Clockwork Cult (now off of rotation, suggestions go in this thread)

[Dr_bee]

Bottom post of the previous page:

Cult is just not a fun game mode most of the time. Its balanced, but its the sort of balance where 45% of the time the cult manages to kill or convert most of the crew before the arc even activates, and 45% of the time the crew sticks together and takes precautions and then the arc showdown is a well armed sec team, a couple hulks, and some guys with mechs fighting like 5 dudes. The other maybe 10% is the actually interesting part, but its rare.
Also I kind of suspect crew would never lose if they had the whole crew go to the armory, get guns, shut down toxins and robotics, and then go hide on lavalands until arc time.

This is kind of my biggest issue with the mode now. I rarely see clock cult rounds where the winner isnt already decided before the portals even open. Conversion is too good of a tactic and base building is too hard to do without mass conversion for power generation. Also certain things are basically noob traps for new cultists, like clockwork walls being basically useless with how easy they are to destroy.

I am not smart enough to come up with solutions to these problems.

[PKPenguin321]

the whole reebe thing feels like it's trying to mimic gang dominators. Where you have to activate it to win but the process of doing so alerts everybody and you have to defend it for a few minutes. Only instead of racing against other gangs you just go at your own pace which makes it way easier, and instead of having to fashion a base out of the station to place it you literally get a whole z-level for it. And instead of guns and uniforms you literally get magic powers that include stuns, cuffs, guradian spirits, stun reduction, etc.

It's literally gangs but with better equipment, a different theme, and the flaws exaggerated. Like gang if it was just the bad parts of it and only those parts consistently. It even gets called out earlier than gang tags got gangs called out if the clock cult decides to declare war. I don't get how people are so OK with this when gang was so vehemently hated

[EagleWiz]

I don't get how people are so OK with this when gang was so vehemently hated

Nicest explanation: teams are the whole station vs one cult instead of multiple gangs, with it being really hard to win if the bad gang recruits you

Less nice explination: gangbangers don't use magic and clockwork themed stuff and people like magic and clockwork themed stuff

Least nice explination: gang was awesome and people are morons

[factoryman942]

Question
Why do all the things use watts and not joules?
'Watts per second' makes me die inside slightly every time I read it

[Xhuis]

i'm not an electrician

[Incomptinence]

It's cultish arcane shit we be using double seconds.

[Stickymayhem]

It's never been worse than right now, the gamemode is unplayable in it's current state.

Removing gazers means power is much harder to acquire, so defences are almost always non-existent.

Also, if the station just cuts power or DOESN'T SET UP THE ENGINE the clock cult get 0 fucking power and lose automatically.

Fuck me why did gazers get taken out with no replacement that was a dumb idea guys

EDIT: This mode CAN work but stop assaulting Xhuis with shit ideas

[Anonmare]

I feel like we could combine the old system with the new one. Using Tinkerer's Caches that produce power instead of components and giving them a "can not be placed within X amount of tiles of another cache/must be placed in a station area" if you're concerned people will just build cache farms in space somewhere.

Stargazers are very predictable in their locations as there aren't many places that are both secluded AND in direct LoS of space. I can also suggest that caches grow more efficient in the presence of brass tiles/walls for those who are willing to make the effort or sacrifice of stealth for power.

[Buggy]

I gotta say though, the new changes are definitely good at breaking up the War meta. Stealth is the only tenuous chance that any cult has at winning now that they can't build defenses; if they're lucky the station will self-destruct so much that when the time comes they can win.

[Xhuis]

snip

Your anger at the power is misplaced, there was actually a bug preventing cogs from generating any power. Keep an eye out on rounds now. The engine being set up has no actual relevance to the cult's power generation, as it draws from APC power.

I feel like we could combine the old system with the new one. Using Tinkerer's Caches that produce power instead of components and giving them a "can not be placed within X amount of tiles of another cache/must be placed in a station area" if you're concerned people will just build cache farms in space somewhere.

Stargazers are very predictable in their locations as there aren't many places that are both secluded AND in direct LoS of space. I can also suggest that caches grow more efficient in the presence of brass tiles/walls for those who are willing to make the effort or sacrifice of stealth for power.

As things play out I'll give it some thought.

[factoryman942]

it draws from apcs
so if you don't set up the engine and break the smeses
all the apcs will drain
station gets no power but neither does cult

[Cobby]

Question
Why do all the things use watts and not joules?
'Watts per second' makes me die inside slightly every time I read it

you can probably change that fairly easily.

