Talking To Plants: Interacting With The Triffids

[Erk]

For the most part you’re barking up the right tree. Communication with triffid will eventually be possible, but the route will probably be through researching them and finding out how they communicate, not through mutation. A plant mutant is no more similar to a triffid than a dolphin is to a termite mounds; I don’t think it would give the power to understand their signals and language.

For the most part I think you’ve got the communication stuff pretty right. Of note, triffid are biased towards assuming we’re inferior. Most interactions with them are going to be heftily weighted to the triffid side. However, they are the most comprehensible of the alien types in the game currently, and could be reasoned with along the lines of diplomacy with a powerful foreign nation.

[Trigon]

I actually like this. Very good points and could make post threshold plant more fun for sure.

Also “Barking up the right tree.” It’s funny cuz plants.

[BushElito]

If you really want something wacky, add a “Triffid serum” that only works on full Plant mutants that cause you to become a Triffid.

I mean, I think you can make Plant mutagens out of Triffid parts (Plant marrow, biollante bud or datura seeds), so technically a Plant mutant is closest to a Triffid? Thus, making an advanced-serum causes you to become a triffid.

[nameless_survivor]

Of note, triffid are biased towards assuming we’re inferior. Most interactions with them are going to be heftily weighted to the triffid side.

Yeah I’m not sure I like that very much. The whole arrogant aliens trope is kinda overused for one thing. Secondly, I’d rather not have players go to the trouble of finding a way to interact with the Triffids only to write them off as being a bunch of speciesist weeds after the first couple of conversations end in the Triffids being arrogant dicks. I know if that happened in my game the conversation would deteriorate quickly, and shortly after I would begin an aggressive campaign of Herbicide.

[Erk]

Talk to one of the other species then. This isn’t a game where anything tends to be very friendly to humans, and frankly the triffid per the design doc are superior to us.

[nameless_survivor]

Yes, but if they are massive dicks people are just going to ignore or exterminate them rather than trying to interact. You can make them a bit arrogant, but much farther than that will defeat the entire point of making it possible to interact with them, because no one will bother.

And aren’t all the other factions either unequivocally hostile or too alien to be communicated with? The fungus has to assimilate you, and at that point you basically become their meat puppet. The blob flat out cannot be interacted with, and getting its attention would be a horribly retarded idea per Kevyn. The netherworld creatures like the Mi-Go are all evil and hostile or nonsapient.

[Erk]

Who said they are “massive dicks”? Don’t make assumptions and then spend a lot of time arguing about the stuff you’ve assumed

[nameless_survivor]

You misunderstand, I’m not saying that they are already described that way, I’m saying that if we make them overly arrogant in their interactions it will be self defeating. They might be superior, but if they rub it in peoples faces too much it will end poorly more often than not. And all the trouble of making them more than just random mobs will be mostly for nothing.

[Erk]

Ah. I don’t think they care nearly enough about us to rub our faces in anything. We just have very little to offer them, besides food made from us.

[Tazeell]

Still, one might try negotiating if your standing next to it flamethrower in hand.

[_k1]

How about a post-threshold plant mutant building a triffid-encrusted-fortress like a clown fish builds its anemone nest? The triffids recognize the mutant and do not attack him.

[Turtleoverlord]

fungus is just annoying like,tey can destroy the evac shelter you’ve baricaded in one day you stayed away from it to find a lab or something in those lines,i only found trifids twice and died to them,they could be some high risk high reward thing to ally yourself with,like you do some stuff for them and they kick fungui ass for you : v

[nameless_survivor]

Still, one might try negotiating if your standing next to it flamethrower in hand.

Ah yes, the Ripley Method of negotiating with alien lifeforms, aka “fuck off or the eggs get it”. I am definitely a fan of that technique.

[hydroplatypus]

Maybe a way of implementing this would be to have a triffid emissary NPC - probably with hidden mutations similar to the bee npc to ensure it registers as triffid friendly - on the bottom layer of a triffid grove, before the heart. So that if the player has killed their way down that far, the heart starts getting scared, and offers to negotiate in an attempt to save itself.

Given triffids seem to be able to manipulate earth plants quite a bit, perhaps they offer to supply food to the human - or nearby human settlement, in exchange for their continued existence. A cautious alliance could grow from that starting point.

[Trivega]

Being plant threshold to talk to plants/triffids brings up an interesting idea. What if ALL the mutation thresholds each have their own unique monster faction you become friendly with? Plants get plants/triffids, Fish get whatever terryfing things below the water, and etc.

Some thresholds are flat out better than others, so giving us more reasons to consider the other thresholds would be a boon.

[Maddremor]

Note that all mutagens, including plant mutagen, is based on blob shenanigans. Post threshhold plant mutants are not closer to being allies to triffids, rather they are probably seen as more enemies of the triffids than the quasi-neutral native humans. If you want plant mutation to be the road to triffidhood, you probably need to change it into a equivalent of the marloss transformation.

[BushElito]

Don’t you use Triffid parts in creating the Plant mutagens and serums?

You might be manipulating the blob, but you are also injecting triffid DNA, no?

[mr_sep]

Has anyone actually thought that only thing a Triffid would like to communicate after lot of effort on human side would be “You will make great compost for my roots, bald ape”. Alien life can be alien not only for it’s looks but also moral code, world view, etc. Expecting to communicate on a same level with and invasive specie is as futile as if suddenly a chicken asked me if I liked em. “I do, especially with a hot sauce, my little nugget KFC. Would you lay me some eggs first for supper, while I heat up the oven?” You get what I mean.

[Turtleoverlord]

We must remember that even if the trifids are smart and everything they could get addicted to stuff like industrial fertilizer just like the food industry addicted us to glutamate monosodium

[mr_sep]

Intricacy of triffid negotiations: “So you tell us you never ate a single plant in your life, Mr. Vegan?”