Bionics (General balance and other issues)

[Hyena_Grin]

Some great ideas in this thread. The CBM thing always puzzled me a bit.

Just a quick addition; installing a CBM should leave you with a significant amount of pain. You are, after all, performing invasive surgery on yourself. It stands to reason you may want some decent painkillers after the fact.

Potentially it could also cause actual damage to whatever area of the body it is installed to, that must be healed.

[vultures]

Potentially it could also cause actual damage to whatever area of the body it is installed to, that must be healed.

Yup, I guess even a workday before cataclysm people were still repulsed with the prospect of a implant-surgery eventually going wrong. I get the logic (I must, I'm a human being and I understand fear) behind the "don't let them cut you open unless it's completely necessary" assessment. Also, that's a little Caveman talking out of me, the one that wants to make experiments on mammoths and make them extinct. If curiosity killed the cat, surgery wiped out the mammoths. :-D I dunno if anyone wants to be cornered with a specific way of thinking. I mean, I was a little intimidated when I first saw "Diamond Cornea" on my screen. I knew the game could eat all my CBMs, and I gulped and gulped before I could hit that key - for the pain's sake (imagine sticking a needle in your eye just to see [i]anything[/i] works) but for the game to [b]deprave me of my eyesight[/b], well, it was just unimaginable to me.

My best advice to all y’alls that still can’t find a way to chew that CataDDA bubblegum - if you grabbed the Clark Kent character in your Real Lives as soon as you saw him, please embrace the Superman in some of our Rogue Likes.

[Hyena_Grin]

I more meant that even when it works it damages the bodypart in question. Failure can already cause damage, I understand.

[ShinQuickMan]

[quote=“GrizzlyAdamz, post:20, topic:3657”]

if we are thinking of adding a torso limit we should also be able to have a cybernetic torso CBM that removes the cap.

I am OK with this.

Base it on total volume- a fusion blaster arm takes up half or more of your ‘arms’ & ‘hands’ space. Meanwhile, light, medium & heavy android torso chassis improve the total volume you have available. Possibly include life-support in the upper-tier chassis.

So you can turn yourself into a quasi-human hulking mechanical monstrosity, or work with a very humanoid, (limited), shell, or stick with your very seriously limited default biological body.

Just increase the volume depending on how mechanized you become, (full arm replacement provides enough space for a fusion blaster or toolkit, plus some for hydraulic muscles).

The system can be expanded and tweaked to a great degree- simple & straightforward.[/quote]

Very nice. While we’re at it, we may as well remove some of the current limitations based on redundancy. This can open up some nice (if likely impractical) interactions, such as double-plated skin, big flame thrower (created from 2 mini-flamethrower installations), and dual plasma arm rifles[sub] for maximum firepower of course[/sub].

[quote=“GrizzlyAdamz, post:20, topic:3657”]Shooting myself in the foot by going on, but anyway:
How would it handle infections/wounds? hrm.
Whatever it is, it can require mechanics/electronics to ‘fix’. ‘Bleeding’ can still occur, but hemostatic powder wouldn’t work…this might be complicated.

Well it can be implemented in steps.[/quote]

Cybernetics would likely depend on the human’s natural systems for repairs, so one thing we could do is have healing rates slowed on different body parts pending on how much cybernetics are installed in them. So an arm that’s completely mechanized can’t get healed from sleep or bandages, but can be repaired by soldering and (perhaps only) from an auto-doc. Repair nanobots might circumvent this, though.

Bite wounds would likely be less effective (and may be ineffective against completely robotic parts), but cyborgs should have other troubles related to that. Perhaps, if they take a certain amount amount of shocking damage, bionics can short out, requiring immediate repairs attention lest a certain amount of them change into malfunctioning bionics. Crippled body parts face similar threats.

[infectedmochi]

[quote=“GrizzlyAdamz, post:23, topic:3657”]I was thinking more along the lines of how it would handle the mechanisms that are already in-place. Bitewounds & infections in a heavily cyber-ized user.

Agree on permanent, that’s…eh. If you can remove them, damage is fine. Not so much otherwise.[/quote]

Yes I figure that permanent damaged bionics that can’t be removed was harsh, still to somewhat even out with pure flesh, bionics should carry a different risk, my suggestion is once damage reach a certain threshold that bionic will cease to function and need replacement/repair. Ideally full bionic should still be better overall than full-flesh to reflect progressions in science.

