[Accepted] t0ky00's IPC Whitelist Application

[t0ky00]

♦ BYOND Key: t0ky00

♦ Character Names: Akari Sakata (Dominian Priestess), Kelly (Station-Bound), Elena Rose (Lunarian Ex-Military Paramedic), Nami Kasa (Martian Xenoarcheologist/Anomalist), Tetra Mayer (Dominian Investigator, a Noble from a minor House), Nayan Niemi (Lunarian Freelance Reporter), Ixone Strelitz (Dominian Zavodskoi Contracted Security Officer, Noble of House Strelitz)

♦ Species you are applying to play: IPC

♦ What color do you plan on making your first alien character: Exempt

♦ Have you read our lore section's page on this species?: Yes

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○ Why do you wish to play this specific race: For a very long time that I have spent playing SS13 on a multitude of servers very similar to Aurorastation, I learned to like and get more curious about IPC's and the gameplay related to them. It would be a very interesting and fun change from the monotony of having only human characters as of now. This would be my first Whitelist application and with it I hope to enjoy even more variety in roleplay as well as gameplay. To me they were always very interesting as they are very efficient machines (most of them) and there is a lot of room for unique roleplay engagements. Be it a emotionless IPC or a service IPC that simulated emotions to (almost) a human level. In this case I am applying to create a security based, contracted and created IPC for the station (and the NBT). Something about being bound to rules In Character and unable to stray from them whatsoever is an intriguing concept that I wish to experience, outside of playing a robot (since robot/android/cyborg code is... broken.) as it provides a very limited experience compared to an IPC.

○ Identify what makes role-playing this species different than role-playing a Human: The main difference would be, for my character in particular, that they are bound to a set of rules and they are owned by a certain company, allowed to move and act upon their jurisdiction provided from said owners and contractors. The way that you have to 'simulate' emotions if you play an IPC that is capable of doing so is also a very interesting concept to me that you simply can't do any other way. It can lead to very very interesting relationships In Character where a human tries to 'humanize' a completely lifeless machine. The other differences are physical capabilities, strengths and weaknesses. IPC's being machines with hydraulic joints, especially the industrial frames, are able to do tasks that are much more laborious and almost impossible for humans without assistance from an exosuit or exoskeleton. Of course due to their weight they move a lot slower than humans can to balance it out. Their strengths rely on their durability and ease-of-access repairs, requiring nothing more than just a few wires, some metal, a welder and a skilled robotics specialist. Albeit some models are a lot more expensive than some, suffering damage to an IPC's hand for example could cost a lot more between a G1 or G2 and a Zeng-Hu frame. They are extremely vulnerable to EMP attacks as well as laser fire as they, by default, produce heat whilst active they also require a cooling unit if the environment does not suit their working temperature threshold. Some IPC's are capable of space walking without said cooling unit whilst most others require them, some even requiring a full EVA suit alongside a cooling unit. And finally, an antagonist role as an IPC is something I have yet to experience, from what I can read on the wiki it says that more opportunities and items are available which is a very exciting thing to me as I love diversity.

