MalMalumam

I've always been a little partial to the idea of letting failed converts simply forget the last 15 minutes or so, as well as the next 5 minutes or so, so that cultists can drop them off somewhere and let them be on their way. I dunno if that's in the spirit of things, though? I wonder what everyone considers to be so bad about cult?

https://github.com/Aurorastation/Aurora.3/pull/9852 There, a PR to make runes more sneaky, and also a little more religious, cause why not?

I am working on a PR to change the rune drawing message now.

@Carver The thought I had behind it was to be able to have a handy in-game reference for things such as e.g. chemistry recipes you were taught, or notes about people you know. Text files require having to tab in and out of the game, which is a little annoying. But definitely fair. It may also be used an alternative source for exploitable information for psionics, borers, and changelings. @ThelonTV I had that in mind exactly, yes. Antags with uplinks (mercs, traitors, ninjas, nukes, raiders) are able to access this list ICly, and I would suggest the order in which they appear be randomized, and the contracts vetted for use and redundancy. Other antags could do with their own sources of gimmicks or goals, perhaps even in-game. The Cult already has a tome; perhaps a list of things Nar'Sie might be pleased by could be put in there. Changelings, borers, and vampires... uhh... could have it in their memory...? Wizards could have it in their wizard tome... Anyway, probably ought to put "check your contracts!" in the welcome message for antags with uplinks.

Alright, so how about this? Cult preference on: "Submit or resist? (Your cult preference is on. You will be able to resist for thirty seconds before being forcibly converted.) Cult preference off: "Submit or resist? (Your cult preference is off. You will be seriously injured and forget the events over the last fifteen minutes in two minutes if you resist!)

Hmm... @DanseMacabre, now that you mention it, there is a way for cultists to do that already: the Revival rune. Take a dead body that you want to insert a ghost into, take another dead body that you'll sacrifice to power the ritual, and bam, a ghost standing on the rune is now a brand new cultist, with a fancy new body to boot. Though having to get another dead body for it first does kinda suck. Oh well. *Shrug*

