I've played a few ISDF vs SCION games now, and am coming away with the impression that Scions are a bit underpowered. Anybody else notice this, and/or have suggestions on how to fix it?
its vary possible, scions have never been the favorate race. There buidl tree is fairly short and option limited.
They do seem under powered during early game in IA to me so I would think this would translate even more so to MP. It's not until you get at least 2 pools upgraded that they start to find their stride.
u have to be more skilled and knowledge about scions then ISDF, at least 1.2
im not sure how this will help but this is what happends in 1.2...
i realy havnt got in real strats of 1.3 because there is no games because - blah
now, the few games ive played scions (with newbs, 4 way strats) ive beaten them preaty easily...
now, in 1.2 scions are weaker at start but if they get blink they won....
simple - u get blink you won in 1.2
now, the isdf can use AI units to help him match the blink but! the AI uses blink as well... so that gives them advantge.. spire walking is always a great thing, and dont forget that if u can draw the defense fire for long time u can push a builder to demolish your enemy rec in 5 secs...
from there its no problem...
oh, and the maulers are much better... - im just thinking how stuff in 1.3 with what i know so far because i havnt had a chance to test them.. and i find it very hard to get to test that stuff...
The problem I see with Scions is that once they get their Jammer up in 1.3, its all over for the enemy team IMO...
Quote from: SilverB1rdits vary possible, scions have never been the favorate race.
Was also my impression. What can really make scion problematic is when you build a bunch of scavs and they get stuck in the matriarch. The harder structures made it even harder for them to make it out of the gully.
On the other hand, scion has its advantages. On maps with plenty of lose scrap Id prefer scion any time.
I played scions the other day in 1.3.
We won with a mauler rush, similar to a scion win in 1.2. The smooth mauler run make me less seasick.
Warriors do seem nerfed. Arc seemed weaker than before. Also it seemed that absorbtion is more damaged by chain gun than before. Unlike in 1.2 where Absorbtion can basically be used the whole game on warriors, I was forced to change to stasis. Not a problem, this just requires a cmdr to read the situation in the field and adapt.
Still, warriors against blast/chain tanks are a fairly even proposition, with blink being the tie breaker and saving the warriors from converting to scrap.
The changes made in 1.3 are acceptable to me. I hope the horrible warp situation is fixed. With a sonic scout, there was no way to accurately hit an Isdf scout unless you were nose to nose.
Still with decent command and a reliable thug, scions have every chance to prevail over Isdf.
I'd like to know from those that think the Scions are slightly disavantaged in the early game, why in your opinion do you think this is?
I'm curious to see your opinion on which factors/aspect/tactic/units, if any, favor the ISDF in the early game, or which factors, if any, disavantages the Scion.
===
I think it's more intersting and strategic when the choice of shields is made more tactical by making it more important to know what the enemy is using on the battlefield (greater differenciation).
===
Someone mentioned it's all over when the Scions have the Jammer. Why? Is it because by then they have access to all/most of the tech, or that it grants access to a specific and powerful tech, or because of a specific advantage the jammer itself provides ( I might not have been aware of how much it is usefull to have a Jammer around)?
In 1.3 the jammer actually WORKS. As such Scions become much more powerful.
Go try it out yourself :p
The last game I played, I was ISDF against Scion. They did get the jammer, and used blink and maulers, but just couldn't punch through. I had built abou 15 chain turrets around my rec, and they just couldn't punch through with anything. I was taking out their titans with a flock of apc's (LOVE the new apc's), and while they could blink back to base when their warriors got shot up, they couldn't do much damage with them.
After starving them and building up a force, we rolled over and levelled the base. I did have some difficulty with the jammer, but was able to manually target it for the APC's.
I think that the APC actually working has given the ISDF a pretty big advantage...would be nice to see the bugs get a similar gift.
Well Archers are a lot better now I notice... Once they land, they are difficult to impossible to target. I don't know if it's enough to balance out, but Archers are definitly better. Poppers in archers will take out bombers and apcs consistantly.
They also start firing before they hit the ground now... pure evil...
I've always felt the Archer's real advantage was sticking to cliffs not easily reached by hovertanks. That bugs me no end, when someone finds a nice spot to hide one in. Makes you use Scouts to pinpoint the little buggers for sure...
-Av-
were the tweaks made in FE to balence scion vs edf used in 1.3? If not, it might be an idea. Many innoative solutions were made to the balencing problems with the scions.
Yes, it is true that alot of people do not like scions.
However, those that *do*....LOVE scions, and ususally become superbe at them (e.g. darkfox, thats Padisha Dark fox to you human scum!)
Jwk... Is that your own original artwork for your avatar? I love it . It's really good (looks a little familiar, so I wouldn't be surprised if it's some quasi-famous piece)
It is a photoshop of my face and hair. My family has a very acient british heritage so i guess the blonde haired blue eyed look suits me :)
Anyhow, How would the community like if we just took *all* of the tweaks and modifications made in FE rev.c for the scions and slapped them in 1.3...and made our way from there. There will be something that might not quite work as inteneded, but i do think it would be a large step from working from 1.2 scions. E.g. the tweaking that made the sentries really well balenced and a common sight in rev.c (vs a good scion player)
....thats if it was not already done....
Did you hand draw it in Photoshop, or did you "goo" it from a photograph. It would make a nice painting. (I too have an ancient British heritage, although one of the branches are Huguenots)
Balance tweaks were made early and often in the 1.3 "closed beta" period...Often without much time spent digesting the last "tweak" before the next testers suggested another tweak..Myself Included.
Before long, there were 50 "balance related" changes made and some of us called for a halt to "Balance" changes and in fact(in mycase) called for a roll-back to essentially 1.2 default as a means to "get a grasp" on the status of things and re-evalauate. Well that idea was shot down and from about that point Forward "Balance" became and obscene word to use and my cries to adress it got no-where.
I guess (in the end) GSH had a plan to address "Balance" in the open beta(again, not exactly as I felt was best) and instead of having 20(testers) ideas to sort through, he may get 500 viewpoints....
as to the specific "imbalances" in Scion vs ISDF...well....as I've said repeatedly...Damned if I know now...Yes..*I* Encouraged moving the Mualer 1 step higher in the buid tree...In direct response to what I've heard by many many online players:
"We don't like to play vs Scions because all scions do is Mauler Rush"..that was very very common complaint.
However, when Scions do not immediatley rush to maulers, I find the Scions with warriors /blink etc are more than adequately able to fend for themselves. the only (old) remaining scion worry) was "We can't break bases with Scion end game weapons....So we gotta Mauler rush..otherwise we lose"..
well..there were discussions with someone(other than GSH) to work on Scion late game weapons..but in reading the recent 1.3 change logs none of those suggested improvements never made it into the beta(maybe they are still on someone at Pandemics hard drive(more likely his personal PC)...But in any event..there were "ideas" of helping Scions late game..but for now that remains "up in the air"
In the end, again..the whole ISDF v Scion, Offensive vs Defensive Balance of 1.3 was NOT thoroughly addressed in the closed beta. In fact, many balance resulting changes were made without being fully able to gauge the impact("better" AI cuts both ways sometimes).
Which is why (prior to the "open beta") I encouraged all players to play this thing and comment on balnce issues...Because I couldn't grasp where it stood from my former time in the closed beta, until now.
I still like to see people play with it, but whether anything comes of requested changes, fixes, balance issues remains a mystery.
I edited a photograph. Go back ontopic to Scions :P
So yes....it is a little known fact that the squad that got converted into scions in BZII were infact all SAS guys loaned from Britain to the NSDF war.
yeah, thats right, the scions rock. and their brits :P
Well, in the FE rev.c beta we had dark fox, argueably the best scion player out there, not to mention all the ISDF vets on the team, so the knowladge of how scions fought isdf was rather high quality if you ask me.
And the 1.2 scions in comparision to the FE rev.c scions are totally different. We balenced it to the point that just about every combination (sonic / gauss/ blink Deflection....or quilll emp blink stasis.....and of course arc/gauss blink absorb....and thats just the warriors!) was being used on a regular basis
I seriously recomend that cut-pasteing all the tweaks made from FE rev.c be used with 1.3. I feel it would be an excellent starting point, as many of the major issues (e.g. as mentioned before sentries) were fixed.
Oh....and we did stuff to blink that was rather clever i think)
I honesty don't think the scion forces need looking at too much at the moment. If maulers were moved up in the build tree it certainly wouldn't bother me, I have a good time fighting with scions without using them at all. Their scouts are *certainly* weaker than a well-used ISDF scout at the start of the game, due mainly to weapon switching with FAF missiles, but this is balanced by their ridiculous power when they get blink.
I really like the Scion scout. In IA games, I'll never get out of my scout all the way to the end of the game.
I think the "radar damped" Sentry would just make it a more usabled alternative to the scout (differentiate a little more too).
fair enough, but those were not the only things we dealt with in rev.c
The initial scion improvements for FEa were too extreme,
but were not sufficiently tested to uncover the real
advantages.
Scions were downgraded a further two times for FEb
and FEc.
Shoehorning FE scions into 1.3 would be very very stupid
and would cause a lots of bad feeling among seasoned
vets.
During my time as a 1.3 Betatester we were NOT allowed to
raise balance issues. Some things mysteriously changed
after they were pointed out (Mauler tech tree psition for example)
but there was no real discussion.
Balance had been broken early in 1.3 development and
nobody in power wanted to unbreak it, probably since
they did not understand human v human vet strategy.
"after they were pointed out (Mauler tech tree psition for example)"
DR..you must have been one of the later adds to the closed, so Our paths did not cross...I was probably already out by that stage...but
The Mualer move was made well over a year ago..and at the time, the change appeared fine.
Unlike what some will have you believe, My request to bump the Mauler 1 step higher in the build tree was not "Because of my personal play style, skill or lack there of it"..
the original idea for moving the Mauler up 1 slot was originated LOOOONG ago during FE (A) testing...when I was involved in testing there and Myself, TV, Buzz, Pastell, Capt Majestic and others would play long and hard FE battles then after the game have a post game discussion about gameplay, styles, weaons, balance etc...the talk of moving the Mualer was originated in THOSE discussions based upon a mutual feeling from that group of testers(not exactly a bunch of newbies) that some ISDF players did not want to play against Scions because "all Scions do is Mauler rush" So therefore ideas were swapped to improve lategame scion weaons so they(the Scion teams) did not need to resort to the Mauler rush.
Eventually Pastell felkt it best NOT to Move the Mauler, but that was part of the Balancing and improvements made for Scions in the FE game....thos changes are not present in 1.2, so therefore the Mauler Rush was/is still a concern hence the origination of my request to bump The Mauler 1 step up the tree in 1.3.
Ken/GSH agreed and it was done..only question I don't have a answer for yet, is did they follow that change through with a improvemnt in late game Scion weaps?..again? I don't know.
I could look at the posts and find out conclusively,
but Wardog I believe you were kicked from the
testing group about a week or two after I joined.
I almost left right there and then, seeing how the place was run,
I couldn't believe it!!
I slyly mentioned various intentionally broken areas of 1.3
but the word 'balance' was taboo by then.
Your inputs were valuable by the way.
The stock 1.2 mauler tech tree level I find necessary as a 'threat' to
stop ISDF rushing for tech without defence for their rec. It
works well in that context.
