Transform Sting

[Ikarrus]

Just polling opinions.

[Incoming]

There's good reasons to use transformation sting, it's just that people prefer the funnier ones. I've been meaning to show off one of the more broken reasons to use tf sting (passing on genetic disabilities like silence) but just haven't had the chance.

[Durkel]

I don't like transformation sting but it does have it's merits. It's mostly just used as a tool to pissed people off and give changelings a excuse to be shit though. Feels more like a wacky relic from ye olden times like lsd sting to be honest.

[Scones]

It's funny.

But funny is not always good, and it actually completely and more or less unstoppably degrades the round to the point where a shuttle call is needed.

[Takeguru]

Well, if it gets the shuttle called faster I'm all for it.

Getting rid of pure ling rounds was just the start.

[CPTANT]

hey look, you are now a blind, mute, epileptic wreck trough the use of a completely undetectable ability. Yay!

Seriously, remove it.


But of course the changeling concept has been completely wrecked over the years anyway.

The entire concept of Changelings will only work as murderboning, absorbing assholes working in a round that already has different antagonists.

[Steelpoint]

Just get rid of changelings, god knows what the hell we are trying to turn it into.

[Oldman Robustin]

It's sad that we're calling for the end of lings, yes they are shit now but they're one of the only antags that I can get on a semi-regular basis that can go toe-to-toe with sec/borgs and come out ahead without putting yourself at massive risk.

Last ling round I decide to just be a broling to the others. After we got picked in a (ugh) mulligan, I decided to raid the AI upload since the blob had popped there and it was still easily accessible from gravgen. There was an engineer repairing the APC but we were all alone and it was pretty dark. I decided to armblade him without even using dissonant shriek since I figured he had the wires panel open and wouldn't be able to shout before going crit.

I was right, but the AI (aka half the reason lings and traitors are reduced to maint-lurking greyshirt killers) was watching us right at that moment and immediately called for help and bolted my exits as soon as my armblade had sprouted. Most other antags would be boned at this point, but I just monkey up, slip out, EMP the gravgen on the way out, and slipped into atmos maint. At that point you just hide in the locker above atmos, wait for someone to go to the right, run up screamining anything to get them to stop (most people aren't going to run from a naked dude), then armblade+emp ftw. That time it was an atmos tech so into turbine we go and within 2 minutes there's absolutely 0 evidence (beyond de-braining a spaced husk and borging/cloning) that I'm Oldman Robustin anymore and I get a completely fresh start.

Ling has its appeal, it needs two very simple things that we should absolutely try, at least as an experiment to salvage ling mode:

1) Progression. Give us 1 genome per absorption and 5 more maximum chems, in addition to letting us reset our genomes again. The reasons against a progression mechanic simply don't apply anymore. Idiots in the coderbus used to WORRY about incentivizing murder for lings, now hopefully they realize that murder and taking people out of the round are NECESSARY to give a game high enough stakes for people to give a shit. I don't ghost and watch a round when the most interesting thing is botany's giant plants, I watch when there's an antag actually ANTAGONIZING through sabotage or death seeing the decisions they make, seeing how the crew try to find him, and all the infinite number of decisions and outcomes that can happen when there's a real antagonist aboard the station. Lings should be incentivized to kill, and not just once for a stupid goddamn brain or ID stealing objective.

2) Make it either a pure team mode or a team-oriented mode. Remove the "kill another ling" objectives, DA already proved that antag on antag is just not what we want it to be... and having back-stab lings is infinitely worse because of hivemind sellouts. I don't even remember the last time I saw a ling-killing-ling objective that produced anything interesting or exciting, either your target uses hivemind and tries to cooperate and you just armblade/absorb him when you agree to meet up, or your target ignores hivemind and you'll never ever find/kill him outside of a pure fluke. What I do know is that ling-killing-ling objectives lead to all sorts of stupid round-killing strategies where one ling immediately outs himself to sec and ensures that the round essentially becomes extended, or the more common issue of hivemind literally going unused all shift and you're left with essentially 4 traitors that are slightly harder to kill but don't have ranged weapons... yea, that's why ling is kinda shit right now.

Team mode would just have difficult, shared objectives. Could start with more obtainable objectives like "Kill and impersonate at least 4 heads of staff and escape using their identity & ID" or even simpler "Absorb 12 crewmembers". Coming up with the objectives isn't even that hard, "Kill the AI, HoS, and Captain". The lings now must work together and can actually use hive DNA, hivemind, and lots of potential ability synergies (having 3 lings simultaneously jab someone with a combo of disabilities). Bonus points for making a % chance at roundstart for lings to make up an entire department (besides sec obviously).

