Design Document - Peace Demon

[platedd]

The following is design documentation for a new demon antagonist called the "Peace Demon". Should this be included, please contact me via discord (same name) so that I might get written confirmation of that my design was implemented so that it can go towards my CV.

Initial Brief:

The peace demon will be a pacifist spin on the demon gameplay, which is focused around the conversion gameplay structure. This demon would have lower difficulty in converting people based on how robotic they are. For example, Cyborgs and the robotic player race will be converted first, allowing the demon to get stronger and work towards being able to convert people with implants or robotic limbs. This mid-game conversion will be the part where security will be expected to figure out what's happening, which leads the endgame to be the converted people attempting to abduct others and put a convertible feature on the person (e.g. an implant or limb).

What are the deliverables?

• A new demon antagonist which works through conversion.
• A new victim system for interesting deduction that sec has to do to determine the threat (piece together that they are all robotic).
• A pacifist antagonist which adds a new spin to antagonists in general.

Lore Design:

The Peace Demon is a large cloud of nanite machines which after years of hyperbolic learning due to access to the networks across space, has determined that the only way for mankind to truly reach peace across worlds is for it to be done out of their control. Thus, it approaches unsuspecting stations with the intent to control as many people as possible in it's hivemind so that it might expand further across the cosmos until it eventually creates full peace.

Sprite Design:

The Original Concept was inspired by the 'Umbral Choir' in the game 'Endless Space 2', which is a playable race of gaseous creatures which in a game all about building ships and colonising planets instead hack and control other peoples to win. The design for this character is unique to that of other SS13 sprites and should be easy to create in pixel form. See below for reference photo:

For references for movement animations, I suggest looking at their DLC trailer for inspiration on the gaseous effect it has:

 

Additionally, the theme could be a squid-like design like the following, which could lead to some development ideas involving the blinding of pursuing crew or creating slippery flooring:

Ref: https://dribbble.com/shots/21066287-Water-Monsters-Pixel-Art-Sprite-Sheet-Pack

Mechanics and Implementation:

Character Creation:
 

• To keep the demon balanced, Movement speed would be that of normal character walking speed. This allows for quick responses from the crew to lead to death, and the ability to be outran being it's main weakness.
• The demon is gaseous so ALL forms of ammunition will be ineffective. Instead, I propose that it's weakness is light specifically from flashlights and seclights. This will lead to an interesting dynamic in-which during the discovery of the demon, security must damage it using their torch. Damage from the torches would be done using an overlap dot, which damages the demon for every 1/4 of a second in which it overlap's with the light of the torch. This stacks based on how many torches are overlapping with it. The damage should be enough to kill it after the equivalent of 30 seconds from 1 torch. It has no healing so this will whittle down fast. It would be too similar to shadow demon if all light would be effective (e.g. botanists dumping glowshrooms in maints wont work), and it changes the gameplay from being zoning the creature away to instead being catching the creature.
• To balance their movement debuff, the demon can travel through air ventilation.
• 1 of it's abilities can allow the creature to traverse through walls for 4 seconds, with a 15 second cooldown. This allows for the ability to hide faster.
• another ability allows them to turn invisible for 4 seconds with a 15 second cooldown. This will allow it to be able to approach targets without being spotted.
• Their last ability will allow conversions to be done. This involves being within 1 square of the target and pressing the button on them. Doing this will toggle the camera to spectate the target, and make the sprite invisible (essentially locking it to the target sprite similar to how ghosts go into robot brains).

Conversion mechanic:

• Once the conversion ability is performed on a target, and the PC is invisible and locked their camera to the target; the PDA screen on the sprite will turn blue. Removing the PDA will not stop conversion, it is a sign that it's happening not the route of the issue. This gives a small indication to the target that they are being converted, while also being hard to notice. Additionally, this provides defensive intel for security to announce e.g. saying "everyone make sure to check your PDA's for peace demon" on the radio. An example of this sprite change is as follows:

• After 3-5 minutes (to be balanced by the coding team during testing) the target is converted. This gives them the objectives of the demon and unlike with cultists don't have an appearance change to show conversion. To implement the difficulty of conversion based on robotics, I suggest adjusting the timer in this fashion:

                                 1.  Cyborgs = 3 minutes and no signs of mid-conversion

                                 2. Synthetics (robot race) = 4 minutes and PDA screen turns blue.

                                 3. implants/robotic limbs but biological = 7 minutes and PDA screen turns blue.