[Xhuis]

Due to feedback from a few people, a lot of whom I trust a lot regarding balance, I'm currently buffing integration cogs. They'll now generate 10 W/second in power, and will continue to generate power at 5 W/second when the APC they're in runs below the siphon threshold, but not consuming any excess power in doing so.

All other feedback on power generation, caps, etc. is appreciated and encouraged!

[Dr_bee]

Due to feedback from a few people, a lot of whom I trust a lot regarding balance, I'm currently buffing integration cogs. They'll now generate 10 W/second in power, and will continue to generate power at 5 W/second when the APC they're in runs below the siphon threshold, but not consuming any excess power in doing so.

All other feedback on power generation, caps, etc. is appreciated and encouraged!

Consider another method of power generation, stealing resources perhaps?

one method of power generation with a tell means a competent engineering staff can completely shut down a cult, especially during war. a more active method of giving a boost of power would be good to have, and it would bring another department into the fight.

[Anonmare]

Due to feedback from a few people, a lot of whom I trust a lot regarding balance, I'm currently buffing integration cogs. They'll now generate 10 W/second in power, and will continue to generate power at 5 W/second when the APC they're in runs below the siphon threshold, but not consuming any excess power in doing so.

All other feedback on power generation, caps, etc. is appreciated and encouraged!

Consider another method of power generation, stealing resources perhaps?

one method of power generation with a tell means a competent engineering staff can completely shut down a cult, especially during war. a more active method of giving a boost of power would be good to have, and it would bring another department into the fight.

I think the Interdiction Lens fulfilled that function before we moved away from components. It would burn out all the lights in an area and drain power from any nearby sources, such as APCs, SMES units and non-cult cyborgs.

[Dr_bee]

Due to feedback from a few people, a lot of whom I trust a lot regarding balance, I'm currently buffing integration cogs. They'll now generate 10 W/second in power, and will continue to generate power at 5 W/second when the APC they're in runs below the siphon threshold, but not consuming any excess power in doing so.

All other feedback on power generation, caps, etc. is appreciated and encouraged!

Consider another method of power generation, stealing resources perhaps?

one method of power generation with a tell means a competent engineering staff can completely shut down a cult, especially during war. a more active method of giving a boost of power would be good to have, and it would bring another department into the fight.

I think the Interdiction Lens fulfilled that function before we moved away from components. It would burn out all the lights in an area and drain power from any nearby sources, such as APCs, SMES units and non-cult cyborgs.

giving a reason to build a base on station to siphon huge amounts of power would be a nice thing to add, old clock cult style. means you have two choices, the sneaky way, or the fortify an empty room way.

[Sweets]

Just experienced the third clock cult round in a row where they managed to convert 85%+ of the crew again in around 30 minutes.

It was the typical factors of
1. No Sec
2. Teleport to toxins to bomb
3. Cogwall off armory/steal armory
4. Ranged stun that cannot miss or be resisted by anyone other than chap eliminates HoS and HoP in first 5 minutes of shift.
5. Retarded Chaplain who picks an armblade weapon and dies

The station wide tele at round start needs to go. Period. Full Stop. It compounds all of these problems. Blood cult still requires TWO PEOPLE and a rune to teleport someone. In Addition, they take two people to convert and only have a melee one use stun with paper and cannot summon bindings.

Remove this awful game mode until something is done to bring it in line with other antags. It is unfun, overpowered and cancer. I am to the point where I and multiple other people just suicide when we hear clock cult.

[Dr_bee]

Yeah the ability to teleport anywhere to attack people and then run back to a place of complete safety with a teleport is kind of shit to fight against.

Holy water is not a good enough tool to fight the teleport as it takes forever to spread around and the cultists will just end up teleporting onto an airlock or onto a disposal chute that cant be sprayed.

It would be much more fun to fight if the cultists had to actually stay on the station once they got there, or at least making the teleport take awhile and not allow you to carry someone with you.

The endgame fight is a good idea but it is the gameplay leading up to that fight that REALLY needs work.

Consider ways to make base building on station more attractive, like having the on-station base be the only way back to reebe before the ark activates.

[Xhuis]

wahhhhh

lack of sec and bad chaplains aren't problems I can fix you brain-dead mong I can't force people to play certain roles when half the players just play assistant. the fact that you suicide when you get a round you don't like tells me we aren't losing anything of value because you can't be assed to play a mode that you scream shit about that isn't even fucking true (like how Kindle is a projectile and not "unavoidable" like you claim). get over it or come back when you're out of middle school, bucko.

