New Castes Discussion Thread

[OatzAndHoes]

Game developers use player input for a reason. Debating changes and suggestions are part of a healthy game community and anyone who discourages this isn't helping the game. There is a reason most professional game developers use things like betas and forums to see player input. I'd like to assume most of the staff/devs realize this but kind of discouraging to see this talk from staff and devs in the thread. Justify why you are making decisions in an open way, don't just say Devs know best, because there are a lot more experienced and skilled devs out there who make bigger mistakes while making games. To be as cocky as to think that devs always know whats best is just hubris. When guys like John Romero can make mistakes that flop games, anyone can.

[RobBrown4PM]

This isnt a Arma 3 realism mod bro we dont use VOIP the best you can co-ordinate is through text and if one cog in the wheel isnt there it's going to be harder to do so.
Ive played tons of rounds where squads were linked up with command and req but still got steamrolled by the new castes.

you dont know what the fuck you're on about lol.

Both games are very similar, different in terms of view and mechanics, but similar in that they're both mil sims that require the player base to plan and coordinate well. Just because there's no VOIP, doesn't' stop you from communicating or following orders. I can't count the amount of times my orders have not been followed, and the marines have suffered catastrophic losses.

[Clutch]

Both games are very similar, different in terms of view and mechanics, but similar in that they're both mil sims that require the player base to plan and coordinate well. Just because there's no VOIP, doesn't' stop you from communicating or following orders. I can't count the amount of times my orders have not been followed, and the marines have suffered catastrophic losses.

i can tell you they're not similar at all lol maybe the aspect of it is.

[OatzAndHoes]

Both games are very similar, different in terms of view and mechanics, but similar in that they're both mil sims that require the player base to plan and coordinate well. Just because there's no VOIP, doesn't' stop you from communicating or following orders. I can't count the amount of times my orders have not been followed, and the marines have suffered catastrophic losses.

Coordinating with VOIP is way easier than typing. A lot of times chat gets lost behind walls of redtext. Mind you it's gotten better with some additions like the whistle and SL locator over the years, but you can't compare private clan games in ARMA that use VOIP (also where your line of sight can be kilometers) versus a publicly listed server that requires you to stop fighting and type to chat (and where your vision is limited to a couple of ingame units).

[Clutch]

not even to mention that SS13 is pretty much an accesible game for /everyone/ and requires no brain to play.

[misto]

I like this. Defender have waaaaay too many kits for a T1 compared to other T1 caste, and Warrior is too strong for a T2

https://gitlab.com/cmdevs/ColonialMarines/issues/3181

i suggested it and it's denied, ah well. they probably have their own plans for what next steps to take

[spookydonut]

Game developers use player input for a reason. Debating changes and suggestions are part of a healthy game community and anyone who discourages this isn't helping the game. There is a reason most professional game developers use things like betas and forums to see player input. I'd like to assume most of the staff/devs realize this but kind of discouraging to see this talk from staff and devs in the thread. Justify why you are making decisions in an open way, don't just say Devs know best, because there are a lot more experienced and skilled devs out there who make bigger mistakes while making games. To be as cocky as to think that devs always know whats best is just hubris. When guys like John Romero can make mistakes that flop games, anyone can.

People don't listen when we talk, we've repeatedly said changes are coming based on observation of the first few days and yet people are still running around like the world is ending.

[Nyeshivuu]

Yeah, calm down people. Remember summer of last year? It was like this, xeno steamrolls every round because of major updates.

[Bancrose]

Alright Scrap everything I said, The devs balanced them quite well really.

Now for the record. 10 Xenos can still shit on 50 marines as I just did it this round but it wasn't due to the Defenders or Warriors. Sometimes it truly is marine negligence.

Now before I go to bed on this thread. Do know this. There are tactics now that have been proven to be able to work. You just gotta play defensively is all and don't make any rash charges.

[Pogo92]

People don't listen when we talk, we've repeatedly said changes are coming based on observation of the first few days and yet people are still running around like the world is ending.

