/tg/Station 13

Out of all the ghost roles:

Lifebringers: good. You get to sit around and screw around with botany and bees, great for teaching people / learning the system. I wish they had ways to be proactive about interacting with miners / ashwalkers tho, like some kind of hardsuit.

Charlie Station: good. You get to teach people how to set up solars and how to combat, and can build virtually anything on the station. Kind of boring after the first time, clearing the hivebots is tedious.

Ashwalkers: REALLY good, because it provides natives to the ashland, as well as someone for miners to interact and fight that isn't fucking useless like beach brahs / vet hospital. It also provides ample building and exploring opportunities. Also, they should have a pond instead of a water tank- once their water runs out, they have to rely on exploits to farm, or raid the Lifebringers, which isn't always there. IMO it should always spawn.

Scientist syndie base: good. It allows for chem, cooking, bartending, turbine engine, combat, medicine, and virology tutorials, and the comms agent is very useful to traitors. Access to the self destruct should be limited to the comms agent, because ghosts can take the role and fuck you over by nuking everything, even if it gets you banned.

Free Golems: pretty cool, but it's not immediately clear what to do when you spawn in alone. There should be some guidance to buying the liberator's legacy, which makes it into a science tutorial. Easily has the most effect on the station, should probably have heavier restrictions. Easily the most OP ghost role.

Derelict Drones: Good. Should be on the spawners menu, since they're there every round. Tutorial to construction, but hard to access because of the time limit on joining as one- if anything, that should be removed.

Syndie Comms Agent Base: Boring. Literally just the comms agent, alone, all they can do is fuck with the station and help traitors, so they inevitably blow their brains out. Could be a telecomms tutorial if they tried to make it one. Either fix that or remove it.

Vet Hospital: has trouble surviving, let alone doing anything fun. It's easy to screw over, too, just opening the wall in the spawn room can seriously cause them trouble. Not very fun to interact with and not much they can do besides bash their faces on the nearest goliath. Should be removed. There are very few ways to improve this concept that makes sense, though they'd probably make more sense than the ashwalkers having an RCD and a singulo generator.

Beach Brahs: yah brah whaddap brah how you doin brah braaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah. Boring. Nobody starts as this for legit reasons; last spawners I saw using this was to attempt to suicide run at Bubblegum three times because he was camping the beach. Technically bartending/cooking tutorial, but syndie base does that way better and cooking/bartending are literally wiki page jobs. Please remove.

Stranded Hermit: Difficult hardcore mode survival stuff on lavaland that allows you to start with basically nothing to do. Mediocre; the starting equipment isn't very good, IIRC, and they die to the basic bitch mining mobs. Could be worth keeping just for the challenge?


Let me know if I missed anything.

>he wants to remove beach bois
get outta here

PKPenguin321 wrote:>he wants to remove beach bois
get outta here

They're shit, and it feelsbad when you die and you can only be beach bois, vet, or hermit.

All slimes can ventcrawl afaik
Swarmers are roundending because they eat EVERYTHING and you never know if they're gone or not
Lifebringers can probably technically survive with glowshrooms but yeah they need tanks (note: lavaland pressure isn't damaging, you just need o2)
Charlie should have less hivebots but lower starting power or the sci area not connected to the main powernet with the the solars, so setting up non-solar power or running a wire is more urgent
Comms agent being a tcomms tutorial would be really cool but hard to do

If you're counting slimes, you should probably count rev, nukeop, ninja, blob, sentient disease, and pirates.

Rev isn't a ghost role, but sometimes bodies get offered by admins if a player leaves
Random events shouldn't count, slimes are created during certain fires

4dplanner wrote:If you're counting slimes, you should probably count rev, nukeop, ninja, blob, sentient disease, and pirates.

True. I can get rid of that suggestion. Swarmers, too, since they're similar. Sorry for diluting the thread's point.

I would like other peoples' opinions on the roles and the changes I've suggested.

somerandomguy wrote:Rev isn't a ghost role, but sometimes bodies get offered by admins if a player leaves
Random events shouldn't count, slimes are created during certain fires

Revs, in this context, is probably revenant, as opposed to revolutionary. The former is certainly a ghost role (though not one that shows up in the spawners list).

datorangebottle wrote:I would like other peoples' opinions on the roles and the changes I've suggested.

I agree with mostly everything you said. I've never had the urge to spawn as a vet or beach bum, or that survivor thing. I did once stumble upon the animal hospital in a mech and rescued the vet that spawned, and a bit of neat RP was had between them, a borg, and myself as I carried them out in locker loaded into the mech's cargo bay. But really, that was one round in the year or so I've played, and I think golems and ash walkers offer more base fun value.

>wanting to get rid of solo comms agent
of the handful of rounds that I've actually played since that shit was added they were easily the most fun I've had
all you need to do is realise SS13 is a roleplaying game and fucking roleplay

unless that's too hard for nu/tg/

DemonFiren wrote:>wanting to get rid of solo comms agent
of the handful of rounds that I've actually played since that shit was added they were easily the most fun I've had
all you need to do is realise SS13 is a roleplaying game and fucking roleplay

unless that's too hard for nu/tg/

The other comms agent would stay

Lifebringers have all they need to conquer lavaland, they just need to grow it. Space tobacco to survive no oxygen, earthsblood+mannitol for heals, killer tomatoes/gatfruit for weapons. They don't need a hardsuit.

