#Remove destroyable walls from caves.

51 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

open mango
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The destroyable rock walls in the caves don't make any sense.
They break the flow of exploration and combat, trap monsters behind the rocks.

Don't seem to add anything from a tactical or gameplay perspective and create this awkward situation where you can see the enemy behind the rock, cannot shoot him and he cannot get to you.

How did the enemy get stuck inside there? How does he eat if it is trapped inside? its illogical.

It makes sense that that is where the sea life breeds, grows larger before venturing out into the larger ocean but how the caves are right now makes that seem wrong from a A life perspective with them trapped behind these walls.

Remove the destructible walls, instead use smaller "choke points" that players have to go thru very tightly swimming on their belly. (this creates great claustrophobia situations and still allows good ambushes) while allowing enemies to transition between parts of the cave system.

Add some destroyable walls/rocks to wrecks and abandoned outposts and beacon stations as this makes sense as some of these would have crashed into the rock and had rubble collapse and build up inside them. make it so you cannot see thru them as that is no longer as needed to "show" that the walls destructible. maybe also improve the texture of these walls as right now they just look like solid masses with little detail.

brittle kernel
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these "walls" are ice spikes
also oh yeah, my worst phobia. How was it called again?.. right, closterphobia!

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honestly can't see much of an issue. They aren't hard to break, and the lore part... clowns have superpowers given by their masks, this game is not supposed to be taken so seriously

lofty quest
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Also, the caves are likely full of background passageways for creatures to enter those blocked-off areas.
The ice walls force you to spend oxygen on cutting them and also give you a chance to prepare for the enemies ahead, instead of always being rushed by everything at once as you enter the cave.

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I don't see them as a negative.

brittle kernel
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also, making some passages so narrow that the player could hardly fit would make shuttles even less useful. Rn you can explore at least some caves with them, but not with passages like that

lofty quest
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It's true, not even custom drones would be small enough to fit through.

open mango
lofty quest
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But none of them block enemies and let you scout ahead safely.

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I do think that caves would benefit from spreading the enemy spawns around more. Maybe then such blockages wouldn't be needed.

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Fighting a whole swarm in one spot always sucks.

pine pollen
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1 Creatures in icewalls is unintended behaviour
2 If you want narrow passages it would create a very real possibility of either creatures being stuck or being unable to progress further in the cave
3 Having icewalls generate in the subs would be impossible due to how the icewalls generate (voronoi cells) same is the reason for 2

open mango
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What i mean is that being in a "cave" should lower their detection ranges.

lofty quest
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Maybe there is a way to implement it. Sounds like a decent enough alternative.

open mango
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also would make the sonar beacons and other traps more useful

pine pollen
lofty quest
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Ye.

open mango
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I could also see a alternative where you have small passageways and larger passageways blocked by rocks for shuttles and exosuits. but for shuttles its hard because they come way later so maybe caves should have those options later?

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I mean in zone 1 you dont need that etc.

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shuttles could use quite a few changes. maybe even have their own permanent upgrades etc.

pine pollen
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you know what would be nice?

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two types of caves

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the ones where shuttles can fit

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and the ones where they cant

lofty quest
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That'd work.

open mango
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TWO TYPES OF CAVES??!!! no you speak pure maddness! /s 😄

pine pollen
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maybe the latter can sprout from the former

lofty quest
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Smaller side paths that serve as an alternative way into the large cave "rooms", in addition to the wider main path through the cave would be a cool addition.

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Right now cave generation is very simple, there's not much nuance to it.

open mango
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would even be nice for some lategame "ruins" where some are bigger for shuttles etc.

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but then you dont want to make shuttles a required item.

pine pollen
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cave generation is literally the same voronoi cells algorithm that is used for sub passages but lesser size of the cells

lofty quest
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Yeah.

pine pollen
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tiny differences here and there but overall pretty much the same

glossy pendant
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I found one wich didnt let me get weed, so good idea

lilac herald
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Yeah ice also helps the meta of using sonar/noise to try to bait creatures out from deeper in the caves. What would be fun is caves having a low chance to generate a micro ruin/wreck/dry cave/research outpost/smugglers stash kind of thing where its like something has been encased or built into the more solid ice/rock whatever. Effecively a 1-3 connected modules that would have their own challenges or issues, possibly also acting as an alternate entrace to the cave network if they generate close to the edge, imagine docking to the bottom of a structure and having to enter the cave/flooded mine to get at your mission target.

pine pollen
lilac herald
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Yeah it would take a bit to mess with that and/or add another wreck style floating slot to plug in another misc level object like research stations or whatever.

pine pollen
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Actually i dont think it is implementable without changing the entire cave gen significantly

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Currently structures generate after caves (as is visible with alien ruins)

hollow wasp
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Narwhals must move from crack in ice to the next to get air. As the ice shifts they can get trapped. Maybe it’s like that

tidal vessel
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Seeing mangled mudraptors stuck in ice is really funny. I like to poke them with my plasma cutter (this frees the beasts)

mighty vale
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ice moves and ice freezes and melts

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even if it's the only entrance or exit (no) it's not like it's a permanent fixture

open mango
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another thing are the map textures are so bad about them, just big black blocks, should look more like larger versions of the ice spikes.

lofty quest
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They are textured like ice spikes, it's just dark in caves.

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You normally view ice spikes through a turret's periscope, which comes with a very bright light.

open mango
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I mean the crystals in the caves

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the map ice spikes look fucking terrible also

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most games do this thing where they "reverse" the textures to give more definition to repeating objects, so they dont look like a single ugly block