Pirate king questions.

[salt1219]

@Tynan  could you give us a example of what a pirate kings stats might look like?

I'm assuming they are higher than regular colonists, you did say they were tougher.  I just don't know what range is reasonable, I've seen stats on colonists range from 3-15.

speaking of stats do colonists gain skill over time? like if a miner started with 5 mining and mines for a few days will he become a 6 or a 7?

you also mentioned pirate kings might spawn with a powerful weapon stolen from a advanced civilization.  how about some teaser info on such weapons.

I will leave this thread for other people to ask pirate king related questions too.

[Tynan]

Stats run from 0-20. 3 is the baseline. 10 is very skilled. 20 is basically unheard of.

Colonists do learn over time, but it's slow. I want them to always retain some of their original identity.

For a Pirate King, you could have a couple stats over ten, or perhaps one in the mid-teens. This is somewhat more than typical colonists. Ideally high stats are balanced by low ones elsewhere. Really, this is something subject to balancing over time.

The powerful weapon thing just means I may create a system that has these characters spawn with weapons from a different pool than the typical raiders. Currently, Drifters come with pistols, Scavengers with pistols, shotguns, and single-shot rifles, and Pirates with assault rifles, sniper rifles, and so on. A Pirate King might spawn with the R4 Charge Rifle (currently a super-powerful assault rifle) or something more exotic. If you get Designer tier I can design a specific weapon that your Pirate King would have (though I can't guarantee it would never appear elsewhere).

[Semmy]

Stats run from 0-20. 3 is the baseline. 10 is very skilled. 20 is basically unheard of.

Colonists do learn over time, but it's slow. I want them to always retain some of their original identity.

For a Pirate King, you could have a couple stats over ten, or perhaps one in the mid-teens. This is somewhat more than typical colonists. Ideally high stats are balanced by low ones elsewhere. Really, this is something subject to balancing over time.

The powerful weapon thing just means I may create a system that has these characters spawn with weapons from a different pool than the typical raiders. Currently, Drifters come with pistols, Scavengers with pistols, shotguns, and single-shot rifles, and Pirates with assault rifles, sniper rifles, and so on. A Pirate King might spawn with the R4 Charge Rifle (currently a super-powerful assault rifle) or something more exotic. If you get Designer tier I can design a specific weapon that your Pirate King would have (though I can't guarantee it would never appear elsewhere).

pirate kings deserve swords.
To get the warhammer universe in here shouldnt he have a power sword or chain sword and something like a boltpistol or plasma bistol

imagine the exploding squirls when they get hit by boltpistols

[salt1219]

@Tynan thank you, that was exactly the kind of info i needed

[GC13]

Is there any incentive planned for raiders for skills other than Shooting? And maybe their skill in a fistfight. Right now, those skills only come into play if you capture and recruit them. Is anyone who makes their Pirate King good at anything other than killing just tossing in a potential bonus to players?

[salt1219]

Is there any incentive planned for raiders for skills other than Shooting? And maybe their skill in a fistfight. Right now, those skills only come into play if you capture and recruit them. Is anyone who makes their Pirate King good at anything other than killing just tossing in a potential bonus to players?

I wouldn't mind it just being a bonus, after taking on a small army i know i could use a good recruit.
I'm not sure how they would use the other skills in a raid.

[GC13]

I mean, when you think about it, you'd want your pirate king to be a desirable character to have in your colony. Still, most people are just going to think "I want my guy to be awesome!" and give him the highest Shooting skill they can.

It would just be sad if three quarters of the pirate kings were superlative killers and not particularly noteworthy for anything else.

[salt1219]

Well not everyone, take a look at my designer thread.  I only game him 5 shooting, his mining and research are much higher.

[GC13]

Yeah, I saw that. Good on you for that skillset.

[British]

It would just be sad if three quarters of the pirate kings were superlative killers and not particularly noteworthy for anything else.

Indeed.
Or they can just be like minibosses: very challenging, but not recrutable.
They'd give a boost to the regular raiders that came along, and those can be recruted.
It's not too sexy that way, but at least it's not over-powering the colony if they get recruted (and the Pirate Kings will most likely have a potent weapon to make up for that anyway).

On the other hand, Tynan said that the Pirate Kings would have a few (couple ?) high skills, and the other skills would be much lower.
So I don't really pictures people that have pledged for this tier designing master-growers, so they might be able to recrute them

[SpaceEatingTrex]

Seems like getting the Pirate King pledge (or higher!) might be a good idea. Thanks for making the thread for questions, salt1219!

For the Pirate King or similar tiers, it seems like so far the ideas have been for human raiders. Do the characters have to be human?

[Tynan]

I can't promise anything besides human. There are no other xenohuman races yet. There will never be aliens.

[salt1219]

So I don't really pictures people that have pledged for this tier designing master-growers, so they might be able to recrute them

well i think that is something we should think about.
When designing a pirate king you should have to focuses, skills that tell a story and what kind of recruit will your pirate make.

first and foremost should always be the story, example...
lets say your pirate is named jack and he was a outcast early in his life, drifting from town to town doing odd jobs to get by.
Construction 6
Growing 4
Research 0
Mining 4
Shooting 5
Hand to Hand 7
Social 3
so i gave him above baseline levels in all work related skills and as a outcast he has low social and no formal education so research 0.   he's a pirate so he gets some combat but did lots of manual labor so hes better in hand to hand.

Tynan said skills range from 3-20 so it wouldn't be all that bad to boost the combat a bit more like.... shooting 8, hand to hand 9

[SpaceEatingTrex]

I can't promise anything besides human. There are no other xenohuman races yet. There will never be aliens.

In retrospect, a better way to phrase this might have been "are all the Pirate King characters going to have the same role as a human leader of human raiders?"

Now that more than 25 people have pledged at this tier, it might be worthwhile to think about the variety of ideas that would be acceptable. For instance, the lone super-powerful gunman stereotype would be dull to see >20 times, but having a couple might not hurt. Likewise, what if someone wanted to be the leader of a "Secret of NIMH"-esque heard of genetically engineered Muffalo?

I just hope the backers come to you with with creative ideas and they can be implemented such that the "Pirate King" characters are distinct and the encounters with them will be memorably different.

[Tynan]

If backers come up with good ideas and are willing to wait, it's possible they could incarnate types of characters that aren't yet planned. There is a standing idea of a single super-assassin who raids the colony alone. While that's not planned, it may be in the future. I wouldn't be totally against putting a PK backer in that category if it ever exists.