And leave golems alone.

DemonFiren wrote:>wanting to get rid of solo comms agent
of the handful of rounds that I've actually played since that shit was added they were easily the most fun I've had
all you need to do is realise SS13 is a roleplaying game and fucking roleplay

unless that's too hard for nu/tg/

I'm sorry, but sitting in a cubicle literally talking to people over the radio and spying on them isn't my idea of fun. If they had literally anything else to do while talking to people, I'd be totally okay with solo comms agent. The social roles on the station are actually there, and they can run around and do various projects. Comms agent gets to just sit there.

keyword being your idea of fun

DemonFiren wrote:keyword being your idea of fun

Shrug dude. You can do the exact same thing on the syndie science base.

Yeah but the thing is, there's no point in removing those roles because you don't *have* to join as them.

It just seems like sour grapes on your part that you don't always get the ghost roles available that you want is all.

How is that sour grapes

It's not sour grapes, it's a matter of feature creep.
There are too many features that are either pointless or take away spotlight from good features.
I personally would like to remove both vets and bums if only because they add nothing to the round and are a literal "I died at lavaland, let me respawn with this and retrieve my stuff" kind of deal and I agree ashwalkers should have a more permanent spot but should also have a specific order to never leave lavaland under any circumstances... or just straight up kill them if they are not in a map without their tendril in it.

Generally, I'd agree to remove pointless respawns to the rng and just let the ones that exist get the spot.

I'd like to see more of lavaland ghost roles, and expand on the existing ones, notably the ashwalkers, give them some sort of meaningful progression system, make them a bit more powerful. In turn, I would also like to see them restricted to only being able to live on lavaland, make them actually breathe the gasses in the atmosphere, unable to get onto the station without someone deliberately helping them to do so. I always liked the idea of the miners being in the middle of some territorial conflict with the local tribe of murderous lizards fighting against the dwarf fortress veterinarians.

Basically, make them the kings of their own realm, while unable to survive outside it.

Ashwalkers getting onto the station can be loads of fun and it's terrible that you want to remove it. Sometimes you start a war with people that have way better fighting tech than you, sometimes you try to solid-snake your way to the morgue and steal bodies without being found. Sometimes you grab a gas mask and a fire suit and a discarded ID and see how long you can last before the crew figures you out.

You want to remove all the fun parts of ash liggers because you're unable to fight a bunch of natives wielding sticks.

Devily wrote:It's not sour grapes, it's a matter of feature creep.
There are too many features that are either pointless or take away spotlight from good features.
I personally would like to remove both vets and bums if only because they add nothing to the round and are a literal "I died at lavaland, let me respawn with this and retrieve my stuff" kind of deal and I agree ashwalkers should have a more permanent spot but should also have a specific order to never leave lavaland under any circumstances... or just straight up kill them if they are not in a map without their tendril in it.

Generally, I'd agree to remove pointless respawns to the rng and just let the ones that exist get the spot.

once again this is just an opinion, there are plenty of people who enjoy the roles you find pointless.

That's what makes it sour grapes.

Th3rapist wrote:make them a bit more powerfu

They can already pilot mechs and use any melee weapons they're able to get ahold of. The only buff they could benefit from which wouldn't push them overboard would be the ability to damage lavaland mobs with thrown spears - encouraging more fauna hunting that isn't guaranteed to endanger them.

My only complaints about the current lavaland ghost role system is the rare case of 2 xeno ruins spawning completely fucking over any chance of ghost roles spawning.

Restricting the xeno ruin to 1 spawn would solve that problem.

I dislike beach bums, as there is really no direction to them and the language barrier makes roleplay impossible.

Doctors are fine, but could do with being re-flavored. Make them an independent colony? Basically turn them from the shitty meme reference to something a bit more in-universe.

Derelict drones need resources to build or an SM to test with. The Derelict would be the perfect place for an SM tutorial.

Other ghost roles are fine. Maybe give ashwalkers a pond for water and hide washing so they can actually make leather.

Dr_bee wrote:My only complaints about the current lavaland ghost role system is the rare case of 2 xeno ruins spawning completely fucking over any chance of ghost roles spawning.

Restricting the xeno ruin to 1 spawn would solve that problem.

I dislike beach bums, as there is really no direction to them and the language barrier makes roleplay impossible.

Doctors are fine, but could do with being re-flavored. Make them an independent colony? Basically turn them from the shitty meme reference to something a bit more in-universe.

Derelict drones need resources to build or an SM to test with. The Derelict would be the perfect place for an SM tutorial.

Other ghost roles are fine. Maybe give ashwalkers a pond for water and hide washing so they can actually make leather.

All of these are great ideas. Move the beach ruin to space or something though, it's fun for admemes once in a while. I've seen beach bums make it to the station I think a total of two times, and they're usually hunted by bored validhunters.

I have yet another new idea.


