Colonial Marines BIG IDEA

[apophis775]

I had an idea, about the SCOPE of CM, and how it could be greatly expanded.

Firstly, nearly EVERYTHING I had an idea for, fits on the marine side.

Jobs:

1. Captain - the man in charge, notice the new name of Captain. His job, is to command the marines, he starts in his office, attached to the bridge. -If he leaves the Sulaco, he must place the XO in command until he returns.
2. XO - The second man in charge, and the head "LO". His job, is to ensure that the marines who need reassignment, get it. Starts on the bridge. - Not allowed to leave the Sulaco without captain permission, and 100% NOT if the captain is dead or not on board.
3. Bridge Officers (2) - One spawns in the navigators seat (I'll go more into this), one spawns in the Operations seat. Their job, is to assist the XO with assignments if necessary, but once that's completed, they will control the Sulaco from the bridge. -NOT ALLOWED TO LEAVE THE SULACO
4. Sulaco Chief Medic(1) - Spawns in medbay, his job, is to ensure the medics have any equipment they need, and to oversee the other medics (both sulaco and Squad) -NOT ALLOWED TO LEAVE THE SULACO
5. Sulaco Chief Engineer(1) - Spawns in engineering. His job, is to make sure the Sulaco has power/atmosphere, and to perform general maintenance across the ship. He is also in charge of the Marine Engineers if they get moved back to the Sulaco.
6. Marine - same as always, be expendable - Start in the Marine Quarters/Barracks

Now, here's my idea on how some of the stuff will work:

On the bridge, there will be a captains chain behind everything, and 2 rooms branching off. One, will be the captains cabin, the other, will be the XO's Office. The office, will open to the main corridors of the Sulaco, for marines to goto if they need to be reassigned. Also on the bridge, will be a navigator station, and an operations station. The navigator station, will have a few options, such as: "Set destination (mission or Centcom), set distance, recall shuttles". Basically, anything having to do with navigation. My thought, was that, they can hyperspace the ship between near CentCom, and near their mission destination. Also, they could set the distance, for the missions: (high orbit, low orbit). I'm thiniking:
High Orbit: Arrival altitude, weapons range, shuttles can be deployed, but not recovered, altitude required to return to CC, no communication with planet. Also, this would be the altitude necessary, for HIT team shuttles (or maybe gateway use?)
Low Orbit: Shuttles can be deployed and recovered, Mission area can be scanned (revealing # of unusual lifeforms, status of power/atmos systems, retreival of targeting data for firing at high orbit), communication with planet
Maybe a time delay, between moving between high and low orbit.

As far as operations I was thinking:
Centcomm communications: Contact CC
Target/fire weapons: small Bluespace shots, SUPER BIG DELAY between shots
Scan mission area

Medbay, will function as it has before, but, Medbay will be able to produce empty auto-injectors, and load them with chemicals.

Engineering however, will be different. At roundstart, the Sulaco, will have all the SMES charged, but a supermatter engine, that is offline. In order to leave the Fleet and goto their mission, they will need to charge their hyperdrive (which will deplete all the SMES to half, giving 5 minutes of power on arrival) by either using the SMES or activating the supermatter. THe Hyperdrive will then move the ship to the mission area, at a high orbit. To move to a low orbit, manuverig engines, will need to be powered. Basically, my plan, is to try and make it so that, Engineering has a need to get the power online, but has work to do after. Basically, once the engines are online and the ship can move. Maintence will need to be done at places on the ship, maybe lights are out, or maybe an APC blows and needs to be replaced. Something to keep the Engineer busy.

For the marines, they will spawn in either the chow hall (at roundstart) or the Barracks/rack (bed area attached to the chow hall). They will have low nutrition, resulting in needing to eat before they gear up. On spawn, ALL marines will be auto-assigned (based on preferences they select). This will hopefully take pressure off logistics, which is now run by the XO. Armor and all the gear will be in the lockers, EXCEPT knives/guns/flares. All that, will be in the armory, attached to the Hanger bay (to hopefully curb some of the early-round grief). They marines, will assemble in the briefing room, talk to the captain, and get let into the hanger and armory for gear.

The hanger, will have a metal floor BELOW the ships, to make it so that it's IMPOSSIBLE to breach the Sulaco to space by just shooting windows (it will be possible, with acid or thermite/desconstruction).

And, that's my thoughts for the sulaco, at least, for the start. I'm open to ideas, but I want to try and make the work on the Sulaco more interesting for those left behind, as well as generate a more interactive experience overall.

[SecretStamos (Joshuu)]

Everything I read, I liked. Especially the bluespace cannon part. That could make things very interesting. Having the Sulaco armed with weapons makes it feel less like a transport ship and actually like a military vessel. There should be some penalties for firing (from centcom), but it should be available in case the marines need it.

I particularly like the High Orbit and the Low Orbit aspect too. Currently, it's a little too easy to switch from the Sulaco to the Nostramo, and I think it would be neat if going into the field meant a little more. A lot of marines turn tail and run back to the Sulaco the moment danger rears up. Making it a little harder to return will basically force the marines to establish a good FOB.



