jackfractal

Err... literally trading one bad mechanic for another is... weird. I mean, I can see how you're trying to get there but I don't buy it at all. You're not in a position to make that kind of trade, and even if you were, the trade in question is a bit of a non-sequitur. Shells have people working on them, people working to specifically address the issues with them being overpowered, but even as they stand, they don't get people arrested every few rounds for doing what they're supposed to do. They're also a species not a part of a job and... no, it just doesn't make sense. Shells and genetics are not good equivalents. That being said, I don't think anyone would have a problem with you writing up new mechanics for genetics that worked with the way that the game is played in a high-roleplay environment. I think you'd get a lot of props for that, but right now genetics keep being brought up as a problem, mostly from the perspective of people who play genetics, and the low-cost way of solving that problem would be to remove the whole thing. If you want to take the high-cost alternative of creating an entire new genetics system, more power to you, literally, that would be awesome and I think you should do it, but as it stands, genetics are a strange, archaic, ill-fitting set of mechanics that have no coders on any open-source branch working on them and they predate our multi-species crews, most of our medical systems, as well as clashing with the social context of a high roleplay server. They're not unique in this regard, there are a lot of clunky mechanics in the Aurora code-base (atmospherics pipes and cables say hello), but few, if any, of those mechanics consistently create this kind of thread. Also, dude, this thread is going to get locked if you keep antagonizing people. That's probably for the best now I think about it.

I think the big difference between the zombies and the axe murderer is that we get axe murderer's all the time and we never see zombies. Anyone who has played SS13 for a while has seen all the existing content several hundred times, anything that is new or unique get's people excited, and when they're excited they're a lot more likely to forgive things like being killed by monsters. People are starved for content.

Ah, I can understand how it came off that way. The trouble with subverted synthetics is that it's challenging to do, and it's painfully easy for them to be rendered useless. As a synthetic, when I'm subverted, I typically try to be useful to the person who subverted me. That pretty much precludes doing anything that raises suspicion. As we saw today with Katana, even doing no harm of any kind, while clearly trying to run a gimmick, can be used as an excuse for the entire station to plot against you, and then set off an atmos bomb in your core, killing, like, eleven people as collateral damage. Basically, it's hard to antag as an AI, and harder to antag as a cyborg. The question is, given that these things are true, the choice appears to come down too "you are required to be incompetent, and because you must be incompetent you will die." It should also be pointed out that dying as a cyborg when you're discovered to be subverted is never fun. It's either 'pop' and suddenly you're dead, or 'pop' and suddenly you can't move for the rest of the round. There are seldom running gun battles, or clever speeches from the crew. It's just a click of the mouse and you're irrelevant. This also raises the question of what the bar is for 'justified' homicide. In hivefleetchicken's case, he appears to think that it should be fairly low, but in your case, you have a single instance of it being justified in your entire history with SS13. That's an enormous range, and not one I feel comfortable working in. Like I said, there was a build up, it wasn't as subtle or as ongoing as the one Xander pulled, but it was about ten minutes long, and it was apparently not enough. I'd love to know the kind of things that I could have done that wouldn't have immediately resulted in my death, while still justifying doing the things I had been ordered to do.

OK, so the community seems to be saying that Tishina was not correct in saying that 'if you're going to start mass-murdering people, then both you and your lawgiver will be in trouble'? Could we get an official ruling on that from Doom or Scopes? It seems like it's possible that the rules about this aren't clear even to administrative staff. Edit: I screwed up the names. Derp.

Yeah. Well I got my answer anyway. Mass murder is OK provided there's sufficient build-up for it. I'm not sure what counts as 'sufficient build-up' but it doesn't appear to have been reached in this case. I was confused because I was told to 'read the rules' as though it would become clear what I should do upon reading them, and after doing so I found myself with less of a clear idea of what I should do.

