The staff and I actually discussed the concept of them potentially exploding upon death a while back; however, this discussion took place long before they were ever released as a playable race. If I recall correctly we had decided that they would leak gas slowly from any wounds they happened to receive, much like how any other person would bleed. Upon a sudden or violent death we assumed they would 'explode' albeit in a nonviolent manner, something akin to a bright burst of light, similar to a flashbang. Loud, bright and disorienting, perhaps causing a harsh and sudden sunburn for anyone nearby when it happens, but not fatal by any means.
I don't think taking away the things that make the races different is a good thing. That's part of the fun of playing in a sci-fi setting, the differences in culture and physiology. The different races not all being humans with a different skin makes RP much more interesting in my opinion.
Having a race that self-destructs on death just isn't healthy for RP, i think. It's also not part of chucklefish canon, even if Bietol meant it to be that way. Chucklecanon says: So Novakid exploding on death isn't necessarily canon. The other parts of their physiology, like how they speak, eat, what the colour says about their age, etc etc, in Bietol's post can be used as additional information, but exploding on death is like having a nuclear deterrent.
Nothing about that says they don't explode on death. I mean they are full of plasma and if you damage that shell that plasma has to go somewhere... What you mentioned says what happens after the gasses have been already depleted... like by the novakid exploding.
If the envelope keeping the novakid's plasma inside vanishes, there would be no "explosion" in the sense known by most people here. Unless the plasma were stored at very high pressures, it would simply dissipate with a flash into the atmosphere, and the electrons formerly separated from their parent atoms would reattach, making (presumably) hydrogen and helium, which are flammable and explosive gases, so you could argue that upon release they combust in a fireball. Shrug. Just my two cents. It's a bit OP for a novakid to level a city block from a headshot, but it could take away from RP a bit to keep them from at least having a little bit of an exciting death. I think a middle ground would be best in this scenario. Maybe a smaller explosion?
The Creator/contest winner of the race says this. Starbound Aamepedia life stages say this: I personally like that thought of the exploding but like Rezima stated as akin to a flash bomb.
I will say that I personally believe Novakids should not try to be reasoned out. We can use the lore for the physiology which is given to us, but any kind of scientifically accurate explanation would be impossible. It's an entirely nonsensical, irrational race that you would be attempting to rationalize. I honestly think in this situation it would just make it more confusing.
Maybe the lore should be that there are so many unknowns about the novakid race, that they can't be really figured out, at least not with currently existing scientific technology.
I would like there to be a unanimous decision regarding faceshotexplosions nonetheless. Are we running with the flashbang model?
Yeah, I'd be willing to grant them Flashbang/chance to ignite minor flammable stuff like hay stacks, not explosive barrels though, unless they're litterally INSIDE the explosive fluid/stuff
How a novakid reacts on death will vary depending on the people you are roleplaying around. Consider it a courtesy thing given the deathly nature of explosives. I know how I feel about it, and how my opinion is not shared among most of the staff. That said, like most all racial traits it should be replayed responsibly for the enjoyment of the group. Most anything can become powergaming is abused.
But seeing that the Novakid physiology is so weird and different from any other race, even when compared to Floran or Glitch, there's no way for them to receive medical treatment... And since they're wild-west themed one would assume that their death toll would be even higher than the Florans'. Bietol even stated in his information, which people like to refer to, that Novakid are exceptionally vulnerable, as the membrane that keeps their gas in their bodies is rather soft/weak. Even if you were to invoke the fact that they do regenerate lost limbs, it's most likely a one-time thing, as the damage done gives feedback to the brand, which will damage the brand and affect the Novakids health in the future, as in next time the arm will only partialy regenerate, if at all. Edit: I wonder if one could capture Novakid and use their bodies as an energy source? That's a great villain motivation right there. Like you could have a power providing company that extracts energy from Novakid ...