Moving Mauler up 60scrap in tech (antenna) would give
the already boosted (APC, bomber, Walker, Asstank mortars)
ISDF even more advantage.
Those "improved" ISDF units, APC Walker ASST tank etc were "Not so improved" when the discussions regarding the move of the Mauler was done(as I said...LOOOONG ago) So we obviously had no idea about a "need" to rebalance vs improved ISDF weapons, because at that stage..the only improved weap for ISDF was ASST tank which could by that stage fire its mortars vs "units" in self defense.
The whole changes to the APC were long after I was gone.
Just to make sure people dont get the wrong idea here.
#1 the beta team did not make massive changes to the isdf weapons.
#2 Ken and Nathan improved/Fixed the AI so it could use what is was given more effectively.
So #2 says that units are now more effective hence the weapons apper to be more powerful. Please avoid the Used more effectively = Directly Made More Powerful fallacy.
Silver is absolutely correct, one of the "problems" disussed early on was the impact the "better" AI had in changing balance from what was "balanced" in 1.2, now became imbalanced by the better AI.
The difficult was(and still is) how to RE Balance those same units WITH the better AI and Keep them blanced in the Offensive vs Defensive Balance equasion and the ISDF vs Scion equasion as well.
well the game at hand i do believe is one me and acne played.. where i ended with a recycling of the recycler cuase i felt blantly ripped off.
I could have handled it better since there were holes i didnt exploit properly in his 10-30 turret defencive "field" but over all i joined in on the middle of the game where it was "pooh" a vet and acne vs aougli and some element nubcake that didnt know how to morph..
so after that id say i did ok seeing as he almost lost his rec, by 1 more fang hit.. but it was the time between then and the end that were the problems.
I personally saw the fault in not being able to inflict equal damage to the sabres that they were doing to us. Sounds wierd now doesnt it? Well id have to blame the netcode. One of the changes in 1.3 has brought on a different kind of warp that certain weapons benifit from and others dont.
this warp.. is in a nut shell something like blinking in 1.2 where the players model and where they really were didnt align for a few seconds.. i dont know if most of you have seen this.. but if sum1 in 1.2 blinked to you.. youd see that green orb explosion of the ship exiting the blink and the ship wasnt there.. few secodns later it was float in to place from the origonal position the person blinked from.. it looked like a ship coming out of warp in Startrek >:D
either way this blink warp Is what this new 1.3 warp reminds me off..
but its far from as bad as 1.2 blinking..
what ive seen is the hitbox and where the weapons are eminating from in 1.3 doesnt line up with the visual model most people shoot for.
the "visual" lags meters behind depending on the speed of the ship..
So how does this have to do with weapons? well for the most part u can hit a person once abush style as it went most of the time that game.. and after that theyed be moving left right like the usual "vet" way where arc isnt as instant as blast, altho its 1 click to fire it.. its actually a salvo of 5 or so shots one after the other.. where as a blast mdm can be sent off nearly at the same time to a slow target.. eh a warrior.. :P
esp if u where ambushed from above and didnt see em etc..
and in the end assualt the mortar rape ensued.. thanks all of those so called "vets" for wanting the final hand in killing ai spires to be a human job..
no reason i shouldnt have lost if u were just counting there ai army vs my scion base.. 3 spires 1 jammer
not to mention the 10 or so apcs where we scions hand NOTHING to kill them with
i started making hoot loads of pods JUST to blink on them multiple times.. as i can tell the apc "soldier" has had there space suit beefed up prolyl to withstand a few more mortar splash damage hits..
all in all, 1.3.. dont count on using scion.. Ever
ass/rocket tanks configured well are just plain killing machines (which i love) but even the mualer with tis more non-nuasiating anti head bob(which a few clueless do gooders in the 1.3 team wanted out(the new beta members, they didnt know the real vets from the early days had over seen kens removal of the head bob)) doesnt help the scions case any..
and for the commanders who love to bomb the bugs, well youll be glad to know the archers on many bumpy maps have grossly large leads on the bombers movment and totally miss with popper and such..
IMO, balancing can only be acheived 'After' the fixes :-) and AIs improvements :-D are completed (otherwise you'd have to start over each time).
So if a unit or race is not quite balance at this stage (it's a 'beta') it would neither be surprising nor a a tragedy, lets tests it to find out, post observations about test made on 'this' version of the beta so others can confirm or not(sometimes we're wrong, are thinking of other verions, or have just not considered factor x). Once a situation is confirmed we can make constructive comments (some bad :D and some good) on potential ways to adress it (theres often more ways then one, the one that makes the least waves is usually closer to the appropriate one)
(this may sound quite obvious :roll: , but dont forget that player skill level and experience varies by such an extreme margin :shock: that that it can be easy to misread/overestimate/underestimate a unit's or tech's true potential.)
Scout, a lot of old a very real vets wanted the mauler head bob back in, not a bunch of clueless noobs.
re: Scion v ISDF balance, it is indeed a bit messed up, but I think this is from the benefits ISDF gain from the new AI.
Why don't scions get these benefits? obvious really... their ships morph at stupid times when under AI control. I asked a million times for this to be fixed, but apparently it's ken code, and ken's been away for quite a while.
Ever watched an AI sonic scout attack an extractor? or an AI arc scout attack a base?
Laughable...
The scions are better about that now, you can force them to stay morphed or unmorphed
Put a few archers in the right spot with poppers, and apc and bomber will never make it to your base.
I'm so sorry, I can't believe I missed the morphing option despite the games I've played so far with the public 1.3 release. That 'force morph' option is awesome, just the ticket.
Scions morph time has been lowered from 5 to 3 seconds. Knowing a lot of vets who are really good with 1.2 scions, I dont think we really need to give them a whole lot of goodies; they practically win at blink.
Scions are now at a serious disatvantage due to the new improved AI. One to one scions were a serious challenge, And this was ballenced by the relativly low number of units.
Its their task-specitif units and style which incorperates 'anti-weapon type shields' and other such stuff which gives them the edge. And also what attracts them to only a few players, due to the relativly high level of challenge it is to control them properly.
However, when its one scion vs 4or 5 ISDf units, mostly AI, the situation is a little different.
One imidiate thing that springs to mind is improving the Lancer as an anti-mortar bike ship (which i believe is what it was always ment to be). How affective it is now? Mortar bikes are going to be one of 'the most' serious threats there is. Just 5 min ago i tested 4 bikes vs a single spire, they destroyed it and lost one ship , and yellowed another.
Also, small things like given jammers the abilty to target things on the HUD's of the commanders (like a scout) could really make the difference for a scion commander.
These things need to be solved as quickly as possiable, and leaving them till after allthe bugs are fixed? sure, but leaving them till after all the AI and other factors that affect ship performance is not such a good idea IMO.
Oh,...and why the hell would someone want to remove the mauler bob? It rocked! you felt like a Horse of Death charging into battle, the fact you could not aim did not matter, because you only have short range weapons (fang, arc and lol sonic wave). It was cool. Some people get sick? so what! Go to F3 mod or dont go into a mauler at all lol
Thats funny, all my tests show that AI mortar bikes get completely and utterly owned by gunspires.
As far as I have seen, Mbikes still get chewed up by spires..
And forced-unmorph units can't shoot at lungs ... wierd stuff.
I want/wanted Mauler head-bob in and argued for it so much
(maybe 2 or 3 posts) that I was threatened to shut up about it
by Nathan.
Hemp, The Mauler Head-bob issue got warm enough in beta to actually have the topic locked, but only cause DR annoyed GSH. I think there were 4-5 ppl (myself included) that asked for it back. The final answer we got was "If Ken gets around to your request, great. If not, please realize he's not had time or interest to work on BZ2 much recently, and there are higher priority bugs". This was shorty before release of PB1.
My test was in single player, so it might of been wrong. I thought it was odd as well.
As to the mauler head bob, why the hell was it taken out in the first place? And whats this about GSH throwing his weight around again? Over things like flying...sure, but head bobing on the maulers? ...seesh, hes not the fountain of knowladge ffs.
oh no! aaargh! i can almost feel the ' thread locked/post modified and deletaed' shot gun being loaded and aimed squarely at my fingers! god forbid their be any postive critism. [/sarcasm]
Hemp Monkey GSH did not change the mauler. Ken did, that is why GSH doesn't want to hear about it. If he changed the mauler, he would probably change it back. Read the freaking changelog before you blame anyone for anything, this applies to anyone that wants to blame GSH for the physics, the mauler, and any other non netcode related code. Read the changelog so you can find out who actually changed a certain aspect of the game.
I am as of this moment reading it. And i did not say GSH changed it....i said that going on what beserker said, its sounds like another point of stress that could of been avoided....e.g. not locking a fourm topic when people are obviously concerned about it.
when fourm threads are locked, the problem does not go away, its just burned deeper into the hearts of those involved.
It basically comes down to not only some peoples urge to get control over other people (yes, it does exist, my dad is a professional psychologist / theologian and poet, there are people addicted to the feeling of control),
But also to the fact that I thought moderators were here to :
A) Help the rest of a community find a solution to a problem/share their opinions
B)Add their help and support to the communities
If the moderators disagree with something, and then lock a thread/edit a post because they do not like what it is saying, then they are doing something wrong.
They do not hold absolute truth, so therefore they are wrong about something(s), if that is true, then how can locking every thread they do not like (and in some cases not even giving the identity of the locker so that no one can even privately complain) be a good thing?
ANYWAY, I do not want to see this important issue get drowned in politics.
On the issue of scions being balanced in 1.3 - I think they're just fine as they are. Blink is godly, it's amazing, all the scion shortcomings put together (range problems, early game problems, scout firepower, lack of pool supression, etc) are worth that one weapon.
If you want to BEAT blink, try using serviced assault tanks with blast, they really are the best weapon ISDF have against blink. Praying may also help.
Quote from: DarkFoxPraying may also help.
[/size]Can I get that from the Stronghold? :D
"I want/wanted Mauler head-bob in and argued for it so much
(maybe 2 or 3 posts) that I was threatened to shut up about it
by Nathan."
hehehehe welcome to my world.
And Co and Greenheart...stop trying to diflect responsiblity from Nathn by what things he did or did not change purely by the (NM)/ (KM) Notations in the changelog..This was Nathans Patch...95% of the ideas, impetus and effort was his, Kens involvement was a favor to nathan, his involvment was early(on physics and some weapon tweaks) then late with a few last minute changes.
True...Nathan didn't do the physics coe..but he was the lrge part of that whoel decision(right or wrong depending how you look at it) and IF Ken made a change and it was negatively recieved, Nahtn could have easily conveyed to ken "Hey..Ken..that didn't work so good"
Ken has told me he pays virtually no(underline ZERO) attention to the boards. He recieved virtually all "usesful information form personal contact.
I don't think I saw 10 posts from him in the entire beta board.
Knowing this, It makes Nathan(as project director) responsible to relay player feedback to the appropriate dept and make corrections. That for reasons unknown, didn't happened, or it did happen, and Ken ignored it(which does not fit his personality from what I've seen).
I don't use "responsible" in a BLAME sorta way...I use it in a "Management" kinda way.
*cha-clunk*
ooo, I think that round was loaded single-handedly
Edit : i just came back from testing a out the new and *improved* scion walker.
Its shockingly hoote, excuse for lack of a better term.