In the film, the marines only armed themselves the moment before they embarked on the shuttle. I like the idea of there being a single armory located in the hangar.



It would be neat if helmet-cameras were implemented. It would give the Captain some insight as to what is actually happening in the field without actually being present.

[Allan1234]

YES YES and YES

[Rahlzel]

I really like all of it, but I have some questions about the weapons systems on the Sulaco:

1. Is it able to target specific areas or mobs?
2. Do you have a ballpark reload time?

The presence of weapons on a military ship makes sense from a realism perspective, but is there any practical use for them? If they only shoot small shots with a huge delay, I don't foresee them being very useful or even used at all if they can't target specific areas or mobs. The problem is, if they CAN target areas or mobs, suddenly there's the advent of griefing, breaches, lag, and complaints from Aliens from being one-shotted with no RP. I think we'd need to be extremely diligent about the pros and cons of a live weapons system when just having some cool-looking sprites be seen as the weapons would be a completely acceptable alternative, at least to me.

Also, one thing I'd like to point out is that I hope the plan is to keep the system flexible with anything else we'd like to add. For example, is the CC shuttle that we sometimes use for events going to be able to dock with the Sulaco while it's near CC, or only when it's at the planet? The way it is now is essentially infinitely flexible (and simple in comparison) since everything attaches to the Nostromo/TGstation map.

[apophis775]

It would be targeting a specific area, since you know, firing from orbit. So, you could target medbay, and it would fire at medbay, but it would hit a random place in medbay. After all, we don't want them just sitting in space blasting. It would be more of a "there's a nest" thing. Also, they wouldn't be able to fire, unless CC unlocked their weapons.

As far as reload time, I was thinking maybe 5-10 minutes, mostly depending on power availability.

One of the things I want to do, is make power more consuming, so that the captain has to decide. Does he want the weapons charged, or the ability to move more quickly from high to low orbit for retrival?

Does he want to be close to scan the planet and retreive marines if they need evac, or does he want to stay in high-orbit where they are fully safe, and can easily return to CC if they need supplies.

Which, one of the things I was thinking, was making it so that, they can return to CC at any time (though it takes time to power the drive) and get supplies.

Also, I was thinking, we'd expand on the "missions"

Ideas I have so far:

Aliens
Necromorphs (basically aliens again)
Zombie Virus (players infected turn eventually, HOWEVER, it ***CAN*** be cured, even if they are zombified)
Virus Response: an unknown virus has infected a few people on a station, Marines have been ordered to evac the uninfected, and contain the infected, so a cure can be made
Rebel Attack: Revolutionaries have seized a facility, they have hostages, and will blow the facility up, if their demands aren't met. (in this type, the revs would GREATLY out-number the marines, but would have almost all improvised weapons)
Spider Infestation.

[coroneljones]

All of my Jones yus-not a dev,still seems Cool.
The auto assign at spawn seems....meh.

[UnknownMurder]

WE NEED FIRE SUPPORT!
WE NEED CARE PACKAGE!
I will seeend you all my Loviiiing.. To you...
+1

[Allan1234]

this idea will work marvelously for CM primary the expanding on missions.

On the note of fire support i was thinking Two cannons that can be fired from orbit the reason being this is a heavily armed frigate not a support vessel, and i would think most combat ships designed for landing forces on planets "Colonial marines" And supporting colonial colony's would have more then one weapon that can target ground based areas. (also for mapping i kinda have a idea for two cannons on each side )
aside form that thoe i like it all.

also for the fuck of it.

"Number one take us into Warp speed"


ALSO ALSO i was thinking of a captains chair that has some features i have yet to think of.

[UnknownMurder]

Radio attached to chair?
Bridge Computer Program?
Rotating Hovering Chair?

At least, add a prequel to the frigate and Nostromo. Aliens start off as a larva on Nostromo. Lets rewind about 10 minutes before the distress signal was called and takes 5 minutes to get to Nostromo then sudden engine failure when you arrived at location.

[Allan1234]

also i was thinking in order to land shuttles you must first send a recon force via drop pods, and in order to land shuttles they need to activate some drop zones by showing safe areas for the marine pilots to land?

[UnknownMurder]

Or we can use transportor pods... Beam me up, Scotty!

[SecretStamos (Joshuu)]

Also, I was thinking, we'd expand on the "missions"

Ideas I have so far:

Aliens
Necromorphs (basically aliens again)
Zombie Virus (players infected turn eventually, HOWEVER, it ***CAN*** be cured, even if they are zombified)
Virus Response: an unknown virus has infected a few people on a station, Marines have been ordered to evac the uninfected, and contain the infected, so a cure can be made
Rebel Attack: Revolutionaries have seized a facility, they have hostages, and will blow the facility up, if their demands aren't met. (in this type, the revs would GREATLY out-number the marines, but would have almost all improvised weapons)
Spider Infestation.

I've been all for adding new antagonists for the Marines to fight against. It will turn the pretend speculation at the start of the round into actual speculation. The Marines won't be entirely sure what they're fighting until they're actually there.

