The Parasitic Beast (Scape and run: parasites)

This mod requires MixinBooter in order to work! It also requires Scape and run: parasites version 1.10+ (a port for earlier versions will be made in future updates)

Introducing The Parasitic Beast, a mod that allows you to become a parasite made for the latest versions of Scape and run: parasites, taking on a completely different approach to the concept compared to the popular Cotesia Glomerata mod. It reworks the Living and Sentient armor by making them obtainable and giving them multiple very powerful buffs (bypassing true damage, multiple health bars, insane regeneration, surviving /kill and more) to make dealing with parasites much easier. There's also lots of custom items, 4 very powerful weapons designed specifically to counter parasites while still being prone to adaptation, 6 tools and multiple advancements combining the features of this mod and Scape and run. 

Unlike Nocube's addons, this mod solely focuses on the SRP late game, as most items can only be obtained by killing different kinds of parasites and using their drops to eventually overpower them.

Here is a guide to this mod and explanation of all the features it adds:

The first thing you'll need to do is make a vanilla glass bottle and use it on any living mob (This includes any mob that isn't undead so zombies, skeletons, wither etc.) which allows you to extract their blood and begin making experiments.

Now that you have a bottle of blood, you can't use it just like that: It's weak, dirty and pathetic. You need to purify it, and you can do that with a liquid purifier, made with 4 iron ingots, 1 diamond and 3 parasite guts. Parasite guts can be obtained from lure components: More valuable components give more guts.

You will then have to put bottles of blood into the Liquid purifier in order to narrow down the blood and create Purified blood. 16 blood gives 1 dose of Purified blood. Once the bar is full, extract the liquid with a glass bottle to obtain it

You can now use this purified blood to start creating your own parasite! Surrounding the purified blood with Parasite guts infects it and you obtain your first dose of Parasitic blood. However, it is currently dormant and lacking sentience, so you must awaken it first. You can do that by using different kinds of parasite drops, all obtainable from Scape and Run: parasites mobs. Now that the blood has a parasite crawling inside it, you need to reinforce it by giving the parasite tissue it can use to develop. 

After obtaining both, you can create armor shapes and when infused with Parasitic blood, a life form is created and it now lives inside you.

The Living armor's texture and model remain unchanged, however it is significantly buffed to make fighting parasites more manageable. It's now guaranteed to adapt to an attack, and after 40 successful counts of damage taken, you will fully adapt to an attack (not really, up to 98% but still really close). It also has 150k durability that automatically repairs when below a certain treshold, so Sentries are helpless against it.

Note that the following buffs are only active while the full set is equipped, otherwise you will only obtain the piece's armor and adaptation properties. It gives decent stat buffs, permanent strength 3 and night vision, regeneration 3 for 5 seconds every 15 seconds and immunity to most negative effects (including hunger, weakness, slowness, mining fatigue, poison and wither) and Scape and run negative effects like vomit and needler while viral and bleeding are capped at level 2.

Since you are now a parasite, fire is extremely dangerous and catching fire grants you one of the new effects added by this mod called "Enflamed". This effect prevents you from adapting to attacks and each level makes you take 25% unarmored damage from all attacks (damage that ignores your armor) and only applies while you are on fire. Parasite set obtains Enflamed 4 so you take as much damage as if you were wearing no armor while wearing it and being on fire. Currently there is no way to avoid this, but future updates will create countermeasures. This set and the Parasitic beast set are immune to fire resistance and cannot be enchanted with Fire protection, so you are still very sensitive to fire no matter what.

The parasite that is now living inside you is also bound to you, meaning you cannot take the pieces out of your inventory by dropping them or putting them in a chest. Attempting to do so will give you a warning.

This can however be toggled by using the 2 commands exclusive to this mod

parasiticbeast:binding_enable       Prevents you from taking the items out of your inventory in any way shape or form

parasiticbeast:binding_disable      Makes the Parasite (and Parasitic beast) set function like normal items that you can take out of your inventory

So far these are the defensive features for the Parasite set, but what about offense?

This mod adds 4 new weapons and 6 tools, which are tentacles created by your body for different purposes. They all have different abilities and functions along with additional reach, 5000 durability which repairs by 1000 every minute, 4% lifesteal that restores hp, hunger and saturation and the ability to damage anything in a straight line, as long as it's in front of their intended target, and will very likely be balanced in the future. All Morphed weapons ignore parasite damage caps. All Morphed weapons and tools can be soulbound with shift+right click so they stay in your inventory when you die. You must become a parasite in order to use any of these tools or weapons, otherwise they will not work.

Weapons:

1. Morphed slashing tentacle

Crafted with 2 Parasite tissue and 4 Virulent tissue (made with viral coating dropped from all virulent variant parasites), this is your crowd control weapon used for taking out big hordes of weaker parasites. It deals damage in a 16x7 area and doesn't need to hit a specific target in order to damage everything inside the area. It also applies another new status effect added by the mod called "Disembowelment". This effect reduces damage by 25%, movement speed by 30% and makes the next attack deal double damage before resetting. 

The only weakness this weapon has is leverage. Because of its size, if an enemy gets too close to you, the weapon will deal much less damage and struggle taking out basic threats, so make sure to keep your distance.

