Monkeys/Bonobos autospawn every 15 minutes

[KingKire]

Summary:
Every 15ish minutes or so, a new monkey or bonobo spawns in the jungle regions around the map.

Benefits:
Gives xenos a small replenishing supply of hosts, makes xenos move around the map, Allows xenos to eventually overwhelm the sulaco if turtling goes on long enough.
Allows xenos to be a little more carefree with their lives.

Details:
I remember hearing this idea some time ago, and i just wanted it posted down for posterity. I think its a good idea, and exchange for some nerfs or buffs around the table, xenos could get a trickling supply of hosts to use. My only issues are that there has to be a way to limit the amount of hosts over time, like the jungle only spawns monkeys if there are less than 3 monkeys on the map. Also, how would this work when it comes to extending games, possibly giving xenos too much staying power if theres only 1 or 2. You could balance this out by giving marines the wayland-yutani life scanner to scan the planet every 40ish minutes for lifeforms. It definitely could eventually give xenos who are assaulting the sulaco a slow but reliable way to break sieges.
Is the risk to reward ratio for xenos too low? maybe theres a better way to get this done that makes it so xenos could have a high risk going away from the hive for some time to hunt for new hosts. Maybe this feature only works when there are no more marines on the planet?

Implementation:
Some of the Dense jungle tiles around the map would be turned into spawn tiles for monkeys or bonobos.

[Sarah_U.]

Duplicates kinda increase the workload of devs, please don't :'(

[KingKire]

it was talked about but never suggested, unless im missing one.

[Desolane900]

Inb4 marines meta the monkey spawns.

[Sarah_U.]

It was actually suggested, although for when the marines weren't planetside. Each 10min a monkey would spawn and it'd put a popup or something was the suggestion.

[KingKire]

i gave the suggestions and denied suggestions list a quick look through and it seems that although there have been hints and discussions, there has never been a full suggestion. although, i can say for certainty that there is no current suggestions currently revolving with that idea i believe.

[ParadoxalObserver]

The Xenos already can very easily recover from when they're losing by just getting one good victory against the marines and infecting them. The marines recovering when the Xenos are winning is far more difficult. Considering this, this idea of just giving them monkeys would only make this situation worse. Now they don't even need to get a strong victory in an engagement to get a couple of infected. They'd just need to play the waiting game. This would, of course, force the marines to always being on the offensive.

[Ithalan]

The Xenos already can very easily recover from when they're losing by just getting one good victory against the marines and infecting them. The marines recovering when the Xenos are winning is far more difficult. Considering this, this idea of just giving them monkeys would only make this situation worse. Now they don't even need to get a strong victory in an engagement to get a couple of infected. They'd just need to play the waiting game. This would, of course, force the marines to always being on the offensive.

This sounds more like an argument in favor of this, considering that marines turtleling in their FOB/on the Sulaco is already a frequent problem. The implementation can be tweaked for balance, maybe by making the respawns only happen south of the river where the patrols from the FOB would still put the xenos out hunting at risk, and putting a cap on the potential xeno population (living monkeys + living xenos), above which no new monkeys will spawn.

Oh, and getting one good victory when at a disadvantage is far from easy, and still requires marines to also fail to keep the pressure on in the 20-25 minutes it takes for the hosts to burst.

[ParadoxalObserver]

This sounds more like an argument in favor of this, considering that marines turtleling in their FOB/on the Sulaco is already a frequent problem. The implementation can be tweaked for balance, maybe by making the respawns only happen south of the river where the patrols from the FOB would still put the xenos out hunting at risk, and putting a cap on the potential xeno population (living monkeys + living xenos), above which no new monkeys will spawn.

Oh, and getting one good victory when at a disadvantage is far from easy, and still requires marines to also fail to keep the pressure on in the 20-25 minutes it takes for the hosts to burst.

Uh. The issue with the Marines turtling the FoB is...? The reason Marines fall back to fortify an FoB and keep one manned is because, surprise surprise, when they're retreating and notice they can't win the advance they fall back, and now it's the Aliens turn to advance. Essentially what you're saying is even though the Xenos already have a huge advantage over the marines, the marines are always forced on the offensive. They can never switch to the defensive. Even on the defensive, 9/10 when marines retreat to the FoB it's because they're losing and so the Xenos tend to, although with some difficulty, break through the FoB.