[quote=“ShinQuickMan, post:28, topic:3657”]Cybernetics would likely depend on the human’s natural systems for repairs, so one thing we could do is have healing rates slowed on different body parts pending on how much cybernetics are installed in them. So an arm that’s completely mechanized can’t get healed from sleep or bandages, but can be repaired by soldering and (perhaps only) from an auto-doc. Repair nanobots might circumvent this, though.

Bite wounds would likely be less effective (and may be ineffective against completely robotic parts), but cyborgs should have other troubles related to that. Perhaps, if they take a certain amount amount of shocking damage, bionics can short out, requiring immediate repairs attention lest a certain amount of them change into malfunctioning bionics. Crippled body parts face similar threats.[/quote]

I agree with this.

[i2amroy]

[quote=“Klomvp, post:1, topic:3657”][size=12pt]3) Mutations and Bionics conflict/interfere with each other[/size]

This would mostly be a matter of applying the same tagging system to mutations and bionics, which would immediately make them conflict in a meaningful way. And might also replace the manually-applied conflicts in the mutation system.[/quote]
GlyphGryph had an idea (that I personally liked quite a bit) where rather than causing conflicts certain mutations can only be obtained when certain bionics are present first. For example if you have the metal plating bionic and the game attempts to mutate you a claws mutation, there is a chance that it will give you the “metal claws” mutation (and there is also a chance it could just give you the claws mutation and destroy/ruin your current bionic, or there is a chance it could just give you the claws mutation and do nothing to your bionic). I do agree that having certain mutations should make installing certain bionics more difficult, but I’m not too sure about impossible. After all just because I have tentacles doesn’t mean that I can have an integrated toolset in them, it just raises the difficult for a successful installation.

[GrizzlyAdamz]

infectedmochi

Yeah, bionics should be overall better, but only if it takes maintenance- mutations can accomplish close to the same results & require no additional equipment besides the mutagen & your body. Bionics are targeted, modular, bleeding-edge effective but are both rare & costly to maintain.

Think rare/expensive replacement parts- (ie you can’t craft them- you have to rely on the RNG to repair damaged parts), & some kind of moderate hassle to maintain them- (bionics oil, craftable, have to administer it once a day to avoid wear/tear)

snip

Sounds like a lot of extra work but I’m ok with it if you fellows are up for it.

Mmm, tentacle tool-arm should be nigh-impossible. If not outright, the difficulty should be max.

Would be a non-issue if some kinda cybernetic limb replacement system is put in-place- would need a full prosthesis for the larger mods.
—Mutations could lower the amount of space available too, so tentacle limbs could decrease it while 8-armed can increase it.

[moist_zombie]

I didn’t read the entire thread, but maybe having bionics at all should be more risky… Instead of the ones you consider conflicting (besides blaster arm, probably) each CBM could have certain potential malfunctions (when exposed to certain weather/temps or electricity, or when damaged in combat or exposed to fire, or when paired with certain mutations…).

So you get slimy hands all over your flamethrower CBM (or try using it in the rain, or while wet), toss in a chance of it failing. Membrane Oxygenation could potentially expose you to toxins/germs in the water… You get electro-sprayed by a shocker and your hydraulic muscles lock up (or your Shockwave Generator starts firing at random)… Seems like the Electromagnetic Unit could potentially pull CBMs out of you… Other good effects too, like “very heat dependent” mutation could be counteracted by having an internal furnace or Heat Drain or Climate Control, “Head Bumps” mutation could allow an extra head CBM installation, Sunlight Dependant could amplify Solar Panel effectiveness… Troglobite/Very Light Sensitive could handle some positive perks for being in darkness since you’re chased from the light… Maybe a new nano CBM that repairs damaged robotic parts… Severe Radioactivity + Radiogenic look like a nice pair to have Also spines/quills + poisonous… I suppose certain CBMs could have multiple installation slots instead of just one (though some are definitely pinned to a certain area). That all pretty much builds off Glyph’s idea of interlocking mutation/CBM stuffs…

Complicating things too much is bad for business though What are the true odds that you can literally single-handedly saw one of your arms off and then install a blaster arm on yourself in the first place? I’d like some ambidexterity before I attempted that one And about 500,000mg of morphine, and someone to wake me up from the nightmare, of course I guess basically all I’m saying is instead of balancing/limiting how many we can have and where we can have them, why not just make the whole mutation/roboticization potentially dangerous to undertake (mutations already are fairly dangerous anyway…)… And I agree with the increased time to install, and the potential of running around with my chest cavity open That’s my long-winded partially useless two cents on the subject

[tikilla]

It’s an interesting discussion, here’s an idea: to intall a cbm you need a “zero component”, something like a small computer that allows cbm to be controlled and linked with nerves/muscles. Without “zero component” cbm will be useless,in particular active one.