2. Morphed tearing tentacle

Crafted with 1 Parasite tissue and 3 Virulent tissue, this weapon is kind of a jack of all trades, good for swarms but also very good for single-target damage. It deals low damage, but has an extremely fast attack speed to the point it can ignore i-frames, which would usually be bad, a weak and fast weapon would be very easy for a parasite to adapt to, but really this weapon is just way ahead of that. Every time it lands a hit, it applies a stack of the 3rd exclusive status effect in this mod, "Combo". Every stack of combo increases damage dealt by 2 which adds up very quickly and can rack up to over 100 after only a few seconds of constant attacking. This damage ignores parasite adaptation so it will deal damage no matter what.

This weapon's only 2 weaknesses are its short reach compared to other weapons and the commitment required to start dealing high damage. When fighting parasites, constantly moving and avoiding them is very important and since combo stacks disappear after 2 seconds of not landing hits, it can be difficult to keep a chain going.

3. Morphed stabbing tentacle

Crafted with 2 Parasite tissue and 3 Berserk tissue (made with berserker coating dropped from all berserker variant parasites), this weapon specializes in dealing high single-target damage to strong parasites from a far distance, as it has very good reach. By default it inflicts 180 damage, 60 of which is always going to be true damage (damage used by parasites to ignore most armor protection, unadaptable) as long as any form of damage is inflicted to a target, so until a parasite fully adapts to this weapon it is guaranteed to deal at least 60 damage. On hit it also applies the 4th effect exclusive to this mod: "Lethality". Along with dealing 2% max health as damage every second (basically bleeding), it also reduces all healing recieved by 50% and every time a target heals, it takes 40 true damage which causes most parasites to slowly die when they stop engaging with you and start passively healing.

This weapon's weakness is very obvious: it struggles against swarms and because of its slow attack speed has a hard time dealing with the impending numbers that the hive can throw at you.

4. Morphed seeking tentacle

Crafted with 1 Parasite tissue and 2 Berserk tissue, this weapon is very different from all the other Morphed weapons because of the way it functions, making it arguably the most powerful weapon of this mod if used properly. Instead of swinging, you charge a very powerful shot that deals very high single-target damage with excellent range. Charging takes 3 seconds displayed by a counter and when it finishes charging, you fire, very simple. However, the real power of this weapon comes in the status effect it applies, the 5th and final status effect in this mod: "Penalty". It's essentially a buffed version of Lethality, reducing all healing recieved by 75% and triggering a DOT of 150 damage over 5 seconds every time a target heals. This DOT stacks allowing you to inflict absurd damage to parasites when out of combat and even one-shot Kirin and Draconite if you land a shot on them.

This weapon's main weakness is the slow charge time and the inability to use it in melee combat. Its melee attack is atrocious and doesn't ignore damage caps. The tentacle's shot also deals 95% less if its target is within 5 blocks from you, meaning it is practically worthless if anything gets close to you.

2. Tools

Morphed tools are crafted like vanilla tools, but instead of sticks they use Parasite tissue and instead of the material they use Breaching tissue (made with breacher coating dropped from all breacher variant parasites) and are crafted horizontally instead of vertically. They start off very weak, having the breaking speed of iron tools, but with every block mined, the tools become faster (100 blocks per breaking level, 50 for axe) and can reach up to a breaking level of 50 which can insta-mine stone. They have 5000 durability and repair by 500 every minute.

If you're too lazy to switch between tools which is completely understandable, you can craft yourself a Morphed Paxel, a fusion of the pickaxe, axe and shovel (inspired by the one from Lycanites mobs) with the ability to mine the blocks of all 3 tools while also now having 7500 durability and repairing by 750 every minute. It also comes with a neat toggleable ability that allows it to mine a 3X1 or 3X3 area with the press of the , key next to letter M (and break bedrock if the blocks around it are breakable). The in-game tooltip says to press the < key but that was the old one and currently it's ,  This will be fixed in the future. 

This isn't it, however, as if you fuse a Paxel with a hoe, you can craft the ultimate block-breaking tool: The Morphed Phaxel, having 10000 durability, repairing by 1000 every minute and now also being able to mine a 3X3X3 area. Crafting the Paxel or Phaxel with already used tools gives it their average breaking value. 

The evolution

As you adjust to your new life, parasites are becoming stronger, and the only way to defeat them is to break your limits and become a new and improved version of yourself. Ths can be done by evolving your Parasite into The Parasitic beast (or the Scape and run sentient armor), a challenging process that unlocks new buffs and makes you much more powerful.

The Parasitic beast set cannot be crafted and can only be obtained after certain conditions have been meet, in which case your Parasite set will automatically transform. The conditions are as follows:

1. Become a parasite by making the full Parasite set.
2. Battle experience. Killing Adapted+ parasites makes them drop a Parasite brain along with all their other drops. You must obtain 100 of these, meaning you have to kill 100 strong parasites.
3. A traumatic experience. If you look at the advancement tree upon starting your world, you will see that the middle row is completely hidden. That's because the advancements are automatically granted to you upon making contact with a parasite of a certain tier or getting close enough to them.

