Wednesday, September 19, 2012

The Scrin and their toys

As we come close to the release of the next version of Xenoforce : The Original 3 (also known as the next release candidate for the system we use for Xenoforce Reborn) I wanted to talk about the Scrin.

A lot of the current Scrin designs believe it or not come from Robotech, or more importantly from the designs and ideas of the Robotech Masters.  While you can't say the Scrin are the Masters you will see in the new version of the mod just how the themes of the Masters played a very unique roll in the new Scrin.

The first thing we've changed is we've made the "upgrade" system easier to understand.  Instead of it being very story driven and players having trouble really understanding what upgrade applies to what units we have changed it to be the Scrin Bio-Index page.  Here you can modify the stats of the types of Scrin Forces that the Scrin can deploy making them stronger/faster/tougher than they otherwise were.

The first column will now effect the Scrin Bio-Units (yes this is now a class of unit).  The second applies to Scrin Bio-Armors and Scrin Bioroids.  Finally the final applies to the Scrin Escort Fleet units.  Each upgrade grants 5% / 10% / 15% / 20% bonus to speed, fire rate, damage, and health giving you the ability to upgrade a single force type by 50% for free!

Now what exactly are these things?  A Bio-Unit is a unit that is built from the Portal.  A Bio-Armor is built from the Warp Sphere.  Finally an Escort Fleet unit is built from the Gravity Stabilizer.  This like I said is to make things easier.

But wait there is more.  Each unit type has a special feature that further makes this an easy to use but interesting design.  Bio-Units are units that have a specialty enemy type.  This means when the unit deals damage to a specific target type it deals an additional 50% damage against that type!  The types that the units can be specialized in are Infantry / Vehicles / Structures.  So if you focus on Bio-Units and then use Disintegrators which are anti-structure specialists you could be doing an extra 2X damage against enemy bases than you normally would!  Units considered to be BioArmors are : Disintegrators, Shock Troopers, Mastermind Squads, Gunwalkers, Corruptors, Seeker Platforms, and Devouerer Tanks.

Bio-Armors are the meat and potatoes of the Scrin Main force.  The Scrin use 3 different types of Bio-Armors extensively.  Silver Bio-Armors are basic units, meant to be mass produced and are heavily armored and designed to deal damage.  Emerald Bio-Armors are stronger units meant to hold back the tide of an enemy.  They are equipped with special weapons meant to slow the enemy down and are very heavily armored.  Finally Ruby Bio-Armors are elite commander units designed to not only use the most advanced Scrin weapons but also give a boost to other Scrin units around them making them stronger and faster in the field of battle.  A bio-armor has a second hidden surprise though.  Once you kill a Bio-Armor the Bioroid pilot is jettisoned from the husk and then continues on foot fighting.  A Bioroid is a very powerful and special kind of infantry, they are equipped with many of the weapons and features that their Bio-Armor had but are more fragile.  Still this "2nd attack form" makes BioArmors a pain to deal with.

The Escort Fleet is the 3rd kind of Scrin unit.  These are flying vessels that are strong enough to deal massive amounts of damage to their entended targets and can be used either as fire support or as an assault force in their own right.  Typically designed around the idea of being offensive units the Escort Fleet can be hard to handle if your not prepaired to deal with them.  Their purpose is to simply be the best at dealing with targets that also fall under their Teir / Class.

Finally the one type of unit we havn't talked about, the Scrin Capitol Ships, are going to be very very powerful on the battlefield.  It will be a rare sight if things go right to see more than a few of these on the field of battle as they simply are going to be ungodly expensive.  However with great cost comes great power.  Think again of the Robotech masters and their Mothership.  If you've never watched robotech go watch some episodes from the 2nd Season, the one that deals with the Southern Cross and the Robotech Masters.  The Scrin Motherships are going to be like that.  However if a Scrin Mothership is destroyed it will cause a psycic echo to go through all Scrin units on a field causing them to become immobile for 15 seconds.  That may not seem like much but thats 15 seconds of being a sitting duck and in the middle of a battle that can be an eternity.

So thats a rundown on how the Scrin are shaping up to be.  Feel free to ask any questions.  Again I hope to have a version out for testing by NEXT friday (Oct 1st at the latest).

4 comments:

Alan said...

Yessss a release date i am soooo looking forward to this release as i am every release.

Alan said...

Its been 8 long days of waiting so i have to ask how are things looking? (My apologizes if I seem pushy I just saw the pictures on Moddb and I am so eager I am ready to explode)(I had never seen the pictures because I always forgot to check the Kodiak, looks great)

azuza001 said...

Lol, I'm compiling now actually.

As always everything is fine and then I remember I have to fix descriptions so people know what they're doing lol.

If it isn't out tonight then it will be out tomorrow.

Alan said...

Yay okay thank you <3