UPCOMING BALANCE CHANGES

[Abbysynth]

Just some stuff. This will likely be in game later tonight. Here's a sneak peek!

* Flamethrower takes up much less fuel per blast, around 30% less. The difference is most noticeable on the first one. Per-tick damage is also increased.
* Boiler max plasma and running speed both buffed significantly.
* Some Crusher exploits crushed, such as moonwalk momentum-building. Hopefully it shouldn't knock you down if you super ram a human anymore though.
* Hivelords, Praetorians are now considered "big xenos" and cannot be pushed around like the small fries.
* Hunter, Ravager, and Runner movement speed nerfed very slightly.
* Larva movement speed buffed! ZooOoom!
* Praetorian max plasma nerfed.
* Queen movement speed buffed.
* Predators are now generally immune to facehuggers and can catch them out of the air. However, xenomorphs who attack a Predator in the head while their mask is on will have a % chance of knocking the clan mask completely off, allowing you to subsequently hug them if they can't get away. Higher damage attacks will proc this more often.
* Xenos heal slower on weeds, but the effects of all pheromones (including recovery) are increased, especially while stacked.
* BURST FIRE FOR GUNS!
Yes, guns now have a burst fire feature, which can be activated in the Weapons pane for select weapons. Weapons which start with burst fire capability (which acts identical to the sentry turret's burst) are the M39, M41a, MAR-20, and Smartgun. Activating the burst also severely lowers the weapon's accuracy, and all default burst weapon bullets have been slightly reduced in damage.
* Two new attachables ->
Magnetic Harness: Rail attachment. When attached to a weapon, when the weapon is dropped either by purpose or accident, and the wearer has a marine armor with an empty armor slot, the weapon will snap to it exactly like the smartgun. Works on virtually any weapon.
Auto Fire Assembly: An underbarrel attachment that replaces most of the internal systems of a firearm. It increases the burst fire capability by +1, meaning it will give 1 extra bullet per click. It allows weapons that otherwise have no burst capability to become a 2-round doubletap weapon.
* Several Response Team items overhauled or changed, most notably the MAR-40 (which was occasionally teh Mar-20) and the mercenary shotgun, which now has a 2-round burst function.
* Hopefully fixed that shitty bug with disappearing items when someone puts it on you. Damn this bug is irritating, you guys have no idea.
* Stetchkin now no longer reloads by SMG magazines. Shit was wack
* Many weapons now no longer fit in holsters. This includes grenade launchers, sniper rifles, rocket launchers, smartguns, and basically everything. Woops!
* Predator stuff! See other post.


Comments? Go ahead!

[Egorkor]

I'm just gonna say what Jack said in the other thread - I'm in love.
The things I worry about is the xenos becoming more vulnerable because of burstfire, more FF (kek), and the bug with auto-snapping I just posted in the bugs.
Thanks for what you're doing in any case.

[Bath Salts Addict]

Just some stuff. This will likely be in game later tonight. Here's a sneak peek!
* Some Crusher exploits crushed, such as moonwalk momentum-building.

You ruined the Crusher. Toroic won't be happy about this one.

[Sargeantmuffinman]

HOLY SHIT BURST FIRE?!

AND THE MAG STRAP!

[Arachnidnexus]

Will xenos get any indication of stacking pheromones in the Status panel?

[forwardslashN]

Burst fire? Oh my...

[Azmodan412]

*FF intensifies*

[TR-BlackDragon]

Wow the alien nerf over buff... slow down the aliens even more so marines can out fun them...

[Nubs]

So.. the mag strap means even marines who get hugged and dragged to the nest now have a weapon that cannot be dropped, dragged away or dissolved? as if babysitting wasn't tiresome enough..

Ravagers were too fast? news to me! The queen and boiler speed-up is a good change though. Not sure why runners and hunters have been made SLOWER, we'll have to see if this makes them as cripplingly slow as the other castes now..

[Yottawhat]

Wow the alien nerf over buff... slow down the aliens even more so marines can out fun them...

Yeah, I've got to agree. I really don't see the point in slowing down Runners and Hunters since their main benefit is that they're faster then marines.

The larva speed buff is a godsend though. Before, marines could actually outrun larva.

[MrGabol100]

So now there's a chance we'll ever get 99 bullet mags?

I mean, if we can make the burst fast enough and that.

[qsleepy]

the magstrap is great for marines that dont use backpacks filled with meta guns. See how it works out!