Understand the player's position: We have no idea what those changes are or if they'll be enough. The issue with balance is multi-faceted and extensive, and without more info we can't even speculate if the changes you're making will work. Last thing anyone wants is for balance changes to hit the server only to not go far enough or miss critical points of contention. Hence, all we can do is throw out as many complaints as possible to make sure you understand our point of contention.

Last thing we want is to wait a week or two for the new Beno to be released, then another week or two for insufficient balance changes to hit the server, then another week or two for you guys to acknowledge there are still issues, then another week or two for sufficient balance changes to finally arrive. All the while the gameplay is significantly worse than it was just a week ago.

[Geikkamir]

Alright Scrap everything I said, The devs balanced them quite well really.

Now for the record. 10 Xenos can still shit on 50 marines as I just did it this round but it wasn't due to the Defenders or Warriors. Sometimes it truly is marine negligence.

Now before I go to bed on this thread. Do know this. There are tactics now that have been proven to be able to work. You just gotta play defensively is all and don't make any rash charges.

How is dragging out the round and giving Xenos more time a winning strategy for Marines?

[OatzAndHoes]

Last thing we want is to wait a week or two for the new Beno to be released, then another week or two for insufficient balance changes to hit the server, then another week or two for you guys to acknowledge there are still issues, then another week or two for sufficient balance changes to finally arrive. All the while the gameplay is significantly worse than it was just a week ago.

Hit the nail on the head. There are a lot of examples of this, the worst offender being when egrills got silently changed without a changelog despite being the most used defense in the game at the time, and then any questions got met with vague dev answers, more engineering nerfs and silence for over 6 months before engineers were made useful again. During that time a ton of top-tier engineering players changed classes or stopped playing CM altogether. The medic nerf was handled a little quicker but still saw the same skill-drain.

I'm going to be honest here and say that compared to almost every other ss13 server out there, you guys are terrible at communicating changes with the playerbase. It sounds harsh but I don't know a nicer way to put it. I've lost count of the amount of times in response to a balance suggestion or a critique on a change I've gotten or seen someone else get a passive aggressive answer from a dev or staff talking down to them for having the gall to comment on the game. The younger players generally eat it up and fall in line, but for many of us older or more experienced players(I'm not speaking for everyone, I've just seen these sentiments echoed by a significant portion of us), especially those of us not on the staff it feels like we're being pushed out. I've been told multiple times by staff of all levels up to and including Apop that "if you don't like it, don't play." It's really disappointing to see this and as I've seen happen on numerous other game projects, both inside and out of SS13 it generally doesn't end well in the long run.

[Nickvr628]

Honestly, something needs to be done with defenders, and the frontline caste in general. A hive with 22 Defenders and 14 Warriors is basically unstoppable on any map. I have watched rounds where the marines have to retreat to the almayor before the first hour is over because the rounstart defenders reach elite and ancient by the marines arrive and clean house against them.

They are broken as fuck, I would even recommend removing Defenders temporarily until some solution can be found for their balance. Warriors feel like they are in a good spot, but their fling ability needs a longer cooldown IMO.

[Mann handle]

Alright Scrap everything I said, The devs balanced them quite well really.

Now for the record. 10 Xenos can still shit on 50 marines as I just did it this round but it wasn't due to the Defenders or Warriors. Sometimes it truly is marine negligence.

Now before I go to bed on this thread. Do know this. There are tactics now that have been proven to be able to work. You just gotta play defensively is all and don't make any rash charges.

- Here comes something a little off topic! -
You mean the round where we had to cannibalize most of the furniture on the ship and melt down guns and attachments to please the metal gods? The same round you dumped 3 squad inside the FoB and played an ultra defensive round in a game where xenos were excessively cocky due to the changes to xenos? The same round that turned into a 3 hour slog with marines defending an awful lot?

Just going to point out that you lucked out there in terms of ship side issues. Jack Knight would have arrested all of cargo if the CE was awake and unhelpful to your plans. From what I was gathering after the round ended, marines actually snatched victory from the jaws of defeat that time in a round was dedicated to a very long battle of attrition.