I thought the 'jolting head' thing was a FEATURE. It made it cool and fun to ride the thing, and mastering double blast cannon in dms was a skill i was proud off, the feeling of intensity, fear and excitment when charging though an enemy base was huge when the enemy guntowers came into range, it was one of the best moments of the game.
and now its ruined.
The '' bug '' of the head bobing mauler (and now i think about it, gsh is the *only* person i have heard say its anything other than really cool) should be reinstated.
This new 'totallybalenced head ontop of a spindly legged walker thats charging at the speed of a scout on crack' (yeah...doesnt make sense to me either) is ...well...
it has no soul.
"Blink is godly, it's amazing, all the scion shortcomings put together (range problems, early game problems, scout firepower, lack of pool supression, etc) are worth that one weapon. "
I hope that one can win by choosing among several balanced tactics/units :) , if a single unit or tech(blink) is godly and almost a requirement to have a chance to win, however great it is to have this unit or tech the the game becomes not as interesting as when there are a variety of tactics for you to choose from, and for the adversairy to predict or adapt/counter (rock, paper, scisors, being more interesting than paper,paper,paper :D ).
Scions have a basic choice between a mauler rush, and teching to blink. To get to the stronghold, they have the choice of using quill/defl scouts as a staging point, or sentries as a staging point. Sentries are less effective, but get you to your final tech quicker.
After blink or the mauler is achieved, one can then tech to the overseer allowing you arc/gauss/blink warriors, titans, and archers, of which the most useful is the warrior.
If you ask me, this is *far* more 'choice' than the ISDF tech tree, which basically involves only 2 real choices - whether to bother with SP/laser tanks or not, and whether to go bomber bay or blast first (blast being the pretty obvious choice).
DarkFox, you have mentioned in another post that you think Scions are ok vs ISDF 8) (when you are playing them :p :D ) , but, should we
eventually come to the conclusion that the Scions could benefit form small improvements to enhance race balance...{i.e. if you humored me :D } :)
...What units and tech would you improve slightly? :-)
What are the unit(s) that most experienced Scion players really avoid building most of the time? :s
What are the techs(upgrade[not default]) that most experienced Scion players nearly never use to equip a ship in a real game situation? :s
From what you mention, if any improvements would be good, I presume these should not affect the mauler, scout, warrior (and now guardian[40] :-o ) units nor the quill,def,arc,gauss,blink, techs which are already very good as is.. 8)
"whether to go bomber bay or blast first (blast being the pretty obvious choice)."
Speaking of choosing blast over bombers, do you think the bombs fall too slowly? (considering I'm not much of a pilot myself and that I can easily shoot a bomb down to my own dismay :shock: :D ).
This bears on the scion disadvantage thread, so I want to
comment on the 1.3 bomber.
It is noticeably faster than in 1.2, and this means MORE BOMBS.
I may be wrong, but the turnaround time between bombing and
getting back to base, rearming and getting out to bomb again seems
to be much faster than in 1.2
I haven't tested this conclusively because it 'seemed' very
noticable in my cursory test.
Now you guys begin to see my frustration?!
DF and I and otehrs tried for months to point out what was resulting to game balance from "Improved AI" and from "not thought out" weapon or balance tweaks(some I suggested myself to be fair)...THEN..the soup was already messed up(Ofensive/Defensive balance god knows what ISDF vs Scion was like)But then ALL Balance issues were squelched, thats whn my concern about 1.3 grew, and my caring about 1.3 fell.
Now...we prolly got a hell of a mess.
DF was in the closed Beta with some of us, and his concerns and learned observations were given little attention...I only hope, *IF* Nathan reappears, that this time SOMEONE listens to good and respected advise and these issues get resolved.
I respect DF judgement above all when it comes to Scions. lets hope, those that matter in those decisions value it as well.
Where's the smiley for "slapping myself in the face"????
*sigh*
Nobody understands how this all worked. Let me try to explain by posting Ken's signature tag from BZ1... now where is that... oh, here it is..
QuoteIf, late at night, you leave your door unlocked and computer running, every now and then a Code Elf will come in and fix your code. While this is often beneficial, you should always remember that Code Elves sometimes have a different notion of "fix" than you do. As your project hurtles towards its release date, when nights grow long and tempers short, you should not leave yourself logged in, lest you find an unexpected new "feature" when you arrive the next morning.
...
Ken Miller, the resident Code Elf on the Battlezone Team, says "thanks" to everyone who deserves it. They know who they are.
Now let me explain how development works, worked, is still working, will work in the future....
Nathan is a network guru who's not completely afraid to take on other aspects of the code. Obviously he's more comfortable with the netcode than any other part but he's delved into just about ever aspect of BZ2 short of AI pathing. Nathan is a 'one step at a time', 'show me the money', logical and methodical coder. I believe he IS the driving force behind the patch and to my knowledge is the one who's put in the most bug-fixing time.
Ken is a 'code elf' by his own terms. He likes particles, rendering, and other visual aspects of the game. He's a tinkerer, an experimenter, and likes to add 'features' until something breaks. He's fixed some things, broken others, fixed them again, lather, rinse, repeat....
As an example of what this does to the patching process:
For 1.2 Ken added some cool effects to the building of new units by the Recy/Factory. What it ended up doing was randomly cause parts of units to 'stretch' back to the build point, even if they crossed the map. Ken then got busy on other projects and BARELY made it back in time to fix the problem. It was very close, and I believe it took some Wil help to get him back for it.
Anyway, for 1.3 both were working from a shared code base. They each added things for various reasons. Some things came from tester-found bugs, some from suggestions. Some things came via new ideas from other Pandemic projects, and may have been experimental from the get-go. Some things may have been things they wanted to do from the beginning, and some were influenced by Wil Stahl so as to remain true to the original vision of BZ2.
The thing is...
pay attention here...
you NEVER ask Nathan to fix something Ken did any more than you ask Ken to fix something Nathan did. They don't exactly overlap in their areas of expertise, and I know from experience that backtracking through someone else's code is an exercise in pain sometimes.Now Nathan can be terse. He can be stubborn. He can be willful. You know what? I think he's earned the right to be. I've never found him especially talkative (unlike me) or especially rude, just blunt and to the point. I like that.
Ken can be creative. He can be imaginative. I've had some VERY cool converstions with him about "might be" things. This is not always good for bug fixing, or when as he says the "deadline gets close", but it always revves my creative engine and gets me going.
Both are necessary for things to be accomplished, and both contribute in their own ways.
And both deserve a HELL of a lot of gratitude from this group for all this work.
***
Now...
The Mauler head bob was cool, it's easy enough to put back. Trivial. Don't worry about it. Lots more complex things were handled by community members without bothering Ken or Nathan.
Ship handling and physics, weapons balance, tougher to do and definately NOT Ken or Nathan's bag. WE need to test and decide these things WITHOUT bringing them into it until we all pretty much agree that we have what's wanted. We'll never get 100% to agree on anything, but moving things back towards 1.2 OR tweaking them slowly is a good start.
Now, I personally think we should hammer on bugs. Bugs, bugs, bugs. Don't worry about physics, eye candy, performance, or anything that could be in an ODF/XSI patch the Community could do. If we can come up with something like that, fine, but the important thing about 1.3 is stability, warp, and AV's. Pound them out of the engine and the rest will follow fairly easily or can be done AFTER we completely lose Ken and Nathan.
Which could have already happened for all we know, but I'm hoping not.
Dinnertime.
-Av-
Balance does not require Nathan(GSH) and in fact Nathan does not want to do balance at all, he laft that for the public beta and it is now
I'd like to see another release of the Exp Rec with some of the new changes people are posting about here.
Speaking of balancing scions, the main thing they need right now is for sonic wave to be fixed back to it's old pushing ability. In 1.3 it has trouble pushing builders, constructors, maulers and walkers.
The scion weapons which are never used are the lancer, esp. multilock missiles, seeker mines, resin mortars, and static charge. If balance is looked at, these are the units/weapons that need boosts.
The archer could do with a boost if acid cloud is taken down in future, which in all honesty I don't think it should be, seen as how the emit mine can be destroyed before it does any damage.
Finally, combat gauss guns also eat too much ammo to be a good choice over ionguns. This isn't really too big a deal though.
I personally don't think any major changes should be made to the 1.2 values. That being said, scions are unique in having some weapons that are *completely* obselete at present, such as resin mortars or multilock.
I understand the points made about Nathan and Ken.
however, being 'blunt' to some people is being very 'rude' to others. I do not see any reason for being 'blunt'. I have seen people get Fired from their Jobs in a polite fassion. So this so called ''its ok because hes been around for ages , so therefore can be rude...and its not rudeness *really*...its him..um..being...blunt?'' is rubbish.
anyway, scions...
the scion sonic wave looks ulgy. and it does not work as it used to...its way to powerful against tracked vechiles now (more so than before) and ...it just looks wrong, this thick flat opaque ''waves'' look horrible, the eariler thinner translucent version was much nicer.
Quote from: DarkFoxThe scion weapons which are never used are the lancer, esp. multilock missiles, seeker mines, resin mortars, and static charge. If balance is looked at, these are the units/weapons that need boosts.
I personally don't think any major changes should be made to the 1.2 values. That being said, scions are unique in having some weapons that are *completely* obselete at present, such as resin mortars or multilock.
[/size]
WASPS: I've already suggested downsizing these big-ass missiles (assault multilock) some threads ago in private and public beta. They basically get in each other's way, easily targetable due to size, easily destroyed by direct fire or splashdamage due to weak health and just too "unrealistically" launched from Lancer's itty bitty missile tube, because of said size.
MULTILOCK: Make their trajectory physics behave as they did in FE. Might work better. I do hate the recycling triple lock. You tend to lose time AND timing when focusing when to let go at the same time you are trying to keep aim on target. :D
SEEKERS: I've said awhile back to make them faster and a bit stronger healthwise (not damage-wise). You know, kinda like the spherical hoverbots in StarWars.
RESIN: Maybe a wider splash area, I dunno.
STATIC: Longer reach maybe? Being that this is a melee-type weapon, it would be somewhat difficult to use in a warpy environment, which is why not many use it I think. :?
My 2 cents (or 2 sense).
The FE multi-lock rocks lol. I loved clicking repeatedly ..it ended up firing random salvos of missiles, and looked auesom.
the wasps? i agree, always had the same opinon. I personally think some kind of comet cruise, but faster, less damaging, and if possiable...make it fly up like 30m into the air...and then when it gets to the target it would 'dive'.
I remember seeing in FE comet cruise fly upwards from a rocket tank to hit this nasty cerberi flying thing.
all the other things?
Seekers, yes..faster...better armour. Mabey a little more kick back. To mak e it a worthy 'running away' weapon.
For static..i tihnk it needs redesigning. I was thinking perhaps that it would fire a sort of 'popper missile', very short range, and with no sound affects or visuall affects it would 'look' like the blue spikes were doing the damage,
the fire properties would have to be edited heavily to make it convincing.
