Changeling doc rewrite

[slarticodefast]

The rewrite for the currently planned implementation, which tries to focus more on keeping the original horror movie theme and stealth and deception based abilities.

This document will be updated along with the changeling's development as some features will need to be playtested to see how they affect the roundflow.

The current development status can be found here: space-wizards/space-station-14#39439

[Mot2332]

This rewrite seem to have multiple fundamental design contradictions, which I suggest be resolved before introducing the changeling to upstream.

1. No Round Removal

The abilities of the changeling seem to be specifically designed to not allow for round removal, however, the continued use of the hivemind mechanic, which seems design WITH round removal in mind leads to some contradictions in intended gameplay.

If a victim of the changeling gets revived, not only do they get to use normal information, but the equivalent of dead information as well.

This means that possibly, changelings will either shutoff or avoid hiveminds, thereby making that mechanic redundant, OR they will round remove their victims by other means, violating the design, as the use of the Devour ability will be synonymous with round removal.

2. Predator or Prey
As it is pointed out many times, the changeling has a strong identity with terror monsters. However, by designing their abilities to discourage combat as much as possible, it seems that the identity of the changeling, as designed, is not that of a sci-fi monster stalking maintenance for hunting, but that of a prey, hiding in maintenance and avoiding groups of predators.

Specifically, it seems the abilities of the changeling can not surpass that of a single person with a stun baton, or a group of multiple people with the equivalent of toolboxes. Not only does that encourage literal validhunting, (which may be intended, as a common trope of sci-fi horror monster is that of unlikely heroes using makeshift weapons to surpass or survive) but it also dissuades the changeling to not murder or fight random people in maintenance, as they might be strong enough to beat them !

3. Objectives based murder
It seems that design wise, the changeling is going to be an antagonist to the station because of their objectives, mechanically encouraging them to murder 1 or 2 people.

This seem DEEPLY flawed, as a changeling murdering 2 random passengers in maintenance is the archetypal example of bad antagonist design.

The hunger based mechanic that would REQUIRE changelings to murder crewmembers to survive seem to have been specifically pointed out as to be avoided because it would be too many resources to keep track off (the other two being the ability currency and the ability cooldown) and also because it would cause a hungry changeling to indiscriminately attack people to eat ( might need more clarifications, seems like a good thing antagonist design-wise) and also can be used to metagame a changeling by.... having security jail them when they get caught ?

In other words, it seems that design wise, ironically, a changeling is the most boring version of a stealth traitor, killing about 1 or 2 people that no one cares about in a random corridor of maints.

4. Captured Changelings
It is not specifically pointed out, but it should probably be specified for the heatlh of the round flow section what the expectations of a caught changeling is from the crew. It could be space law based, round removal based, performing tests, etc.

As it seems intended, a changeling is mechanically immortal from the stasis ability, but also not very lethal or dangerous to the crew. But the only way to kill a changeling seem to be to use the chapel's incinerator, which seems quite harsh as design wise, they are not going to be round removing people (BY DESIGN) and minimizing the number of victims, if any.

This may lead to a wizard style toxic situation, where changelings are getting shot on sight and round removed, having hurt no one or even affected the round in any way.

This is about what I can think off, but I have a feeling that I'm missing some other design flaw that I cant quite identify right now. Excuse the long post but I hope that it can help design the changeling in a healthy way for all involved

P.S. Here's what I couldnt quite put my finger on

5. Stealth is boring
   There has been a push to make the traitor less of a stealth antagonist, has currently, the game does not have the tools to make stealth interesting.

If a traitor kills a random passenger in maintenance, not only are the chances that security or anyone finds the body are slim, but even if they do manage, it requires special coordination to get an investigation going as maintenance is hard to navigate.

Furthermore, it is possible for someone to investigate and not identify a potential perp, or that a disguise or hiding place (in space) is simply not findable.

In other words, the game seem currently not to have the tools in place to support a stealth, cat and mouse style of round flow according to the experience of the traitor antagonist.

[YoungThugSS14]

Good design doc, I’m so glad the horror form is still in consideration

[slarticodefast]

No Round Removal

The doc emphasizes not to encourage round removal on a large scale, but still allows it. Round removal in itself is perfectly fine in my opinion, it just becomes problematic if it's too early in the round or happens too often. And there is a major difference between allowing it and enforcing it mechanically, which is what husking as implemented in SS13 is doing as the changeling does this automatically with every single of its victims. So I don't see any justification for having such a mechanic.

hiveminds

Hiveminds are just a side note and something that we may playtest in the future to see how it works in the context of SS14, but not planned as part of this doc or the intital changeling implementation. Regarding the hivemind requiring round removal: On Goonstation you will also be removed from the hivemind if you are either borged or cloned.

designing their abilities to discourage combat as much as possible

it also dissuades the changeling to not murder or fight random people in maintenance

The doc only discourages combat with multiple enemies at once, in one on one scenarios the changeling should be at an advantage when using its abilities.

mechanically encouraging them to murder 1 or 2 people

The objective to collect DNA requires them to kill multiple people, specific kill target objectives are only assigned on top of that as an additional challenge. The exact number required can be balanced so that we reach the desired round impact.

There has been a push to make the traitor less of a stealth antagonist

You have to distinguish here about what is meant by stealth - stealth in general is not a bad thing.
The changes you are referencing are in particular the thieving gloves and the storage implanter, which in combination with stealing objectives caused players to simply steal a single item and have no further round impact without any chance of getting caught. Changelings on the other hand have kill objectives with require them to take action and actively drive the round forward.

space law
expectations of a caught changeling is from the crew

Those are good points, I'll think about it and see on how to address them in the doc.

[SuperGDPWYL]

I really liked changelings only having to survive, but survival requiring murder in order to not die yourself. It made them pragmatic and opportunistic, and also meant they didn't have the option to be boring. Bit sad to see the objectives replaced with just basic ss13 ling target objectives. I feel like there's far too much overlap with traitor in those, and even with the "absorb X people" objective, you're just giving them a quota after which they feel like they do nothing or risk facing the wrath of 2.9, which repeats the mistakes of current Traitor. At least with old changeling, you had the feeling of the changeling taking whatever they can get, which fit the horror theme a lot more.