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Thread: The state of engineering

  1. #1
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    The state of engineering

    Can we talk about the state of engineering? Because it has been in ruins for too long, but I feel this spitter acid change is just too much.

    It was bad enough with maps without sand being unfobbable at all (prison, ice if xenos decide to be shitters and remove all snow). Just think of the last time you saw a prison FOB hold more than 15 minutes of heavy assault, because I don't remember a single one since the metal cade nerf, and that was easily half a year ago.

    Metal cades die too fast, and are there basically as a cheap second line to hold enough to repair, and block diagonal boiler shots that go through cades. Nothing more. You can't expect to build a FOB, that requires at LEAST 2 compartimentalized cade lines, hopefully one of them double in all 3 fronts. Especially with Tcoms being that big (And needed since the DS console is there), made of purely plasteel.
    Still, things were holding on on the other maps. Sandcades were a big part of post-girderspam FOBs, since spitters couldn't melt them from a distance (even sents could still melt them in melee if noone was guarding them. Annoying, but more than fair), but now, even THAT is gone.

    There is only one water tank in the almayer, and engineering may not even give it to you/Ignore you completely. Planetside water tanks and extinguishers will get melted by any non-braindead xeno, and extinguishers run dry too fast either way.
    So basically, a young T2 will destroy a whole front from 6 tiles away basically unopposed, unless you have at least 3 marines on guard duty, one to shoot at the thing, one to extinguish, and one to repair. Guard duty, which is the thing that only a few select ones do, noone really wants to do it, and they never do long enough either way. And God help you if you face two of those fuckers.

    And this is my main complaint, notice how this requires literally 0 coordination for xenos to perform (save maybe having some weeds for infinite plasma), while it ties 3 marines, that require heavy coordination, in a FOB that took a lot of involvement and people to build, and that's only until the water tank (if you are lucky to have it there, and good luck to the other fronts), or the extinguishers run dry. Then Req has to hemorrage points if they even care, and the resource drain is just too much to justify for a T2. That's right, the main marine resource drain right now are spitters and their acid bullshit. A xeno that has less than 10 minutes of lifetime, (and outperforms railgun boilers at sieging, which shouldn't really happen), without ANY coordination can completely ruin the coordinated work of a whole FOB squad and req. That's easily 12 marines. It's simply frustrating. Hell, last game a dedicated synth with a water tank couldn't stop me from melting through all the cades in the densest part of the FOB. No need to flank, or probe for weakneses. Just brute force the main defenses, because the FOBs can't handle a single spitter focusing on cades.

    And we still wonder why there are no veteran engie mains anymore, and everyone has moved out of Bravo...

    My impression from an engineering point of view, in my year and a half or so of playtime, is that every mechanic that forces xenos to cooperate (girders, double liners, shocks), even on a basic level gets nerfed to the ground. And yet here we are, as FOB squad, not being able to overcome something we have no control over, even with all the coordination in the world, and nothing is even in the dev discussions.

    The issue here is lack of xeno teamwork, because we all know that when xenos cooperate, and their queen is half decent at guiding their troops, it's a rout and marines evac at 12:40.
    If marines never coordinated, should we buff them/nerf xenos because of their poor performance? Or should we just encourage teamplay? In my opinion, one leads to frustration, and the other leads to better games for everyone.

    I can agree that 4 hour sieges being the norm was too much, and it's tough for everyone, but sieges are a battle of attrition, and as such, easily controlled by limiting the resource generation of a side, forcing them out of said resources, and out of the siege. Limit req, if you need to, but don't take out the only tools that marines have to defend themselves, because when desperate becomes impossible, it leads to people abandoning the role, and not caring anymore.

    Much love.
    Vanessa 'Pocket' Miller

  2. #2
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    I agree wholeheartedly.

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    Also the things that made engineering somewhat interesting (atmos,hot wiring, building machines, windows, power) have all been removed.

    The removal was needed to fix lag.. like atmos. But now you have all of three things you build.. and power is mindless and takes no effort.

    There is no creativity with fobs. And they are so easy to break.


    Short term we need to fix spitters per above.

    Long term.. we need more options. Like grates that can be fired through. That must be flanked with walls but are significantly stronger and cannot be slashed down. Portable lights, portable ammo printers.
    Portable generators that have purpose to power above.
    Make oxygen bottles and gas masks make you immune to boiler gas, then give us a portable o2 compressor that uses power cells like crazy to recharge.


    This problem is also why MT and CE are boring as fuck right now, and just meme roles. They should be having to prepare field equipment, repair it, send power cells and charge 02 bottles... instead they just build bars in the gym.

    Or fix generators and cyro.

