For the Swirl game mode of Tremulous 1.3, we are looking into overhauling how evolution works for the aliens (and I will be elaborating further on this in other related topics very S00N™), and one of the things we are looking into is the ability to devolve. But what I’m wondering is, should combat aliens be permitted to devolve into a granger? What problems might exist if that was the case? If we should allow devolving into grangers, should there be conditions/limitations? If so, what should they be, and why?
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Yes, I feel this would be highly needed. What if you are low on eggs and are hunted down by humans, say you needed to keep building instead of dretching you are with fellow grangers you’ll die instantly all of you. Maybe one will escape, but the chase will begin again. If your only stuck with fellow grangers it would be great if they had some chance and ability to aid each other with maybe even the help of a few surviving dretches.[quote=“dGr8LookinSparky, post:1, topic:3714”]
What problems might exist if that was the case?
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I don’t think in my opinion any problems would occur, some might not fully agree but giving the aliens ability to have a surviving chance unlike humans who have the ability to use the blaster even with a few rifles sounds good to me. 
As if humans are stuck with rifles and no base they cannot randomly get a Ckit, it would be fair if an Overmind (much like a Reactor and Armory) is required. Maybe a evo penalty though this could depend as humans don’t get fees on Ckits, then again they are aliens.
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re: infinitegames.avi
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I think @MaeJong is correct about the potential for infinite-game (assuming no time limit or other restrictions), as I believe the idea of not being able to evolve into granger is so that you can ultimately kill the alien team by eliminating their spawns.
On the human team, when there’s no telenodes; as long as the RC is up, and you have an armory, you can go ckit and build nodes to allow teammates to respawn.
On aliens, to build more eggs you have to spawn as granger, from an egg. If there’s no eggs and no grangers, your team is on the path to losing.
So, similar to how aliens can cripple the human team by taking out armory, humans should be able to cripple aliens by taking out their eggs.
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No RC → Can’t build nodes or arm, have to respawn to build
No OM → Can’t build eggs, have to respawn to build
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With the bp reserve on Swirl, already there is a limit to how much can be rebuilt. If combat gets more intense, and building becomes more easier, then that reserve should be used up even quicker.
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The possibility of egg-hunt games could begin as soon as humans can first rush the alien base and kill their eggs, which might even be only 2 minutes into the game; possibly where the builder hasn’t even touched the main BP yet, let alone the reserve.
So then you can have an egg-hunt game where first all the main BP is spent on eggs, then eat up all the reserve too as main BP regens, so… you should be able to get about an hour+ long egg-hunt game going.
Boooooooooooooring.
[quote=dGr8LookinSparky]
[Swirl DIscussion]Should combat aliens be allowed to develove into grangers?[/quote]
This is a good DIscussion, and I think combat aliens should be allowed to develove into grangers. Love is all around us and is what gives true happiness in life.
should humans equipped with weapons be permitted to re-equip construction kits ? what PROBLEMs exist due to this ? if they should be allowed to re-equip, should there be conditions/limitations ? if so, what should they be, and why ? also, what r the current conditions/limitations, and why ?
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WROOOOONG !!!1!
Allowing alien classes to devolve into grangers would make the game infinitely harder for humans.
→ Goon runs around the map, kills a bunch of humans.
→ Goon devolves into granger, spams a bunch of eggs.
→ Granger re-evolves back into goon, continues killing humans.
Alternately:
→ Goon runs around the map, kills a bunch of humans
→ Overmind is under attack
→ Goon devolves into granger, immediately puts down a new OM once it dies.
→ Granger re-evolves back into goon, continues killing humans (who just spent all their credits rushing).
→ On test server, human team just gave the alien team a metric shitton of evos by killing them, and are immidiately wiped out by a counter-rush. Because sparky and co. think that communism is the solution to feeding.
If aliens get to change to builders at will, then humans get to carry ckits and guns at the same time.
Solution in search of a problem.
It could be nice to actually be able to devolve into grangers. But, so it dosn’t make the game last too long, maybe few ideas could be welcomed to make it better.
Such as (maybe):
- Devolving to granger shouldn’t give back evos (Since it’s an evolution from a before form.)
