# Mech mining

### Goals

1. Make Mechs something worth producing at Robotics for Mining, integrating Shaft Miners and Science together more.
2. Make Mechs useless on station for player combat purposes, it just is not fun as a Player to fight a mech that has 4x your health and is unstunnable.
3. Make Lavaland dangerous for non-mech users, rather than a playground of loot to collect.
4. Make mechs more personal to a Miner, it's not like armor that you throw away when you get a better one, it persists the entire round as you gradually upgrade.
5. Keep Mining and the Station separate for Miners. Miners on-station should be realistically as vulnerable to attack as everyone else, their monster hunting activities remain limited to Lavaland/Icemoon.

### Non-Goals

1. Remove Ghost roles from Lavaland. Ash Lizards (or maybe Dwarfs if we want to replace them) and the Lavaland Exile should be able to survive through alternative means.
2. Make Miners completely reliant on Robotics. Integrating them together is cool and fun, but Shaft Miners should still be able to play without Roboticists, just at a cost.
3. Make it impossible for new Miners to enter a round and start mining.

## The Idea

Mechs and Lavaland revolve around eachother entirely. All existing tools should be moved to Mechs instead of being their own equipment, and non-mining existing Mech equipment should be removed.

There is a ton of Lavaland content currently, and unifying them all under Mechs would be more than enough to make them upgradeable both through Lavaland and Science, giving enough content through them to last the round and make them worth using.

No mech weapons should be printable through Robotics, except maybe as Illegal tech for Traitor Roboticists (Goal #2).

## The Mech

- There should have 1-2 Mechs on Lavaland for Miners to begin with, and they are removed from Cargo. This helps with Goal #1, however if there are no mechs and no Roboticists, Materials should still be purchaseable through the Cargo console, so Miners can order materials and get the Mechs built themselves, either through breaking in, or another Science member helping out.
- Mechs should not have a slowdown while on Lavaland (Goal #2).
- More damage types can be added, such as Ash collecting onto mechs causing rust, requiring more intricate ways of repair that would need you to send your Mech up to Robotics for repair.
- You should be able to DNA lock a mech, however Robotics access will overwrite this and allow entry regardless, for repairing and upgrading purposes.
- Mining mechs should start with the ability to pick up crates with MMB/AltClick (whatever pref is used for MODsuits) so they can pick up Tendril chests (and for Cargo). LMB and RMB should be their two weapons. This can be PKA/Crusher/Resonator/Drill, in any variation. This should be limited to 1 crate at a time, with the Cargo variant getting an upgraded version that lets them hold more. Robotics can print bettern ones when researched.
- There should have a section of things attached to a Mech that is usable through Action Buttons (like MODsuit modules) but aren't tied to one of their weapons. Things such as the Jaunter.

They should also be unable to be fully destroyed, so repairing them is always possible no matter what state they are at. However;

1. When they have 30% HP left, their modules should go offline.
2. When they are at 10% HP left, it should automatically eject the user, and become grabbable (so it can be brought to Robotics).

(sidenote: These numbers are selected purely at random and can be whatever)

This is for Goal #4 - Losing your personal mech you spent all round working on is devastating and round-crushing to a miner. Destroying one should be very hard to accomplish.

When a mech is fully destroyed, their modules should be salvageable (or at least the weapons, so Crusher upgrades are not lost).

### Mech Types

Clarke/Ripley - This should be merged into one Mech, the one for Cargo can still exist, though it is mostly replaced by the Cargo MODsuit. It's just not a problem.
Odysseus - This is probably fine to keep, there's not much of a problem with it. They shouldn't be able to use any modules outside of their own. Or in an alternative scenario, these could be Paramedic mechs used to recover dead Shaft Miners.
H.O.N.K/Retience - These are joke Mechs that don't have any combat advantages, it's fine to keep them in. They shouldn't be able to use any modules outside of their own.
Phazon - Could be removed in favor of an upgrade to the Clarke/Ripley by using a bluespace anomaly core on them. (Goal #4)
Maurauder/Mauler/Seraph - This is fine to keep in, including its modules, as nukie/admin only.
Savannah-Ivanov - It's fine to keep in the game if it's turned into a Mining mech that is just split between 2 players, which would give the benefit that one can dodge while another shoots.
Durand - Removed entirely.
Gygax - Removed entirely.
Dark Gygax - Removed entirely.

