Idea for procedurally generated Eximus units to freshen up star chart/Steel Path missions

[ImWithDerp]

Half-serious wishful thinking ahoy!

TL;DR: Every few real-time days, each planet comes up with a procedurally generated design for a unique Eximus unit (with a random general shape and random weapons/abilities) that is added to the Eximus spawn pool for that planet until the next design is made, helping to keep some extra freshness in the standard gameplay loop

Liches/Sisters do have some procedural elements but fill the role of procedurally generated bosses instead of units that can be sprinkled throughout most missions, and their Thralls/Hounds have much less variety due to being limited to humanoid/canine shapes and a smaller selection of weapons/abilities

Instead, an enemy could be introduced that DE can go ham on procedural generation with. For maximum variety it should be an enemy that can take many physical forms (bipedal, quadrupedal, floating, roll-and-unfold, etc. combined with being bulky, skinny, top-heavy, bottom-heavy, symmetrical, asymmetrical, etc.), avoiding non-combat fluff that would make procedural generation harder like extensive dialogue or idle animations. For Corpus this probably means a robot, Grineer it could be either a robot or a cyborg with their whole body replaced. Infested and Sentients can innately take on many shapes anyway. The Corrupted might need something new, lore-wise.

This enemy could also have randomly located hardpoints on which can be mounted random faction-appropriate weapons or shields/armor plates that we need to shoot around. On top of that, it could have a randomly selected special ability depending on what class of enemy it is.

This enemy should probably be an Eximus (with the special ability mentioned above replacing its Eximus ability), or at least a heavy unit, so there is a bit more engagement with it than simply steamrolling over it as if it were cannon fodder. Granted that many players can steamroll over lower level Eximus anyway, but at least we still have Steel Path for extra challenge.

It might not be necessary for every individual one of these enemies to be freshly generated - instead, some of these enemies could share a configuration that is generated at regular real-time intervals, to give players some time to adapt to each configuration (especially if the UI shows us what the current configuration is before going into a mission) without letting each configuration get too stale. Each planet could have its own configuration for a bit of extra variety. There could even add a special factory/laboratory node to each planet which players can attack if they want the configuration to change faster!

Care should be taken to let players know where the current configuration's head (or equivalent) is, either by showing it to the player before a mission or making it stand out in gameplay. Although working around certain kinds of obstacles to score a headshot can be interesting, I don't think guessing whether the thing you are hitting is a head at all is one such 'interesting' obstacle.