Garoux's Idea Thread - The Goliath - Rust

Hello, fellow Newmans! Rust is easily one of the most promising survival games out there at the moment, with a strong big-picture emphasis on social structuring and PvP. The only real problem, however, is that there is so much that is still missing, and the incomplete package given to us Alpha testers is currently a package of senseless killing/raiding/griefing, as well as very few mechanics to bring players together to form villages/towns instead of merely banding together to stave off bandits or to become bandits. So as these threads grow when inspiration hits me, I will be elaborating on my ideas for how to improve everything from PvP, PvE, to simply surviving. When I consider my idea threads to be thoroughly complete/long enough, I will be re-releasing all of my ideas into a single thread for convenience purposes. [U]Current Topic - The Goliath: [/U] A lot of ideas have been circulating around the Rust community, over two game-play aspects that I, personally, feel to be appropriate when taking Rust's atmosphere into account. The first idea, is to have smaller guardians of sorts, to help encourage emergent game-play and cooperation amongst Newmans. But that is another topic for another day. The idea that I want to tackle today, is to have an enigmatic creature to help replace the decay system that we had back in Legacy. So let's get started! [U][I]What will this creature be?[/I][/U] [B]-Examples:[/B] 1. [URL="http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2013/109/6/e/golem_by_rahmatozz-d627zay.jpg"]Goliath Example #1[/URL] 2. [URL="http://tinypic.com/m/iw5cva/4"]Goliath Example #2[/URL] -[B]Explanation[/B] The creature that I want to introduce will be a mechanical Goliath that has clearly aged, to the point where when idle, naturally blends in with its environment. In my head, there will be only one, and is large enough to cross through water, as well as climb across mountains. They are indestructible, at least for this stage of Rust, but can be diverted from its established path using heavy enough ordinance, which I will be getting into shortly. [U][I]What is the Goliath's purpose?[/I][/U] [B]-Decay System:[/B] 1. As the game sits right now, hard wipes are necessary, and while those are being waited for, server owners have to manually remove entities that cause lag after enough has built up. What I propose, with the Goliath, is that it is always on the move, and will head towards the oldest home that is currently standing on the server. Edit: Since there appears to be a bit of confusion, I would like to elaborate: the decay system still exists, but now there is a Goliath involved instead of your home(s) falling apart. What this means, is that so long as you consistently reset the decay on your home(s), the Goliath will likely never make them a priority target. 2. As it is heading towards the oldest home currently standing, it will not attack anything in its path. However, once it reaches its destination, it will proceed to destroy any nearby buildings, as well, before moving on towards its next goal. 3. While the Goliath will not attack anything that is not within its set goal, it will demolish anything it steps on during its travels, requiring players to divert its path if they want to save their property. [B]-PvP Elements:[/B] 1. For players that follow the Goliath around the map, and are able to keep up, destroyed homes can easily be looted in its wake, which will naturally evolve into PvP areas should the Goliath destroy any high-priority bases/settlements. 2. Should a multi-playered settlement be in the way of the Goliath, or should a home within a settlement be old enough to attract the Goliath there naturally, then there are only two options: abandon the settlement, or acquire enough ordinance to divert the Goliath. By using high enough quality explosives, the Goliath will go into a defensive state, where low-health defense bots will be released as the Goliath repairs itself. If the bots are destroyed before the repair sequence is finished, the Goliath will determine the settlement as too high-risked, and will divert its path towards its next goal. [B]-PvE Elements:[/B] Unless you are looting from the buildings the Goliath destroys, there are not really any PvE elements involved with the Goliath that I can think of for now. Will update this thread if any ideas come up for PvE elements. [U][I]Previous Topic(s):[/I][/U] -[URL="http://facepunch.com/showthread.php?t=1365384"]Animal Husbandry[/URL] -[URL="http://facepunch.com/showthread.php?t=1362854"]Hidden Panels[/URL] -[URL="http://facepunch.com/showthread.php?t=1363896"]Cages[/URL]

So.. To counter this you would have to build late in the servers history? Why even build if you know it will be destroyed based on duration?

[QUOTE=Damoc;47444951]So.. To counter this you would have to build late in the servers history? Why even build if you know it will be destroyed based on duration?[/QUOTE] Like I said: this would replace the Decay System by adding a Goliath instead of having your home(s) falling apart. If you reset your decay on a consistent basis, then there is no reason to worry about your home(s) being targeted. [editline]2nd April 2015[/editline] Keep in mind, for everyone reading, that this system would do well with the addition of home-aging that Garry and his team have been working on. For further information, make sure to check out their Trello page! Keep resetting the decay in your home(s), and this should never become an issue. Let your home(s) age, and eventually you might become a priority target as the land begins retaking your property.

So the goliath will sense if someone is bad at maintaining their base?

[QUOTE=Damoc;47445495]So the goliath will sense if someone is bad at maintaining their base?[/QUOTE] At this point, you are arguing for the sake of arguing, seeing as in how Rust has never been about ultra-realism. Please only put forth constructive criticism.

