The Alchemist on 2/2/2012 at 09:03

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RESURRECTION

I am playing this again... I forgot how delightful it was. If any of you would like to have a match, have at me!

Also 2v2 is almost ready, and the iPad version as well.

The Alchemist on 10/2/2012 at 05:26

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Ive surmised in recent games an inherit flaw in the mechanics, but alas its also already been fixed. Not sure when the patch will be out but let me explain:

The game favors camping. This can, with some clever moves, be overcome somewhat, but the bottom line is if you're on the 5th or so round of an Extermination game and your enemy is one man down, the easiest way to win is to just sit it out, conditional to the units available and your positions. But typically, not moving too much is the best way to go. A stationary unit, especially one behind cover, needs to be "tricked" in order to be bested. If you watch my last game with henke you will see what I mean. I made a mistake early on that got 1 of my guys killed. From that point on, all henke had to do was sit (even if he shuffled a bit) in his well covered position to win the game. I had options, obviously, as in the last round I took out one of his men by using a diversion tactic. However, even these tactics can be avoided with the proper enemy focus.

You can argue that I could have used a combination of that diversion tactic and a rush from my SG to try and even the playing field, or maybe just take that one guy out to force us at a draw. However, it still makes the game rather stale, and often times I find myself in situations where I know the best move is no move at all, and that bothers me. Ergo in this match, being familiar with henkes play style and the staticness of the map at hand along with the units available to us, I pretty much knew where it was going. I could have NOT rushed with the shotty and worked and those sketchy diversion moves and come out on a draw, but I was frustrated with havng to deal with this whole thing. I dont blame henke, because I do it too, but it just illustrates a prime problem with the game.

However, this has been solved. First of all, they have added multikills. Meaning, two units in identical advantage shooting at eachother is no longer a coin toss. They can both die as a result of the ensuing firefight. The best addition, however, is "focus aim" while moving. Let me illustrate:

The enemy has a gunner behind some half cover aiming at an area that covers three or four openings. Unless you use some tricky action engagement (such as a decoy running past a door to get the enemies aim on him, allowing for another unit to come around a corner and take the enemy out) you dont have much you can do without more dynamic units such as RL and GL. A good fix for this would be half engagements, meaning, allowing you to tell a unit to come out, take a few shots, and then run back, instead of committing to the engagement. This would make these decoys much more effective, however its still a bit of a crap shoot. Focus aim solves this as such: If the enemy solder is aiming at a wide area, he has to account for an enemy coming out of any of those corridors, which in reality means you still have to match up the shot. You have to id your target, adjust aim, and fire. The mechanics, as is, still preference the still unit, even though he might have to adjust his aim X amount, he does this instantly almost, and the attacking (charging) unit has no benefit. However, focus aim allows you to tell your attacking unit where to focus his aim, adding to an engagement a factor of time for lining up a shot. So if you're aiming out to an open area, covering a lot of ground, and you are not sure where the enemy is coming out of, when the enemy does appear at one of these corners, you have X time to line up your shot. However, if the charging unit knows the spot you are sitting at, when he rounds the corner, hes already aiming in that direction. He may be mobile, but he doesnt require nearly as much (or any) time to line up the shot, where as the stationary unit has to line up his shot from his default aiming face. Of course, you can tell the defensive stationary unit where to focus fire too, so if you want to cover an X area but KNOW that a charge is coming from door B, you can focus aim there, giving you an advantage on anyone coming out of door B, and even if the charging unit from door B is focused aim on your location as well, NOW the stationary vs charging dynamic should have effect. However, if your stationary unit is focused on door B, but the unit that actually charges comes out of door C, and has focus aim on your location due to presence of fire or whatever form of intel (or a good guess, for that matter) then when he rounds that corner, he has you lined up, and despite him moving, the stationary unit has to realign his shot from focal point door B to door C, at which point the unit charging from C has already opened fire. This completely changes the dynamic of the game, and fixes one of its most annoying inherit loopholes.

Camping will still be effective, but campers will have to re-position often, and diversion charges/attacks etc will become all that much more effective. This plus a double kill engagement means the game will become much more strategic and less exploitable.


So no more camping for you henke. :P


(AND FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, WHY HAVENT THEY ADDED A BETTER MESSAGING SYSTEM? This game CALLS for an email system like Eve Online, the IRC chan is a nice touch but people should also be able to make their own chat rooms in game so that friends can sit and talk shit and challenge each other in game. Also, you still cant seem to exit from individual conversations from IRC once they start.) :|

It's somewhat frustrating because this game has so much potential. Actually, just saying that feels derogatory because the game, as is, is very good. However, I think tiny details like the messaging system, a chatroom system, and even cooler yet would be like a system controlled tourney set up by people singing up (public or private) and having matches that run the course of the tourney with a graphical flow chat or the progression... but now I'm asking for a lot. How about a working messaging system? I want to email my friends in game and if they alt tabbed from the game I still want to be ble to send messages to them that they can read when they come back into that match.

The Alchemist on 10/2/2012 at 06:33

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Oh man I didnt mean to sound like I was complaining about you specifically! I'm sorry, I was just illustrating the issue with stationary vs moving units and the proposed fix...

gunsmoke on 10/2/2012 at 22:17

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I just installed this on the laptop. Trying to wrap my head around it and get decent enough to play online.

Jeshibu on 13/2/2012 at 18:15

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I've been getting into this again to prepare a bit for the RPS event. The hardest thing is to stop second-guessing myself 32875 per turn.

There's a few open games from right before our collective lull that we could finish. From memory, I've got unfinished games with Ziaeon, Bakerman, and dethtoll. Maybe more.

Also, (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s97w6ruTSQE) here's a match I'm surprised my rocket launcher lived through.