Oh...and can someone PLEASE fix the emp-stream sound affects??!? its got the popper sound, that sounds hoote, and does not fit the weapon at all, the old sound affect as perfect.
i know some1 we can ask for some sounds... :) :roll:
now, static causes ALOT of troubles for me and i know for others as well..
at least in 1.2.. i havnt tried it in 1.3 yet
the biggest problem with static charge that after 1 use it'll look like everytime there is static on something else... sometimes u'll see static on ships, or buildings , or pods and even weapon powerups which absoultly cant do static charge..
its very very annoying and i hate whoever uses static cause it *Ammo*s up the game...
im talking about 1.2 here not 1.3 so if its fixed ignore all of this :P
and maybe giving them a lil bit radious dmg and enchant the dmg can be cool
although i find it hard to belive some will use it over blink :roll:
Quote from: Jwk the Hemp MonkeyI understand the points made about Nathan and Ken.
however, being 'blunt' to some people is being very 'rude' to others. I do not see any reason for being 'blunt'. I have seen people get Fired from their Jobs in a polite fassion. So this so called ''its ok because hes been around for ages , so therefore can be rude...and its not rudeness *really*...its him..um..being...blunt?'' is rubbish.
It's very hard to convey emotions on the Internet. Too many people are lost without the emotional subtext. That's why that whole bank of smileys exists when posting, to help get some emotion into the message....
Then again given all the bull Nathan's received in the past I'm suprised he even reads this stuff...
Quote from: DarkfoxThe scion weapons which are never used are the lancer, esp. multilock missiles, seeker mines, resin mortars, and static charge. If balance is looked at, these are the units/weapons that need boosts.
Nobody uses Lancers??? They're such good anti-Turret anti-MB units! Well, against AI, pardon my "Strat Ignorance". I suppose human-placed Turrets are more protected but still... I'd rather have a Lancer sitting in my base than a Turret when the MB's roll in.
Well, we have some excellent weaponsmiths here. Put them to work on delicately tweaking these things.
As to the Scion Late Game we've suggested adding a unit or two to the top end. Personally I like the Gorgon from GAIPS but that's just me... :)
-Av-
hi guys. i'm new here can you tell me all what i need to konow :oops:
Welcome to the looney bin, always room for one more... ;)
First off, there's a few FAQ's floating around here in the various boards. Read them before you go nuts with questions.
The main thing for THIS board is testing the 1.3 Beta Patch. Install Battlezone II, then use this patch, then get out there and play! Come back here if something goes wrong and tell us what happened...
-Av-
Quote from: BulDoghi guys. i'm new here can you tell me all what i need to konow :oops:
One thing to look at would be the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs):
http://www.pandemicstudios.com/games/bz2/community.htm
loosing 1 of 4 bik4s to a spire? i would image all the bikes die. after the first shot the spire wont miss.. its 2 hits to kill each bike..
as to why the head bob is out... both request and as a FIX.. READ THE CHANGE LOG MORONS
Why i said clueless noobs is some not so vetskilled players Your average talk alot furom hanging 1.3 tester felt certain head bob was stolen from them.. never knowing(due to being FAR beyond there time) that it was offically out...
sad to call youself vets seeing as your want head bob back not to put your lowly selfs on a even playing field with a begginer or what not.. since adapting to the impurities and exploits of battlezone is what u think makes your great... Laff :D
the only threat the the community in bz2 is themselfs :o
wtf are you talking about scout with reguard to mauler?
The 'new and improved' mauler feels like your riding a damn BIKE, where as before hand it felt like you were
RIDING A MONSTER HORSE OF DOOM .
Also, the newer maulers are stratigically identical to the old ones, meaning the changes were purely graphical.
And now they suck....
i dont care if it is 'in the change log' or 'if it was a bug that needed fixing'...it nothing like flying, and it was a bad idea to remove it in the first place.
I say the mauler should be given back what it was like in 1.2. It was PERFECT in 1.2.
And no i did not protest against flying or any of the other exploits removed. I have long been against all forms of exploit. But how the *Ammo* is a head-bobing mauler a damned exploit?!?
it was COOL. I did not give any definate advantage, and it was FUN. It felt GREAT...and noone..not
ONCE ever complained about the head bob! it was an accidental thing that got inculded, and was found to be really fantastic. Hell, i did not even know it was a bug!
EDIT :
Quote...since adapting to the impurities and exploits of battlezone...
ITS A HEAD BOB. What the HELL are you on about? it is infact if you think about it, a DISADVANTAGE to the player pioleting the mauler....stratigically...
god it felt cool, and now it is *Ammo*ing RUINED. I am so angry at this!
Quote from: Jwk the Hemp Monkey
The 'new and improved' mauler feels like your riding a damn BIKE, where as before hand it felt like you were
RIDING A MONSTER HORSE OF DOOM .
RocketmanX dubbed them "Cockroach Ponies". Not so grand a moniker...but in a similar vein.
I never could drive them from first person without getting severely ill...so I don't miss the jerking. It did always bother me that the inside jerking never really matched up with the outside animation....
I do sympathize with your POV...it was something that made the mauler even more unique...but I like them better now. I wouldn't scream if they were put back the old way though.
A bit of advice: If you want to retain even the small chance of them getting changed back, try to speak about it in a more positive light. When you say they suck, a programmer reading your post will read it as "my work sucks", and probably react with "no it doesn't...therefore HempMonkey is a rude idiot...screw him!"
Quotea programmer reading your post will read it as "my work sucks", and probably react with "no it doesn't...therefore HempMonkey is a rude idiot...screw him!"
The programmer would be very wrong - Hemp is an incredibly civil human being, almost unnaturally so.
Get a grip dude, it's BETA. Some of you guys really need to look up what that means before you proceeed to swear and moan and go apehoot. It's also a trivial alteration and easy to put it back, can be done in Notepad if you are that desperate.
A little head bobbing on a walker is a good thing, but walking a mauler in 1.2 was way too bumpy and added nought except the potential for seasickness (running was better tho - like going from trot to gallop on a horse). What 1.3 BETA mauler loses in character it makes up for in user-friendliness.
And in case you missed it the first hundred times: it's BETA. Keep ya pants on FFS.
Quote from: DarkFox
The programmer would be very wrong - Hemp is an incredibly civil human being, almost unnaturally so.
Well, he's getting a bit natural over this bobbing thing. :lol:
Why thank you dark fox for the compliment heh. However, i personally think having seasickness inducing charastitics in the mauler is a sign of charactor :D
I dont think the mauler should be too 'user friendly'. It is a very powerful unit
QuoteIt did always bother me that the inside jerking never really matched up with the outside animation....
Thats a good point. How about we make a comprimise.
We link the head shell with the body in such a way that it bobs , actually bobs and then leave it at that. As a result the 'charging horses of doom' would have even more character, and look good. It should be tried out IMO.
Also, the new ones seem to lose all their momentum at even the slightest bit of terrain getting in their way. Has anyone else noticed this?
"i personally think having seasickness inducing charastitics in the mauler is a sign of charactor"
thank god you have no direct influence on the way games come out.. Whew!
Graphical affects such as that are often seen as great in-games. AvP and AvP2 for example...when you 'wall walk' as an alien your vision shifts radically according to what wall you are on, its great!.
And so was the mauler head bob.
Yes teh mauler does bump into the terrain to much.
The head bob was ok but I would go for slight reduction in its jurky ness
No that kind of suggestion sounds good, there should be some 'jerky ness'....
it is a 5 legged beast traveling at high speed, its not ever going to be a 'smooth ride'. And the bobing should hinder aim somewhat whilst running, it looks good..and scion assault cannon types are all close range anyway.
As for the mauler being slowed down easy... i agree. Even somewhat shallow inclines will sometimes bring it back down to its "trot".
One nice thing that I noticed, tho I don't know if they meant to do it.... Sometimes in 1.2 when the mauler would go over a bump and fly into the air, it would stop galloping and go back to troting in midair! Sometimes I would avoid getting air so I wouldn't slow down. In 1.3 that doesn't happen anymore (as far as I know), the mauler keeps galloping in the air so when it hits the ground it continues to move fast. I like this feature. I don't if anyone even noticed or if its an issue but I thought it was nice.
As for the "head bob", I agree with hemp, it made the mauler more realistic. If the walker is galloping and the whole body is going up and down.... then shouldn't the head as well? If it doesn't get changed back I won't mind too much, but i agree it was pretty cool. The only reason I wouldn't change it back is if it makes the AI miss. Human players can always adapt, but the AI is another story. I don't think it caused any problems with the AI tho....... so my vote is to change it back.
the m1a1 can be doing 60 mph over roguht terrain and the barrel will remain at the angle regardless. Its really a mute point much like people arguing over ships using air jets or gravametric repulsion to stay in the air.
The head bob is so bad in 1.2 many people dont drive it because it would make them ill, now I have nerves of steel, I can look through binoculars in a moving vehical and not get sick, so the mauler head bob did not effect me but having one of the main units of the scion race making people ill when they drive is going a little far I feel.
ya but u can get used to it
your points are good Silverb1rd, but firstly the whole room in which the person is sitting does not move, just the image on the screen. Not nearly as nauesiating.
Another point is that yes, stabilised tanks do aim well at 60mph, but they are on tracks, a Mauler is on legs for the purpose of being able to get to higher speeds over rougher terrain at a lose of felxabilty, and accuracy.
Since all mauler weapons are close range - point blanc then being able to aim accuractly is even less of a concern.
I never saw 1.2 maulers miss or be any more accuracte/inaccurate than humans. They were just less intelligent in the way that they moved from point A- B and they never got quite as close to the target as a human does.
Quote from: Jwk the Hemp MonkeyI never saw 1.2 maulers miss or be any more accuracte/inaccurate than humans. They were just less intelligent in the way that they moved from point A- B and they never got quite as close to the target as a human does.
I've always been unsure as to how much of an effect the AI standing back a little when using fang has on the damage inflicted. I guess because when AI maulers are used, they're normally in packs so It's hard to tell.
I like numbers :) But I'll accept such answers as 'null', 'a little', 'stfu' or 'tons'.
depends on the target, when attacking a small unit like a turret or something, its going to have more affect, when attacking a larger one such as a factory every shot hits.
I guess thats why equiping AI maulers with Plasma stream is alright sometimes, cause they dont waste as much of their ammunition.
Humans should have fang, always. Its so insanely good.
Well I loved the head bob in the Mauler made playing in DM with it a little more tricky when one had two of the all powerful blasts in it. But I suppose that the 1.3 walker having 2xA cannons sort of changes that. HMM
They should be balenced for human vs human strat first, not DM's. Dm's have 'alot' of flexability.
Also, can people stop thinking that a Bulldog is the equivelent of a Titan, and an Attila is the equivelent of a Mauler, Its not like that.
The titan is the Scion equivelent of the Attila walker, and the Mauler is the equivlent of the Bulldog/rocket tank.
when it comes to damage/armour values/tactical value.
by the creators titan is called scion assult tank because its on weels and cant swim while a mauler and walker can 'swim' and they have lags
the name comes from here - walker
a walking unit... while the assult tank drives - same for the titan..
i think thats why people call the titan assult tank and mauelr walker
but
QuoteThe titan is the Scion equivelent of the Attila walker, and the Mauler is the equivlent of the Bulldog/rocket tank.
when it comes to damage/armour values/tactical value.
true dat...
He's not arguing names, just what is a match for the other. I have to agree, the Titan and Landmaster are walking GT/GS's, while the Mauler and Bulldog are GT/GS killers.
Good point.
