Predator Changes

[Lostmixup]

Summary (a quick, 2-3 sentence summary):
So at the moment, I think the predator really doesn't mesh well from a gameplay standpoint. It really needs to be changed up a tad so that it meshes together better with the aliens and the marines.

Benefits (How this will benefit the server and game as a whole):
Will increase the enjoyment everyone is having from a round with a predator in it. Probably will increase the amount of RP predator's will employ.

Details (Description of how you think this would work, the benefits, etc):
So I have a few ideas:

1. Make the predator's invisibility cloak have a charge up timer before it can be used again
Something I've noticed is that predators will walk up to someone and try to attack them, but then pussy out and turn invisible again a few seconds latter. To fix this a 30 second timer should activate when a predator de-cloaks that prevents them from cloaking again until the timer is up. This particular change would prevent rambo preds from just running in, getting a few pot shots, and then skittering away.

2. Predators's invisibility should drain more of their energy
The invisibility a predator has shouldn't be essentially their default state of being, it should be something a predator uses when he notices some possible prey nearby. Making invisibility drain a bit more energy, along with making the invisibility have the 10* second timer, will make them think twice about taking on multiple prey at once or taking on prey in dishonorable ways. A quick note: I don't mean make the invisibility only last like a minute, I mean make it drain a bit more energy so that it isn't something a predator just has on casually all the damn time.

3. Give the predators some sort of beginning prep time that prevents them from immediately being on the ground
Give the predators some sort of beginning prep; whether that be their own ship to setup on, or a spawn timer (the spawn timer could be them phasing onto the planet, could take 30 minutes, etc). This would allow the aliens to become actual worthwhile prey instead of being cannon fodder at the beginning of the round.

4. Give the predators objectives
Giving the predators objectives such as "hunt x amount of aliens and x amount of humans" will give them something to do. Better yet, if we were to use the example I gave, it could be made so the amount of aliens and humans needing to be killed could depend on the starting player count. Objectives could give the predator something other to do than just simply fuck up everyone's day. In fact, the objective could simply be "destroy all humans" (bu dum tish) or something similar. They don't always have to have objectives of course, but it would be nice if they'd sometimes get some.


That's all I could think of; not all of my idea's need to be implemented, and not all of them need to be exactly the way I mentioned, however I do think the predators need some changes here and there to fit in better with the marines and aliens.

EDIT:
What would you guys think about making energy take longer to recharge? This one I'm not too sure about because I don't remember how long it takes to recharge at the moment, so I need some experienced opinions on this.

[Tetsip]

1: The timer in my opinion should be ten seconds. In combat thirty seconds is an insane amount of time.

2: I agree with this though, it should be punishing to use your invisibility often and make using things like your plasma caster harder.

3: I know this is in development at the moment. Something about a predator ship that they can go to and from.

4: I know that Apop is already on the drawing board with this one as well.

[apophis775]

1. No timer. The preds, can control their cloak pretty much at will.

2. Predators, can spend HOURS and even DAYS cloaked while hunting prey.

3. In development

4. We are working on something.

[RangerFrank]

These are perfect suggestions. It's extremely difficult to handle preds when right out the gate they can take out runners or drones and make it harder for the aliens to do anything. Also, it's not fun to get instantly killed as a survivor either. And on top of that Predalien???

[Feweh]

I'm in the process of making a massive Predator suggestion like this. However I've had the privilege of being a Predator so it's a bit more focused on actual experience.

I'd like Predator's to be more RP'ish rather than just running around killing people. I've tried to do the whole "fear" and fuck with Marines but it's very difficult given the tools we have, you can only *roar so many times before it becomes boring.

The only thing that I'll say that I'm against is your invisibility changes, they actually need to be buffed because you can see Predators quite easily if you're paying attention. Not to mention decreasing the invisibility does nothing but hurt the RP aspect, I'm more likely right now to run around the FOB *roaring and causing panic because I have the time I need. If I had less time I wouldn't bother going invisible and risking the chance of getting caught, this cuts down on cool elements such as instilling fear and chaos on people.

Decreasing the Invisibility would promote it being used more as a weapon or a tool to simply kill. Predators would just hide and drop in invisible to go for kills then fuck right off. Right now proper Predators will use it to run around and cause panic and fear.. at least that's what I do with it. You also have to realize that Predators go down with 3-4 shots to chest from internal wounds, invisibility is the Predators sole defense. Honestly Marine's are brutal to fight as a Predator, there's always that chance you're going to catch that one bullet that fucks your lungs up and you're dead. (Seriously 4 of my 6 Predator deaths are from my Lung's being destroyed)

Anyways, I'll have a big suggestion thing up tomorrow for Predators myself.

[Feweh]

These are perfect suggestions. It's extremely difficult to handle preds when right out the gate they can take out runners or drones and make it harder for the aliens to do anything. Also, it's not fun to get instantly killed as a survivor either. And on top of that Predalien???

No Predator should be going after survivors, I've never seen any Predator's that I've hunted with ever target a survivor. I'll actually use survivors as bait to lure aliens and protect them more than anything.

Predator's give survivors a chance to survive.

