Nicking Aliens from Colonial Marines

[monkeysfist101]

Question, what roleplay would you get from this? Fear? Action? Death? From what I have seen during my time here when aliens get involved, RP goes out the window for robustness.

Scopes, if we take what we know from the movies and games, it's shown that conventional weapons and ammunition do jack shit against xenos. Low velocity rounds (or in our case, low power laser weaponry) don't even slow down a hunter as seen in Isolation. The marines sent to LV-426 were using 9mm, 10mm, and .45 caliber hyper velocity explosive caseless ammunition. Flamethrowers have only been shown to be effective against eggs, facehuggers, and chestbursters (AVP is non-canon and A:CM does not exist). Flamethrowers have been effective at wounding or forcing a retreat from drones. While it would be interesting to have a chance for hive xeno eggs at random on the other z-levels, I feel that the lone hunter would be more effective at creating a sense of horror.

[Contextual]

Here's what I don't understand---there seems to be an explicit fear expressed in this thread that the aliens might be too strong, that security might not succeed, that everyone on the station might be reduced to existing in perfectly rational fear of these completely unknown, horrifying, powerful, seemingly perfect killing machines that are slowly---or rapidly---picking them off, being hunted across the station.

Why is this a bad thing? Why does the crew have to win?

Are we worried about the 'warfare' castes? Why not just disable evolution into boilers, crushers, and ravagers, then?

Let's try a ittle compare and contrast with two of the most common 'antagonists' on the server.

Combat Drones and Space Carp, both happen, frequently, and both pose a minor danger to players.

Aliens happen, infrequently, and pose a major danger to players.

Combat Drones and Space Carp generate very little roleplay, and don't offer much potential for more.

Aliens generate a lot of roleplay, and have an incredible amount of potential--especially with the Stable code.

Someone help, I'm not finding any downsides.

[Dreamix]

Here's what I don't understand---there seems to be an explicit fear expressed in this thread that the aliens might be too strong, that security might not succeed, that everyone on the station might be reduced to existing in perfectly rational fear of these completely unknown, horrifying, powerful, seemingly perfect killing machines that are slowly---or rapidly---picking them off, being hunted across the station.

Why is this a bad thing? Why does the crew have to win?

Are we worried about the 'warfare' castes?

(...)Aliens happen, infrequently, and pose a major danger to players.(...)

Aliens generate a lot of roleplay, and have an incredible amount of potential--especially with the Stable code.(...)

 

I was always wondering, why there are no semi-moderated gamemodes? Small number of players (aliens) sacrificing admin-independency of their gameplay to provide fun to the other majory of players? So, aliens would build a nest, with admin-spawned larvaes. They would evolve, and be ordered to defend their nest. Then, overpowered aliens (hunters, crushers, praetorians and other) would attack the part of the station an event host orders them to attack. In short, the queen is event host that's ghosting.

The crew could have their fear-rp and stuff. And aliens would effectively infest the station with weeds and facehuggers.

We could avoid egg-spamming, aliens being too powerfull and killing without any roleplay in this admin-controlled way.

Also, what is Sue doing, that's more important than a suggestion at least 7 people agree with? Could we be informed, at least?

[Veneke]

Question, what roleplay would you get from this? Fear? Action? Death? From what I have seen during my time here when aliens get involved, RP goes out the window for robustness.

 

So is that an event problem or a playerbase problem?

 

Does it really matter how you categorize the problem? It seems to me to be fairly straight-forward: if the aliens are so powerful that players act in a more power-gamey fashion than they might otherwise act during a normal round then these stronger better aliens will lead to worse RP.

Whether the playerbase don't like being so outclassed or the event is too powerful doesn't really matter all that much for the purposes of including Colonial Marines' aliens. Adjustments would have to be made one side or the other to rectify that problem, and in that case you may as well look at the problem and how to fix it before you actually implement the code. Presumably that's the logic that lead to Sue's project - use aliens from Colonial Marines as a base, and adjust for Aurora's needs.

It would be nice to get a rough idea of what Sue is planning on doing though.

[LordFowl]

I believe its something to do with necromorphs, and was inspired by her spritethread. Not sure though.

[mirkoloio]

Just because something is free it doesn't mean we gotta dive on it like hawks.

We're Aurora, not a copy of other servers. I remember some staffmember saying we stopped taking Baycode stuff because we're Aurora, not a copy of some server.