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• Character Name: SCOUT 22

• Please provide a short backstory for this character: SCOUT 22 is one of the models created by Eridani Federation Military, Index Security Solutions, for use for security detail, peacekeeping and monitoring for any contracting company as well as smaller private firms. Every month the SCOUT units receive a memory wipe and receive a standard chipset for their personality and operating procedures. This memory wipe and re-initialization can happen sooner if the specific unit is to be moved to another station or ship for one of the three aforementioned duties (Odin/Aurora to Horizon). Their personality is consistent of very strict laws and inability to ever become free due to their make and purpose. They are incredibly resilient physically as their motor functions are more than capable of performing maneuvers to avoid gunfire/hazards or similar harm that is inbound as well as armor plating for resistance against ballistic weaponry. This makes them very vulnerable to EMP attacks. They are exceptionally obedient and are equipped with state of the art optical sensors, granting them the ability to recognize civilians, higher ranking personnel, threats, etcetera. Alongisde the optical sensors, their logical processors are completely oriented to a structure of command and orders, a complex system of receiving and executing orders as well as inquiring about an elaboration of said order if required. SCOUT 22 was created and manufactured in one of Oran's many manufacturing stations on the 4th of December, 2463. A full day was required to prepare the unit for it's duties and in a matter of a week it was contracted to work aboard the Aurora (Or Horizon). Transported in a batch across the Republic of Elyria and Tau Ceti region, dropping of individual units for contracting, SCOUT 22 was one of the last units of the SCOUT model to exit the TSS Humpback, a secure Cargo/Transport starship with a security fleet escorting it. After a few weeks of preparation and adjustments to the protocols, procedures and regulations to the company standards, it was employed to work in the Security department on the 5th of January, 2464.

• What do you like about this character?: SCOUT 22 would be a very unique security IPC, acting as an (almost) perfect mechanical security officer. Their frame is completely armored alongside with the armor provided by the contracting company on-site. The way they think, talk and make decisions is something that will be incredibly fun for me to do. I personally love order and rules and when things are fair and just I love sticking to it. The IPC in question would be incredibly consistent in communication and operation and I would do my best to achieve said result.

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♥ How would you rate your role-playing ability?: If there was a scale, I could not exactly pinpoint it as everyone has their own standards for good and bad roleplay. I myself have a very strong love for acting and writing. As SS13 is a text based game. Aurora in particular, focusing on high roleplay and immersion, I think I fit more than enough for most if not all roles as long as I am able to reference things from the WIKI (as I quite literally always do, having it open in the back always.). Familiar with the concepts of Metagaming and Powergaming, I strive to avoid them and stay away from them as far as possible. Alongside this, I try to fit my character's background, appearance and behavior and make them as life-like as possible in this game as well as using proper grammar and slang for their culture, origin, etcetera. In my own PERSONAL scale, I would rate my roleplaying ability at a 9/10.

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Notes:

Edited February 8, 2022 by The lancer

[Shadow7889]

Solid backstory and good understanding of IPC mechanics and lore. +1 from me. Imagine going from dominion to their mortal enemies. 

[The Stryker]

Hi! Thanks for applying. I have some questions and comments for the application before we can pass a ruling on it.

On 04/02/2022 at 23:01, t0ky00 said:

The main difference would be, for my character in particular, that they are bound to a set of rules and they are owned by a certain company, allowed to move and act upon their jurisdiction provided from said owners and contractors.

How rigidly does an IPC have to stick to these rules? In that case, what separates an IPC from a stationbound?

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 Identify what makes role-playing this species different than role-playing a Human: 

You have the mechanics and physical aspects of IPCs down to a T.  Could you talk more about how an IPC thinks, behaves, and functions in general? (I think you covered the basics in your reason for wanting to play IPC.)  Could you also talk about how IPCs get treated by society and how they fit in (or don't, in some cases)?

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• Character Name: SCOUT 22

Is 22 the number for this particular SCOUT model on-station, or the batch of SCOUT units? You also discuss briefly what a SCOUT unit is, but what model of IPC will it be or most closely fits (in ingame terms)?

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Every month the SCOUT units receive a memory wipe and receive a standard chipset for their personality and operating procedures. This memory wipe and re-initialization can happen sooner if the specific unit is to be moved to another station or ship for one of the three aforementioned duties (Odin/Aurora to Horizon).

What is the purpose of this?

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Their personality is consistent of very strict laws and inability to ever become free due to their make and purpose.

Could you talk more about their personality and directives?

I love the idea of a very rigid unit that definitely lends itself to the synthetic nature of IPCs, but it could do with a little expansion. Could you talk more about how SCOUT (the on-station one!) will behave? What mannerisms will it adopt? How will it respond to actions outside of security-related matters, for example, what if a fellow officer were to make small talk with it? Finally, how will the idea of monthly memory wipes be showcased ingame?

