The Mutant Theory

Stowaway

What information do we have on mutants.

I have read a couple of conflicting (in my mind) news tidbits.

1) There will be genetic engineering/enhancing places. you splice yourself with a jellyfish (or something)

2) Unlocking your mutant potential, finding the way to do it. (kinda like JEDI in star wars?)

Either way it is the only thing which worrys me about fallen earth, mutants.

How do you picture post-apocolyptic mutants?

I am hoping the designs change from the video we have seen, as that to me is more City of heroes than Fallout.

Now, im not taking the piss, im not having a go, but hell I want to be honest with everyone here and anyone reading so in turn they are honest with me.

Im sure some people may like that, and i dont begrudge a game having what they want for their vision, its not MY game after all

BUT.

If it is way 2, some kind of secret way to unlocking it..... I am really worried you are going to end up with a situation like you have with the Jedi on SWG.

SWG is now changing, its trying to be more FPS orientated, we all said a few weeks ago FPS is the future and well this just proves it, because everyone is trying to get in on it!

But look at the jedi situation... at first jedi were secret way to get it, you didnt know how to, everyone trying , they were rare, people were happy, then whine after whine after whine, it changes, you see holocrons which give hint as to how to get jedi, 'master this profession' 'master that profession' ... then the system changes to a way everyone can do it but you need to grind forever....

then we come full circle, the current SWG updates are making it so starting as a jedi is a click away, its now a selectable class.

So, while im also asking for everyone in the community heres opinions on mutants, how it shoudl be done, shouldnt be done, i woudl also like to ask.

How is it being done?

What is the vision here.... are mutants in the fallen earth world considered another species? Like you would in fallout. If so shouldnt they be selectable from start with different character traits and look.

Are they more like X-men superheroes (which, and no offence meant by it) is how they look from screens and footage so far. If so, what's the vision with that, what's the balance between the mutants and the humans and how does it fit into the over arching world and vision for fallen earth.

Mutants is the one thing that consistently niggles at the back of my head as a doubt about this game, I couldn't be more excited about this game, i couldn't be anticipating it anymore than I am... but since I've read about it, that is the one niggle for me. Mutants. and now seeing how the 'jedi saga' has turned out in SWG, im more worried.

I would really like to here thoughts on this.

Personally I would like mutants to be gritty, more fallout, I would love to play a mutant if they were this way, an ugly creature, citys with 'NO MUTANTS' signs hanging up, being persecuted, maybe you get bad trading skills, NPCs dont like you , scared of you or make you pay more.

I want them to look and feel and as a result act differently.

To me a guy who can shoot fire or make ice or something is not a post-apocolyptic mutant, that is x-men, that is fantasy. One of these mutants I dont think I would like to play very much, especially if it is same as jedi, your CURRENT character becomes mutant.

Where as with the first way, the gritter way, where they'd have different look, (Green skin, but maybe not that fantasyish either! :P ) you would just select human... or mutant.... and your character would be influenced by that.

Maybe dont even start with mutants... have them come in later so the game doesnt become Humans Vs Mutants....

I dunno, already from just riffing on my own post there are problems that are easily seen that come with the concept of mutants (or jedi, or anything 'special' in an mmorpg. if its special, people want it, how should they get it and just how special should it be? Balance issues. are we gonna see mutant nerf after mutant nerf? Who knows! joke )

Please understand i mean absolutely no disrespect to the game at all, been following and talking about it for a LONG LONG TIME, this is just something I would like to talk about.

this post is a discussion, a talk, i dont know HOW they are doing mutants, so this is just asking you guys' opinion and stuff.

Even if the mutant side of things goes a way I dont like/want i will still play the game, because if the jedi saga and million other things in SWG hasnt forced me to leave, nothing is gonna get me to leave fallen earth, ever!

God I feel so guilty and this post isnt even a flame.... how is it possible to feel this much loyalty to a game and its development crew before its even in beta.......