Yeah the ability to teleport anywhere to attack people and then run back to a place of complete safety with a teleport is kind of shit to fight against.

Holy water is not a good enough tool to fight the teleport as it takes forever to spread around and the cultists will just end up teleporting onto an airlock or onto a disposal chute that cant be sprayed.

It would be much more fun to fight if the cultists had to actually stay on the station once they got there, or at least making the teleport take awhile and not allow you to carry someone with you.

The endgame fight is a good idea but it is the gameplay leading up to that fight that REALLY needs work.

Consider ways to make base building on station more attractive, like having the on-station base be the only way back to reebe before the ark activates.

right now they are developed around getting to and from reebe on command, and while there's a great deal of potential ways to change this, no one particular way is more likely to succeed over another. when a lot of roles go understaffed, it's a player problem, not something I can address, and their power will be massively skewed as a result.

one thing I'd like to do is change the teleport to a whitelist of areas and not a blacklist; allowing them only to teleport into public areas would make them far fairer to fight.

incentivizing outposts is a neat idea, but I'm not sure how to do it.

[Stickymayhem]

I have no fucking clue what I'm talking about

You have no fucking clue what you're talking about.

Xhuis, I've recently had some success with a "gamemode" where a small group of syndies operate from a nearby lavabase I've asteroided up and put in space, who have to sabotage and steal from the station to get rewards. I've just realized that clock cult is basically ideal for this with power as the reward of course.

A clock cult deconstructor you can dump valuables into for big power boosts would be a cool method of power generation. It would be less viable long term but provide enough power to set up a reasonable defence set-up in cases where there's only one or two competent cultists and they need to do most of the work themselves.

Also, there are several "High-Security" areas on the station that no one gives a shit about and cultists already can't teleport to: Teleporter Room, Gateway, Gravgen, SMES (To an extent), Vault and RD Servers. Maybe cogging these APCs (Or the machine themselves) could be a high-risk high reward power strategy with some tells (Gateway/Teleporter brings through the occasional simple mob marauder, Gravgen increases meteor events a bit, Vault causes Radiation storm events etc.

Now the cultists, especially during war, have some targets to focus on to disrupt the crew globally. During stealth these are risky options that crew will suffer from if they aren't attentive.

A big problem with war at the moment is having 20 minutes of wandering around followed by a fight that is usually a stomp one way or the other. This would help with that a bit, and give crew areas to lock down, or cultists areas to make bases. Creating defensive shrines around key station machines is very thematic too. Kind of looks like they're researching or worshipping the most advanced kit on station.

[Xhuis]

that's actually a really neat bunch of ideas. I'll give it some thinking as to how it could be best done.

[Sweets]

I do know what I am talking about because this game mode suffers from the same shit blob did til it was removed. Specific jobs are REQUIRED to defeat the antag (Chaplain and Sec) that is very bad.

Lets quickly look at every antag in game in comparison:

Traitor: Can be stopped by an assistant with a toolbox. Crew has the numbers advantage here.

Changeling: Can be destroyed in many ways (SM, Shuttle, Gib, Incinerator, Bomb) and can be beaten by any generally robust person. Crew has the numbers advantage here.

Nuke ops: Can be beaten by anyone who gets a good disarm hit on them. Highly identifiable. Crew has the numbers advantage here.

Wizard: Multiple checks, but arguably the strongest single antag in game. Crew has the numbers advantage here.

Revs: Mindshields and blunt trauma deconvert. Revs have no benefits over nonrevs. Crew does not have the numbers advantage here.

Blood Cult: Runes can be removed with holy water, mindshielding a target lets them be summoned into the game as a SPIRIT instead of being worthless to the conversion side. Endgame is having to defend a ritual ON STATION with little prep time, so one well armed and robust crewman can defeat the cult due to close quarters and jostling (Bombs and flashbangs are HIGHLY effective). Crew does not have the numbers advantage here.

Clock Cult: Sigils CANNOT be removed with holy water, mindshielding a target removes them from the round if the cult gets them. Endgame is having to defend a ritual OFF STATION with tons of prep time so trying to win as one man is impossible. Cannot use bombs. Crew does not have the numbers advantage here.

