So, I’ve had a few days to play around with the new stuff that came out in the Twinfusor patch for Tribes:Ascend.
For those that missed it, the main thrust is the addition of three new weapons: the light, medium and heavy Twinfusor. These do pretty much what it says on the tin; you can fire two less damaging discs in rapid succession before having to reload. Also added were new maps, balance changes, weapon tweaks, and a party system (like Smite’s) so we can all go to the ball together! Full change list is here. Note how they’re really pushing the twinfusors by making them better for disc jumps and nerfing impact nitrons. It’s also worth noting that blue plate specials should be easier now – can’t say I’m a fan of that. There are also some new skins and voice packs…up to you I guess!
Anyway, back to my point. I’m no pro, but Tribes is one of the few games I don’t suck at totally, so I loaded up my soldier with a medium Twinfusor and jumped into some TDM to test it out. Once I’d got back into the swing of a spinfusor (my normal load out is Gasts Rifle/Thumper DX), things went ok. If I stayed on the edge of a fight, I could fire in a couple of discs and get the odd kill/assist. Where it all went horribly wrong is when I got attacked directly. I kept bumping into a similarly ranked soldier with a standard spinfusor and every time, I lost – getting the timing right to hit with one disc wasn’t too bad, but then following the target after he bounced randomly to get him with the second was next to impossible. So in a battle of DPS, you’re screwed. Incidentally, I missed the rifle so badly when it came to finishing off a target – the Eagle Pistol just doesn’t hack it.
So it’s not a duelling weapon. Fine, I thought. Let’s go into some CTF and see how we do. Once again as a soldier, I went off to attack the flagstand and wow, is that what this weapon’s designed for! Flying high up on a trajectory to land on the stand, firing off around 8-10 discs, there was nobody left when I landed. Had I been on a team that knew how to play, the pathfinders would’ve had an easy time taking the flag (as it was, everyone was a brute or going around getting pointless kills or a sentinel that couldn’t hit the back of a barn door at 20 paces).
After that, I got to see the sharp end of how this works; our team had no heavy on flag, so I donned my doombringer suit and planted my fat arse in the way of those pesky pathfinders. Except, I didn’t. Aside from the usual frustrations of dodging juggernaut mortars and infiltrators..well..infiltrating, I suddenly had a million twinfusor discs flying at me. I spent more time respawning than I did shooting. The other team were half decent, their pathfinders linking up nicely with the other players, and so it was a quick 0-5 loss for my dribbling excuse of a team (seriously – four sentinels?!)
So there you have it – if you’re a dribbler after an amazing KDR, don’t bother, just uninstall and do the world a favour. But if you’re a team player, then this spells some unpleasant times ahead for any base defences.