[Guest]

Does it really matter how you categorize the problem? It seems to me to be fairly straight-forward: if the aliens are so powerful that players act in a more power-gamey fashion than they might otherwise act during a normal round then these stronger better aliens will lead to worse RP.

 

alternatively, those players could pretend (or rather, roleplay) to be normal human beings and to be afraid of such killing machines instead of drawing a parallel themselves and killing everything they see.

The aliens are expected to at least do a little hiss hiss, tap tap and growling before they murderize their target.

The crew should probably not go hunting for aliens alone, because they will most certainly die.

but, y'know, clearly the playerbase is in the right in ramboing everything in their way.

the point of a xeno round is that you (as crew) are not expected to win. nor are the xenos, but the point of xenomorphs is that they have a significant advantage over the crew due to their towering, frightening appearance and physical savagery to boot.

 

Whether the playerbase don't like being so outclassed or the event is too powerful doesn't really matter all that much for the purposes of including Colonial Marines' aliens. Adjustments would have to be made one side or the other to rectify that problem, and in that case you may as well look at the problem and how to fix it before you actually implement the code. Presumably that's the logic that lead to Sue's project - use aliens from Colonial Marines as a base, and adjust for Aurora's needs.

 

Have you considered that the playerbase is wrong, and being outclassed is the point of the roleplay scenario?

storytelling becomes pretty shitty to try to participate in when the participants themselves are in control of the pen.

 

It would be nice to get a rough idea of what Sue is planning on doing though.

 

necromorphs, with some unique 100-200 line mechanics.

still don't see why we can't have both.

[Baka]

The argument of 'where's the roleplay' is moot because this is a heavy roleplaying server, one is already expected to roleplay. If someone is not roleplaying at all (this is different from 'they are not roleplaying the way I would like them to') and you see "thrown out the window", then as an admin, you're supposed to intervene.

[Veneke]

The aliens are expected to at least do a little hiss hiss, tap tap and growling before they murderize their target.

The crew should probably not go hunting for aliens alone, because they will most certainly die.

but, y'know, clearly the playerbase is in the right in ramboing everything in their way.

the point of a xeno round is that you (as crew) are not expected to win. nor are the xenos, but the point of xenomorphs is that they have a significant advantage over the crew due to their towering, frightening appearance and physical savagery to boot.

 

It's an unreasonable expectation to hold that the playerbase will react to this new balance of power with more RP, when by ditching RP and going more for robustness they can swing things back in their favour. It's also unreasonable to suggest that alien players with the new code won't be anxious to take advantage of their newfound powers. So unless you want admins hand-holding everybody during the event porting them over directly looks pretty clearly to be a non-starter.

Arguably you could include them as-is, but only if you also buffed the station and/or ERT to more properly equipped to handle them to keep the balance... but then you're still left with the 'oooh, new shiny buttons I want to press!' issue. That'll effectively turn Aurora into CM: Lite edition for a round every time aliens pop up, which isn't necessarily a bad thing but isn't something to be stepped into lightly either.

I don't think anyone is suggesting that we shouldn't have better aliens. But lifting aliens specifically designed for a server dominated by military RP and action strikes me as a strange choice for a server with a focus on HRP. They should be tweaked before implementation to better provide for RP, which is what Sue seems to be doing already.

 

Have you considered that the playerbase is wrong, and being outclassed is the point of the roleplay scenario?

 

It doesn't matter if the playerbase is wrong or not, if a change is likely to lead to a worse RP then it's not a good change for a HRP server.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Veneke, there is reasonable expectation that slaughtering the robust will lead to more player involvement and engagement in the round. In the independence game, where Houssam was president, after an attempted coup he dismantled the entire security department and replaced them with a secret police/militia made up of cargo technicians and miners. There was a balance of power that prevented any direct robusting, because it was immediately met with da pew pew.

It was a blast, and I didn't hear any complaints about the situation.

Until a roboticist ran out in a combat mech and slaughtered half the station in a divine manifestation of robustness because the RD was arrested for treason. That was less fun, but that's the reaction to antagonists: parts of the crew just flip the fuck out.

I'm not saying murdering security makes rp magically appear, but having antagonists that actually require you to be creative in order to avoid or beat allows more, well, creativity from players and thinking outside the box of robust.

So while I'm not saying murder security, we really need to just give free reign to robust the shit out of anyone(s) that tries to just waltz in and pewpew the problem away.

