Skull132

Application accepted, archiving.

Applicant was accepted and then went inactive. Archived.

Application archived.

Any chance you could apply yourself to something other than just the internals as well? We already have Keknar to pester for that bit, so another mapper purely focused on it would be a bit too much, perhaps. Perhaps you could give us an example of a workspace design or something like that? Showcase your ability to also handle the aesthetic bit of mapping, basically.

Bud. Really. Objectively false. "I get guns whenever code red is pressed," is infinitely easier than, "I need someone to press the "Give guns" button, then trot over to robotics and get a module switch board." You shift your focus from IC to OOC too much. Those "arbitrary rules" that are enforced upon Sec Officers are standards of roleplay. If you go full Duke Nukem on code red as a security officer, you are not adhering to the standard that our administrative staff enforce upon you. The standard stemming from the fact that humans generally experience fear, pain, anxiety, etcetera in a combat situation, and do not wish to (in most cases) rush in to certain death. Also boundaries of knowledge and so forth apply. For borgs, as I've explained, a lot of these inhibitions do not exist. As such, any restrictions would be arbitrary and exist for gameplay balance purposes. Implementing your solution would greatly reduce the lack of flexibility. While asymmetry would still exist, it'd be lessened for no real reason. Summa summarum, the result is clear: borgs with guns protecting the station would become more common. This has been proven to be detrimental. End of.

As has been pointed out by Fowl and Sackboot, yes. Absoloutely. I will not implement a decision which has now been proven to be detrimental to gameplay balance for the sake of realism. Because that's an amazing way to ruin the actual game aspect of our 2d spaceman fart simulator. Even though we are a HRP server, I still firmly believe that the game and its mechanics are still very relevant, and cannot be discarded simply because, "We should all know how to RP, so yeh, just don't abuse the million and one things!" Those restrictions exist due to a proven need. We ran a 2 month experiment with combat borgs being restricted to red alert and requiring a module reset (a more lenient system than now), and it negatively affected gameplay. There's really not much to say here. We have proven that quickly accessible combat borgs are detrimental. This is why they're a bit of a pain to get. That's how balance works: you're only meant to bother with them when you have an absoloute need. In general, you also seem to overlook what makes borgs powerful as sin in a roleplay environment. While the mechanical possibilities you outlined exist (flashbangs, CH, etcetera), they're held behind administration enforcement of the roleplay rules. If a security officer rushes to chemistry, gets CH, and then rushes nukies alone. Please do adminhelp that, he's most likely going to be short a few roles on the next round. Borgs, however, lack the requirement for fear, and their lawset quite easily enables them to engage in skirmishes with confirmed hostiles alone. They also lack pain and other feelings. This is why they are very, very scary for antagonists: because they can legitimately, RP wise, ruin your day 8/10 times. (Though, in response to this, people can nuke borgs easier, because hey, RP wise, they're just machines!) Now, why don't we just do your change and force similar rules onto borgs? Because it's not practical nor reasonable. It would basically require removing the expendable borg aspect from borgs, by telling them to stop if they try to handle situations at their own expense. Or we'd need to establish arbitrary rules to curb their usage of weaponry in code red cases. Neither of these are reasonable, which is why we simply use mechanical restrictions in this case. They don't require us to establish arbitrary rulings to make sure balance is in check. Last point. Because I missed this while writing the address above. This makes it apparent that your desire is a golden middleground without major flaws and major bonuses. Which is not what asymmetric balance is about. And SS13 is basically asymmetric balance: the game. It favours extremes and niche applicability. As long as something is not too niche to ever find usage (which it most likely isn't, combat borgs do still get use out of themselves), it's most likely fair. Golden compromises which can do everything good enough are not something befitting SS13.

No. Not only would it buff sec borgs to a stupid degree (at which point, they'd become even more valid on sight for antags), it would be repeating a mistake we cleared up. The restrictions imposed upon the availability of the combat module were put in place after a few months of active playtesting. The module used to be easier to acquire than it is now, you'd basically see one running around almost every time red alert was called. This was not the best for balance, and thus, the module was made harder to get via it requiring more fine grain controls. Srsly, sec borgs are scary as fuck to begin with. Combat borgs too, though their lack of stun puts them into a harder box when it comes to how they can apply their force. Removing that box would be. Bad.

Yeah, you can. If the lathe is busy and you press to construct another thing, it'll be added to the queue. There's even a button to view the queue in the UI.

Both are already implemented. I know that it's implemented in Robotics. Can you confirm that it's certainly implemented for RnD machinery, meaning the protolathe and maybe circuit printer?

