derailed thread

[captain sawrge]

Basically if the engine starts to output too much energy or starts malfunctioning/going critical, it'll spawn bluespace portal things. These might have different random effects, one might act as a hostile mob spawner, one might EMP, one might work like a powersink, others could start localized random events (wormholes, pyroclastic anomalies, radiation storms, gravity malfunction, etc.)
Maybe make it so they all drain some power from the engine while active?
To get rid of them, you'd have to go inside and do a little mini "dungeon" kind of thing:
\PvE fight against mobs,
solve a little puzzle (zelda style dungeon puzzles, layton riddles, figuring out how to activate a device similar to science/mining artifacts, etc.),
getting through a maze,
getting through some sort of hostile environment (lots of lava or fire, irradiated areas, low/high pressure, filled with gases like N2O, freon, plasma, etc., very dark,)

At the end there'd be some way to deactivate the anomaly as well as a portal out.

I think the main reward should be that the anomaly is closed and you don't have to deal with it, but maybe some form of loot would be neat? I think it would be interesting to have people really try to work the engine to get more anomalies to spawn so they could farm them if they're up to it. I'm not really sure what to give though. I don't know what would really be balanced or appropriate to put inside, but maybe neat little toys or useful items. Maybe a bottle of a rare chem, or a powertool, maybe it could spit out anomalous crystals rarely, I dunno.

Edit for an alternate implantation of this that doesn't require mapping a bunch of new things and putting them on a z-level or something:
Maybe instead of all of this, have the anomalies function similar to STALKER (http://pid.bungie.org/Roadside_Picnic_Artifacts.html) and have them appear on the station. I'm not entirely sure how this would work, either they come and go on their own or give the players some way to make them go away. Maybe have an item at the center that has to be activated similar to anomalous crystals. If you can figure out how to activate the anomaly, it'll kill the effect. Re-activating it causes the anomaly to start up again. Maybe people can find a use for em after they deactivate them.

[TheColdTurtle]

More supermatter shards as the loot

[DarkFNC]

You'd need some pretty amazing maze designs to prevent people from following the wall on their right all the way to the end of the maze, especially on a two dimensional game

[Jacough]

You'd need some pretty amazing maze designs to prevent people from following the wall on their right all the way to the end of the maze, especially on a two dimensional game

Alternatively take a page from Pacman and throw in some extremely aggressive mobs that are either invincible or insanely tough and require the players to run for their fucking lives and try to find ways around them

[DemonFiren]

You'd need some pretty amazing maze designs to prevent people from following the wall on their right all the way to the end of the maze, especially on a two dimensional game

Alternatively take a page from Pacman and throw in some extremely aggressive mobs that are either invincible or insanely tough and require the players to run for their fucking lives and try to find ways around them

It's gonna take all of two days for someone to come up with a way to block their pathfinding.

[kevinz000]

I'm porting the Supermatter cascade after the freeze

[Armhulen]

I'm porting the Supermatter cascade after the freeze

YES

[cedarbridge]

I'm porting the Supermatter cascade after the freeze

Hopefully porting with conditions that require effort and sabotage (like the current singulo) rather than "engineering couldn't figure out the engine on his first day on the job so the station's hosed."

[DarkFNC]

Is this the universe ending cascade we are talking about?

[Jacough]

I'm porting the Supermatter cascade after the freeze

Hopefully porting with conditions that require effort and sabotage (like the current singulo) rather than "engineering couldn't figure out the engine on his first day on the job so the station's hosed."

Accidents are funny every now and then though. If it was caused in a way that really requires engineering to fuck up on a whole new level of fucking up that could be great.

[cedarbridge]

I'm porting the Supermatter cascade after the freeze

Hopefully porting with conditions that require effort and sabotage (like the current singulo) rather than "engineering couldn't figure out the engine on his first day on the job so the station's hosed."

Accidents are funny every now and then though. If it was caused in a way that really requires engineering to fuck up on a whole new level of fucking up that could be great.

Right, accidents are funny, but we gated the singulo behind effort because it was entirely too easy for too long for antags to just slap the PA together and mash the button to get a singulo eating the station within 3 minutes of roundstart. The cascade doesn't just have a drift change of eating the station. It does eat the station.

[Screemonster]

Edit for an alternate implantation of this that doesn't require mapping a bunch of new things and putting them on a z-level or something:
Maybe instead of all of this, have the anomalies function similar to STALKER (http://pid.bungie.org/Roadside_Picnic_Artifacts.html) and have them appear on the station. I'm not entirely sure how this would work, either they come and go on their own or give the players some way to make them go away. Maybe have an item at the center that has to be activated similar to anomalous crystals. If you can figure out how to activate the anomaly, it'll kill the effect. Re-activating it causes the anomaly to start up again. Maybe people can find a use for em after they deactivate them.

If you're looking for temporary sub-sections of z-levels that are randomly generated, self-contained, garbage collected when they're no longer needed and the map-area reused for the next one, you could do worse than looking at vorestation's roguelike asteroid belt miner shuttle.

Not even kidding.

[DemonFiren]

>learning from vorestation
Oh baby.

[Remie Richards]

Latest commit f027045 12 days ago Leshana Added vore capabilies to the new simple_animal system.

AAAAAAAAAARRRGH

[DemonFiren]

[youtube]t7-BX4bWYvg[/youtube]

[Jacough]

I'm porting the Supermatter cascade after the freeze

Hopefully porting with conditions that require effort and sabotage (like the current singulo) rather than "engineering couldn't figure out the engine on his first day on the job so the station's hosed."

Accidents are funny every now and then though. If it was caused in a way that really requires engineering to fuck up on a whole new level of fucking up that could be great.

Right, accidents are funny, but we gated the singulo behind effort because it was entirely too easy for too long for antags to just slap the PA together and mash the button to get a singulo eating the station within 3 minutes of roundstart. The cascade doesn't just have a drift change of eating the station. It does eat the station.

Well yeah, when I say fuck up I'm not just talking "oops, little Johnny forgot to turn down the PA or missed one of the field generators and now the round is over". I'm talking some UAC levels of fuck ups, maybe engineering trying to push for unlimited power and fucking up royally. IIRC on vg a Bluespace cascade occurs when a super matter crystal as opposed to a shard delaminates. Maybe implement that with some sort of cost/reward system to actually give people a reason why they might want to use a crystal over a shard as long as they're very very very very very very very very very very very very VERY careful while using it.

I remember HG gave me a power cell with infinite power once for some ritual I did as a chaplain. Maybe a super matter crystal could allow engineering to produce these somehow, like exposing regular power cells to them for a prolonged period of time. They could in turn either be used to upgrade departments' APCs or sold off to cargo for insane amounts of points.

[Anonmare]

Maybe a cascade occurs when a SM crystal is charged via a Particle Accelerator? Not an easy thing to accomplish I'd say.