Shanzhai was originally created by another member named 'Hopperorouk,' including his visual description, weapons and ability. I helped develop the character by asking questions and providing some feedback to the ability ideas Hopperorouk had, where I later suggested adding an additional ability to the character; I'm also working on writing his backstory and adding more details to Shanzhai's appearance. The link to the original discussion is here: https://www.spacelordsthegame.com/community/index.php?topic=31799.0

Appearance ideas are here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQUso-gIltPO_zNQniJFu20oUme6TEXltwXgOBH604ikNXVbG0_vA8iCZAACCPysjGcU2Uj4Veb6_CM/pub

And backstory ideas are here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vSd8ricwd-3IpsotLk7f9ryJ6Dspw-vaWuxTkAED5ytbCeLoqddO2rTsWZ7ZJfU9j9xf3f-Mge00QYk/pub

I would appreciate useful and meaningful feedback and I hope you enjoy this character idea ( :

This is an idea that I thought of in a previous post, it's mostly experimental, but I would like some honest feedback:

All player's can gain access to an active ability that once activated will apply an elemental property to all of their CQC moves and ability and weapon functions, with the property having a different effect on each of them. Each element is a counter or vulnerability to another, and when their elemental ability is active, applied to the character:

• Elemental interactions: players can debuff or deal more or less damage to enemies based on whether or not their element is a counter to the enemies; players with the same element as the enemy will neutralize their elemental effects on each other;
  
  
• When a player has been attacked by a character with their counter element they receive a temporary debuff: this reduces the potency of all their elemental effects, including applying elemental debuffs to those they counter, and increases the cooldown time on reusing their elemental ability
• Elemental abilities can stay active for 20 seconds, but the duration is depleted with each use of their CQC moves, weapons or their character ability, however this ability can be deactivated early after a 3 second delay and recharge faster depending on how much time was saved upon deactivation. How much weapons and character abilities deplete the duration varies and depends on their properties: low ammo capacity weapons accelerate depletion faster than high ammo capacity weapons (e.g. firing a single shot from a high ammo capacity weapon would be a fraction of the depletion from a single round weapon); faster recharging abilities accelerate depletion faster than slower recharging abilities; durational abilities accelerate depletion faster than single-action abilities, like Mikah's
• The duration of this debuff can last a minute, but can instantly end once the player either kills that same enemy in CQC or dies. I don't know if each element should be exclusive to a single faction or mix between characters of different factions, or if elements should be an item that can be equipped by any character as part of their loadout
• Here is an example of this elemental system: Oil Element: when a player with the oil element does a roll in CQC, they can roll further away and avoid grapples, and create a short temporary trail of oil that when enemies walk across will fall down. Meanwhile, allies can use the oil like the piscasas to run faster; but if their element is a counter (for this idea it will be fire) then the enemy can burn the oil trail and create a damage over time effect. Activating this ability, while rolling and near the edge of an open border map, like 'The Mouse and the Snake,' can get the player killed as they can fall off the edge

When is a new campaign coming hasn't it been like two years since the last one?

If they do make one, I hope it introduces local enemies and compliments less  popular characters and raider compositions.

One of my online friends told me that when the cross-platform setting in the main menu is turned off, it resets after every match and turns back on; this isn't a big deal, but I still wanted to report this very minor bug

When I'm on the Spacelords website and open articles from the 'Suggestions' page, my security program tells me the sites aren't secure

The best way I can classify mission mechanics is by their impact on mission progression and their relatedness to aleph:


• The first system mainly divides mission mechanics by their impact on mission progression
• Progressive Mission Mechanics: Necessary to progress through the mission e.g. at the start of 'The Mouse and the Snake' raiders have to pull all the levers down in order to enter to the next stage of the mission
• Linear mission progression mechanics: mission objectives can only be accomplished by a single means e.g. in ‘A Weapon From The Past,’ raiders need aleph to progress through all stages
• Non-linear mission progression mechanics: can be accomplished by more than one means. For example, in 'The Beast's Lair,' players can choose between shooting at some of General Marmalade's Eyes or using the pig to shoot at his primary weak spot, and in 'Mind Over Matter,' when the fifth council is invulnerable, raiders can choose between either overloading the antenna and pulling the levers at the moment the Fifth Council walks in front of the electrocution or by defeating designated target enemies. Based on the mission or mission stage, antagonists can win matches through other means besides killing raiders e.g. in the final stage of ‘No Reservations,’ the antagonist can win by preventing aleph refuels to the engine until it runs out
• Non-Progressive Mission Mechanics: don’t progress the mission further, but based on the mission or mission stage and whether you're playing as a raider or an antagonist can either obstruct or help players progress through objectives e.g. turrets on ‘A Low Blow’