This is something we're considering for the new map meme. Specifically, there's a suggestion for making the arrival shuttle move, and spawning people at CC if they so choose. I do believe one round of discussion there involved making it also affect folks at round start. Currently under review by madmins, will post as soon as I get details.

Scope of the field counts, though. Entire department, unhindered, for one module == too much.

That's kinda the slippery slope, though. "Can do everything a human can do, but only in their designated department." Thus making them comparable to humans, simply restricted to their department. It's one further step down that slope. Addendum to prevent double posting: slippery slopes aren't only about the destination. The journey is equally important, and justifying taking another step down that slope with the excuse of, "Well, it's not the destination, so we'll be fine," is not really valid.

Medical borg is probably a mistake, I much prefer the older surgeon module. Should have made a chemistry module alongside it, tbqh. Also, you should not take for granted playing a single character. At least, not without accepting that you may be denied the opportunity based on what happens in the game. Life is easy-come easy-go in 2d spessmen. As for the purpose it serves. It's a matter of direction. Enabling all of which you have presented, for the reasons that you have presented, puts us firmly moving in one simple direction: borgs ending up with de facto arms and hands. And borgs ending up with hands would make them objectively superior to humans. Their concept is that of a caged genius: an all access ID, all the crew trust in the world, but restricted role and ability to directly influence the world. These seemingly "arbitrary", pointless, etcetera, nuances contribute greatly to this image. "I'm capable of destroying this station if I wanted to. But I need you to shove this cadaver into the cloning pod for me." Humans are limited by knowledge, borgs by their capacity to apply knowledge. Also, according to Scopes, and my memory, back in ye day, borgs weren't able to shove corpses into cloners. And it worked out just fine for years.

Re: 2. Notice how there's a borg module specifically for surgery, that's butt useless in most other cases, due to his toolset. Also, borgs not having hands is not an arbitrary limitation. As for your example, there already exist alternatives to resolving those situations. Get a human to shove bodies into cloner, voila. It is perfectly acceptable to have the AI/Borgs handle cloning machinery with a human simply acting as a loader, has been for years. There's also the 30 minute respawn timer, so your point of, "They're out of the round 5ever," is unfortunately moot. Re: 4. Arm-creep. The fact that they can kinda-sorta do it in a more laborious way is not a reason to simply go the full mile. Borgs do not have hands. If their player is smart enough to figure out a bypass with tools available to solve the situation, then great! Props to the player! But it doesn't mean we should just take a step back and give them the ability to do it fully unhindered.

Will look at the application over the weekend, unless my schedule opens up in the mean time.

Will look at the application over the weekend, unless my schedule opens up in the mean time.

I'm gonna use a silly phrase here but I think it'll get the message across: hand-creep. Here's the thing. Borgs are meant to be limited in their application and purpose. And by no means are they meant to be able to do everything a human can do in their field. This is the reason why they don't have hands! Unconsciously extending their capabilities bit-by-bit in this regard (interacting with the world in an intricate manner) would basically be the same as power creep, but, with hands. so, hand-creep! #2 is a definite "Nope". Cloning is an operation that should be overseen by actual staff, and not performed by station bound synths. The only exception maybe being a synthetic purpose built for such shit. An actual borg built around a mobile cryo/cloning tube might be interesting as shit, though limited in operational freedom. Which is fine. Further! Cloning is not fundamental to medical! Not by a mile! #3 has been answered. #4 starts heading down the same territory as #2. #1 Will have to mull on this. Or just watch this thread to see what ideas are put up. Borgs cannot unbuckle people from anything 5ever because no hands. Changing this for lollerbeds would be interesting. Onions are welcome.

Moderator who applied the ban is retired. Will ping active admins.

Will shove this in the admin discord, apologies for the delay.

Inbrief conducted 27JAN2017, as per Jackboot's request.

Aurora has changed, Nebs. It has changed a lot. We have socks now. *shudders*

Oke, hopefully I found all of the bans. Try to connect and lemme know if you get in or not.

A part of me wants to hear what UM has to say about this. Anyways, your bans are a bit of a web due to the old method of catching dodges, and I don't have time at this moment to go through'em all. I'll see about untangling them tomorrow, so in about 10 hours. Both head admins cleared it.

Oh hey, I think I remember this one. As long as you're cool with not repeating the shenanigans that got you banned in the first place (to include racial slurs over adminPMs), we should be good to unban you. I'll wave a Head Admin this way to see if they have any gripes.

Apparently that's TG code. We could port that. Also, why not make camera jammers another item? They're far more obvious than the multitool notice thingy. "Hey, why's there a mountain of static moving around in my camera view...?"