[GrizzlyAdamz]

The lines between mutations and CBMs seem to be blurry- I’d rather they be more defined.
So, depending on how it’s done, I’m not so much in favor of sunlight dependent improving solar panels, but am for internal furnace helping with coldblooded. Purely mechanical interactions.

Anything that mixes the two (like metal claws) has to be it’s own, separate, specialized mutation/cbm hybrid- and have unique conditions & whatnot for appearing.

But before that though I’d prefer to just see the CBMs redone, and then if you kindly devs feel loik working on cbm/mutation interplay that’s even better.

@tikilla
Why name it “zero component”?

[PogoMarimo]

With the loftier ideas being floated here, I’m going to throw out two really minor things:

1. Replace any PC instance of “Android” with “Cyborg”. This is a simple semantic thing, but even the small details count, right? I know the profession still has the “Failed Android” option as of my most latest update, for instance.

2. Bring back a randomized bionics option at character creation. I loved the bionic lottery at start-up, and if you wanted to tie it to profession make it something like: “Bionic Victim - You woke up naked with a fresh scar on your body where some psychopath experimented on you. I wonder what they did?”

[infectedmochi]

I like GlyphGryph’s idea mentioned before, bionics and mutations have a complicated relationship, some times they hamper each other, some times they complement each other and some times they just ignore each other. I agree it’s will be lots of work and plannings though so this is some thing of a long-term goal. Right now we should concentrate on improving bionic (and mutation) first.

btw, lots of good ideas floating around in this thread

[KA101]

Uh, making bionics require non-craftable components in order to maintain them risks the Asthma problem: sooner or later your character is gonna get RNG-screwed.

Therefore, I understand that most folks don’t take Asthma. Hoping that these don’t do the same to bionics, which IMO are one of the neater things in Cata.

I’d rather they don’t become inordinately full of gotchas and nerfs and otherwise inaccessible for those of us who like to just play the game.

Thanks.

[EkarusRyndren]

I’d rather they don’t become inordinately full of gotchas and nerfs and otherwise inaccessible for those of us who like to just play the game.

Not to tumblr-ify things but…

[move][size=36pt]^^^ THIS ^^^[/size][/move]

I don’t want to be driving around and suddenly “YOUR BIONIC INTESTINES BACKFIRE, SEPTIC SHOCK, GAME OVER MAN.”

[Klomvp]

I don’t want to be driving around and suddenly “YOUR BIONIC INTESTINES BACKFIRE, SEPTIC SHOCK, GAME OVER MAN.”

You don’t remember the original cataclysm much then, with things like the old Acid Rain and Lightning Strikes.

I’m not kidding when I say Cataclysm is slipping from a YASD roguelike to a mary-sue grinder.

[EkarusRyndren]

[quote=“EkarusRyndren, post:38, topic:3657”]I don’t want to be driving around and suddenly “YOUR BIONIC INTESTINES BACKFIRE, SEPTIC SHOCK, GAME OVER MAN.”

You don’t remember the original cataclysm much then, with things like the old Acid Rain and Lightning Strikes.

I’m not kidding when I say Cataclysm is slipping from a YASD roguelike to a mary-sue grinder.[/quote]

Never even heard of the original Cataclysm. But if you want random game ending additions why not just every five minutes flip a coin, heads delete the save folder, tails keep it? I don’t mean to be rude but having a random, unavoidable insta-kill sounds like fun. "You can avoid it by not " Yeah I could also avoid it by not playing the game at all. (Though I suppose that’s what made Spec Ops: The Line interesting, but that’s another story.)

I want to make it clear, I have nothing against making the game a bit more challenging. But there’s challenging, and then there’s “SURPRISE, YOU’RE DEAD. TIME TO START OVER.”

Forcing limitations on what and how many bionics you can install? Bleeding lip bite acceptable. It’s not my taste, but it’s a balancing factor.
Forcing limitations on what bionics you can install with mutations? Same. Not my taste but I can’t justify it not being there.
Forcing in random death? …That’s not exactly fair.

[Klomvp]

f you want random game ending additions

Not particularly, and if you read the OP that’s not what I intended.