The final advancement in this branch is "Something Stirs", requiring you to go within 75 blocks of a Kirin or Draconite. Once all these conditions are met, you will be granted the "Dawn of The Parasitic Beast" advancement, transforming you and your set.

This set takes every weakness the Parasite set had and either removes it or makes it significantly more bearable.

The transformation, being a very intense process, strips all your previous adaptation to attacks, meaning you will have to readapt to everything from scratch. No worries, as this set adapts twice as fast to damage, requiring only 20 instances to fully become immune (100%).

Along with massive stat buffs, it also grants the following effects: Strength 9 (so fists deal 28 damage by default), resistance 3, jump boost 2 (2 block jump), regeneration 5 that is active for 5 seconds every 5 seconds, complete immunity to all the effects the Parasite set is immune to including Viral and Bleeding (you are still not immune to the Kirin and Draconite's distinct status effects like Positive, Negative and Distorted enlightenment), immunity to up to 10 true damage (health instantly gets restored when lost) and the inability to take damage that would deal more than 20% max health to you (including /kill).

Your adaptation is still hindered while being on fire and you are granted the Enflamed effect but with intensity of 2 instead of 4 so you take 50% less damage. Also, now that you are a danger to society, there is a large bounty on your head among parasites so you are permanently granted the Spotted effect while transformed.

Extras

The things i mentioned are the main features of the mod, but there are still a few extra features to make the experience more convenient and interesting. These include:

1. Adaptation codex
This item, crafted with all 4 types of Parasite tissue and Parasitic blood, allows you to check the current sum of adaptation values of the pieces you currently have equipped on you which can come in very handy when you have up to 1024 sources you can adapt to. It's also bindable so you can keep it in death.
           


2. Skins
If you are unhappy with your current appearance, you can craft Virulent, Berserk or Breaching skins to change the Parasitic beast's texture. Hold the skin items in your hand and right-click to apply the skin to the equipped pieces.


 

3. Food

I originally made this because i had no idea SRP meshi existed, but this mod also has its own exclusive knife and 2 food items: the "Bun" and the "Assimilated slider". 
First you have to make this mod's knife with a very basic recipe. You then place a piece of vanilla bread with the knife on the crafting table to obtain 4 buns. These buns can then be used with infected flesh to make an assimilated slider.

This is a scrapped section as i intended to expand on it until i found out about SRP Meshi with lots of different foods using parasite drops, highly recommended mod has some pretty cool stuff, especially Beckon kebab

4. Survival of the fittest

A new advancement that serves as a nice challenge to anyone who wants to lock in and overcome the mobs in this mod, this advancement requires you to kill every mob in Scape and run: parasites except worm carrier, Ancient Overlord and Dreadnaut, Architect and Worker (so people who play without colonies or nodes can still obtain the advancement). Good luck!

Credits:

birdabile, the artist for SRP Meshi textures, is the original creator of the "Disturbance in the system" icon which is just the SRP Meshi raw buglin texture made slightly darker. I have been given permission to use the texture so much thanks to him/her/it.
For posing the shots i used the Mo'bends animation mod which reworks minecraft animations and makes them look so much better, highly recommended

Possible things people might assume are bugs but aren't:

1. My transformation doesn't work when i get close to a Kirin or Draconite
Make sure you complete the "Something stirs" advancement otherwise it will not register your contact, meaning you have to make contact with all the previous parasite tiers before you can finally have the encounter with Kirin or Draconite count towards your progress. Also extracting the full stack of Parasite brains from the creative inventory will not work because when taken out like that, the 100 brains are not actually treated as proper items and tend to glitch. Split them using the right mouse button or kill 100 Adapted+ parasites to collect the 100 brains as mob drops and it will work that way.

2. I can't take off the Parasite/Parasitic beast set, it returns to my inventory

The set tends to glitch a bit in creative from time to time, not letting you take it off. Switching to survival fixes it, or you can use the /parasiticbeast binding_disable command to remove the binding altogether

3. I can't use the tentacle weapons, they do not work
You need to have the full Parasite or Parasitic beast set in your inventory or equipped in order to use it.

4. Adaptation codex won't show my adaptation values

You must have the full set equipped to see all the adaptation values. Yes i know the message is a bit misleading, this will be fixed

5. I can't enchant the set, it keeps going back into my inventory and the weapon enchantments don't work

This is intended as Fire protection could completely bypass the Enflamed effect and remove the weakness you have to fire as a parasite, protection is also not necessary as you can fully adapt to just about any source of damage. Same thing with weapons, they are very powerful and currently only Tier 1. In later updates as parasites get stronger and more SRP updates release, weapons will also be upgradeable to unlock new abilities and buffs, the set i believe is strong enough to fend off almost any parasite so i currently have no intentions on buffing it besides adding a way to bypass Enflamed.

BUGS!
These are current bugs present in the mod that are not intended for the player and will be fixed as soon as possible:

1. Shooting anything with the Morphed seeking tentacle within a 5-block range causes the player to obtain the Penalty status effect which makes them die almost instantly if they are not at full health and begin regenerating.