AI War themed mech...?

[Pepisolo]

OK, so this is something that probably isn't happening, although maybe, but probably not, but maybe, but... if there was to be an AI War themed mech, what would it look like? What abilities would it have? What would we call it? What would the design be? Any thoughts? I just thought I'd ask this as a bit of fun!

[Logorouge]

Neinzul Mech, with a swarm of familiars (temporary or not). Fun for all the family!  >D

[TheVampire100]

Starward Rogue makes several nodes to The last Federation with several weapons, that were made by the iconic races of this game.
Maybe we can have some weapons from AI War races too? Spire photon lance, Neinzul drone launcher, Zenith Devourer module? These are just some names/ideas I have but I honestly have no idea what these kind of things would actually do.
Hell, why not go with a human-themed weapon?

An entire Mech inspired by Ai War would however be hard because, well, AI War never had any ground combat for it to work out.
If anything, it would be a Raptor they would have used.

[Whistler]

Botnet mech! Zombie boss fights

[keith.lamothe]

All we need is a cross between this:



And this:

[tombik]

Hmm... A Mech that has enemy damage scaled based on its "threat" level, which means in this case its own damage? Does not sound that exciting

[Draco18s]

Hmm... A Mech that has enemy damage scaled based on its "threat" level, which means in this case its own damage? Does not sound that exciting

Doing more damage based on health % is something one weapon we already have does.

That also gave me an idea for a new incredibility; one where the longer the player goes without taking a hit, the more damage they'll take when they finally do.
As a bonus, they'll also deal more damage.

[tombik]

Hmm... A Mech that has enemy damage scaled based on its "threat" level, which means in this case its own damage? Does not sound that exciting

Doing more damage based on health % is something one weapon we already have does.

That also gave me an idea for a new incredibility; one where the longer the player goes without taking a hit, the more damage they'll take when they finally do.
As a bonus, they'll also deal more damage.

I am not sure I perfectly conveyed what I thought, I was basically considering to scale up all enemy damage based on the damage of the player. If SR also has this, then I dont know about it.

[Logorouge]

I am not sure I perfectly conveyed what I thought, I was basically considering to scale up all enemy damage based on the damage of the player. If SR also has this, then I dont know about it.

A mech with a threat level is a very cool idea I think. Make the threat level scale based on the player's exp level instead, that way it will work with all sorts of builds.

[keith.lamothe]

Interesting. Basically have a mech that motivates you to not gain XP, beyond a minimum you need to kill your target. That's very AIW.

If the math worked I'd say something like "All enemies start with -90% damage, but each level you gain gives all enemies +20% damage" or something like that.

But damage numbers are very coarse so it doesn't seem like that would work.

Something like "Enemy spawn rate -90%, but each level you gain increases enemy spawn rate by +20%" would be even more appropriate, but I don't think SR's room designs work with the idea of increasing or decreasing enemy spawns on that basis.

Something like "All enemies and enemy shots slowed by 90%, but each level you gain increases speed of enemies and enemy shots by 20%" would work mechanically and probably work balance-wise, but it doesn't make a lot of thematic sense and kind of horns in on the Redshift's deal.

Something like "You start with +100 health, but each level you gain decreases your health by 20" would also work mechanically and maybe balance-wise, and would kind of accomplish the same idea as the -90%-enemy-damage rule, but it doesn't make sense thematically.


Taking a step back, how about something like this:
- Every level you gain increases enemy spawn rate by 20%.
+ All shop items (including sac items?) are free.

So you can gain a lot of power by reaching the shops (like you can in AIW from Advanced Research Stations, Advanced Factories, Design Backups, Turret Controllers, etc) but reaching them involves clearing rooms, which involves killing enemies, which involves gaining XP.

The spawn rate increase would just mean randomly picking X% of the spawn points and having them spawn a second/third/whatever monster. I think that mechanic already exists. But maybe it's just too much of a pain?

If so, the spawn rate could be replaced with an enemy speedup.