Now think about this. Clock Cult REQUIRES a chaplain to deconvert and have a null rod to deal with sigils and it REQUIRES sec to fight the cult on Reebe and respond quickly to sightings. No other game mode has an absolutely required job to fight it specifically. Even Blood cult can be beaten by a single scientist with a bomb, an atmos tech flooding or an engineer releasing an engine. Because Bombs don't work on Reebe and its not on station, you are forced to have to slog through defenses and cultists to reach the ark. This normally would not be a problem if the cult didn't have such a rapid conversion method.

Think about it. Blood cult requires the victim to be dragged to a specific rune somewhere on station and converted. Clock cult just needs to be on camera. Blood cultists and revs also have to be able to get into where you are to convert you, while Clock can just TP in.

Now what did I mean about the Blob comparison earlier? Think of it like this. back before blob was removed, you would get tons of people suiciding as soon as they heard LEVEL 5 BIO HAZARD announced, because blob was UNFUN for a large portion of the crew. The round could only go one of two ways. Blob denies access to mining or RND and wins or Blob loses to Xrays. Mining and Science were the only departments that mattered. Everyone else was just fighting an enemy that they knew they could not kill without tons of lasers or xrays. It got repetitive. Clock cult is the same way. It always ends with the same assault on Reebe and is always either a steamroll due to cult caught very early or the cult converts everyone.

Why bother investing in something for a round I know is going to end in 35 minutes? i can't try to RP because the cultists will be shitters. I can't explore space because the round is too short. All I can do is try to fight the cult and get frustrated when they instantly teleport away from me when caught or get beaten by near wizard tier mobility and better stuns and weapons.

The game mode is predictable and unfun to play against.

[Xhuis]

if you can summarize that in a paragraph instead of a gigantic essay I'll be happy to consider it
also, sigils can be removed by clicking them on harm intent you goddamn idiot
another thing, if a cultist is caught, they can't warp away because their warp requires a channeled ability from their slab. it's no different from a teleport talisman, and a teleport talisman is even better at it because it's instant.

[Stickymayhem]

snip

What a worthless post. All that just to basically say "Gamemode is bad I don't like it" based on a weirdly arbitrary criteria.

10/10 content

[Not-Dorsidarf]

snip

What a worthless post. All that just to basically say "Gamemode is bad I don't like it" based on a weirdly arbitrary criteria.

10/10 content

What a worthless post. All these shitposts just to basically say "I'm in love with gamemode in every way" based on no articulated critera.

10/10 content

[Stickymayhem]

snip

What a worthless post. All that just to basically say "Gamemode is bad I don't like it" based on a weirdly arbitrary criteria.

10/10 content

What a worthless post. All these shitposts just to basically say "I'm in love with gamemode in every way" based on no articulated critera.

10/10 content

Not even a good try

[EagleWiz]

Clock cult is not a base defense mode. Clock cult has never been a base defense mode, Clock cult will probably never be a base defense mode. Clock cult is a conversion antag, and the base is just there to give them an edge if its close (and lets face it - for a group that has a bunch of magic spells and armor and weapons and the ability to teleport its not even that useful an edge). I don't think I've seen a game where the crew had a significant numbers advantage by the end and managed to lose because of cult defenses, and I don't think I've ever seen the cult have an advantage and lose because the crew managed to rush the arc.

Honestly the thing I most resent about the game mode is that its basically abductors, and I used to like abductors.

[Sweets]

I like how Sticky didn't even try to argue against my points and just attacked me. Quality adminning there.

The mode is broken. It is unfun and predictable. Either the crew catches them in the first 5 minutes and is forced to sit there twiddling their thumbs til the ark activates or the cultists steamroll and convert 50%+ of the crew and sit there and twiddle their thumbs while the crew all die to the first wave of traps and wardens because they can't build sleepers/rechargers on reebe and just get out attritioned.

The majority of the playerbase hates this game mode. The winrate for cult is miles ahead of every other antag.

Rework it or remove it.

[Xhuis]

Due to multiple posts on your part that are either misinformed or factually wrong, I'm gonna say no.

[Sweets]

Yeah I'm done here too. There is no point in arguing with you when you refuse to take into account that a large portion of the playerbase thinks your gamemode is broken and unfun and refuse to take any valid criticism of your obviously broken game mode.

Every time clock cult pops up, multiple people suicide or ghost. Players refuse to even bother going through the portals because they don't want to deal with such a busted,unfun antag. The round always ends with large amounts of complaints and salt in OOC.

[oranges]

please don't speak for a large portion of the playerbase unless you have a poll to back you up it just is crazy.