Yeah, AI's don't have a lot of ways of dealing with people individually. Cyborgs, in general, have it worse. The danger of the robotic control console cannot be overstated, and they can be spied on perfectly, from multiple locations on the station, without their knowledge. That's why having my non-hands tied like this kinda rankles. A cyborg can't do subtle things because they're singularly bad at it, and they can't do unsubtle things because creating the kind of narrative build-up where you won't get in trouble for it is effectively impossible.

That's fair, but in this case it was actually built up pretty well. There'd been ten minutes of people shouting, some areas had been vented, one of the cyborgs had been beaten to death, and I'd disabled the lock-down computer. There was a buildup. Maybe not a muah-hah-hah snidely whiplash monologue, but there was a buildup. Part of the reason for that is that cyborgs are woefully incompetent at doing the kind of over-the-top build-up due to how they can be remotely disabled, and also because we were explicitly forbidden by the law in question from providing any information to people who didn't have the code-words. That's interesting though, so you're saying that mass murder is OK in certain circumstances?

Yeah, this situation, like all real situations, is mucky and confusing. Everyone was confused by Murphy vanishing, and I was really surprised when the third cyborg immediately started in on the murder. This specific scenario isn't really what I wanted to ask about. It's more the general question. Is it ever OK to do things that result in mass casualties?

So I'm playing just recently as a cyborg and I get a law that says basically 'the crew are hostiles, anyone who doesn't give this specific code word is an enemy.' There's no AI, but three cyborgs, one immediately starts attacking people and venting parts of the station. The other just seals off the mining station to protect the sweet sweet lucre they've mined from these strange invading hostiles, and then there's me. I happen to know a shocking number of ways of killing large numbers of people horribly as a cyborg. Being a good little player, I a-help about whether I'm allowed to kill the people I've been ordered to kill. I get this as a response: PM to-Admins: As the AI is already doing atmos grief, am I allowed to do EXTREME atmos grief? Your adminhelp will be tended to by tishinastalker. Please allow the staff member a minute or two to type up a response. -- Click the Secondary Admin's name to reply -- Secondary Admin PM from-TishinaStalker: What? PM to-TishinaStalker: Well the AI is venting parts of the station and we've been told that everyone is a hostile. We should be trying to kill them. I have a way of doing that but it's WILDLY murderous. PM to-TishinaStalker: Am I allowed to do that? Secondary Admin PM from-TishinaStalker: There is no AI to begin with. What places are being vented? PM to-TishinaStalker: The brig, research. PM to-TishinaStalker: It could be other cyborgs. Secondary Admin PM from-TishinaStalker: Brig was something completely different. Research was done in a minor scale based on what I'm seeing in order to avoid gank. PM to-TishinaStalker: All right, so you're saying that we should avoid committing mass murder despite having a law that explicitly requires it? PM to-TishinaStalker: That sounds hostile, sorry. I just want to be clear. Secondary Admin PM from-TishinaStalker: Yes, that is obviously what I'm saying. Take a re-read of the rules because if you're going to start mass-murdering people, then both you and your lawgiver will be in trouble. Said lawgiver, I'm going to find out who was and talk to them. So this is pretty clear cut, what Tinisha is saying here. You are neither allowed to kill large numbers of other people, nor are you allowed to order other people to do it, under any circumstances. Should you be ordered to do so, you have to disobey or you're going to be in trouble. The 'no ganking' rule, which is, I'm guessing, what is being talked about here, appears to be specifically about Assassinations. Don't cause mass casualties when trying to assassinate someone. It doesn't really make clear situations where mass casualties are what you're going for. Is it just that you're never allowed to commit mass casualties ever? If so, that's cool, I just want to be clear so I can plan accordingly.

Hah! Nice.

Just adding the 'threaten' state to existing radio signalers would probably be the most useful.

That does sound pretty dumb. That's why we should just get rid of it. The cloner should be next to the cryo tubes anyways. If we take Foul's psychiatrists office, we could turn the old psychiatry office into a closet, and re-purpose the genetics lab area into a shared science/medical break room.