I have this to-do list sitting around on my computer, but I'd rather it be somewhere public, since I might not get around to some of these. I couldn't figure a good place to put this, so a human apparently/Jade/MarinaGryphon suggested I put it here. -Update cult wiki: Need to test duration on blindness, deafening, and incapacitation runes. Fix Blood Drain rune entry. DONE 9/1 Test to see if Blood Boil/Blood Drain activates when an adjacent rune of the same kind is activated. Update juggernaut to say that it only reflects lasers, and not bullets. Update conversion rune to tell players to put some effort into it - make a ritual, deliberately lead them into an ambush instead of ganking, etc, to inspire people to hit "submit" instead of "resist". Update incapacitation rune's entry to emphasize how useless it is. DONE 9/1 What gender is Nar'Sie? Note that "Appraise Offering" verb exists. DONE 9/1 - EDIT 9/1 1:46AM EST Conversion rune should notify its drawer that the "Appraise Offering" verb exists. Modify "Appraise Offering" proc to have a special message if someone has turned off Cult in their preferences, "You get the sense that your master is interested in [target], but first you must convince them of the worthiness of His cause." or such. Modify conversion rune to check if someone has Cult turned off in their preferences. See also "Make Cult Unresistable" - Memory function to have IC notes that persist between rounds? Perhaps either in the PDA, or in a character's memory? Reuse records code? - Should vampires be vulnerable to garlic or mirrors in some way? - "Agent" shows on agent ID cards to AI chat. Agent cards also appear to not update the assignment on their card completely correctly - they show on secHUDS as "?". Need to verify, then report if still present. - Fix RCON interface. Seriously, it's janky - the box starts too small, and the wattage should perhaps come with a preset wattage or at least show the station's load on each sector so you have an idea of what to set it to, and it updates really darn slowly. At least update the wiki to have a suggestion for what the RCON values should be. Perhaps also fix VueUI, in general, so that you can change box shape via corner/edge click-drag more intuitively - right now, you have to aim a little outside of the corner/edge to change the box shape, and the mouse icon doesn't change when you're able to click to do so. - Refactor Spatial Mage. It was removed because the wizards would become too flighty and be a pain to track down, but perhaps some limitations would allow it to be reintroduced. Teleport: Can only teleport when not seen, and/or after a "charge up" of five(?) seconds that can be interrupted? Mark and Recall - rune should make a 7x7 area glow blue, and make buzzy sounds, making it easy to find? Blink and Ethereal Jaunt - have portals that people can follow you through, and prevent forcewalls from being summoned nearby? Swap - only lasts for a short time, and then revert? Maybe using enough spells (2?) in succession makes the space around you glow blue in a bigger and bigger radius, even through walls? Does Spatial Mage have protections against telegibbing? - Have a collection of antag gimmicks/goals set up somewhere? People newer to antag may find themselves lost in regards to what they should do. Give suggestions for each type of antag, and for each type of job should they find themselves as crew antag. I have my own list of cult gimmicks, but it's improper to put them on the wiki. - In a similar vein - write a guide for how to antag for the crew, not just yourself. It's pretty easy to go "We'll just quietly rob the vault/go stealthcult the whole game" and then the round becomes extended + a few people being antag all to themselves. More likely to happen when you have no idea what goals/gimmicks you should pursue, though the contracts in the uplink can provide some guidance. Perhaps antags that start with uplinks should be told in their welcome messages that if they don't know what to do, pursuing one of those contracts isn't a bad idea? (Should probably vet, clean up, and randomize the contracts in that case.) - Ling should be able to make something like holoparasites from their victims? Blatantly stolen from Paradise (except theirs are for traitors, not lings): https://www.paradisestation.org/wiki/index.php/Guardian There is unimplemented code for victims to be part of a changeling "hivemind", but all they can do in that mode is talk to themselves and all lings on a secret channel. It would be good if a changeling absorbing someone didn't just end the round for the victim, and they got a chance to be antaggy. (I'm tempted to suggest porting some of the antag items from Paradise, but that seems pretty rude and against the spirit of things.) EDIT 9/1/2020 2:15 AM EST @Chada1 suggested that perhaps Lings could spawn Morphs out of consumed people: https://tgstation13.org/wiki/Morph - Solar power buff/refactor? Seeing as the supermatter and tesla use phoron (so far as I can tell?), and there's supposed to be a phoron shortage, maybe solar should get a buff somehow? Couple of ideas: "Bluespace Solar", where a satellite closely orbiting a star focuses the sunlight and turns it into energy, then sends that energy through a portal to the station. Or, it sends the sunlight through the portal, then a power station on station turns that sunlight into energy. The bluespace solar satellite could be on z-level 1, requiring a voidsuit protective against temperature and radiation to survive on, or it could be just left offscreen. "Offscreen solar panels": The station needs about 1-2 thousand solar panels, or an implausible buff to the current solars' production value, to power the station effectively. Actually deploying that many panels would be too big of a load on the server, and too big of a load on engineering, so instead, just move them offscreen into a console, and have them orbit the station's asteroid. Or alternatively, make a computationally light "solar panel" tile and pave z-level 2 or 7 with about 8 screens worth of them. A special, really thick power tether connecting to the orbital solars is all that remains on-station, and it needs to be connected correctly and the console configured for the orbital solars to provide power. Eliminates inefficiency from being in the asteroid's shadow. If completely off-screen, automated machines keep them maintained, but perhaps special packages of glass and steel need to be sent up to them in a "solar shuttle" for the machines to maintain them. If screens are instead paved with solar tiles, then maybe engineering can get a buggy they can navigate the solar tiles with, or at least a jetpack. Either way, each method should take roughly the same amount of time and effort that the current engines require. - Medical cryo storage for patients medbay can't handle? It's the 25th century, with cryogenic storage systems that routinely keep people asleep and in perfect stasis until they are revived for their work shift. Surely, there ought to also be cryo storage for patients that are near death that the station isn't equipped to treat. It would have the same effect as dying on the player - you're ghosted, and no longer able to participate in the round - but at least your character might be able to get actual medical treatment off-station, instead of dying to incompetency, lack of medical staff, or lack of a proper ICU. - Soul capture IPCs? The soul capturing mechanic in soul stones appears to rely on isAsystole. IPCs can't be asystole, however, since they have no heart. Should IPCs be able to be captured in them? If not, then maybe update the soul stone's description to reflect that. I think they should, since you can convert them to cult. (Maybe this is all just a misunderstanding, and IPCs really can be soul captured.) - Ranked choice voting for antag modes. Apparently Baystation has this already? First-past-the-post voting kinda sucks; no one can express a preference for Wizard vs Ninja, for instance; if they want an antag round, they just have to pick Secret. Perhaps give Extended a bit more weight, since "antag" vs "no antags" is its own issue that people vote on. - Let antags leave. Credit to @Snakebittenn: It just needs to actually be coded and merged. Rough difficulty of coding, in order: 1. One time use teleport scroll wizard starts with that teleports them back to the wizard den - very easy? 2. One time usable "Home Base" option on antag shuttles - mercs, nukes, raiders, burglars - easy enough? 3. Putting wizard den back on the teleport scroll, but that expends the rest of the charges on the scroll - easy enough? 4. One time buyable uplink item to teleport mercs, traitors, ninjas, revs, nukes, raiders, and burglars to a home base - easy ish? 5. Cult/vampire can summon a obj/singularity/narsie/large/exit to escape - only a little easy? 6. Hijack the teleporter, after which it explodes after a countdown - not very difficult? 7. One time buyable uplink item to call an antag shuttle to the station, that antags without shuttles - traitors, ninjas, revs - can use- kinda difficult? 8. Hijacking the transfer/research shuttles/escape pods to go to a different place - difficult-ish? - Overmap for escape pods? Credit goes to a human apparently/Jade/MarinaGryphon. In connection with number 8 in "let antags leave", it would be a neat thing to do. Also would tie in to NBT nicely, perhaps. - Experiment with medchems to see what are the best chem mixes for various problems, given the chem side effects update, and update wiki accordingly. Determine which, if any, medicines are good to put in the cryo tubes alongside clonex/cryox, and add in that to get maximum effect from cryo tubes, you need to set the coolers to 0K. Also put an update on Guide to Medicine/Physician/Paramedic's wiki page about how to take care of critical patients. Credit to CertifiedCybs on the discord for the proposal below: 1. Stop the bleeding with brute kits/gauze 2. Hypospray Inaprovaline (unless due to giant spider venom; then inject dylovene, and not inaprov, to avoid making tricordrazine) 3. Use dexalin/dexalin plus inhaler 4. Hypospray mortaphenyl/perconol 5. Hypospray Dermaline/bicaridine/tricord as appropriate 6. Use kits and gauze/ointment for other injuries (if you used gauze in step 1, use ointment on those wounds to disinfect) 7. Put on roller bed, attach IV bag if there is bloodloss, go to medbay - Apparently the worths of material stacks are all messed up in Cargo's ordering menu. Credit to @ThelonTV for reporting this. See SS13_Cargo_fuckery.xlsx, attached. Probably needs fixing, unless buying and selling wood planks back and forth from Centcom for infinite credits appeals to people. SS13_Cargo_fuckery.xlsx

