CM-SS13 Suggestions Guide
This guide (and helpful list beyond it) is a gift created by the dev team as a whole,
to further our goal of improving effective communication between us and our loyal playerbase.
There was a time when it was official policy to deny players things simply because enough of them wanted something,
that is no longer the case, and this guide is part of our efforts to reverse the damage done to the health of the dev-to-community relationship over time.
In general, please keep the following in mind.
- The absence of your suggestion on the list of things we will likely deny does not necessarily mean it will be implemented.
- It is called the list of things we will likely deny, not the list of things we will automatically deny.
The idea behind the list to make it abundantly clear that certain suggestions are extremely unlikely to be implemented.
Yes, it is technically possible for the things on the list to be implemented anyway,
but in general these are things we are not (officially) taking suggestions on.
- Don�t submit more than one suggestion per issue, unless they�re very closely related.
Multiple suggestions about unrelated ideas just confuse the point you�re trying to make.
Small, concise, well-formulated and presented suggestions are more likely to be implemented.
- Avoid posting massive new feature or rework requests.
While these are sometimes popular with other players,
these ideas tend to either be something we�re already working on,
or are so complex they�re unlikely to ever be added in the way you envision it anyway.
- Avoid posting suggestions that would cause a fundamental change to game balance. We do enough of these already.
- Avoid posting slight variations on existing suggestions.
Contribute to the discussion of the existing suggestion instead - it�s why issues have a comments section.
- Search for your bug or suggestion in both open and closed tickets to avoid duplicates.
Try out a common keyword in the search bar at least. (Ex: "Queen" if you're suggesting a change to the Xenomorph Queen)
Things we will likely deny.
- Reverts of new features.
your �suggestion� is just �Remove [thing]�, we�re going to ignore it, because it just isn�t constructive.
- Replacement for Xenos
They are the main antagonist of the round and we are not looking to change that for the foreseeable future.
- New playable factions
We are comfortable with the amount of factions we have right now. Adding more wouldn�t be worth the labor time at the moment.
- Game premise changes
We are not looking for suggestions that suggest marines know about the xenos or other changes to the fundamental premise of the game.
- New Weapons
This is just not something we are looking for.
The new weapons that are coming will not be added because they got suggested.
At this time new specialists, weapons, armor, tank modules, and such are really not being considered.
- New jobs, including Janitor, Clowns/Mimes, Commissars/Morale Officers.
We are not against adapting existing jobs, but we don't have any brand new functions we need to cover. Should we ever desire to add them, we will.
- Cyborgs or playable AIs.
We understand that Aliens has AI, but playable AI/playable Cyborgs are in an ancient, dilapidated state code-wise - they haven�t been touched since we split off from Baystation code years back, except some minor work from Dean to make them usable for events. If this happens, it won�t be for a long time. (Synthetics are already whitelisted).
- Changes to Predators
Please go through the proper channels and avoid opening public tickets.
Tickets complaining about Predators when you don't play them are not constructive.
We would prefer to get these through the council. Similarly, bug reports about predator stuff should be submitted as a hidden ticket.
- New game modes and new maps
Game Modes would take far too much development time to be accepted. We already have mappers working on their own map ideas - plural.
- The APC or other vehicles
Vehicles have proven extremely difficult to balance properly in the past, and have been extensively discussed. The general conclusion is that they
need some gameplay overhaul we are currently not ready for. They�re likely to be map-specific or DEFCON-limited (or both!) resources in the future.
- Balance suggestions
We already actively adjust balance according to how rounds play out, and have been making regular updates.. Many balance suggestions just do not fit within our vision. It�s worth stating that we�ve seriously amped up our data collection to more accurately meet our balance goals of late.
- Whitelists
Adding whitelists to more roles is not going to happen. We are not going to whitelist more roles or remove whitelists on roles. This includes soft whitelists like roles being locked behind playtime.
- (Temporary) Game time/length
We are 100% aware that roundtime is a bit shorter than what we want, and we do have an intended range for round length in mind. We�re getting there - no need to remind us of this one.
Originally Posted by TheDonkified
