Mutagen is too rare compare to CBM

[ArgusTheCat]

I really like the idea of a Genetic Expression Device as an “enemy” that sits in the middle of some cities. It’s basically just a turret, but it blankets everything within two or three map tiles with a constant mutator effect, as if you were in low radiation, but without the hair loss. Early game survivors just have to tough it out as they scavenge, but mid or late game survivors have the choice to drop a mininuke on it or hit it with a bus, thus shutting off the field.

It could work as a good replacement for the lost copious amounts of mutagen, maybe.

[Thwap]

[quote=“ArgusTheCat, post:7, topic:9479”]I really like the idea of a Genetic Expression Device as an “enemy” that sits in the middle of some cities. It’s basically just a turret, but it blankets everything within two or three map tiles with a constant mutator effect, as if you were in low radiation, but without the hair loss. Early game survivors just have to tough it out as they scavenge, but mid or late game survivors have the choice to drop a mininuke on it or hit it with a bus, thus shutting off the field.

It could work as a good replacement for the lost copious amounts of mutagen, maybe.[/quote]

The only reason I’d keep playing if something like this existed is because I could mod it out.

[Coolthulhu]

There could be a mutating lab, like ice lab but with constant mutation getting worse the deeper you get.

[infectedmochi]

Sounds awesome, a special lab, or just a specific floor where extensive mutation experiments were being conducted when the cataclysm struck would be a good place to house this device, then wil sort of turn into a minigame of “find and destroy the device before you mutated something bad.”

[secretfire]

I agree with Coolthulhu, but go a bit farther. I think we need:

1. More force-mutation monsters. Particularly for the less desierable mutation lines (fish, anyone?) - there should be buildings on the surface, albeit perhaps not common buildings, where there is some sort of enemy that forces you into them. This can even help balance out particularly crappy mutation lines, where one might not be willing to MAKE mutagen for them, but if they can be forced on a player, it changes the strategy of them, as a new survivor could get them far before they could get into a lab.
2. I’d ultimately like to see occupied/settled labs. Most of the content and buildings in the game right now are appropriate for day 0 or the first month. The new NPC shelter content is the lone exception to that. Ultimately I’d like to see buildings appearing a year into the cataclysm that won’t be there, at all, on day 1 or even season one. This would allow for things like … cracked open and invaded labs where monsters of some type, or survivors of some type, have set up shop and mutated. I mean, the labs are going to be significantly more dangerous 5 years after the cataclysm then they are on day one.

[prytoclasm]

A basic survivor is so extremely powerfull that he doesn t need thing like mutations or petty toys like cbms.

Well, there’s one CBM I really don’t want to miss, and that’s the Artificial Night Generator CBM. It’s sooo handy in sooo many circumstances. IF you have the power!

[Thwap]

There could be a mutating lab, like ice lab but with constant mutation getting worse the deeper you get.

Otherwise known as “that lab you don’t go into” since there are a potentially endless number of labs out there and most of them don’t cripple your character for going inside.

Honestly the last few posts sound like game-ruining garbage. “Yeah you know how nobody uses fish mutations because they suck? Well we could force them on people! Then fish mutations would be seen more! And that would be good… for some reason!”

Restrict this crap to mods please.

[infectedmochi]

The open-world nature of the game means people don’t have to explore everything, but those who do and want a different challenge found in a typical game can choose to do so.

A simple warning, either directly to the player or as a message on a terminal (probably the latter) should provide enough warning for those who unknowingly wandered into such lab.

[Zireael]

I like the mutating lab idea.

[vache]

I had an idea for a mutation lab of sorts that would have some sort of damaging gas in areas where the player had to either risk injury or death to enter, have a containment suit, or find some other way around using other skills. I think a key point for pulling something like that off is that it has to be contained, such that you wouldn’t run into it unless you decided to, and the player has to have a pretty clear idea what the danger actually is. As long as there is some way to circumvent it there should be no problem for making it mandatory to progress. Changing the gas from damage to mutagenic would make sense for the theme and could be done just as easily, though I’m not sure how you would reconcile it with the lore. For instance, if the mutagen were aerosolized, why not make mutagenic spray instead of injections?

I think an injector type monster would make more sense in that situation. When the lab workers started to die and zombify, the other workers injected themselves with massive doses of different varieties to try and fight off the zombies. When they died, they were still full of mutagen and their attacks have a chance to inject some into their target.

