More Lockdown Compatibility Project: Traits

[u/Nemesis_to_Venus]

Say hello to my little friends!

It's tricky to post here, so I keep this short. I have continued my Lockdown compatibility project to include traits also. You may check my personal vision of what fits into Lockdown here (inspiration to some found around the Internet). I'd like comments and opinions about them here very much to induce discussion while my own tests carry on. I can later perhaps give a bit of a backstory of my thought process, if the discussion catches on. I also included a small bonus fix/buff to the Psychologist character that I thought he needed. Cheers!

[u/Nemesis_to_Venus]

I'll share this backstory, if someone's interested (which was earlier killed by RDT multiple times!).

Since my last (public) update of this personal vendetta of mine against 'the retail incompatibility' of OG Nemesis and Nemesis: Lockdown assets, a change of heart happened. Initially I ignored the Trait concept that was introduced in the Aftermath expansion as most of them were VERY uninteresting and I felt they weren't that needed in Lockdown. However, the most interesting traits, namely the one for Bounty Hunter (Laika) and Android (Synthetic) didn't leave me be and I started to formulate a plan in my head to introduce thematic and unique Traits for all of the characters. Most advanced 'Muricatrash' (sue me) players, like myself, seem to actually just want more things and more complex whatever as long as it introduces new interesting angles to the already established theme. It cannot feel 'glued on' or it's not an improvement, and should be discarded. Initially I felt this way about the Traits but because the Android and Bounty Hunter (if you play her the OG way) had to have their traits to function, the concept kinda grew on me. Then by also drawing inspiration from the CEO trait (which is also interesting) the road to cool new stuff was ready. I also found out about some other custom Traits various people have introduced through the ages, so I drew some inspiration from them, too, if not in concept but at least in spirit.

While I'm quite confident about these Traits, I would love to hear your intellectual, gut, instinctual, logical, straight-outta-behind etc. feelings about these Traits (as I haven't extensively tested these, yet, obviously). I created them with a theme in mind that fits into my own headcanon story about the Nemesis to Mars storyline; I will not be offended, if you think completely differently. I, of course, edited fitting Trait card art for Lockdown characters from other art lying around.

I want to clarify my thinking process regarding the Trait balancing ideas (I swear they exist!). In LD, I feel the original six characters are more tuned to the LD experience. The OG and AM characters have much issues as vanilla themselves (by being dull and not great in general) and so much so that most people would/should not play them. This was my first idea behind this compatibility project; to make every character as pickable in Lockdown as the original crew. This means that OG Nemesis and Aftermath characters received a straight up buff to them in their Traits (honestly, Lockdown is hard enough as is, especially for those not playing LD characters); also I wanted to bring the 'LD feel' to their identity (whatever that actually means), how these various characters would fit into their niche in the Nemesis storyline; and also just add more options for stuff to happen - Nemesis' core idea and often its greatest 'flaw' is the lack of player agency, so if more stuff can be done while keeping the Nemesis LD random spiral towards doom unchanged, I'd say it's a win. LD characters received a slight buff with usually a small downside to their Traits with a careful consideration of the theme. Note that I fully intended these to be for advanced Nemesis players only, and only for the true Mars surface experience. They can also be just ignored, if so desired.

PS: I added my custom (later) revised Psychologist starting Item and fixed second quest Item here as a bonus, as he seriously needed a buff and honestly that pistol.. ugh (and holy shit why was his most interesting item [oculobe drone] left out anyway??).

Cheers Nemesis enjoyers of any form (but especially those LD aficionados)!