Make lavaland roles consistent

A place to record your ideas for the game.
Post Reply
Toroic
Joined: Fri Apr 28, 2017 11:09 pm
Byond Username: Toroic

Make lavaland roles consistent

Post by Toroic » #289838

I love playing some of the lavaland roles, yet am continuously irritated when you get beach bums/vets two games in a row and then the next game you'll get a couple golems but it ends up being a rev round and over in 3 minutes.

I think it would be great to have lifebringers, ashwalkers, golems, and crashed pods consistently in every round, and cut out the rest of the options completely. Golems/Lifebringers are a lot of fun to play but take a fair amount of time to get rolling. They make lavaland more interesting for miners and especially with the recent golem buffs people love playing those roles.

It also allows a lavaland metagame to develop where both ashbringers and golems can greatly benefit from finding the lifebringer pod and exploiting them for their own benefit, maybe even go to war over the lifebringers who can't replenish their numbers the same way that both ashbringers and golems easily can. Both ashbringers and golems have a reason to dig their way around and uncover significant portions of the map, and in theory would have the tools to eventually take down megafauna.

Design-wise it seems like some of the roles were intended either as learning sandboxes for botany/science/viro, or difficult surivivor roles to help ghosts get back into the game. The problem is that rounds really aren't long enough that ghosts will die, come back as a lavaland role, and get anything done. Unless you're a roundstart lavaland role you won't get a lot done either, lifebringers need a few plants grown before they can leave their pods and golems need to do some mining (2500 points worth) before they can build more machines.

I believe this would make lavaland a lot more fun and dynamic, and clear out some of the roles (like syndie base) that are well-mapped and intentioned but don't really provide anything interesting for miners or for ghosts.
Unprofessional Catgirl and Straightboy Supreme.
User avatar
Wyzack
Joined: Fri Apr 18, 2014 11:32 pm
Byond Username: Wyzack

Re: Make lavaland roles consistent

Post by Wyzack » #289839

It would literally be the opposite of making Lavaland more dynamic because you are by definition taking several dynamic things and making them static
Arthur Thomson says, "Since there are no admins I would loging with another account and kill you"
Caleb Robinson laughs.
Arthur Thomson catches fire!
tusterman11 wrote:Can you stop lying? I just asked you and you are was a piece of shiit on me!!!
Kor wrote:I wish Wyzack was still an admin.
EngamerAzari's real number one fangirl <3
certified good poster
Slignerd
Github User
Joined: Mon Nov 09, 2015 2:27 pm
Byond Username: Slignerd
Github Username: Slignerd

Re: Make lavaland roles consistent

Post by Slignerd » #289847

Ashbringers? Lifebringers? What?
It would appear that I'm a high RP weeb who hates roleplay and anime.
Jalleo
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 1:27 pm
Byond Username: Jalleo

Re: Make lavaland roles consistent

Post by Jalleo » #289851

The biggest issue is most of these things are not fully fleshed out and nobody really wants to get to the meat of it and develop this stuff if it wont end up being used because station evac'd round ends basically immediatly.
User avatar
D&B
Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2016 2:23 am
Byond Username: Repukan
Location: *teleports behind you*

Re: Make lavaland roles consistent

Post by D&B » #289855

Absolutely not.

People already abuse these roles as cheap second lives and try their damn hardest to get back on station. If not, then it's either Lifebringers spreading kudzu throughout lavaland, or syndicate scientists trying to build bridges to get out of their little island.

