Chromehounds - NOW WITH IMPRESSIONS

[hepcat]

criminy, i still feel horrible for getting a friend's request from someone named Doopri, accepting, then coming back to the squad lobby and asking, "anyone know a Doopri?"

...only to discover i'd been playing with him for the last 2 games.

in my defense...i AM an idiot.

[Lockdown]

Shifty:  I'm not going to try to convince you to get the game, as you probably won't at this point.  But, you should at least know that although there are some people in our squad that take things a bit more seriously, mostly we just go out there, Arkon barks out some orders, we try to follow them, and we have a good time playing together.  

It's really not all that complicated.  You throw a bunch of guns on a base, attach some other crap, and you go out there and try to blow the snot out of the other team.  As much as I make fun of everyone else, I must redesign my mech after nearly every fight, and half the time, the designs just flat suck.  Noone cares.  We are out there trying to play our roles, to win if we can, to have some semblance of strategy, and to have fun together.  (Well, I probably shouldn't speak for everyone, but that's the sense I get nearly everytime I'm online.)  Can you spend hours upon hours trying to maximize space on your frame, pick the exact legs, exact guns, exact ammo, exact decal, etc...?  Sure you can, and it's alot of fun to do that.  Do you need to do that to have a blast?  Hell no!

It's trial and error.  All the studying and reading in the world will never prepare you for what REALLY happens out there.  It's learn as you go, it's trying to work together, and it's laughing at Soulchilde's short squatty mechs of destruction.  What could beat that!?!?

(And Soulchilde, I'll follow you out to any Combas you want, but you should know I read there is a self-destruct button, so I'm taking you with me when you kick my arse).

 :wink:  

[Starshifter]

Hoagiehead - you are absolutely right in every way.  I'm in a terrible rut where I am spending more time reading strategy articles for games than playing the darn things!  You should see the pile of print outs and strategy guides I have on Oblivion, Star Wars Empire at War, Titan Quest, Fight Night 3, Civ IV, Gal Civ 2, Star Rangers and even Rockstar's Table Tennis!!  I even printed out and read Arkon's excellent strat guide on building hounds - and I don't own the game!!!!  I'm pitiful.  I'm one of those classic videogame nuts who gets more enjoyment out of buying the games and reading the manuals than actually playing them (minus the KOTOR games of course).

I'm heading over to Circuit City after work to pick up NCAA 2007 (Xbox version) for my son and to get the free strat guide for him.

I will not pick up Chromehounds.  I will not.  No way.   :?  

[Purge]

It's really not all that complicated.  You throw a bunch of guns on a base, attach some other crap, and you go out there and try to blow the snot out of the other team.  :wink:  

I'm with Shifty... I think I'm gonna sit this dance out. I don't have the time right now; I doubt I'll be really into gaming for another 3 months. by that time we'll be shootin' up terrorists in Vegas and defending ourselves in the Gears o' War (an irish title, no doubt )

[Lockdown]

Yeah... that's not the point I was trying to make, but that is essentially the truth of it.

The point I was trying to make was more this:

Can you spend hours upon hours trying to maximize space on your frame, pick the exact legs, exact guns, exact ammo, exact decal, etc...? Sure you can, and it's alot of fun to do that. Do you need to do that to have a blast? Hell no!

For some people, making great mechs is one of the most fun parts of the game, and it certainly makes a big difference in effectiveness (at times) if you put the time in to make a great mech.  But I don't think you have to do it to have fun.

Hope that clarified my point a bit.

[stiffler]

As long as you don't toss smoke shells into the middle of the firefight, I'll be happy.  :roll:  :lol:

My scout has a smoke gun mounted on the back and it is pointed straight down.  Puff and I'm gone!  Of course I have no business being IN a firefight so hopefully that won't be a problem.

Lighter weight radiators?  IN!

Not just that, but they are THIN!

Looking forward to more this evening.

[Jarrodhk]

Smoke is awesome for cover.... it's just very disconcerting when someone lobs the smoke shell in between you and the hound your fighting in close quarters... suprised the heck out of me  :lol:

Plus, I wasn't sure if it had been done by a squadmate or the AI.  Considering the AI we were fighting at the time was quite a bit meaner than the average bunch.  Come to think of it, if I remember right the AI Did pop smoke later in that fight.

