Reactions to predators

[Heckenshutze]

Predators aren't tough, the issue is the SD they trigger when they die. This thing wipes squads and hives.

What kind of predators have you met? Predators can steam roll both sides if they really wanted to.

That's why everytime marines/xeno try an assault on their lodge they get wiped out with ease.

[Zilenan91]

What kind of predators have you met? Predators can steam roll both sides if they really wanted to.

That's why everytime marines/xeno try an assault on their lodge they get wiped out with ease.

Preds are powerful but they aren't tough in the sense that they can't take a stupid amount of damage. They'll die if you shoot them enough and since they have persistent damage like broken bones, bleeding, fractures, etc it makes them less durable than some xenos.

[Feweh]

Predators aren't tough, the issue is the SD they trigger when they die. This thing wipes squads and hives.

Sd will only kill in about a 4x4 box, the rest will be breaks or wounds.

It's easy to run out of the 4x4 box

[Zilenan91]

Sd will only kill in about a 4x4 box, the rest will be breaks or wounds.

It's easy to run out of the 4x4 box

Yeah you can do it but sometimes the warning sound doesn't play for SD so it's a completely untelegraphed boom ur ded kiddo type of thing

[Kerek]

Well see, that last part is part of why the OP made this thread. Marines seem so hesitant to attack preds in any case that doesnt involve a direct assault by the pred, and theres a few OOC and IC reasons why. OOC, people are terrified of the powerful weapons and nearly mythologized stamina of preds, and dont want to be gibbed/decapped and removed from the round. IC, people may feel that an unknown humanoid alien should be reasoned with rather than antagonized. Others may feel that it's better to wait for command to advise before running after a large strange figure in the dark.

I can't think of any way to combat this, and some of these reasons seem perfectly rational to me (at least the IC ones). Pred-marine interactions tend to be wonky and strange, and pred-xeno reactions can seem downright lore-breaking, but what can you do in a game with a limited respawn mechanic beyond making a new rule?

Big Space Jamacian that are upwards of 8 feet tall, wearing armor, pretty buff, has melee weapons and thing on his shoulder that makes you go BOOM. They would be scary, and not something to really shoot at.

[Crab_Spider]

What kind of predators have you met? Predators can steam roll both sides if they really wanted to.

That's why everytime marines/xeno try an assault on their lodge they get wiped out with ease.

Or because they're just using the launcher and a full strength caster on the Marines.

[Ghodere]

Robust a predator and you die. It's not hard to figure out why so many on both sides prefer to simply never interact with one, including turning your head when murder's happening.

[Blade2000Br]

Sd will only kill in about a 4x4 box, the rest will be breaks or wounds.

It's easy to run out of the 4x4 box

to be honest, the time I stolen Bobby's mask and Jay was chasing me, I shoved myself inside the dropship. Jay came after me and marines simply start shooting him non-stop.

he triggered his bracer, blew up literally everyone inside the ship, and I gotta say alot of people got gibbed that seemingly wasn't in a 4x4 space...and half the DS marines died of internal bleeding...

that explosion is just strong man.

[Winter]

I try to befriend them. Space Rastas gotta be chill, right? Maybe we could have pizza. That'd be cool.

[Blade2000Br]

I try to befriend them. Space Rastas gotta be chill, right? Maybe we could have pizza. That'd be cool.

Plasma castering unworthy prey INTENSIFIES

[Kerek]

But I’ve got to say, I’ve killed a fair share of preds recently because they attacked someone or I took out a vendetta on them because they killed my friend. As long as you listen, even though the death click is quiet, you can hear the last bit of it clearly, and have time to run away before you get killed from it. Especially xenos, they can pounce away and are even rarely killed when right adjacent to a predator.

[Jagdges]

A Marine seeing a Predator for the first time may even think they're a form of Xeno. Can't communicate? Angry thing with crazy weaponry? Just like the movies guys, it's not something you want to bullshit around with. I'd use the typical rules of "If it gets close, shoot it. If it attacks, shoot it."

