Chtonite race: terror unit ideas needed

[Solarius Scorch]

Hi all,

In the same cheap way I made Reptoids, I would like to make another alien race made from recoloured TFTD sprites: this time, it's the Gillmen. However, since they're brown, I would like to make them into a subtrerranean-themed species, with the working name of Chtonites.



Still, apart from the race itself - which will be fairly low-tier - I'm out of ideas for their terror unit. And since this a cheap mod, I would like it to be something that's already made, for TFTD or something.

Help, please?


EDIT: A test version of the mod in the attachment. It should work as intended.

EDIT: This mod was incorporated into the Recycled Alien Collection mod, and is therefore discontinued as a standalone feature.

[NeXaXeN]

If you're looking for quick and dirty, I have two ideas to go with the subterranean thing (I leave the color schemes to your capable skills):

1. Proposed name: Tunlun
Model: Deep One Terrorist
Idea: The Tunlun has a large tube for a mouth. Tunluns burrow through the earth by spitting acid to corrode rocks for digestion. The "flippers" from the deep one model are actually biological shovels to move dissolved earth aside. They are used by the Chtonites to hollow out cavernous holes for their UFOs to appear and disappear undetected. However, their acidic spit makes them perfect terror weapons.

2. Proposed name: Dulcean
Model: Aqautoid
Idea: The Dulceans are a quasi-sapient hald-breed race crafted as humanoid drones. Normally used for menial labor to construct the Chtonite undergound caverns, they are also capable (with supervision) of being used as foot soldiers. While not as terrifying as Chryssalids they are conveniently expendable.

[LouisdeFuines]

Both mods cry out for OpenTFTD

[Solarius Scorch]

Thanks, NeXaXeN! The Dulceans are too obviously Sectoid-like, but Tunluns definitely have potential. I'll try to experiment with these.

Louis, I would love to see a hybrid game

[moriarty]

actually, the perfect terror unit for these would be the silacoids. too bad they're already taken

[NeXaXeN]

Thanks, NeXaXeN! The Dulceans are too obviously Sectoid-like, but Tunluns definitely have potential. I'll try to experiment with these.

Louis, I would love to see a hybrid game

THANK YOU Solarius, for giving us more aliens to play with! As for the hybrid game, when Open TFTD hits I'd be all over that--ESPECIALLY with a compilation mod on top of it! Oh man... I'm having fangasms just thinking about it...

[Solarius Scorch]

actually, the perfect terror unit for these would be the silacoids. too bad they're already taken

Hmm... I don't really want to change vanilla items... But hmm...

THANK YOU Solarius, for giving us more aliens to play with! As for the hybrid game, when Open TFTD hits I'd be all over that--ESPECIALLY with a compilation mod on top of it! Oh man... I'm having fangasms just thinking about it...

Hehe, no problem. This mod is such dirty work anyway, I'm kinda ashamed of myself.


EDIT:

I think I have the race finished, though it's not tested much. I'm putting it here (first post) for brave testers to try it out b efore I upload it to the Finished Mods section.

(Next race: tentaculats. You're going to hate them - no zombification, but no equipment either, since they'll use psionic blasts only.)

[NeXaXeN]

Tunlun Terrorist doesn't show results when researched, and no entry in the UFOpedia.

[Solarius Scorch]

Tunlun Terrorist doesn't show results when researched, and no entry in the UFOpedia.

Indeed, it was missing the lookup: STR_TUNLUN string. Apologies, should be fixed now (and old saves should work too).

[Sectoid_Soldier]

A terror unit based on TFTD's Lobstermen might be good.

[NeXaXeN]

Indeed, it was missing the lookup: STR_TUNLUN string. Apologies, should be fixed now (and old saves should work too).

Confirmed, works fine now.

And no worries--I gave up trying to get an Alien Ranks research mod going... I couldn't even get it to load. XD
Your stuff is Einsteinian by comparison.

[Solarius Scorch]

Confirmed, works fine now.

And no worries--I gave up trying to get an Alien Ranks research mod going... I couldn't even get it to load. XD
Your stuff is Einsteinian by comparison.

Haha, thanks, but this particular mod (just like Reptoids) was stolen from Robin and rewritten

Anyway, what do you think of Tunluns? I think their sprite is somehow weird, like there was a problem with the drawing routine...

[NeXaXeN]

The Tunluns look fine to me-- light sandy-brown but that goes with the subterranean thing.

Odd thing though: when they die now, they don't leave a corpse, and the Cthnite Corpse looks like a Reptoid...

[Solarius Scorch]

The Tunluns look fine to me-- light sandy-brown but that goes with the subterranean thing.

Odd thing though: when they die now, they don't leave a corpse, and the Cthnite Corpse looks like a Reptoid...

Weird. I checked the file and it looks okay.

I guess it must be some sort of a conflict between mods... Which is mighty strange, since there should be no conflict between mods, ever - each uses its own system. Have you perhaps tried merging this mod with other mods or something?

[NeXaXeN]

I have the Reptoid, MiB, Gazer, and Waspite mods as well as your Gauss Mod (Gauss Cannon Ufopedia causes a crash, but it always did that) and some other non-alien related mods. I've never seen this high strangeness with the corpses before.