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    As one of the few that still plays bravo engineer, absolutely. Metal cades are worthless, and any cade not actively defended by a whole FT of Marines winds up doused by a spitter and memed. Us Marines need nice things too Admins, and engis do most of all

  5. #5
    Senior Member SirMandrake's Avatar
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    Yup, it's been fucked for a while, can't remember the last time I went engi/ct/ce (not that i did a lot, but still). The fact that sandbags are tougher than metal makes no sense. It's especially disheartening for those that do try to make and maintain a decent fob, cuz hard work can disappear so quickly.

    In it's current state only mines, mortars, and goofing off redeem doing engi
    Goosen Dagen-casual marine

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    Buffing the cades mean you have to nerf the marines so you still have the 70% xeno win rate. Not get 70% really but because aliens have so few numbers and are very prone to losing good tier 3s. A robust marine dies? 20 more to replace him. A robust tier 3 crusher dies? Yea wait TWO HOURS for MAYBE to get replaced. Most likely more. Idk hopefully the xeno pods allow more wiggle room for buffs in other areas. At least buffing cades first would slow down marines as there is a strong reason to hold an area and let engineers cade up.

    At any rate currently cades are mostly for preventing lurkers/runners/warriors from grabbing or killing people in various areas and for preventing the whole alien hive from rushing in after a screech. Against determined assault they don't do much.

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    Anything which increases a squad engi's workload will also necessitate reducing their current workload. This means reducing the inordinate amount of time an engineer spends building cades. As an engineer assigned to the FOB, I can expect to be constantly trying to put up some adequate defenses and salvaging/searching for more mats for the first half an hour to 40 minutes after first drop. And with how many cade lines it takes to stall a determined xenos push (3+ lines minimum) and how many flanking points there are around some maps (*cough* big red *cough* trijent *cough*), there is very little that can be done to reduce this workload unless one of the following happens:
    a) The strength of individual cade sections is dramatically increased, so far fewer cadelines are needed. Mat availability would also have to be dialed down.
    b) Cades become much quicker to build, and preferably quicker to move around, so engineers can get more free time in between supply drops
    c) More marines are able to build cadelines, so engineers can entrust PFCs to building cadelines while they do other things. This would probably be as simple as letting technician PFC kit pamphlets give PFCs enough skill to make plasteel.
    d) Marines become far less dependent on cadelines defensively. Needless to say this would require radical changes to how both marines and xenos function.

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    Hm, I think you last two are both missing the main point, and I'll give you that I should had made it clearer, but the forum is being difficult, and I can't edit yet so...

    I'm not directly asking for 'buff muh cades', although I do believe that indirectly, metal cades should be buffed. Not for the sake of it, but in order to make FOBs in certain maps viable at all. If that brings extra marine nerfs/xeno buffs, and makes the game more enjoyable for everyone, it's welcome.

    What I'm asking is for both teams to have all the tools needed to deal with the other team. As it stands now, there is nothing to realistically counter spitter acid, and that was my main concern. The fact that one spitter causes a bigger resource drain than anything else in the FOB, be it in manpower or supplies.

    And about the increasing the engi's workload, we do have a way to combat that, and it's called teamwork. You are just arguing for what I'm against in the OP. We have the tools to make the FOBs, we don't need that kind of buffs/nerfs, but more teamwork. Marines can build sandcades and wire them if they get wire. Specs can build metal and sandcades and wire them. Miniengies can build whole sections and repair them, save for building plasteel, which it will take the SL or an engie 5 minutes at most. The SL is basically an engie, and by the time sieges come and major repairs are needed (If we ignore the spitter problem of today), then you have 4 squads worth of engineers, and a bunch of miniengies.
    As you can see, we have enough tools, we just need to create again that collaboration spirit that we had. But for that, FOB duty shouldn't feel pointless, and again, it feels pointless because it is, and we simply don't have the tools to do a good job at holding the xenos more than 15 minutes.
    Vanessa 'Pocket' Miller

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    I can only see this changed by adding some mechanics that allow experimentation. Normal SS13 has power grid, atmospherics, conveyor belts and hackable machines to play around. They can come up with interesting and smart designes, test them, improve them etc to create incredeble things.

    With what CM engineers can experiment? Metal cade in front of sandbags, so that you can still weld them in safety and have more time if they break completly, or maybe sand cade first and GTFO as fast as they drop?

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by CABAL View Post
    I can only see this changed by adding some mechanics that allow experimentation. Normal SS13 has power grid, atmospherics, conveyor belts and hackable machines to play around. They can come up with interesting and smart designes, test them, improve them etc to create incredeble things.

    With what CM engineers can experiment? Metal cade in front of sandbags, so that you can still weld them in safety and have more time if they break completly, or maybe sand cade first and GTFO as fast as they drop?
    Good that someone agrees with me.

    I remember that you used to be able to do things like have windows that block boiler glass, electrify grates, etc. Most of my time spent was repairing engineering wires to get power back online throughout the station.

    All of that is gone. So engineering is boring.

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