[tombik]

Interesting. Basically have a mech that motivates you to not gain XP, beyond a minimum you need to kill your target. That's very AIW.

If the math worked I'd say something like "All enemies start with -90% damage, but each level you gain gives all enemies +20% damage" or something like that.

But damage numbers are very coarse so it doesn't seem like that would work.

Something like "Enemy spawn rate -90%, but each level you gain increases enemy spawn rate by +20%" would be even more appropriate, but I don't think SR's room designs work with the idea of increasing or decreasing enemy spawns on that basis.

Something like "All enemies and enemy shots slowed by 90%, but each level you gain increases speed of enemies and enemy shots by 20%" would work mechanically and probably work balance-wise, but it doesn't make a lot of thematic sense and kind of horns in on the Redshift's deal.

Something like "You start with +100 health, but each level you gain decreases your health by 20" would also work mechanically and maybe balance-wise, and would kind of accomplish the same idea as the -90%-enemy-damage rule, but it doesn't make sense thematically.


Taking a step back, how about something like this:
- Every level you gain increases enemy spawn rate by 20%.
+ All shop items (including sac items?) are free.

So you can gain a lot of power by reaching the shops (like you can in AIW from Advanced Research Stations, Advanced Factories, Design Backups, Turret Controllers, etc) but reaching them involves clearing rooms, which involves killing enemies, which involves gaining XP.

The spawn rate increase would just mean randomly picking X% of the spawn points and having them spawn a second/third/whatever monster. I think that mechanic already exists. But maybe it's just too much of a pain?

If so, the spawn rate could be replaced with an enemy speedup.

Can something be done about already cleared rooms?

If so, here is another idea that would incorporate what you are suggesting:

1) With AI War Mech, teleporters will not be usable.
2) With each new level previously cleared rooms have +%10 chance to respawn all enemies (with some cap). Since every new level needs more XP, repeated clearings will not cause things go overboard I think.

I think this reflects AI producing more ships for higher threat levels in AI wars. And since it is always a chance, it will feel more dangerous than 1 room out of 5 and such.

This does not need any kind of free shop items, and actually this may be further balanced by an increase in damage or speed of the enemies as you suggested.

[keith.lamothe]

That sounds a lot like "the superpower of this mech is that you get to backtrack a ton." Is there interest in that?


Going a bit further afield, maybe: using this mech replaces random rooms with "wave rooms" that are fairly open (with some strategic cover) and on one end it just spawns a ton of enemies that come and try to murder you. Lots of XP. But the higher your level, the more murderous these rooms get.

[tombik]

That sounds a lot like "the superpower of this mech is that you get to backtrack a ton." Is there interest in that?


Going a bit further afield, maybe: using this mech replaces random rooms with "wave rooms" that are fairly open (with some strategic cover) and on one end it just spawns a ton of enemies that come and try to murder you. Lots of XP. But the higher your level, the more murderous these rooms get.

Good point. I am just trying to find a parallel in a lore consistent way without thinking how much fun it will be.

The wave rooms sounded too far fetching for me, but also works. But it sounds like too much effort for just a single mech.

What about increasing the chances for spawn of higher floor enemies? Although for later floors this will not work.

[keith.lamothe]

The wave rooms sounded too far fetching for me, but also works. But it sounds like too much effort for just a single mech.

The dev effort wouldn't be very large, and the room design would be fairly simple (open arena). It's not more effort than the Redshift took, for sure.

The main question is whether it would be fun; I dunno on that.

What about increasing the chances for spawn of higher floor enemies? Although for later floors this will not work.

Yea, it would become less meaningful as the run went on.

[Whistler]

The idea of the threat level is quite interesting. To make it less granular, you could do something like +x% enemy speed at player level 2, +y% HP at level 3 and so on with different effects at each level, with major enemy boosts like +1 enemy damage at levels 6 and 11. 

My main concerns would be that the game could become too grindy if enemy HP boosts get too strong, and giving the player upgrades that mitigate these effects without being their direct opposites.

Also, the warhog launcher is just like a MK I nuke.