Goonhub
02-08-2014, 07:45 AM
Skeletons, created by evil wizardry with murderous hearts and evil minds are on the whole... not very spooky. They go down like bitches with next to no effort from an assistant with a fire extinguisher. The worst they do is make a corpse unclonable and in order to make a skeleton you need to kill someone. Not very efficient compared to a golem which, while not bright, can be exceedingly deadly and punish people trying to kill them.
My suggestions are these: Change the code for the animate dead spell to create a generic murderous human like the life chemical does, than change his sprite to the skeleton sprite (I've seen this done, it is similar to how lizard men work) than grant the skeleton a few mutations, specifically immunity to breathing, cold and chemicals (all chems placed in its bloodstream vanish on one cycle with no effect because it has no bloodstream!) The AI of the murderous life-human is quite robust, it steals gear and wears it, picks up and throws weapons when convenient and is generally incredibly robust, additionally with the new mob type it would be in some ways harder and easier to subdue the skeleton since it would be vulnerable to handcuffs and such, but stronger than four hits with a fire extinguisher by far.
To balance the robust AI, the gear stealing ect when the skeleton hits critical damage it simply pops into bones on the floor.
Alternatively: since the above option would be a bitch to code (probably) make it so if a skeleton corpse is left lying around, it pulls itself back together and continues rampaging from full health, or if you're feeling fancy, when killed the skeleton dies and 'gibs' spawning two skeleton arms, two skeleton legs a skeleton rib-cage and a skeleton head. After a delay, the skeleton body than begins to gather body parts too itself. If it can at least one working arm or leg it will continue to fight with much less efficiency (The skeleton crawls after Pubby McScrubby!). Meaning that in order to permanently get rid of a skeleton you need to pick up the skeleton body and gib it or other wise get it away from its constituent limbs... all while a wizard is out there killing more people and making more skeles.
But wait it gets worse, because a skeleton body dosn't /just/ pick up skeleton limbs. Any limb will work. Meaning if you accidentally leave a dead skele in robotics you might wind up with a cyber skele, Or if you leave a dead Skele in the morgue it will take the still flesh-covered bones from a nearby body to replace its own missing limbs and continue its horrifying work... Much spookier than a few hits with a fire extinguisher.
Also they should make skeleton puns.
My suggestions are these: Change the code for the animate dead spell to create a generic murderous human like the life chemical does, than change his sprite to the skeleton sprite (I've seen this done, it is similar to how lizard men work) than grant the skeleton a few mutations, specifically immunity to breathing, cold and chemicals (all chems placed in its bloodstream vanish on one cycle with no effect because it has no bloodstream!) The AI of the murderous life-human is quite robust, it steals gear and wears it, picks up and throws weapons when convenient and is generally incredibly robust, additionally with the new mob type it would be in some ways harder and easier to subdue the skeleton since it would be vulnerable to handcuffs and such, but stronger than four hits with a fire extinguisher by far.
To balance the robust AI, the gear stealing ect when the skeleton hits critical damage it simply pops into bones on the floor.
Alternatively: since the above option would be a bitch to code (probably) make it so if a skeleton corpse is left lying around, it pulls itself back together and continues rampaging from full health, or if you're feeling fancy, when killed the skeleton dies and 'gibs' spawning two skeleton arms, two skeleton legs a skeleton rib-cage and a skeleton head. After a delay, the skeleton body than begins to gather body parts too itself. If it can at least one working arm or leg it will continue to fight with much less efficiency (The skeleton crawls after Pubby McScrubby!). Meaning that in order to permanently get rid of a skeleton you need to pick up the skeleton body and gib it or other wise get it away from its constituent limbs... all while a wizard is out there killing more people and making more skeles.
But wait it gets worse, because a skeleton body dosn't /just/ pick up skeleton limbs. Any limb will work. Meaning if you accidentally leave a dead skele in robotics you might wind up with a cyber skele, Or if you leave a dead Skele in the morgue it will take the still flesh-covered bones from a nearby body to replace its own missing limbs and continue its horrifying work... Much spookier than a few hits with a fire extinguisher.
Also they should make skeleton puns.