What the Skreek? Clone me!

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

Well i stand by watching Vox beeing nerfed bit by bit, because i aggreed that they were overpowered when they were first introduced.

 

I am kind of meh on removing the already weakened leap, but i could accept that. What i can't accept is the fact that they can't be cloned anymore. This has little to do with game balance but more with removing players from the round.

 

(I haven't tryed cloning vox myself, but i was a vox about to be cloned and two doctors aggreed on the fact that the DNA scanner is refuseing me. So i can only assume vox not beeing able to be cloned is a thing)

 

There are only two ways for you to get back into the game:

 

The first is beeing brain transplanted and cloned into a random body. Which requires more effort from medical staff then a simple clone and just won't happen because people are either to busy or to lazy for that. Even if it happens you most likely end up in a randomly colored retarded looking furball. Sorry but i can't play serious like that and even worse, you get a different name or you get a vox name and look like a furball. The DNA change just doesn't work correctly accross races. So you get this whole issue of your ID not matching your name, beeing arrested, going to HoP and stuff. You are better of just asking the geneticist to make you a monkey so you can go and derp around the station.

 

The second would be borging, which also requires more effort and materials and it's a very different gameplay, which i don't enjoy beeing forced in.

 

[Streaky Haddock]

but without dead people where are we getting ERT volunteers from

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

Do you really want someone who plays vox having a shotgun and all access IDs?

 

On the other hand: Long live the new Quill! SkreeeK!

 

[Streaky Haddock]

 

It'd be nice if you could pick race for ERTs but I guess that would complicate things. One thing you have to consider is, without bodies where are you getting ERTs, Ninjas (random event), Aliens (also random event sometimes i think but also the gamemode) and etc from?

I think that the unclonable races (Slimes, Vox and IPCs) fill a valuable niche.

 

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

I really don't like playing ERT in general and try to avoid it. It's a personal thing, to much chaos and usually very bad RP.

 

I would enjoy beeing spawned in as ninja or xeno, but this almost never happens. I don't think this sort of things justify a bunch of players not beeing propperly cloned or revived.

 

If you would announce it in dead chat, i have the choice to avoid beeing cloned and wait to be spawned as ninja or xeno. Give me the choice, because chances are high i won't accept beeing spawned as ERT anyway.

 

[Rumiluntti]

 

I never play ERT even if I die and if I'm command staff I'm always against calling that team of fuckup.

I play vox.

 

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

What are the options for dead players now anyway?

 

Pets

Most of the time confined in their office and when outside you are basicly try to survive on a station where 50% of the crew is out to kill you, god knows why.

 

Maintenance Drone

You can move around open airlocks and interact with your enviroment.

 

Biggest flaw: no interaction at all with other players, except for them smashing your circuits to pieces.

 

I mean i get that they are not supposed to impact the round via opening airlocks or repair/destroy vital stuff, but if i want to ping happily at someone who pets me than let me fucking ping at him! It's a multiplayer RP game after all.

 

Diona

Most likely one of the best choices because you could evolve back into the game.

 

Golem, cultist summons and other rare stuff

Gimmick and not reliable.

 

ERT

If you like playing ERT, this would probably the no. 1 choice.

 

Admin Spawn + Random events

Very rare, but most likely lots of fun.

 

 

The first 3 options are fairly common / accessible, but are weak substitute for a normal character and are meant for player that are dead to have something to do until the next round starts.

 

Not letting a player be revived / cloned to play a weak substitute for the character that he is no longer allowed to play doesn't make sense to me.

 

The last 3 options offer gameplay that would be equal or maybe better then your dead character but they just happen way to rarely to be a valid reason to not let someone get back into his character. Ok, ERTs are called fairly regulary but often they are called in the wrong situations and i am probably not the only one who dislikes playing them.

 

Edit: Guess i forgot to mention pAI, which are great if you like this sort of RP and get a decent partner / master. Very good but also sort of rare and definitely not everyones thing.

 

Edited December 3, 2014 by Guest

[Spacemanspark]

 

>ERT with different species.

>Kei' Shen as ERT.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

As for cloning vox, how the hell are you going to hook it up to N20 before it dies again?

 

[Eldrin-Kanthos]

Vox were supposed to get cortical stacks to be removable to revive Vox, but the coders ran out of steam and all that happened was that they cannot be cloned.