I just want some actual depth to the mid-end game characters.

[KA101]

Yeah, and the original Cataclysm had bionics too. They didn’t require maintenance.

More generally, I guess others like to invest time and effort into their characters, and resent being randomly killed. As so I. IMO, only thing worse than putting in effort to develop a character and build a base is to have that effort shot to hell by a random roll.

[hr]

As for “depth”, well, I played GearHead and GearHead2. GH1 had soft-capped skill limits and allowed players to spend money for skill training. In practice, one character, played for long enough, could take practically every skill.

Because Temple of the Roguelike frowned on that, Joe Hewitt hard-capped skills when GH2 rolled around. Therefore, characters pretty much had to specialize from game start. If you wanted to take a flavor skill or give your character any life outside of mech-fighting, well, hope you picked the right one, because that’s all you’d have room for.

At the end of the day, I found GH1 far more rewarding than GH2, despite getting to the final boss in each. GH1 let me do things, experiment, and explore. When one aspect got boring I could switch to another–could even forget I had a skill, if desired. GH2 was a grindfest of the same shit constantly over and over and over, despite (if not due to) having the restrictions on what I could do and how my character could develop.

So in terms of “depth”: it’s what you make of it. If you don’t have an RP thread handy, mental-RP is better than nothing. Consider jotting down a character journal or notes or something?

[Klomvp]

character depth in a rougelike is GH2

Where in the OP did I say "I want grindy min-maxing"?

IMO, only thing worse than putting in effort to develop a character and build a base is to have that effort shot to hell by a random roll.

Where in the OP did I say "I want MORE yasd?"

Seriously. What the fuck are you guys projecting here.

Mutations, bionics, interact. Bionics nerfed. That’s it.

[GrizzlyAdamz]

The random-death is a strawman, guys, no one suggested that.

Here’s the abridged discussion line for convenience:

[spoiler][quote=“GrizzlyAdamz, post:31, topic:3657”][quote=“infectedmochi, post:29, topic:3657”]Yes I figure that permanent damaged bionics that can’t be removed was harsh, still to somewhat even out with pure flesh, bionics should carry a different risk, my suggestion is once damage reach a certain threshold that bionic will cease to function and need replacement/repair. Ideally full bionic should still be better overall than full-flesh to reflect progressions in science.[/quote]
Yeah, bionics should be overall better, but only if it takes maintenance- mutations can accomplish close to the same results & require no additional equipment besides the mutagen & your body.
Bionics are targeted, modular, bleeding-edge effective but are both rare & costly to maintain.

Think rare/expensive replacement parts- (ie you can’t craft them- you have to rely on the RNG to repair damaged parts), & some kind of moderate hassle to maintain them- (bionics oil, craftable, have to administer it once a day to avoid wear/tear)[/quote][/spoiler]

So if you read that, infected kinda suggested permanent damage, (which was discussed and disagreed with), and also postulated that bionics should be overall better than mutations.
At that point I agreed, but suggested the caveat that they require maintenance & have rare parts.

Let me elaborate on that:
As far as rare parts, I mean that you would have to find these parts to repair damaged CBMs or cybernetic limbs.
—The obvious alternative—
Remove the damaged part and install a duplicate, or make due until you find one.
Keep in mind: this would only come into play if a CBM or other equipment becomes damaged/broken.

As for maintenance, I suggested a craftable recipe that you’d have to apply once a day or incur a small chance to damage your machine bits.

This is all to counterbalance having CBMs being more powerful, overall, than mutagens. Which is, itself, a suggestion that isn’t realized at the moment.

My attitude regarding CBMs & mutations is that they should each be a distinct branch of character development, but not be mutually exclusive. I and the OP differ on this, (I think), because my view favors the absolute freedom of the player to operate within reasonable bounds while the OP wants hard classes & whatnot. But I shouldn’t be talking for him.
Just wanted to make that clear.

Now that’s said, I’d like to point out this is all tangential to something else I’d really like to see happen: a volumetric rebalance of the CBM system.
Currently the PC can install everything they get their hands on, which doesn’t make sense when you’ve got internal storage, an internal furnace, an expanded digestive system and a whole host of utility CBMs & stacks upon stacks of storage units in one torso.

To fix this, two clear suggestions were made- the first being to limit them with a max number of CBMs per limb, and the second to limit them with a max volume per limb.
I advocate the latter, and would suggest ask, please reread the thread if you’re hazy on it.