Further Atmospheric Technician and Engineer Division

[Sneakyranger]

I've seen the suggestion to merge atmospheric technicians and engineers brought out repeatedly over the past several months, and those who partake in those discussions know that I am generally speaking a staunch opponent to the idea.
It has been made clear that administration have no interest in alt-titles being permitted as an excuse for one to not do certain parts of a role's job - I understand that the electrician alt title was especially notorious for this issue. Therefore, any merger of atmos tech and engineer then must be, fundamentally, only one job with a thin veneer of difference.
As I illustrated in serious discussion, this merger is in my eyes undesirable for several reasons, including the following:

1. A job that is expected to interface with specific mechanics means that the character must be expected to either learn how to interface with those mechanics or already know.
2. Merging atmospherics technician and engineer will mean that engineers will be expected to know how to interface with pipes in an intermediate manner. The alternative is that no one will be expected to know how to interface with pipes in an intermediate manner, and this is unlikely because breaches often cause pipe damage that requires vent placement or scrubber placement, and the benefits of minor upgrades are unlikely to go ignored because the knowledge will not immediately disappear from the playerbase - this will cause some engineers as well as outside observers to begin to expect the upgraded performance.
3. Alt-titles provide no fundamental differentiation in a job's knowledge expectation on Aurora, and therefore are completely pointless beyond personal character flavor. They will not remove the knowledge expectation. They will likely only make it worse.
4. It is unhealthy for a department with as many deep mechanics as engineering to encourage characters who know all of it, both from an OOC and IC standpoint. The OOC irritation has been established in #2 - and with many engineering players' tales of irritating bridge crew - but justifying all that education for a character forces a character to be hypercompetent just because of how, in character, these disciplines are not only unrelated but also extremely complicated.
5. At present, the two jobs allow one to interact primarily only with the mechanics of the department they enjoy. Many engineers loathe pipes. A few rare cryptid players love pipes and find repair work trite. This should be expanded on instead of quashed, as nothing is really lost from doing so.

Engineering would be better served by further differentiating its two roles, not by merging them in to what would be in practice super-engineers. The alt-title is all well and good until it's all hands on deck and there is no longer a meaningful differentiation of labor. 

To carry out this differentiation, I propose the following:

1. An easy method of injecting pure, cold phoron in to the thrusters that is able to be done by engineers with little IC or OOC knowledge. This is already partially in place, but a way to carry it out without engineers having to set foot in atmospherics would be preferable.
2. Locking the atmospheric tank control computers behind atmospheric technician access. For those unfamiliar, these are the computers next to the giant gas tanks that change their pressure output level and are mandatory for distribution upgrades. 
3. Editing to wiki articles to encourage players to differentiate their roles better. I can carry this out myself and plan to do so on the soon-to-be-revitalized Guide to Thrusters, and can easily carry it out elsewhere.
   As an aside to this, atmospheric technicians are generally treated as "engineer but different" because that's how they're played as or seen as by many. I feel like illustrating that this is not to be done is sufficient enough to change the culture without really requiring too much immediate moderation influence. I myself have delegated different tasks to capable techs in the past to great effect, because they already have tools that the engineer does not if they know how to use them.

 

Finally, before submitting this topic, I have three things I want to cover, each in bold and placed at the end so they're more likely to be read:

Differentiating the jobs further would not create a situation akin to medical where the department is hamstrung because a role is missing. Engineers already carry on without atmos techs in the status quo - techs just make the department better. A lack of them does not make the current status quo worse.

Whatever differentiation is done, it does not need necessarily to be the above proposal. Half of this post is an argument against the merge - I just dislike suggestions that don't offer a way forward with whatever they're suggesting.

Finally, if you intend to skim this post, I suggest skimming the proposal and reading the argument against the merge more deeply.

Edited June 23, 2023 by Sneakyranger
Edited the last line to clarify that people should read the anti-merge argument more closely and skim the proposal if necessary. Original line was more vague than I would have liked.

[Sycmos]

I'm more or less in agreement with all of Sneaky's points. As someone who has been consistently playing Engineer for the last three years, both as a normal engineer and as a Chief Engineer, the increased importance on Engineering presence has been very noticeable and on many occasions detrimental to both participation in roleplay and occupational mechanics. The unspoken expectation of Engineering players to perform the tasks of both an intermediate Engineer and Atmospheric Technician, regardless of whether they are one or the other, places far too much responsibility on them for the functionality of the Horizon and by consequence the enjoyment of players who utilize its functionality (Bridge Crew, in particular). This forces Engineering players to potentially sacrifice more time that could be spent interacting with other players in a roleplay-oriented fashion, which effectively means they are trading their own enjoyment of a round for someone else's at a loss. As a "heavy roleplay" server, we should be promoting changes that incentivize bringing these differences into roleplay and character interactions, and make sure that we are not homogenizing the experiences of players who may not be comfortable with performing more mechanical obligations and/or incorporating IC character knowledge that was previously unneeded for their profession. Merging Atmospheric Technician and Engineer will only aggravate these problems as we continue to further and further put pressure on Engineering players to fulfill tasks outside of their mechanical obligations and in-character backgrounds, overall promoting less roleplay and potentially driving away players from playing believable, grounded Engineering characters.

