o11o1 wrote:

It's quite likely these numbers are simply a side effect of the dev process: it's a pain to try to "optimize" the lists when you might not even have the cost formula 100% straightened out yet. If cost was divided by 3 instead of 4, for instance, which morphs are "underspent" moves around quite dramatically.

This is more or less the case, though the main issue is more that the Gear chapter is far from finalized, and so some of the ware may change. I'm pretty certain we'll be sticking with the 25% cost reduction (we played with other #s, and they don't quite work unless we make the morph CPs much higher, which means either giving more customization points or creating a special pool of points that's primarily for buying, and we're trying to avoid both of those options). So, yes, they are not yet completely optimized yet. We'll tackle that later, once the chapters are closer to final. That said, if you have specific suggestions for tweaking/optimizing them, will definitely keep that stuff in mind as we get around to it.

Decivre wrote:

RobBoyle wrote:

That said, if you have specific suggestions for tweaking/optimizing them, will definitely keep that stuff in mind as we get around to it.

The only real fixes we can recommend at the moment are pool increases (for discrepancies of 2 or greater) and hit point boosts of 2-3 (for discrepancies of 1 point). I suppose we could make recommendations of implants from the starting gear lists, but in some places that's lacking (infomorph upgrades, for example). That said, the wizard module needs more equipment of some sort. The pattern of them basically having the same amount of DUR and armor is nice, and I'd rather not tweak that or pool values (albeit it wouldn't be gamebreaking for the Wizard to grant two points, but I'm working under the assumption that you combine all points when you merge flexbots... two points is twice as powerful, in theory).

Broadly seconded. I'll add that it appears that some morphs are clearly intended to be in the same "cycle" as it were, with the Menton, Olympian, and Sylph being good examples. They're all very evenly matched in terms of total point cost, and the distribution of their pools. I take this as a a hint that they're intended to be even matches for each other but specilized to specific situation. The takeaway then becomes"pay attention to which morph is in which cycle" and make sure they actually hold to the cycles general setup. I don't have the morph rules in front of me, but other cycles that come mind are Flat - Case - Basic Pod: being the "super cheap, cruddy option" at the bottom of the barrel. In this case, Basic Pod stands out with costing too much for what it needs to be. I could be convinced the cycle is actually "Flat - Case - Digimorph" though. All the flexbots are clearly a cycle. For wizard morph, I would trend towards giving it more mental boosters and maybe a Radio Booster to ensure it can do it's intended task of long range hacking-drone jamming. Bouncer, Ruster, and Hibernoid (and presumably future Hazer) seem like they're in a cycle of "Mid-range option for special enviroments". I've mentioned in other threads (i forget where) about my thoughts here. Splicer, Exalts, and Remades, on the other hand, are a sort of vertical cycle: increasingly better variations on the generalist solution. Fury morphs appear to -not- be in a cycle, which raises the question of maybe there should be a Moxie and an Insight version of them. The not yet implemented Hyperbright comes to mind, they strike me as the Insight variation of the Fury. Likewise, a top-end Insight/Moxie construction at the same CP level as the Reaper could be an interesting design exercise, probably as a [strong]"James Bond" Pod[/strong] of some form. Unlike the reapers highly tilted "all to vigor" pool, the James Bond would take 1 vigor, and some flex, then lots of Moxie and Ingisht, then plenty of clever trick implants. Camo-skin + skin-flex, pheromones, oracles, inbuilt utilitools and nanoswarm generators. Multitasking module and ink glands. Maybe a drug gland that both makes doses of Alpha (or Hither), and extrudes scrappers gel. A pod for agents who want to smooth talk their way into the secure parts of a base, covertly apply a time delay sabotage to important stuff, and then stealth their way back out before anyone notices. That or survive the explosive decompression and land on a waiting escape shuttle.

Decivre wrote:

o11o1 wrote:

........

The liquid silver steel morph is effectively a high end stealth synthmorph. That said, I like to believe that the high-end synthmorphs represent the things that machines have always been better than humans at doing... surviving intolerable conditions (Q-Morph, Nautiloid), and converting resources efficiently into work (Reaper, with the work being destruction).

Still, what do we have in Pod flavor?