I LOVE YOU FALLEN EARTH

Xilanxiv

The mutant idea is to take place of the "magic" scene. It allows non-realistic things to be put in the game and have a valid reason for them happening, i.e. radiation or mercury or some chemical or something.

In my mind, I think they should have every character, when started, have a random set of events and things that must occur in order for the mutation to begin, then more random events to make it develop. These could be something like 2 things have to happen from 5 different groups.

For example: Your character has to die or be seriously affected by some type of poison, and/or radiation and/or shocked and/or a chemical. That could be the first catagory. Then, you would have had to have been to like a certain number of places in the world. Maybe also a certain amount of time has to go by. I think it should be like 8 months to a year before things start to "happen". And you shouldn't know when you've unlocked it. Let's say you're fighting something, doing to same hunting and fighting techniques you usually use. Let's say it's at night. (I'm hoping that there WON'T be radar in this to let you know where things and people are. You actually have to look and listen.) Normally at night you'd have to hide and wait for something to come by, like in real life. You hear a sound and turn around. For a split second, like maybe the effect would randomly turn on for 3 seconds then be off again for maybe days or weeks. As it develops it would come "on" more often. But you'd turn around and see infrared for a second, or have like night vision for just a sec, kinda triggered by the sound behind you and you becoming suddenly aware of something, so your body pops into fight mode from rest mode.

Or maybe sometime your climbing a cliff to get somewhere, and you fall, which would normally kill or hurt you, but you turn in air and land on your feet. Or maybe in winter, (since they will have realistic seasons and hopefully you'll take damage if in the cold for too long without proper clothing.) Anyway, your guy starts growing thick hair on him/her that protects him from the cold. Or maybe you'll grow gills. I'm hoping they put under water enviroments in the game, and only good swimmers can dive deep enough to get the good fish or resources, and the more you swim the better you are.

Anyway, that's what I'm hoping. I hope the don't make mutants something powerful or even something completely positive. Let's say you swim a lot, and grow gills after a year or so, and it would be a long time growing, you'd just notice that you guy could stay under water a long long time, and maybe they would appear on your person. Anyway, you have gills, but you won't be able to go into very dry enviroments like deserts without taking damage. Or if you have the fur coat, you can't go into hot enviroments. So everything good that happens mutant wise will have logical side affects that will affect your game as much as the good part of the mutation will. And it should be something along the lines that your guy does a lot of. If you hunt a lot, you might get enhanced senses or something, if you swim, gills, if you craft, perhaps a third hand or something or extra dexterity to help with crafting.

That's what I'd hope.

Cthulhuvong

If I remember right, the last time they talked about this, you would find these genetic canisters. They would be very rare and would only be found in hard to reach places like military bases with automated defenses or biological labs with freak creatures guarding them. Then you would have to take them to science labs (only a few around, like near the starting area) to use them and they would give you special powers like electric shock from Electric Eel DNA, or the sight of an eagle from Eagle DNA.

RipperjackAU

If they did it along the same lines as, say... Gamma World RPG, that would be cool.

That game had mutations along the lines of pseudo-like super powers, but there were sever limitations on them to balance out the muties from the PSH's ( Pure Strain Humans ).

Anyway as for game balance, the could go one of two ways:

First. Make it that everybody can have mutations. Either though augmentation or insertion of DNA. This way mutations would be seen as more of an additive to your characters set of abilities/skills/attributed. In which case mutations would not really have many side effects perse, as anybody could acquire them in time.

 

Second. They could go the class method. Where only certain classes can have mutant powers. In this case this would be like Gamma World RPG. Where mutants had powerful abilities that the pure strain humans did not have, but in return had some serious limitations and vulnerabilities to balance it out.

 

From what scant knowledge I have gleaned, I feel that it could me mostly the first method, with some classes in the game being predisposed to mutations than others. In which case this favouring of mutations could be a class feature, balanced out with other classes in the game.