Yes, it takes 40 seconds to 2 and a half minutes to get someone to 100 burn damage, so it's decently quick to seriously injure someone. Given brainmed though, I'm not sure how long it takes to kill? The rune does do brain damage at later stages, but that could take anywhere from 6 to 33 minutes to kill on its own. Wait, hold on, I just saw a proc in the code, /datum/antagonist/cultist/proc/appraise_offering() ... if(!cult.can_become_antag(target.mind) || jobban_isbanned(target, "cultist") || player_is_antag(target.mind)) to_chat(usr, SPAN_CULT("You get the sense that [target] would be an unworthy offering.")) else to_chat(usr, SPAN_CULT("You get the sense that your master would be pleased to welcome [target] into the cult.")) Is this already implemented? This should be made front-and-center obvious to anyone who draws a convert rune... like, make the act of drawing a convert rune point out that "Appraise Offering" is a thing they can do. I can't tell if this proc covers whether or not a person has cult turned on in their preferences. Edit: Either way, it should probably give a different message if they simply have their preferences off - "You get the sense that your master is interested in [target], but first you must convince them of the worthiness of His cause." or something like that.

@canon35 Temporarily memorize a rune - like, be able to draw a rune without having to have the book in your hand? For instance, you could memorize "Tome Summoning" and walk around without a tome? Would the memorized rune be able to be deployed instantly, so that you could use it e.g. like memorize Wall then deploy it immediately while being chased down maintenance by Sec? You could even just start the round with "Tome Summoning" memorized, and have all new converts start with it memorized too. I also agree that the rune drawing message could use a bit of work. At the very least, remove mention of a sacrificial knife from it- there's no knife anywhere near cultists. Perhaps a cultist could store a vial of their blood inside the tome, and have like a quill to draw the rune with?

Cult robes don't have gloves, but cult suits do, and they work as insulated gloves. Cult suits are made by clicking the cult robe onto a daemon forge. They are slower, though, so they're a bit less good for combat [edit: and it requires constructs to be around to make the daemon forge for you]. It does feel a little memey to have to be like "the hands! Target the hands!"