-Av-
Quote from: Scoutnot to mention the 10 or so apcs where we scions hand NOTHING to kill them with
i started making hoot loads of pods JUST to blink on them multiple times.. as i can tell the apc "soldier" has had there space suit beefed up prolyl to withstand a few more mortar splash damage hits..
Static Charge works wonders on APC soldiers but you may want to equip deflection before you go out there and start frying the annoying bastards so you dont get a giant wad of rockets blowing the crap out of you.(Well not as fast at least :mrgreen:)
Static charge also lags multiplayer games to high heaven. Gas mortars or arc stream are the best scion weapons against APCs IMO.
I have NEVER used Static Charge in a MP game unless i was using it against APC soldiers so i dont know how much lag it makes but IMHO the APCs would certainly lag the game about as much, since if im correct they are 5 AI units in one.
BTW and i know this is completely off topic but what is this emoticon supposed to mean? :mrgreen:
I think it means your so happy your about to puke, or it could just be a little variety.
the only way static would ever get used is if
A) it did not cause the lag and other problems
B) it was *low* down the tech tree
C) it was more powerful (longer range field)
i hate whoever use static, it'll cause the bug where u see everything staticed - from power-up boxes and pilots to buildings
forgot to check it in 1.3 though
The static charge bug thing was fixed in 1.3 as far as i can tell.
Quote from: PhoeniX-FlamEQuoteThe titan is the Scion equivelent of the Attila walker, and the Mauler is the equivlent of the Bulldog/rocket tank.
when it comes to damage/armour values/tactical value.
true dat...
just one tactical value ill dissagree on...
Maulers are great for advancing and attacking, but when advancing with rctk tanks, they just get slaughtered. I prefer them to help defend a turret before i can get gts up.
Never question Mr. Green!! :mrgreen:
Perhaps Scions should have a bomber.
They do, its multi purpose, doesnt need to go back to base every time it attacks, is pilotable by humans, and is called the archer.
and it cannot be deployed behind defences to anilihate the enemy.
especially if the enemy is getting ready for a tank rush :mrgreen:
Scion and isdf are pretty well matched. They both have advantages and dis advantages over each other. In my opinion, i like the archer better than the bomber. It can hide, doesn't need to go back to base, and shoots mortars. bombers are a bit too easy to destroy because they are flying right above your head. ISDF has some other advantages over scion though. Basically, one can counter against the other. They are evenly matched if u look at it the way i am. I won't go into much detail cuz right now i am on VACATION!! :twisted:
ISDF beats the scion in power everytime.... Please include the fury bomber by default.....
The archers much like the morter bike.
the balance comes in early compared to late games...
isdf has absoultly no chance to win vs scions in late games unless a succesful pummel rush or preaty mid game when scions aint fully done yet and didnt control field yet if u manage to get ALOT of the big units...
which will be probably fail as well...
if walkers have assult instead of combat with blast isdf will be able to match the scions and drive them back preaty neatly...
since 1 blast shot from walker (FE - assult cannons) gets warior to red.. few more chains or even 2 lasers will kill a warior... (or a blast from nearby tank that following the walker)
ISDF beat scion in the early game, scion beat ISDF later on, even wiithout blink.
*WITH* blink, scions are completely overpowered. When playing highly-competitive games, such as pre-arranged clan games, we try to do mixed races, preferably isdf v isdf, isdf v scion, scion v scion, and scion v isdf. In the mixed-race games, I've noticed scions winning far more than ISDF, which is the reason I started banning the use of blink when I host games.
Since banning blink, the races have seemed perfectly well-balanced.
And before anyone accuses me of being too hard with the ban, know that I'm a *huge* scion fan, and strongly dislike the ISDF. If you're having trouble winning when using scions, get out of the early game asap, rather than wasting scrap on lots of empty scouts which will all be butchered, Since you'll lose the early dogfights against ISDF players that switch between minigun and FAF well. Try to get to either quill scouts with deflection shields, or gauss sentries with stasis shields, for a foothold (gauss/stasis sentries work better against laser scouts, deflection/scouts work best against chainguns). Trying to get stasis scouts or deflection sentries will leave you open too long, and chains will wreck your chances. You then have the choice between teching to maulers, or arc/gauss warriors, either of which will typically win you the game against most ISDF players, whether you're playing FE, 1.2, or 1.3.
Saying scions need more powerful weapons seems strange to me, as does saying that the archer is better than the bomber. If I was making a race to win all games, I'd choose the bomber over the archer any day. I'd also pick scions over ISDF any day.
Oh - and re: Assault blast, it's still nothing incredible against absorbtion warriors, which are the standard against ISDF. FE and 1.2 *do* help walkers with that assault blast, but they also help scion archers, balancing the ISDF assault somewhat.
you gotta rememeber that FE game that we let acer and apcs cmding...
the walker did preaty nice.. i ran out of ammo and not enough trucks - thats why we lost it... i killed few scouts and few wariors with NP at all... they had absro & blink...
Yeah Pheonix - FE walkers are quite good, and they're the very best units in the game for countering serviced base assaults (250m assault blast to snipe out service trucks).
For an attack they're not too bad, but any experienced tactician worth his salt will have you countered on the double.
Oh, are you sure your attack failed because of trucks and ammo? I was certain it was more to do with flame mines, but I might be thinking of a different game.
Either way, I don't deny dual-blast walkers are great, I just still don't think they beat assault tanks in the attacking.
u were scions... u stole aougly scout at start and had gauss stinger scout
was on plaza... ur talking about a difrent game =)
a mauler killed me when i had no ammo, before it got close to me it was half accutly...
Ah yes, I remember the game now. The walker was indeeed doomed - not enough trucks, no defense against mauler attacks, on a map with plenty of water, and spotted way too early. Your wingmen were too eager to leave you alone too. In fact, it was one of the weakest mauler attacks I've ever witnessed, I'm sure I've seen you personally do a much better job with a walker on moonshroud before.
Quote from: PhoeniX-FlamEa mauler killed me when i had no ammo
THAT WAS ME THAT WAS ME THAT WAS ME!!! It was so much fun to run behind you and put Fangs in your ass, you should have seen the look on your ass :mrgreen:
if i only had some ammo *sniff*
If you had some ammo you still would have died, since both your escorts had been killed, and did you know that when a walker has full health and fights a mauler, begins firing at maximum range etc, the fight is still pretty much a draw?
Add the peppering our wings were giving you... *very* dead walker, it wouldn't have even been close if you *had* ammo.
The relevance to this topic is getting slim, any chance this topic could be split or something?
have u tried it? mauler just *starting* to run after 1 / 2 shots towards the walker in full range while the walker has full ammo and health?
the walker also used a lil bit of laser...
u sure u tested it?
the mauler was almost half when it was 150m near me... i had no ammo at all
I know for a fact that when scions get blink, they lose.
Cause most players will use all 4 blink blasts to get into battle and forget they need ammo to fight....
Allow blink dark fox, its a newbies weapons, and not a strong one, a plasma walker will take just about anything the scions will throw at them.
The scions have early-mid game advantages with Solar Flare, and Morph..... None of the other races (hadean is an exeption) can stand up to scions duing this.
Once the plasma walker comes out, its all over for scions and hadeans. :)
Blast walker is stupid :P
wow dino, you are totaly wrong...
scions are extremly weak at start, scions scouts have no chance against a well piloted mini-faf ISDF scout, and i dont think plasma damages the headen xypos 2 much... its also harder to aim with the plasma cannon compared to minigun and praticle gun (spelled right?), which are 'faster' and almost instant (almost instant compared to the plasma cannon, hehe)
i dont think you ever met a vet, because once scions get blink they won the game, and theres almost nothing isdf can do, unless if they can get a big unit (assult tank / walker) with alot of trucks... only then they can push scions back and kill those damn blinking wariors...
in 1.2 its just crazy.. blink doesnt use 2 much ammo, although in FE blink is still *extremly* usefull
flares are useless IMO, you can kill turrets easily, but if you play with rec defense you dont need turrets, and most cmdrs goes for gts 1st against scions, i personaly think none of em needed, once a scion morph he is an easy target, espicely if I still have my fafs
plasma walker? are you crazy?
plasma is weak compared to blast, and i dont think plasam does any "critical" damage to absrobotion wariors, scouts
or the heavy units that scions are using - maulers and titans...
i do think, that walker got a chance to stand vs a mauler - with blast but i havnt checked yet
more to add, if your gonna use plasma walker - i can just get m-curtien (if im isdf or hadeans [hadeans got m-curtien right?]) and it will deflect your plasma shots
Dino - wrong on almost every point. I'll disect them one by one...
QuoteI know for a fact that when scions get blink, they lose.
Cause most players will use all 4 blink blasts to get into battle and forget they need ammo to fight....
Allow blink dark fox, its a newbies weapons, and not a strong one
Blink allows the scion players to either win or draw every single dogfight they enter. Newbies might blink into combat, but vets never do this. Vets reserve their blink for escaping if they're losing a fight, or catching up with an escaping enemy. In simple 1v1 combat, it means either the scion escapes, or the ISDF ship dies. ISDF ships cannot escape when scions use blink, and ISDF ships cannot kill when scions use blink.
In 2v2, 3v3 or 4v4 games the inbalance is even stronger, because even if the scion player *does not* win his fight, his teammates can finish his opponent off while he blinks away.
Just when you think thinks can't possibly be worse, you witness a scion player losing a dogfight, blinking back to base for pods, then blinking back to their wounded foe and finishing the job. It's a joke.
Quote, a plasma walker will take just about anything the scions will throw at them.
Not at all. Even without sonic cannon, a plasma walker can be easily beaten by a mauler or a titan. When the scions *do* use sonic cannons, the plasma shots will rarely even get a single hit, due to the sonic shells pushing the plasma away.
QuoteThe scions have early-mid game advantages with Solar Flare, and Morph..... None of the other races (hadean is an exeption) can stand up to scions duing this.
First of all, yes, solar flare is amazing for taking out turrets, but there are two major problems with scions that prevent this from being a game breaker - the first is that only starting scouts have flares, and the ISDF team will rip your ships to shreds in the opening dogfight, taking away your flares. The second is that good ISDF players will not use turrets against scions - seeing as how scions have to morph to do any damage to your base, and since a morphed scout is a larger target, moving very slowly, with no way to defend itself, and with it's health reduced from 1200 to 900 (ISDF scouts have 1800 health). With this in mind, ISDF players quickly realise that it's easy to defend against scion base attack *without* turrets.
The second problem is that morphing is the *only* scion way to attack pools, meaning you have to risk your life every single time you attack a pool.
In short, scions have very little chance of surviving a dogfight against good ISDF players that can switch between minigun and faf skillfully. Even if they *do* survive, there will be no turrets to flarebomb, unless the ISDF commander is an idiot.
QuoteOnce the plasma walker comes out, its all over for scions and hadeans.
Blast walker is stupid
First of all, the plasma walker is a 105-scrap top-tech-tree unit, meaning it probably wont come out at all. Secondly, the plasma walker can be taken out by almost any scion unit. A drone can do it, a warrior can do it, a lancer can do it, a sentry can do it, a titan can do it, and a mauler can do it. Plasma walkers, in short, are complete rubbish. Blast walkers *do* pose a problem, but if the scions are indeed allowed to blink, they will effortlessly blink behind your walker and quill it to death.
