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As I'm quite used to taking comments of criticizm on the "balance" of the mod, I think it's very important to point out that this mod has been acclaimed for it's balance. Not only by myself (and believe me I have no problem owning up to my contribution) but by the community at large (not just this one). It was infact the balance that first brought the authors of WCS to contact me. I have since had contact with other authors of previous mods for the hl1 engine and have used their code to improve ours.

As an experienced gamer, and a long time fan of this particular mod, I do have a great deal of insight as to what exactly brings about balance in it. I'm not saying it's perfect by any means, but I will say that it does a fair enough job at it. There are plenty of other servers out there which do not share my sense of balance. You will notice them almost immediately. As you wont be able to choose certain races or there will be items allowing invincibility (godmode), etc.

Let me just touch on a few things to start with, as there's no way I'm going through the entire list...

#1 - Suicide Explosion. Despite what some people think, the damage is pro-rated. I have gone so far as to use other methods other then just using an env_explosion entity to deal the damage. And all of them yeild the same results. The damage works perfectly fine, and I will not use the slower methods for no reason.

#2 - Tomes are buyable at anytime. You can merely drop ur item and purchase a tome. I don't care if it bothers you. Infact it's supposed to. Allow me to explain it.

The shopmenu is an extremely powerful option that EVERY player has at their disposal. As such the choices you make are crucial. If you choose to fill your first slot with an ankh, that is your choice to do so. Nothing says however that you cannot drop it, buy ur tome, and re-buy it. However the reason it is done this way is so that lets say you rack up $16,000 and have an ankh.... This prevents you from spamming a tome before a bloodmage has the opportunity of robbing you blind. If you choose to leave the spot free so you can spam the tome, that means you run the risk of possibly missing out on an ankh or claws or other such items.

There is nothing that prevents you from dropping an ankh, buying ur tome, then re-buying the ankh except time. Oh, but isn't time everyone's enemy in the end? This is the design. Much like in life, you have choices to make. Nothing says you can't change your mind, but there's always a chance your time might run out.

#3 - HP Cap. This is NOT going anywhere. I'm sorry to all the Undead fans out there. The only way to get above 100hp is buy a periapt. This does not weaken the Vampiric Aura despite your cries (which believe me fall on deaf ears). Every Single player and race in the game has a HP cap. It will not be removed, or changed. There are plenty of skilled players who make tons of Headshots. Headshots yeild incredible ammounts of damage, and therefor yeild incredible ammounts hp back. Could you imagine Neg without a HP cap? He already pwns an entire team the way it is. Believe me, it's there for a reason.

Now, it occurs to me that people are once again having thoughts of new races. However, Traps are not coming. I repeat for those who just dozed off during this rather lengthy post....

TRAPS ARE NOT COMING!

It is not because they can't be done, (however not as described with the "use" key) but still are not being introduced. Wards are as close to a trap as you're getting. These things tend to cause serious performance issues as is, I wont be adding more.

Side-boards will NOT be added either. A side-board is an expression used to describe something that specifically targets 1 other thing. In this case an item that targets specifically 1 other skill or race. The necklace is pretty close, but yet fairly universal as it targets all races with activatible ultimates.

I don't want to introduce a 3rd shopmenu. We already have 3 skills + ultimate + 2 items. I think that's plenty of options as is. Honestly now, lets not get carried away here.

I would also like to touch on crypt lords ultimate. There is a 35 sec cool down on ultimates. Their ultimate does at most 35 damage. This means that even with 2 rings, you will regen all the health lost by the time they activate it again. Lets not forget you can block the ultimate with a necklace, or you can evade it, or even reflect some of it.

There will not be a CoH added to vamp. That is a silly concept in general. Go play WCS if you want that along with uncapped hp. That was a point we argued on many times, and have agreed to disagree on. Vamp has always been a 100% CoH, I will not tarnish the race by changing it. Nor do I want to find an effect to try and show it happening. While we're back on the subject, could you imagine a human with a mask... if vamp gave you uncapped hp, humans would dominate once again.

There is a reason we keep the HP reasonable. It is to prevent the mod from becoming too over-powered. You say that nubs die fast, well that's the same in every game. No one jumps on a new game they've never played before is an instant pro. Although much of CS is still the same with this mod, it is still much like playing a new game. You don't expect players to run around that fast, and come out of choke points before you can get there. Yes some skills will offer an advantage, but with you being such a higher level then they are, they will gain levels that much faster just by hitting you. You gain more expience from hitting players that higher levels, infact it's based on the difference between your levels. You could gain as much as 10xp per hit, when combined with say a tmp, that could be well over that of what you gain for killing 4 players.

Anyways, that's all I'm saying for now. This is already so long that 90% of people wont want to read it anyways.