Making Xenoarcheology an actual job/role (and not an alt-title)

[Captain Gecko]

"Xenoarcheologist" and "Anomalist" currently are alternate titles for the Scientist role. Thus they get the same permissions, same expectations, same limits, etc. I believe that it would be for the better, especially with the Horizon on the horizon (laugh, please).

 

Why should we make Xenoarchs an actual role:

- The expectations are way different. Xenoarchs and Anomalists are very often either outside, or in their anomalous dungeon. While they can handle RnD, chemistry, and such, they do not have the same skills as other scientists, and neither do they have the time to do their job. I mean, hell, the "alt-title" literally got its own wiki-page, that's how different they are.

- A Xenoarcheologist could use access unique to their own role, such as a limited access to the mining department and the mining pods. Not to go out by themselves (because EVA is currently highly dangerous but that's a discussion for another day so going alone is suicidal), but to move with more ease in and out of the department, and on their own. Active anomalies have to be handled fast very often, and needing a miner or someone else from operations to open the door can often lead to unneeded wounds or even death (IE: radiations emitting anomalies).

- Access to better EVA gear. I get the balance between voidsuits, and I perfectly understand why the science voidsuit is so miserable... It's not meant for hard work, nor is it meant for exploration. It's used by your local telescientist to not die in case their portal went wrong, or for your local bombmaker to assess the damages of their creation in person. But this makes Xenoarcheology incredibly hard and dangerous. the EXTREMELY LIMITED view range afforded by the headlamp (3 tiles at most) certainly shows its limits in the pitch-black environments of the asteroids around the Horizon, and while the (light) protection against radiations is welcome, the paper-thin armor means that a couple of carps can very well end you if RNG isn't in your favour once they hit you. (See more about that below in the "intricacies" category)

- No more confusion about "Scientists" doing X job. A rare instance, and a minor one, but one that happens nonetheless... Since they are the same job, a "Scientist" can leave and do Xenoarcheology. There's nothing wrong with it, since it's all alt-titles... But I've seen a few instances where Scientists expected to do RnD and the likes get shouted at for doing Xenoarcheology, which they were still allowed to do. Separating the two jobs can prevent such confusion.

 

Intricacies, things to tweak and change and not forget about if we ever go on with that:

- The role capacity, or whatever it's called. Currently, I'm pretty sure we can have 5 scientists tops, which includes Xenoarcheology. If Xenoarcheology becomes its own role, first, I see up to three players in this role, I've seen this happen quite a lot on busy rounds, but never more than that. Scientists would then have their numbers reduced to 3-4 players tops, I supposed.

- "Anomalist" becomes an alt-title for the "Xenoarcheologist" role.

- The Xenoarch's "better" EVA gear can be anything. At first, a cheap solution might be mining gear (assuming the Xenoarch role has access to the mining department). They present different advantages and drawbacks... Better armor and lights, lack of resistance to radiations... It's a choice, to make, but I feel like a Xenoarcheologist in mining voidsuit would DEFINITELY have higher chances of survival.

The better solution might be the creation of a Xenoarcheology voidsuit, one that strikes a middle-ground between the mining and science one... But that would be for another thread entirely. Just know that, since Xenoarcheology becomes a role on its own, only they have access to it.

- As far as access goes, it would be comparable to a Xenobotanist's or Xenobiologist's, with the added (partial) access to the mining department.

 

With this logic, why not giving a unique role for telescientists, bomb-makers or exploratory chemists?:

- Lore-wise, I feel like it would represent the slow, and small, but still noticeable growing interest in anomalies and such. The Aurora was a SCIENCE station, the Horizon is an EXPLORATION ship. To quote its wiki page: "While detecting Phoron is considered the primary objective, there also exists secondary and even tertiary objectives in which the crew of the SCCV Horizon must attempt to accomplish - examples of which are investigating potential colony sites for the expansion of the Stellar Corporate Conglomerate and the Republic of Biesel, as well as analysing deep space anomalies to uncover the mysteries of the Orion Spur, and hopefully unearthing additional information on why Phoron exists and why it has such a profound impact within the regions of which it is discovered."

- Gameplay-wise, bomb-making and telescience are much less time consuming. On the Aurora, it takes between 30 to 60 minutes to extract a find and bring it back, and I'm not speaking about actually analyzing the finds... On the Horizon, it can take up to an hour and a half (which is WAY too long, but once again, something for another thread.)

 

 

If people ever agree with such a thing, of course, we would have, then, to see through other thread how it would be implmented, some of the intricacies (IE, the Xenoarch voidsuit if people ever agree with such a concept), but I just want to see if people ever agree about making the Xenoarcheologist an actual role first.

Edited April 18, 2022 by Captain Gecko

[wowzewow]

Honestly, with the job scope Xenoarcheologist has, I honestly thought it was a completely different job. The job definitely needs a little more fleshing out, but it's definitely achievable. Perhaps after NBT drops.

 

Anyway, yeah. Access is probably important too.

[Myazaki]

- Access/Expectations

I can get behind giving them separate access or exclusive job role expectations with Scientists.