[Doopri]

hehehe yea the ai was the second  one, the first one in the middle of the massive firefight would be me... whoops

i think the end result was pretty funny - after the mission at least 3 people said "um, im putting thermo on my mech"

and yes heat sinks are great - i took my 800+ heat mech into the desert and promptly started screaming "why am i blowing up, whats going on?!?!?!!?" before it was determined i REALLY needed a few on there

and no worries hepcat - the moment was priceless "whos this doopri?" um, the guy next to you hehehe

[Harkonis]

you can't really lob a smoke grenade anywhere, the maximum range is about 5-10 meters even when you aim at hte best angle.

[Turtle]

Gentlemen.  I suggest for future ops we adopt the Nato Phonetic alphabet to make it easier for us to give directions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_phonetic_alphabet

I just returned the game to the rental place.  Except now I'm sure that I'll buy it only because the MP is good and there's a lot of people online I can play with.  Only problem is that I'm going to Comic Con wed-sun so I can't buy it yet, let alone play it.

I still think it needs a lot more work, but for now it's the main Live game I like.

[Destructor]

not only do you take damage from fire, but it raises your internal temperature pretty rapidly.  If your heat ever hits the top of the bar, your generator takes damage at an enormous rate until the heat is back down to about 1/4.  It literally takes only 10-20 seconds for the generator to completely cook off if you are hit with incendiary and have no radiator.  After you lose your generator, you do everything much more sluggishly.

So that's what heat damage does. I've been looking for an exact answer. Thanks!

But,[/b] you should at least know that although there are some people in our squad that take things a bit more seriously, mostly we just go out there, Arkon barks out some orders, we try to follow them, and we have a good time playing together.  

It's really not all that complicated.  You throw a bunch of guns on a base, attach some other crap, and you go out there and try to blow the snot out of the other team.

I think that explains how we play perfectly. And it's a great description of the game itself.

you can't really lob a smoke grenade anywhere, the maximum range is about 5-10 meters even when you aim at hte best angle.

Just like the Mortar Launchers that have grenades of doom in them. Makes them pretty much useless.

[pingwrx]

As long as you don't toss smoke shells into the middle of the firefight, I'll be happy.  :roll:  :lol:

My scout has a smoke gun mounted on the back and it is pointed straight down.  Puff and I'm gone!  Of course I have no business being IN a firefight so hopefully that won't be a problem.

Lighter weight radiators?  IN!

Not just that, but they are THIN!

Looking forward to more this evening.

Hey never thought of that good idea Stiffler I think I'm gonna put one of those smoke thingys on my scout now.

[DonD]

Anyone seen a flame-thrower type weapon yet?  i'm thinking that would be the ultimate close-combat weapon.

And probably the perfect for a light, quick hound like a scout.

[Destructor]

Anyone seen a flame-thrower type weapon yet?  i'm thinking that would be the ultimate close-combat weapon.

And probably the perfect for a light, quick hound like a scout.

An interesting idea, but not that I know of.

The Piles though do a well enough job of being the ultimate in melee weapons to really need much else though.

EDIT: And the war is over (again)! War 3 is over with the US pulling a victory out of nowhere. For you keeping track, the Russians have won two, and the US one.

Let's be the Russian guys next time, eh? I need to get some parts.

[The Grue]

EDIT: And the war is over (again)! War 3 is over with the US pulling a victory out of nowhere. For you keeping track, the Russians have won two, and the US one.

Let this be a lesson to you traitors that made us move over to Sal Kar.  We would have won!!!

[Turtle]

I would have been perfectly happy staying with Tarakia and fighting to get our capitol back for the entire war.

[Destructor]

EDIT: And the war is over (again)! War 3 is over with the US pulling a victory out of nowhere. For you keeping track, the Russians have won two, and the US one.

Let this be a lesson to you traitors that made us move over to Sal Kar.  We would have won!!!

But look on the bright side - we now have a bunch of new parts to play around with.