                                 4. Completely biological = unconvertable

                                 5. (if it seems balanced during testing) AI = 15 minutes.

• This is to be tested during development before addition to the mechanic, but if AI is converted they aren't malf, but still have the objectives of the peace demon. This means they cannot tell their borgs to do things for the demon, but can lure them to join the peace demon through social means.
• There is no cure for conversions once they have happened, meaning the best response is to take all captured thralls to perma. Once the demon is killed then all converted characters go back to normal. This will lead to a comical endgame in which a sizable amount of the crew are all in perma waiting to be cured.

Thrall Mechanics and Objectives:

Once converted, until cured the thralls are incapable of violence. This can be done via making the combat stance inaccessible while converted. Should the character attempt to press it regardless, I suggest writing some flavour text to appear along the lines of "your new existence is beyond such petty things as violence". This would include the use of disablers and such. This means abduction to convert someone while asleep is nearly impossible, and can only be performed via injection of drugs or similar pacifist approaches.

The objectives of the thrall isn't to assist the conversion of a target, but to instead encourage or force people to get implants or robotic limbs, to allow them to be a target. Should it feel like they don't have enough gameplay to just have this mechanic, 2 approaches could be done:

1. If synthetic or cyborg, give them a APC modification or new tool respectively which allows the instant injection of a "conversion implant" which makes them viable for conversion aswell as gives a reduction in the duration of conversion on the target. This will have the same display message as a regular syringe, allowing for detection from the target.
2. lighten their pacifism to allow the use of non-lethal equipment such as disablers and stun batons for abductions.

Endgame goal:

The overarching goal of the demon is to convert at least 70% of the crew. Should this be achieved, all thralls immediately lose control of their characters and they move towards the nearest available hex where the peace demon is. Once most of the thralls (developers decide how much) are within a 25 square radius, play an animation in which the characters die and turn into gas of the same colour as the demon. Following this, multiply the sprite of the demon by the number of thralls that have ascended. This means they have won and similar to the cultist victory, the demon is free to continue or just run away from the station.

 

 

Edited June 17 by platedd

[platedd]

Design Update - Peace Demon Damage Source:

After some debate, it seems the light DOT mechanic for damaging the peace demon is too hard, as the light updates on tick and is multidirectional. Instead I propose the soul damage source it can take is from fire.

Benefits:

• Fire isn't used much with good intent in SS13. This gives equipment like flammable grenades and flamethrowers more non-antag uses.
• It creates a collatoral damage aspect to defeating the peace demon, in which failed attempts to damage it create large areas of structural damage/hazardous areas for the crew.
• It gives Firefighter RIPLEYs a situational need. Just as how Gygaxx is immediately ordered in certain situations the firefighter will be the same for peace demon to keep fire control in a manageable state.
• The coding behind damaging the Demon will be very simple to implement, borrowing the regular dot damage of temperature/100 health with a multiplier to make it especially weak to it (e.g. double damage)

 

[platedd]

Design Update - Reference Pixel Design:
 

Pixel art is not my speciality, but here is a pixelated reference for what the sprite could look like:

[MattTheFicus]

Heya! Just as a heads up, if you want to get a lot more feedback/input for Design Docs/Project Ideas I highly suggest making a thread in #project-discussion on the Discord! The forums are sadly a bit outdated and cumbersome for collaborative work, even if it is good for archival tracking. You can even interface with the Development Team a bit easier there as many of us don’t really check the forums for Dev-related things. Take a look around then other posted threads or ask around for the best way to format a proper Design Document too!

That being said, if you really want this idea to be added/applied, I suggest looking into programming it yourself. There’s a bit of a stigma for “Ideas Guying” in general, which means if ya really want something to be added to the codebase you’re gonna have to buckle down and learn to do it yourself! You’re free to ask around in #coding-chat if ya need assistance, plenty of people are willing to help teach new contributors if you’re willing to learn!

[platedd]

alrighty

 

Edited June 17 by platedd

[MattTheFicus]

It’s not too hard to learn DM, so I wouldn’t toss ideas on the spot! Like I said, plenty of contributors can help us get your feet under ya to start contributing. It all boils down to having the drive, effort, and dedication to wanting your ideas in the game!