Xenomorph Round End

[monkeysfist101]

 

I propose that in the event of a near-total personnel annihilation during xeno rounds, (all but ten crew KIA) the United States Colonial Marines be called in. They would have orders to neutralize the alien threat and evacuate the remaining crew. Proposes squad size would be around 10-12 and wold be set up in Aliens squad makeup: Two smart gunners, four marines with flamethrowers, and four to six marines with pulse rifles.

 

Basically it would just add another 5-30 minutes of gimmick playtime to the end of xeno rounds.

 

[Fj45]

 

Bluespace marines are better I think.

 

Ending xeno is always a hard thing. Classic shuttle evac is impossible so you have to get creative. Pulling back to the mining base or labour camp works well enough, you can always just jump off into space or, my favorite, is to evac in the ERT shuttle.

 

Nuking is a theoretical possibility but due to shitty metagaming xenos busting in and melting it first thing I don't think a xeno nuke is ever going to happen.

 

The ERT shuttle evac works so well as arrivals is never really touched and its easy enough go secure. Just make sure to either grab a centcom I'd or have a few ERT alive. (They drop like flys, I blame the shitty, spammed to hell OP neurotoxin.)

Thats if people arr still alive or command was condoms and theres just a few people in engie. I think the best time for the marines would be about now.

 

A bit more admin involvement with xeno rounds would help. Proper communication over the message system. Giving the ERT orders. Cargo shuttle supply drops.

 

Endgame xeno needs quite a bit of dev but could be one of the vey best.

 

[Combine]

 

I don't think we need any special "groups" or "factions" for this mode; we have ERT / DS as major factors if need be, or even some sort of Admin / player gimmick. Creative ways as alternative I mean. Like a heavily armed agent sent by CC or a crew militia.

 

"But ERT is usually just few and they could drop like flys" - Keep in mind that in theory, you can spam the station with ERT.

 

Your only limit would be players and gear on centcomm (ERT area). While ERT "callout" has a delay and ultimately ends, I've seen a round where ERT was called in twice. In short: Call another ERT if you need it.

 

[Fj45]

 

At one point or another, no matter how much of the crew is armed with ballistic shotties and even if theres ten ERT running around, everyone WILL slowly get picked off. Sending in ERT after ERT doesn't help. (And theres a vey small limit on gear and players, at best you would get two squads of five) Thats the point where you either ERT shuttle evac or die. Thats when the marines should be sent it.

All of that is based off rounds I have played. If a blueshield with all access and a huge surplus of weapons couldn't get enough support then nobody can. In that instance a xeno queen ended up attacking the bridge and what remained of the ERT(about three) barely managed to fend em off. (And there was me+five other ballistic weapon armed crewmembers+a ripley.) I pretty much said fuckit, ordered everyone to fall back to arrivals and managed to get a pitiful number of crew out. Remember, the entire time I was calling for ERT and talking to Centcom.

 

 

Sure, we have DS but they are more a rev type thing/a bit too powerful. If the marines fail then I guess you would get a DS.

 

[xomega000x]

That would actually be a very good Idea. And maybe cut some of the Marine numbers, and send an ''armed'' Ripley? But not too OP.

[Fj45]

They WOULD need to somewhat OP to stand any kind of chance against the xenos. Imagine a DS with weaker, ballistic weapons.

[Fj45]

 

For the weapons side of things, I have a few ideas. These would need spriting and coding though.

 

Steyr Aug: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steyr_AUG

Could work as both the squads assult rilfe and LMG.

Bullpup so it makes sense for the close quarters of a space station and it has a great Sci-fi look.

The SA80: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SA80 may be a good alternative.

 

The KSG: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kel_tec_KSG

Or SPAS-15: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franchi_SPAS-15

Squads combat shottie.

 

Using the classic "stream of fire" flamethrower seems impractical and difficult to use.

If we had another grenade launcher (This maybe? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milkor_MGL) with a much larger capacity you could fire incendiary rounds and clear out xeno nests easily.

 

Don't think any kind of pistol or SMG would be needed or practical.

 

[monkeysfist101]

The weapons in the movie Aliens were MG-42's on swivel camera mounts for the smart guns and Thompson sub machine guns with a futuristic furniture set.

[mkenner]

 

I don't really see the need for this, especially with the prohibitive levels of coding and spriting required.