Chucklefish on the Floran lisp, ladies and gentlemen: I particularly like "i am seventeen summers old" "as top hunter, i'm expected to lead this tribe when i come of age" "the floran are not inherently evil, my father taught me to respect life" "i try to talk without a hiss, but sometimes i just can't help it" "i've been hunting since i was a sprout, winning since i became a bud" So: 1. Florans can learn to surpress their lisp, we now have the Floran scholar and Nuru as examples. 2. Perhaps Florans /do/ have a child state, perhaps only in mind, y'know, sapling-sprout...-bud(? think that bud thing was just a joke) 3. She's 17 summers old and not of age yet, so florans aren't perceived as adults when they're 17. I'm guessing around 18 or 20 they're of age. 4. There's wise and not evil Florans out there, even among the tribal ones that aren't plant suits like the Floran scholar (and by extension Oak) So apparantly Nuru is a tad smaller than the Floran Player's character. I believe that, if you watch the Floran respawn animation, you see a Floran hatch from a pod, i believe this Floran is slightly smaller than the player character as well, so this would imply that Florans are a tad more developed than other races when they hatch, but they still develop afterwards and mature when they're as tall as the normal Floran player. The child-hood equivalent of a Floran's development would be the part where they grow like plants, and when they hatch from their pods they're basically in an early stage of puberty, and they mature later on. (I think.) I compared model size between the respawn animation and the in game representation: The eyes have the same amount of pixels in both models, which means they're most likely correctly scaled. The adult one, the in game one, is 140px tall. The "younger" one, the respawn animation one, is 132px tall. Nuru, who is supposedly not of age yet, and perhaps smaller because she's younger, is 124px tall.
The hiss more or less falls in line with what a lot of us believed. The bigger issue here is floran age. Up until now I know myself and other worked under the assumption floran didn't really have a "child" phase, other then in mental capacity. Apparently they do. Not exactly sure how I feel about this, given the way we had assumed they multiplied in the past.
I believe it's like this: Floran reproduction happens, they plant a seedpod, the seedpod grows into a floran cocoon pod, the cocoon pod hatches, a sapling is born, a sapling ages from 1-12, 12-14 is a sprout,16-18 is a bud or adolescent (almost adult), 18(or 20) is an adult Floran. Between sapling and adult there is a small amount of maturing growth. There is more mental growth than physical growth, i believe. If the "bud" comment was just a pun, then i believe 12 - 18(or 20, adult) is a sprout, which is probably the most likely. Another possibility could be: 1. Conception/Reproduction happens. => A seedpod 2. age 0-9 => Cocoonpod 3. age 10-13 => Sapling 4. age 14-17 => Sprout 5. age 18 => Adult Floran Though the problem with that seems like they wouldn't say "seventeen summers old" when the cocoon stage is pretty much the same as 9 months of pregnancy in humans. Another possibilty: 1. Conception/Reproduction happens. => A seedpod 2. +- 1year after conception => Cocoonpod 3. "birth" 0 - age 10" => Sapling 4. age 11-17 => Sprout 5. age 18 => Adult Floran Though one could argue that plants grow faster than animals, and that perhaps they do count the cocoon stage as "age" because they're living in a stationary plant-like life phase then, like how amphibians live the first part of their lives in water, and live on land for the second part. In that case THIS one is more likely. [DOUBLEPOST=1431632342][/DOUBLEPOST]Anyhoe, this means i have to revisit my original Floran Physiology thread!
Or there is the possibility that Nuru is just a short floran, and florans require florans to be a certain age to be tribe leader because of the experience that comes with that age. Pretty much all the NPCs that chucklefish recently showed have a unique body type to make them more distinct and unique.
Even so, the Floran that comes out of the cocoon in the respawn animation is significantly (8px of 140) smaller than the player character in game. Maybe they do not have a physical child stage, but i do believe the sapling and sprout stages signifiy a little extra maturing in both terms of physical and mental growth.
I highly doubt the 2 pixel difference in height of a picture in a respawn animation is relevant. The two pictures are identical, one just has slight;y wider pixels in some places.