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

As for cloning vox, how the hell are you going to hook it up to N20 before it dies again?

Not saying that vox cloning was anywhere close to beeing perfect, but it was possible. You could eject the body early out of the cloning machine hook up internals and throw him into cryo. There should also be a guide on here that describes the process. The fix to a badly implemented feature should never be just removing it entirely.

 

Here is an easy fix: Make the clone spawn with a masks with a small tank attached, the tank has 3-5 minutes worth of nitrogen supply, use the sprite of a normal mask, done, fixed.

 

[Eldrin-Kanthos]

 

As for cloning vox, how the hell are you going to hook it up to N20 before it dies again?

Not saying that vox cloning was anywhere close to beeing perfect, but it was possible. You could eject the body early out of the cloning machine hook up internals and throw him into cryo. There should also be a guide on here that describes the process. The fix to a badly implemented feature should never be just removing it entirely.

 

Here is an easy fix: Make the clone spawn with a masks with a small tank attached, the tank has 3-5 minutes worth of nitrogen supply, use the sprite of a normal mask, done, fixed.

Makes sense, it can clone clothes. Why not a breath mask?

 

[SpaceTimeNow]

Since i can't play for the next like one or two hours, even though my body is right next to the cloning machine, i have plenty of time to warm up this topic.

[Fox McCloud]

 

As for cloning vox, how the hell are you going to hook it up to N20 before it dies again?

 

Not just that; inaprovaline is used to help stabilize the patient while they're in critical status and still healing....and that's highly toxic to Vox.

 

So they'd be taking tox damage from breathing in oxygen AND taking tox from having inaprovaline in them...end result? They'd die almost the split second you pressed "clone" on the console.

 

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

Like i said, a body can be ejected early from cloning with a medical ID, obviously it comes out in a way more damged state but you can survive it with cryo and other meds.

 

Not saying that's the best way to clone someone, but it's definitely better than no cloning at all.

 

Not sure if the damge of inaprovaline is new on vox but it should be 0,4 tox damage, not sure how this would influence vox cloning, but obviously it could be coded to work. I just don't see the point of letting certain races not clone and get back into the game.

 

Edited December 6, 2014 by Guest

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

I also figured out that spawning as a diona is worse then expected. Got picked up by a random dina and merged with it (without giving me any choice and it's intant), great. Can't do shit at all except for talking and he seems afk for quite a while. So i guess i force ghost and the round is over for good.

 

Honestly that's no fun, considering how long the rounds go at this time of the day.

 

[PJB3005]

Honestly, I don't think vox being unclonable is that bad, especially since it's godawful lore wise, but we do really need them to get buffs in other ways, or ATLEAST fix the various spawn equipment bugs

[MarkvA]

Nothing's going to get fixed unless you report it in the bug reports section as its own, separate thread.

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

I still don't see how people could aggree that's a bad thing for player to get back into the round, regardless of race. This weekend i died 3 times very early to some random crap, allways at the time of day where very few players are online and rounds keep going forever. I thought i could have some fun RP but no, i just had to watch everyone else play for hours or do other stuff, while my bodies kept lying right next to the cloning machine. That time probably adds up to like 3-4 hours (in three rounds)!

 

Does that mean i should not play Vox depending of the time of the day? I fail to see how there even needs to be a discussion about this matter. It's just bad game design to kick people out of the round depending of the race they choose. Either let everybody or nobody revive.

 

I do aggree that maybe lore wise cloning a Vox might not be perfect, but it could work as a placeholder until there is a better game mechanic. Same goes for Slimes btw.

 

[PJB3005]

 

I still don't see how people could aggree that's a bad thing for player to get back into the round, regardless of race. This weekend i died 3 times very early to some random crap, allways at the time of day where very few players are online and rounds keep going forever. I thought i could have some fun RP but no, i just had to watch everyone else play for hours or do other stuff, while my bodies kept lying right next to the cloning machine. That time probably adds up to like 3-4 hours (in three rounds)!

 

Does that mean i should not play Vox depending of the time of the day? I fail to see how there even needs to be a discussion about this matter. It's just bad game design to kick people out of the round depending of the race they choose. Either let everybody or nobody revive.

