Game Mode: Warbeast

[Skunkrocker]

Summary: A top secret weapon that the Syndicate have been working on for quite some time, hidden away in the station maintenance halls, is set loose upon the crew. It has a ton of health, not much can damage it, and each time it shows up it has a different set of abilities. The crew MUST destroy this monster robot, or face certain death: the Escape Shuttle absolutely will not dock once the Warbeast is detected.

Antags: 1
Spawning: Randomly somewhere on the station, hidden inside a wall connected to a maintenance tunnel.

Winning Conditions:
- if the Warbeast dies: the Crew wins!
- if every Crew member is dead, or has left the station Z level (considered abandonment) whether or not the Warbeast has been defeated: the Syndicate win!

The Machine:

This idea is based on the 1994 film Death Machine. If you haven't seen it, please do. It's a great bad film.



(yes that is Brad Dourif aka Chucky as Jack Dante, the villain)

At the beginning of the round, the player of the Warbeast is allowed to select 3 traits to help them become the ultimate murderbot from a list of 9 out of a possible 15. These traits are listed below. The Warbeast starts with thermal and meson vision for free, can smash anything in it's way besides walls, and can force open any door including bolted ones. In addition to those traits and abilities, the Warbeast also takes very little damage from common attacks such as melee. Explosions, fire, actual bullets, lasers, etc. will be required to do decent damage. Even then, the Warbeast is hard to pin down. Luckily, the crew has an advantage: the Warbeast is a machine, first and foremost, and cannot understand human communication in any way shape or form. All it knows is that it must kill. That means it doesn't know what the crew is planning. It doesn't understand alerts, so if for example a meteor strike is about to hit it won't know to avoid it. It can also be shorted out using tasers and water, but only for a second and only to give you time to get away. The Warbeast is always in aggro, cannot pick up items, and essentially will attack anything it runs into including critters and objects. Also, the vacuum of space is very bad... if the Warbeast has nothing to grab onto, it will just float away. Note that it does not have an ability to have magnetic feet. If the Warbeast leaves the z level, it's considered dead.

Available Traits:
1. Battering Ram: instantly destroy doors and windows upon touching them, while decreasing response time
2. Crushing Soles: destroy items on the ground as you walk over them, but also floor tiles and panels
3. Light Step: you make no noise when walking, otherwise you're very loud and VERY noticable; however, you now take way more damage from melee attacks
4. Cloak: gives a camouflaging ability with a cooldown that gets longer the more you use it
5. Thunderstrike: getting electrocuted causes you to shoot out a lightning attack at the cost of your health
6. Reinforced Hull: extra health at the cost of being extremely slow
7. Maximum Overdrive: you're very VERY fast. In fact, you can't stop running once you start. Hitting a wall will stun you.
8. Juice: burst through walls, at the cost of your meson vision.
9. Auxiliary Battery: anyone immediately behind you or to your sides gets instantly stunned, but you take more damage from head on attacks
10. Radar Detector: you get a pinpointer showing you the closest human target, but no thermal vision
11. Fireproof: you take no damage from fires while starting with less health
12. Armor Upgrade: you take less damage from explosives but you have a vision cone of only what is in front of you.
13. Recharger: getting shocked heals you, but stuns last longer
14. Translation App: you can understand humans, alerts, and cyborgs; you take longer to force open doors and smash windows though
15. Self Destruct: if you die, you become an unstoppable bomb detonating in ten seconds that is the size of 2 macrobombs in power, but if you don't take out the rest of the crew with you when it goes you lose.

As you can see, certain traits in combinations with others are actually a detriment, but also some make you nigh impossible to destroy. The crew must put their heads together to stop you.

I came up with this idea while at work, so it's not quite fleshed out. I hope you have some thoughts and ideas to contribute because I think this would be a great game mode.

[Frank_Stein]

We had an older thread about reintroducing the Human looking replicant borgs back into the game, only as a Robotic antagonist.

Seems like ideas from here and there could comingle

[Lady Birb]

This seems pretty cool, though some of the traits seem like they are too powerful for their downside (eg. Auxiliary Battery, Juice) while some others seem too weak for their downside (eg. Light step, armor upgrade). Maybe give them a ranged weapon too?