 

The players have been equipped with a station capable of producing robots, robotic exoskeletons and experimental weaponry. I'd rather see the players make the most of their resources to confront menaces and overcome challenges rather than coding in additional resources for their faction to call upon.

 

Most players have already been given additional chances at life whether respawning as xenos, ERT and DS or by being brought back to life by either robotics or genetics. If we're worried about players being left out of the round, then extending the game-time towards the end of such casualty heavy rounds is likely to be counter-productive rather than solving the problem even with a comparatively large respawn squad.

 

Especially since experience shows that the main thing we'd see would be people suiciding in the hopes of joining the marines.

 

A bit more admin involvement with xeno rounds would help.

 

We don't really like taking sides between two player-controlled groups. We can choose who wins at any time in such a contest and I don't see how our involvement would make things more fun. We'll sometimes intervene to balance things out if the game seems so lopsided that it won't create any interesting play, but that's rare.

 

Also Centcomm exists as an in-game group, who you can contact via bluespace but they're only aware of what you tell them. If you want more admin intervention, send more bluespace faxes. Otherwise, it's the job of command staff to rally and organize their troops, not the admins.

 

The end-game drags out because people run off on their own, one at a time to robust a xeno with an oxygen canister (because they're thinking they'll either win and be awesome or die and get to play a xeno, so it's no loss either way). It's the horror-movie equivalent of the non protagonists wandering off to get a drink during the serial-killer slumber party. If everyone was rallied together with a unified goal, then the round would end one way or another much more quickly and we'd see more dramatic last stands.

 

I think it makes more sense to balance the existing weapons of both side (such as the aforementioned neurotoxin) to make things more equal than to introduce new factors to the game which will start off either underpowered or OP and take time to calibrate to work.

 

Also, sometimes the xenos are going to win and that's okay because it's a player controlled faction too. The xenos hunting down the last remaining crew-member is no less gameplay oriented then the survivors hunting down the last few wandering xenos. Since the Xenos don't get any admin reinforcements and the crew already have at least one, this seems reasonably balanced.

 

For the record: This is just my personal take, not the stance of the team as a whole.

 

[Fj45]

 

I very much agree with everything you said. Just for clarity, the admin involvement WAS about messaging Centcom, in past times my messages seem to have done very little apart from getting ERT support. If you need more info, please ask for it. Sending vague distress messages (halp! EVERY IS DED!) is my only option otherwise.

 

The reason I want Bluespace marines is to (maybe) help stop that stage of xeno where all the unrobust are dead, 9/10ths of the station is covered in weeds, multiple ERT units have been picked off, those who remain are either armed to hell and turtling somewhere or running around and hiding. It pretty much just ends at a stalemate with the admin often having to go GG, aluims win. It never feels like a proper ending. I feel that having them come in would end the round with a nice bloody gunfight where everyone makes a last stand or the aliens would slowly, department by department, get pushed back. They shouldn't get called in all the time though. Only if there's some kind of remaining "fort."

 

Now, for why DS can't just be used. Few reasons:

Assorted RP/fluff type stuff, very minor though. (Don't feel like listing it now but if you want to know I'll finish it.)

Balance, xeno is very, very, very difficult to balance and having them be used the way they are with so many roundtypes means that you either have them UP or OP for xenos.

Their weapons are not really "fun." They wreck walls so DS units are very mobile, that really shouldn't be the case with xeno rounds. One or two hit lasers are not all that fun to fire or fight, a hail of ballistics IS.

They look badass but don't have quite the right look for a unit turning xenos to mush.

They are the elite of the elite, a really rare and damn scary unit, having em the only option after ERT teams either means no support or they loose that "prestige."

 

Sure, send em in as a rare event with really crazy xenos rounds, not saying that shouldn't happen.Just that a custom unit (mainly) for xenos round is preferred in a few ways.

 

 

 

Ok, sorry if I'm doing a poor job of getting my point across, (or its just all BLARGHXENOGUNSSHOOOTEYY KILLYARGHH) really should be in bed.

 

[GodOfOreos]

 

I actually (poorly) sprited the M41A from Aliens using the dream maker.

 

The idea I had was that a group of marines (or ERT) would all be equipped with one, but could choose an extra module to add on to it such as a flamethrower, shotgun, grenade launcher, scope, or a set of extended magazines. This module could then be switched from the normal gun using the objects tab.