Team-oriented mode would be more of a copout by those afraid of serious change to a broken gametype (why?!), but it would still involve removing ling-on-ling objectives and give many of the lings a shared assassination target.

As we all know right out, outside of a ling that infiltrates security, there is virtually no fear of lings on the station during any round. As a solo antagonist they have an extremely limited offensive arsenal that is not sufficient to really threaten anyone who stays on camera and doesn't go AFK. If they started working together as a team, I know I would always be worried about that possibility. You can no longer assume you're safe because more than one other person is in an area with you, you're strategy for staying alive is no longer "just stay out of melee range" but rather "be on the lookout for odd associations between crewmembers, keep alert for conspiracies, don't go anywhere isolated even with multiple crewmembers", that's the kind of paranoia we've lost and its within our reach to get it back.

You've given us an antagonist with some of the BEST TEAM SYNERGY in the game and then added meta-rules and objectives that ensure that the BEST TEAM SYNERGY never gets used. This isn't some kind of goddamn master riddle to solve lings guys, just make a few modest changes to ling objectives and you'll ensure that Ling's strengths actually align with their goals.

[CPTANT]

It's sad that we're calling for the end of lings, yes they are shit now but they're one of the only antags that I can get on a semi-regular basis that can go toe-to-toe with sec/borgs and come out ahead without putting yourself at massive risk.

Last ling round I decide to just be a broling to the others. After we got picked in a (ugh) mulligan, I decided to raid the AI upload since the blob had popped there and it was still easily accessible from gravgen. There was an engineer repairing the APC but we were all alone and it was pretty dark. I decided to armblade him without even using dissonant shriek since I figured he had the wires panel open and wouldn't be able to shout before going crit.

I was right, but the AI (aka half the reason lings and traitors are reduced to maint-lurking greyshirt killers) was watching us right at that moment and immediately called for help and bolted my exits as soon as my armblade had sprouted. Most other antags would be boned at this point, but I just monkey up, slip out, EMP the gravgen on the way out, and slipped into atmos maint. At that point you just hide in the locker above atmos, wait for someone to go to the right, run up screamining anything to get them to stop (most people aren't going to run from a naked dude), then armblade+emp ftw. That time it was an atmos tech so into turbine we go and within 2 minutes there's absolutely 0 evidence (beyond de-braining a spaced husk and borging/cloning) that I'm Oldman Robustin anymore and I get a completely fresh start.

Ling has its appeal, it needs two very simple things that we should absolutely try, at least as an experiment to salvage ling mode:

1) Progression. Give us 1 genome per absorption and 5 more maximum chems, in addition to letting us reset our genomes again. The reasons against a progression mechanic simply don't apply anymore. Idiots in the coderbus used to WORRY about incentivizing murder for lings, now hopefully they realize that murder and taking people out of the round are NECESSARY to give a game high enough stakes for people to give a shit. I don't ghost and watch a round when the most interesting thing is botany's giant plants, I watch when there's an antag actually ANTAGONIZING through sabotage or death seeing the decisions they make, seeing how the crew try to find him, and all the infinite number of decisions and outcomes that can happen when there's a real antagonist aboard the station. Lings should be incentivized to kill, and not just once for a stupid goddamn brain or ID stealing objective.

2) Make it either a pure team mode or a team-oriented mode. Remove the "kill another ling" objectives, DA already proved that antag on antag is just not what we want it to be... and having back-stab lings is infinitely worse because of hivemind sellouts. I don't even remember the last time I saw a ling-killing-ling objective that produced anything interesting or exciting, either your target uses hivemind and tries to cooperate and you just armblade/absorb him when you agree to meet up, or your target ignores hivemind and you'll never ever find/kill him outside of a pure fluke. What I do know is that ling-killing-ling objectives lead to all sorts of stupid round-killing strategies where one ling immediately outs himself to sec and ensures that the round essentially becomes extended, or the more common issue of hivemind literally going unused all shift and you're left with essentially 4 traitors that are slightly harder to kill but don't have ranged weapons... yea, that's why ling is kinda shit right now.

Team mode would just have difficult, shared objectives. Could start with more obtainable objectives like "Kill and impersonate at least 4 heads of staff and escape using their identity & ID" or even simpler "Absorb 12 crewmembers". Coming up with the objectives isn't even that hard, "Kill the AI, HoS, and Captain". The lings now must work together and can actually use hive DNA, hivemind, and lots of potential ability synergies (having 3 lings simultaneously jab someone with a combo of disabilities).

Team-oriented mode would be more of a copout by those afraid of serious change to a broken gametype (why?!), but it would still involve removing ling-on-ling objectives and give many of the lings a shared assassination target.

