Fear the Genestealer in the Year of the Dragon

[ChromeAngel]

Happy new year 40k fans, it gives me great pleasure to finally announce the release of Beta 6 of Exterminatus - Rival Species 2.  This beta brings the number of player classes up to 10 and a total of 8 playable maps.  Additional new features in this version include against the clock missions, marine battle cries and burst mode for boltguns.

A list of Beta 6.0 download mirrors is available on the 40ksource.com downloads page, where you can find both a self-extracting installer and a Zip file around 310MB in size.
As with all recent EX releases the Exterminatus Game Group steam community page is the best place to find the servers and times to play EX.

Changes
The new (tenth) class in EX is the Tyranid Genestealer (AKA stealer), which is smaller and more agile than other tyranid classes and is available from the start of the game.   While Farseer was working in the animations for the stealer I had time to add a much requested feature, a rapid fire mode for boltguns.  The Specialist's Meltagun and the Zoanthrope's warp blast attacks have been brought into line with the boltgun by enabling them to fire through grates, making both classes more dangerous in tight, vertical areas like ex_hive and ex_orbital.  These improvements prompted widespread adjustments to the balance of others weapons and classes, specifically affecting the StormBolter and the Carnifex.

Beta 6.0 adds 2 new maps, ex_hive_city by Nqss and ex_orbital by Nic2 and Typheron.  A new timer has been added to the player's HUD in order to help players stay informed of their progress in “against the clock” missions.   ex_hive_city, ex_thunderhawk and ex_spacehulk have been updated to make use of the new timers.  Many of the existing maps have been polished to provide better atmosphere and game play, particularly ex_digsite, ex_lycantium and ex_ichar_iv.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the people that have contributed to Exterminatus and participated in playtesting tests leading up to this release.

Future Plans
I had planned to offer another feature poll, sadly we no longer have enough developers or testers to finish any more features.  Future developments of EX will therefore be on an ad-hoc basis, oriented around polishing the existing features toward a final 1.0 release.  Naturally i'll still be incorporating contributions as they occur.

[ChromeAngel]

I failed to mention in the news post that the beta also includes a new map for testing player classes solo.  The map is called "tech_adept_lab".  Something like this could become a tutorial in future versions.

[ChromeAngel]

Thoughts on balancing EX after playing a few rounds of Beta 6:

Veteran's less preferable than Specialists.  I'm thinking the Veteran could use a small buff, better grenades or a higher rate of fire for his pistol.

Terminators seem less preferable than Heavies.  Since Terminators had their damage nerfed along with other boltguns, maybe heavy bolters should be nerfed slightly too.  Alternatively it's been suggest that terminators could use a range boost for their powerfists.

Hit registration for the Generstealer claws could use some investigation players don't always seem to be hitting when it looks like they should.  This may just be trans-Atlantic lag and insoluble, but it's something to look into.  Otherwise Stealers seem toi be effective at flanking and generally getting where other cannot.

Zoanthrope seem a little over powered.  It's hard to judge this exactly as they are the tyranids only 3rd tier class, but the improvements to both their attacks seems to have been a bit too effective.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on the balance of beta 6 and your suggestions on how the game can be tweaked for better balance.

[Nqss]

my thoughts

Veteran's less preferable than Specialists.  I'm thinking the Veteran could use a small buff, better grenades or a higher rate of fire for his pistol.

people are trying to fight with chainsword and plasma every time they play as vet
because this is what different about this class, other weapons of vet - same tactical.
increasing plasma pistol rof will manage people to use plasma pistol ONLY as vet
increasing grenades stast wouldn't do much , because people's first reaction is to use thier chansword and plasma pistol as it is main weapon of vet...

so i still think vet need improvments in his close combat as he is close combat class for marines.

Terminators seem less preferable than Heavies.  Since Terminators had their damage nerfed along with other boltguns, maybe heavy bolters should be nerfed slightly too.  Alternatively it's been suggest that terminators could use a range boost for their powerfists.

terminators are less likable only because of ammo they carry
yesterday i heard alot about that , they runs out of ammo pretty fast , so choice is heavy because he got lotss of ammo for everyone.
and nerfing heavy is not an option at all. he is already balanced enough.

Hit registration for the Generstealer claws could use some investigation players don't always seem to be hitting when it looks like they should.  This may just be trans-Atlantic lag and insoluble, but it's something to look into.  Otherwise Stealers seem toi be effective at flanking and generally getting where other cannot.

yesterday people were taking warriors instead stealers

Zoanthrope seem a little over powered.  It's hard to judge this exactly as they are the tyranids only 3rd tier class, but the improvements to both their attacks seems to have been a bit too effective.

i think thrope is actually balanced now , his primary attack can miss alot at high distance , he is slow and tall and secondary attack getting all his energy and if its miss , this is a bad thing

i think all meele weapons should get thier sounds of hitting target (enemy) which is not the same as hitting everything so people can define if they are hitting or just waving at thin air

[ChromeAngel]

Just finished playing the first beta 6 mid-week regular.  I think we need more marine battle cries.  Maybe even class specific ones like the tyranids.