To say there are strategies and that you have to play ultra defensive is not really reassuring to be honest. I mean for a start it was a one off victory that was sweet to some. If you tried the same sort of thing again I would bet that the xenos would play differently and would focus more on longer range encounters like boilers. Also the amount of metal and shit we sent down to the FoB was beyond ridiculous. We recycled everything we could get our hands on that we were cleared to get, plus you gave us cargo techs access to marine preps right off the bat before briefing started meaning we had access to a ridiculous amount of ammo. AP was a mainstay of orders when we could get it. The tank went down without a secondary until the final push where they actually asked for the smartgun, the tank spent most of its time running things over.

In short. It was a one off, it bothers me a little when someone pulls a one off and says that things are OK based on that one off and it is proven to work. It was a nice game to play in but I don't see this making waves yet and I doubt many will want to see this kind of round played over and over.

[MattAtlas]

Honestly, something needs to be done with defenders, and the frontline caste in general. A hive with 22 Defenders and 14 Warriors is basically unstoppable on any map. I have watched rounds where the marines have to retreat to the almayor before the first hour is over because the rounstart defenders reach elite and ancient by the marines arrive and clean house against them.

They are broken as fuck, I would even recommend removing Defenders temporarily until some solution can be found for their balance. Warriors feel like they are in a good spot, but their fling ability needs a longer cooldown IMO.

You realize that 22 Defenders and 14 Warriors means that there's a FUCKHUGE amount of Xenos, and that's probably the reason why marines lose?

I'm gonna reiterate this. The reason marines lose is that all larvas are constantly used up. Go look at a highpop round and tell me what the chance of getting in as a xeno is.

[spookydonut]

You realize that 22 Defenders and 14 Warriors means that there's a FUCKHUGE amount of Xenos, and that's probably the reason why marines lose?

I'm gonna reiterate this. The reason marines lose is that all larvas are constantly used up. Go look at a highpop round and tell me what the chance of getting in as a xeno is.

That's pretty insightful actually, we've been balancing around the average xeno player count and now we're getting 100% larva utilisation.

[Bancrose]

How is dragging out the round and giving Xenos more time a winning strategy for Marines?

The entire strat before the current balances was that marines can not push.

Like in no way was it smart for your squad to push because you'd evac the planet by the hour mark.

But the longer you drag it out on the planet the more you can whittle down the xenos. Yes they get older as that is the drawback of the plan but that also gives you time to beef up your defences and get more fresh cryo marines.

It becomes a war of attrition, and the more xenos throw themselves at your cades due to their impatience. The better it is. Almost to the point where we drove the xenos who were almost crushing us at LZ1 all the way to hydro, all the way to the containers and into the north central caves on LV.

You are just waiting for the opportunity to counterpush the enemy when they are at their weakest. Does that make sense?

[Bancrose]

- Here comes something a little off topic! -
You mean the round where we had to cannibalize most of the furniture on the ship and melt down guns and attachments to please the metal gods? The same round you dumped 3 squad inside the FoB and played an ultra defensive round in a game where xenos were excessively cocky due to the changes to xenos? The same round that turned into a 3 hour slog with marines defending an awful lot?

Just going to point out that you lucked out there in terms of ship side issues. Jack Knight would have arrested all of cargo if the CE was awake and unhelpful to your plans. From what I was gathering after the round ended, marines actually snatched victory from the jaws of defeat that time in a round was dedicated to a very long battle of attrition.

To say there are strategies and that you have to play ultra defensive is not really reassuring to be honest. I mean for a start it was a one off victory that was sweet to some. If you tried the same sort of thing again I would bet that the xenos would play differently and would focus more on longer range encounters like boilers. Also the amount of metal and shit we sent down to the FoB was beyond ridiculous. We recycled everything we could get our hands on that we were cleared to get, plus you gave us cargo techs access to marine preps right off the bat before briefing started meaning we had access to a ridiculous amount of ammo. AP was a mainstay of orders when we could get it. The tank went down without a secondary until the final push where they actually asked for the smartgun, the tank spent most of its time running things over.