[Peppermint]

Big fan of further job differentiation. To be honest I'd be fine with more alt-roles across the board as they lead to a wealth of character differences and encourage creativity and roleplay. This all sounds pretty good to me.

[niennab]

It wasn't until recent that I found out that thrusters are technically an Atmospheric Technician's job and while the wiki doesn't neccessarily give Engineers a pass to deny doing them, I do think that by both roles being expected to do all of the standard procedures really does make Atmospheric Technician an alt title in everything but its name. I wouldn't want to see the roles merged either, but instead that the division of labour is more sectioned off and clear cut.

I think that by diversifying both roles it'll make the department feel more distinctive and unique internally. Beyond that, Atmospheric Technicians are quite literally and somehow collectively OOC the most brilliant people in understanding atmospheric code AND eager to teach it. There's apart of me that would hate to lose the name even for that last, frivilous reason.

[La Villa Strangiato]

Pretty much all the atmos techs I've met not only merit but deserve extra cool shit in their department, and I'd support differentiating the roles more. Now merge physician and surgeon. NOW.

[ShakyJake]

During the time I've played here, I've had a kinda mixed stance on this subject, but I've come to definitely lean on maintaining role differentiation. I pretty much play atmospheric technician exclusively here because I enjoy the mechanics of it, but a lot of people in engineering really don't care for it at all, which is totally fair. If you really want to dive into that stuff, it can get fairly complicated.

I love messing with thrusters, so I pull out some kind of gigathruster stuff whenever I play. When I was at my most active, what I unfortunately started hearing about is some bridge crew would start pestering other engineers for similar levels of thrust and such when I'm not playing. Big thruster upgrades can take up a significant portion of the round, depending on how far you take them. Expecting most engineers to spend 30 minutes on thruster upgrades every round is obviously quite ridiculous,

Ultimately, that all stems from how most people tend to look at atmos techs and regular engineers as essentially the same thing, and expecting the same things from them. It's a cultural problem more so than a direct mechanical one, but it's certainly encouraged by the mechanics. A firmer differentiation between the two roles would better draw a line in the sand on where expectations lie, so that engineering players can focus primarily on what they are here to do without worrying about taking on the full weight of mechanics that really aren't their role's focus. 

I feel that merging the roles together would be a step in the wrong direction in addressing these issues, and would only reinforce them if anything. I'm not opposed to adding more mechanical enforcement of the differentiation as well, since that'd be one of the most surefire ways of establishing where expectations lie.

I think the ideas Sneakyranger brought up for differentiation are good, and I'd like to also add to the cold setup point. This is something that already exists, but is either commonly forgotten about, or commonly misunderstood. Thrusters don't have to be complicated if you don't want them to be. A cold phoron setup is a two step process, takes less than two minutes to set up both thrusters, and actually provides better thrust than your standard burn setup at the cost of some fuel efficiency. It's practically designed to be a quick and easy option for engineers if the ship needs to move in the absence of an atmos tech, and should really be the only setup method regular engineers should be expected to worry about.

[Boggle08]

Although I've become comfortable being able to do everything, I think differentiation is ultimately the way to go. Implementing the small changes listed by the OP could set the precedent for a new design outline for both roles. I think I'll add onto it by saying that atmospheric technicians should be given more tools to remotely manipulate and analyze the subsystems they preside over, more efficient equipment at regulating the quality of the air, and better tools at combating fires.

On the old station, we actually had consoles that could keep tabs on the state of distribution and disposals, and I think we'd also benefit from consoles that can remotely manipulate electronic valves in the place of the manual valves affixed to the phoron supply. Myazaki mapped in atmospheric substations a while ago, I think we can refine the concept further in the long run by remapping these so that there's one on each sublevel, and they feed that particular level they're on. Atmospheric technicians can get their own RCON substation program for these life support reserves, in order to offset cases where high volumes of damage control are depleting distro to critical levels.

[hazelmouse]

Hazel here, might have seen me around as Reem. My experience as a new player learning engineering generally and atmospherics specifically over the last month is in agreement with these points. Engineering as a department has a *lot* of ground to cover and I've barely scratched it so far, I'll often get called out to fix telecommunications, hack a machine I don't even know what it does, something else I've not even considered I'd need to learn before then. I'd be more comfortable as an Atmospheric Technician knowing that I'm only expected to be good at a particular sphere and that I can learn the rest piecemeal with different roles.

On note of thrusters, there's a lot of confusion on them that I think would be helped if cold phoron injection was more emphasized for engineers playing in for the absence of an atmospherics tech, like other atmos techs have said here. Fixing the wiki so that it no longer recommends poorly optimised setups would be a good start, and also, I might actually suggest allowing total thrust to be actually viewed from propulsion and not just from the bridge somehow. It might be useful to actually get a reading on how good the configuration is locally so you don't need to pester bridge crew or command to let you at the thruster console upstairs, or play on a private server to test it, particularly when you're teaching other technicians new methods in which total thrust and efficiency are a big deal. This may also help people learn to avoid outdated thruster configurations, as they'll actually be able to view why it's bad themselves.