You've given us an antagonist with some of the BEST TEAM SYNERGY in the game and then added meta-rules and objectives that ensure that the BEST TEAM SYNERGY never gets used. This isn't some kind of goddamn master riddle to solve lings guys, just make a few modest changes to ling objectives and you'll ensure that Ling's strengths actually align with their goals.

I really agree with having progression for lings again. I also think that instead of having every ability available at roundstart more powerful abilities should be unlocked with more absorbs. Changelings should get SCARY once they have fed enough. Also remove that extract sting, it is just boring (whats the point of absorb objectives when you can extract genomes undetected anyway?).

I am not sure about point 2. I really see the future of lings as a solo antagonist operating in other gamemodes. As a threat silently gaining power until it decides it is ready to fuck up everyone living on that station. (no not like shadowling, that ascend abillity just ends the round)

Actually Goon has it pretty right with their changelings. (no its not good cause its Goon, its good because it maximises the potential of the changeling concept).

The new datum system is perfect for this

[Steelpoint]

Doing so would require a good long hard look and a design discussion on the changelings abilities and how it scales as it progresses to a end game.

Simply cutting off some of the changelings powers and calling it a day is not going to cut it.

I am of the opinion that a ling should get more powerful as it progresses into the round, and I do like Goon's ling to a extent.

But sadly everyone's opinion on our changeling is so heavily varied that we're resulted in this situation.

Perhaps going with Oldman's suggestion of just making it a team antag mode would be the simpler way forward?

[Oldman Robustin]

Doing so would require a good long hard look and a design discussion on the changelings abilities and how it scales as it progresses to a end game.

Simply cutting off some of the changelings powers and calling it a day is not going to cut it.

I am of the opinion that a ling should get more powerful as it progresses into the round, and I do like Goon's ling to a extent.

But sadly everyone's opinion on our changeling is so heavily varied that we're resulted in this situation.

Perhaps going with Oldman's suggestion of just making it a team antag mode would be the simpler way forward?

That's why I proposed it and the whole 30TC for traitors (syndiebombs 16TC then ya big babies, they suck now anyway). We're all just jerking each other off here until something gets implemented and my proposals are almost completely effortless and, at least as a temporary experiment, really don't have grounds for a spirited opposition. We REMOVED ling because it was so bad, would trying it as a team antag for a while really be so abhorrent that it's not even worth trying?

I think not.

[Phalanx300]

Personally I would change the Changelings into "Things" from the movies. Really seems ironical to me that the issues we have with Changelings (taking people out of the round/being useless) don't apply to the movie but do apply here. Basicly I would essentially combine Revolution and Changeling into a single gamemode.

Several Things are spawned acting as normal crew. They only start with two abilities, Infect and Armblade.

When using Infect you will disable your target, they can't talk on the radio and they will be infected in a lenghty duration, both players will be completely disabled for the duration. It will be very flashy with tentacles showing and blood going all over the place. After the Infection is complete the Thing can choose to become a Greater Thing which allows you to ventcrawl and increases your damage and health, you can't become a human again though. Or the Thing can choose to turn the target into a new Thing. Turning into a Greater Changeling essentially destroys the body of the target. Infect only works on living beings.

When using Armblade you will morph a part of your body into a weapon. This will be irreversable, making it a last ditched effort to defend yourself. In this scenario you should try to become a Greater Thing for survival.

Essentially to infect someone you must make sure no one will show up as it becomes obvious what is happening and you will be unable to defend yourself. You can also morph yourself to become better at combat however that will come at a cost of stealth.

The crew will also be able to perform blood tests to test for infections. (Apply Welder/Lighter to container containing blood)

This will mean Paranoia will return again and Changelings will be feared again. Ofcourse there is many other stuff you can include, like infecting non-player mobs giving control to Ghosts and detaching bodyparts for Ghosts to control.

[Oldman Robustin]

Personally I would change the Changelings into "Things" from the movies. Really seems ironical to me that the issues we have with Changelings (taking people out of the round/being useless) don't apply to the movie but do apply here. Basicly I would essentially combine Revolution and Changeling into a single gamemode.

Several Things are spawned acting as normal crew. They only start with two abilities, Infect and Armblade.

When using Infect you will disable your target, they can't talk on the radio and they will be infected in a lenghty duration, both players will be completely disabled for the duration. It will be very flashy with tentacles showing and blood going all over the place. After the Infection is complete the Thing can choose to become a Greater Thing which allows you to ventcrawl and increases your damage and health, you can't become a human again though. Or the Thing can choose to turn the target into a new Thing. Turning into a Greater Changeling essentially destroys the body of the target. Infect only works on living beings.