Now, if we'd only visit the Russians once again, I'd have a full set of every part currently available...

[Doopri]

Gentlemen. I suggest for future ops we adopt the Nato Phonetic alphabet to make it easier for us to give directions.

Turtle you are hardcore - and i love it! im going to start doing this tomorrow!

[stiffler]

As long as we don't get too hardcore.  Some of those Battlefield clans are scary.

"19, head COMBAS India at Foxtrot 3"
"Umm...  I'm on it?"

[Turtle]

Recommending the nato phonetic alphabet was more a response to some people who had trouble hearing which letters I was speaking over the microphone.

Besides, it's pretty easy to tell which letter is being spoken in the alphabet, it usually starts off the word.

Also, it makes us sound a little cooler spouting off these instead of yelling "No not D, B as in boy!"  

As much as I wanted to stay Tarakian, I do like the new weaponry Sal Kar have.  My current defender design was only possible with the light weight of Sal Kar arms.  However, there's almost no point in bidding for captured parts unless those parts are better than the standard ones.

I think the Tarakian victory was a product of the word of mouth that the multiplayer for this game is getting.  US players, after getting out initially bad reviews, jumped online after a week of hearing so much about it.

We've already established that the SP simply sucks.  They should have clearly marketed it as more of an MP game instead of releasing trailers and such that make it seem more SP oriented.

Also, I wish there was a way to observe or record matches, at least in free play mode.  I'd have liked to see how certain battles unfolded.

[stiffler]

Also, it makes us sound a little cooler spouting off these instead of yelling "No not D, B as in boy!"  

I've had that happen so many times.  I have pretty bad hearing as it is and then you compress it and push it through a low-quality mic...

We did find out that the AI is unbelievable accurate with that artillery fire.  My poor scout mech was hit by multiple barrages while in a full sprint by at least two different mechs lobbing that crap over a river and into a half-destroyed city.  But one of us got behind them to blow up their base so pfft on you AI!

[Arkon]

I would have been perfectly happy staying with Tarakia and fighting to get our capitol back for the entire war.

The problem was that anyone who didn't get a chance to go to the shop, or started late in the game would not have been able to buy any parts and would have most likely immediately quit.

I think one big reason the Tarakians won is that many of the Russians switched sides.  Almost every battle I had against Tarakia involved HOUNDs using exclusively Russian bases, cockpits and PILEs.

[Lockdown]

Agreed.  Not to mention having parts from each nation is really kinda' cool when trying to design your mechs.  Count me in as another person that did not have the money to take advantage of the Russian parts when we were briefly aligned with them, and would love to revisit their parts shop at some point.

[Arkon]

Well, it looks like before I even get home War 4 will be completed by the Russians thanks to the timezone difference and the 1v1 AI rushing that has become the tactic of the day, take a wheeled PILE HOUND and in under 2 minutes you have a win.  Literally in the time it would take a group of 6 of us to complete a mission and earn something around 70 occupation, a group of 6 people could run 3 1v1 missions and earn nearly 900 occupation.

[Soulchilde]

I expect Sega to start nerfing stuff.  I expect they didn't want  wins to come so quick and so cheap.  I seriously expect piles to be NERFED hard or at least nerfed against buildings


Also, count me in as a person who would like to re-visit the Russian side just to buy new parts

[hepcat]

As long as we don't get too hardcore.  Some of those Battlefield clans are scary.

"19, head COMBAS India at Foxtrot 3"

"can't, red leader one.  dog has nose buried in crotch and can't get him off.  request backup and rolled up newspaper."

[DamageInc]

All I know is that the Spec Ops AI teams are sickly over powered, and it's embarrasing losing to a bunch of mech covered in red, white, and blue poka dots.

I also agree that the appealing thing about this game is having a great bunch of people to play with in your squad.

Delta India out

[Jarrodhk]

The spec ops squads are tough, they use much more human-like configurations.  Couple this with the fact that the polka-dot squad had 2 heavy gunners in it, in a confined space, and we got clobbered.

Basically our tactics sucked.  We expected fairly push-over AI and got something a lot meaner.  Didn't help that we had no TC, 1 heavy gunner without splash damage weapons (I think?).  Equalled a major stomping.