• The second system divides mechanics by their relatedness to aleph
• Aleph-based mechanics
• Aleph: how far it can be thrown, how fast it explodes, where it spawns, how much of an impact it has on characters, etc.
• Aleph Storages: what can contain aleph, but also where it can be extracted from e.g. elites, wardog looters, etc.
• Aleph-based Systems: can be fueled with aleph e.g. elite abilities, engines, roots (Double Agent), antennas (Mind Over Matter), the pig (The Beast's Lair), extractors (Short Fuse), etc.
• Non-Aleph mechanics include anything that doesn't require aleph to function or exist: turrets, canisters and artillery tanks (Short Fuse), barriers (A low Blow), flowers (Double Agent, first stage), terminals, etc.

*In some cases aleph can be either necessary or unnecessary to progress through missions based on the mission and it's stages e.g. in the first stage of 'Enemy Within,' aleph randomly spawns around the map, though it has no direct impact on the objective at that stage; In the next stage it can be used to overload the creature, which gives it additional importance to obtaining in the first stage of the mission

WORK IN PROGRESS

1) Character Statuses (refers to the activity of the character, both passive and active): There are five characteristics to player statuses, one of which can be sub-categorized into actions

• Coverage: the state of being locked onto cover
• Coverage table: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vRjYp0obqmCaokfh1g2pPX6LZb_A2zVv-MzlFHOmuLdOFMoe65bvZ7zb2oPA0NQZ2qItNph9VTVjRHQ/pub
  
• Health: Stable or wounded
• Movement: Moving or stationary. The state where one can be in continued velocity
• Stress: active or inactive
  
• Vulnerability: the state of being vulnerable or invulnerable

2) Faction

• 2a) Faction Traits: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vSChwo6-q9bxL31UUn9ulR1IFHxTDbTPS6TCDIB-JNHk-w9SQsNiOuIqvRGogSrBqs2vEmDudgc6XL6/pub
  
  2b) Faction Talents: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQw9szI04Uuc-dwbLJOxV7piea9WUBpKzIvuoBytC4uFDpdL0X6zMZrQeqCi5xiHQunhOyykzVWLUGC/pub
  
  3) Missions
  
  3a) Mission Design: Missions can have multiple maps and maps can have multiple stages and environments. Map designs are characterized by their stages, the variety and commonality of their regions, and their objectives.
  
  Stages are the succeeding mission segments where objectives or sub-objectives change; maps can have multiple stages and the similarities can vary between a few environmental changes to a complete difference in functionality e.g. in the mission 'White Noise,' the map is the same, but in the second stage delayed telekinetic traps are added to the map
• Map regions are distinguishable from general map features and other environments; they can mainly be categorized by their scale and enclosure, and to a lesser extent by their interactive mechanics, including stationary mission objectives e.g. engines that can be overloaded with aleph, like the one on 'A Low Blow'
• The maps of a mission are a determining factor to what characters and loadouts a player should pick

3b) Missions Notes

• Hanging by a Thread: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQyZbuMvvRHwxjvKsWeTL03tQUTewh6Ft5kQ38Mg1hgSHrTBNiyoJQzIFqO25eyvmonU6ajECtM0EZ1/pub
• Hades Betrayal
• A Low Blow
Large Scale and Open Spaced Maps:
Small Scale and Open Spaced Maps
Large Scale and Closed Spaced Maps
Small Scale and Closed Spaced Maps

2) Mission based Characters & Loadouts
Stealth: closed-spaces prevent being spotted by enemies from vantage points; complex pathways deny consistent line of sight, especially for snipers; and large environments can offer more places to hide and find cover

which makes it harder for players to find you. Meanwhile the smaller and more open-spaced an environment is, the less useful stealth is to the situation as there are less places to hide and more directions one can be spotted. This makes other character elements more viable for the situation, like mobility, ricochet effects and AOEs

