Off the pot and back in action, pun intended.

Awhile ago, I download Magic The Gathering for XBLA. My friend used to play Magic The Gathering on the road years ago with his friends. I also played it when i was a young buck, but it was too hard and not my thing.

When you match up with an opponent in a ranked game your 'deck' is hidden to the opponent. In the case of Worms Rev, I propose to hide the formation. Only then could we say it is CHEAP to use 4 Scientists. Go play 'Classic', it is a much faster version of essentially, the same game.

When you see two other players with 4*scientists, what do you do?

I believe the only logical thing to do is fight fire with fire. 4 scientists. You?

Why would you want to have formations hidden? Pretty surely that would encourage players to only take Scientists at all times.

For me it doesn't matter much, my favourite formation for standard modes is always 2 Scientists and either 2 Heavies or 1 Heavy and 1 Soldier. (Scouts are underpowered in most standard schemes.)
4 Scientists may be a tad annoying when your opponent refuses to attack and darksides all the time, but it's up to you not let it come that far. Heavies in particular deal massive damage, and there is not much Scientists can do when facing off Heavies early in the game.

In an ideally balanced situation, by the time the hiding starts and players are down to 2 worms, I will usually have made sure I kept both a Scientist and a Heavy alive. The 2 Scientists on the opposing side might regain health faster, but the Heavy is also able to eat his way through the landscape with his giant explosions in a couple of turns and ruin their hidings. If you can land shots, Heavies are simply awesome. It's a skill-based class that rewards you for good aim.
However, I wouldn't call Scientists cheap - they are more brains than brawns after all, and that's what the player needs to adapt to by making sure they stay away from enemy attack range as long as possible, which awards them with more health to eventually be able to come out and fight. Not to get uncovered and hit is not an easy task in Worms, at least when you are set against players of high skill.

I believe the only logical thing to do is fight fire with fire. 4 scientists. You?

In short, 2 Scientists and 2 Heavies is a better and more balanced (in your own favour, of course) counter in my opinion.

IlikeFARTS, I do the same. But am I happy to have to do the same? No: I want to play with 2 scientists, 1 soldier and 1 heavy. But do I do that? No! And that is why I agree with you.

Definitely not cheap to use 4 scientists, but Thurbo, i'm inclined to disagree with you. From personal experience, 4 scientists fare better than 2 heavies and 2 scientists. I've killed a lot more teams with your setup than my setup (which is also 4 scientists) and I generally feel less intimidated by heavies. Sure they may hit harder, but considering half the game is about moving your worm properly and making the most of the entire map, heavies fall far short in that regard and with the jet-pack they are hopeless. I suppose if you were almost as good at aiming as the CPUs, that heavies would be tougher, but in most scenarios, that doesn't happen, so 4 scientists win against the average pub.

What appears to be apparent from all of this is that, scouts are underpowered and should be given some kind of buff. They're good for time trialling the missions but I would love to see more scouts tactically used instead of used in the noobie-just-got-new-classes setup, the 1 scout 1 heavy 1 soldier and 1 scientist. Unfortunately, most decent players know that scouts are rubbish and will never use them, me included.

I suppose if you were almost as good at aiming as the CPUs, that heavies would be tougher, but in most scenarios, that doesn't happen, so 4 scientists win against the average pub.

Man, the CPU accuracy.....

Nah, Heavies don't fall short of the rope, teleporter and teleswap; it's as useful to them as to any other class. Just keep the jetpack for a Scientist. People who know how to play this game are hard to beat with a team of Scientists, it definitely takes a couple of "damage dealers" in order to be successful.

Hmm, I agree the scout should be buffed. He dies easily, which is a big negative, and moves well, which is a big positive. Balanced. He deals rubbish damage, which is a big negative, and he fits into tight spaces, which is a minor situational benefit. Not balanced.

So scout could do with a damage buff, not as high as a soldier but better, more like scientist level damage.

The scientist could take a nerf, but only a very careful one. There is a very thin line here. How about this; The scientist heals all team worms each round as he currently does, including himself. The exception is that he can't heal other scientists on the team (physician, heal thy wormy self...). This would then nerf only multi-scientist teams, and then only a little (2 scientists + 2 others = nice buff for the other two each round and each scientist still gets one buff) which would lead to better mixes and more variety IMHO.

An alternative would be to simply switch the damage of the scout and the scientist and leave it at that (after all, the scout is supposed to be the vanguard and the scientist behind the lines), but I think that would be too harsh on the scientist just as it is on the scout. I prefer my other idea.

What do you think?