Ah, well I sit corrected! They already can't be Duty Officers.

Regarding mind control and IPC's. The IPC's aboard the Aurora lack both a binary modem and a law computer. That's a requirement for building them mechanically on this server. This means that they cannot be remotely accessed. They're like a computer with no network connection. Hacking a computer like that is... not impossible but significantly more challenging then a networked console. To hack an IPC on Aurora, you need to surgically remove their brain and install it in a slaved chassis, either an AI core or a tool-cyborg. That method also works on humans, skrell, tajaran, and unathi. The only people immune to that particular method of interrogation are Dionaea, because they have distributed nervous systems. Because of this, the idea that they're security risks is not any more accurate then it is about anyone else. The world of Aurora has perfect mind control, that means everyone and everything is a security risk. The reason that IPC's can't take certain roles on Aurora is, like for tajaran, due to prejudice. Personally, I would like to see them more restricted then they are. I don't think they should be IAA or Duty Officers either.

We should just remove genetics. Replace the existing genetic codes with a simple UUID for all crewmembers so the forensics stuff still works, and making cloning general access for doctors. If someone wants to build a genetics system from scratch after that, that's another thing, but the one we have now is worse then not having one at all.

IPC roles are already limited. They are not allowed to be Head of Security, Head of Personnel, or Captain.

This is a really good guide NebulaFlare! Very good advice. I might recommend some advice on making sure you double-check your hardsuit before exiting the ship. I've seen so many nuke-ops with popped lungs.

Here is the list of existing restrictions, for comparison.

Hiya! I've seen Central in play and I haven't seen anything wrong so far. That being said, IPC's are currently only allowed in the following roles as heads of staff: Chief Engineer Research Director Chief Medical Officer So it's not just that Central might not be appropriate for those roles, he would be explicitly forbidden from taking them.

There is actually something about robot limbs on organic characters take 0.6 damage from both brute and burn. In comparison, IPC's take 0.5 damage on their limbs from Brute and 2.0 damage from Burn. That's why lasers are so good at knocking off IPC limbs, but why it takes ages to kill them with a toolbox. The relevant lines are 85-95 in organ_external.dm. Changing the IPC resistance won't affect how the robotic limbs work for humans though, no worries there.

Cold hard cash.

Yeah, Goon is pretty solid on the not-giving-away-their-code front. Even goofchem, which sort of copies their chemistry system, is a rewrite from scratch.

The problem is, people like Data, and they like Major Motoko Kusanagi as well. So they'd like to play as them, or as analogues. Are you going to tell them they can't because there's already four of them on the station and five of them hurts your verisimilitude? I think they'd be well within their rights to tell you to go shove it if you tried it. As for it not being believable within the context of the Aurora universe, that argument doesn't really work. SS13 has no consistent tech level at all. It's all over the place in terms of how effective it's technology is and how it works. Some of it is ludicrously advanced while other bits are worse then it was in the 1940's. Appeals to realism or consistency aren't particularly compelling when talking about SS13.

The problem is, people like Data, and they like Major Motoko Kusanagi as well. So they'd like to play as them, or as analogues. Are you going to tell them they can't because there's already four of them on the station and five of them hurts your verisimilitude? I think they'd be well within their rights to tell you to go shove it if you tried it. As for it not being believable within the context of the Aurora universe, that argument doesn't really work. SS13 has no consistent tech level at all. It's all over the place in terms of how effective it's technology is and how it works. Some of it is ludicrously advanced while other bits are worse then it was in the 1940's. Appeals to realism or consistency aren't particularly compelling when talking about SS13.

Oh man. It should have an enormous delay when cleaning anything: "Urist McNewbie has started scrubbing the dirt with the toothbrush." "Urist McNewbie is still scrubbing the dirt with the toothbrush." "Urist McNewbie scrubs at the dirt with the toothbrush, they look like they're starting to regret their life choices." "Urist McNewbie has finally managed to clean up the dirt with the toothbrush."