[Tom Clancy's Gay Ghost]

"1. Battering Ram: instantly destroy doors and windows upon touching them, while decreasing response time
2. Crushing Soles: destroy items on the ground as you walk over them, but also floor tiles and panels"

A big no on these two, IMO. It'd be able to vent the station just by existing, and would be super obnoxious.

[Skunkrocker]

This seems pretty cool, though some of the traits seem like they are too powerful for their downside (eg. Auxiliary Battery, Juice) while some others seem too weak for their downside (eg. Light step, armor upgrade). Maybe give them a ranged weapon too?

There is a ranged ability in the traits, but outside that I feel giving this thing range would break the game.

"1. Battering Ram: instantly destroy doors and windows upon touching them, while decreasing response time
2. Crushing Soles: destroy items on the ground as you walk over them, but also floor tiles and panels"

A big no on these two, IMO. It'd be able to vent the station just by existing, and would be super obnoxious.

Apparently I did a poor job explaining the deterrents on these. The "response time decrease" puts a slight delay on your controls, forcing you to anticipate where you're going or run into problems. Also, vacuum is bad for the Warbeast. It gets sucked in and can't get out. Essentially if you take both of these at the same time you're going to be a sitting duck.

[Frank_Stein]

What if vacuums were the Warbeasts weakness, in that they ran on a loud as fuck, flame and smoke spewing combustion engine? No oxygen equals no fuel for the fire

[Skunkrocker]

That could work as well, as long a it drains health and isn't like an instant kill.

I was thinking that with Crushing Soles it would damage the tiles and panels first, warning you that you're gonna screw up the floor running through the same area more than once. All players would have to do is wear their internals.

[Mordent]

All players would have to do is wear their internals.

lolwat? You've not been in an area with a hole in the floor much, have you?

[atomic1fire]

All players would have to do is wear their internals.

lolwat? You've not been in an area with a hole in the floor much, have you?

All I know is I kinda want the warmachine to have to crawl if it loses both it's legs.

Also crew wins by getting the warbeast to walk into the [heavily reinforced] test chamber and then lobbing pipebombs/air transfer bombs at it.

If the warbeast can't speak it should be fairly easy to coordinate a group of staff assistants to "make a spot that we can safely blow up" so someone can egg the war beast into running into it. Or slip them into an open window, or mechanics teleporter catapult them into space.


This mode is basically Tom and Jerry spaceman game.

By all means the cat should win, but the Mouse is violent and smart.

Although I don't know where the admins would stand on suicide bombing the warbeast, although with chest cavity inserts it could be far more entertaining.

[Skunkrocker]

This mode is basically Tom and Jerry spaceman game.

By all means the cat should win, but the Mouse is violent and smart.

That would be the idea, yes. Have you seen the movie? It's basically that.

[Skunkrocker]

Restructuring the concept a bit...

To help balance and help the game mode be more fun I thought what if you had to choose your head, arms, and legs? Below is the result of my brainstorming, and some of your ideas!

Head 1 - Ninja: +Active Camo -No Thermal Vision
Head 2 - Soldier: +Pinpointer -No Meson Vision
Head 3 - Spy: +Radio Access -Coned Vision
Head 4 - Shield: +Fireproof -Tinted Vision
Head 5 - Bomb: +Explode on Death -Flashes Stun

Arm 1 - Pistons: +Instant door opening -Lower health
Arm 2 - Saws: +extra melee damage -Slower door opening
Arm 3 - Hands: +use items -must use items to attack
Arm 4 - Ranged: +guns -cannot attack and move simultaneously
Arm 5 - Claws: +faster attacking -less damage

Legs 1 - Treads: +Speed Boost -Cannot Stop
Legs 2 - Stompers: +destroy items, damage prone -Damage floors, panels, and girders
Legs 3 -  Plated: +burst through walls -electricity damages
Legs 4 - Armored: +extra health -extra slow
Legs 5 - Light: +no noise -stuns last longer

EDIT:


Concept art; Warbeast base, +Bomb Head, +Ranged Arms, +Stompers Legs... art isn't very good, but kind of gives the idea of what I think would be interesting.