New Pickup/Relic idea. The Distractor/Relic of Distraction

[MrLoathsome]

I had an idea yesterday, and thought I would post it for discussion & input.

The initial idea was just for a pickup item you could toss like a flare, that would cause all monsters
within a certain radius to loose focus on their current enemy and all rush towards the tossed Distractor.

It would only remain active for a brief span, so you could slip by or hammer the crowd with a rocket or whatever.
The effective radius and duration would be configurable via ini.

Then I started thinking about how it could also be made to work on bots and human players, so it could be useful
in all gametypes, not just coop or MH.

Bots would be easy, although they shouldn't all rush to it like the monsters would. It would need another config
variable that would set the odds that bots would be distracted.

Then I thought of a way that might work with human players also.

It would have its own, hopefully unique model/mesh/texture when it was waiting for a player to pick it up, but
when it was activated and tossed, it would look like something else. Redeemer, MegaHealth, Armour etc.
Something a player might change his path and try to pick up. It could probably be made to broadcast them
a "You just got distracted!" message or something when they try.

It could load a list of class names of items it would disguise itself as from the ini as well so it could be used with
anything. Would use a list of stock UT items as default properties list.

Any thoughts?

I think most if not all of that can be done, but not sure if it would be better as an independent pickup item
or if it could be made into a relic.

I just started actually working on the next update for MoreBlood that will use Nuff's fixed splat decals tonight.
Will probably be looking at that, then a few other things before I actually have time to mess with this Distractor idea.

[EvilGrins]

Did you ever see the first Total Recall? The one with Arnold. He had the holographic device that made it look like he was somewhere he wasn't when it was activated. There's been a lot of variations of this in a lot of fandoms, but that's one of my faves.

How would that work for your distraction relic? Pick it up, everybody sees you somewhere you aren't.

[UnrealGGecko]

Holograms FTW!!

[Dr.Flay]

Thoughts...
Have it wrapped and sent to my room !

Perfect for the swarm zombies (though what would attract them?).

Hmm, relic or not.
...A few sips of tea, and a few inhalations of inspirations later..
No. I feel that It should be a normal inventory pickup.
Though most people will have an easy "toss_relic" key set....
...hmmm, if it is a relic, most people may just throw it away immediately, and the strategy aspect would be lost.
So no, I don't think a relic (though it could look like one).

Actually you could also have it look like a flag for CTF

A selection of "Gotcha" messages would be fun (5 is probably good).
"You have been duped" I think is appropriate, and a "Look behind you" always catches everyone

Was trying to think of an SFX shot.
Proxy giggle, robotic laugh, and power-down type sound, are all I can think.

How would you control it? is it random or can you choose?
Maybe it could imprint on the item you are looking at ?

As long as it works with Chaos, XPickups, and Wormbo's Enhanced items, I'll be happy.

[EvilGrins]

Perfect for the swarm zombies (though what would attract them?).

Variant of what attracts the monsters in Spatial Fear? The person that made that mod created a pheromone trace to all characters in the game, so the monsters of SF literally found you by following your scent.

Then again, I dunno if that's practical. Holorgrams aren't supposed to smell.

Realistically, I'd think a hologram might be attracted by your zombies in much the way the cybots in NW3 attract monsters. They see it as another threat, even if it's not one they're prepared to handle they still get distracted by them.