[t0ky00]

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How rigidly does an IPC have to stick to these rules? In that case, what separates an IPC from a stationbound?

AN IPC would depend on each individual Positronic brain and the design of it. This particular model would have a set of company directives from it's original makers and contractors, combined with the station regulations and rules. SCOUT models, SCOUT 22 in this case would be a specialized IPC for the Aurora/Horizon, sticking to the directives of the station/ship as strongly as possible. Very similarly to a stationbound but with a little more freedom with it's decision making due to it's logical on-board military grade processor.
But as an example, if a station bound has a rule similar to "You must spin in place every time you hear 'speen'." It would have to follow that order to a T.
Where SCOUT 22, IPC's in general, are outfitted with more loose orders. An example of the same type of rule would be "You can spin in place if you hear 'speen' and deem it necessary, beneficial and safe."

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You have the mechanics and physical aspects of IPCs down to a T.  Could you talk more about how an IPC thinks, behaves, and functions in general? (I think you covered the basics in your reason for wanting to play IPC.)

An IPC, as I said before, depends on their make and design. But generally they are meant to simulate humanoid workers as efficiently as possible, perhaps even better in some aspects, be it in physical labor, mental, clerical, medical, etcetera. Either created to be a luxurious, clean medical surgeon IPC, Perhaps a psychiatrist IPC that would have to have top notch body language recognition as well as audio receptors for all known species that would require such a service. But in most cases an IPC would be a simple, cheap, efficient working force in the physically laborious work fields, such as security, mining, cargo, etcetera. SCOUT 22 would be one of those simpler makes with the most advanced parts being it's armor, logical processing with a strict cause-and-effect hierarchy of rules and directives for decision making, alongside it's optical processor, able to detect weapons, hostile body language and more which is expected of a somewhat expensive IPC unit, such as SCOUTs.
 

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Could you also talk about how IPCs get treated by society and how they fit in (or don't, in some cases)?

IPCs in Bisel are technically very accepted to an extent where there is a whole District full of free and owned IPCs, District 14 of Mendell City. Due to the nature of the universe and the companies working together in the Orion Spur, some religions don't take so kindly to synthetic life in any form, some accept them quite openly, some are mixed and some accept only synthetics (IPCs). The Empire of Dominia in particular is very hostile towards synthetic life. So in this particular case on the Aurora/Horizon it would depend with whom SCOUT 22 is paired with. From my knowledge, people are required to respect IPCs as much as possible despite them being 'lifeless machines', they are property in regulations but property that can think, act, and simulate feeling on it's own, although they can be 'free' they often choose not to be due to their high maintenance cost (If they are even allowed to choose). Some would even debate that that alone would be enough to call them sapient to some degree. SCOUT models are resilient to all 'racial' confrontations directed towards them and they are set to not engage in it unless it will result in the unit itself being harmed. As usual the main directive of an IPC would be self preservation.

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Is 22 the number for this particular SCOUT model on-station, or the batch of SCOUT units?

SCOUT 22 is the singular model of the SCOUT model series which was mass produced in December, 2463. Designed and developed somewhere around February of 2463 as a requirement firstly in Oran, further developed to contracting. So to elaborate, there could be a SCOUT 56, SCOUT 100, SCOUT 521, etcetera. somewhere else in Tau Ceti or Republic of Elyria, working for a firm as security detail, a company and even military. Each SCOUT is catered to a specific clientele but only by a small margin.

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You also discuss briefly what a SCOUT unit is, but what model of IPC will it be or most closely fits (in ingame terms)?

