Talk:Combat Plugin

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This page is to discuss the plugin as we plan and code it. Irish, this is where we can decide what we want to do.

--Squeak 02:06, 16 Jan 2006 (EST)

[edit] Effects on Gameplay

I've been thinking about how it will effect gameplay in the more indirect ways. I would like to collect enough thoughts so we can know how the game will play before we implement the plugin.

I am typing this out so my train of thought can be seen. If you don't care, skip ahead to the bullet points.

Since individual levels will be gained slower, but things that combine individual and team levels to get may go faster. Currently I think we should keep the restrictions like they are, only allow shotguns if the team has chosen to get weapons 1, ect. My current plan for the divide up is like this

Personal: Marines: welder, mines, grenades, shotgun, hmg, gl, jetpack, heavy armor, scan, catpacks. Aliens: All the chamber upgrades, all life forms.

Team: Marines: Weapon upgrades 1-3, armor upgrades 1-3, resupply, motion tracking Aliens: 2nd hive abilities, 3rd hive abilities, unlock movement, unlock defence, unlock sensory

Since the plan includes individual levels coming more slowly we have to consider how well each team will be able to respond to what the other team gets in terms of power for the same number of points.

Getting a jetpack or heavy, and a shotgun will take only three individual levels, and 3 team levels, and will include armor 2 and weapons 1, but no resupply. The same price for a 2nd hive ability fade and one unlocked chamber (which should include that chambers ability originating from the hive) but no upgrades.

Now this sounds to me like it might be in the marines favor, but it can be hard to say. You have to keep in mind, these marines will not have resupply and level 3 shotguns. A skulk with 3 personal levels could have leap, and focus or carapace. Jetpackers won't be getting extra health mid flight until they get resupply, and with only armor 2 the amount of damage they can take if not welded or going back to the armory will be 240.

So lets try to imagine how this might realistically play out if the marines went straight for shotguns and heavies/jetpacks. (heavies probably being the bigger threat at this point). It's a 6v6 game, the marines get weapons 1 as their first upgrade, and before very long the top 2-3 marines have shotguns. If aliens we getting less kills than the marines (I'll branch off the other way in a moment), they would be able to choose second, and lets say they picked dc so they could get carapace to combat the shotguns. So right now none of the aliens have celerity, and only the top 2-3 of them have carapace. The hive regens itself and close aliens a little bit faster. All marines have weapons 1, and the top 2/3 have shotguns.

The game goes on further, if the marines are still doing better they will have thier choice first. They will chose armor 1, and by this point most of the team that wanted a shotgun should have one (4-6 of them) the ones at the top are saving thier levels for jetpacks. The aliens catch up and decide to get movement. By now most of the aliens that wanted carapace will have gotten it, some may have saved for lerk. The top ones will be able to either lerk or get celerity or silence in addition to thier carapace.

So right now the battle is between marines that have armor 1, weapons 1, and shotguns for the most part (some probably got welders and mines) one of the top ones may have gotten an hmg or gl. They will be against aliens who have only carapace until the aliens catch up and they face maybe one of the top ones went vanilla lerk (probably gassing them, and trying to keep a distance, can get an adren refill at the hive) and a few skulks with carapace. After the aliens catch up, they are facing a vanilla lerk and 1-2 skulks with celerity and carapace, and most the rest having carapace. Any gorges that need to heal the hive get extra adren (movement) and the regens a bit faster (defence) This still looks fairly balanced to me.

Lets say the marines continue to pull ahead. They get armor 2. The top 2-3 get jetpacks and heavies (probably mostly heavys at this point, especially if countering the lerk) they have either shotguns or hmgs/gls. One might have a welder and some mines. The marine levels starting at 3-4 at the top, and going down to, i'm going to say if they have been there the whole game they are bound to have gotten at least one level by this point.

At this point the lerk will probably have either gotten an upgrade or become a fade. When the aliens catch up, they start saving for the 2nd hive ability. With the personal levels of the aliens starting at 3-4 for the top, there probably won't be more than one fade, the top player might be a fade with one upgrade, or a lerk with two (or a silence celerity cara regen skulk) If the heavies stay together they might be hard to take down, but it's unlikely many of them will have welders, and none will have resupply.

By now it gets hard to predict how the game will go, there are too many variables and of course it has a great deal to do with the skill involved. Lets look and see what would happen if the aliens had to make thier choices first, the marines going for the same strategy.

Aliens make thier first choice to be movement. The better half get celerity or silence, and a short while later the marines get weapons 1 and shotguns.

Aliens get defence second (have to cover the bases incase the marines went up to weapons 2 or 3) the top ones have cara and a movement upgrade, there may be one lerk at this point. The marines get armor 1. An hmg or gl may appear. Mines and welders may be held by some people.

