Nightmare

[onleavedontatme]

Bottom post of the previous page:

Kor you bad man, lings can transform sting people into nightmares - I presume they themselves can also turn into nightmares.

I just had a NIGHTMARISH round where 50% of the crew were nightmares, and 100% of the crew were zombies. So we had a fuckload of zombimares.

https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/30681

Sounds fun!!! as a one off thing though

[ShadowDimentio]

I'm fairly certain its baton and cablecuffs got removed

[Anonmare]

Why'd we give borgs stuns again anyway

Because you took away the dedicated stun borg

Does default not still have a baton?

It has zipties but no baton. Ironically, it's still better at security than the pecekeeper borg is.

Standard module is a jack-of-all-trades and can do basic construction, basic mining, basic cleaning, basic first aid and basic peacekeeping but it's outperformed by the specialised modules in their area of expertise.

Except peacekeeping. Peacekeepr is the meme module.

[Incomptinence]

Baton removal from standard was the height of pants wetting weakness.

On that same angle expect this neat antag to be removed or neutered in a few months.

[HeatherK]

Should the armblade fry the headlamp until they visit a recharging station? Until a roboticist puts a new flashlight in them? Leave it as is and the nightmare should just grab sunglasses/a flash?

I think having it temporarily fry the headlamps for at least maybe 20 seconds or until recharging/repaired could work, as otherwise it'll become a whole meta to stock up on flashes and sunglasses the moment someone shouts that something's gone bump in the night. It could work to just made the light knockout thing last a bit longer.

If there's ever a lore writeup for them, I hope the twin genocides of 9/11/2557 gets mentioned, when people started worshipping and becoming the things, and then promptly being wiped out by sec and the borgies for dank memes.

Edit: A hard counter I noticed the other day when I annoyed Kor for a TC trade (sorry about that) was a shocked door. Just a shocked door in a lit room. If a nightmare's needing to use a door to escape, they've either gotten greedy or they're doing it wrong. But it still remains a hard counter against nightmares that sillycons can still have, even if they lose their BORGO PURSUIT LIGHTSHOW killing machine schtick.

[Oldman Robustin]

Had a longer run with a Nightmare today:

1) Make the armblade depower (not just temporarily, require repairs before it can repower) and pry doors

2) Make the offhand a low-key "shadow shield" with a 50% block rate

I can guarantee you that the only direction for the Nightmare meta right now is "figure out how to cheese shit with your free hand". Using that hand to make water slip traps, get a stun baton, sabotage atmos, subvert the AI, use traitor gear, etc. Not healthy for a side-antag.

Having a bunch of pried doors in the path of the Nightmare would also make it more atmospheric.

[Nabski]

There are a bunch of spots where you come into a room expecting it to be dark enough to leave, then some light around a corner is enough to trap you meaning you need to climb a counter break a glass and hit the bulb.

Ended up in a spot between two walls, plastic flaps, and some equipment. Couldn't jaunt away, couldn't walk, the only choice was to smack down the computer to let me out.

If you're jaunting instead of opening doors it's enough to alert people you exist and then they start hunting.

Out of the five times I've gone for it, two have ended painfully from borgs, Two from putting myself in a shitty unmovable spot, and one from an assistant with a flash. I need to get good I've yet to last until the shuttle is called.

Could the Nightmare emit a small amount of antilight like shadowshrooms (or are those just tinting everything a very dark blue)? Maybe the anti-light grows the longer you stand still so that it's less likely you'll get yourself stuck.

[Luke Cox]

Looks pretty cool, kinda bummed about them being yet another side antag though

[Incomptinence]

Ya we're pretty desperate for new non conversion rounds. Hell i spruiked for 8 abductors as mode when theu came in.

[Oldman Robustin]

We're going to have only 2 conversion modes soon. I'd argue that we need a good one to replace the void that Sling/Gang/CC/HoG have filled over the years, those modes had issues but they still gave us new gameplay.

For non-conversion modes we just need fresh ideas to traitors, they've become extremely stale.

I would like to see side antags like Nightmare have a chance to spawn at roundstart in lieu of another traitor or ling. Same with abductors.

[onleavedontatme]

I was thinking of having a 5-10% chance for a side antag to spawn roundstart in any mode but I am worried it will just turn into cultists with converted abdcutors or security nightmare slaughtering nuke ops.

I guess ~20% or so in traitor might work

[Armhulen]

I was thinking of having a 5-10% chance for a side antag to spawn roundstart in any mode but I am worried it will just turn into cultists with converted abdcutors or security nightmare slaughtering nuke ops.

I guess ~20% or so in traitor might work

If you're able to capture and convert a nightmare in cult you should earn the right to use the nightmare

and ops have tons of equip for fighting nightmares if they lose to a naked teleporty man with an armblade boo on them

[leibniz]

I was thinking of having a 5-10% chance for a side antag to spawn roundstart in any mode but I am worried it will just turn into cultists with converted abdcutors or security nightmare slaughtering nuke ops.