5) Talents, Character Actions and Weapon Features

• Maps
• Stealth: stealth is less important
  
• Ammo Supply and Reloading: Unlike other factions, when Locals manually reload their weapons, they can’t use CQC actions or cancel their reloads mid-way, so investing in faster reloads or ammo supply capacities can minimize exploitability of this weakness. Some locals can still use their ability, while reloading e.g. ‘Bewitch,’ ‘Stalk’ and ‘Heal.’ Reload animations can be canceled by push effects, strikes, grapples, being wounded. How good your accuracy is is an indicator to whether your builds should focus more on reloading or ammo supply. Players with better accuracy should invest more in ammo supply, and players with less accuracy should invest more in faster reload speeds, because players with low accuracy will miss more often and investing more in faster reloads is more forgiving when missing shots, especially with weapons with small ammo capacities. Here are some Talents and Weapon Features associated with ammo supply and reloading
• Ammo Supply
• Basic Features: Arsenal
• Advanced Features: Auto Reload and Over Reload
• Faction Talents
• Character Talents
• Reloading
• Basic Features: Quick Fingers
• Faction Talents
• Local Talents: Skill, Lone Hunter, Urgency, Suitability, Lone Assassin and Appropriateness
• Hades Division Talents: Nerves of Steel
• Character Talents

Mobility & Crowd Control: mobility and crowd control can be versatile properties when using the right loadout and character as they can be used defensively, offensively or usefully: mobility can be used to pursuit target characters, evade being targeted, move to cover faster or moving faster while carrying objective components e.g. Encoders (In Medias Res), Schnieder (In Medias Res), Lyre Sphere (A Weapon from the Past), Cannisters (Short Fuse), (White Noise)

and crowd control useful for both covering the distance between target characters or to escape;



• Toxin
• Pros: it's damage over time makes it useful for restraining raiders/antagonist or elite's movement when their wounded and buy time for players or their allies to corner and fire at or finish them in CQC
• Cons: situational and easily counterable with the proper talents

Wounding: when players or elites are wounded, they have minimal mobility, their strike action is slower and can be countered by a non-wounded characters strike action; they can't use their abilities, jump or climb over high-walls e.g. 'Mind Over Matter.' Players can negate the duration of being wounded by using certain talents and advanced weapon features and if their being attacked by shots, they can sustain life by using advanced weapon feature

Here are a few tips to forming an effective raider comp against antagonists

• Form a team at the main menu screen and invite the others to your party in party chat. When your in party chat with your teammates, you can coordinate your character picks before and during character selection at the beginning of a match. This can be used to your advantage, if the antagonist bases their pick on your teams and can't make up their mind quickly enough; as the timer goes down, your team can move their cursors over their character picks and wait at the last second to select their characters. This will give the antagonist only a few seconds to decide who to pick
• At least one character pick should fit the role of countering antagonists: character selection should take into consideration the characters viable for the map to build a well rounded team and what character the antagonist would probably pick

Scale and form

Stealth: All Locals; Mikah, to some extent any Hades character equipped with the enhanced stress control talent

Mobility: All Wardogs, especially Alicia and Rak Mayura; Iune with blink, Doldren and Harec; Hans and Mikah; and Ginebra. Good for flanking and responding to allies in close range danger, like CQC

Range: All Locals; and some other characters with the right weapon

Harec can fit this role in most missions, because most missions are large scale and open spaced, which fits him perfectly!

Shakura is good against CQC Doldrens, because the projectiles from the Einstein-Rosen bridge can follow Valeria in any direction

Antimatter: good against Hades Characters, because they negate their extended health advantages

Antimatter's uses can be similar to attractor: if a raider needs to extract aleph from an elite by shooting at them, then antimatter reduces the chance that shots will kill the elites and instead wound them, leaving the aleph intact

Fifth Council Elites: assault elites can't be headshot; they occasionally fire projectiles that pull raiders toward there direction, when they are wounded the projectiles push raiders away so take that in mind when picking a character and loadout. Snipers use rapid fire pistols that can quickly drain player health, take that in mind when approaching them directly. Shotgun type regular enemies also use the assault elites weapon, but their projectiles only have a push effect.

Burst Damage vs Sustained Damage:
Burst Damage is better for fast encounters and opportunities, while sustained damage is about gradually diminishing health in order to approach and corner enemies

Burst Damage is important for missions with boss fights, advanced features like berserker, paramagnetism and faust amplify burst damage

Toxin, Echo and Antimatter are good for sustained damage

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Tip #1: When it comes to evading pursuing enemies, jumping off platforms mostly neutralizes advantages, because all characters fall at the same rate, so evading enemies by falling won't give you much time to run away, especially if your character is much slower than theirs e.g. fifth council (not-ginebra) vs wardog. Climbing up platforms can be more advantageous, because the rate of traveling to the upper floor does factor in speed differences, like running up ramps. Alicia's Double Jump can be used to scale up platforms and can be modified to glide (with the right character talent), but her ability can't be used effectively while under a low ceiling; Han's jetpack can't scale walls, but it can be used inside, glide and fly over obstacles; Ginebra's cougar form can't glide, but it can scale walls and run fast, which can compensate for the neutrality of free falling from platforms[/list]