When using Armblade you will morph a part of your body into a weapon. This will be irreversable, making it a last ditched effort to defend yourself. In this scenario you should try to become a Greater Thing for survival.

Essentially to infect someone you must make sure no one will show up as it becomes obvious what is happening and you will be unable to defend yourself. You can also morph yourself to become better at combat however that will come at a cost of stealth.

The crew will also be able to perform blood tests to test for infections. (Apply Welder/Lighter to container containing blood)

This will mean Paranoia will return again and Changelings will be feared again. Ofcourse there is many other stuff you can include, like infecting non-player mobs giving control to Ghosts and detaching bodyparts for Ghosts to control.

These are just fantasies at this point. Plus we've just added two more secret conversion gametypes in the last couple months... we really don't need another.

[Phalanx300]

Personally I would change the Changelings into "Things" from the movies. Really seems ironical to me that the issues we have with Changelings (taking people out of the round/being useless) don't apply to the movie but do apply here. Basicly I would essentially combine Revolution and Changeling into a single gamemode.

Several Things are spawned acting as normal crew. They only start with two abilities, Infect and Armblade.

When using Infect you will disable your target, they can't talk on the radio and they will be infected in a lenghty duration, both players will be completely disabled for the duration. It will be very flashy with tentacles showing and blood going all over the place. After the Infection is complete the Thing can choose to become a Greater Thing which allows you to ventcrawl and increases your damage and health, you can't become a human again though. Or the Thing can choose to turn the target into a new Thing. Turning into a Greater Changeling essentially destroys the body of the target. Infect only works on living beings.

When using Armblade you will morph a part of your body into a weapon. This will be irreversable, making it a last ditched effort to defend yourself. In this scenario you should try to become a Greater Thing for survival.

Essentially to infect someone you must make sure no one will show up as it becomes obvious what is happening and you will be unable to defend yourself. You can also morph yourself to become better at combat however that will come at a cost of stealth.

The crew will also be able to perform blood tests to test for infections. (Apply Welder/Lighter to container containing blood)

This will mean Paranoia will return again and Changelings will be feared again. Ofcourse there is many other stuff you can include, like infecting non-player mobs giving control to Ghosts and detaching bodyparts for Ghosts to control.

These are just fantasies at this point. Plus we've just added two more secret conversion gametypes in the last couple months... we really don't need another.

Yep. Best thing we can hope for is a transfer from Goon to get their superior Lings. Just saying that the movie style would fix the problems currently existing with Changelings, which is funny seeing how they are supposed to be a ripoff from them.

[Anonmare]

We could have movie-style Lings with a sort of team/conversion mechanic but I'd remove their ability to talk on Hivemind chat and not give them a means of innately recognising each other, since it was speculated in the film that the people The Thing impersonated didn't know they were The Thing so we could have a variation on that. I'd also put a hard cap on the number of conversions, either a global limit or a strict number of how many Changeling can be in a round at once (with scaling with population). You can explain it as all Changelings sharing a "consciousness" that is split between them but it can only be split a limited amount at a time and the splitting breaks them off from the Hivemind which allows a certain amount of autonomy.

Changelings have three forms (representing how aggressive they've become) and can't move backwards to a previous form. Each Changeling is essentially independent and are under no obligation to *all* shift forward, and can take any actions necessary to maintain their cover - This includes killing other revealed Changelings. However, I'd make it a rule that they cannot help security as a revealed Changeling to hunt down other Changelings or reveal undiscovered Changelings unless they themselves are in danger of being discovered otherwise. To root out Changelings, you need to do a blood test and "infected" people lose any implants they had as the rapid change in biology forces them out (mostly to catch out infected Sec/Captains since a Ling would be fairly difficult to contain/catch otherwise.)

The three forms would be:-

Spoiler:

• Incognito/Undiscovered

- Geared specifically for stealth, very little directly offensive powers. Can synthesise chemicals inside their body which can be used in an "Instant Reagent Sting" or a "Delayed Reagent Sting", but can only synthesise certain chemicals, which they have to spend DNA points on, and some chemicals are too hostile to the biology their imitating to create. Get Mimic Voice as a starting power along with transform but DNA sting must be bought. DNA string can only copy someone's form and does not count towards DNA absorbed objectives and using a form gained through DNA sting stops Chemical regen since the disguise is imperfect and needs constant uptake. Can use their stings on containers for deniability and !fun! during, say, a blood test with a Ling is doing the test and decides to spike the container with an injection of their own blood. If in danger, can immediately transform to Stage 2 or can skip Stage 2 entirely into Alien form.

