/tg/Station 13

Recently, mappers have been playing around with the mechanics of having the station itself exist on connected and interactive z-levels. MMM's work on donut has been a particularly notable example of this. But, in all this excitement to see if we can, nobody's stopped to ask if we should.

Is adding a third dimension in a game strictly bound to two dimensions really a good idea, from both a design and gameplay perspective? I fear that the potential complications that this change can bring about are entirely unnecessary, and don't necessarily bring any meaningful mechanical depth to the game. It feels like more of a "hey look at this neat trick we can do in the code" than something designed to enhance the player experience.

pros: ceiling raids, realistic pit falls with traps, stairs, sewers, throwing bombs at people on the underfloor

cons: ceiling is ghetto telesci, being trapped in the upfloor because someone blew up the stairs, rcd grief

Lifeweb has this and they're fine. I believe Bay and some other servers may have it as well, BUT I don't think any of those servers have to deal with:
1. Singularities
2. Teslas
3. Dragons swooping from above (this can be considered weird right now, but this would mean that our rooms and station would be really fucking tall)
4. Chasms (there used to be chasms that only dropped you down one z-level wtf where did they go)
5. Blobs
and probably some other shit that hasn't been thought about.

Ayy Lemoh wrote:3. Dragons swooping from above (this can be considered weird right now, but this would mean that our rooms and station would be really fucking tall)

The third dimension in general has been pretty easily handwaved due to it just not really existing in our mindset.

Ayy Lemoh wrote: 4. Chasms (there used to be chasms that only dropped you down one z-level wtf where did they go)

chasms automatically switch to dropping you down one z-level if there is a z-level configured as "down"

deedubya wrote:Recently, mappers have been playing around with the mechanics of having the station itself exist on connected and interactive z-levels. MMM's work on donut has been a particularly notable example of this. But, in all this excitement to see if we can, nobody's stopped to ask if we should.

Is adding a third dimension in a game strictly bound to two dimensions really a good idea, from both a design and gameplay perspective? I fear that the potential complications that this change can bring about are entirely unnecessary, and don't necessarily bring any meaningful mechanical depth to the game. It feels like more of a "hey look at this neat trick we can do in the code" than something designed to enhance the player experience.

Here's your shit thread, where you have the gall to claim Mmmiracles has been making a multi z map since August of last year to show off. The complete nads on this guy to really say the numerous coders and mappers throughout the years (a lot of which fucked off, mind you) did it just for themselves, without even considering if it's an actual feature tg should have or the problems that come with it. The man who did not join the multi-z test server miracles threw up even for a second, and has otherwise not played a LICK of multi-z beyond winter ball believes that the """""potential complications""""" make it more of a hassle than it's worth.

tldr; deedubya is a fucking ungulate

I played on a server where the brig had a walkway over it for the warden to watch everyone and I was detective so I didn't have brig access to actually put someone in a cell so instead I dragged them to the walkway and yeeted them over the edge

shit was cash

holy moly

Armhulen wrote:

deedubya wrote:Recently, mappers have been playing around with the mechanics of having the station itself exist on connected and interactive z-levels. MMM's work on donut has been a particularly notable example of this. But, in all this excitement to see if we can, nobody's stopped to ask if we should.

Is adding a third dimension in a game strictly bound to two dimensions really a good idea, from both a design and gameplay perspective? I fear that the potential complications that this change can bring about are entirely unnecessary, and don't necessarily bring any meaningful mechanical depth to the game. It feels like more of a "hey look at this neat trick we can do in the code" than something designed to enhance the player experience.

Here's your shit thread, where you have the gall to claim Mmmiracles has been making a multi z map since August of last year to show off. The complete nads on this guy to really say the numerous coders and mappers throughout the years (a lot of which fucked off, mind you) did it just for themselves, without even considering if it's an actual feature tg should have or the problems that come with it. The man who did not join the multi-z test server miracles threw up even for a second, and has otherwise not played a LICK of multi-z beyond winter ball believes that the """""potential complications""""" make it more of a hassle than it's worth.

tldr; deedubya is a fucking ungulate

Or, rather than implying that this is a personal attack on anyone, perhaps it's a thread posted to solicit feedback and discussion on a feature that could become incredibly game-breaking while also being entirely unnecessary to the core experience. Your implication that I have something against MMM is also baseless and untrue. If anything, I respect his dedication and the effort he's put forth into trying to improve a map that the majority of the playerbase wants nothing to do with.

tl;dr keep your shitposting in the hut, where it belongs, fucking mong

I think it is a bad choice.

It makes orientation harder and less intuitive. You can't even represent the station in a flat image any more.

I think it can lead to problems, but it can also lead to some really interesting map designs and clever uses.
Imagine if all of maintenance was like actual vent/crawl spaces and were UNDER the station. You could do interesting stuff like removing floor to push people into maintenance, or get ladders to climb up INTO spaces etc etc

I think theres a lot of cool potential

multi-z has some design issues but nothing that can't be resolved and making a feedback thread without actually having a full multi-z map is useless as you're just all gonna end up arguing without anything to base your opinion off of and end up looking like Ungulates.

Qustinnus wrote:multi-z has some design issues but nothing that can't be resolved and making a feedback thread without actually having a full multi-z map is useless as you're just all gonna end up arguing without anything to base your opinion off of and end up looking like Ungulates.

Seriously this is so dumb. After the map is made everyone will just go "well it's already made".


>I think it can lead to problems, but it can also lead to some really interesting map designs and clever uses.
Imagine if all of maintenance was like actual vent/crawl spaces and were UNDER the station. You could do interesting stuff like removing floor to push people into maintenance, or get ladders to climb up INTO spaces etc etc

How is that different from removing a wall and doing the same?