[OatzAndHoes]

Was just going to make a thread on this. I get not blasting preds on sight, but the minute they do anything hostile(which includes not complying with marine requests to drop their weapons) marines should be opening fire.

Predators are scary looking motherfuckers. It's ridiculous how much marines will let slide with preds that they wouldn't with a person, when it should be the opposite. A pred can shoot at marines, or hunt a specific marine and still you'll get marines that want to be friends with it. Imagine if they treated CLF or UPP soldiers that way? Players who will refuse to fight preds unless its directly shooting at them personally are metagaming because they're acting on the knowledge that preds are powerful and have an ability to wipe out a good number of marines.

Big Space Jamacian that are upwards of 8 feet tall, wearing armor, pretty buff, has melee weapons and thing on his shoulder that makes you go BOOM. They would be scary, and not something to really shoot at.

Xenos are scary as fuck too. Marines don't refuse to shoot at the queen because it might provoke them. Any reason you have for not shooting a pred is purely out of metaknowledge. I'd be happy if they started handing out bans for the worst offenders(those who absolutely refuse to fight preds even when we have a proven history of fighting them ingame) but its a bit of a slippery slope.

Also protip for all the marines out there. Preds aren't that tough when you set them on fire.

[Challenger]

Great point and visuals, Oatz.

Although I have to say that marines do refuse to shoot at the queen; they run away in fear. Well, it's really metagaming the screech (especially the first time), but still an awesome visual: the badass company that blasts through every alien they see all screams, turns tail and causes a stampede out of sheer fear of the biggest, baddest alien there is.

Imagine if we had the same awesome visual for preds instead of jackasses standing around asking how its day is going and casually nodding at it skewering their squadmate to roast over a fire.

[Renomaki]

Honestly, when I'm a human and I encounter predators, my first thoughts of them are to assume that they may be pirates or raiders. They certainly look the part, what with their strange, barbaric appearance and even stranger tech and weapons. Being this is deep space, it wouldn't be odd to assume that some raider groups have some unorthodox means of fighting, along with using what could be stolen tech.

Of course, just instantly shooting them isn't very good RP (mainly because it takes away the predator's chance to RP with marines first before engaging), so I wait for an appropriate time to open fire. If the strange man just stands there staring you down, you stare right back until he does something to break the ice [or your bones].

After all, until predators show hostile intent, I don't think there is a reason to outright slaughter them. That doesn't mean you should try to befriend them though.. Rather, you should observe them as they observe you, keeping ever diligent should they attempt to ambush you.

[Kerek]

Was just going to make a thread on this. I get not blasting preds on sight, but the minute they do anything hostile(which includes not complying with marine requests to drop their weapons) marines should be opening fire.

Predators are scary looking motherfuckers. It's ridiculous how much marines will let slide with preds that they wouldn't with a person, when it should be the opposite. A pred can shoot at marines, or hunt a specific marine and still you'll get marines that want to be friends with it. Imagine if they treated CLF or UPP soldiers that way? Players who will refuse to fight preds unless its directly shooting at them personally are metagaming because they're acting on the knowledge that preds are powerful and have an ability to wipe out a good number of marines.


Xenos are scary as fuck too. Marines don't refuse to shoot at the queen because it might provoke them. Any reason you have for not shooting a pred is purely out of metaknowledge. I'd be happy if they started handing out bans for the worst offenders(those who absolutely refuse to fight preds even when we have a proven history of fighting them ingame) but its a bit of a slippery slope.

Also protip for all the marines out there. Preds aren't that tough when you set them on fire.

Yeah, that I get, and often, marines tell us to drop to the floor, strip etc. Aim at us, and then yaknow, pew pew with the caster. Happens with the round, but there is that meta choice of, "Do I want to risk getting killed really early on by fighting this predator?" You have that choice just like you do wanting to rambo off and hope to get a few easy kills on some lone xenos.

[Winter]

Plasma castering unworthy prey INTENSIFIES

There is nothing wrong with diplomacy and pizza.