The SCOUT type unit would be able to be compared to an Industrial First Generation model due to the simplicity of the frame but ease of access for handling and moving the unit around. On it's chest, back and shoulder they have handlebars for gripping. Those can be used to easily move the heavy IPC if it had suffered damage or is simply needed to be held, perhaps as a point-man it would be first to breach into a room, lead by the person behind it or another SCOUT unit as they are developed to be extremely cooperative (closely related to a SWAT tactic, a shoulder grab to indicate to the other person that you have their back in real life. Or when injured, the traps on a bulletproof vest, usually at the back near the neck.).

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What is the purpose of this?

The purpose of the memory wipes and re-initialization with a brand new chip is to maintain consistency of a strict personality. Releasing the strain of memory, keeping only path-finding and general memories that would be deemed 'useful'. Some SCOUT units can be an exception to this maintenance procedure should the contracting company request it, of course this comes with it's own fine print as they are prone to develop inconsistencies in their logical processing if not wiped consistently, in simpler terms, they would be able to develop emotions, learning more and more the more it interacts with sapient beings. As it's social interaction capabilities are quite limited, they could be manipulated by an antagonist or simply bonded to a human after some time. Despite this, they are not akin to a child and they aren't able to be manipulated easily.

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Could you talk more about their personality and directives? About how SCOUT (the on-station one!) will behave? What mannerisms will it adopt? How will it respond to actions outside of security-related matters, for example, what if a fellow officer were to make small talk with it?

I've touched on this in the text above, but to add to it I can give examples and actual directives they have coded in. Should an colleague engage in small talk with it, it would give somewhat bland but very direct answers with a raspy and sharp tone with a clear Eridanian accent.

Officer: "So, Scouty. What do you think of the Horizon?"
SCOUT 22: "The Horizon is a capable vessel which is still in prototyping phase. Safety assessment shows major flaws in design and path-finding errors."
Officer: "Uhuh... Why is it flawed?"
SCOUT 22: "A breach located in the center of the vessel would expose a large majority of the ship to vacuum."

Once the situation calls for it, the SCOUT unit is able to take a more authoritative tone, engaging it's built in speech volume boosters for crowd control. The tone and format of such commands would be as follows:
SCOUT 22 exclaims "<::CLEAR THE AREA!::>"
SCOUT 22 exclaims "<::HALT!::>"
SCOUT 22 exclaims "<::DROP YOUR WEAPON!::>"

The on-board SCOUT model is not allowed to exhibit a strong emotional response to any scenario, they are required to logically process each situation with a high speed military grade processor and determine the next course of actions. Their mannerism would be formal, strict and attentive, finally incredibly cooperative to orders from commanding staff. Albeit they are able to deny an order if the order conflicts with their current directives (This is where memory wipes come into play.), before denying though, they would most likely inquire further of the reasoning of the order if it is a massive conflict in their processing.

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Finally, how will the idea of monthly memory wipes be showcased ingame?

The monthly memory wipe would most likely not be very present with the current time format and change the server has (it basically almost never changes). But if a month passes in lore, SCOUT would lose all memory of any crew interactions and act as if they have never met them before. Other than that, the Unit would still be more than capable of navigating the ship/station and performing it's duties.

♥ Thank you for the quick reply, I hope this is satisfactory.

[The lancer]

Hi. While making an IPC such as this is fine, using them for an application generally doesn't provide the insight into the societal aspects of IPCs that we would like to see. You do have a good understanding of the mechanics surrounding the species, but I would ask you to tweak your character backstory to provide a short story that is not just them being made and shipped to the station. I would suggest making them an older model that has seen a bit of the world, having come into contact with other people and outlining how this shaped them as a character, what opinions they hold, etc. You may forego the memory wipes for that purpose. If you do this then this application will be complete I think.

