/tg/Station 13

I don't think anyone needs convincing that ninja in its current form is not good.

The way I see it, if ninja is to remain a random event, it needs to lose capability to murder people with a rate of a wizard, a high level antagonist to which the entire game mode is dedicated.

Ninjas aren't supposed to fight much anyway. Their main purpose is, well, stealth. Espionage and sabotage primarily, with some assassination of high value targets added.

I think it's actually pretty well for a random event character. Ninja should in my opinion be lurking in the shadows, while sabotaging station's resources, stealing assets and gathering intelligence.

One other possibility that I want to bring up is having a game mode dedicated to ninja. I don't have a clear idea of what could it be, however in one of the previous threads about ninjas someone suggested samurai versus ninja mode. I could see it being the case. Something like gangs, but with Japanese clans, melee weapons and bows, martial arts and code of honor. Doesn't sound too bad.

What could be done for a ninja as a random event? Basically, a character with abilities that are non-lethal and stealthy. Things like holographic camouflage that copies someone's appearance. Cloaking similar to genetics, in the darkness and while standing still. Perhaps a cloak like alien hunter has - not complete invisibility, just highly transparent. Weapons that do stamina damage, immobilize, disable.

What about objectives? Well, let's start with espionage. Stealing research data, blueprints, nuclear disk, high tech items, "secret data", those are already existing objectives that could be used. Sabotage, this could be linked to screwing up station's power systems (By draining power sources, or through other means. For instance in one of existing threads someone suggested ninja being able to link APCs to his suit to provide him constant surplus of power over time, rather than simply draining them). Air could play a role. Now that singularity's gone, there could be an objective on the percentage of station intact, also equipping ninja with bombs of some kind.

Assassinations could be a thing, but I don't think randomly sentencing one player to death with a random event is a good way to do it. it could be reserved for rounds where, for instance, one gang vastly dominates other two, and a ninja could be sent to assassinate the boss to balance it out somewhat. It's more controversial though.

Anyhow, I'd like to hear what people think about this, and additional ideas definitely are needed. It's the end of semester for me, but I should be able to find time for this in near-ish future (definitely in January unless something comes up), so that's with the code part.

Ninja could have the objective to bomb certain areas, such as research, head offices, or atmospherics.

Also, for the love of all that is holy, give these guys a temporary mute on one target or shit like that so that when engaging a stray maint prowler or isolated assassination target they don't immediately ;HELP NINJA.

Also, this was supposed to be in Ideas. Pardon.

DemonFiren wrote:Ninja could have the objective to bomb certain areas, such as research, head offices, or atmospherics.

Also, for the love of all that is holy, give these guys a temporary mute on one target or shit like that so that when engaging a stray maint prowler or isolated assassination target they don't immediately ;HELP NINJA.

Well, having ninjas go completely unnoticed could mitigate their impact on the round. It's not particularly fun if people only find out it was ninja all along in the very end. I'd rather have them be evasive even when people know there IS ninja around. Suppose there's a first phase of infiltration where people don't realize there is ninja, but after that escape mechanisms should still work effectively.

Keep ninjas as they are. They're meant to be a late spawn antag in those 2+ hour rounds that forces the crew to finally call the shuttle. It's not like they spawn with objectives to kill the whole crew and escape alone. Most of the time it's a player who finds this as the chance to finally act like they're robust instead of roleplaying a stealthy assassin whose goal is to do their mission and nothing more. Changing ninjas into Skrulls won't stop players from trying to find ways to murderbone, it's just the mindset of a lot of players on our server.

And if you're not taking down tcomms as a ninja you're doing it wrong.

Lo6a4evskiy wrote:Also, this was supposed to be in Ideas. Pardon.

DemonFiren wrote:Ninja could have the objective to bomb certain areas, such as research, head offices, or atmospherics.

Also, for the love of all that is holy, give these guys a temporary mute on one target or shit like that so that when engaging a stray maint prowler or isolated assassination target they don't immediately ;HELP NINJA.

Well, having ninjas go completely unnoticed could mitigate their impact on the round. It's not particularly fun if people only find out it was ninja all along in the very end. I'd rather have them be evasive even when people know there IS ninja around. Suppose there's a first phase of infiltration where people don't realize there is ninja, but after that escape mechanisms should still work effectively.

That makes highpop even more hardmode for them than for any other antag, though.
I think. I didn't exactly go down the list of antags, mind you.

Well then you need to choose whether you think of them as game mode antagonist and "side" antagonist. Because those are different and they have different balance requirements as well. Besides, it's hard to talk about how hardmode they would be when we don't have any concrete abilities or objectives in mind.

Knaive wrote:Keep ninjas as they are. They're meant to be a late spawn antag in those 2+ hour rounds that forces the crew to finally call the shuttle. It's not like they spawn with objectives to kill the whole crew and escape alone. Most of the time it's a player who finds this as the chance to finally act like they're robust instead of roleplaying a stealthy assassin whose goal is to do their mission and nothing more. Changing ninjas into Skrulls won't stop players from trying to find ways to murderbone, it's just the mindset of a lot of players on our server.

And if you're not taking down tcomms as a ninja you're doing it wrong.

I've thought about hardcore restricting them to using only the tools that their suit/equipment gives them, and those could be limited accordingly. Or something like "busido code" stuff where injuring someone that isn't their objective penalizes the ninja. I can totally picture a ninja clan in the future with suits bound to their wearers that also restrict their actions, say hurt the wearer when they do unwanted things.

And yeah, even that might not be enough, but that's not exactly the point either. There's a big difference between antagonist DESIGNED to be effective at murdering lots of enemies (such as wizard), and the antagonist that CAN do that (such as abductors, or all of conversion based stuff).

DemonFiren wrote:Ninja could have the objective to bomb certain areas, such as research, head offices, or atmospherics.

Also, for the love of all that is holy, give these guys a temporary mute on one target or shit like that so that when engaging a stray maint prowler or isolated assassination target they don't immediately ;HELP NINJA.

Ninjas have an EMP ability. Just emp the guy.

I've always liked the idea of certain side antags spawning when certain conditions are met, i.e. revenants spawn when non-antags die in massive numbers, abductors spawn when science or medical does something, etc.

Hamster powered ninja.
Hamster would get its own ninja mask