Perhaps it should be dependent on whether you have cult turned on in your preferences? If you have it turned on, you get a dialog stating you have it on and you can either submit or use the dialog to turn it off. If you have cult off in your preferences, you get a dialog stating you have it off and you can either resist three times before being killed, or use the dialog to turn it on. Also you should get killed after a certain time period anyways just to prevent turning the preference on and off to try to work around the resist limit. Being able to make guard dogs or something out of corpses seems like a neat idea. Constructs are supposed to be what you do with dead bodies, but if they just don't want to play cult at all, instead of just insisting that their character can't be converted - or if the cult is not smart enough to know how constructs work - then that won't work either. I would say not everyone wants to play along with a secret round. I know I like to, but some people just want to be bystanders, and I think it's possible a good portion of these people are the kind who keep OOC turned off and don't engage in the forums or discord, so we don't hear from them. Gahhh, I need to update the wiki. Bleh. If a change like this goes through, please ping me on the discord. Edit: Another factor is that when you're not very robust or not very good at RP or just new to cult in general, your first approach to conversion might just wind up being "gank and yank". Which sucks for the victim and is no fun, and was asserted to be the reason behind not being willing to convert by a number of people. I asked around about this, and the consensus *appears* to be that people are much more willing to hit "submit" if at least a modicum of RP/effort is put into the conversion attempt. I.e. - lure the victim into a trap, or tie them up and have a proper ritual with chanting or something. Even the hardcore anti-cult person I talked to said they'd hit submit if they got a "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Nar'Sie R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn" in a dark RP ritual.

So far we have (in addition to the default "escape as crew, a prisoner, in cryo storage, dead, riding the escape pods during standard crew evac, or stuck on station")... -Hijacking the emergency/crew transfer shuttle -Emagging/agent ID'ing the research shuttle -1 time use uplink item to GTFO -Hijacking the escape pods to leave early -Cult/vampire being able to summon an escape portal (there's actually an object, Bluespace Rift, obj/singularity/narsie/large/exit that teleports you to a beach.) (Special things happen if this Rift is on the map when a singularity eats a supermatter.) -Lings being able to make a bio-ship. -Make an announcement when the antag ends the round by escaping. (Unknown signature shown leaving the station, unauthorized use of pods, or ripping the moorings from the station, for example.) My own suggestions: -Give a "Home Base" option to antag shuttles that only works once. (If the idea of ghosting antags once they return is implemented, letting new antags join, then once per "set" of antags?) -Wizards being able to use the Teleport scroll to get back to the wizard den, but doing so expends the rest of the charges. Or, give them another Teleport scroll that only leads to the wizard den. (If Spatial Wizard gets re-implemented, don't put the destination on their Teleport list.) -Borers can make a "ship" out of a sufficiently high number of themselves. (I think this makes sense, since they are supposed to have reproducing as a goal.) -Hijack the teleporter, perhaps? And once someone goes through the hijacked teleporter the first time, it starts counting down (to let team antags all get through), then explodes? -If a single use uplink item to GTFO is made, make sure that the base they wind up at is generalizeable to all antags with uplinks - mercs, traitors, ninjas, revs, nukes, raiders, and burglars.

>Regarding alkysine, the drug itself is too frequently misused by folk in Medical. The drug requires blood oxygenation levels to be above 85% oxygenation, yet people usually inject the chemical as soon as a patient comes in asystole (when blood oxygenation would be rock bottom at ~20%). The drug is also very strong (which won't be changing, unless you OD it), 5 units is more than enough usually, and yet most people hammer in 10 to 15 units - whether they're underestimating it's strength or just making sure the alkysine remains in the blood long enough, I'm unsure - but this'll aim to reduce the frequency of events like this, making people actually consider when to administer alkysine and hopefully ensuring people only administer it in the right circumstances. If the changes have their desired effect, it'll also reduce the burden on chemists to have to stock 3 bloody bottles of a chemical that'll only have ~20 units dished out per shift. Of course there will be accidents where doctors are either unaware of the change or, just out of habit, administer large doses of the drug, but with how pronounced the side-effects may be, people'll gradually come to realise that it's not a safe drug to hammer in willy-nilly. Part of this is... well, lack of knowledge. I literally didn't even know that alkysine required blood oxygenation until I bothered to look it up on the Guide to Chemistry (it's not in the Guide to Medical). Nor did I know that it is very powerful per unit (30 damage per unit! Only 3 units required per patient, in worst case scenarios.) Fortunately, dexalin can help alkysine work, so that's something I learned just now.

Something to note is that in the code, there is a "super singularity," which is what happens when a singularity eats a supermatter. It's basically a stage 5 supermatter, except even worse. When it's made, everyone everywhere gets flashed; if the shuttle is on the way but recallable, it turns around due to "bluespace distortion"; if you're within 10 meters of it, you get turned to dust; everything becomes blue; wherever the super-singularity goes, the parallax of stars gets turned into blackness; and all APCs and fire alarms get busted. In other words, singularities and supermatters don't mix well. Though who knows how outdated that code is, lore-wise. Of course, simply turning a singularity into a supermatter couldn't be that bad, right?