The very bottom line is that scions have a weaker early game, but a very strong late game, and this is *without* blink. If blink is allowed, scions have a difficult early game, and an almost gauranteed win when they get blink. The money you save from never losing a ship can buy you countless spires all over the map, massive mauler attacks, infinite scavs, upgraded pools everywhere, pilot bazookas, useless jammers, and anything else you can possibly waste cash on. 3 maulers is normally all you need to do to win though, and it's not hard to afford them when you're never losing a ship.
It's also very frustrating to play against, and eventually becomes very frustrating to use. I just feel cheap when I use blink, and I *know* there is nothing the enemy team can do if the teams are even remotely balanced.
I would prefer to do two things
A) change blink (although there is alot of talk this is not possiable)
B) simply stack the games in favour of the non scion team.
If there was a way to make blink chargegunclass, with 3-5 seconds chargetime, then yes, that would be dandy.
I can't figure out a way to do that though, and stacking teams against the scions doesn't work because they lose in the opening dogfights so badly, they haven't got a chance against stacked teams. Furthermore, even against stacked teams, blink is no fun to use. There's no adrenaline when you've got a safety net like that on your vehicle.
I totally agree with the charge gun idea. Shame it is not doable unless GSH thinks of it as a bug...which in stratergy terms it is.
If that option is not doable, then perhaps swaping it for another weapon, perhaps a very-ammo-draining 'force' weapon, or jax. Whilst improving the other specials.
Quote from: Jwk the Hemp MonkeyIf that option is not doable, then perhaps swaping it for another weapon, perhaps a very-ammo-draining 'force' weapon, or jax. Whilst improving the other specials.
Personally I think Blink is fine the way it is and that removing it would take away some of the fun of playing Scions, when I first played BZ2 the only things that made me choose Scions over ISDF were,
Blink, Lancers, Lungs and the fact that at the time I thought only the Scion Builder could climb. If it were up to me I would prefer to ban blink from games rather than remove it entirely.
Personally, considering the upfront nature of a mauler id like to see it have upgraded healing capacity, if you look at the ballance of the game.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
archers/mortor bikes, rang ect the same, mortar bikes are probably more usefull as the mortars from archers take to long to hit ground units... unless your just useing them for aa...
scouts, well we already know there unbalanced, is it still unbalanced later on in the game, scion have shielding but does it make up for 700-900 hp..
Isdf tanks are definitly an equel match to the warrior, blink for phantom vr, sp cannon is way way too strong nowdays, cuts through everything in secounds, if you dont have shields your a gonner in a warriorand it smashes titans something feirce.
a mauler vs a walker, ok take into acount the walker had a range increase with its ass hardpoint, i dont think a mauler has a chance in a clear field, its not like they have a huge amount of life to get so up close and personal. maulers are also usless at defending themselves, 1 ai isdf tank will do it. its a good unit the mauler, in a class of its own though....
rckt tnk vs lancer, lancer can move around a bit but when ive tried killing an ai rckt tnk ive died everytime within 2 hits.... and with the bee bomb drones being as weak as they are in 1.3 theres no point using them, even if they hit they dont warrent the ammo cost to low dmg.. the drones used to be great.
titan vs ass tnk , titan rips it to shreds even with the rang dissadvatage.
titan vs walker , I havent tried this one yet but thewalker does outrang a titan.
ok now then bomber... um wheres the comparison unit
ok and sentry, what good is it, nice speed but even with shields its hard killing a isdf scout or killing a turret. its like a more expensive scout.
so from my understanding the scale in normal units favours isdf, on the basic compare this to that, without the sneeking behind a walker using blink shouldnt come into acount, thats a persons tactic just like vring up to a titan ambushing and running of.
I think scion needs a bomber, I modeled one for it but im no good at texture mapping at the moment. Whith that aside the scions need to be balanced up, how are you supposed to fend of isdf without 2 pools, where as isdf can build all its core base structures of 1 pool, so with weeker scouts and gaurdians you have to fend off stronger scouts and possibly mortar bikes depending if the isdf commander decides to go that way.
if you want to see the bomber http://www.endarkend.50megs.com/photo2.html
Those models are nice, but TBH i think you might need to disscuss scion stratergies with Dark fox a bit more. Perhaps they can be inculded for something else. They look very 'EDF'y to me.
However, one thing has become apparent. BLink is cool. People do not want to get rid of it because its *really* fun for some (i for one actually get an adrenaline rush using it, esp getting away at the last moment).
Although i do think bolt mine would be a great replacement to blink, but i still think blink should exist in some shape or form. Perhaps some kind of dedicated building that takes 105 scrap to make, has low armour and is at the very highest tech tree, and 'all' it does it give you blink...which you *have* to drop off, no prebuilt.
That would make it balenced again i suppose.
Now if someone could make a really scionic looking building that takes up one square.
archers can be hidden and they got HUGE range, i dont realy think u can compare them.. mtr bikes are usefull in defending sometimes, but the archer is probably a much better assult unit
scouts can be balanced, more or less - if scions wont use blink.. because shads tear shielded scion scotus apart... + a mix of chain scout and a laser scout will kill any shield (espicely both with shads)
empty arc vs empty laser - preaty balanced id say
isdf tanks are far from being a match to wariors, with blink that is...
once the scions get absrobotien on their wariors isdf tanks cant do much but dieing... more to add, when a tank fight a shielded warior, it usualy 'disables' his better weapon... so u get something like arc & gauss vs chain guns or arc & gauss vs laser
PL does nice dmg, and probably the best cannon isdf can have vs wariors, but it still far from giving isdf tanks a chanve vs a wariors (even without blink)
on a side note: mdm does real sweet dmg, but the chances ull hit with that are preaty small unless its a close range, and a smart warior wont let you get 2 close
mauler vs a walker, depends... FE walker? blast fe walker? i think too, that the walker will win - havnt tested yet though, also - a mag walker will kill the mauler in 1 shot (FE walker)
1.2 walker - mauler will win anyday no metter what weapon the walker has
rocket tanks are not the one you should be compaing with lancers
rocket tank is a mix of anti air (poper archer), fang mauler (close range salvo) and a lancer, or just a long range assult unit with hornets
titan vs ass tank - depends on the pilot... mdm will tear the titan apart IMO
but, the titan can easily dodge in 175 range with its arc, so it depends
a real bad compare was VIR to blink
vir is useless against scions, u can still target and see on radar
VIR is only used to dodge shads, not to ambush, wanna ambush? get red field
Phoenix's answer was pretty much dead on. Just to address the points he missed:
Sentry:
The sentry is *not* a useless unit, far *far* from it. Getting a kiln, forge, dower, then going for sentry with gauss and stasis shield, will give you a ship that runs out of ammo quickly, but can take on a laser scout *or* a chain scout with ease, and can still hit pools well.
Even better, you can skip the forge, and just use a kiln/dower, then use stasis and iongun, which will still kill chainscouts and laserscouts, and can fight well in combat *or* assault mode, so morphing to hit pools is no risk.
Bomber:
Scions definately do not need a bomber. I honestly think you need to play more strat games against good players, and see the awesome power of spirewalking, blink, or mauler rushes, at which point you'll quickly realise scions are powerful enough, thankyouverymuch.
Scouts:
I have no doubt at all that scion scouts are *the* most powerful scouts in the late game. Whether they're using sonic or arc, they are incredible when they have shields. A scout that can benefit from high-tech *cannons*, and has the ability to improve it's damage resistance with a shield. Even without blink, scion scouts are the best in the late game.
As for an arc empty vs a laser empty - that's a hard one, I personally don't use empty scouts much at all with scions, but I have a feeling the laser empty would win.
Mauler/walker:
Assault cannon walkers, like those in FE and 1.3, do indeed beat maulers in a straight up damage contect, firing starting at maximum range. If the mauler rushed around the side of the walker, I'm not completely sure.
Tanks:
SP stabber is a crap weapon for fighting vehicles. You'd have a much better chance with blast/chain/mortar (yes, mortar, not mdm)
SP stab is an awsome weapon as far as weapon dmg, fire rate and ammo cost go, I like sentrys movment and yeah i normally use them with guas cannon but if i remeber right theres not quiet enough ammo to kill a scav pool.
"a real bad compare was VIR to blink
vir is useless against scions, u can still target and see on radar
VIR is only used to dodge shads, not to ambush, wanna ambush? get red field" well you said it... and blink isnt perfect, ive often lost my warrior with under 5 life from blinking into a mountain. if anything it makes you conserve ammo more.
So what you are saying is that its not fair that scions are "so much stronger" endgame than isdf, making a new hi tech building wont help at all. are you saying that the blink special item should cost 50 scrap instead of 30.
archers are good for atacking buildings....... but the mortor takes way to long to hit its target making it usless in helping get ride of enemy units. I found that out playing an mpi with a friend. i only use archers in desperation as there hardly worth the scrap....
I was playing fortress map with a friend. It took 10 secounds for a isdf tank to kill a standard none shielded warrior with sp stab... never had a chance until we put stasis shields on.
-------------------------------------------
If i could texturemap id have both sides with a bomber and a bunch of pilotable aircraft as war tese days is as much in the air as on the ground and id put in a satilite that launched and fired an ion cannon to add the extra zing for isdf. Id also try and make the game more like dark reighn as in hover veichels are only good for flatish land, id add in wheel based buggies for hilly terain and try making 2 manned tanks by ataching one unit to the other so the botom one moved the top unit around and the top hopfully could swivel..... All just a dream though...
with 1.3 how high would be the recommended poly count? still around the 300-600 or more like 1000 - 2000?? not that theres much point in me asking, im never happy with the mapping so i dont put things ingame :(
just trying to get over this stupid migrain at the moment so forvgive any rambling and incoheriant chatter ive posted.
Quotewell you said it... and blink isnt perfect, ive often lost my warrior with under 5 life from blinking into a mountain. if anything it makes you conserve ammo more.
hehe, but how many times would you die without blink?
x50 more times then without blink
QuoteSo what you are saying is that its not fair that scions are "so much stronger" endgame than isdf, making a new hi tech building wont help at all
yes
QuoteI was playing fortress map with a friend. It took 10 secounds for a isdf tank to kill a standard none shielded warrior with sp stab... never had a chance until we put stasis shields on.
why would u build a non shielded warior?
QuoteSo what you are saying is that its not fair that scions are "so much stronger" endgame than isdf, making a new hi tech building wont help at all
[/size]
Thats taken out of context. This is how i would think about solving the problem of Blink being so powerful.
Replace the 'current' blink with Arc Mine (very scion).
Make blink harder to get. I.e., make it harder to reach up the tech tree.
As in , make a new scion building whos only purpose is to let the armour drop off blink.
And! To make sure that people do not still have the abilty to arm ships with blink if this structure goes down, rig it so that the armour can drop off 'blink' crates for 40 scrap, but the forge cannot 'pre build' units with blink.
This would make scions have a fairer weapon when the enemy has its base fully made. It would give the scion commander the stratigical choice of either rushing-to-blink, or concentrating on taking them out 'now' with maulers or whatever else he has at his disposial.
It would mean Scions would *still have blink*. But it would much harder to reach and harder to actually get onto the ships..
And! to make the building that allows them to drop of 40 scrap crates, they need FOUR pools, minimum.