Calmar

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Originally posted by RipperjackAU

If they did it along the same lines as, say... Gamma World RPG, that would be cool.
That game had mutations along the lines of pseudo-like super powers, but there were sever limitations on them to balance out the muties from the PSH's ( Pure Strain Humans ).
Anyway as for game balance, the could go one of two ways:
First. Make it that everybody can have mutations. Either though augmentation or insertion of DNA. This way mutations would be seen as more of an additive to your characters set of abilities/skills/attributed. In which case mutations would not really have many side effects perse, as anybody could acquire them in time.
 
Second. They could go the class method. Where only certain classes can have mutant powers. In this case this would be like Gamma World RPG. Where mutants had powerful abilities that the pure strain humans did not have, but in return had some serious limitations and vulnerabilities to balance it out.
 
From what scant knowledge I have gleaned, I feel that it could me mostly the first method, with some classes in the game being predisposed to mutations than others. In which case this favouring of mutations could be a class feature, balanced out with other classes in the game.

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only problem i see with your idea is, and its kind of a big one, that there will be no classes.

RipperjackAU

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Originally posted by Calmar

only problem i see with your idea is, and its kind of a big one, that there will be no classes.

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Oh really? You don't say?

http://fallenearth.com/overview/feoverview.htm

They certainly look like character classes to me.

Cthulhuvong

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From the FE Character Overview page
To achieve that, we unleashed character growth from artificial templates of classes.You choose and control your character’s growth within the game, rather than the game permitting framed or restrictive growth-paths.In Fallen Earth, a character grows organically, with his or her own understanding of the world and mastery of its dangers. It’s not easy – but it is compelling beyond belief.

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Sounds like no classes to me.

The groups at the bottom are factions within the game, not classes.

RipperjackAU

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Originally posted by Cthulhuvong


Sounds like no classes to me.
The groups at the bottom are factions within the game, not classes.

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Yes... but everybody has to start somewhere, and that starting point would be a character template. Sure from that point you can dictate where your character goes, but everybody has a class starting out. So, whether or not you stick to your template is up to you, but it is a class none the less.

 

I guess we well all find out sometime in 2006.

A1learjet

Well we dont really know for sure...But  from reading there web site and newsletters,I wouldnt doubt if you  start out with "points" sorta like pick points and you might be able to pick a mutation or not,which later we will find out if mutations can be one of them at which point we will know if beign closer to "PureStrain" will be advantages or not.

But I also really enjoyed Gamma World and would love to see some of those princaples in the game.

But yes just like Gamma World  Fallen earth will have factions so weather or not some faction might have a inhernt ability or not is left to see.

 

Cthulhuvong

Actually, it sounds (for now) more like Fallout (there are levels and you choose to do what you want with the points you get at those levels or an even more free system (there are no levels and you use your exp as points to add to your abilities).

Going back to the Mutant Powers, heres some stuff I found on the Travellers Hub:

Arthur C. Clarke once pointed out that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. So, yes, there will be powers and abilities deployed in the game, but they’re the result of technology, engineering, mutation, rather than supernatural magic per se.
Source: Gamebunny Interview

There will be a number of mutant powers including biologic mutations endowing the player with super human abilities as well as certain mutations that allow the player to control the environment around them.
Source: March 2005 Newsletter

To customize your character, you’ll be able to modify your character’s genetic makeup using vials of recombinant DNA. You can take DNA to a gene splicing facility (the architecture is similar to the spaceports found in Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided), along with other needed scientific tools, and mutate your genetic code for enhancement. Step in, a few lasers and lights, and you’re done. Genetic modifications can range from cat eyes granting you improved night vision to stronger legs so you can jump higher. The game’s character modification system exemplifies the team’s desire to create a fantastic world based in modern science; heretofore, genetic splicing set within the game not only captures that paradigm, but it’s also imaginative. The limits of genetic manipulation are virtually endless and it should be interesting to see where the team takes it. We would love to see modifications to include electric eels for bioluminescence, jellyfish to make your character opaque, canine DNA for sense of smell, sight enhancements from eagle DNA, the sense of sound from a cat, and even the venom from a snake.
Source: GameMethod Interview