Aliens save for 2nd hive abilities, a fade or two, and a lerk or two may be in play, fades most likely having an upgrade, and lerks having 1-2. Marines get armor 2, the top couple can get jetpacks or heavies. The battle rages on.

Ok now I realize a number of things about this scenario are highly idealistic. But I'm trying to learn more about how the game functions. First of all, we can see that having the option of responding to the enemies choice can be valuable. This means the team that falls behind gets a small advantage in the ability to chose a response. Many games will probably be close enough that each team will be unable to respond to the other teams matching level. (if marines get shotguns first, aliens will probably have already chosen something, be it defence or not, and will have to respond to shotguns with thier next level) Now a smarter move for marines might be to get armor 1 first, because then with only one team level they can choose between getting weapons, getting jp/ha, and getting resupply.

I think aliens have decent choices from every chamber for a first pick. Sensory may give the most powerful secondary benefit, in giving sof and cloaking to aliens in range, but it doesn't really respond to anything the marines might put out, and most higher life forms look for movement upgrades first. (higher life forms tend to come later in the game, so sensory first would still work)

So, to sum it up in some nifty little bullet points, as sort of a "what was learned" fasion:

• The votes for team levels should last for a specific duration, and even if the votes are all in place should go until the end of the duration.

• A small amount of balancing between the teams occurs when one team gets far enough ahead for the other team to respond with thier choice.

• Marines can potentially get vanilla heavies and jetpacks faster than aliens can get vanilla fades and onos.

• The scan upgrade for marines becomes more valuable, as one aliens get sensory, many aliens near and in the hive room will be cloaked.

• Both team levels and personal levels become more valuable in the seperation, and need to be chosen wisely.

• Motion tracking and resupply are more costly upgrades, and aliens will know once one marine has it they all have it.

• Armories will be more valuable. Aliens will have better reason for attacking it, and marines for defending it. (until resupply is obtained.)

• Aliens may require faster personal experience than marines to keep balance. (read, less of a reduction when plugin implemented) This would be counterbalanced by slower alien team levels. Aliens may inately gain less team experience by the nature of close range attacks, but further reduction and balancing may be required. More information neccessary.

• Consider whether 2nd hive abilities should cost 1 or 2 points.

Viable strategies: Marines:

• Heavy rush.

Armor 1 and 2 obtained as soon as possible, heavies and some welders obtained as early as possible. Aliens may be unable to counter with life forms higher than lerks for a while.

• Weapons rush

Shotguns obtained early, further push to get level 3 weapons and kill a cara skulk in 1 shot if able, or armor and resup if needed.

• early mt and resup don't really count as a strategy, but may be just as plausable as any other upgrade.

Aliens:

• SC first

Aliens get the benefits of cloaking and sof for the area around the hive, most of the team switches to camping. Aliens are able to enjoy some of the benefits of sensory upgrades while saving thier personal points things that cost more than one point like life forms and focus.

• Abilities first

If the first ability costs two points, this will be a be a heavy investment for first choice (more potential reason to keep it at 1) Leap, bile, umbra, meta are available early. Life forms will be the only available place to spend points, thus most aliens will change thier life form as soon as possible. If the first ability takes 1 point it's a more viable strategy, and moving onto final abilities before unlocking a chamber may be possible (xeno, web, primal, acid rocket, and charge available to otherwise vanilla aliens)

• mc and dc are both viable first choices, but do not note a distinct "strategy" aside from saying something like "hey lets all get cara" Balance will have to be found between upgrades and life forms.

-Irish Pirate, 1/16/06

[edit] Marine Upgrades (non-team)

I was thinking about how the Aliens get to re choose their life form after they die, and thought it unfair for the marines to pick a static load out. What I suggest is to have the marines choices "reset" when they die, giving them the SG/HMG/GL/JP/HA options to choose from. Other choices, like welders or mines would be static choices.

Here is how I would classify each teams upgrades:

Marines

• Individual:

Shot Guns, Heavy Weapons, JP/HA, Cat Packs, mines, HG, welders

• Team:

Upgraded Armory (unlocks heavy weapons), Upgraded Protolab (unlocks JP/HA), MT, Med Packs, Armor 1,2,3 Weapons 1,2,3 (maybe integrate them together, so you pick lvl 1 of both for 1 pt).

Aliens

• Individual:

Life forms, chamber abilities

• Team:

Hive unlock, chamber unlock.

As you can see, the aliens need less teamwork to figure out what upgrades to get, while the marines require more teamwork to unlock upgrades.

When we start programming the plugin, we should start out with the aliens, since they seem the easiest and most straight forward to modify.