4 scientists is easytobeat, but I'm notgoing to reveal the tactics of course.

And I'm actually surprised anyone is stillplayingit after the whole corrupt save fiasco. I haven't gone back since - any good will built for the series was pretty much destroyed in that 3 week period

Hmm, I agree the scout should be buffed. He dies easily, which is a big negative, and moves well, which is a big positive. Balanced. He deals rubbish damage, which is a big negative, and he fits into tight spaces, which is a minor situational benefit. Not balanced.

So scout could do with a damage buff, not as high as a soldier but better, more like scientist level damage.

The scientist could take a nerf, but only a very careful one. There is a very thin line here. How about this; The scientist heals all team worms each round as he currently does, including himself. The exception is that he can't heal other scientists on the team (physician, heal thy wormy self...). This would then nerf only multi-scientist teams, and then only a little (2 scientists + 2 others = nice buff for the other two each round and each scientist still gets one buff) which would lead to better mixes and more variety IMHO.

An alternative would be to simply switch the damage of the scout and the scientist and leave it at that (after all, the scout is supposed to be the vanguard and the scientist behind the lines), but I think that would be too harsh on the scientist just as it is on the scout. I prefer my other idea.

What do you think?

Yes this would balance everything out by a longshot.

I think even with a damage buff the Scout would still be outclassed by far. There needs to be more of an upside, something that comes in really handy for all situations.

I've thought about improving him in several manners to add it all up in a bid advantagous pot. In my opinion he should be able to go even faster and jump higher than he does now and recieve even more jetpack fuel. Let him dig twice as far with his blowtorch and drill and give him the option to either create thick tunnels (so his teammates can follow him) or thin tunnels as usually (so he can escape his foes). How about a special parachute for Scouts which is unaffected by wind and can be controlled to a higher extent than the normal variant?

The scientist could take a nerf, but only a very careful one. There is a very thin line here. How about this; The scientist heals all team worms each round as he currently does, including himself. The exception is that he can't heal other scientists on the team (physician, heal thy wormy self...). This would then nerf only multi-scientist teams, and then only a little (2 scientists + 2 others = nice buff for the other two each round and each scientist still gets one buff) which would lead to better mixes and more variety IMHO.

Quite a while ago (might have been on the beta forums, actually) I suggested healing for Scientists to decrease the more Scientists are on a team, i.e. a team with 2 Scientists only heals 4 points instead of 5, 3 Scientists heal 3 points and a team of 4 Scientists only recieves a health bonus of 2 points each turn (note: decreased health bonus for the entire team, not just Scientist worms). The healing would go up every time a Scientist dies though; should you be left with one Scientist being the only worm in your team you get the full 5 health points each turn.

Now that it's possible to have up to 8 worms in a team this method wouldn't work anymore (or we agree any team with more than 4 Scientists only recieves 1 health point for each Scientist's turn). Your idea does sound interesting, however. I just wish it would be possible to test this somehow.


And I'm actually surprised anyone is stillplayingit after the whole corrupt save fiasco. I haven't gone back since - any good will built for the series was pretty much destroyed in that 3 week period

The PC version wasn't affected by this. On the consoles they added a cheat code to unlock 100% of the game to make up for the corruption, as far as I know.

The unlock code was a joke. I was reluctant to use it but did anyway. I did not get my 800 coins as promised. I still had to replay ALL campaign and ALL puzzle missions. I had to earn coins, buy worms and set up formations all over again. WTH was the code for?

[QUOTE=Neat;789388]Definitely not cheap to use 4 scientists, but Thurbo, i'm inclined to disagree with you. From personal experience, 4 scientists fare better than 2 heavies and 2 scientists. I've killed a lot more teams with your setup than my setup (which is also 4 scientists) and I generally feel less intimidated by heavies.

Dude, you have no $#%ing idea what you're talking about. Go play classic if you are so lame that you need 20 extra health a turn! Are you serious? You are destroying the fact that there are classes by using only one of them. Clearly you are in fact a NEWB if you are using such a wimpy formation. I have no problem making CPU shots because that is how the game was designed. The only true formation is Sci,Sci,Heavy,Soldier as stated above. If my opponent is kind enough to only use one scientist, I would gladly sub in a scout. I also believe that the game was intended to be played with one of each class, any REAL wormer should be able to figure that out.

Actually the game is supposed to be designed so one can play and enjoy it with any class formation they want, which is why I think scouts should be buffed to get people to use them more. However there are definitely formations that will put you at a disadvantage.

