Nerf the Queen Screech + Runner Drag combo to the GROUND!!!

Development Ideaguys
1

Title. Queen screech is bad enough, considering how long of a stun you are in when queen well screams. But by far the most egregious, unfun, bullshit part of queen screech is how runners can drag you multiple screens across in the matter of a few seconds.

You might say, “but marines can just shoot the runner.”

Objection!

Take a look at this. No, marines cannot shoot the runner fast enough to save a poor marine being dragged by a runner. Want to know why? Oh, there’s many reasons why. One, queen screech has a HUGE radius. Runners are also typically close to queen as well. Meaning anyone who is closest to the runner will be stunned and unable to shoot at time. Even if they are awaken up, the runner would have dragged them to the South Pole by now. Keep in mind runners can drag caps relatively fast as seen in the video and bullets lose damage overtime. Grenades CAN work, but marines aren’t gonna always have a m79 or GL spec hero on their side. And sometimes, they can get stunned to. So not a good counter to runner dragging. And even then, there will always be xenos next to the runner to secure the cap further or tank bullets, making rescuing the cap straight up impossible. You could also argue CAS is a counter, but it really isn’t, especially if the runner just looks at the chat.

There is zero risk, huge reward if runners drag marines during queen screech. It’s an unfun and unfair thing in CM13 that needs to be axed immediately.

Here’s an idea for you.

Make it so that if runner or any xeno tries to drag a marine from screech, it wakes them up instantly from the stun. The runner could try to pounce, but then it’d reset the tackle chance and give marines more time to rush in and actually save the poor marine who is being dragged. By the way, marines can wake up other marines by clicking at them with help intent during screech, so why not the same for xenomorphs? I think this would be a great feature, would make xenos have to get more creative about getting captures, and would also give marines more time to breathe and react during queen screech. Again, there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING YOU CAN DO if queen screeches at you and runner drags you.

I’m a xeno main, and even I despise queen screech + runner drag.

I broke my promise about complaining in the fourms, but I’ll try to make this my last one. It’s just such an egregious and unfun feature and I’m surprised this is still even in the game. I should take a break from fourms posting, so I’ll make this my last one for a long while, for real.

I make this post with love for CM13, okay? I have no ill will towards the devs or anyone. I am thankful the devs made this great game, and it has taken a lot of dedication to make CM13 the way it is. But I feel this needs to be fixed.

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No.

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Oh hey Bea! ~Sable White

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now do it again but queen is giving frenzy pheros

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Screenshot 2025-05-10 025956

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thanks for ur daily mald post

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Can you believe it guys? Queen rework! in 2025! Wohoo!!

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When we do this, let’s also nerf runner spam tackle/drag speed so they can’t subvert the risk of devouring

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let’s just remove runner guys it creates more problems than it solves

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have you ever actually played a runner dragging marines off on screes?

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I’ve seen enough.

Nerf runners buff shotguns.

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Not really, but I’ve seen tons of queen screeches and one or two runners just capping marine per screech. It’s a really slop mechanic.

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you should give it a shot, its by no means rocket science, but considering every marine left clicks in the general direction of a scree and as a runner you have the health of a parakeet, I have just gotten shredded a million times after one or two successful scree caps, usually by someone not aiming for me

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the half a dozen other marines that instantly surge from offscreen to shoot you to death three tiles into the drag:

honestly after playing forever it’s one of those things that kinda sucks but is necessary for the game to make hive comebacks or else it’s gg for a lot more rounds and fucks with the balance

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I agree that this combination is very powerful and very frustrating to experience as a Marine.

From the Runner’s perspective, its viability ranges based on several factors. Trying to do a Runner+Drag combo in a hell chokepoint littered with other bodies is an exercise in frustration, and all it takes is one Grenadier or explosive user who avoided the screech to ruin your day.

Acid Runners are also viable to pull off this move, their health and defence boost do increase their survivability, at the cost of some movement.

As others have pointed out, this strategy can become mandatory to make a hive survive, a guaranteed cap or two every screech will stabilise a hive so long as the marines can’t break the frontline.

I feel that this strategy becomes more common on maps or situations where the Marines have no real ability to flank and are forced to push a single chokepoint. The caves on 624 are the most egregious example. It’s also an issue compounded by the impossibility for Marines to split their force to pressure multiple points

I’d love to see this strategy be removed but I fear its presence is a necessity at this time.

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Nerfing the “I win” button seems the hardest thing to do because people have different ideas for it. Personally i think the queen screech needs to charge their screech.

The longer the more powerful, making a low audible sound when it is charging. And to prevent it from being abuse, if they cancel the charge they get a certain amount of cool down

As for the runner, man I hate those combo, instead of “carrying”

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They can. If that was a real combat the runner dragging from the edge of the screech would be dead 10 times over.

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The author is marine agent.
Who kills all caps and refuse to deliver em. fr

Recent changes made everything, to make sure, that xenos had to rely on this combo. Instead of normal capping

Can’t wait for queen rework.

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I don’t think straight up removing runners from being able to drag a marine that was screeched is needed, but slowing it’s speed and lowering it’s tackle chance would be more than enough, so they are more in line with other xeno castes when dragging screeched marines.

Though, xenos having one burst per cap instead of the ol’ two has made stuff like this almost necessary as steelpoint said. I honestly think removing two bursts per cap has kinda ruined xeno balance (at least with regards to attrition, especially on lower pops).

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Re add Queen Charge.

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