[Crab_Spider]

There is nothing wrong with diplomacy and pizza.

Yes there is

[Winter]

What would YOU know about diplomacy, exactly anyway? Besides, a predator once saved Rain's bacon when I got surv somehow, and the runners came by.

[contactdenied]

In an RP sense I would probably mistake a pred for some sort of survivor because of the humanoid appearance, double check and *scream because that is definitely not a survivor. I might try to initiate conversation if it looks like it isn't going to do anything, but I'll probably radio my location because I would probably die horribly if I made one wrong move.

I've never had any real experiences with a pred except for one time where LV 624 was the only map next to Ice Colony, I had a flamer, and my fellow marines started shooting at something. I go over to check, and they're shooting at a pred, so I join in because it's shooting back at us with stun orbs. I didn't actually manage to hit the pred with the fire, but it stunned me, took my flamer, then gave it back without the tank. Cheeky shit.

[Heckenshutze]

It's complicated. Predators are asked to roleplay yet be a villain, but not that hard because you can fuck up the tides of the round. Since the hunt requires you to stalk and not do a direct attack it's better to wait for the other side to attack you. This doesn't apply to xenos yet you have to be careful with your picks.

[Symbiosis]

In an RP sense I would probably mistake a pred for some sort of survivor because of the humanoid appearance, double check and *scream because that is definitely not a survivor. I might try to initiate conversation if it looks like it isn't going to do anything, but I'll probably radio my location because I would probably die horribly if I made one wrong move.

I've never had any real experiences with a pred except for one time where LV 624 was the only map next to Ice Colony, I had a flamer, and my fellow marines started shooting at something. I go over to check, and they're shooting at a pred, so I join in because it's shooting back at us with stun orbs. I didn't actually manage to hit the pred with the fire, but it stunned me, took my flamer, then gave it back without the tank. Cheeky shit.

You're welcome

[Sailor Dave]

It's a very situational thing. The majority of it, I'd say, is definitely an ooc issue of some marines either wanting to get on the predator's good side so they get to have fun with them (regardless of how good of an idea it is), or not wanting to get annihilated by the caster stun and/or self-destruct. I've seen entire squads get wiped out by it, despite what feweh says.

Contrarily, The most devastating effects usually happen when the Marines 'decide' to head in the direction of the lodge, deliberately antagonize the preds and get their whole squad and -usually- the predators destroyed. This is a very consistent thing, and I've seen it happen multiple rounds in a row.

It's the same thing with xenos. Some will want to fight the preds whenever they see them, others will scream at each other to leave the pred alone, and the queen tends to fall into the latter category presumably out of fear of getting half the hive wiped out because of a few arrogant xenos. This is always a dull experience, but it's an understandable reaction, as I've also seen this happen too.

Another part of it is that some xenos, despite what everyone thinks, often DO want to roleplay. The trouble is, there are no guidelines for this, no restrictions. Xenos are not expected to roleplay by most, despite how often people complain about it. I think that these xenos probably just don't know how to interact with a predator, so they treat them the way they do to have their moment, to have fun with a predator, even if the way they do it doesn't make any sense.

It's not enough and it's not fair to say "use common sense, behave like a xeno" because they don't know what that MEANS in practice, and telling them "you're just a mindless xeno, you're not supposed to roleplay" is a very dull way of playing.

[DadLantern]

Marine reactions are usually fine.

Xeno reactions is when it devolves. Often times, when queening or just being a regular xeno, you often see Xenos chasing preds with little to no RP. They simply want a fight with the predators, which always leads to death to the Xeno and angering of the RP-heavy predator (ICly). They just want to be snowflake and get a simple reaction from the pred, whether that be a fight or a recognizing. It's mindless, and you should scream at Xenos to ignore the predator.

[Liptick]

Could someone please explain why it makes no sense for a ruthless killing machine to try to kill or impregnate anything they see? The whole concept of xeno role play kinda makes me laugh. They kill or capture anything that isnt xeno... i would expect every single xeno that isnt part of the hive building to attack a pred