Irish Pirate's Response: Something like these team choices might be a way to counter the slower nature of the aliens team xp, and the potential need for individual xp (they won't have to counter as much early on, I mean it would be two points to get armory and proto, and they wouldn't have armor2). I'm just concerned that it might be getting too complicated. I would say one of the best arguments people have put forth about this mod is that they want it simple.

Also, just as with aliens where they have been given a benefit for having to spend team points on something that wasn't there originally (chamber effects) I would want to give marines something if we did that. Making the armory on the map advanced would increase it's armor, and since it would be more important that might be useful, but I wouldn't then take away the ability to get heavy weapons, so I don't know if it would feel right.

The other downside is it would be more work. Since you normally can't get a shotgun until you get weapons 1, I think it would work more conveniently for us, we probably wouldn't have to change when shotguns are allowed, only when weapons 1 is allowed.

Having marines reset after dieing would sacrifice speed for more options. I don't think it's neccessarily a bad idea, but it's going to weaken marines who are in thier spawn. This would combat the very real change that it would take marines longer to get the extra points to change thier mind. I think it might be worth testing in conjuction with this, but I would like to leave it as an option, we will see how it will work. If it could be set up to where it can change from active to inactive in game, it might provide for good testing. I'm just not sure it's solving a problem we really need to worry about. Aliens get the choices and in turn lose alot of time gestating, marines would still be using less time, and potentially with scripts could be losing no time at all. It used to be that aliens didn't get to rechoose thier life forms, it was changed specifically because the only way aliens can heal the hive is if they are a gorge, and once you went to a higher life form you couldn't go gorge again. I'm not sure if it's an issue that should be addressed with this mod, but since this mod does effect some of the same things I think they could be tested together. I'm not certain how well it would work, but I think it's worth trying. Is there already a plugin like this out there? I wouldn't be surprised, and all we would probably have to do is modify it to work with this plugin.

I think the marine reset after dieing would be a great idea for a seperate plugin.

Squeak's Response: What if we just made it a toggle feature? If you die, and you WANT to choose a GL over an HMG, you type something in team chat that allows you to do a new load out on the marine.

As far as the Team options: it would make more sense that the team needs to decide what upgrades to unlock vs what upgrades to get together, and makes it alot simpler in the mod AND to code. Its more of a stepping stone, and something I think we should attempt first and change later.

Irish Pirate's Response: Like autogest sort of a thing? I still think it might be better as a seperate plugin. I'm not saying it's bad, I'm saying it's not directly pertaining to this plugin. Letting marines choose what they want could work with or without this plugin, and if thats something you would like to do too I would be willing to work on it with you as a seperate plugin. I especially like that toggle idea, I think it would be incredibly easy to code too. Check to see if a player has either hmg or gl, and jetpack or heavy, and let them say which it is they want to change it.

The team options as you put it makes alot more sense if you look at it from classic, but it's farther from current combat. I know people who don't know what proto labs are. I figure people who are familiar with combat will know you need armor2 to get jp/heavies, and weapons 1 to get weapons. The marines will still be choosing what to unlock together, because they would have to pick weapons or armor upgrades to unlock things. The difference is this way weapons 1 and "advanced armory" would be packaged together, "upgraded proto" wouldn't require the AA, but would require armor 1, and would come with armor 2 as a bonus. This is how I would explain the step down. [edit: I feel so stupid, I just realized that your way would allow shotguns sooner. You unchain the shotguns, and then make gl and hmg require the AA, this is sounding a bit more complicated then I thought.]

If you think it will be easier to code your way, then I think we should try your way first. I just think changing it so getting a shotgun requires an upgrade we added instead of weapons 1 it might be harder to code. My understanding of how it would work is we would make weapons 1 like a team upgrade, and it would automatically stop people from getting a shotgun until the team selects weapons 1 without any extra coding. I'm all for the first choice being the easier one.

It would be more of a stepping stone, and it might be worth trying if people go for it. I want to find a comfortable place between classic and where combat is right now, scaring as few people away as possible. I think pushing as close as we can to that limit would be good. We will have plenty of time for feedback on things like this when we test.

[edit] Flow Chart

You wouldn't happen to have any flow chart software on hand, so we can visualize this a little better?

Also, lets not get \\too\\ far ahead, and focus on smaller, more easily achievable implementations of the plugin. I think that a flow chart will help us figure out what needs to happen in what order.

Irish: Sorry, no i don't, but I can do something similar with microsoft word. Are you wanting a flowchart for how to go about making this (programming strategy or something) Or a flowchart of how the mod will work? Maybe I should just do both...

---I found some flowchart software. When I have a chance I will start. Alot of it could be tackled in any order, but I will try to pick an order that makes sense.