting power around to achieve.. well, not perfect balance, but a more competitive and skillful gaming experience.

[Ninjah!]

Remove carriers, make huggers unable to be picked up. Renable tackle spam and increase speed. Aliens suddenly sound fun.

[NumerousPotatos]

and give marines a chance to remove the hugger on their own before they've been implanted,

What. That's not even lore accurate. I know that's a flimsy excuse to pass off good suggestions. So I'll give more.

On paper, it sounds like a good idea (Jk it's not, IMO), but think of it like this.

You want them to just pull the face hugger off their face as if it were a leaf that flew into your face. You're basically saying "NO" to aliens winning ever again.

Just my opinion though.

[MrGabol100]

Remove carriers, make huggers unable to be picked up. Renable tackle spam and increase speed. Aliens suddenly sound fun.

Basically like in the movies, aliens tackle you and pull you at amazing fast speed to their hive so a hugger jumps out of the egg and impregnates the host, this summed to the tracking huggers when fresh out of egg sound like something we may test for a round.

[Ninjah!]

Basically like in the movies, aliens tackle you and pull you at amazing fast speed to their hive so a hugger jumps out of the egg and impregnates the host, this summed to the tracking huggers when fresh out of egg sound like something we may test for a round.

You think this is worthy of a suggestion thread? I don't feel like spending my time on making a whole suggestion just to get it shuttdown with all -1.

[MrGabol100]

You think this is worthy of a suggestion thread? I don't feel like spending my time on making a whole suggestion just to get it shuttdown with all -1.

Sure, go for it, if you get -1s, at least it may be considered in the future.

[Fritigern]

What. That's not even lore accurate. I know that's a flimsy excuse to pass off good suggestions. So I'll give more.

On paper, it sounds like a good idea (Jk it's not, IMO), but think of it like this.

You want them to just pull the face hugger off their face as if it were a leaf that flew into your face. You're basically saying "NO" to aliens winning ever again.

Just my opinion though.

If you're gonna be salty just come out and say it, you sound like an idiot otherwise, trying to slip in all these sarcastic comments.

Using the "lore accurate" argument is really weak counter to begin with, but I'll play along.

In the second movie Ripley, who isn't a fit and combat ready Colonial Marine (Man or Woman), and yet she is able to resist the facehugger trying to give her a skullfuck for an exceptionally long period of time, struggling only because she was being strangled with its tail at the same time. We're not even going to talk about how an 8 year old girl fought off one on her own at the same time. These are creatures that rely on a stationary host to infect, or the element of surprise. They are, also, so valuable to the Queen that she overcomes her own predatory instincts and allows Ripley and Newt to leave in an uneasy peace, just for the sake of her unborn children. So why, then, do other Queens allow her children to be flung like baseballs for the sole purpose of breaking some guys face only to then be immediately stepped on and killed?

So let's break it down into actual numbers and mechanics.

Throw a facehugger at a marine, it latches onto their face and they're unconscious, as is standard right now, but for only 5-10 seconds. Afterwhich the marine is immobile on the ground, and they must immediately begin using the 'resist' command to start fighting with the facehugger, while still on the ground. If it's done soon enough and they aren't interrupted, they can remove the hugger themselves in another 5-10 seconds.

You still have the ambush potential, you still have the in-combat stun, but it's no longer a TKO the moment a marine gets his mouth fucked with.

And remember, this is not just a "NERF FACEHUGGERS AND GIVE ALIENS NOTHING ELSE".. THING. It's about SHIFTING power. Now that the aliens have a more reasonable facehugger mechanic, now we can buff the shit out of them in OTHER AREAS OF THEIR KIT. Understand? The whole alien combat cycle no longer has the facehuggers anchoring them down, they can pivot into other areas and become stronger. I can't lay out every possible buff that they could get I'm not getting paid to make this game for everyone, I'm just pointing out how a change in one mechanic would then warrant more FUN changes elsewhere.

[NumerousPotatos]

Using the "lore accurate" argument is really weak counter to begin with, but I'll play along

I mean, I'm naturally going to ignore your salt comment. I mean, making "Sarcastic comments" Is a salty excuse to, ironically enough, call someone salty. Salty....Edgy....Edge works. Anyway. So. I did admit it was a weak argument, seriously, like, it's right in the text.

and yet she is able to resist the facehugger trying to give her a skullfuck for an exceptionally long period of time,

Though I haven't seen the movie in a loooonnng time. I still recall that the facehugger, was, NOT on her face, She was simply fighting it off, like in that annoyance of a game, Aliens: Colonial Marines. However, if we're going to continue with "lore arguments", once the facehugger is on someone's face, it restricts their oxygen supply and shoves them full of face fuck.

If it's done soon enough and they aren't interrupted, they can remove the hugger themselves in another 5-10 seconds.

I agree it shouldn't be an instant knockout, but rather a slow knock-out, giving them time to take it off with the mechanic given.

And remember, this is not just a "NERF FACEHUGGERS AND GIVE ALIENS NOTHING ELSE".. THING. It's about SHIFTING power.

I mean, the problem is with BALANCE, not power. I'm sure alien spitters would love to just click on the screen and fire 7 shots at a marine like a marine can shoot an alien, but it hasn't been done. Besides. This wouldn't do much anyway, that is, if the alien (OR MARINES) know what they are doing. Alright, time to jump back a bit to finish this off.

Afterwhich the marine is immobile on the ground, and they must immediately begin using the 'resist' command to start fighting with the facehugger, while still on the ground. If it's done soon enough and they aren't interrupted, they can remove the hugger themselves in another 5-10 seconds.

I think they should still be standing up. Mainly so someone can just push them to re-start the cycle, it sounds dumb, but having them on the ground resisting, in the middle of a fire-fight, is most likely going to be a, "Well done, no baby alien for you", moment, unless the aliens can drag him off in time. Though all I'd like to see are some TOUGHER RESIN WALLS. But yeah.