- Role Capacity

I guess this could be increased? Will have to see what it looks like when Horizon is around. Can be easily done!

- Access to mining department

Not a fan of this one. It's just going to lead to problems with respect to their shuttle, gear and scientists trying to be miners to get materials for RnD. Instead the xenoarcheologist areas should have whatever gear they need. Which... they already mostly do. 

- Better Voidsuits

Making the lights the same as the mining voidsuit makes sense. I'm wary about buffing armour values, but it might be sensible for it to be the same as the mining voidsuit -- Only ones available to xenoarcheologists/xenobotanists. It's fine for people to get injured on dangerous science missions.

Quote

On the Aurora, it takes between 30 to 60 minutes to extract a find and bring it back, and I'm not speaking about actually analyzing the finds... On the Horizon, it can take up to an hour and a half (which is WAY too long, but once again, something for another thread.)

The time to return with a find will definitely decrease a lot when people are more practiced and used to moving the Horizon as well as the shuttles. Especially if peeps use the teleporters as well. We're waiting to change this until we see how speedy people get with the current state of things.

The actual job content needs a rework / polishing and some new stuff now we have the overmap, for sure.

[Captain Gecko]

On 01/04/2022 at 16:53, Myazaki said:

It's fine for people to get injured on dangerous science missions.

That I can definitely agree with. And, well, I said it and will say it again, as a Xenoarch/Anomalist main, I really don't mind unfair deaths unless it's from something unintended like a glitch or bad roleplay... Like, stepping into the Xenoarcheology Atrium is basically like signing a contract that says that RNGeesus now handles your fate. That and, as a Unathi main, I can always shrug off some seriously ridiculous ammounts of damages so I don't worry about that...

However I still believe that a suit upgrade might be needed, beyond a better headlamp (see below.)

 

On 01/04/2022 at 16:53, Myazaki said:

We're waiting to change this until we see how speedy people get with the current state of things.

Also this. The Horizon is still basically in its infancy. The testing weeks are basically over, but I assume that we're still going to see a lot of updates and maybe even changes the moment it drops, and I'd rather wait for these changes to happen first, and for us to get used to it to speak too much about this part... Plus the fact that it's a whole other subject that deserves its own thread... So I'll be brief.

Basically, it's just the idea of being so far from the main ship that makes EVA so dangerous currently. The new fauna, despite how brutal it can be, is welcome... However, the risks to have a "slow death" are much higher. Say... That a shark headbutts you in the wrong spot and your lungs have been damaged. On the Aurora, you might have been able to walk back to the station and have a First Responder pick you up once inside, but out there it's not possible. You have to head back to your pod, maybe wait for your miner pals to come back too, cycle in, fly back to the ship, cycle again, and then get picked up. The whole process takes at least up to (extra) five minutes (compared to how it went on the Aurora) which is MORE than enough to make a difference between life and death. The Horizon cannot hear you from your rock unless you're already in your pod with the long range communicator, so calling the First Responder for a rescue is out of the question, plutting aside the fact that they'd need to get on a pod, cycle, fly to the destination, cycle, pick you up, etc. There's the idea of taking a First Responder with you from the get go, but unless you get wounded it's gonna get boring for you, they might not have the tools for the right operations, and at some point, it just turns into a whole expedition (which had this kind of danger level) just for a random anomaly, or some minerals. There's no easy answer to balancing the added lethality of the new EVA, as far as I can see, and once again, now is probably not the right time to try to answer it, maybe in a few weeks when we'll all be used to this.

But anyways yeah that's my reasoning behind all of this, and why science, or at least the Xenoarch, should have a suit armor upgrade of some kind.

 

TL;DR: EVA is much more unforgiving on the Horizon, it's less about getting hurt and more about being killed by things that tended not to on the Aurora.

Edited May 25, 2022 by Captain Gecko

[KingOfThePing]

I agree, that Xenoarcheology should not be just a scientist alt-title. It also pains me how bare-bones it is, especially coming to artifacts. Maybe I will recruit a coder to work with me on it, but no promises. There is great potential for expansion here, especially with the Horizon.

I believe, especially with the points about dangers you made, Xenoarcheology has to be newly approached in general, when it comes to equipment and standard operating procedures. 

[Myazaki]

29 minutes ago, Captain Gecko said:

*snip*

I think the intention is that Scientists try to tag along on the Intrepid missions, or get a Bridge Crewman to take them on one. The Intrepid has a little medbay. Take the miners in that, too, if it's suitable. Then you have people to drag you out and patch you up.

Also I think the teleporter room will be more useful on the Horizon to teleport a doctor to you, to save you having to fly back to the Horizon before you get help.

---

But maybe I'm getting off-topic. 

[Captain Gecko]

Almost two months later, and after the Horizon properly dropped, I come back to this thread! Honestly, I think working with miners is... Mostly a plus? But certainly unhandy at times. I guess we would need output from other Xenoarch players to know how much they like it. Most of my problems are still there however. Most of my suggestions, I believe are still valid, namely:

- A Xenoarch would need access to parts of the mining department, at least to access and leave the mining bay on their own. Needing to wait for someone to open the door can be tedious at times, dangerous at others (IE: needing to relocate an active anomaly from the shuttle to an isolation room QUICK.)

