The list of proposed changes for the second iteration is massive and much too long for a single news post. We're hoping to release a live update with these changes in a week or so. Here's a link to the proposed changes and the intro from the balance team.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oIsqF--0homZgnzLgSlrqckQM2R4f0tRcx9ZLPyPwno


Some of the changes currently in the live balance mod can be considered emergency triage- some (like the alien tech tree cost reductions, the fade blink energy reduction) were bandaids with the goal of immediately improving some of the most glaring balance issues.

The patch notes here can be intimidating, but it’s important to consider that the overall goal of this patch is to further streamline and hopefully eliminate many of those previous glaring issues in a much more in-depth manner, opening up more choices in gameplay, and addressing some previously frustrating gameplay mechanics.

With that said, however, not everything that has issues is being addressed here. Things like hallucination, phantom upgrade, Flamethrowers and Exosuits- these all seem to have their own list of issues. However we felt that trying to address everything in a single patch would not be the best way to go about it. So for now, those issues will remain to be addressed another day, while the overall changes to the alien tech tree are evaluated.
Feedback and suggestions on these patchnotes are encouraged, but please keep in mind that if you do have a suggestion or criticism, you need to provide well thought out reasonings for it. Just saying “this is bad” or “add/change this” without the reasoning behind it will not get your ideas the consideration or respect they deserve.

craaazy

when should we expect this to drop assuming everything gets the greenlight? i need to try out metabolize asap :P

Please, make webs available at least at biomass lvl not higher then 6, cause when u have 3 hives and 7th biomass its a GG for marines in 90%, and u wont need webs in that situation. With webs available at biomass lvl1 it will be a lot more useful.

Tachi says

Please, make webs available at least at biomass lvl not higher then 6, cause when u have 3 hives and 7th biomass its a GG for marines in 90%, and u wont need webs in that situation. With webs available at biomass lvl1 it will be a lot more useful.

Maybe not at biomass lvl 1 xD, biomass lvl 4 or 5 could be great for the webs to realy counter jetpacks when they are out :)

My only worry from this list is that the removal of tres lifeforms + ability specific lifeform upgrades will cut down the costs for alien commander that pve will take a larger portion of the gameplay. Not sure if the drifter usage would drain tres enough for it to be an impact.

Iots says

My only worry from this list is that the removal of tres lifeforms + ability specific lifeform upgrades will cut down the costs for alien commander that pve will take a larger portion of the gameplay. Not sure if the drifter usage would drain tres enough for it to be an impact.

I doubt it.

These changes look amazing. Can't wait to see this play out.

These changes look great. The first step to better gameplay overall and less PvE/Commander interference :P

+1 Tachi If webs arent at a lower biomass there really isnt a use for them. I think that gorges should be able to have all their abilities accessed by just a single biomass upgrade. Not spread out between three different biomass levels. Because with them spread like this you dont really see much of the abilities used besides bile. So if webs were unlocked at a lower biomass it would make them much more viable.

"c) Give onos more player movement control."

I think onos movements are fine. It's the only thing you actually need to practise as an onos, when you are going forward you can't go back easily.
Exept for boneshield i don't think onos need buff or nerf.

#18: reduce auto-explosion radius for pulse grenades.

#yourwelcomebitey

Changes look good

I don't like the idea of aliens starting on different (less) pres from the marines, I understand its been done to compensate for other price changes, and in which case these other things need to be looked at again, I think starting on different pres is too much of a fundamental change.

I disagree bile bomb should shred marine armour less, most certainly not 50% less (15% would be acceptable at most). If marines are stood in a close group that's their mistake. Bile bomb travels slow, doesn't go far and is thrown by a slow moving life form, it takes skill and timing to use it effectively in combat and get out alive, lets not make the gorge completely useless in combat.

Web should be about bio3-4 unlock. Don't underestimate how powerful web can be, it would be easy for a skilled gorge to go base with 1 skulk and trap marines on the ips after a respawn with just 1 web over each then spamming heal.