- There could be a maximum of eggs/grangers. (Even with those battle grangers…) (This could feel limiting few times, but it could possibly make it a faster game.) (The limit could increase/decrease depending on the amount of players online.)
- Eggs not connected in a specific range of the other eggs and om could have a decay stat which would get it to be destroyed or get damaged over time. This way, we’d need to have chains of eggs to be able to make a long lasting base/temp. base.
- OM should still be needed to devolve.
(These are just some ideas of what could possibly make the game lasts as long as the regular games.)
WROOOOONG !!!1![/quote]
He actually has a point, I personally wouldn’t like a 3 hours game over ATCS just because of egg-hunting.
This is why we’d need to have a good way to limit how long games are before adding such devolve.
I’d definetely love to be able to devolve, but it would only make games too long without anything to limit it at least a single bit.
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Not necessarily. Not being able to devolve into a granger isn’t the only way to generally limit the length of a game. As I mentioned before, the reserve bp of the Swirl game mode limits how much rebuilding you can do. There can also be new weapons, equipment, enhancements and features that make “egg hunts” more effective for humans.
The other thing is that DevHC brought up a good point by indicating that the humans already have an ability where they switch from combat to builder without having to die and respawn. There are situations where humans can have all combat weapons and no telenode, but if they have a powered armory, at least one human can switch to a builder, and rebuild their telenodes and base (even at forwards).
One could make the argument that in the case of the humans, whether or not they can switch to a builder depends on a buildable (a powered armory), but the same can be done with respect to combat aliens devolving into grangers. For example for a combat alien to devolve into a granger they need to be within a certain distance of the om, and have the om in their line of sight (I’ve heard that at least one mod has done something like this in the past), or prerhaps a combat alien would have to be touching a booster to devolve.
One could also make the counter argument that humans have more difficulties with building, and forwarding, and moving basses than aliens do. This is true at the moment, however, we intend to make all of those things much much much easier for both teams than it is now. So the argument against combat aliens devolving into grangers resulting in more egg hunts, would equally apply to a telenode hunt in the case for humans being able to switch from combat to building without having to die, The easiness in building would be countered by much more effective combat for both teams, which means that while bases and forwards would be popping up more often, they would also be destroyed more often, so games would be a lot more dynamic and intense.
The ckit was made into a side arm in at least the Tremulous Zombie mod (but of course in that case human players are fighting against a team (swarm) of zombie bots). I don’t know if other Tremulous mods made the ckit a side arm.
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Point being, if Aliens get to build AND fight at the same time, then humans need to be able to build AND fight at the same time. Otherwise you have a(n even more) loaded game.
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I do agree with everything, but one thing…
We might want to make the base forwarding maybe not too easy for both team. this way, if (As exemple) I decide that I wanna forward my hummy base, aliens can still counter it by either forwarding too or fortifying at this specific forward path.
Definetely making both team being able to forward would be a nice way to balance it, but in the end, it would (maybe) only mean that the first team to make a forward base would be the winner. Which we might want to avoid a bit. It’s fun to have multiple fast games, but a long game where you have something challenging (and not impossible) is great too.
The first team to base-forward would have a (close-to) decisive win.
I remember seeing that in the past on Tremulous, and (if I remember well) it did work a bit, but the games were too fast to be enjoyed at it’s full potential.
I would definetely make forwarding easier for both teams, but we might want some way to counter that aggressive strategy. (And I doubt fortifying a single spot would suffice. Considering that the other team would only have to go through the other entrance to win.)
Anyway, I do agree that aliens could have devolve, (With maybe as you said with prerequisit to be in front of the OM or close to a Booster)
And as the team forwarding, we need some ways to counter it easily as well as forwarding easily, so there might be still a way to win after a aggressive forwarding 
(Sry for the long posts once again 
I’m used to it so bad…)
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I 100% agree .But we do plan on having aliens freeze in an “evolve state” while evolving for a certain period of time (to replace the blocking of evolving from being near a human player/buildable), So switching between aliens would no longer be instantaneous. I am on the fence about giving the humans a ckit as a side arm (might try it sometime depending on how the game play develops), but we do plan on having combat humans and combat aliens participate more in the build processes (through the use of deployables and a new build system for both teams that have been planned, I’ll post topics about those in the near future when we are about ready to initially implement them).
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