Communicating with The Big Three

Game Talk The Drawing Board
1

So getting the attention of the blob collective would be…uh…‘bad’. Let’s just settle with ‘bad’. We don’t have anything to talk about and frankly we don’t want to talk to them.

Triffids have been talked about a bit, basically every heart would be its own faction beneath the ‘triffid’ master faction and it’d be a lot more political, though whether they actually give a shit about you comes down to the heart’s personality and what you have to be recognized for. Some would be inherently hostile for one of many reasons; some you might be able to be almost allies with. Almost. Because inevitably the triffd heart is looking out for its own interests and you might not always be very important to them.

Currently it seems like the only way to talk to the Mycus is to be a part of the Mycus. From an outsider looking in that seems kind of scary. I don’t want to be able to see what I’m dealing with when I can’t get out of it. I want to know what I’m getting into. I myself can just go on a wiki or someting and go spoiler hunting but the survivors cannot. Most people that find the Mycus probably had no idea it existed before they found it.

If it’s even possible to find out about the Mycus’s existence prior to be assimilated into it, I’m wondering if there is some way to contact it. I thought initially some kind of Mycus Hivemind Radio you could remotely contact them with somehow but even one way that seems sort of…counter-intuitive.

I’m trying to think about the relationships between player and faction. Triffids are hostile until delved deeper into (eventually), blobs are always hostile no matter what, and the fungus seems like it’s either avoided and/or burned like a poison or embraced if you’re already neck-deep in it. Can it be broken down any farther than that?

I mean obviously there would be relationships between the particular Nether fauna, but those would be on a small scale. I’m trying to think about more interactions between the three biggest forces in the game.

2

An interesting note might be if someone is particularly mutated and then attempts to get into the Mycus faction; the blob inside of them that is handling the mutations and the Mycus that is attempting to get in on the action are not the most graceful of housemates and one is basically guaranteed to eventually drive the other out of your body (which is not the most healthy or painless process).

For the Mycus my guess is that most survivors end up finding out about it through the eating of marloss berries (which is coincidentally the first step into the world of the Mycus). In a sense the Mycus work kinda like recruiting drug dealers; they hit you with enough that makes you feel good, no charge, at the beginning and next thing you know you’re in so deep you can’t turn away.

Honestly I think that if you are trying to communicate and ally with a faction your best bet would probably be to shoot for the Mi-go rather than actively trying to communicate with one of the Big 3. The Mi-go are probably the closest to our current civilization of any of the different invaders (short of the whole slavery and advanced technology things), and if we could present a good enough front we could probably end up becoming a protectorate Mi-go state. For the common person that probably wouldn’t end too different from the way they lived prior to the Cataclysm, albeit with some Apartheid vibes and institutional slavery (you’d still be treated as individual people and not end up part of or subject to some huge hive mind though!). When your choices range from destruction + zombification to total loss of free will, sometimes rooting for the guys who just want to enslave a large chunk of you and turn the rest into second-class citizens is the best of your bad options. :stuck_out_tongue: (And a local Mi-go takeover with enough force could certainly ensure that not every part of the globe falls into the hands of things that would zombify, assimilate, or mind control you; while they can’t contest the Big 3 for the whole world, they certainly have enough power and technology access to take some chunks of it strongly enough to not lose them later).

3

Nobody can stop my indestructible super survivor. Not even the big nether players. They get in our way they die.
I don t negotiate :smiley:

4

There really aren’t a lot of good options, are there? Makes me wonder how Cortez felt when the next thing he knew white men with magical explosion sticks started flattening his cities and started jamming their alien flags into the ground. :stuck_out_tongue:

What other factions are there? I wasn’t even aware that the Mi-go were sentient until devs started to mention that they were sapient and even had a society of their own. I thought they were just Nether animals with mimicking tendencies that mob and slaughter people like the zombies do.

Also, Grackens. Really hoping to see those get some proper depth later. Being able to just knock them over doesn’t feel right.

5

The Mi-go are probably the biggest “minor” faction. Right now you are mainly seeing their scouts and explorers while they try to figure out what particular chunks of land they want to take; once they do so they will probably push for those areas hard to secure them before anyone else can react. In my opinion the kreck are one of the big Mi-go subhuman intelligence slave races that have been mostly enslaved (though there are still plenty of wild ones out there).

Grackens have always been a minor faction IMO, though they don’t really have enough clout to claim any of our world themselves. That said they have a pseudo-truce with the Mi-go where they are welcome as traders, etc., in the Mi-go cities (along with a large variety of other semi-unknown races; as long as you have been “recognized” by the Mi-go you are welcome to trade and live in their cities… assuming you don’t do anything to piss off the Mi-go overlords).

Then there’s the Big 3 that we’ve encountered and discussed quite a bit (i.e. the goo/blob, the Mycus, and the Triffids).

There’s also the shadows, who are sort of the new kids on the block (besides us, that is). As best as we know they were from the other “side” of our dimension from the Nether, so this is the first time that anybody, Nether denizens included, has met them. They aren’t having much luck staying on our side yet due to the fact that sunlight kinda melts them (or forces them back to their home dimension, we aren’t sure) but they have had a few times where they’ve infested underground areas. Nobody knows much about them or has really managed to communicate, so they are definitely still an unknown wildcard in the situation (though they are pretty limited to sunlight-free areas, which limits their ability to control ground pretty drastically). I think it might be interesting to potentially have something similar to the Necropolis, but instead of the whole place being filled with irradiated wanderers the whole place (aboveground houses included) is filled with shadows. It’s perfectly safe to wander around in the daytime (including looting near windows), but go someplace too dark or try to do something during the night when all the shadows boil out of the earth would be suicide.

That’s all the real “factions” we have ATM, though there are a few other groups that might be worth noting:
The cultists - These guys are weird. They seem to have some sort of relationship with the blob, but they’ve also definitely been in touch with other factions as well; most likely they can’t accomplish anything here other than be creepy atmosphere guys, but they do exist.

The horrors - This is the amigara horrors, the breathers, and few other of the spooky (usually references to other games/etc.) things. They are usually pretty powerful, but are almost always linked to a specific location (such as the fault lines). These things are native to earth, and have been here for as long as anyone can remember; and they will most likely continue to be here even if something else conquers the planet completely. That said they most likely won’t have any real influence in the long run due to the fact that they are linked to areas, and the fact that said areas are usually just as deadly to humans as they are to other things.

I’m glad you feel that way. I actually drew on the colonization of the Americas as some of the inspiration for stuff that’s there, and the fact that you are feeling that way is definitely a good sign about the lore IMO. :smiley:

6

Speaking of Breathers, it’s been many versions of the game since I’ve seen any kind of artifact generated. Have they been removed or were they made much rarer?

7

Probably just bad luck possibly combined with some bugs. I know that there is at least one spot that is supposed spawn artifacts right now but isn’t (the amigara fault) so it’s certainly possible there could be a few others.

I’m in the middle of finals right now, but I’ll definitely take a look into it in a week or so when I’m all done with everything (assuming someone else doesn’t first).

8

While on the topic of shadows I’ve long wanted to make an abandoned lab with a portal to the shadowland. Complete with UV weapons that only work on shadows and the like.

So I can finally add a place for wraiths to spawn… and change how wraiths work while at it.

9

Sorry to derail, but Cortez was actually one of the aforementioned white aliens. He was a Spaniard. Return to your regularly scheduled programming.

10

Sorry to derail, but Cortez was actually one of the aforementioned white aliens. He was a Spaniard. Return to your regularly scheduled programming.[/quote]

I am history much good