[Abbysynth]

Another change I forgot: Facehuggers now give an initial target scan when they first are created. They should be a little more dangerous when fresh out' the egg.

You guys are way overplaying the nerf to the ravager line, it's really not noticeable.

[Stivan34]

When is this going to happen...?

[Ninjah!]

When is this going to happen...?

Evening, it's in the first sentence of the post

[Fritigern]

Except the post is from yesterday and it didn't happen that evening. Derp.

[Wickedtemp]

Regardless, xenos need a speed BUFF more than anything. The only advantage a runner has is the fact it's fast, even though it's as fragile as wet paper.

Yeah, this is cool and all, but nerfing the speeds of the runner and the ravager (who was already slow to begin with, to the point Marines ran circles around it) is just a stupid decision.

[GGgobbleCC]

I'm not sure why these marginal buffs had to come with major nerfs to speed for the 'speedy' castes, and a healing time nerf. It already takes awhile to heal on weeds anyway.

I can just see Apop having permab& someone who dare suggest alien buffs, and would only allow these changes if they came with buffs to marines and >even more< nerfs to aliens.

[Abbysynth]

major nerfs to speed for the 'speedy' castes

You guys never listen at all, right?

You guys are way overplaying the nerf to the ravager line, it's really not noticeable.

[Wickedtemp]

What people would be getting upset about is that, as far as we can tell, there's no reason for the nerfs, no matter how slight. They were just nerfs for the sake of nerfs. Runners are SUPPOSED to be fast. And Ravagers were terribly slow as they are.

"New toy for marines."
"New toy for marines."
"New thing to help marines kill aliens."
"Some aliens are slower now because...reasons, I guess."
"Marines use less ammo when shooting flamethrowers, to help kill aliens."
"New toy for marines."

[Arachnidnexus]

Ravagers aren't that slow... Also I'd be fine with hits to the runner line if other castes got buffed speedwise so that they're actually playable. It was kinda ridiculous how you could outrun bullets as a Runner. I'm going to wait and see how these changes affect aliens before judging them too harshly. Speed buff might make the acid spray actually usable for Boilers.

[ParadoxSpace]

If it's not noticeable why include it?

[Toroic]

You ruined the Crusher. Toroic won't be happy about this one.

Pretty much yeah.

90% of the things you want to crush, particularly on the prison map are not in places where you have enough momentum. You'll also never crush marines now without blind luck, since by the time you have enough momentum you'll skid stun yourself

I honestly can't imagine why anyone would still want to evolve this caste. It's worse than ravager in pretty much every way now.

I've been slowly drifting away from CM as each important changes catered harder and harder to marines. Marine damage buff. Xenos can't breach the sulaco, so there's little reason to hold the FOB with any urgency. Hivelord are a waste of space on the prison map.

Now any marine with a mag strap can't effectively be disarmed, marines have even more bullet spam, and the entire offensive caste of the xenos just got nerfed, with the crusher effectively being crippled. No one thought crushers were OP before, and they currently have a worthless charge, an awful melee (damage AND accuracy) a good stomp, and a good tackle.

You're definitely going to see even less xeno players now than before, since things that are fun for xeno players keep getting nerfed, and replaced with things that aren't fun (mag strap marines, hanger forts, late join marine reinforcements, massive wait times to join as xeno on the prison map after 1300 because there aren't any SSD larva.

With pred rounds (and preds are almost exclusively going to be marine players, as they are better known and treated better by the current game mechanics) 25% of the time you're going to have preds focusing on xenos and ignoring marines on top of all the other shit.

Xeno players do not exist to be interesting cannon fodder for marines, and the random numbers make it frustrating to try to get a sense of community among xeno players.

What I anticipate is xeno pop will start becoming shit even in high pop and the only time marine players will lose is due to mutiny/events/preds.

As a xeno player, I really appreciate CM doing the same thing for my play experience that the show Heroes did for the viewing experience:

A steady decline in quality until I've lost interest.

I think I'm there, so best of luck.

[Steelpoint]

I've never seen a Boiler for a while, its always Ravagers with the occasional Crusher.

[Toroic]

I've never seen a Boiler for a while, its always Ravagers with the occasional Crusher.

The problem with boilers is that they are very unreliable.

The bombard wanders, the death gas sometimes does nothing and sometimes insta-kills.

The buff they needed was accurate bombard and reliable gas. Not movespeed.