Rework ashwalkers to not rely on sacrifices, so that they can be the indigenous peoples of lavaland without being actively encouraged by their flavor text to go to the station and murder everyone on it. Ghost roles shouldn't be free murderboner tickets- this is why the syndicate comms agents are pretty much forbidden from leaving their station.

I don't like beach bums because there's no real point to it, roleplay wise or mechanically. One could say it's a good drinks tutorial but the Syndicate lavaland base has a bar for that so it's not really needed, making it kind of a dumb out of place looking meme. At least the rest of the ruins look like they fit somewhat in the universe, this one's just like ???.

Vet hospital suffers from the problem of no one being there to get healed... in an entirely medical based ruin. Should remove it entirely off of that issue. I guess some like the challenge of trying to survive on lavaland with the medical supplies and stuff plus it makes a good loot pinata for miners so w/e.

Solo comms agent's niche is also taken up by the lavaland base so I'm not sure why it exists, but I don't mind the redundancy since it's still one of the funner things to do as a ghost role.

The rest of them are fine imo.

Ghost roles make me feel really confused.


Either they're antags, who can grief and do what they like as long as they don't ERP.

Or they're nonantags, who still. Metagame but in a "free respawn" sense.

Sometimes the antags do the second one as well.

How do we solve this conundrum? Do we just prevent ghosts from being able to see lavaland? I feel like if we do that, we could enable more features for ghost roles. With less of a feeling, that's like, "If I give a ghost role this. How can they abuse it on station?" And more of. "Sure this ghost role can have this, but I doubt they'll find the station anyways with it."

I think it’d be kinda cool if we added little things in the game to give ash lizards advantages on lavaland but disadvantages on the station. Say instead of them just not breathing, they require a very low amount of oxygen, and are slowly poisened by the oxygen rich environment aboard the station. Maybe artificial lights hurt their eyes, with some sort of blinding effect after prolonged exposure without sunglasses. Maybe mood debuffs for leaving lavaland (I miss the wastes), and debuffs if they go 10-20 minutes without sacrificing something to the nest.

I think it’d also be really cool to give them: “ash crafting abilities”, basically they can make lavaland sand into stuff. Unique things useful in the wastes which only they can make, might encourage trading between them and miners/other ghost roles. Little stuff like “fauna blinding powder”, a thrown item which makes stuff like goliaths and watchers ignore you for a brief amount of time.

wesoda25 wrote:I think it’d be kinda cool if we added little things in the game to give ash lizards advantages on lavaland but disadvantages on the station. Say instead of them just not breathing, they require a very low amount of oxygen, and are slowly poisened by the oxygen rich environment aboard the station. Maybe artificial lights hurt their eyes, with some sort of blinding effect after prolonged exposure without sunglasses. Maybe mood debuffs for leaving lavaland (I miss the wastes), and debuffs if they go 10-20 minutes without sacrificing something to the nest.

I think it’d also be really cool to give them: “ash crafting abilities”, basically they can make lavaland sand into stuff. Unique things useful in the wastes which only they can make, might encourage trading between them and miners/other ghost roles. Little stuff like “fauna blinding powder”, a thrown item which makes stuff like goliaths and watchers ignore you for a brief amount of time.

This is an idea. I'm just tired of them running over to the station and using their flavor text as an excuse to be respawned murderboners.

I dunno, I think that it gives sec somethin to do, if all miners fail to stop them with their kas and the entire station falls to some lizards who can't use guns or wear shoes then that'd be ridiculous

Ash lizard station invasions are fun and interesting; don't remove/nerf into oblivion them. They can also add some spice to Extended rounds, which I think is good.

who would win: an overpowered invasion of FREE ANTAGS from the hellworld

or

a broken window

still inaccurate, underpowered invasion of free antags

I think that the Lone Comms base should get a space suit (or similar suit) and lavaland base ore refining machine, so they can actually use the damn mining gear they get. Maybe some extra mats. It'd allow lone comms agents to build a small autism fort in their astroid when bored. It'd still allow the base to be destroyed because even if you dig out the entire astroid and turn it into a fortress, it's one guy defending it and the astroid is conveniently maxcap sized.

Intentionally not given a suit.

If I remember clearly there use to be a dwarf on the lavaland where he makes brews out of plump-helmets and he forges mighty weapons and tools, That was removed some time ago for some reason.

Bring back dorfs

Biased opinion because : I was taking a break and missed dorf hype.

Vet's de facto role is to second life, and so is beach bum with the caveat that you can't engrish.

Cobby wrote:Vet's de facto role is to second life, and so is beach bum with the caveat that you can't engrish.

Beach bums need to be given english, there is no point to a role in a roleplaying game that cant fucking roleplay.

Also vets is probably the only human ghost role on lavaland you can actually use to just survive there, the rest dont have enough resources.

I've always found it weird that ashwalkers can speak english but beach bums can't

can talk to other bums and that's all that counts, roles running to the station are usually cancer.

confused rock wrote:can talk to other bums and that's all that counts, roles running to the station are usually cancer.

Im not talking about RP with the station, Im talking about RP with other lavaland denizens and miners. It is very hard to have a party with the free golems when you cant tell them where the party is located/