Lavaland Update

[onleavedontatme]

Inspired largely by the swarmer thing

-No megafauna spawn at round start.

-Tendrils spread corrupt fleshy floor tiles around them, and spawn evil looking gold grubs/worms, which go around slowly eating and corrupting the environment

-As they feed the tendril grows, spawning more monsters at higher stages. At max size, the tendril will spawn a boss or spread more tendrils.

-Much like the swarmers, the tendrils and their spawns will call for help from nearby mobs

-The tendrils will of course have bigger rewards the bigger (and more dangerous) you let them grow

-Killing enough max size tendrils (or enough bosses out of them?) would let you fight some super final boss (maybe with rewards that impact the next round, since it'd take the whole round to kill it anyway)

-There'd still be a handful of the classic mining mobs (goliath/watcher/legion) in the tunnels.

Lavaland would be less dangerous to start (no more dragons right outside the base) but would morph into something even more terrible as the round went on if you let the monsters grow out of control.

Also since I added easy ways to cheat and set baseturfs, I plan to put meta or box on a lavaland map, and have the enroaching tendrils outside the station/base walls be a long term threat.

So yeah, feedback or suggestions please.

[FantasticFwoosh]

I can go through this in a few very simply put points.

Against

• Would require severely reducing the number of tendrils on lavaland and spreading them further apart, largely void of life - No thanks
• That and making people required to wait for this (corruption) mechanic probably wouldn't go so well on our short round scheme. - Nuh uh
• Faux infinitely respawning bugs with no describable loot drops which are probably aggressive and as trash as regular gold grubs & destroy the enviroment creating wide open areas of absolute darkness and empty content - Please no.
• Monsters accumulatively are TERRIBLE to fight, as our combat system can't support being hit by more than 1 high damage mob at once without literally TANKING it, making swarming monsters nightmarish - positively no thank you

---

For

• No megafauna immediately in your face to destroy you just by RNG bad placement
• Not so much item reliant progression (like the current path to 'endgame' dragon armour & boss weapons) / Though on the flipside that might not be true as weapons will progress via R&D or mining whatever to clear out more and more boss monsters
• The only point i utmost agree on is that you consulted us first rather than just going ahead and PR'ing and merging it anyway before anyone got a chance to comment.

> If you want to try lavaland boxstation, I say go for it but the outside will be dangerous enough as it is.

Nice idea on paper, but doesn't really have a place in the actual current game experience i think.

[Alipheese]

Im all fine for this besides the length thing. By the time the shuttles ready people are already calling the shuttle and bitching.

ALTERNATIVELY,
Make it do this all only on extended so there's more playtime / stuff to do over a longer period.

(Will probably update post when I think of more.)

[D&B]

Rounds don't last enough on either server to warrant over time growth.

It would be fine as an extended only mechanic but the main appeal of lavaland is the danger. With no opposition then we're just making it the asteroid with a non hard suit Atmos.

Monsters currently present make taking the normal tendrils a challenge already. Goliath tendrils are a battle of attrition, watchers are a danger when going to get the chest and closing in for the kill, and legions can quickly decimate someone if they don't keep the numbers in control.

If anything make tendrils drop crystals that can summon the megafauna when activated.

[Dagdammit]

Something I was already going to ask about related to lavaland compound was chopping the z-level up into a grid (maybe 4x4) of 'sectors'

[3][X][X][X]
[2][3][X][X]
[1][2][3][X]
[c][1][2][3]

I showed this to Kel the Oblivious to illustrate the state of comm & GPS signal quality at roundstart, but he really liked the idea that it could reflect some lavaland generation mechanics. Here's what he wrote in the discord chat:

Zone 1: No tendrils, no megas, no exotic structures. Low mineral content. Local fauna still spawn normally.
Zone 2: Tendrils begin to appear, as do exotic structures. Low tendril count.
Zone 3: Megas, tendrils, and better exotic structures.
Zone EXTREME: Signalless megas, roving aggressive tendrils, strange new horrifying fauna!
Up to Zone Three, you can count on Old Mining still being... Mining
But once you get into the NEW zone... Oh.. Oh dear.