On a different note, speech patterns like this

On 06/02/2022 at 00:33, t0ky00 said:

SCOUT 22 exclaims "<::CLEAR THE AREA!::>"
SCOUT 22 exclaims "<::HALT!::>"
SCOUT 22 exclaims "<::DROP YOUR WEAPON!::>"

are not really recommended. I would drop use of the "<::" as well as refraining from using all caps. The stereotype of validhunty G2 officers with little personality that only appear to yell all the time and engage the bad guys isn't one we'd like to encourage, especially in security. This does not mean that it cannot be pulled off successfully, or that security officers cannot shout orders, but I would be somewhat cautious to approve of it in a whitelist application. So I would recommend that you tweak this a bit as well.

[t0ky00]

1 hour ago, The lancer said:

Hi. While making an IPC such as this is fine, using them for an application generally doesn't provide the insight into the societal aspects of IPCs that we would like to see. You do have a good understanding of the mechanics surrounding the species, but I would ask you to tweak your character backstory to provide a short story that is not just them being made and shipped to the station. I would suggest making them an older model that has seen a bit of the world, having come into contact with other people and outlining how this shaped them as a character, what opinions they hold, etc. You may forego the memory wipes for that purpose. If you do this then this application will be complete I think.

On a different note, speech patterns like this

are not really recommended. I would drop use of the "<::" as well as refraining from using all caps. The stereotype of validhunty G2 officers with little personality that only appear to yell all the time and engage the bad guys isn't one we'd like to encourage, especially in security. This does not mean that it cannot be pulled off successfully, or that security officers cannot shout orders, but I would be somewhat cautious to approve of it in a whitelist application. So I would recommend that you tweak this a bit as well.

Thanks for the reply, below is the reworked version of the backstory of SCOUT 22. The speech pattern is out of the picture entirely, the memory wipes and the lack to gain emotion.
As the memory wipes are now gone SCOUT 22 can 'learn' emotions from other humans as it has been in its past contracting locations.
Also I have to note that I provided an example of SCOUT 22 talking to an officer, they are more than capable of speaking to people normally.

SCOUT 22 was created and manufactured in one of Oran's many manufacturing stations on the 15th of March, 2463. A full day was required to prepare the unit for it's duties and in a matter of a week it was contracted to work for the local police authority as a "Cadet", set to working it's way up. With zero to no emotions at the start of it's career, it was trained and programmed socially to respond as it should in it's work environment, to fulfill it's duties to its maximum capabilities and follow rules strictly. During it's work period on Oran it was exposed a number of crimes and scenarios where it gained knowledge and experience on how to react in the most efficient way possible, alongside this, it has interacted with many criminals and officers alike, IPCs as well as Human and other species occasionally. It's primary work locations being the safer regions of the Underworld on Oran. On a few occasions the unit suffered damage which required repair, due to this SCOUT 22 was offered to be simplified in it's chassis or improve in performance. SCOUT 22 chose the latter and began researching on it's own whilst recharging on idling nearby, guarding 'suits' and other companies, sometimes responding to criminal threats and assisting the Oran Police Department. After many months of development it was offered work off-world. It had an option to act as security detail for a dreadnought class ship which was sent out to chart Deadspace as well as the Human Frontier and the Aurora/Horizon. It chose a simpler, safer option of a research station/ship as it would gain the ability to improve in it's tactics, interactions and general performance to please it's creator. The SCOUTS who accepted their contracts to work off-world were then transported in a batch across the Republic of Elyria and Tau Ceti region, dropping of individual units for contracting, SCOUT 22 was one of the last units of the SCOUT model to exit the TSS Humpback, a secure Cargo/Transport starship with a security fleet escorting it. After a few weeks of preparation and adjustments to the protocols, procedures and regulations to the company standards, it was employed to work in the Security department on the 5th of January, 2464.

SCOUT 22 will still retain it's strict tone as any human/skrell/unathi is in the security force of either the station or ship since it chose to be as it is from the circumstances it was developed inside of and as stated before they are able to communicate normally and comprehensibly, acting upon cause-and-effect rather than emotion, prioritizing their work and performance over social interactions, albeit they will not flat out ignore or decline any sort of interaction.

I hope this will suffice.

[The lancer]

Accepted.