In short. It was a one off, it bothers me a little when someone pulls a one off and says that things are OK based on that one off and it is proven to work. It was a nice game to play in but I don't see this making waves yet and I doubt many will want to see this kind of round played over and over.

That was a bit unpolished but I've reinforced the tactic now. The whole premise is to play defensively. Now we don't really have to because Defenders are much more easy to kill. The FOB wasn't that bad actually and I was aware I was lucky that the CE wasn't awake so we could scrap the entire ship for metal. Every bit counts son. We are fighting a total war down there. I mean if you can show a trustworthy strategy that I can put my confidence in I'd be willing to change my opinion either but so far I haven't seen anything else work.

[Casany]

-snip-

I mean you guys won but it doesn’t seem like a fun round to be a part of. I know if I were just some standard I woulda gone brain dead and left because it doesn’t seem fun. Yeah marines can win again but are they really going to enjoy the victory when they have to play defensively for 3 hours? Most wouldn’t.

[Bancrose]

I mean you guys won but it doesn’t seem like a fun round to be a part of. I know if I were just some standard I woulda gone brain dead and left because it doesn’t seem fun. Yeah marines can win again but are they really going to enjoy the victory when they have to play defensively for 3 hours? Most wouldn’t.

Sorry I get off on the thought of winning for marines sometimes. Is it a fun round not really. Is it fun to die in the first 5 minutes of deployment due to defender and warrior swarms. The answer to that is still no.

[Casany]

Sorry I get off on the thought of winning for marines sometimes. Is it a fun round not really. Is it fun to die in the first 5 minutes of deployment due to defender and warrior swarms. The answer to that is still no.

I wasn't saying that it isn't good you won. My point is that either way, if marines win or loose it just isn't as fun RN. Which is why these caste still need to be balanced better.

[Bancrose]

I wasn't saying that it isn't good you won. My point is that either way, if marines win or loose it just isn't as fun RN. Which is why these caste still need to be balanced better.

Oh, I misread your tone in that than. Yeah it seems a bit xeno side but wasn't that always the intention? Xenos are suppose to be stronger. And 75% marine lossrate and all that.

[Casany]

Oh, I misread your tone in that than. Yeah it seems a bit xeno side but wasn't that always the intention? Xenos are suppose to be stronger. And 75% marine lossrate and all that.

Yeah I'm fine with that but I wanna have fun when I'm fighting. Literally last round I was walking close to the river and a warrior just instantly broke my groin before I knew it was there. It took me outa combat for like 5 minutes. Then a spitter got me down and in ONE slash gave me lung and heart damage and IB. So I was outa combat for 30 minutes after fighting for 3. That just isn't that fun, IMO.

Don't care about winning or loosing I just wanna enjoy a round.

[zoboomafoo]

Sometimes you get fucked by the rng, sometimes your armor absorbs every bit of damage. Just the nature of the beast.

As for the new castes, I like em well enough, but I'll still probably stick to playing runner/hunter. It's good to have a set of castes that is a little more idiot proof than runner/hunter is, prevents a lot of dumb deaths from xeno players who want to be on the front lines but aren't necessarily careful enough to manage runner or hunter health. I do think, however, the new castes are only a small portion of what's causing the xenos to win a lot more now.

[NoahKirchner]

If a warrior grabs you, you're fucked. So no, you cannot resist.

The grab is fast enough that it can be done even after just a normal disarm, it's not like it takes long enough to do that being fucked is justified, because in a lot of scenarios you're not fucked, you're just being cheesed by an instant red-grab that completely immobilizes you and is certain death with a single click of the middle mouse button. There's not a single other ability in the game except for MAYBE screech which can immobilize you to that degree with no counter and while doing no damage. It's ridiculous and broken, especially because it actually DOES break most of the time since ss13 grabs are buggy enough that when you do actually escape the grab because someone pulls you away, you still can't move.