[Brandon]

1. No timer. The preds, can control their cloak pretty much at will.

2. Predators, can spend HOURS and even DAYS cloaked while hunting prey.

3. In development

4. We are working on something.

1. throws out the term of fair fighting and is complete bullshit predators are starting to do the shitty tactic if decloaking right next to a marine stabbing them and imminentdly recloak to preventing any sort of retaliation and thus a fair fight.

[Feweh]

1. throws out the term of fair fighting and is complete bullshit predators are starting to do the shitty tactic if decloaking right next to a marine stabbing them and imminentdly recloak to preventing any sort of retaliation and thus a fair fight.

I don't really understand your logic here, you'd prefer Predators not cloak and run right at you while you have a gun out? Knowing that Predator's have the same health system as marines.. Suffer fractures and internal damage.

Or would you prefer they blast you with the plasma cannon from a distance, because I feel like you'd complain about the cannon more than a Predator going for a melee take-down.

[Brandon]

I don't really understand your logic here, you'd prefer Predators not cloak and run right at you while you have a gun out? Knowing that Predator's have the same health system as marines.. Suffer fractures and internal damage.

Or would you prefer they blast you with the plasma cannon from a distance, because I feel like you'd complain about the cannon more than a Predator going for a melee take-down.

Can't belive Me out of all people has to point out the code that you are breaking Jesus Christ Killing while cloaked: It is very dishonorable for a hunter to kill prey while he is cloaked. It ignores all laws of fair and honorable hunting, and giving the prey a fighting chance read that line CAREFULLY

[Feweh]

Nothing about killing someone while they're cloaked was mentioned. You mentioned Predator's cloaking and de-cloaking to engage Marines at close range?

My point was that it wouldn't make sense for them to de-cloak and run at a marine with a gun, they need to get close enough for them to have a fighting chance as well.
Even in the movies and comics they don't de-cloak after enemies with guns.

I never said anything about killing while cloaked.

[Lostmixup]

I'm in the process of making a massive Predator suggestion like this. However I've had the privilege of being a Predator so it's a bit more focused on actual experience.

I'd like Predator's to be more RP'ish rather than just running around killing people. I've tried to do the whole "fear" and fuck with Marines but it's very difficult given the tools we have, you can only *roar so many times before it becomes boring.

The only thing that I'll say that I'm against is your invisibility changes, they actually need to be buffed because you can see Predators quite easily if you're paying attention. Not to mention decreasing the invisibility does nothing but hurt the RP aspect, I'm more likely right now to run around the FOB *roaring and causing panic because I have the time I need. If I had less time I wouldn't bother going invisible and risking the chance of getting caught, this cuts down on cool elements such as instilling fear and chaos on people.

Decreasing the Invisibility would promote it being used more as a weapon or a tool to simply kill. Predators would just hide and drop in invisible to go for kills then fuck right off. Right now proper Predators will use it to run around and cause panic and fear.. at least that's what I do with it. You also have to realize that Predators go down with 3-4 shots to chest from internal wounds, invisibility is the Predators sole defense. Honestly Marine's are brutal to fight as a Predator, there's always that chance you're going to catch that one bullet that fucks your lungs up and you're dead.

Anyways, I'll have a big suggestion thing up tomorrow for Predators myself.

I'm pretty damn sure that abby as pred this recent round tanked a metric ton of bullets to the chest without even going down.

I think having some kind of actual management to how much the cloak drains energy would actually make players think about what the hell they're doing, and plan out what they're doing better. It doesn't have to be significantly more energy drained, just a tad bit more. In exchange, the cloak can be even harder to see than it currently is. Adding in the short timer before you can decloak would also promote less immediate re-cloaking right after pot shotting someone. I also agree it should be around 10 seconds, 30 is a bit long (I'll edit my post).

Honestly, my experiences against the predator haven't been very fun. People have a lot of fun playing the predator, but not against the predator it seems like. Perhaps I just need to get into its shoes again, but I've had pretty much just an annoying experience with the predator overall.

I feel like the predator right now is too much of a power fantasy role right now. It never feels like I'm fighting a super skilled hunter when I'm against the pred; it feels more like I'm fighting against a damn super juiced up soldier that has a super strong melee weapon, and a super strong blaster.

[Feweh]

I'm pretty damn sure that abby as pred this recent round tanked a metric ton of bullets to the chest without even going down.

I think having some kind of actual management to how much the cloak drains energy would actually make players think about what the hell they're doing, and plan out what they're doing better. It doesn't have to be significantly more energy drained, just a tad bit more. In exchange, the cloak can be even harder to see than it currently is. Adding in the short timer before you can decloak would also promote less immediate re-cloaking right after pot shotting someone. I also agree it should be around 10 seconds, 30 is a bit long (I'll edit my post).

Honestly, my experiences against the predator haven't been very fun. People have a lot of fun playing the predator, but not against the predator it seems like. Perhaps I just need to get into its shoes again, but I've had pretty much just an annoying experience with the predator overall.

I feel like the predator right now is too much of a power fantasy role right now. It never feels like I'm fighting a super skilled hunter when I'm against the pred; it feels more like I'm fighting against a damn super juiced up soldier that has a super strong melee weapon, and a super strong blaster.

