Core bypass mechanic : core opener#1097

The last update added “Bypass cores”, which allow you to claim a Drillship without needing to damage any of its modules. Currently, the only difference with regular cores is that they cost a lot more resources, but that feels unbalanced, considering resources are abundant and getting more is rarely an issue. I thought of a way to implement this “bypass” mechanic in a more interesting way, and more balanced than simply requiring more resources : the Core opener.

This would be a new tool, fairly expensive to craft as well. To use it, you have to get inside the Drillship you want to claim, and interact with the core. The ship being undamaged, the core won’t be opened for you to be able to replace it with your own. But by placing the core opener on the closed core, it will attach itself to the core and start lockpicking/cutting it, trying to get it cracked opened. After some time (~5 minutes ?), the core will open, and you will be able to claim the ship with a normal core, like we are used to. This means the standalone bypass cores aren’t needed anymore.
However, during the entire time where the core opener is trying to do its job, the ship will send a help signal to all COGs in the area. The challenge is that during all this time, COGs will continously come to this ship and try to break the core opener. This means that you have to defend the ship until the core opens and you’re able to claim it (Of course, COGs wouldn’t be trying to damage their ship ; after all, it’s still theirs. They can still open doors, the spawners can still spawn COGs, and the turrets are still trying to shoot you). If the core opener is destroyed before having finished its job, you will lose your progress and need to start over with a new core opener, if you want to retry.

This would allow us to claim ships without having to damage them, but with the cost of having to defend yourself from COG attacks which try to stop you from claiming their ship. This feels like more of a challenge than just having to gather more resources.
And we can even imagine tiers of core openers, which each cost more and more to produce, but take less and less time to get a core open.

Plus, this would work especially well in PvP, compared to the current bypass cores - imagine going around, and suddenly your ship gets claimed out of nowhere, and there’s basically nothing you can do about it. Instead, with the core opener, you and everyone in your team would get a warning message that this ship is under attack, that its core is being forced open. You then have 5 minutes (or whatever number feels the most balanced) to react and try to take down the enemy that is trying to claim your ship.

This kind of gives me Payday2 vibes xD

Doesn’t feel very “Volcanoid”. Too high-tech.

In a world with remote camera live-feed, Robots, Drillships, giant lasers… I feel like a machine that wields a few cutters and lockpicks isn’t out of place, especially considering we already have the hacking tool.