Edit: Or one could make it so instead of having to make another building. One could say it costs 105 scrap to upgrade the Stronghold (scion armoury). and this new stronghold can give blink.
it doesnt metter... just gives the isdf more time to fight back IMO, once sicons will get that blink they won (almost) the game
I honestly think if blink was crate-only with a huge price (I'd say about 80 scrap per crate), it would be fine. Maybe make it require a stronghold and an overseer array...
After all, if an ISDF team *really* concenrates they can kill a blink warrior, they just lose 2-3 tanks doing so. If the blink warrior is worth 145 scrap, then this would be fine IMO.
I think that would be a good solution, Making it 'crate only' based is v importaint IMO. Making that crate cost 80 would also be nice.
And i am suprized it is not already up at the top of the tech tree. In hind sight perhaps my suggestion was a little OTT.
Then again, what hope do 3 isdf players have to take down 3 blink-equiped warriors.
with your suggestion its 80 scrap for each warrior to get blink.
What can the ISDF spend 240 scrap on that would be equal to the advantage that the scion warriors now have blink?
i realy think not, once the 1st blink warior out the isdf team just 'give-up', they fight till the end - ya
but its just "oh great, here comes the blink warior"
as i said in my last post... it will just give the isdf more time to kill the scion base before they are doomed
and scion scouts are still darn good (with arc / sonic)
just get your whole team in full scouts and ull get the scrap for blink with NP at all...
Not nessearily. A good team will say '' crap! they have blink! '' and their top-tech (by now) sabres will go in strict packs of 3, perhaps with AI Missile scout escorts. Thats how i would do it. the 1.3 AI missile scouts are quite good, and they would provide the hitting power /anti absorbtion that would be enough to make the isdf stand a chance.
im talking about thinking, not realy saying =)
hehe ai missile scout? the cmdr might get in missile scout, dont think AI is any good.. one run of blinking warior = bye bye msl scout, and the AI is preaty dumb :lol:
This is 1.3 , AI missile scouts are fairly good. They fire lots of missiles, they would be*escorting* the blast tanks.
so the scions would probably be facing 2 humans and a minimum of 2 AI shadower missile scouts.
rainbow it with a scout / warior
besides, it costs quite alot of scrap
I'd just "hyperspace" blink...
Think "Asteroids" and you'll know what I mean.
:)
For you young'uns that don't remember Asteroids I'll explain. :D "Hyperspace" made you blink out of one spot and a short time later appear somewhere else (not always a safe place). Thing was, there was always a chance of blowing up on reentry...
So, give BZ2's "Blink" the same setup. Say, maybe, a 10% chance of losing your ship each time you use it.
Exciting, NO? LoL...
-Av-
(I think MAG should be the same way, btw...)
:lol:
Quotei realy think not, once the 1st blink warior out the isdf team just 'give-up', they fight till the end - ya
but its just "oh great, here comes the blink warior"
I personally snipe like hell. Last time I was in a game where blink was allowed and the scions managed to tech up there, I sniped 2 blinking warriors, hoping to eventually get one for each teammember.
If blink increased the cost of a warrior by 80 scrap, and required 2 pools to get it, it would have proven much more difficult for those players...
With some more thought... 80 scrap isn't much more than a spire, and is still reachable with 2 pools. I'd rather see blink crates at 100 scrap, so that building blink is a big problem.
In my opinion, blink gives scions a huge advantage over ISDF. (that is if you know how to use it) But, if you think about it, the people at Pandemic who made this game made it so that the odds for Scion and ISDF would some how be even. We have made FE and the patches and have tampered with a couple things but the concept is still the same. ISDF VETS vs Scion VETS = a pretty even fight. Sure, in the beginning ISDF might win pool fights but scion will eventually catch up. Then comes the issue of Blink. Scion pilots who know how to use blink will prob. wipe out a good amount of ISDF ships before actually getting destroyed themselves. ISDF can retalliate in some ways but it is difficult. That is why i think that IT IS A GOOD IDEA to raise the scrap cost of Blink. (I doubt this will ever happen though)IMO, it would make odds somewhat more balanced.
QuoteISDF VETS vs Scion VETS = a pretty even fight.
Without blink, this is certainly the case. arc/gauss is better than blast/chain. maulers are the best game winner of all the units, bombers always fail to hit a base against good players.
WITH blink the opening fights belong to the ISDF, the early-mid game is even, and the late-mid and late-game are almost gauranteed wins for scions. Scions should have the same advantage in the late game as ISDF have at the start, but blink prevents that.
how many ships did your team lose before u sniped the wariors DF?
anyways, once arc hits the field scions can keep pools with np
arc scouts with absro are just killers, fast agile and strong
it will be np to keep 3 pools till blink comes... and when blink comes - doesnt metter anymore how much it 'costed' u still got it
I disagree here. Arc scouts with abso are powerful, yes, but they're slightly inferior to blast/chain sabres, and fall horribly to missile scouts. Ergo, they can be countered.
I dare say if blink was crate-only and super-expensive, ISDF and SCIONS would be a fair matchup. As you know, I just ban it in it's current form.
I do not agree that Blink needs to be changed or against any change it may receive but I figured I may as well put in my two cents, instead of making Blink crate only why not make it two use only so that it can only be used twice before a new Blink crate is needed to be able to Blink again, while the actual process of Blinking wouldn't have an ammo cost.(afterthought, of course this would probably let you Blink to an infinitely distant point and back again)
Becuase the problem with blink is not getting around the map. Thats cool and fun. The problem is that you can escape combat reguardless of the out come.
Now a %chance of blowing up is interesting, but doesnt really fit in with the scionic way of thinking. They like their technology to work perfectly.
Your suggestion is interesting, but it has no effect on the combat side of the situation, it just stops people from using it to go around the map. Which is the opposite of what we want.
The simplest solution so far is to replace the current 'blink' with bolt mine.
And then create a top-tech-tree 'blink crate'. Perhaps with its own special affects :P. Make it cost a minimum of 85 (3 pools) and then make sure that one cannot pre-configure it with-in the recycler panal or the factory panal. Only buy having it manually dropped off and picked up is an option.
ive seen scions starting to own the field with quill absro scouts with NP
Without blink those drones would be chewed up by missile scouts like the tiny things they are.
not realy... i can dodge shads with empty scout, scion / isdf
1.3 AI missile shad scouts with Mits mine.
Yes, i can dodge them to , but unless you have something like sonic or arc then i think the chances are you will cancel eachother out.
im talking about arc...
and i dont think the mits is as strong as the mits in FE, or is it?
the mits in 1.2 vs scouts is just useless it seems
how about we do a fight? ill get absro arc scout - u get msl scout and we'll see?
Quoteive seen scions starting to own the field with quill absro scouts with NP
You said quill, and thats what i was refering to.
I also mentioned how a sonic or arc scout with absorbtion is going to win because it has full tech *cannons*.
with quill u own the pools, with pools u get arc and i think almost any vet will take msl scout with quill absro scout with np as well :P
Missile scouts own pools, you just have to know how to use them.
only if the other team doesnt do anything :D
Hense my point. Quill /sheild scouts cancle out shadower/ mits scouts
quill / shield scout will own msl scouts imo... espicley in teams...
Now you made a MAJOR mistake there PF... In a 1v1 the scion scout will certainly beat a missile scout, but in a team battle, say... 3 scion scouts with arc against 2 blast sabres and a missile scout - the isdf will usually win.
The scion scouts get peppered with shadower, which they are easily dodging, while they're out of range of the blast cannons. The scion scouts, therefor, close a little distance to hit with their arc cannons, and the blasts begin to open fire. Blast still does significant damage to absorbtion shields, 4 blasts will kill an abso scout... The scion scouts now have the choice between dodging in one direction to avoid shadowers, or wiggling around to make it hard to hit them with blast. They're better off wiggling on the spot, and thus take full damage from the missile scouts... 5 Missscout shots will kill them. A lot of blast cannons are still hitting them while this goes on. In short, the shadower missile scout forces the scion scouts to move predictably in one direction, or die in <5 seconds. Since their small size and fast speed are their biggest advantages (being hard to hit), a single missile scouts effectively removes their biggest advantage, and turns them into low-health, easy to hit, cannon holders.
Before long, the scion scouts disengage after realising that the ISDF just have too much health in this fight, and run. They they remember that the shadowers will travel over 800m to get them, and they promptly die.
u forgetting 1 big factor.... warp... chances to hit with blast is preaty low against scouts... more to add that the scouts can rainbow and what? 5 shots will kill a msl scout? 1 hover run u can hit 3 times... then u can 'chase' the msl scout with np while maybe 2 tanks will hit you...
most likely they wont be in team of 4...
sure, head to head isdf will win, thats where brains and thinking comes in
Quoteu forgetting 1 big factor.... warp... chances to hit with blast is preaty low against scouts... more to add that the scouts can rainbow
Doesn't make sense. I'm not forgetting warp at all - if the shadowers are coming in, the scouts have to dodge in a single direction, in which case they *will* get hit by every blast a good player sends their way. If they wobble on the spot the shadowers are great anti-warp weapons, since they only use ammo if they've locked on successfully, in which case hey'll cut right through warp, because they track their opponent in the network world, rather than the graphics world.
As for arc killing - shadowers are just about the most effective Anti-air weapon in the game, closely followed by blast. I'm not forgetting it at ALL. Scion scouts are crap at arcing due to their slow pitch speed, and the ISDF team all have powerful anti-air weaponry.
As for the notion that a scion scouts can chase a missile scout - rubbsih. First of all, the missile scout is 200m away from the scion scouts, and if it has a good pilot, it will stay that distance. Second, the missile scout is just as fast as the scion scout.. once again that slow pitch speed makes the scion scout sluggish.
Naa, I've not forgotten anything... If you're using scion scouts against me, I can win all the fights just by mixing a single missile scout in with my squad.
shads, anti-air? u gotta be jk... when i hover the most deadly thing will be laser scout, which absro disabled, i *never* get hit by shads in the air, unless im going in 1 direction or staying above a certien point...
what you dont do with rainbow, the chances to getting hit by shads while rainbowing is almost zero chance to hit
u can get a lock, doesnt mean you'll hit
and you dodge few shads, then go to other side... ull warp like ***
besides, what happend to the scion team? only 1 scout vs army of isdf?
more to add, if ur smart u wont stay on ground... ull run the side by a hill and start doing weird circles in air making almost ever shad to miss and hard for blast tanks to hit, and you got 175 range , so ull most likely will be able to hit everything...
scout speed is WAY better then msl scout, unless the msl scout stays in base its dead... why do you think msl scouts arent being used vs isdf?
they do nice dmg, but they die so quicky... because there is no other weapon that does as nice dmg as shads to scion scouts people are using msl scouts, not vs scouts though, mostly vs wariors
the msl scout can be 200m away, but scion scout going 25 m closer can hit... and its not 2 hard to get 25m closer to msl scout - comparing the speeds espicely if the msl scout going backwards to still be able to shoot
Quotebesides, what happend to the scion team? only 1 scout vs army of isdf?
Pay attention to my posts before knocking them, please. Go and re-read.
SCOUT AGILITY:
Re: All your talk of rainbowing and spinning in circles in the air. I can't *believe* you're saying this PF... I know why you are though... you play about 95% as isdf, and are obviously assuming scion scouts have the airborne agility of ISDF scouts. Newsflash - they don't.