[Veneke]

I'm not sure I'm following what you think the aliens are in your example. To my mind CM aliens are the roboticist, and that sort of behaviour is precisely the concern to have regarding aliens. Your proposed solution (drop RP to outrobust the people taking advantage of the mechanics) is as bad as admin hand-holding.

Why run this risk at all when there's a project in the works, based on the CM aliens code, to alter the CM aliens to a point where they'll make sense in a HRP context?

[Contextual]

Okay. Sue is not working on xenomorphs. Her project has little to no bearing on this discussion and I have yet to see a good reason why it should.

Can we please stop pointing our fingers at this illusory, fantastical xenomorph project you're all convinced she's working on, now?

Please? It's shutting down legitimate discussion.

[Veneke]

Well, hang on a minute. If Sue isn't working on something similar then that has a distinct affect on the landscape. But Soundscopes has said earlier that

 

I gave Sue the go ahead to work on something similar which uses this code as a base/

 

Not that the issue of balance goes away whether she is or isn't mind you, but we should all at least be clear as to what's what.

[monkeysfist101]

I don't understand why everyone is so concerned with projects that are still in the works. Just because an unfinished project /might/ exist in the near future, doesn't mean that we can't play something els until it comes out. And while I personally would like to se a few test rounds with an Isolation style Xeno, I'd rather have CM xenos than what we have.

[Guest]

^ Seriously, what the hell? The community wants it, so why not? There is no one here who would say 'No, we shouldn't have updated xenomorphs for our code, we should continue to make do with the broken, steaming piles of crap that currently exist.

Reminder of this rather ridiculous quote because it lacks a fuckton of context that we've been asking for, and contradicts his quote that he stated above:

 

Because they will be rarely used, and we are having something that Sue has been working on that needed this.

I have already spoken to Sue about her project, and I said that I will not accept both projects, or will I make us CM v2.0

 

So you gave Sue the go-ahead to do a project, but you're not going to accept it anyway?

I've been nice enough to avoid asking: "What the fuck is going on here", but I may as well ask it anyway.

 

It's an unreasonable expectation to hold that the playerbase will react to this new balance of power with more RP, when by ditching RP and going more for robustness they can swing things back in their favour. It's also unreasonable to suggest that alien players with the new code won't be anxious to take advantage of their newfound powers. So unless you want admins hand-holding everybody during the event porting them over directly looks pretty clearly to be a non-starter.

 

"It is an unreasonable expectation for you to expect people to roleplay." ...Really? "...when by ditching RP and going more for robustness they can swing things back in their favour..." So you're also, either intentionally or unintentionally (correct me if I'm wrong in either of these instances here), advocating that the humans powergame? "...It's also unreasonable to suggest that alien players with the new code won't be anxious to take advantage of their newfound powers..." Yes, it is completely reasonable to assume that alien players will only powergame and not consider at least hissing a bit before taking their first victims. That's oddly lacking in faith, you immediately assume the worst if this feature is introduced. Then again, it's to be expected when something like that happens, there's always one or two people who are either desiring to beg the question or play devil's advocate.

 

Arguably you could include them as-is, but only if you also buffed the station and/or ERT to more properly equipped to handle them to keep the balance... but then you're still left with the 'oooh, new shiny buttons I want to press!' issue. That'll effectively turn Aurora into CM: Lite edition for a round every time aliens pop up, which isn't necessarily a bad thing but isn't something to be stepped into lightly either.

 

How is this going to turn it into CM: Lite? The crew isn't staffed with marines on operation. Especially if said marines with weaponry loaded with explosive ammunition, flamethrowers and other weaponry... simply do not exist in this sort of setting. There is no Sulaco, there is no Nostromo, there is no Commander, XO, BOs, or any other staffing who have the expectation that they're deploying into a combat zone, and are aptly armed for it. Save for quite a bit of laser weaponry, there's not much that does well against xenomorphs. Hell, you've never even seen CM Stable xenomorphs in action on this server. You've no idea what to expect, and you can't make such an assumption that it's going to go the exact same a typical CM round would. On CM, ganking the crap out of the opposition is encouraged, as the setting is mildly competitive, with a balance and small expectation of roleplay.

Aurora is clearly not Colonial Marines. The last time we had an alien round, the entire science staff got talked to by the administration for validhunting xenomorphs, after building laser cannons and rushing xenos.