[Stickymayhem]

Yeah I'm done here too. There is no point in arguing with you when you refuse to take into account that a large portion of the playerbase thinks your gamemode is broken and unfun and refuse to take any valid criticism of your obviously broken game mode.

Every time clock cult pops up, multiple people suicide or ghost. Players refuse to even bother going through the portals because they don't want to deal with such a busted,unfun antag. The round always ends with large amounts of complaints and salt in OOC.

You are the living embodiment of hyperbole

[Stickymayhem]

Clock cult is not a base defense mode. Clock cult has never been a base defense mode, Clock cult will probably never be a base defense mode. Clock cult is a conversion antag, and the base is just there to give them an edge if its close (and lets face it - for a group that has a bunch of magic spells and armor and weapons and the ability to teleport its not even that useful an edge). I don't think I've seen a game where the crew had a significant numbers advantage by the end and managed to lose because of cult defenses, and I don't think I've ever seen the cult have an advantage and lose because the crew managed to rush the arc.

Honestly the thing I most resent about the game mode is that its basically abductors, and I used to like abductors.

The mode is probably strongest when it leans further into basebuilding. The conversion part is the least fun part of clock cult.

What if conversion Sigils were one-use, expensive, and locked behind one of the tiers? Make conversion less of a currency and more of a reinforcement option.

[Dr_bee]

Clock cult is not a base defense mode. Clock cult has never been a base defense mode, Clock cult will probably never be a base defense mode. Clock cult is a conversion antag, and the base is just there to give them an edge if its close (and lets face it - for a group that has a bunch of magic spells and armor and weapons and the ability to teleport its not even that useful an edge). I don't think I've seen a game where the crew had a significant numbers advantage by the end and managed to lose because of cult defenses, and I don't think I've ever seen the cult have an advantage and lose because the crew managed to rush the arc.

Honestly the thing I most resent about the game mode is that its basically abductors, and I used to like abductors.

The mode is probably strongest when it leans further into basebuilding. The conversion part is the least fun part of clock cult.

What if conversion Sigils were one-use, expensive, and locked behind one of the tiers? Make conversion less of a currency and more of a reinforcement option.

Yeah, mass conversion is too good of a strategy. The exponential growth from converting people is pretty much better than any defenses you can build on reebe. Also the fact that the cult can steal corpses needs to no longer be a thing.

Make absconding with someone require them to be alive, and make conversion more expensive and the mode might be better.

Or bring back the clockwork posibrains and remove or heavily restrict normal conversion so borg building becomes the primary method to gain more cultists, which would mean that the cult would need to steal resources more.

[Bombadil]

I think we can all agree clock cult is fucking awful. Nothing can be done to fix it.

[Armhulen]

I think we can all agree clock cult is fucking awful. Nothing can be done to fix it.

who agreed on that at all, we've spent 6 pages arguing if it's awful or not and if so what we can do to fix it

do you just post the first thing that comes to your head or something

[Xhuis]

I think we can all agree clock cult is fucking awful. Nothing can be done to fix it.

who agreed on that at all, we've spent 6 pages arguing if it's awful or not and if so what we can do to fix it

do you just post the first thing that comes to your head or something

don't bother, brain-damaged people can't be reasoned with

[darkpaladin109]

Yeah, as much as I like conversion, I think you need to restrict it somehow. It's too powerful.

[SpaceInaba]

[BAD IDEA INCOMING]
Maybe a cap based on what tier of clock abilities you have that scales with population
that way you cant just mass convert but you also dont get cucked/cuck people when its high/lower pop

[Xhuis]

A conversion cap or limit of some kind seems like a good thing to implement, but I'm not sure if it'd work. I'm afraid it would just end up with servants murderboning, which I already dislike.

[SpaceInaba]

give them a lifeweb to hook unconverted crew up to for power generation in order to encourage not killing them

[D&B]

I've noticed a lot of complaints about Clockcult lately, with regard to its low amount of fun and limited combat options. But what players are forgetting is the main reason Xhuis programmed Clockcult. Clockcult is not designed to be hybrid Tower defense/Conversions, as many claim. Instead, Clockcult was designed to be played while downloading pornography.

Clockcult has roughly zero combat interaction, thus making it the perfect gamemode to play while downloading massive amounts of hardcore pornography. Simply summon a marauder, give orders, and minimize your window. Then sit back and enjoy the amazing girl on girl action.

