[MERGED PR] Nadir changeling rebalance: near-total immunity to aqua tenebrae

[github_bot]

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[BALANCE][INPUT][CHEMISTRY][GAMEMODES]
About the PR

Alters aqua tenebrae's interaction with changelings to near-totally remove its ability to affect them. Some details:

- When a changeling would otherwise take damage from aqua tenebrae, they do not.
- This only kicks in at the actual point of damage dealing; gear will still receive decay from the acid.
- The acid is still capable of deforming the changeling's face, alerting them with the message "The acid withers our visage." This does not inherently elicit a scream, as it isn't painful (more of a weird sloppy feeling), as a subtle tell.

Why's this needed?

Nadir is at the moment the only map in which changelings can't reasonably go into breached or exterior areas unsuited, one of their core advantages, and the map's fairly condensed nature exacerbates this issue. Be it in this way or another, their balance could use an upward bump.

Some alternate ideas, if the consensus is that this pushes things too far in changelings' favor:

- Grant changelings a free "Harden / Relax Membranes" ability that gives them total immunity to aqua tenebrae, but prevents them from absorbing other lifeforms while it's active, with a brief cooldown required to toggle.
- Instead of granting total resistance, simply grant partial damage reduction to the acid, cutting the effective amount of applied aqua tenebrae in half.
- Grant changelings a fixed percentage of chemical protection that applies to them globally as a baseline. (This is probably my least favorite idea, but mentioning it in case it sparks a better one.)

Changelog

Code:

changelog
(u)Kubius
(*)Changelings' biology has adapted to the unique variety of acid surrounding Nadir. Be watchful.

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[Zafhset]

Honestly, Nadir's design around the acid ocean is deliberate - can we stop encouraging changes where only the crew has to deal with it in full while antags don't?

Having to change your playstyle or approach to antagging is a good thing. You can play as the free spacing ling on all space maps, while on oshan and nadir you have both sides being able to free walk outside or not at all.

[Chatauscours]

Seems good and logical to me, considering how changelings can literally spit acid at people.
The only concern I have is that one might just go outside and begin dismantling all outdoor windows, but this problem will be nullified if subs will be added to Nadir.

[Cheffie]

Honestly, Nadir's design around the acid ocean is deliberate - can we stop encouraging changes where only the crew has to deal with it in full while antags don't?

Having to change your playstyle or approach to antagging is a good thing. You can play as the free spacing ling on all space maps, while on oshan and nadir you have both sides being able to free walk outside or not at all.

The map creator is making this PR... also on oshan lings can roam as freely as in space.

[Kubius]

Honestly, Nadir's design around the acid ocean is deliberate - can we stop encouraging changes where only the crew has to deal with it in full while antags don't?

Having to change your playstyle or approach to antagging is a good thing. You can play as the free spacing ling on all space maps, while on oshan and nadir you have both sides being able to free walk outside or not at all.

Philosophically, I agree with this in general; however, changelings in particularly have a very rough time on Nadir as-is, because of how hard they tend to get pursued once their existence becomes public knowledge and the relative lack of obscure spaces.

My main concern with indefinite and "drawback-less" protection, as brought up by Chatauscours, is that a changeling might be encouraged to simply disassemble the entire station in order to flood the entire station in acid and operate with relative impunity; however, I do believe some extent of acid resilience (even with a capability drawback or partial protection drawback to mitigate that concern) would be overall beneficial to the Changeling experience on Nadir, especially as it relates to shamblers.

[Kotlol]

Honestly, Nadir's design around the acid ocean is deliberate - can we stop encouraging changes where only the crew has to deal with it in full while antags don't?

Having to change your playstyle or approach to antagging is a good thing. You can play as the free spacing ling on all space maps, while on oshan and nadir you have both sides being able to free walk outside or not at all.

Philosophically, I agree with this in general; however, changelings in particularly have a very rough time on Nadir as-is, because of how hard they tend to get pursued once their existence becomes public knowledge and the relative lack of obscure spaces.

My main concern with indefinite and "drawback-less" protection, as brought up by Chatauscours, is that a changeling might be encouraged to simply disassemble the entire station in order to flood the entire station in acid and operate with relative impunity; however, I do believe some extent of acid resilience (even with a capability drawback or partial protection drawback to mitigate that concern) would be overall beneficial to the Changeling experience on Nadir, especially as it relates to shamblers.

Even those with a suit can do the same... I think the changeling being a more "creature of the deep type" is a cool change.
Insted of the changeling walking into the acid ocean right away.. they "mutate" something that will reveal their idenity as a changeling when coming into contact with acid water.

Sure now breaches...can force the changeling to shed their skin and reveal themselves...but hey... now breach strategies won't happen on Nadir.

[Silent Majority]

as I found out, its not even 'real' burn damage so they can endlessly regenerate it anyway

[TheMaskedMan2]

Honestly, Nadir's design around the acid ocean is deliberate - can we stop encouraging changes where only the crew has to deal with it in full while antags don't?

Having to change your playstyle or approach to antagging is a good thing. You can play as the free spacing ling on all space maps, while on oshan and nadir you have both sides being able to free walk outside or not at all.

While I typically agree with this in that "Why does nobody have to deal with the acid except for the crew?" I disagree for lings. This isn't a random change for changelings, they always had immunity to exterior problems. I'd agree that it's weird Nukies and etc are immune to the acid but Changelings kinda always- I just feel like it makes sense for them. They're immune to space, immune to water, and immune to acid.