I guess ~20% or so in traitor might work

If you're able to capture and convert a nightmare in cult you should earn the right to use the nightmare

and ops have tons of equip for fighting nightmares if they lose to a naked teleporty man with an armblade boo on them

>implying they want to fight back against becoming double antag

[Armhulen]

I was thinking of having a 5-10% chance for a side antag to spawn roundstart in any mode but I am worried it will just turn into cultists with converted abdcutors or security nightmare slaughtering nuke ops.

I guess ~20% or so in traitor might work

If you're able to capture and convert a nightmare in cult you should earn the right to use the nightmare

and ops have tons of equip for fighting nightmares if they lose to a naked teleporty man with an armblade boo on them

>implying they want to fight back against becoming double antag

it sounds way funner to fuck with the cult zip in zip out than join them but i guess that could be a problem

[Oldman Robustin]

I was thinking of having a 5-10% chance for a side antag to spawn roundstart in any mode but I am worried it will just turn into cultists with converted abdcutors or security nightmare slaughtering nuke ops.

I guess ~20% or so in traitor might work

I'm sorry were those supposed to be examples of why NOT to do this?

I've been contemplating giving nearly every mode a ~50% chance of having a "false flag" agent whose job is basically to fuck with the mode-meta. The hardest part is having the agent become a visible and convincing threat but with items or instructions that would prevent them from teaming up with or shitting on the round's "true" antags.

[onleavedontatme]

I think an unassailable cult base on the centcomm z level would be fun exactly once yeah.

Like you said it'd be pretty tricky to make it into a three way battle instead of security or the antags just getting a member with super powers to kill everyone

[Oldman Robustin]

I'm starting to think people are realizing (now that summon locations are limited) that holing up isn't a great cult strategy. You can't just chill off-station, nab the target, then use a manifest ghost army to finish off your summon in "Port Aft Stern Starboard Solar Maintenance" or "Abandoned Aux Storage".

With summons happening in somewhat public locations I've seen plenty of previously easy cult wins collapse when their summoning gets raided. The mode's emphasis is shifting towards getting sufficient numbers to protect a summon location.

Anyway im getting off track. Isn't there an unconvertable var/flag/something that would let the side antags be conversion immune, so there's no worry about them joining a cult or revolution?

[Luke Cox]

If you're going to put this much effort into side antag development, they really need to see more play. I wouldn't mind the side antag spawn chance being as high as 50%. Bear in mind that they fuck with other antagonists too.

[onleavedontatme]

Better to start off rare and have people wanting more than start off with it being too common (especially when bugs/balance are being ironed out) and have everyone sour on the idea entirely.

Unconvertable var would probably be good. Would let them work with whoever without any OOC protections for the alliance or easy HUD.

[oranges]

delusional robustin still thinks conversion modes can be good

[kevinz000]

nightmares are weak
just keep a taser with a gunlight and another light
keep gunlight off
run around with other lights to force it to un-jaunt
take out taser and shoot them
if they hit you before you can shoot them turn on taser light for another try
almost gaurunteed to kill them if your aim doesn't suck shit/your reflexes aren't snail-speed.

or just build planetstation floodlights in every corner of maint.

[Melonmancer]

Sometimes this happens (Got nightmare from Pride's Mirror)

You can't break your way out and you can't destroy the light, so you just slowly die.

[onleavedontatme]

Not sure that will ever be fixable short of remapping all the ruins that use magic lighting

[ShadowDimentio]

Do that then, magic lighting is stupid and should be purged wherever found.

[onleavedontatme]

I don't want to spend the time to do it. You're welcome to though

[AnonymousNow]

I feel as though nightmares are an interesting antagonist, if they AREN'T killing people. If they have objectives to do so, then what's the point?

It should be something that sows discord and chaos, not just kills. So very boring.

[Durkel]

They're fine and you're just upset I edgelorded behind you and ruined your xenobio experience.

I think they would be good to have spawn in mid game or have one round start to make maint really dangerous.

[AnonymousNow]

I'm reflecting the concensus of the chat at the time, and feelings regarding the nightmare through testing. You disappoint me, Durkel.

[Durkel]

If we took the consensus of dead chat with any merit we would quite literally have no source of death on the station.

[Oldman Robustin]

Still just feels too fragile, even when I go and pre-emptively create escape routes, carefully plan my appearances, devise all sorts of contingencies, prepare multiple safe havens, and do the shit that 99% of our playerbase wouldn't consider/bother carrying out - I still get dunked in relatively short order because of how little utility you have in practice.

The shadow jaunt simply needs to be more robust. I find myself literally never using it because of how fragile it is. With the inherent lag of SS13 (especially when moving that fast) the jaunt feels almost suicidal - before you can even see a threat you end up materializing a few feet in front of a sec officer. It's only useful in a defensive context and even then its uses are surprisingly narrow, basically it boils down to situations where you are 1v1, knock out someone's lights, but they stun you immediately after. That's pretty much it.