Scientist is a class especially new players are easily drawn to as it immediately implies you don't have to be all that good with movement tools and don't need accurate aim. Just darkside, take a shot from time to time while hiding behind your sentry guns. It's just that players who know how to aim and use Heavies make short work of sentries and defensive constructions even from across the map if possible.
I'm sure that Scientists, although they have a damage debonus, can be as destructive as any class if only you can aim with them. It only takes a bit longer, that's what your additional health makes up for. From my experience though players with 3 or 4 Scientists in their team can't aim for f***. A good player and a team of Scientists apparently don't match.

Actually the game is supposed to be designed so one can play and enjoy it with any class formation they want, which is why I think scouts should be buffed to get people to use them more. However there are definitely formations that will put you at a disadvantage.

Yes, I agree with buffing the Scout. Even though he is my favorite class I don't think I would ever go into battle with a team full of them, and I'd also like to see him buffed to get more recognition so he isn't left out all the time.

Also, another suggestion. It's really hard to get the Scout to move through some of those forts, because he jumps to high/far, so maybe the Scout could have 2 different types of jumps. One jump makes him jump like the Scout already does, and another makes him jump like a Soldier. Maybe even add a third for extra high/long jump.

[QUOTE=Neat;789388]Definitely not cheap to use 4 scientists, but Thurbo, i'm inclined to disagree with you. From personal experience, 4 scientists fare better than 2 heavies and 2 scientists. I've killed a lot more teams with your setup than my setup (which is also 4 scientists) and I generally feel less intimidated by heavies.

Dude, you have no $#%ing idea what you're talking about. Go play classic if you are so lame that you need 20 extra health a turn! Are you serious? You are destroying the fact that there are classes by using only one of them. Clearly you are in fact a NEWB if you are using such a wimpy formation. I have no problem making CPU shots because that is how the game was designed. The only true formation is Sci,Sci,Heavy,Soldier as stated above. If my opponent is kind enough to only use one scientist, I would gladly sub in a scout. I also believe that the game was intended to be played with one of each class, any REAL wormer should be able to figure that out.

The game wasn't intended to be played with any single formation in mind, like Thurbo said, otherwise the game would start you with 1 of each worm and wouldn't allow customisation. As for destroying the fact there are classes, i'm clearly not, since my team doesn't affect what other people use. Thurbo is not bothered by what I said, so it doesn't destroy classes at all. If you're going to use a scout, that's fine by me, but most players will recognise that scouts have situational advantage at best. They aren't worth the paltry damage they dish out. If I want to use 4 scientists, I can. It isn't my fault that team17 didn't balance the scout properly for standard matches.

Like I said, from personal experience, 4 scientists works better than 2 heavies and 4 scientists. So I do in fact know what i'm talking about from a personal level. Maybe you should think carefully about what you're actually suggesting before you try and make a criticism of what I said, and there's no reason to be rude to me either.

@Thurbo. I can do basic aim, whatever will get me by, but i'm nowhere near the level of the CPUs. I've already said I don't like heavies because of their pathetic movement. I don't want to be stuck in a position where I can't use jetpack or do a simple backflip over a normal piece of terrain. I used to take 2 heavies and 2 scientists until the heavies let me down in times of need. If it means my teams lacking some firepower because of that, so be it, but my strategy works from movement and gaining a superior position (as well as a little darksiding when push comes to shove). Using the rope only works in certain situations (indoor maps) and considering the temperamental nature of the rope in this game compared to other worms games, i'd rather not rely on it. Teleswap and teleport should be used in emergencies, also because they cancel out your turn. At least i've rarely seen teleports used tactically well when the person still has other movement tools. To insinuate that i'm a "new player" because of my team choice, is a little insulting to say the least. It suggests I can't stand to be out in the open and just hide every turn for the extra health. That's not how I play. I use the extra health as an added bonus that will accumulate nicely towards the end of the game. I have 206 hours clocked on the game, a good deal of that is multiplayer play.

I'm guessing I have 500 hours. I make the rope look easy bud. And I still insist that 4 scientists is for rookies.

Maybe the scouts should not activate mines unless really really close. But I guess that's not enough for them to become better.

make it optional and everyone will be happy.

They serve multiple purposes boys and ladies.

1. they move and jump like a god worm.
2. they rope like a beast
3. the collect crates like a boss
4. there are several weapons that aren't effected by worm class, i.e. teleswap, teleshield, poison, etc
5. the most interesting thing I've concluded is that the scout in fact generates crates faster than any other class giving my third reason a huge boost

I hope this helps anyone who contemplates using a scout.