Commander experience

It annoyed me, that this board was clear
I would like to share some commander siege-related experience with AirBorn and Dr.Moron (since afaik they are the only ones that comm as long as I do). Others (community) can read it, so I am not planning to hide it but keep the discussion public.
The first thing is: do Dr.Moron and AirBorn want to talk about it? Because if not, the project will probably die

F.e. on ns_chucksiege_b13 there is a small room with a CC. In this room we should place an armory and upgrade it, it will be hidden from aliens. We need to place second armory outside the room, for marines to load ammo (but it can be done much later). In the same room we can build an obs, one armslab and a prototype lab. Second armslab has to be placed outside (possibly near doors to the room, not to help fades pressing the button or entering the doors).
the target layout (generic, it shall be like that on all maps) of the base should look like this:

AR - armory

(IP)  (IP)  (IP)  (IP)

         (AR)

        ((PG))

or even like that:

     (IP)  (IP)

(IP)            (IP)
        (AR)

       ((PG))

or even:

    (IP)  (IP)

(IP)   (AR)   (IP)

      ((PG))

So marines can spawn, take a weapon, welder and jp/ha (proto must be close enough), load ammo "in run" and go to PG. If You build the base without much thinking on siege007, You can even loose because of that (f.e. IP on one side of the CC and armory on the other side is not a good idea). Speaking about siege007, obs should be placed in the corner, behind the RT, armslabs should block the access:

A-arms
o-obs
     A
 (RT)
A    o

Thease are just first thoughts, I want to see how the community reacts :P

Hmm good ideas there Reef, i certainly like the obs behind the RT, so that you can hide it from fades and Arms will just block it :P

P.S. glad to have second post on this topic :lol:

Originally Posted by Reef

So marines can spawn, take a weapon, welder and jp/ha (proto must be close enough), load ammo "in run" and go to PG. If You build the base without much thinking on siege007, You can even loose because of that (f.e. IP on one side of the CC and armory on the other side is not a good idea). Speaking about siege007, obs should be placed in the corner, behind the RT, armslabs should block the access:

A-arms
o-obs
     A
 (RT)
A    o

Thease are just first thoughts, I want to see how the community reacts :P

Fade can get get behind any block.

Still got lots of aliens who can not or difficult

Fade jumps behond the RT, kills the Obs and can silently pummel the armslabs into dust, even when it gets noticed marines need to walk there, jump onto the armslab and get in reach of swipe.
No upgrades = loosing.

I do like the idea of 'grab 'n run'


How about upgrades in average siege maps when HA rushing ?
What do you give priority ? Buiding all RT's first or building a few things in between ?
I ( <-- Noobcommking) always build an armory (and upgrading it) first and then go past all the RT's.
Then I build an Obs, get phase tech etc and move on to armslabs.
I get a proto, research HA and save up for equipment for all.

I myself do it like this in ns_siege_007:

Hop in CC, and build a Armory first, click it quick and give it the number 4.
I give some buildings numbers, for if people go stand on it, I can't select it, but I can press the number and the building will be selected.
Next when Armory is finished, I update it.
Then I build the rts around mariner base, and Press [L] (this on default selects all mariners).
I give them number one, then I select two or three people, and give them number two.
I tell squad two to stay in base, and place a extra waypoint for them, squad one goes through the level and makes rts.
When I got all the rts build, I move back to squad two, who will build a IP and then a observory, this will get the number four (replace the armory).
When Observory is finished I update the PhaseTech (for phase gate).
Then I make two Arms labs, and upgrade the first upgrade.
When PhaseTech is finished, I build two phase gates (one at base and one at front), and when Armory upgrade is finished I build a Proto lab and start upgrading HA.
Then I start dropping weapons, squad two will get GL's, and the rest HMG. and Welders for everybody
when HA is ready I start dropping them, and people will get them and then rush into the halls.
In the first corner I build a third phase gate, and in the second corner a turret factory, wich you give number 3.
Upgrade turret factory for sieges.
Then you can build a optional armory, mariners will like it.
And build sieges.
Then scan the hive, with your quick key 4, and then scan.
Mariners won't stop rushing and if they spot and attack the hive the sieges will go off too, their main goal is to protect the sieges.
And then the releaving peeps will come, and aliens will die, some of them will hide in res room, you can build a observory in the middle of the three halls to the three res rooms, this will uncloak all. trow couple of nades in it, and you're done.

I know I don't spend time on upgrades from the arms lab, because I don't got time to do it, don't got the res to do it, and I forget it...

By the way, the tip of the observory in the corner is pritty good I think, I now use it.

