Beta 5.05 Post Mortem

[ChromeAngel]

Time to try something new here.  I'd like to hear your feedback on the changes in Beta 5.05 :

"ex_bolter_rof" was set to it's default on the server I was playing on.  Plenty of time to experiment with this later.

Balance Changes

• Added an extra marine mission to to ex_thunderhawk by Typheron, along with many tweaks
• Buffed the Zoanthropes movement speed
• Revamped Zoanthrope PSI-powers, made the BAMPF attack secondary and added a new, faster, plasma based, primary attack
• Buffed Warriors ranged attack and Nerfed their melee attack to compensate

Adding a fuel stop to TH doesn't seem to have stopped the general marine rampage on this map.  A lot of "fuel? where's the  fuel?" from the marine side.  Once the p[layers learn where the extra button is I doubt it will slow them down.  As a tyranid I never felt like we hand much chance of holding out for the full 20 minutes.  The extra cover helped somewhat and made the marines spread out onto both bunker roofs.

The Thrope movement buff wasn't really noticeable to me.  Perhaps someone who played Thrope on 5.04 more recently can comment?

The Thrope's new primary attack is a bit of a bitch to aim.  Had some fun spamming the marines bottled up in Dig Site's tomb though.  It feels more useful than the old repulse, but not really 3rd tier dangerous.  If we stick with this new attack the effect will need to be brought in line with the look of the BAMPF attack.  Seeing the BAMPF attack charging up was useful and built the tension nicely.

The deathspitter did not feel significantly improved, but the reduction in talon damage was very noticeable, making the warrior feel in-effective all round.  Sorry this change turned out so badly.

Attempted to fix the following bugs:

• Disconnecting players cause a white, ERRORNAME, kill message
• Carnifexs cannot cap without crouching
• Certain maps not specifying start objectives as expected

Looking good on all these points, they do indeed appear to be fixed.  However it sounds like some kill messages may not have been appearing as usual, this could be a side-effect of the ERRORNAME suppression.

There was a bit of confusion on Dig Site when the entire tyranid team failed to notice their spawn in the Bunker had been captured while they were franticly USEing the button in the Outpost.  Nice "Deepstriking" on the part of the marine team

[Farseer]

Regarding the fuel problem, you need to add the info that the fuel is in the tunnel, instead it just says get the fuel. SM know where the tunnel is, they usually dont go there tho, too dangerous (that being the point).

Thrope is suppose to be slow, he's a giant levitating head.

Thrope became more pew pew, as was intended. Use it like you would use the Direct Hit from TF2 (lead the target and sometimes anticipate where they gonna go). I like the low cooldown it has, i can PEW PEW like a maniac. It might be a good idea to make 2 seperate ammo counters for the Pew Pew and the BLAMF. i dont want BLAMF ruining my PEW PEW.

Leave the talons as they are now, but BUFF the deathspitter again. if that dont work then roll-back to previous damage till you can think of something else.

EDIT: All in all, a good patch. Needs some tweaking, but so does everything else.

[Valvatorez Jr.Commissar]

The fuel button doesn't hinder the Space Marines well at all, the best solution I can think of is have part of the fuel pipe fall off forcing them to fix it. The timer for the nids victory could be made shorter after pressing the last button, this would force the Human team to clear out the Tyranid forces instead of camping.

The deathspitter projectile should move faster after it's fired, enough so to make last second crouching is pointless but not unavoidable when you strife normally.
I have to agree that the Thrope should use separate ammo sources for his attacks, as the pew pew works best to trick your target into moving so that their more vulnerable to the warp blast.

I was the Space Marine who capped Bunker in Dig Site, as it was obvious that the Tyrainds weren't watching their six.   Nid players don't have to go through it as the route from the outside is much shorter. Maybe something should be added in to encourage players to use both routes.