I like the idea of grenades being thrown faster, maybe even give players a quick key that would throw it for you so they are less clunky?

I don't believe onos need more player movement control, they are playing as an onos not a skulk, again its something that takes skill and timing to use, lets not keep taking that away.

If the jetpacks are more accessible now since you reduce the cost of the AA.

why don't we restore the old devour skill for the onos when you got 2 hives (like ns1) cause atm there is no real counter against jetpack.

It could be a good feature don't you think ?

These are my quick thoughts, if I didn't talk about it I think it is good or I want to see it played that way to form an opinion.

5. Remove movement and bite cone bonus from Enzyme
The movement bonus of enzyme can be considered redundant with celerity, the bitecone is something that was sort of tacked on in the b250 changes and is more or less an unnecessary addition. The attack speed increase alone is quite powerful, these other features are no longer needed on this drifter ability.

I think the movespeed should stay the same. There could be cases were an onos can go Carapace and still get celerity with the proper micro of a commander or a case were you lose spurs and can still again keep that move speed in most fights.

10. Change the fade damage type to light structure(75 damage)
With the current Puncture modifier, fades do 75 player damage and 37 structure

Even with the small amount of armor added to buildings I still think fades can then ball. One skulk or lerk come could over bite all the armor off then a fade can spend the rest of the time killing the structure.

18 damage to a structure with armor, 75 without. Takes a long time to kill a structure and I think this change will turn out fine.

I might agree with Stranger on the movement speed for enzyme. I think it was really only useful for the Onos/gorge player. Other life forms were already fast enough, and the change does little to affect their movement, but it was really useful when used with onos/gorge to position them properly.

I think it used properly with a good commander, we should reward a slight movement speed increase for the more slower lifeforms to improve their survivability. Makes the enzyme ability have two functions, an in-combat and out-of-combat use, similar to mucous which can be used in or out of combat.

Is the umbra duration change necessary? It will just make lerking when umbra is up even more of an energy drain/chore. I get the AOE change, but making it so lerks have to spend even more energy on umbra will make them unable to contribute much if anything to a fight.

I'd have to try out the new onos movement before making a final judgement, but the lifeform sounds almost useless now unless you have celerity. Enzyme + 2 shotting a1 marines was the only reason onos was remotely effective without celerity, unless the new onos movement is a big game changer I can't imagine ever selecting it without charge/celerity. Now you 3 hit a1 marines and at lower levels the marines will live much longer from medpacks. I'd rather stay skulk than waste my pres on onos.

Can something be done about the dumb crop duster spores? plz

The onos will be more effective because he'll be able to hit people more consistently

METABOLIZE, YOU LISTENED, THIS IS PERFECT, UPPING EFFECTIVE HP WITH A SKILL BASED MOVEMENT ADD IN THING IS THE WAY TO BBBBBBBBBBBBBE

a copy from the post i did on the news:

i totaly agree to simba alien comm was passive some ns2 builds ago but as you see it has been proven to be bad haveing him only passive thats why drifter abtilitys bonewall ect got introduced

Also Bonewall is the Hardconter to Catpacks/jetpacks rushing the onoses
and even this counter is easy to deny with killing cysts
it has to have more risk to play on infestation thats like the asymetric factor and similar to enganging marines that have pgs all over the place what increses the risk of being traped


so keep bonewall untouched plz


AND PLEASE DONT CHANGE TOO MANY THINGS AT ONCE

THIS BRINGS THIS MOD TOO FAR FROM VANILLA GAME :(


(i mean take a look from season1 to season4 (thats like 2 years) how many season1 players are left 10% ?)


please make this mod as easy to get into as possible and as close to the normal game as possible

Mega says

Also Bonewall is the Hardconter to Catpacks/jetpacks rushing the onoses

Onii*

I am excited about the new changes, and am curious to see how the new addition to fades will play out.