And no, a hosts bursts after about 10 minutes, not 20 to 25. Also the issue with this is...? The game already heavily favors the Xenos. They get stronger over time, they can very quickly recover their numbers if they get one good victory, they don't have issues like needing equipment and ammunition, they require a lot less organization to succeed and so on. And with the resin handcuffs you don't even need sentinels to actually watch the marines. You need only one drone, hivelord, or Queen, and the marines will never escape. Instead of needing a few sentinels in case the marines have weapons on them and attempt a good escape. Meaning it's not even that likely to lose infested hosts.

The marines are NOT supposed to always be on the offensive, something I don't think people get. And they fallback to the Sulaco when they've lost enough people. How would it make sense to assault an enemy you've been losing against with a handful of demoralized men? And they don't fortify the Sulaco because the Admins will (rightfully) smack people over the head if they attempt to fortify before the Xenos use the console. So there is zero reason to make Xenos even stronger and give them more of a reason to stall (as they so commonly already do).

Edit: Another point I forgot to make is it removes the choice between killing and infecting. Right now, Xenos already towards the end start killing a lot more than infesting because they know that infesting would make things a lot more difficult and likely lose more than gain. It's a strategic decision. Auto-spawning monkeys suddenly means there is zero reason to not kill marines as you have these other, much more easily obtained hosts.

[Karmac]

And no, a hosts bursts after about 10 minutes, not 20 to 25. Also the issue with this is...? The game already heavily favors the Xenos. They get stronger over time, they can very quickly recover their numbers if they get one good victory, they don't have issues like needing equipment and ammunition, they require a lot less organization to succeed and so on. And with the resin handcuffs you don't even need sentinels to actually watch the marines. You need only one drone, hivelord, or Queen, and the marines will never escape. Instead of needing a few sentinels in case the marines have weapons on them and attempt a good escape. Meaning it's not even that likely to lose infested hosts.

You wot? Every single time I've been infected for the past week it's taken about 20 minutes to burst on a good day, and 30 minutes on a regular one, shit's fucked man. Had a round where I was infected and died from spitter nuerotoxin 35 minutes into being nested, didn't burst. Either I'm just lucky and the marines will always have plenty of time to rescue me, or shit's broken.

[ParadoxalObserver]

You wot? Every single time I've been infected for the past week it's taken about 20 minutes to burst on a good day, and 30 minutes on a regular one, shit's fucked man. Had a round where I was infected and died from spitter nuerotoxin 35 minutes into being nested, didn't burst. Either I'm just lucky and the marines will always have plenty of time to rescue me, or shit's broken.

30 minutes? Your perception of time might be a bit off. Even if it were 20 minutes, as it is now you get one drone to watch the people and done. It'll keep them always cuffed so they never have a chance to do anything. And that still doesn't answer the question of why give them monkeys? Marines have it tough enough as it is... and now you essentially want them to always be on the offensive? I don't know if you've noticed, but Marine offenses don't tend to go very far before needing a fall back. I've seen several games where the Xenos were at a huge disadvantage, they get one good victory, and bam. Their numbers are now doubled and the marines are in disarray. The difference is, at least in those situations the Xenos had to sort of work for it. They didn't have to just scout about to try and get some easy monkeys.

[Renomaki]

Honestly, I think the xenos should be punished for wasting larvas, just like how the marines are punished for not sticking close with their fellow marines and getting hugged.

Reserve larvas run out so quickly due to players overestimating their skill as a xeno, going as a runner and trying to tacklehug people in the middle of a crowd, which often gets them killed. They don't bother to try and upgrade before doing such daring things, and get too aggressive. Mindless aggression should be punished.

[ParadoxalObserver]

Honestly, I think the xenos should be punished for wasting larvas, just like how the marines are punished for not sticking close with their fellow marines and getting hugged.

Reserve larvas run out so quickly due to players overestimating their skill as a xeno, going as a runner and trying to tacklehug people in the middle of a crowd, which often gets them killed. They don't bother to try and upgrade before doing such daring things, and get too aggressive. Mindless aggression should be punished.

It kind of already is really well punished since young aliens die easily. The issue is it doesn't punish the alien team and only the player. Unlike the marines side where losing a rambo'ing marine harms both the player and the team since you suddenly lose a fully equipped man while that alien will just be soon replace with another. Then again, in certain respects punishing the hive for the stupidity of single Xenos might be too harmful to them. I think it's more of a duty of revamping some Marine mechanics than nerfing Xenos.

[forwardslashN]

We're considering some options in terms of how to deal with xenos getting some extra larvas. It won't likely be this, but there's some stuff in the works. Resolved.