Nobody has asked to make xenomorphs a game mode. That means xenomorph events are going to be rather rare.

 

I don't think anyone is suggesting that we shouldn't have better aliens. But lifting aliens specifically designed for a server dominated by military RP and action strikes me as a strange choice for a server with a focus on HRP. They should be tweaked before implementation to better provide for RP, which is what Sue seems to be doing already.

 

Ironically, you are suggesting we shouldn't have the Colonial Marines Stable version of xenomorphs. I'm sorry, do xenomorphs need less combat mechanics and more tapdance emotes alongside a tophat modification to their sprite? I guess if Isolation-esque levels of survival horror isn't an ideal roleplay scenario, I figure Drone (223) singing 'Hello My Baby" whilst dancing into the ventilation duct system would be more Heavy Roleplay-oriented, evidently. Or, to be more accurate, we could take from lifeweb and add intercourse verbs to 'better suit' the environment of 'Heavy' RP, nawmsayin'?

And no, the extent of roleplay that xenomorphs or necromorphs are going to give you is immeasurable levels of horror leading up to either your death or their death. Death is a terrifying thing, is it not?

Oh, and about their power level. A great man from some 'meh' tier movie once told me, "With great power comes great responsibility." Like, thanks, Uncle Ben, that's maybe the wisest thing I'll ever hear from a fictional person. So consider that for a moment, if you immediately think that their potential for steamrolling is a problem, because humans can already do it anyway.

No, they don't need tweaks. Stable xenomorphs are just that, Stable. They're absolutely perfect in their current state, and they can introduced to any server environment and achieve overwhelming positive results and feedback.

[spacevoidagent]

I support the idea of using the CM alium code. It would be a lot more realistic and immersive that way. The aliens would be what they really are, powerful and scary, and the crew wouldn't even dare to step foot near the nest, for they know it would lead to certain death. When playing Xeno rounds I try to RP as much as I CAN. I put more effort into Xeno rounds then I do any other.

It seems to me the staff doesn't want this because they will have to pay attention more and make sure people aren't powergaming or metagaming. Sounds like the staff needs some motivation to do the position they signed up for. If you don't want it because it will be harder to moderate, you shouldn't have become a moderator.

So once again, I fully support taking the open CM code to use for the exclusive Xeno rounds.

[hivefleetchicken]

Any new developments on the d4nk aliens?

[hivefleetchicken]

Any new developments on the d4nk aliens?

[Contextual]

Stable aliums are still stable.

[Contextual]

Stable aliums are still stable.

[canon35]

Just gonna put in my 2 cents. The aliens were for a FIGHTING server. We are a RP server. All this will do is make xeno rounds a hell of a lot shorter, as we'll be swarmed by xenos that not even 30 armed and armoured marines can't take down, with grenades, rockets, turrets, and landmines.

[canon35]

Just gonna put in my 2 cents. The aliens were for a FIGHTING server. We are a RP server. All this will do is make xeno rounds a hell of a lot shorter, as we'll be swarmed by xenos that not even 30 armed and armoured marines can't take down, with grenades, rockets, turrets, and landmines.

[hivefleetchicken]

Just gonna put in my 2 cents. The aliens were for a FIGHTING server. We are a RP server. All this will do is make xeno rounds a hell of a lot shorter, as we'll be swarmed by xenos that not even 30 armed and armoured marines can't take down, with grenades, rockets, turrets, and landmines.

 

Which is exactly what we can use for a change instead of some lesbian-tough-rebel-nurse beating the aliens to death with a welder.

[hivefleetchicken]

Just gonna put in my 2 cents. The aliens were for a FIGHTING server. We are a RP server. All this will do is make xeno rounds a hell of a lot shorter, as we'll be swarmed by xenos that not even 30 armed and armoured marines can't take down, with grenades, rockets, turrets, and landmines.

 

Which is exactly what we can use for a change instead of some lesbian-tough-rebel-nurse beating the aliens to death with a welder.

[Guest]

Just gonna put in my 2 cents. The aliens were for a FIGHTING server. We are a RP server. All this will do is make xeno rounds a hell of a lot shorter, as we'll be swarmed by xenos that not even 30 armed and armoured marines can't take down, with grenades, rockets, turrets, and landmines.

 

Then for what it's worth, I'll say this.

There is more RP on Colonial Marines than there is on Aurora, with or without Stable xenomorphs.