The Lazarus Project

# The Lazarus Project When God gives you lemons, you make lemonade. At its core the Lazarus Project is codename for a group of changes that aim to switch Skyrats gameplay loop from TG to something far more unique. ## Introduction Hello, my name is Cobalt, and I've been the Head Maintainer of Skyrat for the past two years. I'm sure some of you reading this know who I am and what I've done and will like and dislike me, thats fine, I'm not here to convince you otherwise. I've always wanted this project(Skyrat) to be something memorable, something that will leave a nice little legacy on Space Station 13. Its an incredibly niche game, and an even smaller community and that's why I'm so invested to try and make this community matter more than its uptick in popularity which will, ultimately, come to an end someday. Unfortunately its not in a state that I find particularly pleasing, when I proposed the rebase, I did not intend for us to stick to TG as much as we have and its taken its toll on my perception of the server as a whole, currently we barely differ from TG but our ruleset tells us otherwise, and that we are not to play it like TG. This has created a rift in the playerbase that has only contributed to making the community as a whole more and more toxic, thats ontop of the already drama prone furry previlance. After analysing the fundamental issue with Skyrat as a whole it has become clear that the issue stems from the game itself and the policy surrounding it. Namely, the fact there is no common enemy. There is no "good and bad" regarding interactions. This is great when you have a server that is designed to have quick gameplay sessions without much continuity, and we could do that really well if we wanted to, but we don't. We have rules that try to make antagonists create a story and roleplay, but it just doesn't work like that. Instead, it rifts the playerbase and causes individual department players to clash. It spreads toxicity at an unfathomable level. Over the past year I have become less and less interested in the direction the server has been rapidly taking, and its now clear to me that I cannot continue to maintain the server to the standard I have been, so that is where we are just now. This all seems fairly negative so far, and it mostly is, but I'm not someone that just sits on his ass when a problem is clear as day, so thats what this project is, its my final attempt to make Skyrat something memorable, more than just "That meme furry TG server". It is safe to say that if this project fails, I do not see myself continuing to maintain or develop for Skyrat, and that is sad for me to think about. ## The Project The Lazarus Project as stated above is my attempt to make Skyrat something more than it is, so, lets get right into it. What I want to do is create an entirely new system that redesigns the gameplay loop from the ground up. This project is codename for a story system, one that will enable us to create a common enemy. One that is not from within the station, we want to shift our focus away from the station as a whole, and move it more towards a support area, think of CMSS13, the Almayer. One of our biggest problems is that there is no common goal, no common enemy, this results in the station feeling like it has no depth, no character, no purpose. To do this we would have to introduce a few fairly substantial changes, we'll discuss those next. Due to the size of this project, we would require additional help to complete it, there will soon be an application made to join the project, and if you are deemed to be good enough, you will be brought on. This could lead to a more permanent position. ## New Features Here we will discuss the new features introduced by this project, and how they would play their part. ### The Control System(STORY) This would be the central nervous system that would be responsible for driving the game and deciding what is needed and what is not needed. It would consist of datums that tell it how the game should be, these will be referred to as **STORIES**. These stories would control what subsystems need to be running, what maps will be needed, and what roles to open and close and most importantly, what the main mission is. It would be responsible for sending announcements and mission points(points at which a mission has moved forward). The chosen story would be portrayed by the system giving a mission brieifing announcement shortly into the shift, at which point, the command team would decide how to tackle it. There would also be periodic updates from the system being sent to command. ### [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) The [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) would be created to support the idea that there is a common operation going on, this would consist of a new department and new roles, all with the common goal of completing the mission objective which is decided by the Story system. This closely resembles the CM structure for squads. We do not need to reinvent the wheel. The squad roles are as follows: * Squad Leader - The leader of a squad, they are responsible for directing their squad appropriately and efficently while following the orders of the command team. * Squad Comms Operator - Responsible for setting up communications between the operaton site and the command team. * Squad Weapons Specialist - * Squad Smartgunner * Squad Medic * Squad Engineer * Squad Marine ### Support roles Along with