CPTANT wrote:

Qustinnus wrote:multi-z has some design issues but nothing that can't be resolved and making a feedback thread without actually having a full multi-z map is useless as you're just all gonna end up arguing without anything to base your opinion off of and end up looking like Ungulates.

Seriously this is so dumb. After the map is made everyone will just go "well it's already made".

Wrong, see: the 8 maps that were removed from rotation due to a mix of lack of maintenance and layout issues.

no because it completely fucks with how combat and engagements work in this game

Flatulent wrote:no because it completely fucks with how combat and engagements work in this game

Combat already needs an overhaul. Removing the stun/slip-based meta was a step in the right direction, but we’re a long way from escaping the zip-around in circles and click-until-horizontal system that we currently have.

But you still raise a good point. Future combat innovations should keep mutli-Z in mind.

multiz should be used when a map needs the extra space, it shouldn’t be “this map doesn’t have multiz, better fix it!” when the map wasn’t designed with multiz in mind and adding another layer just bloats the size of an already complete station. Multiz is interesting, but not necessarily to engage with- Eris and Lifeweb use multiz to make an environment claustrophobic and confusing while still being able to fit 60 players in a quarter the space of your average station. Those aren’t things we really need here.

if you map bees away from botany we can't be friends.

only acceptable if they have a cool multi-level bar

we don't ask ourselves such questions.

We do because we can.

oranges wrote:we don't ask ourselves such questions.

We do because we can.

coincidentally, we have combustible lemons in the game

on-topic though, I really think this is the kind of thing we can only answer after playtesting. theorycrafting about how players will use mechanics in a game as open-ended as this is rarely effective.

Considering I think I'm one of the few players who actually regularly plays on servers with multi-z I think my opinion holds a bit of weight.

Yes, it is complicated the first few weeks as you adjust to thinking in three dimensions but you will adapt once you've explored the areas enough times. It gives you entirely new ways of approaching problems and causing/experiencing conflict in a way that's new and interesting. On Eris, for example, you can use the verticality and hollow walls around departments to set-up Excelsior workshops barely a few feet away from somebody else working in the department with them being none the wiser. Hell, the AI core can be quietly infiltrated by cutting your way through the atmospheric pipeline route on the top level and drop down into a hollow wall behind the AI Upload consoles and the AI in question wouldn't likely notice your presence.

I do agree that you can't merely adjust an existing map to be mutli-z, you have to design the station entirely with multi-z in mind or else you're going to have balance issues of assistants deconning a tile of floor, dropping down into armoury, stealing everything, making a table and climbing back out. But to be honest, Box and Meta could benefit from an overhaul if I'm being frank. The current maps don't even make use of piping and cable layers to their full potential and, with verticality, you can shrink the horizontal space a department takes up - meta always got shit for being too big, even adding one extra z-level would let you cut the space it uses up by half, and with less space being required by the essentials, mappers can be more creative in their layouts with the real estate freed up.

I kind of look forward to department design using multiple z levels. Imagine medbay where the break room and storage room are upstairs from the rest of the department.

Slapping multi-z on the maps we have is a bad idea but if it is actually designed around it you can get some pretty compact but functional station designs.

peoplearestrange wrote:I think it can lead to problems, but it can also lead to some really interesting map designs and clever uses.
Imagine if all of maintenance was like actual vent/crawl spaces and were UNDER the station. You could do interesting stuff like removing floor to push people into maintenance, or get ladders to climb up INTO spaces etc etc

I think theres a lot of cool potential

Baystation has this, I think it's the 3rd zlevel

can you look up

cacogen wrote:can you look up

this is actually the most important thing you can add for multiz because without it you will just get continously griefed by people upstairs who throw chinese children at you from there

how do bee dynamics work on multi z tho, do they fall?

Tlaltecuhtli wrote:how do bee dynamics work on multi z tho, do they fall?

flying mobs do not fall, if bees aren't flying mobs i'll be shocked

Armhulen wrote:

Tlaltecuhtli wrote:how do bee dynamics work on multi z tho, do they fall?

flying mobs do not fall, if bees aren't flying mobs i'll be shocked

holy shit imagine if you get crushed to death by falling bees

Tlaltecuhtli wrote:how do bee dynamics work on multi z tho, do they fall?

well, according to all known laws of aviation...

Cobby wrote:if you map bees away from botany we can't be friends.

keep bees in space station

CPTANT wrote:Imagine if all of maintenance was like actual vent/crawl spaces and were UNDER the station. You could do interesting stuff like removing floor to push people into maintenance, or get ladders to climb up INTO spaces etc etc

cacogen wrote:can you look up

These are the primary issues I have with it. It's absolutely not intuitive, and the perspective we play with clearly isn't meant to account for up or down. How will you even know there's something above or below you? "just learn the map lol" isn't intuitive at all, and doesn't account for things that you'd be able to see (exposed upper walkways for example) but can't because of limited perspective.

cacogen wrote:can you look up

On most servers with mutli-z, you can unless there's a ceiling right above you.

I've thought about this before, but my biggest concern is repairs.
Let's say an explosion punches a hole in the station. Does it blow a hole in the ceiling? How do you repair that hole? Do you have to climb onto the roof to patch it? Is there some weird interface for building a ceiling from the floor below? How do you even convey a lack of ceiling in a top-down view? And What about gasses? Do they travel across Z levels? What's the extra performance cost on that?

OP could literally just go to one of few servers with multi Z level maps, which are all doing fine, and save good people of this forum a bit of time.

Vore has an amazing map, suggest everyone go play a round and run around

well i would but y'know