 

I do aggree that maybe lore wise cloning a Vox might not be perfect, but it could work as a placeholder until there is a better game mechanic. Same goes for Slimes btw.

 

There's multiple ways to get back into the round, you should be able to respawn after 30? Minutes, also, slimes are still cloneable if the doctor's aren't incompetent, just transplant the brain they apperently have, because slimes having brains makes sense, right.

 

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

There's multiple ways to get back into the round, you should be able to respawn after 30? Minutes

I don't think respawn is allowed on Paradise. Even if, i would prefer to continue my character and not play a new one and force yourself not to meta game anything.

 

Obviously there are other ways to "get back into the game", but like i explained at the beginning of the posts this options are either to rare (because they are admin or event dependent) or they are just a very very weak substitute of a real character.

 

also, slimes are still cloneable if the doctor's aren't incompetent, just transplant the brain they apperently have, because slimes having brains makes sense, right.

Same works for Vox. But it's even more infuriating as having to watch the round as a ghost:

 

- it takes a metric fuck ton of time for the right doctor to find you and then for him having time and the will to make a monkey human, transplant and clone.

- because it takes so long, the doctor half asses the monkey clone and you get a body with the wrong gender, random skin color, blue hair and a green beard. If you are very lucky they remove the braindamage and close up your skull.

- So you wake up in a body you don't want to play and by that time all your stuff has been looted clean. So you have no gear, no id, nobody believes you who you are. Fun times.

 

I would not call this back in the game. Been there two times and it sucked.

 

[PJB3005]

You're not supposed to be able to transplant cortical stacks to human bodies, if you are it's a glitch

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

You're not supposed to be able to transplant cortical stacks to human bodies, if you are it's a glitch

I don't think anyone gave much thought about this at all, that's what this topic is about.

 

My strong opinion on this matter is that player should not be penalized by the choice of their race to the extent that other races can revive back into the game and your race can not. I do aggree that diversity is fun, like having to wear a gigantic tank on the back, but in return you are able to EVA. But there is nothing that could balance out the fact that certain races are unable to revive and be extention are not able to play the game. At least that is my opinon.

 

Up until now i have heard basicly two arguments against it:

1. Cloning Vox does not fit into the lore:

I would argue that Vox lore is very dodgy about this matter and that there are many other changes made, like vox suddenly having blood that aren't exactly lore either. So i don't see why it's such a big deal now, especially if you consider that cloning vox was a thing for a long time. It would be totally reasonable that NT studied the vox that worked with them and implemented new technology to the cloning machines to do so.

 

Lore is built around a game to make it richer and explain certain abilities or disabilities or events but when lore conflicts with a certain features that you want to implement, then you better change the lore and not the game.

 

2. The current code wouldn't allow it (Like inaprovaline killing the vox):

For me this is no argument at all, considering i am writing this in a subforum which main purpose is to discuss changes to the existing code.

 

 

Following this reasoning their are only two ways to deal with it:

- Implement a quick & dirt solution that may not fare well with the lore. (Clone vox and slimes)

or

- Take the time and develop a better solution that would allow for revival in a way that would harmonize with the current lore.

 

 

I am leaving IPC out of this discussion because they can be revived at the moment, it's just buggy as hell and that's a topic for the Bug Report forum.

 

[Midaychi]

 

Vox were supposed to get cortical stacks to be removable to revive Vox, but the coders ran out of steam and all that happened was that they cannot be cloned.

 

Basically this. Zomgponies was drawing up a device to do this at some point but never finished it.

 

Basically you cut the cortical stack out, get a larva shipped from an ark ship. You then go through a number of processes and have to deal with the fragile-ass container, place it in a machine to grow it into an immature vox, then use the cortical stack in the machine to implant it.

 

The machine would then handle the full growth from monkey-sized vox to full sized vox.

 

[SpaceTimeNow]

 

Basically this. Zomgponies was drawing up a device to do this at some point but never finished it.

 

Basically you cut the cortical stack out, get a larva shipped from an ark ship. You then go through a number of processes and have to deal with the fragile-ass container, place it in a machine to grow it into an immature vox, then use the cortical stack in the machine to implant it.

 

The machine would then handle the full growth from monkey-sized vox to full sized vox.

That sounds frigging awesome, a shame that never happened.