By the same token, once we reorganized a bit we rolled over the AI the next few battles.

The last fight vs. the humans blew though.  They were good shots with the cannons.  Direct hits to the cockpit from 2 cannons at a time will rock your world like nobodies business.   :lol:

[CeeKay]

We did find out that the AI is unbelievable accurate with that artillery fire.  My poor scout mech was hit by multiple barrages while in a full sprint by at least two different mechs lobbing that crap over a river and into a half-destroyed city.  But one of us got behind them to blow up their base so pfft on you AI!

Heh, Teamwork:  It gives them someone else to shoot at  :twisted:   I actually upgraded that scout last night with better piles and better bombs so his base killing tactics are more effective.  It never occurred to me to use the piles on a base though-  all I was using was bombs.  It's kinda fun to be out of Combas range while killing the enemy base- it's like giving your team a surprise present when the screen of the base blowing up appears.

Oh, and sorry about disappearing on that last mission- I got the 'Connection Failed' screen just as the deployment started.  :cry:

[Jarrodhk]

Now that I've had a little more experience using the high angle scopes, I think I'm going to build myself a 4-leg heavy gunner.  My apologies to whoever I drop with tonight.  Likely to be a lot of me getting slaughtered while missing horribly.  

[Destructor]

BTW - if you are an artie based Hound, get the free on the Marketplace download of the new Heavy Arm. It's an artie based gun that fires TWO shots per trigger pull.

Talk about nasty.

[Jarrodhk]

Don't think that didn't occur to me when I was thinking about using a heavy gunner hound  :lol:

I expect to see a whole lot of those guns the next few days.

[CeeKay]

The Chromehound DL's are out?  I thought it was going to be an automatic update for the guns-  I guess I'll have to look at the marketplace tonight.

[The Grue]

Anyone know what the two light arm additions are?  Hoping they are better MGs than I have.

[Soulchilde]

Anyone know what the two light arm additions are?  Hoping they are better MGs than I have.

We're happy to announce that the first downloadable pack of new content for Chromehounds will be unleashed next week. And it'll be free!

SEGA and FromSoftware have made the decision to offer the pack free of charge by way of a thank you to HOUND pilots around the world. As you may know, we experienced some tricky server-load problems right after launch, and we hope this will go some way to saying thanks for sticking by the game.

The pack will be available to download via the Xbox Live Marketplace at 00:00GMT on 19th July.

PACK CONTENTS:

Light Arms
http://tinyurl.com/n8mdn
WP_SG003
A sniper cannon for fast, furious engagements. Features a smaller magazine to reduce weight.

Heavy Arms
http://tinyurl.com/njkgb
WH_HC034
An improved HC1500/D, for those in the know. A giant cannon with massive destructive power.

Assist Part
http://tinyurl.com/mlkec
AX_AM002
Additional armor with an enhanced KE defensive profile. It’s shaped to better turn bullets.

Colour Pattern
http://tinyurl.com/o3y3q
WWII Tricolor Camouflage
A brand new World War II inspired camouflage pattern.

Enjoy!


Taken from Segas Official Website!

[Jarrodhk]

BTW, that 'reduced magazine' on the sniper rifle is 3 shots.  For a reduced weight of about 8.  I'm not sure who they think will use that part.

[papasmurff]

Thanks for letting me play with you guys last night, It was fun....

[Lockdown]

3 shots?  Even I, the king of sniper love, find that to be rather comical.

 :?

[Destructor]

BTW, that 'reduced magazine' on the sniper rifle is 3 shots.  For a reduced weight of about 8.  I'm not sure who they think will use that part.

It does do more damage than the standard Sniper Rifle, but...

Yeah, it's utterly useless. I'd be pissed if I paid Live money for it.

The Heavy Gun though...very, very nasty weapon. If you somehow hit somebody head on with both shots, they'd just blow up. Now to figure out how to mount that on my standard Cannon Hounds...

[Jarrodhk]

Mount the heavy gun between your chassis and your cockpit.  Seems to be the most stable place to fire it from.