SHADOWERS FOR ANTI-AIR:
Yes, you can dodge shadowers in the air - but as I said in my post, you have to move in one direction unless you're in a mortar bike or ISDF scout. Moving in one direction lets the tanks hit you with blast. Furthermore, yes, I regard shadowers as great anti-air. The reason for this is that shadowers will travel 800m until they hit something. When there's no ground for them to hit, they keep doing large circles until they hit you. Effectively, being airborne gives shadowers 2-3 chances to hit you, rather than the normal 1.
ARC CANNONS VS BLAST:
Yes, you are hitting them for 212 damage/second and they're only hitting you for 150 damage/second... but since the sabres have over 3 times as much health as scion scouts, the only way scions can win is by wobbling around a lot, whether in the air or on the ground.... Which gets you hit by shadowers.
LASER SCOUT IS THE THING YOU FEAR WHILE ARCING:
Saying you fear laser the most while flying is completely daft too. What about blast? Why don't you fear that? Are you used to playing against players that are so crap they run out of ammo before getting 4 hits on your airborne, shadower dodging scout?
BOTTOM LINE:
I don't buy it one bit. Play against a good team who know their strategy, and you'll find tanks+shadower have the odds in their favour when fighting a team of scion scouts. I'm not saying it's easy for the isdf, it certainly isn't, but the odds are *just* in their favour.
Now if the SCION commander mixes his units a little, then the dogfights are perfectly fair.
heh, more like 80% of my games are isdf, and i love scion scouts agilty... and i think fly better in scions scouts rather then isdf scouts
shads: they just hit the ground once ur done rainbowing making none hits exept maybe 1 if launched right exactly when the scout is busy flipping over on groundtouch
we're talking about 1.3 - so scouts cant just hover forever... incase of hover forever the shads will hit, but vets wont hover forever with shads on their ass
ARC vs BLAST:
Yes, you are hitting them for 212 damage/second and they're only hitting you for 150 damage/second... but since the sabres have over 3 times as much health as scion scouts, the only way scions can win is by wobbling around a lot, whether in the air or on the ground.... Which gets you hit by shads
thats on the paper....
in air u wont get hit by shads, and blast will miss quite alot, either because some cant shoot in air that well, or because of warping
laser scouts:
this accutly not about being scions..
when i hover with my chain scout the thing i fear most is a laser scout 50m near me starting to shoot me, not many people do that, but once i get myself laser i can promise you my base is well defended vs hovers, and tanks, its much harder to look up + some even shad from 200m in the air... (i think its lame but w/e..)in that case - blast cant reach them while with laser i catch up to them in no time
I think we should test this... name an evening where we can do some tests, perhaps in a DM map.... I'll fire shadowers, and I want to see how you dodge them in mid-air without flying in a predictable manner.
Don't worry, I'm not out to prove anything, I'm being open-minded here.
*gets pop-corn out*
ooo! i would love to see this.
1.3?
If you wish. I assumed you'd have more success with airborne stunts in 1.2.
do it in 1.2 FE first, and then pb 1.3?
1.2 will be preaty easy, espicely since i can 'play' in air
ill have to 'unrust' for 1.3 though... but sure =)
Personally I find enemies in the air easier to shadower than those
on the ground. Enemies going by walls are the hardest, mostly
the missile hits the wall.
Scion human-scouts are the hardest thing in the game for me to hit with blast. This has a lot to do with my setup,
56k modem connection, plus the horribleness of not being able to predict
AT ALL the real position of small moving units in 1.3 public1. Tested.
In 1.2 the cmdr usually doesn't pass out msl scouts unless requested.
I find them absolutely vital in ISDF v Scion games, they lock on so well
against scouts and warriors, and backed up by Sabres they can swing
a fight in ISDF favour many times.
Anti-air : in 1.2 a laser scout is my weapon of choice in a base like
HiLo with lots of high walls to get up there quickly. Without the fast
launch of high walls I'd say shads and blast are best anti-air
from the ground.
From the many perspectives of Bz2, both Foxy and Booby are
perfectly correct.
I don't see them agreeing about that, but that's the joy of it.
i think we both agree we both knows tons about the game and its tactics
but i think the more opnions the better...
the more opnions --> more stratgries...
i accutly prefer my laser scout in quarry-like map.. i go stright from the ground up - i dont use walls... i acccutly hate the walls in hilo with my laser scout =P they push me back down if im going stright from the ground....
Quote from: DarkFoxScion scouts are crap at arcing due to their slow pitch speed.
Why is the pitch speed so low?
It's the speed at which your nose can move up or down (NOT your crosshair, your ship). Funnily enough, the value for the ISDF scout nose moving down is slower than the value for the scion scout, but the ISDF scout's nose-up value is twice as high as the drones.
This leads me to believe that perhaps the 'nose down' speed in the ODF works for something else, or is just ignored completely, because in the game the ISDF scout moves it's nose up *or* down about twice as quickly as the scion scout's.
Get in a game and try taking off with an ISDF scout on flat ground without using strafe... easy.
Now try it in a scion scout without using your strafe thrusters... Very very difficult.
hmmm
QuoteGet in a game and try taking off with an ISDF scout on flat ground without using strafe... easy.
Now try it in a scion scout without using your strafe thrusters... Very very difficult.
why should i do it without strafe? i think it'll be about the same if you do it right with strafe... im not saying they are the same - hell no.... but once you know to control both they will be about the same, controloed difrent - no doubt but once u get the hang of scions should be np (i think most start with isdf 1st... and not scions... and seems like isdf *is* easier -
at start)
If you know much about me, you'll know I detest ISDF, and my favourite of the 3 races is scions by a long way.
That being said, since just about everyone picks ISDF most of the time, I've got plenty of experience with both, nearly 50-50.
Quotewhy should i do it without strafe? i think it'll be about the same if you do it right with strafe...
From the ISDF scout odf:
velocStrafe = 20.0 // [20]
rollStrafe = 0.1 // rolls while strafing [1.7]
omegaTurn = 3.5 // turning while moving speed [3.45]
alphaSteer = 5.5 // how fast it responds to steering [3.]
rollSteer = 0.1 // rolls while steering [.35]
From the SCION scout odf:
velocStrafe = 15.0 // [20]
rollStrafe = 0.085 //rolls while strafing [.2]
omegaTurn = 3.0 //turning while moving speed [4.5]
alphaSteer = 4.0 //how fast it speeds up and slows down to steering [3.9]
rollSteer = 0.07 //rolls while steering [.25]
I think you'll find the scion scout has a slower strafe as well as a slower pitch speed. It *would* have an advantage from being faster at moving forward, but since everybody uses nose-down and strafe to move faster, the ISDF scout ends up beating it in every agility category.
hmm let me go check :s
after giving the scion scout an agility test this is what i found out :P
THEY SUCK!! lol jk
anyways, strafe side to side wasnt 2 much noticed, the pitch! oh my, i never thought its that worse... but anyways - i managed to hover from solid ground, u have to use more forward thrusters though, unlike the isdf scout
once in air they are about the same
i think though, that scions benefit from air catching... (if ur higher then some1 and wanna go down, some1 is beside you and you turn to look at him and go forward towards him) but i couldnt realy test that...
so im just assuming
forward, with a lil bit of hills and bumps id say they are about the same, totaly solid ground (which u cant realy find) isdf are faster
Quoteheh, more like 80% of my games are isdf, and i love scion scouts agilty... and i think fly better in scions scouts rather then isdf scouts
i take that back.. i only played with scion scotus in strats, mostly quarry - with lots of hills and i was usualy air, and as i said while testing allover - they are about the same in air...
id say their size metters a bit too, they are smaller which is another small advantge...
bottomline:
isdf scouts are better, but once ur already air doesnt metter that much
Oh, hell no, Scion scouts are far better when they get shields, I agree with that one. I was just saying that scion scouts are not manourverable enough to dodge shadowers in mid-air without moving predictably. In a scion scout you just *can't* dodge shadowers and blast at the same time, which is the reason blast tanks + 1 missile scout is a good counter against a team of shielded scion scouts.
From the Scion scout,
pitchPitch = 0.12
pitchThrust = 0.12
From the ISDF scout,
pitchPitch = 0.25
pitchThrust = 0.25
Okay the pitchPitch values are how fast you can move the nose of your ship up and down with the mouse(or whatever you use), the pitchThrust values are how fast your nose jerks up or down when you try to move forward or backward. As you can see the Scion scout values are less than half the amount of the ISDF values which is why they can't fight in the air as well as ISDF scouts can.
But that isn't what I asked you 8), I asked you WHY the Scion scout values are lower than the ISDF values . :mrgreen:
QuoteOh, hell no, Scion scouts are far better ......
you got me wrong... i was talking by terms of agility only =)
hmm thats odd @ apc, i seem to have no problem flying with a scion scout, probably as good as i would fly a isdf scout
Well if you want to so called even up the scion and isdf endgame units then wouldnt you have to even up the begining of the game, before scions can get shields?
also scions dont have any weapon like mag cannon. a rckt tank can also hit a warrior thats blinked out of rang.
Lets bring things down a level, in mpis and single player blink is good. in team stratagy it can be a bit of a bitch not being able to kill your apponent. by the way what would you kill a rckt tank with other than a titan without a blink warrior. 1 hit of salvo rckt and a mauler is history and a salvo rckt has semi desint rang.
Pandemic probably spent the time balancing the game..... if you want to adjust the game for team stratagy cool but leave the rest of it alone, blink is their for a reson... if you still hate blink drive a rckt tnk, it costs 65-75 scrap :) .
EndarkenD - the rocket tank's shadower missiles fire only 800m before they dissapear. A warrior can blink much further than that in an instant with ease. Furthermore, all that is required to dodge a shadower is a quick blink 'through' it, whereupon it will arc round and likely dissapear before catching up with you.
Finally, a warrior that blinks up-close to your rocket tank can dance around you, making it alsmost impossible to lock the missiles on, all the while hitting you with arc/gauss, quill/gauss, assault EMP/gauss, or any other powerful combination of scion weapons. Good luck beating it with your salvo rockets, which don't do that much damage against absorbtion shields.
The early game is fine for scions. They have trouble in the opening dogfights, but quill/defl scouts, emp/plasma/defl warriors, or even iongun/stasis sentries are all easy to reach in the tech-tree (easier than chains), and can beat a chainscout, plus attack pools well. They also have gunspires to prevent hovering. They're perfectly balanced until they get blink.
I honestly believe BZ2 was balanced without weapon-switching in mind, and without knowing about effects such as the speed boost from firing EMP at the floor.
I also think no weight was given to considering the effect on Player confidence that weapons that simulate WARP have...
Pity the poor newbie that jumps into a game against Scions where the opposing team is blinking around like mad. He'll be cursing the server as laggy without realizing it's a weapon.
There should have been some sort of cool effect during blinking just as there is during morphing... maybe a blur/shimmer like the Shadow Forces in B5 had...
:)
-Av-
more to add about rocket tanks vs wariors... if u blink under the rocket tank it will lose control and almost roll over - making it impossiable to aim while ur being pushed away (who knows, maybe ull fall in waters / to enemy base)
out of curiosity...the blink is not correctly shown on the graphics world right? No more 'phasing' of the ships hull though the path of the blink.
If that is corrected, does it apply to FE portals in mulitplayer as well?
Jwk I think I remember reading that was fixed for the FE portals too. You'll have to check the change log to confirm this.