Because Clockcult takes about one full minute to produce a marauder, you can leisurely browse the erotic and pornographic fruits of the internet without much concern over your Cultist welfare. After a minute, I go back to DreamSeeker, and usually my Cultist is alive and ready to loot the corpse. This is what makes grinding so pleasurable and convenient for me; the ability to simultaneously watch girls have sex with each other and win at the same time. I doubt any other gamemode has such an elegantly designed system, and I applaud Xhuis for their foresight in crafting a gamemode that I can play with while playing with myself.

Combat? Who needs it? The quicker I kill something, the less time I have to watch boobies. Combat Interactivity? Overrated. I'd much rather interact with the girls writhing on my computer screen. Yes, clockcult was created for the sole purpose of surviving a fight while you stream hot pornography directly to your computer. That is why we have the high armor class, healing abilities, and the low, low DPS.

As for PvP, nothing is better than getting into the station and soaking up the energy while I watch girls take their clothes off for money. Only the minimum interaction is necessary for a cultist to perform, and it is this very quality that I love the most about Clockcult. I doubt Revs get any time to watch pornography while trying to vanish and rack up spears, and I bet Nuclear Operatives haven't seen a single naked breast while figuring out which door to emag down before choosing which bomb they are going to plant next.

In addition to grinding, we have several defensive options during combat that also allow us the flexibility of downloading pornography. Skewers allows a quick 6 second glimpse at a naked lady while our opponent is stunned, and Smokers allows a leisurely 8 seconds of quality right-hand time. Indeed, Clockcultists have cornered the market on the pornography during playtime of SS13 gameplay.

It saddens me that many ClockCultists do not take advantage of the main functionality of your character, and are in fact lobbying for increased interactivity, or more combat options. These are all unnecessary frivolities that would only harm our pornography downloading efficiency. Instead, we should thank Xhuis for crafting a gamemode that is great to grind with while grinding your loins.

[SpaceInaba]

so this is the power of being permabanned

[Xhuis]

please be gentle with repukan inaba he is very sick

[SpaceInaba]

poor soul had the wee wormies eat his brain tissue away

[onleavedontatme]

Everything Repukan said but unironically

[Karp]

The unironic smartest poster on the forums

[Oldman Robustin]

I think CC is in a much healthier place with gazers gone. Warcult is now a niche option instead of a mandatory default since some degree of stealth is now important if you're going to be dropping cogs.

I think the missing piece right now is on-station combat. The gameplay there is still very lacking. You just go in with kindle prepared and get this binary outcome of "direct hit - free conversion/kill" or "miss - now your just a valid asshole with a toolbelt". If you can keep your scarabs from jizzing brass for the first 10 minutes you can get the spear in a reasonable timeframe but its basically just a 2nd kindle that hurts more. Outside of the throw-stun the spear is just garbage and not fun for that reason as well.

Everything else the cult has is an automatic defense. Spear traps, stun runes, wardens, vitality matrices... all extremely powerful but pretty unsatisfying for the cultists. Clock cultists need something that makes them a threat when kindle isn't pre-prep'd.

Defenses feel a little more sane now though I think the addition of spear-traps was still a mistake. We already had stun runes, was it really necessary to add a SECOND "floor that stuns you" option? Floor stun spam is the absolute bottom-tier of SS13 combat. Reebe combat just feels so dull for the cultists because they're sitting there with spears while mechs and RND guns are blasting at them and once again they have to rely on automatic defenses + marauders to hold the line. I would've much rather seen a beam-weapon style manned turret that gives a tracer-effect style warning (green to red beam) before firing a penetrating med-range beam. The crew could counter it by "spreading" their push out or by bringing reflectors (I giggle at the thought of crew rolling up reflectors like siege towers and the defenders have to try and smash them from afar with spears so the big-guns can fire unimpeded).

[Nabski]

Robustin, the trick to on station combat is building gazers and traps. You even said that yourself in paragraph three. They aren't supposed to be combat gods on the station, they are supposed to prep and plan and prepare. Not run in with a reflecting shield and spin to win sword.

[Xhuis]

I generally try to nudge servants towards avoiding direct confrontation in favor of setting ambushes and trap nests they can retreat and fall back to should their cover fail while they're out and about. They're kind of master trappers but fairly weak in normal combat without heavy scripture support. That being said, though, their offense on Reebe is notably lacking. I've been brainstorming about it, but I don't have any real full ideas yet.

[BeeSting12]

I've taken Repukan's vision for clock cult mode and my experience has improved by 200%.