- A Xenoarch needs to better EVA gear, namely, a better suit. I have created another thread to discuss this matter, and I believe that this is the most important. The Fauna and the likes has been balanced around miners, which is great, but also makes Xenoarcheology even more dangerous than it already was, considering how weak the current science suits are.

 

One... Issue persists too. The time it takes to bring materials back to the Horizon is much shorter than back when we started, which is good. The rate at which we bring anomalies, however, is way too low. I don't play more or less than back on the Aurora, but while back then I would be able to bring an anomaly back at least 75% of my rounds (generally interrupted by antag rounds and the likes). Now on the Horizon, after almost two months of playing on it, I only managed to bring TWO proper anomalies (the big ones counted as major artifacts on your ore scanner). Increased danger and the likes certainly is one of the main reasons behind this, but another one is also lack of access to any asteroids. As stated previously, no miners means no access to the shuttle, and while on rare occasions a pilot will be spared to take just a single Anomalist to a nearby asteroid on the Intrepid, lack of independance is still one of the mains reasons behind rounds where I... Pretty much do nothing. This is pretty frustrating to me, and I assume players in the same situation as mine where we only get the time to play a couple of rounds a week on average, to end up stuck in boring rounds where we cannot do anything due to such factors. As far as I go, I cannot think about an easy solution to this... That and perhaps I just happened to be extremely unlucky and other players got to find anomalies on a more regular basis.

 

 

I also hope that some other Xenoarch players will give their input too in there.

[Boggle08]

The part you speak of about getting out of mining on your own, there is a simple solution: On the old aurora, many of our doors were programmed to have all access flowing out of the department. The function for this still exists, but none of the doors here are mapped with it programmed in at the start. Getting this reimplemented across the map is worth it's own thread. 

I don't really see the point of Xenarchs and anomalists separating into their own role, when it sounds like there are so many obstructions to getting your hands onto anything substantial. These obstructions would have to be resolved in my mind.

There's plenty of space on deck two, the only solution I can see as being permanent is the eventual creation of a specialized ship just for anomalists. If we map in a small hangar that is port of the science department, and give it a small shuttle with a specialized anomaly compartment. The pod gets in and out of the ship via a massive hangar bulkhead that rests above or below it.

A specialized anomaly compartment on the shuttle is necessary. I've gone on one expedition with you before, and we had to leave an artifact behind because it kept EMPing the mining brick. If the shuttle had SMES units and APC equipment like they do now, it probably would have marooned us. A specialized compartment that can keep artifacts contained in a vacuum environment, and down the line eventually suppress their effects for transport, would be a godsend. Another thing that would be good is leaving enough space on the shuttle for a retextured M.U.L.E. rover that can carry one large anomaly and the anomalist's suspension field generator. The longer you're out there, the more chances you have of something going wrong. Having this MULE device will help the xenarch so they don't have to do so much slow wrangling with heavy equipment and big anomalies.

 

[Captain Gecko]

7 hours ago, Boggle08 said:

I don't really see the point of Xenarchs and anomalists separating into their own role, when it sounds like there are so many obstructions to getting your hands onto anything substantial. These obstructions would have to be resolved in my mind.

Oh yeah, let's CERTAINLY NOT separate these two since, as far as the game goes, it's practically the same job with different specializations (The Xenoarch is more knowledgeable about historical artifacts, while the anomalist is more about unnatural phenomena linked to these). What I meant up there was that Anomalists be made, then, an alt-title of the Xenoarcheology job, basically.

 

7 hours ago, Boggle08 said:

A specialized anomaly compartment on the shuttle is necessary. I've gone on one expedition with you before, and we had to leave an artifact behind because it kept EMPing the mining brick. If the shuttle had SMES units and APC equipment like they do now, it probably would have marooned us. A specialized compartment that can keep artifacts contained in a vacuum environment, and down the line eventually suppress their effects for transport, would be a godsend. Another thing that would be good is leaving enough space on the shuttle for a retextured M.U.L.E. rover that can carry one large anomaly and the anomalist's suspension field generator. The longer you're out there, the more chances you have of something going wrong. Having this MULE device will help the xenarch so they don't have to do so much slow wrangling with heavy equipment and big anomalies.

 

While I would appreciate a new shuttle, note that the EMP problem is no longer a thing! Back then on our little misadventure, the issue was that we lacked anomaly containers, which were originally made EXACTLY for that kind of situation. Sure it's just another piece of gear to pull around, and something that takes space, but it basically "freezes" anomalies preventing to do whatever they do, from what I got by experience... And by now these anomaly containers have been put back in the atrium, thank god.

As far as the idea of a new shuttle goes, however, I leave this to devs and mappers. As far as I know, it's a "no", so far.

Edited May 28, 2022 by Captain Gecko