The Rebel gamemode would work perfectly in the prison map that is being made. It would be neat if dead prison-guards littered the map for the prisoners to steal equipment from. The Prisoners could also have control of the cameras in the prison to watch the marines.

Here's some of my ideas. (these could be tacked onto the regular aliens gamemodes as well):
Predators: The marines fight off against a group of fully-armed Predators. Similarly, this gamemode could be applied over the Aliens gamemode, but with fewer predators in the pack. A Predator infected by the Aliens creates a Predalien.
Weyland Yutani PMC: Probably not best on their own. They're probably about on par with a marine in combat, but usually with smaller numbers. Probably best fielded as a side antagonist. Could also be deployed with combat synthetics.
U.P.P: The Cold-War esque rivals of the Colonial Marines. They were originally planned to be the secondary antagonists of Aliens 3, but were removed. They've made a couple appearances in some novels and games. They are described as having worse technology to the Colonial Marines, but they have slightly more men and they utilize a lot of combat robots. In the original script, they end up attacking the Sulaco and unknowingly bring the aliens onboard.
Weyland Yutani Commandos: Outclass the marines in firepower and armor. They'd probably be the strongest human antagonists. They utilize black M41As, but could be given special armor-piercing ammunition that mostly bypasses Marine armor. Probably best off deployed in a Nuke-Ops/Deathsquad manner.

All of these have some level of art done on them. The Predators and the PMC icons are practically finished, while the UPP have a couple icons and the Commandos have only a forward facing sprite.

[Minimike]

Seems pretty cool. Zombie idea is awesome, I love virology!

[Doctor Clockwork]

Some of my purple goes to you

+2

[UnknownMurder]

Why ARE we not funding this?

[Minimike]

Cus we're poor? Oh and for gamemode we should do a vote at start of round for A. Infestation B. Rebels. C. *whatever else* IF we get new gamemodes

[Void00]

Cus we're poor? Oh and for gamemode we should do a vote at start of round for A. Infestation B. Rebels. C. *whatever else* IF we get new gamemodes

No vote , just random , as is in the normal SS13.

That would give the marines a true sense of "not knowing what is behind that door" , rather than the "pretended" one we have.

[Minimike]

True.. but I mean what happens if lets say... rebels keeps coming up and people don't wish to play that.. we could add a secret button?

[Allan1234]

it wont its impossible since the gamemodes each require specific amount of players to work and its randomized so the chance of a back to back is 1/(how ever meany gamemodes) x2

[apophis775]

The round will ALWAYS be secret, to prevent people from knowing what the mission is, until they arrive.

[coroneljones]

Maybe Give the marines a "Sulaco Chef" Job to prepare more complicated/Give the marines rations.
Possibly Extending the prepare at the begining of the round thing

[apophis775]

If you didn't notice, I spent time rebuilding the kitchen, and added in the food dispensers.

[speedybst]

Apophis, all of my yes. +99999
Recently i've just been unable to play simply because it was getting too stale for me. All of this just jumped up and screamed "YES!" in my face.

As a thought, with the ground map how hard would it be to set up something like the fog from LV-426 or Fury 161, perhaps generated from some terrain objects? Use the code for a smoke grenade, set it to something like water for the reagent, or perhaps something mildly damaging to prevent marines from sitting in it with motion trackers or whatever. I think it would just help with the tactical approach for the first landing, especially with the Marines-vs-humans-type gamemodes. When you can't see the facility you're approaching easily, the amount of effort that would be taken to ensure a safe approach would suddenly be much higher, adding that little extra bit of tactical planning into the mix. It also could make it so that the defenders have a way of ambushing the marines, if they plan it out well. IDK, maybe i'm just pipe dreaming.

[Void00]

Apophis, all of my yes. +99999
Recently i've just been unable to play simply because it was getting too stale for me. All of this just jumped up and screamed "YES!" in my face.

As a thought, with the ground map how hard would it be to set up something like the fog from LV-426 or Fury 161, perhaps generated from some terrain objects? Use the code for a smoke grenade, set it to something like water for the reagent, or perhaps something mildly damaging to prevent marines from sitting in it with motion trackers or whatever. I think it would just help with the tactical approach for the first landing, especially with the Marines-vs-humans-type gamemodes. When you can't see the facility you're approaching easily, the amount of effort that would be taken to ensure a safe approach would suddenly be much higher, adding that little extra bit of tactical planning into the mix. It also could make it so that the defenders have a way of ambushing the marines, if they plan it out well. IDK, maybe i'm just pipe dreaming.

IDK.
It would probably cause a good amount of lag , a continuos production of elements.
On the other side , i believe there is a metod to reduce the visibility onto determined tyles.

I've restarted working on my planetary map , BTW.

at least there wouldnt be the problem of "approaching a open structure" as the more secure areas are partially (if not totally , like the AI core) hidden inside a mountain range , while the external is a desert-plain.

[coroneljones]

There is a mist thing in the code,somewhat like fog,doesnt block your vision i think,only semi hide things in it