- DutchBull

About an observatory in the corner:
the alternative solutin is to place observatory like other buildings, just place it somewhere. It will be destroyed much faster than if we put it in the corner, hidden. DON'T YOU THINK?
Poekie-Cerastes & Major - Chubby: listen; don't be destructive to ideas. Have a rule, like me. The rule is to TRY to give two good ideas, when You flame someone's (not necessary) bad idea.
RT can be electrified, that will take away the idea of lerk destroying obs and probably arms too. You can place Proto in the 4th corner of the RT and electrify it if You have res to do that (practically only in 4-6 ppl in team).

DutchBull: thanks for posting, a good post, I am glaad that I started such an iniciative.

I have bound F1 to select all marines, I frequently press F1 and ctrl+1 to keep latejoining marines in the 1st squad. I keep obs on group 5, next observatories on groups 4, 3. Group 2 is unused.
I think Dutchball orders more marines to stay at base, than other commanders do. I must say, now whan I think about it, it is a better soultion.

Generally: AA is live, then RTs are life. First building to be build is Armory, upg it asap and then build all RTs asap too. If You will wait with building the Obs and IP to research PG, wait with getting up ONE arms (second can be build after the door is open), dont upgrade too much... You can have more marines equiped. Notice:
We have two games, two commanders. In the first game, commander builds armory+upg and RTs, obs,arms,ip at the last moment. He has XXX of res (we consider no weapons, no upgrades beside AA,PG, HA, LVL1weapons).

The second commander in second game, makes armory+upg, an IP, and then RTs. Obs,arms,ip at the last moment. He has YYY of res (same upgrades).
The thing is, that XXX > YYY. Marines must wait longer until the second commander gets res to give them a RT, and RT is longer not-placed, so it doesn't make money for a longer time. It's about seconds, I know... But still, all the tacticts that we describe here, give seconds. Building base in the right way can result in gaining tenths of seconds, but You have to multiply this time by the number of marine respawns, so it starts to matter.
BTW, a good idea is to tell marines to load ammo from armory on the front, so they dont hump armory in the base, they just spawn, IP has a HMG on it and they to directly to PG. I saw this on one server yesterday, I think it's genious.

About my comming siege007: I think it is more importnant to have all marines equipped with HMG, than having one-two more upgrades. It's all about fades passing. I order two marines to stay in the corridors, very deadly solution, works on supersiege003 too (while I not comm, I frequently defend those corridor positions with player named Max). If marines are loosers, one or two upgrades will not save them. As I give equipment to all mariens I frequently don't have res to research upg's anyway.

Let's get back to general siege scheme (excluding "stargate"): A+upg first, then RTs. Then we have a problem: when to start making ip,obs,arms and to stop giving RTs for a while? This has to be solved by each commander by himself. We should get arms before AA and have PG+marines armed with HA+HMG before door opens. If we don't have HA, we give HMG. We shoudl have lvl 1 weapons by the time, but if we don't, this makes no tragedy. But if fade passes, we have a problem.
This is all about aggressive style of play for now, we will get to the defensive later.

Originally Posted by Reef

Poekie-Cerastes & Major - Chubby: listen; don't be destructive to ideas. Have a rule, like me. The rule is to TRY to give two good ideas, when You flame someone's (not necessary) bad idea.

I just said a fact, which shows whats the problem with the idea. Now you flame me and i can use bold text too. So instead of pointless replies, think further. Yes, I admit i couldve done that too.

I know some fades rush through all your men, put the point is that all your men carry a HMG and only two to three carry a GL, if they all shoot and move together through the halls it's difficult to get through.
But the fact is, that if a fade gets through, he's heavily damaged, it will take some time for him to recover full health, and not many fades I know will rush a base with low or medium health.
As soon as they get in your base, you got the phase gate in the first corner finished, and you can ask some man to fall back to base...
About 75% of the mariners will ignore you, since they can get points, are in a fight or just don't want to go back, but 25% can irritate the fade, and make him run for health...
If the fade goes gorge, he's allready to late to harm anyone, since you will be sieging the hive then.
If fade is in your base, you are busy on the hive too, so fade will need to choose, and won't be able to bring down a whole base by himself...
Beside around 50% of the aliens, start attacking RT's on their way, the most stupid thing and I guess the most common reason why a alien rush fails...

I think this strategie is water proof, unless you have a good mix of fades and onoses against you...

By the way, Only one fade got through while I was doing this strat, he managed to destroy one rt in ramps and then died...

You are right Chubby, we shoudln't let this topic become a battlefield (should we make another one for that purpose? ).

Much more than 50% of the fades attack RTs