You're SOL against ranged (especially considering that you're often confined to maint which is 1x1 for easy peasy tazing) and even in melee you're typically at a disadvantage against anyone prepared. Flashes are easy to find/produce and have a MASSIVE edge against nightmares, self-attacking with a flash means there's no way to retaliate or disable lights, setting you up for an incredibly easy follow up direct-flash.

The ultimate issue is that this character feels like it was designed with 1v1 in mind, and not the reality of maint getting stormed with bored validhunters. I think the most important change is to make the jaunt less of a PITA. Raise the lumonosity that causes it to fail and add a delay when it does fail so that lag related to going SANIC in BYOND isn't your #1 cause of death.

Possibly, in addition, just give the thing the darkness/smoke cloud that the old Shadowling had. This would give the Nightmare an effective escape tool (something Kor probably doesnt want) but a tradeoff would be that jaunting out of smoke will give your jaunt a smoke trail or visual effect indicating which direction you fled. The biggest problem with the old SLING jaunt was that you could go almost anywhere and people had a very small chance of being able to track you - knowing where the Nightmare fled (and knowing that it cant just jaunt over lit areas) - combined with a long cooldown it would make an escape spell much more reasonable.

Edit: Can't tell you how thrilled I am that miners got ANOTHER self-antag option.

[Cobby]

I mean you are a SIDE-antag, robustin.

[oranges]

robustin doesn't understand the concept of a game where he isn't front and center and the most important thing on the station

[Oldman Robustin]

The shadow jaunt is a huge QOL issue for the side antag. I play nightmare because I want something DIFFERENT than traitor round #5234809, I don't expect to be crazy robust but I've talked with other players I respect and we all agree that Nightmare just feels like a really gimpy foe who is only good at stomping assistants.

The more I play with the shadow jaunt the more it just frustrates me. Even if you try to use it defensively to escape a stun AFTER you managed to knock out someone's lights, the jaunt doesnt even cancel the stun so its just a matter of them flipping on another light while your invisible ass spazzes on the ground. I love the flavor but it's really just a weaker changeling right now.

Maybe I'm just confused when other side antags like morphs/ninjas/blobs/xenos are all very threatening but when we add Nightmare its ludicrous to expect it to be stronger than what ultimately plays like a skeleton with a sharpened spear.

[onleavedontatme]

the jaunt doesnt even cancel the stun

Fix for this was merged yesterday

[DemonFiren]

other players I respect

fake news

[Zarniwoop]

Nightmare needs a little somethin more to it. I have a few ideas. Maybe they'll fit, maybe they'll inspire some other ideas. Maybe you'll all hate them, I dunno, but the mode does need something

1) Nightmare gets a deployable drone in the form of a shadow-themed Revenant. The Nightmare finds a suitable place to hide and deploys its ghostly form to do this, that or the other thing. Perhaps you could lock abilities behind a wall similar to the Revenant's life energy while requiring the Nightmare to feed in it's Rev form. I'll leave the perks and drawbacks of the revenant form up to people more familiar with the finer details of the code.

2) Nightmare gets a sidekick in the form of a shadow-themed Revenant. Similar to 1, but uses a ghost role. On top of this, give the Nightmare an ability to build a shadow-emitting nest to feed stolen life-force to, unlocking the sidekick. If the nest is destroyed, the sidekick goes with it. The nesting concept could be used in any of these, really, but it seemed like the sidekick Rev required something to balance it out.

3) Nightmare gets the ability to spawn ghostie minions. Very weak, but useful in supporting Nightmare. Tie the limit of minions Nightmare can spawn to the amount of station engulfed in darkness. Able to move around in the light without being exposed but can't do any damage. Can just manipulate certain things and add to the spookiness. Tie their strengths and abilities to the progress of the Nightmare, mostly because I'd like them to be able to possess people for limited times, but that shouldn't be easily available.

I guess my thinking behind these and especially number 3 is that this could be a good spooky mode and we don't have enough of those. I'm just leaving the broad strokes here. Between the technical details that are best left to others and my tendency to start rambling off into the bushes, I should keep it short and sweet. I can expand if this gets any traction but I tried to get down the basic balancing and mechanics, the rest should come fairly easily if there's any interest.

[Hathkar]

New Passive Ability: Shadow Shoes
When in areas of shadow, the nightmare is treated as if they are wearing no-slip shoes.

[JJRcop]

I found that destroying apcs in 8 hits was safer than risking myself by going out and clicking on lights. When I died later, a couple people in deadchat said that it was kinda meta and the crew can't as easily recover from a dead APC than a few broken lights. I wasn't concerned that I depowered their machinery, I was mainly concerned wih their lights, and it's much easier to destroy an APC than finding all the lights and destroying them.

Should a nightmare's interaction with APCs be changed, or left as it is?

I think it should be modified slightly, like light eaters can disable the lighting of APCs, or break all lights connected to an APC, or a random one each time you hit an APC with the light eater.

[PKPenguin321]

or a random one each time you hit an APC with the light eater.

this sounds really cool