[Screemonster]

-Much like the swarmers, the tendrils and their spawns will call for help from nearby mobs

I must have missed this part about them 'cause I was totally wondering about call-to-arms behaviour for mobs. the use I had planned for it was an away mission or ruin with mostly-nonhostile borg drone kinda mobs that summon all the warrior variants in the area if the crew are dumb enough to go murderhobo on it.

[kevinz000]

Also since I added easy ways to cheat and set baseturfs, I plan to put meta or box on a lavaland map, and have the enroaching tendrils outside the station/base walls be a long term threat.

FUCKING YES.

[letshavecake]

Swarms of regular enemies are already awful, destroying the environment on top of that just makes the problem worse
And you want the entirety of lavaland to be that

Well, parts of it sound nice, just gimp all of the mobs so one or two people can easily take on the enemy hordes with a moderately powerful melee weapon, or else you might as well just remove ghost roles too

[Remie Richards]

-Much like the swarmers, the tendrils and their spawns will call for help from nearby mobs

I must have missed this part about them 'cause I was totally wondering about call-to-arms behaviour for mobs. the use I had planned for it was an away mission or ruin with mostly-nonhostile borg drone kinda mobs that summon all the warrior variants in the area if the crew are dumb enough to go murderhobo on it.

The summon_backup() mechanic has existed for atleast a year I'd say.
in the code there's a Syndicate Civilian who will run away and summon anything with a friendly faction to join it.
Which means if you had say, a Goliath with the syndicate faction, as a "pet" of sorts, it too would come to help (I had to make this mechanic optional for swarmers, otherwise the mining mobs would help the swarmers as opposed to just ignoring them)

[Screemonster]

Neat.

Suddenly visions of using this to summon mobs to a point RTS-style using cameras and so forth. We drone riggers now.

edit: holy shit I'd never really looked at mobcode until now, I didn't realise the proc would be that simple

[Remie Richards]

Neat.

Suddenly visions of using this to summon mobs to a point RTS-style using cameras and so forth. We drone riggers now.

edit: holy shit I'd never really looked at mobcode until now, I didn't realise the proc would be that simple

Yep, summon_backup() is only for Hostile AI mobs, however the "walking to a point" as you say uses the Hostile AI proc Goto(), which is just a wrapper around the byond proc walk_to(), so it can technically be done on anything that can move (It starts a movement loop in the background, and is actually the reason AI Mecha pilots used to die and leave their mecha haunted and still moving, because that move loop was left running!)

Generally in the codebase we like nice neat reusable frameworks, Hostile/Simple AI is a bit poop in places but it's had some nice love recently (Speed ups, new functionality, etc.)

[Saegrimr]

That's basically already a thing with blob spores.

[onleavedontatme]

Rounds don't last enough on either server to warrant over time growth.

Guess this is true

[imblyings]

make them grow faster then :^)

or have a few tendrils grow faster to provide early opposition in a few directions while the rest grow at a normal speed

perhaps tendrils globally grow faster each time a tendril is killed and only slow down when a megafauna boss is killed

[D&B]

Another option would be to make tendrils spawned creatures move towards the mining outpost every certain amount of ticks.

Thus you incite miners to upgrade their tools with RnD in order to keep the hordes at bay

[Jembo]

Mining is super popular fast spreading tendrils would be cool. Or maybe make it so they can't spread over holywater? So if the station is low pop a chaplain could just spread about and keep the spread from getting out of control.

[Iatots]

I like Dagdammint/Kel 's suggestion, get a grid of regions, with less dangerous or "younger" regions closer to the outpost, some moderately mature tendrils inbetween, and a core region with the necropolis gate and a guardian. On the infestation aspect, I too would like to avoid swarmers 2: fleshy voodoo: I'd like the infestation to convert walls or build structures, not outright dig into the rock, unless you can make it so worms don't start digging until all the tiles reachable by the tendril creep have been converted, at which point they could make a serpentine into a wall until the reach lava or more floor tiles.

