A group of gremlins have been rounded up and their weapons have been collected by the Spiral Order! Now, Gremlins live on Cradle, and their numbers far outmatch those of the Spiral Order- losing a single prisoner of war camp back to the gremlins would be a costly reminder of this, and would cause the death of many knights. That's where you come in- rather than hold all of the gremlins forever, Feron has decided to turn a blind eye on ethics, but needs someone else to deal the killing blow on several dozen defenseless gremlins.
What this looks like:
A new level of course! It fits into the rotation as a statusless gremlin level that can replace any decon zone. Here are my ideas for what would go on:
Level idea one:
A small encampment sits around the elevator, and the rest of the level is one big pin full of reskinned mortafires without any means of getting their weapons back- they still drop crowns, so that players are made to want to kill them. Feron explains the Spiral Order's plans, and the player follows orders and slaughters the defenseless gremlins. After killing the gremlins, players receive various rarities and are commended on their performance.
Level idea two:
This time, the encampment needs to test their vials on something living, to see how well they work in the field. The knight is given several pickups to use, and must kill a gremlin in a chamber using nothing but those vials. To code this, the knight's weapons are all temporarily removed and several vial spawners are presented. Once the gremlin is dead, a room full of boxes will be presented to you.
Once the knight clears the level a few times, Biotech Hahn will add the word "again" to his introductory text explaining the situation- "Good data is like good pudding, and we need someone to conduct this vital research... so can you, [Player name], perform the test for me again?"
Level idea three:
A schemer similar to Razwog has been caught and needs questioning, but won't talk. Because of this, the Spiral Order has captured several of her family members, and plans to use them against him! The mission starts out with a dialog between Feron and the schemer- he won't talk, and Feron has the family.. the gremlin shouts no! But still won't talk!
A gremlin is spawned, and the knight is made to kill it. The schemer yells out in pain, crying a bit. That's what happens- how about giving us the info on project R now? But still nothing. Two more gremlins- the schemer's children, are released into the caged area and the gremlin breaks down but can't bring herself to betray the Crimson Order. The knight murders these and after some more dialog Feron decides that the gremlin is truly a monster, and must die as well with her lover... this makes the gremlin crack, and admit what they know.
Later in a scenario room, that same schemer turns up dead, surrounded by ghostmane stalkers.
Level idea four: (new!)
Everyone knows that gremlins are intelligent, but just how intelligent are they? The Spiral Order needs you to do some science using the newest plug-tail accessory to find out for sure. A gremlin is all tied up, and one of the biotechs hands you a plug. You go up and click on the gremlin (like in A Pinch of Salt) to activate that you are done, then return back to the observatory. Upon clicking, the gremlin gets a plug coming out of its stomach area, plugged into a nearby generator.
The biotech reads the gremlin some upper level math/physics problems (because gremlins are smart), and before long the gremlin starts to get them wrong. Whenever this happens, the biotech laughs and tells you to administer a shock. To do this you must step on a button, which also opens a gate containing a few treasure boxes for your troubles. The gremlin answers a few more and gets another one wrong, and you are made to turn up the shock even further and receive more boxes. At this point the gremlin is shaking a bit and pleads for you to stop. The problems continue until the gremlin has missed 5 of them, in which case the biotech turns down the power and, inspecting the gremlin says "It's dead.. we'll have to collect more data some other time. Go collect your reward."
A new gremlin based weapon!
For partaking in Feron's T3 camp 100 times, the knight will be presented with a unique new bomb based on gremlins: The Toxic Walker, which looks like one of the cages found on some levels.
The knight charges the cage, which has a charge time and walk speed similar to that of big angry bomb. Upon releasing it, the knight spawns a gremlin knocker.. but instead of attacking like a healthy knocker would, this knocker walks with a limp and has a radius protruding from around it. When the knocker's radius reach it's outmost layer, the knocker staggers a bit, and a small explosion is heard.. at this point, a bright green liquid begins leaking out of the gremlin like footsteps, occasionally dealing poison and fire to all that step on it like venom veilor/ash of agni do. After the knocker walks about for a little while, it slumps down and a large puddle (the size of a 4* blast bomb) is left on the ground. This pool of liquid deals moderate damage, and very very rarely lights enemies on fire/poisons them.
Seems dark. Although a dark theme would be a rather interesting change, I really doubt Three Rings would go down the "WE'RE THE BAD ONES" path.
However, a POW camp where we're infiltrating a gremlin camp would be a great "story" level. As of right now we have only one real "story" level set containing gremlins, and that's the jade triangle set. Or was it emerald axis? Gah, you know what I mean. The gremlin-aurora isles area.
Right now we have a fiend + undead level(technically a shadow level), two slime + undead levels (concrete jungle, scarlet fortress), a piercing level(aurora), and an elemental level(jade triangle). A mix of gremlin and fiends would actually make for an interesting level setup. As such, you could be sneaking through the office space or the higher-up's rooms and find fiends working, and when outside thwackers are patrolling.
Call the level set "Camp Odious" with the first level being called "". The second level could be called "The Front Gate" with the alt level being "The Side Entrance". Third levels can either be "Crooked Courtyard", "Sickening Sweatshop", or "Atrocious Alleyway". Finale could be "The Breakout", and it could have the "Main" theme playing (like all other finales). You rescue various knight NPCs on the final level, and bring them to the elevator.
And yes, like the other "themed" levels, you could only have like, 2 or 3 of these levels, without the finale and without the starting level.