[Coolthulhu]

[quote=“Coolthulhu, post:9, topic:9479”]There could be a mutating lab, like ice lab but with constant mutation getting worse the deeper you get.

Otherwise known as “that lab you don’t go into” since there are a potentially endless number of labs out there and most of them don’t cripple your character for going inside.

Honestly the last few posts sound like game-ruining garbage. “Yeah you know how nobody uses fish mutations because they suck? Well we could force them on people! Then fish mutations would be seen more! And that would be good… for some reason!”

Restrict this crap to mods please.[/quote]

Mutations are actually way too fucking good. Pretty much the only reason not to be a tentacled abomination is that they have too much of an effect on the ability to wear armor (should cause a lot of encumbrance, not “you can’t wear power armor because you have webbed hands”).

Mutlabs could help to balance the mutations by having people actually test them out, not just have post-endgame grinders purify all the bad ones and keep the good ones.

Mods could probably remove mutlabs rather easily.

[Murphy]

I sort of like the mutlab idea. Some of my characters probably wouldn’t go there, but it’s an interesting challenge, and it’s easy to just not go in there if you’re a perfectionist.

Mutating monsters, I’m not sold on. Mutations are already very hard to achieve in good combination (without savescumming), and having a monster ruin your perfect set in one attack is very depressing.

[Cacophony]

Mutating monsters, I’m not sold on. Mutations are already very hard to achieve in good combination (without savescumming), and having a monster ruin your perfect set in one attack is very depressing.

This is exactly the problem. Even with robust genetics, it can be very difficult, depending how generous the RNG is feeling, to get a good combination of mutations that fit your current playstyle. A monster that can mutate you could easily undo ingame days or weeks of work just in mutations, not to mention the fact that you might mutate in such a way as to destroy your equipment.

[vache]

That’s part of the difficulty. Like I said, if something like that were used, it would have to be clear you’re going to encounter it.

[Valpo]

There should be something that helps me “save” my current genetical makeup.
So i can purify back to my state of beeing a tentacle monster… should i have grown a pair of unwanted insect wings … for instance… without risking to purge what i wana keep-.

[vache]

That’s far too overpowered. Mutagen is supposed to be a mixed bag. The non-deterministic factor is what separates it from CBMs.

One thing that might be interesting and allow the player to offset it a little bit might be to create specialized mutagens that grant from a much smaller pool of mutations. Say mixing something like a bear and an alpha mutagen creates a mutagen that has the intersection of traits between those two categories, both positive and negative. The crafting system doesn’t really support mixing recipes like that right now though. There would have to be a single recipe for every combination.

[Valpo]

keeps no one from savescumming i supose. You can just mix in bad traits into a dna fix. like you wanna keep this trait? well you ll have to keep the other one there too. I see no problem.

[Wally-kun]

I thought mutagen was supposed to be brewed, thus why you don’t typically find it laying around, right? CBM’s you have to go find, because they’re professionally made except for some of the most basic ones. Mutagens are a cocktail nightmare concoction brewed up by daring survivors with access to classified chemical information from looted labs. It’s unstable and potentially powerful. CBM’s are more stable but are almost impossible to replicate on one’s own save for the most simple things.

There does need to be more tradeoff though. NPC’s will provide a lot of that later but mutations should limit your options more. Just like CBM’s need spaces to be filled instead of just plugging them endlessly into one another so they’re towering out of you in the slots you keep wedging them into.

AND, there should be some big risks in combining mutations with CBM’s. Those things weren’t designed for mutated anatomy. Increase in failure rate for the number of mutations maybe?

[Zireael]

[quote=“vache, post:22, topic:9479”]That’s far too overpowered. Mutagen is supposed to be a mixed bag. The non-deterministic factor is what separates it from CBMs.

One thing that might be interesting and allow the player to offset it a little bit might be to create specialized mutagens that grant from a much smaller pool of mutations. Say mixing something like a bear and an alpha mutagen creates a mutagen that has the intersection of traits between those two categories, both positive and negative. The crafting system doesn’t really support mixing recipes like that right now though. There would have to be a single recipe for every combination.[/quote]

I love the mixing mutagen idea!

[Valpo]

Mixing mutagens would yield the same result as saving traits.
With the differens: It would be easier and faster to build what you want and you can not fall back to your build after sufering from unwanted mutation like radiation or a yugg attack or telesickness enduced mutations.