the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) we would require some more support roles to ensure a smooth gameplay experience, these would include: * Bridge Officer - Someone to help coordinate the mission from the CIC. * Pilot - Someone that would stick with the shuttles that are given to the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad). While also coordinating when the shuttle should head back and depart. ## The Changes Here we will discuss the possible changes that we would likely need to make to existing features. ### Dynamic and Antagonists Dynamic would have to go out the window, and by that, I mean simply disable it. This would mean no more randomly rolling antagonists such as traitors or changelings, or gamemodes, such as assault operatives. This does not mean there wouldn't be any on-station antagonism, it would just come entirely from OPFOR, though, again, the station would no longer be the primary focus point so we'd want to keep it to a minimal level. ### The Random Events System The random events system would likely need to have most of the catastrophic round ending events disabled, such as Meteors and similar. We would also need to disable things that generally impact the station hugely and require a lot of hands on the deck to sort. The only kind of random events that we'd actually want to see would be, for example, anomalies. Anything else should be disabled. ### Security Security would likely become less important, by a large margin. They will be there for when the common operation fails and to deal with any unruly members of the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad). This would be required as they would no longer be the focal point of the mission, and in turn, this entirely destroys the antag versus security mentality that TG pushes. ### The Station The station would need to become more of a staging area for the preperation to execute the common goal. To maintain parity and map maintenance, we would keep edits to a minimal, such as readapting Arrivals and the Interlink. ### The Interlink The Interlink would be entirely repurposed to serve as the "Forward Operating Base" for the common operation. To avoid massive conflicts with the station maps. The shuttle between the Interlink and the Station would likely have to become much much faster, and perhaps even, linked to the Z level. On this new area there would be the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) preperation area and main exploration ship bay which houses the multiple ships available to the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad). Once TG has developed the Overmap system, we would then use that to make exploration missions far more immersive. ### The Rank Structure We would likely need to move towards a more militaristic structure to support the shift towards having a common enemy. Right now, we do not have any kind of coherent command structure. This would mostly be a role name change as well as policy change. Think Captain to Commanding Officer. ### Fucking Combat Balance The state of combat right now is utterly disgraceful and would need to be rebalanced to support **endurance battles** where each side has a weak attack force and an ability to take a lot of damage. ### Round Endings Round endings would need to change to be more reflective of the mission, the round ends when the mission succeeds of fails, the moment a mission fails or succeeds would be dictated by the STORY. ### Threat Delay Threats should take a while to actually become a problem on the planet so people can strategise. ## Stories Here we will list potential stories for this system to use, I did this in 10 minutes, naturally, there would be way more. ### The Hivemind Type: Investigation - Search and Rescue Enemies: Fleshmind, player playable. Maps: There would be 1 central map, the colony station as well as the two dropships. Win Situations: Destroy the hivemind - Crew wins Hivemind destroys the crew - Hivemind wins Duration: 1 - 2 hours excluding prep time Story: This story would consist of a distress beacon recieved by the station regarding a long lost colony station, that was thought to be entirely destroyed. The [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) is sent in to investiage the abandoned station and once they have entered into the station, they encounter the hivemind which is quickly found to be hostile and the mission then becomes to destroy the hivemind. ### The Necromorph Outbreak Type: Mining and investigation Enemies: The Necromorphs, player playable. Maps: There would be 1 central map, the mining planet with the mining colony on. Win Situations: Necromorph outbreak destroys the station Crew contains the outbreak Duration: 2 - 3 hours excluding prep time Story: This story would consist of a routine checkin with a local mining colony that is not responding to hails, the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) would head in and discover a bloody mess of gore and dead colonists. The [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) would continue to search and eventually find the drill site, where the colonists had discovered a marker. The mission objective then changes as Nanotrasen wishes for the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) to retrieve this marker and take it back to the station. This would slowly result in crew members going insane and eventually turning into Necromorphs themselves, the [PLACEHOLDER](operation squad) would need to fend this attack off.