## The Player

Players should not be able to survive in Lavaland's atmosphere on their own. They'll need an explorer suit to simply not die from pressure damage, which comes with slowdown, encouraging them to not wear it on-station (Goal #5).

We should only expect players to get out of their mech in extremely dire circumstances, or when they get to the mining base. We should not be putting any focus on the player's body while on Lavaland, outside of causing effects that we need them to repair throughout a round through station-player interaction.

### Player damage

While in a Mech, players should be able to recieve some level of damage that the Mech takes, in the form of wounds.

Examples:
- Ash drake breath can cause burn wounds
- Colossus bullets cause bleeding
- Bubblegum ramming causes blunt wounds

Lavaland's atmosphere should allow these wounds to progress more slowly, however, so Miners have ample time to fight the Fauna they are competing with, and returning to the Mining base.
This system would mean that Miners will have to get wounds fixed if they take too much damage, but it is not a priority over their current survival while on Lavaland.

## Gear

If I haven't mentioned something here, it's because it's not changing, or I haven't noticed it to mention what I would like to change about it. You can leave a comment about anything I might've missed, or let me know on Discord.

### Lavaland Loot

- Ash Drake armor: Replaced with an ash-proof upgrade to your mech.
- Staff of Lava/Storms: Still exists, requires you to exit the mech to use.
- Wisp Lantern: Goes on a mech instead of a player, gives the benefit while you're inside of the mech.
- Immortality Talisman: Goes on the mech instead, takes up a Weapon slot.
- Holoparasite injector: It's fine if it stays, but it's quite boring to be a Power Miner to someone in a Mech all game. This would basically only be good to give out to players on-station.
- Memento Mori: Replaced with an upgrade to the mech that increases its max health. Mechs are already invincible.
- Soulscythe: Perhaps changed into an upgrade that makes your Mech sentient?
- Anomalous crystal: Can be picked up with the crate holding module.

### Order Console equipment

#### PKA

A mech variant exists already, this is removed. PKA upgrades should be able to be used on Mech PKAs, if not already possible.

#### Crusher

A mech variant should be made and replace this entirely. It can be purchased from their vendor with a ticket, or printed at Robotics.

Crusher upgrades and loot will still exist, it will require you to take the Crusher off to add the upgrade onto it.

#### Resonator

A mech variant should be made and replace this entirely. The upgraded variant should be an upgrade to the base that is added on top of it, either through the mining console or Robotics.

#### Mesons

Replaced with Mech mesons, so you see through the Mech to see outside (iron lung reference, for those who don't get it (no its not this is a stupid comment))

#### Mining MODsuit

Any module that can fit on a mech should be moved over to a mech module instead. The MODsuit itself should be removed.

#### Mining Pens

Removed entirely. Replaced with Welding/Cable to repair a Mech instead, Miners should not have a way to directly heal themselves on Lavaland.

#### Jaunter

Can be something loaded onto a Mech for a one-time use save from a Chasm. Otherwise you'll have to manually walk back to the Station.

#### Pickaxes

Fine to stay in the game as they are now, mining without a mech is possible, just a lot harder. This is so people who don't have Mechs (anyone using Public Mining) can still mine if there's no Miners, though Cargo can still order materials/mechs as an alternative to this. This is also so Ghost roles can still do things without a Mech.

#### Capsule shuttles

It's fine to stay, as a way to prevent your Mech from rusting from an Ash Storm. It will remain as an item, so you will have to exit the mech and use the capsule.

#### Khieral Cuffs

Fine to stay.

#### Shoes

Jump boots can be made a mech module made through Robotics
Ice boots have no reason to exist anymore, and can be removed.

#### Style Meter

Unless reworked to work with Mechs, will be removed.
There is no problem with it, it just should not be something tied to the player directly (Goal #5). This is an afterthought to Mech mining.

#### Minebot

It's fine to keep in, maybe Mechs should be able to pick it up, but otherwise it's fine as-is.

###### tags: `TGstation`