[Idea] Mutant Tarrs/Mudds

[firekirby135]

(Credit to Ayecrusher King on the Slime Rancher wiki for sparking this idea)

To preface this whole idea, I would like to propose a name for these "Mutant Tarrs," as typing that out is both a hassle, and does not flow nearly as well as the name I'd like to propose; Mudd. Much like the Tarr they mutate from, Mudd could be interpreted multiple ways. Primarily, it can be interpreted as either as "Mud", as an abbreviation for the word "Muddled", or as an abbreviation. (Mutated unusually desired disasters, for instance)

Now, with that out of the way, what is a Mudd? They are, as the name would suggest, a muddled, mutated amalgamation of a Tarr. They occur when a Tarr eats three different largos consisting of three of the same components within its lifespan. (for example, a Pink Rock, Pink Tabby, and Rock Tabby would result in a Pink Rock Tabby Mudd) The resulting Mudd would keep the Tarr's base model, but with the base color of one of the component slimes and the iridescent color of the remaining two component slimes. (though all the iridescent variants would be a lot of work to create, so keeping the standard rainbow would be reasonable) I feel this would fit with the already pre-established theme of mixing slimes to create largos, and could still occur naturally, albeit quite rarely, due to every cell in the game having Largo and Tarr potential. However, once players start noticing these and recognizing the potential Mudds possess, it would open up a vast, new, late-game tier for veteran players that could raise the current progression ceiling.

So, how would they create a new tier? Because unlike their... "unrefined," destructive forms, Mudds actually do have a benefit; "alloy plorts". These plorts would be an amalgam of the plorts of the three component plorts, effectively condensing them into a single plort for a combined price of the three, with a bonus to the price to reflect the difficulty of obtaining them. (probably around 50-100% more than the sum of the three combined plorts) The Mudd would produce these plorts in a similar manner as a Puddle Slime, intermittently and without any real control. And just to bring the danger of these full circle, any slime that eats one of these plorts instantly becomes a Tarr. After producing a couple of these plorts, (probably around 2-4 cycles, or about 1-2 days of neglect) the Mudd will have "expelled" the buildup of the particular slime components from itself and revert back to a regular, purely destructive Tarr, at which point it will inevitably pop due to the Tarr's limited lifespan.

Players can prolong the lifespan of Mudds, however, by feeding them all three plorts matching the type of Mudd regularly. This is crucial for keeping these extremely beneficial slime variants, as neglect will cause them to simply disappear due to their limited lifespan. The requirement of all three plorts not only suggests the player have a steady supply of the plorts beforehand, creating a natural progression before ranching them, but also forces them to actively take care of the Mudds, as plorts cannot be placed in the Auto-feeder, and even if they could, only one type could be put in at a time. And just to cement them at a much higher tier, the Mudd are just as aggressive as Tarr towards the player, and unlike Hunters, can NOT be tamed.

I feel like such a system could open up a lot of possibilities for late/end-game progression further down the line, both economy-wise AND science-wise. This should, of course, be left for much later into development, likely well after all planned core features are added and the game is fully completed. Working on this post-release could bring a lot of attention back to the game after it inevitably grows stale for many players. At least, that's what I would like to think. Anyways, that's more or less the idea I've been mulling over for a good while now. I personally liked it a lot, so I just thought I'd share to get some thoughts. ^_^

[EmeraldPlay]

I absolutely love this idea!
Oh, and welcome here!

[firekirby135]

Thanks. Figured I may as well migrate my way over here from the Wiki eventually, and this seemed like a good enough reason as any to do so. ;)