If you make them static it's gonna reach a point in which potential grief that can be caused by those ghost roles is gonna get them the ash walker treatment.
Spoiler:
[20:26:02]ADMIN: PM: [censored admin]->[censored]: Welp. It was just a prank bro isn't a very good excuse when it comes to unprovoked nonantag murder, but since this is your first time doing it and you seem to understand the problem instead of a bannu I'm just going to leave you with a warning. Please PLEASE don't do this again in the future, as funny as crackhead broken bottle memes can be. Alrighty? Do you have any input on this?
[20:26:39]ADMIN: PM: [censored]->[censored admin]: Alright, no problem. I have some input. Fuck my boy pussy.
[20:27:06]ADMIN: PM: [censored admin]->[censored]: Okay then. Have fun.
[20:31:29]ADMIN: PM: [censored admin]->[censored]: Excuse me?
J_Madison wrote: that's a stupid fucking stat
you don't play, you've never played
lying little shit with your bullshit stat
fuck you
ColonicAcid wrote:and with enough practise i too could blow my own dick so well that only the gods know how it feels.
Toroic
Joined: Fri Apr 28, 2017 11:09 pm
Byond Username: Toroic

Re: Make lavaland roles consistent

Post by Toroic » #289859

Wyzack wrote:It would literally be the opposite of making Lavaland more dynamic because you are by definition taking several dynamic things and making them static
As having the roles people actually play more often does make things dynamic, because having those roles in lavaland causes change from game to game, and especially for miners the same way having the set pieces rotate causes change. Miners have more interesting things to find. No one plays beach bums, because that role is garbage.
Sligneris wrote:Ashbringers? Lifebringers? What?
Lifebringers are podpeople that spawn in a fully upgraded botany room.

Ashwalkers are ash lizardpeople.
Jalleo wrote:The biggest issue is most of these things are not fully fleshed out and nobody really wants to get to the meat of it and develop this stuff if it wont end up being used because station evac'd round ends basically immediatly.
I'd argue that golem/lifebringer are very much fleshed out, they have all the tools necessary to explore ashland indefinitely. and make their way to the escape shuttle. Golems have a good chance of taking down megafauna too. Ashbringers would have a more difficult time due to the lack of ranged weapons, but they are also hostile and more likely to fight miners/blend in more on the station.
D&B wrote:Absolutely not.

People already abuse these roles as cheap second lives and try their damn hardest to get back on station. If not, then it's either Lifebringers spreading kudzu throughout lavaland, or syndicate scientists trying to build bridges to get out of their little island.

If you make them static it's gonna reach a point in which potential grief that can be caused by those ghost roles is gonna get them the ash walker treatment.
You don't have time to get anything done as lifebringer/golem as a second life unless roundstart players are already working. Making it back to the station can be quite difficult depending on the spawn. I agree that kudzu is cancer, but that's not lifebringer specific, last week tons of rounds were ended because of station botanist spreading kudzu in the first 10 minutes. The issue is kudzu needing a nerf, no one else can do significant griefing. Golems/lifebringers are explicitly neutral, ashbringers can't use guns and struggle to take down watchers.

It's not uncommon to get 1-2 of these roles in a game, the problem is that ashland is cluttered with roles no one seems to play and we might as well make the fun ones more consistent. They aren't "cheap second lives" because lifebringers need time to survive outside the pod, golems are non-human and kill on sight (will likely need to dig and fight to get to the station) and ashwalkers start with crappy weapons and armor and can't ever use guns. They can make it back to the station, but the advantage of this is questionable and most people kill ashwalkers on sight. I'd fully admit ashwalkers are the weakest entry, and if it was just golems/lifebringers every round I think people would play them fairly often. Kudzu needs a nerf because of station-side issues, which would also solve the ashland issues.
Unprofessional Catgirl and Straightboy Supreme.
User avatar
Nilons
Joined: Tue Oct 04, 2016 5:38 pm
Byond Username: NIlons
Location: Canada

Re: Make lavaland roles consistent

Post by Nilons » #290254

I feel like they should be categorized, I.E

Nonviolent/Noninteractive

Beach bums or vet can spawn or whatever else would fall here

Aggressive/threating to the station

ashmemes here

Interactive with the station but otherwise peaceful

Whatever falls here like golems

And then make it so that one from each category will spawn
I play Ostrava of Nanotrasen (good name) and Rolls-The-Bones (Crag Given name god bless)
Signature Memes
Image

Image
Image
Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users