[QUOTE=Damoc;47445495]So the goliath will sense if someone is bad at maintaining their base?[/QUOTE] When decay was working the only thing that was making the house NOT decay was to use a door from the whole house, that was it, adding this Goliath would really bring an awesome element to the game, just another event like the airdrop . Now one thing to your whole idea Leon, people might exploit it by building some little base hidden in some place in the path of some player that they don't like and that thing will decay if nobody will use it and then the enemy's house will be destroyed because the Goliath wanted to take out that abandoned 1x1/3x3 or w/e. I like it though and I hope they will consider it.

[QUOTE=Mezamorphis;47445975]When decay was working the only thing that was making the house NOT decay was to use a door from the whole house, that was it, adding this Goliath would really bring an awesome element to the game, just another event like the airdrop . Now one thing to your whole idea Leon, people might exploit it by building some little base hidden in some place in the path of some player that they don't like and that thing will decay if nobody will use it and then the enemy's house will be destroyed because the Goliath wanted to take out that abandoned 1x1/3x3 or w/e. I like it though and I hope they will consider it.[/QUOTE] Having ticking time-bombs is an excellent idea. Keep in mind that they will take time, though, as the Goliath goes through the most decayed houses first, before moving onto the next. So if you are on a server that is pretty old, then there is the chance that it might take days/weeks for the Goliath to reach them. If the server still mandates periodic server wipes, then the Goliath might never reach them! However, on new servers, the ticking time-bomb tactic would be very devastating. Thank you for your feedback. :) If I come back to this thread to add onto it, I will make sure to add your thoughts, too.

Ah I see :) well, it's a great idea and I hope they will consider it or at least some version of it rather than the simple decay.

Leon, I am not arguing for the sake of arguing. Its a known argument to avoid critics. I might not have read the latest news, but did not Gary state earlier that the decay system is out entirely?

[QUOTE=Damoc;47448325]Leon, I am not arguing for the sake of arguing. Its a known argument to avoid critics. I might not have read the latest news, but did not Gary state earlier that the decay system is out entirely?[/QUOTE] I really have no interest in this tract of conversation anymore - when a discussion goes into the realms of ultra-realism, there really is no winning for either side, and it would end up as argumentum ad nauseam. As for your question, it might have been scrapped for the most part, but it definitely has not been scrapped entirely. If you read their Trello, it appears that Garry and his team have some interesting ideas in the works in regards to decay/aging.

I think you misunderstand. Im not against using your imagination and use things that are un-realistic. What Im against is using features that do not have any internal logic even in that "universe". What is the goliaths motivation? Is it a sentient being? Has some elder beings that are into tidyness constructed it to keep the area tidy? I do realise its hard to answer this since there is no story line in the game (yet). The legacy system would be better than this feature logic wise. (Not a big cool entity walking around, but still.) Let there be a relatively slow decay where it would take 1-2 weeks before the building starts to go away. The decay could speed up if the construction made it more prone to be damaged by the elements or if someone made a hole in the structure.

[QUOTE=Leon Garoux;47448364]I really have no interest in this tract of conversation anymore[/QUOTE] He asked perfectly valid questions. Guess you haven't really thought your idea through after all.

[QUOTE=Maximum Over;47451564]He asked perfectly valid questions. Guess you haven't really thought your idea through after all.[/QUOTE] Only narcissists like brown-nosers. In a game where you can destroy entire buildings only using a hatchet, where you can heal damage caused by grenades/bullets using a syringe-applied medicine, where you pull someone's skull off of their body and yet the body's model does not change... do I really need to keep pulling examples out? What it boils down to, is that Rust is not all that realistic. Not even close to being realistic, in-fact. So casually dismissing an idea, because it is not 100% realistic, is not a logical argument to use in regards to Rust. Instead, maybe you can provide some legitimate criticism, instead of brown-nosing some anonymous person on the Internet? Because I am more than aware that nothing you have said, is worth this response that I wrote out to you. Consider it a formality, if anything at all. [editline]29th May 2015[/editline] [QUOTE=Damoc;47448659]I think you misunderstand. Im not against using your imagination and use things that are un-realistic. What Im against is using features that do not have any internal logic even in that "universe". What is the goliaths motivation? Is it a sentient being? Has some elder beings that are into tidyness constructed it to keep the area tidy? I do realise its hard to answer this since there is no story line in the game (yet). The legacy system would be better than this feature logic wise. (Not a big cool entity walking around, but still.) Let there be a relatively slow decay where it would take 1-2 weeks before the building starts to go away. The decay could speed up if the construction made it more prone to be damaged by the elements or if someone made a hole in the structure.[/QUOTE] My apologies for taking so long to reply - I have not had a proper computer in a few months, and am only now getting around to checking old forums and such that I never wrapped up. Anyways... as to your opinion. When it comes to internal motivation, something needs to be taken into consideration: is there any internal motivation, at all, in regards to anything involved with Rust? Do we know why we are naked, and having to run around while dozens of other naked men try to bash our brains out? Why did we decide to learn how to turn lumber and ore into huge fortresses of doom, where we go out and slaughter people not in our clans? Why were there zombies, and why are now, so many wolves and bears that want to eat us? Most importantly, casting internal logic/motivation aside, Garry has already shown us that he at least entertains the idea of having robots in Rust, as seen with the Caretaker concept his team created, and his recent words about them on the latest dev-blog. So what is the internal logic behind the Caretakers? The motivation? Until you can answer that, your point is rendered moot. As for your reiteration of the old decay system, I disagree with you, but not because of an idea clash. The reason why the decay system is in place, and one of the reasons why wipes exist, is because enough entities will crash any server. Causing homes to only decay after 14+ days, defeats the entire purpose of a decay system, and would end up mandating more regular wipes. Now, I would understand if you wanted a reversal to the old system - having entities decay after 12-24 hours of disuse, helped clean up servers, and in most cases, was too subtle to notice until all that was left were the infrastructure.