[FantasticFwoosh]

Is just digging rocks not enough for you people? Where does the content bloat stop, at the simple statement of miners being resource collectors without also being adventurers/monster hunters like a goddamn RPG where you level up to end level gear then destroy the station because your stuff is better than WHATEVER the station could get normally? (plus to say you blew the station's budget to get the tools under pretense of digging) Its so obtuse by this point and Kor's attempt to make tendrils blatent 'evil corruption' antagonists does not help.

• A unnessecary and enviromentally destructive antagonist, symbolising the most combat driven suggestion i've ever heard where miners are going to be passing out from monsters hitting them left right and centre; because looking at swarmers who have the exact same suggested mechanics they are REALLY hard to fight with lasers - electrical shock melee's coming at you. It just becomes a running and collecting combat away mission where you're just there to collect cluttering loot.

Monsters currently present make taking the normal tendrils a challenge already. Goliath tendrils are a battle of attrition, watchers are a danger when going to get the chest and closing in for the kill, and legions can quickly decimate someone if they don't keep the numbers in control.

• Monsters would have to nerfed into THE GROUND/radically changed and their drops made completely worthless to justify making them killable by the swarming behaviour. Imagine how terrible it'd be to play this solo (on lowpop with no other choice but to get minerals) being chainstunned by goliaths and the shit smashed out of you to become another legion to heed the distress call?

• How are we supposed to keep digging rocks and actually work with all this going on? Asteroid was pure, everyone started with pickaxes and the monsters were substantially hard but no more so than they needed to be in the dangerous atmosphere where if you went down into crit, you choked to death, with no way to take your suit off to save you at risk of dropping your air, armour & pressure protection. All the good stuff came from traitors/centcomm and R&D which got fed directly by mining, now miners can just go off and get their own better stuff, and use & abuse science before throwing them away when not needed.

We're using our mining z level for this remember (people have to play on it to get mineral stuff), its not some level where its of no consequence, if you really want to go for this, i suggest moving the corruption tendrils into a chasm underground area and separate z level plane accessible through lavaland

[TechnoAlchemist]

Lavaland is good and you talk too much for someone with so little cognition.

[Grazyn]

That would actually be great, lower z-level with more dangerous stuff, ruins and nasty mobs. Accessible only through chasms (but you get falling damage) and hellstairs (that maybe show on gps?), and chasms could be placed randomly in the upper z-level instead of being tendril-only to add another threat to careless miners

[Alipheese]

That would actually be great, lower z-level with more dangerous stuff, ruins and nasty mobs. Accessible only through chasms (but you get falling damage) and hellstairs (that maybe show on gps?), and chasms could be placed randomly in the upper z-level instead of being tendril-only to add another threat to careless miners

Had this idea for so long
Some item to prevent death from chasms and the underground portion of lavaland is where all megafauna live and the source of tendrils. The heart of lavaland.
Ie above ground is mining
Below is big shit.

[onleavedontatme]

That would actually be great, lower z-level with more dangerous stuff, ruins and nasty mobs. Accessible only through chasms (but you get falling damage) and hellstairs (that maybe show on gps?), and chasms could be placed randomly in the upper z-level instead of being tendril-only to add another threat to careless miners

Two entire z levels for 3 people would be way too much.

[Alipheese]

But Kor
Like 6 z levels of space.
THAT NO ONE USES.

[letshavecake]

Two entire z levels for 3 people would be way too much.

Very often it's a lot more than just 3 people

[MimicFaux]

Two entire z levels for 3 people would be way too much.

The lower level doesn't need be the full 255x255. Treat it like an away mission and drop them into a smaller sized zone where the robust go to die.

[Alipheese]

Two entire z levels for 3 people would be way too much.

The lower level doesn't need be the full 255x255. Treat it like an away mission and drop them into a smaller sized zone where the robust go to die.

You fall into the inner core of lavaland. Where there's only 1 signal. The heart of lavaland. Large ass 3x3 tendril that spawns megafauna at random so any are possible (besides legion and hierophant) and that is the challenge. If the heart is destroyed. No tendrils next round. The loot? Only the gods know (headmins)

[D&B]

That sounds too easily exploitable.

You could use a colossus as extra firepower.

[Dagdammit]

a lower z-level would get really interesting in combination with a boxstation-scale lavaland station, where it's possible to go underground and then tunnel up through the floor or something.