[Denied] Glorious Vendor Machine Lore

[VTCobaltblood]

Type (e.g. Planet, Faction, System): N/A

Founding/Settlement Date (if applicable): N/A

Region of Space: N/A

Controlled by (if not a faction): N/A

Other Snapshot information: what

Long Description:

This is an explanation of why vendors randomly throw things at people which I've been using for some time. Make it canon big plz.

To say that NT's vendor technology is a mess is a huge understatement. The printable vendor blueprints were made in a huge rush for the NTCC Odin opening deadline, and have not been updated for over a century. As such, many leftovers of scrapped technology are still present because their creators had no time to remove them, and are accidentally turned back on in their unfinished state due to technical oversights.

One example of such a technology is the vendor voice activation. After saying a certain codephrase along with your selection, the vendor would throw the selected item at the user for them to catch, and automatically pay for it from the employee's paycheck.

The throwing mechanism was almost perfected, with the vendor easily both locating the target and launching the desired object. However, the voice recognition technology was very far from finished. In the state that it currently is, the thrower seems to be activated from random sounds, including steps, opening doors and sufficiently loud breathing.

Software-wise, the vendor always listens for the signal to launch. However, the microphone is mechanically turned off. Damaged wire insulation can lead to the microphone wire catching a signal to turn on, which is usually combated by just cutting the microphone wire off entirely.

Important Note: kill me

[Coalf]

If I'm not wrong the companies that have made these vendors aren't actually NT itself but rather their respective name brands. Chipco etc.

I mean it's a nice theory but I don't see where it would really fit in.

Note: I am currently unable to kill you upon your request, I apologise for the inconvenience.

[VTCobaltblood]

If I'm not wrong the companies that have made these vendors aren't actually NT itself but rather their respective name brands. Chipco etc.

I mean it's a nice theory but I don't see where it would really fit in.

 

Despite that, each of the vendors has exactly the same wires and functionality, which is pretty unlikely if they are all made by different companies. I'm inclined to believe that the foods in these vendors are outsourced (so, Chipco vendor only contains foods made by Chipco and subsidiaries, etc.), but the vendor technology itself is NT's - or, really, anyone else's, since vendor machines being manufactured by NT isn't really a key point here.

 

Note: I am currently unable to kill you upon your request, I apologise for the inconvenience.

damn

Edited November 14, 2018 by Guest

[Coalf]

Well it's the same because the people who made it were fucking lazy per the usual developer discipline of SS13.

oops accidentally pressed the submit button.

What I wanted to add was, you can have this canon in your head however it's going to be as valid as any other theory since it can't really be "logged" anywhere.

Most likely it'll be forgoten in a few weeks, this is why I don't really see the purpose of making an explanation for something this simple when I think it's much funnier and simpler to have people make up their own theories for why this doesn't work.

[VTCobaltblood]

I don't really think it's because of laziness, moreso just game convenience - you need to only hack a vendor once to be able to hack other vendors. Vendors being named by food brand rather than the vendor machine itself's manufacturer isn't that far of a stretch, anyway. I really doubt that a food company would have a facility to produce machinery.

As for what you've added, well, I guess. This could be an in-game book or something, though, for it to be logged.

[Coalf]

If we want to go down that thought line, coke machines are branded by coke, pepsi and other food production companies however usually a different company that actually manufactures it while the food company itself owns it.

However if we want to go down that line of thinking, why would NT dedicate an entire branch or facility to make food vendors when they were a genetic company branching out into engine creationg, phoron reasearch and phoron mining.

Again it's not a bad application and the idea itself has only small technical problems that are honestly easily shrugged away just as we shrug the game issues away each day.

However what would be much better is if someone had created an explanation for all of our food companies and included that in there.

It seems like something that would get either ignored or changed at the next sight of it being in the way right now, so I'm not prone to accepting it but not denying it.

I'd say it's like Schrodigers cat, whatever explanation whatever character has for the vendors is correct and I think that's a good way to have it to explore what characters can think of in regards to explaining why the code is fucky.

Similarly like every character has a different explanation on how positronics work, where golems come from, how slimes work, how carps survive etc.

Like gravity IRL, we know it exists and what it does but we're not exactly sure what it is exactly.

You can write a book yourself frankly and nobody can really stop you from adding it to the library.

Hell you can even write it as a 3rd party and not your character using the Aurora-WI and Library function.

[VTCobaltblood]

I don't really like the concept of "Schrodinger's lore". I would prefer it way more if we actually had an explanation for how posibrains work, where golems come from, how slimes work, how carps survive and why vendors throw things at people randomly. I can accept Schrodinger's lore for non-canon things, such as wizards, vampires, Nar'sie etc, though. I guess I'm not really the one to argue with an admin about this. If writing in-game books about minor lore things like these and regarding them as canon is alright, then I guess this thread isn't really needed, and I would really like it if it was clarified somewhere that books can invent minor lore points.

[Coalf]

Actually this might suprise you, cult, wizards, vampries and Nar'sie are indeed canon. Just the rounds they happen in, are not.

Don't worry about my rank, you can argue with me about whatever you want, I'm no more educated on vending machine lore than you but what I'd like to see is something more than just "yeah X works like Y now" but rather a bigger explanation.

For example if this application came with some lore for all the food vendor corporations that I could refer to Zundy, that would just be top, but otherwise this is too barebones to declare boldly "canon" because small things like this CAN get in our way when we're making lore for the future and there is always the danger that we change it without really informing people because we simply forget about these very small things because there would be WAY TOO MUCH to remember.

Sadly Schrodigers lore is simply a difference in opinion and how it functions mostly right now because even small things like that can be potential traps to write ourselves into a corner at which point we might actually just change it because we need to, which puts into question why it was established in the first place.

Regarding the books, well, technically BadKitty and ScalesNStuff people consider real even though they're technically just player made books, so really it's canon as long as enough people go along with it.

So either I'll need this suggestion to be made CHONKIER or have a better reason to make a specific book detailing this.

[VTCobaltblood]

I don't think this is barebones. This simply explains one aspect of a thing. If I simply want to outline why vendors throw things at people, why do I need to think up the food corporations lore? It doesn't really make much sense to me.

[Coalf]

Because it's like establishing that guacamole is now spelled guacamoule.

I don't see a reason why this NEEDS to be canonized, what bridge this gaps, what this establishes.

It doesn't really explain why some vendors have secret or even illegal merchandise, why every vendor is designed differently externally instead of being a carbon copy with a re-paint.

It's information so extranious it doesn't even have a place to be writen in besides the IC library and any lore developer can tell you "yeah sure it's canon" on discord and it'll bear as much relevance as me writing it here.

Application denied.