[QUOTE=Leon Garoux;47834511]Only narcissists like brown-nosers.[/quote] ... what? All you've done in response to criticism is go on the offensive and call people names. It's a shitty idea. Instead of attacking everyone who doesn't share your idea, maybe accept that some people just don't think adding a giant island-smashing robot to Rust is a good idea. In other words, you'll get over it.

the game needs more to it, especially its PVE aspect, and end game content, cause when you can craft an AR why go raid someone for their AR? its not like it takes a rare resource or something to craft literally anything in the game. not saying a giant that goes around aimlessly smashing old structures is what it needs , but it def needs more pve, end game, rare materials, etc.

[QUOTE=Maximum Over;47849135]... what? All you've done in response to criticism is go on the offensive and call people names. It's a shitty idea. Instead of attacking everyone who doesn't share your idea, maybe accept that some people just don't think adding a giant island-smashing robot to Rust is a good idea. In other words, you'll get over it.[/QUOTE] That's nice. [editline]1st June 2015[/editline] [QUOTE=Greyfoxzb;47849295]the game needs more to it, especially its PVE aspect, and end game content, cause when you can craft an AR why go raid someone for their AR? its not like it takes a rare resource or something to craft literally anything in the game. not saying a giant that goes around aimlessly smashing old structures is what it needs , but it def needs more pve, end game, rare materials, etc.[/QUOTE] The PvE content will come with time - I have faith in that. I am patient enough. :)

leon, i know this is your thread, but did it really need to be necro'd just to get the last word on max?

[QUOTE=mrknifey;47850031]leon, i know this is your thread, but did it really need to be necro'd just to get the last word on max?[/QUOTE] You are making the assumption that that was either my sole reasoning, or even my reasoning at all. My response was two-fold: 1. I wanted to show good faith by responding to Damoc, since I am open to discussion. The other response was just a formality - a little sarcasm in response to condescension never hurt anyone. ;) 2. I am going to be updating my thread directory soon with a new idea thread. Consider this a bump, of sorts, while I am working on new content.

What if it was not one fiant beast, but many many tiny critters swarming to devour the remnants of buildings. It surely would be less visual, but would be easier to implement. Nanobots that are programmed to nature's pattern? No clue. The goliath would seem a bit OP if clans just constantly redirected it. Other than that, I like it!

[QUOTE=Pretermit;47850214]What if it was not one fiant beast, but many many tiny critters swarming to devour the remnants of buildings. It surely would be less visual, but would be easier to implement. Nanobots that are programmed to nature's pattern? No clue. The goliath would seem a bit OP if clans just constantly redirected it. Other than that, I like it![/QUOTE] You raise a good point, and I feel that this is a perfect chance for some clarity on my part: the Goliath idea is just a template. It is an embodiment of my feelings towards replacing Legacy's decay system, and adding in something that is both fun, and adds a prevalent challenge into the game. For me, I decided on some huge ass mechanical beast of burden. For you and others, a swarm would be more appropriate. It all boils down to personal perception, and I support the idea in all of its forms.

[QUOTE=Leon Garoux;47850231]You raise a good point, and I feel that this is a perfect chance for some clarity on my part: the Goliath idea is just a template. It is an embodiment of my feelings towards replacing Legacy's decay system, and adding in something that is both fun, and adds a prevalent challenge into the game. For me, I decided on some huge ass mechanical beast of burden. For you and others, a swarm would be more appropriate. It all boils down to personal perception, and I support the idea in all of its forms.[/QUOTE] I do agree decay needs a nice rework. Even overgrowth would be nice. Like bushes and grass taking over prior to turning into a slight bump or eaised terrain!

With the duping bug on the dev servers at the minute, I have been roleplaying as the goliath. Wandering round the map constantly crafting either c4 or rockets. In fact my inventory gets so full that I end up pooping rockets as I craft them walking between bases. It's been all out destruction, I completely level a building then move onto the next one. This causes a fair amount of noise, and players have turned up to kill me! Some succeeded, some failed. Perhaps a more "realistic" version of the Goliath is an NPC that is a guy who has just snapped. Just had enough. He's out to take down everyone and he's been crafting all week. Maybe he could also poop rockets or c4 behind him to pick up, just for fun. edit: Just noticed this bug has been closed, good to see.