What really caused our eyebrows to perk up were the genetic modifications planned. While certain basic DNA mutation was available on the development server (facial reconstruction, body modification, as well as sex changes), Icarus plans to allow players to discover means of splicing their own DNA with special attributes exhibited by animals. Players can have the leg strength of a grasshopper, or the eyesight of a cat, or even the ability to “manipulate electricity, like eels.” It's not necessarily safe to inject a character with random or black market DNA samples.
Source: Warcry Interview

They also touch on how it will be a class-less game:

Classless Character Development System

We chose a classless character development system because we felt that class-based systems inevitably constrain what players can do. And there really is no reason to do this. In a lot of ways class-based systems are holdovers from the original D&D role-playing game. They have a lot of history but they carry a lot of baggage – they are virtually impossible to balance a class-based system. A single ability can alter the balance of the whole game. Trying to seek equilibrium becomes an endless process of chasing a moving target.

As far as players go, a class-based system restricts them to a specific character type. Our goal is for players to define their characters by their actions - what they have and what they want to pursue, rather than a pre-defined template.

The result is that players develop their characters themselves, and make them as individual as they, themselves, are. Their characters’ skills and abilities will be developed naturally within the game itself. The only thing the players define for their characters is initial appearance – actual character definition comes from gameplay (the appearance of characters can later be altered in gameplay…).

Our ambition led us to feel that unconstrained characters deserved an unconstrained world. Fallen Earth is zoneless because bounded play areas are not only highly artificial, they artificially constrain gameplay and game-flow. We wanted, and we created, a large world that was open and seamless. And huge: Fallen Earth takes place across an 83 kilometer by 83 kilometer area in real-world terms. Such a region naturally encompasses all manner of terrain, towns, underground complexes, the ruins of the world, and so on.
Source: Gamebunny Interview

ordeith

I agree with the thread starter... the current Fallen earth screens/vids looks like Cityofheroes... . I was thinking mutant abilities like the "perk&trait" system in the Fallout-world would be awesome. but the "genetically engineered" system would work too, but I'm not sure I like the skills... sofar in the screens/videos I've seen the following abilities:

levitation (ok, that looks cool)

"Ice thingie" (Ice armor CoH style, or is it an ice attack to freeze opponents? don't like it either way)

"fire thingie" (Fire aura CoH style, or perhaps an fire attack? don't like it! especially the GFX, it's not very "post-apoc", more like every other MMO out there )

I would more apreciate "non graphical" abilities.. like. "fast reload", exceptional eyesight", "exceptional hearing", "improved strength", "wildlife friend", "radiation resistance". and if some really good skills comes with an "negative skill" aswell that would be interesting, example:

say you pick the "night stalker" skill that gives you +X of range, +X% accuracy, +X%spotting +X%sneaking at night(or in darkness), the "negative skill" you at the same time get is that you get -X of range, -X% accuracy, -X%spotting -X%sneaking in daylight or bright lit environments... would make things interesting.

Blackmoor

Just going to add in that levitation, pyrokinesis , and whatever it called for doing the ice thing are all tied together by one thing - Telekinetics. Its all in how its used. Levitation is just using TK to lift yourself. Pyrokinectics is using TK to make the molecules and atoms move faster so they create more heat. Ice is using TK to slow down the molecules and atoms so they suck up more heat. Those i can see in game pretty easily. The ice/fire shrouds , not for players, it pushes it too far into the superhero realm with that for my taste.

The other thing with the genetic engineering is that i am pretty sure they will have drawbacks for the various enhancements and stacking limits and combos you can't do to balance it out.