However, I'm not really sure if I agree with the life form egg drops being removed. By changing the lerk egg biomass requirement to 4, it isn't at all useful until late game (I believed this to be the main issue). Basically any kind of higher life form egg drop is non existent as is, aside from a gorge, but it should not just be removed. Marine commanders have the ability to drop tech for their players, should that be removed as well? Why not try increasing the cost slightly rather than just cutting it from the game. I don't see an advantage given the current requirements for the life form eggs by using team resources instead of personal.

Thoughts?

I was reading the changelogs again and was like:

WTF WHY NOT A SINGLE CHANGE TO THE EXOS

i mean you change the fade make it more powerfull but the totaly never used thing at all gets not a single change ?

Make exos use PGS and make them costing like 35 RES or give them the abitly to weld each other increse there walking speed replace them with the HA from the NS2Balancemod with a hmg+welder

JUST DO SOMETHING TO THEM

Beside that i agree to Griff removing eggdrops completley is uneseary just increase the cost if its rly that bad in your opinion

Mega says

I was reading the changelogs again and was like:

WTF WHY NOT A SINGLE CHANGE TO THE EXOS

i mean you change the fade make it more powerfull but the totaly never used thing at all gets not a single change ?

Balance Team says

With that said, however, not everything that has issues is being addressed here. Things like hallucination, phantom upgrade, Flamethrowers and Exosuits- these all seem to have their own list of issues. However we felt that trying to address everything in a single patch would not be the best way to go about it. So for now, those issues will remain to be addressed another day, while the overall changes to the alien tech tree are evaluated.

i really want to play the new BM and see how it works and if it feels nice but isnt a balance mod supposed to make little changes to balance the game? this seems a bit like a complete new game or mod so i hope u dont have to fix it for eternity since u add new abilitys and critical changes at all fronts
Maybe dont call it a balance mod since this is much more than that.

Legendary Snails Classic ns mod FTW!

it's more like titus balanced mod than legendary snails classic ns mod, if it was it would be much better than this actual ns2 :D

Ns1 > Ns2 :D

legendary snails was create a Mod long time ago for NS2 that was called NS classic, that was a NS1 copy and feeled pretty nice

There are some substantial changes here that would greatly change the meta.

Maybe release a test version of the mod so teams have the option to test the changes in pcws before they're finalized, lots of these things you can say yes or no too, but without being able to actually play the changes you can never be certain.

While I am sure everyone working on the mod will try to balance it, you will get much better and more valuable feedback from people who can actually play with the changes rather than "here's a list of some numbers and things what do you think?"

izO says

legendary snails was create a Mod long time ago for NS2 that was called NS classic, that was a NS1 copy and feeled pretty nice

I want that weed man

at least it ran on the server of them ;P

Change Hallucinations please. I'm tired of this shit.

Simple changes that won't really affect the gameplay:

1) When an Hallu' dies, remove the name of the player that the hallucination mimics. When an Hallucination is destroyed, I want to read "[MarineP1] --pewpew--> Hallucination", not "[MarineP1] --pewpew--> [AlienP2]"
I'm real tired of marines killing thousands of lifeforms... not.

This is something very annoying, seriously, and there was no need to change that.

2) When the marine com uses a scan on hallucinations, they used to disappear. It's ok if they don't anymore, but at least make it so the scan actually does affect them. Could it be possible that they turn violet just like they were before when you saw them as aliens? I think there's not much work to put on this, right? Just so marines can actually see the difference between skulks in the blink of an eye.

That's it for the moment, that's not too much, eh? Thanks for reading.

Just a small update. The latest patch for the mod is nearly complete and will be ready for testing very soon, probably playable tomorrow. If all goes well it will be pushed to the live mod early next week.

Also alien commanders will be happy to know that the bonewall change has been revised, Bonewall will remain instant, and now scales @ 100hp/bio, so it starts will 300hp on biomass 3 and will gain 100 more for each biomass thereafter.

edit:
The test-mod is here for anyone who wishes to see them before they get pushed into the main mod: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=247834990

You can read the finalized change-log here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oIsqF--0homZgnzLgSlrqckQM2R4f0tRcx9ZLPyPwno/edit?usp=sharing