I definitely get where you're coming from and there really needs to be some improvements. The biggest problem is that Predator's are very bare boned right now, they kill stuff and that's it. When I first started playing as Predator I went for kills.. now I've started harassing FOB's and playing around with the Alien's. Heck, I even leave Marine's intact and don't butcher them so they can revived again.. because why bother butchering marines when you get nothing out of it in the end, there's no counter or tally for collecting human skin.

This might be hard to understand because you don't play Predator but you really have to work for your kills. Alien's are easy, honestly they are joke to hunt.. especially Tiers 1 -2 they can't do anything to you really.

Marine's are the real challenge with the guns and them all being grouped up, you actually have to stalk and hunt them and wait for opportune moments.

The biggest problem that really effects Predators being balanced is the fucking BYOND Mechanics. It's hard to balance out a class like this with the way BYOND and SS13 works.. Don't even get me started on the RANDOM NUMBER GENERATOR, sometimes I get insta de-heads... other time's I'll miss 3 stabs in a row.

You can't tank as a Predator at all, honestly as soon as you start getting shot it's the same Health system as Humans. You go red, your speed is reduced and you start taking damage. As I said, 3-4 shots usually causes some kind of internal damage which is game ending for Preds.

[RangerFrank]

I definitely get where you're coming from and there really needs to be some improvements. The biggest problem is that Predator's are very bare boned right now, they kill stuff and that's it. When I first started playing as Predator I went for kills.. now I've started harassing FOB's and playing around with the Alien's. Heck, I even leave Marine's intact and don't butcher them so they can revived again.. because why bother butchering marines when you get nothing out of it in the end, there's no counter or tally for collecting human skin.

This might be hard to understand because you don't play Predator but you really have to work for your kills. Alien's are easy, honestly they are joke to hunt.. especially Tiers 1 -2 they can't do anything to you really.

Marine's are the real challenge with the guns and them all being grouped up, you actually have to stalk and hunt them and wait for opportune moments.

The biggest problem that really effects Predators being balanced is the fucking BYOND Mechanics. It's hard to balance out a class like this with the way BYOND and SS13 works.. Don't even get me started on the RANDOM NUMBER GENERATOR, sometimes I get insta de-heads... other time's I'll miss 3 stabs in a row.

You can't tank as a Predator at all, honestly as soon as you start getting shot it's the same Health system as Humans. You go red, your speed is reduced and you start taking damage. As I said, 3-4 shots usually causes some kind of internal damage which is game ending for Preds.

Just a question for you since you have actually gotten to play as a pred, what exactly happens when you get hit with nerotoxin. From my perspective when I was trying to fight a pred Id hit him with a spit and be on top of him in less than a second and he cloaks and just disappears from me. Does cloak auto remove the stun?

[Feweh]

Just a question for you since you have actually gotten to play as a pred, what exactly happens when you get hit with nerotoxin. From my perspective when I was trying to fight a pred Id hit him with a spit and be on top of him in less than a second and he cloaks and just disappears from me. Does cloak auto remove the stun?

I've honestly never been in a situation yet where I've cloaked after getting stunned by a Spitter/Sentinel, so I really don't know.
Code of Honor we can't, well shouldn't be cloaking in a fair 1 vs 1 fight and that's the only time I've been stunned by sentinels/spitters was in a even fight.

The few time's I have been hit by Sentinels/Spitter and been stunned it's only for a couple of seconds and by the time they react or move to us where already up.
I've also never been hit by Acid yet so I don't know how effective that is.

If you get a good strong Alien though Queen/Ravager/Prae/Hivelord they can do some good internal damage with a couple of slashes. The other tier's of Xeno's only really do superficial damage making Xeno's not really worthy prey till late game I find.

[xywenx00]

Those healing crystals the preds have should heal internal damage = Problem solved ;P (They use crystals to heal, right? )

[Gentlefood]

+1 to all of the suggestions. While I'm more than happy to see or hear other versions of the proposal I personally feel predators in their current incarnation are overpowered in an unfun for gameplay sense rather than a "holy fuck that thing is strong" sense.

Cloaking seems to be a gimmick that almost guarantees a (competent: ie quick on the button) predator cannot die. The only exceptions to this are AoEs of which only Marines (Grenades, Rockets, Incin Unit, Orb Strike, etc) have. Predators also seem to recover from stuns very, very rapidly I don't know if this is by design or a bug but combined with the at will cloaking it makes it almost impossible for Aliens (even tier 3 apex predator aliens) to kill them.

I feel as if Predators were looked at and the design wanted to be "able to hit and run well" or "very physically strong and capable" or perhaps even both. But translating this over to game terms in a 2d Spessman simulator grants both the most powerful abilities in SS13. Mobility, and tanky DPS. There's a reason why a Wizard can completely destroy a station by himself and its for the two aforementioned reasons, and the wizard doesn't even have to be tanky. I understand that we want to be lore friendly and I agree there is a degree of fun in realism, but there are limitations in SS13 that may require some of it to be artificially toned down or changed.

[apophis775]

Locked. We are working on some of these.