• Exposed/Revealed

- Focused entirely on evasion and combat, with few stealth abilities to speak of. All their DNA points are refunded to them and gain a whole host of combat powers. Can spend DNA points on upgrading their existing powers, like improving Chitin armour for added durability and space-worthiness. They're obviously not Human/Lizardperson on sigh with mutilated appearances and "look like hideous abominations" on examine and their voice sounds inextricably wrong (Says/Exclaims/Yells replaced with Moans/Screams/Wails and get a somewhat limited vocabulary). Have a chance to automatically scream upon being sighted by someone. Can no longer transform but can detach body parts as a last resort (not as obvious as a headslug since it doesn't gib). Get stun and toxin resistances as well as very fast speed but are slightly more damaged by burn-type weapons.

• Alien/Monstrous

- Changelings in all their putrid, horrific glory and can only be described as "alien". Doesn't bear any resemblance to crew members and can no longer infect people and lose a lot of speed, can't use guns and can't wear any clothes except a headset (but gain "flesh" versions of clothes so they still have pockets and backpacks). In order to switch to this form, they need to have absorbed a minimum of 6 corpses personally and need another unabsorbed body as well as time+safe place to complete the transformation. Are completely immune to stunning, radiation and poison and gain a whopping 90% melee resistance with a 50% resistance to brute ranged weapons. But pay the price in taking double damage from burn weapons and take 2-3 times as long to come out of regenerative stasis. They can ventcrawl at will thanks to having such a malleable anatomy but must move slowly, so they can't just walk into the AI core to say hi. Can force open airlocks, including bolted ones, and can instantly absorb people through devouring them. Their abilities are focused entirely on offense and defence and have no stealth abilities to speak of. You should never fight a Ling in monstrous form alone and would be suicidal to face in melee combat. Another saving grace is them having low chem regen but high capacity so you could wear it down to the point it can't use fleshmend anymore

I'd go into more detail but I've put more thought into this then I should have already.

[Oldman Robustin]

One of the defining aspects of The Thing was that you really couldn't be left alone with anyone else. If you were alone with the Thing you were already dead, only groups promised some hope of safety.

Yet parasting is the first thing we remove from changelings while insisting we want to see it themed like the movie. IMO parasting would've been fine with a higher chem cost and significantly reduced stun.

[rockpecker]

Yes please. Bring back parasting.

[Incomptinence]

Make it a loud stun if you must but a stun should at least part of the toolkit. While they can murder fine without it groping around for prod parts or sec gear when not optional can really slow things down.

Ling's most dire failing is no terrain interaction powers. Fucking aliens our side darlings of ultra death get to melt doors and reg walls left and right. A flat half of lings' failings is being a TERRIBLE THIEF hunting down someone with access and killing them quietly THEN going back to snatch the item is a chore few bother with anymore. Sure it would allow them to escape perma maybe but taking lings to perma is rare and if you really wanted to a little N2O should make it possible.

Maybe have the acid/whatever power be limited uses per respec but without proper stealing they aren't a dynamic antag worth facing, traitors can nab any sort of crap to make them more flexible lings don't and as a result our shape shifters are too limited by their initial job for much of the game (seeing as any prudent identity theft requires leaving almost no trace).

[ChangelingRain]

I made a really in-depth ling idea, and it sounds like the thing people want.

[Remie Richards]

Ling armblades already work as crowbars for doors, why not just let them use it on Powered doors with a noise, some chat feedback, and maybe an animation.

[Takeguru]

I wouldn't be opposed to parasting if it wasn't a fucking 3 minute stun and mute

Minute tops.

That's more than enough time to strip a headset and cable cuff them, at least.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

I wouldn't be opposed to parasting if it wasn't a fucking 3 minute stun and mute

Minute tops.

That's more than enough time to strip a headset and cable cuff them, at least.

To strip a headset and cuff, you need about five seconds, not sixty.

[Takeguru]

I'm aware.

I'm conceding a bit here.

1 minute is enough time to do all the grating changeling shit.

Strip headset, drag into maint, chow down etc etc.

[Cik]

transform sting is trash

it's basically uncounterable and doesn't really help to achieve any of the goals a changeling should have. as a tool it's a blunt instrument that just creates a mess. it's useless for infiltration and only it's niche use is interesting (spreading genetic problems) however it's never really used like that.

while it's not exactly grief it's just useless. replace it with something else instead that actually enables interesting counterplay and/or is actually useful as an infiltration tool.

[Scott]

I am not sure why it has to be replaced at all.

[callanrockslol]

I am not sure why it has to be replaced at all.

Because people kept buffing it into uselessness