Edited June 26, 2023 by hazelmouse

[Syncron]

My biggest issue is, while yes, engineers and atmos techs are different titles, engineers don't even have access to the atmos portion of engineering. If it needs repairs, and theres no atmos techs online, they have to hack their way in, among other ways. I don't mind the role differences, but the access limitations make no sense to me sometimes.

[GeneralCamo]

On 26/06/2023 at 19:43, Syncron said:

If it needs repairs, and theres no atmos techs online, they have to hack their way in, among other ways

If medical needs a surgeon, and there isn't any on, that does not give medical cause to do surgery anyway. We don't allow "super-"doctors, we shouldn't allow "super-"engineers either under the same reasoning, if we keep them split. 

[Syncron]

5 hours ago, GeneralCamo said:

If medical needs a surgeon, and there isn't any on, that does not give medical cause to do surgery anyway. We don't allow "super-"doctors, we shouldn't allow "super-"engineers either under the same reasoning, if we keep them split. 

Never once did I say they would know how to set up the thrusters. I said if engineering needs to do repairs, and theres no atmos techs. Let me give you an example:

 

IRL? I'm a welder. Do I know jack shit about how to pump gasses and chemicals through the pipes I weld? No. Can I lay the pipes and build the lines? Yes.
Engineers would know how to repair piping, walls, floors, etc. That doesn't mean they would know how to set it up. But with no access, they cannot repair and do their job.
 

Quote

If medical needs a surgeon, and there isn't any on, that does not give medical cause to do surgery anyway. We don't allow "super-"doctors, we shouldn't allow "super-"engineers either

Under this argument, Atmos techs should not be setting up the supermatter core, tesla, or anything that does not fall under atmospherics. Any non-pure scientist role (Xenobio, Xenobot, Xenoarch) should not know how to work the R&D machines properly. The point here is, you need to think about the requirements of the position. Let me give you another example:

IRL, doctors, when they are med students, or commonly, a medical intern at a hospital, while they don't actively perform it, they are shown, and taught how to do surgery in the operating room. So it is reasonable to assume they would know surgery, to some degree, with the requirements listed on the Wiki
-----
Qualifications: At least 25 years of age, applicable MD from an accredited school and a completed 2 year of residency.
-----

And to add to this, straight from said Wiki, on the Physician page: https://wiki.aurorastation.org/index.php?title=Physician

Sometimes a surgeon will not be present. In these situations, you are expected to know certain surgical operations which you can find here. Do keep in mind, however, that if there are surgeons on shift, DO NOT operate on a patient unless the surgeons are busy or it is an emergency.

-----

If you have a patient with a heart injury, you should inform your pharmacist to make Adipemcina. In absence of a pharmacist, the Surgeon can treat the same injuries.

----

These lines alone, from the Physician guidelines, makes your statement moot, as they are in fact allowed to perform surgery if there is no surgeon present.

Edited June 29, 2023 by Syncron

[Sneakyranger]

On 26/06/2023 at 18:43, Syncron said:

snip

 

32 minutes ago, Syncron said:

snip

I felt this went without saying when I read your first post, but to clarify:

Engineers having to hack their way in to areas that need repair when no one is available to let them in is so common as to be ubiquitous. None of the access they would lose would compromise their ability to repair atmospherics; it would compromise their ability to increase the department's efficiency in the manner that an atmospherics technician would. 

 

As for the second post, the surgeries camo was likely referring to were the surgeon only surgeries, such as limb replacements or most organ repairs. Those can be found on the surgery chart (bleh) on the surgery page which is linked to in your post. Physicians are not allowed to perform those even if necessary - the part of the physician wiki page that you quote refers to the general division of labor of medical.

Anyway, medical is really not relevant and I hope that that satisfactorily concludes the thread's diversion in to that topic.

The most relevant part of this reply is the first half, and in fact engineers have to hack in to atmospherics under the status quo. The thruster doors being open to all is probably an oversight that was allowed to remain because of how commonly engineers found their way inside the nacelles, but every door before it requires an engineer to hack or otherwise break in. I have heard that there is some circuitous route that allows access to atmospherics unintentionally, but the simple fact that the main doors bar engineers is evidence enough to my point.

I would like to add for any other readers that I would honestly also suggest for the blast doors in the thruster nacelles to be atmospheric technician ID locked if the ID locking is pursued; I left this out of the original post because I was aiming for brevity to encourage people to read it and understand it in full, and also because I felt the OP was sufficient to accomplish the goals on its own.

[Doxxmedearly]

I also agree with the points discussed here, and reception has generally been pretty supportive, it looks like.

I have done one part of this in this PR: https://github.com/Aurorastation/Aurora.3/pull/16819

This gives access to port propulsion for engineers, without having to go through atmos. Though, technically, engineers can access the east part of atmos already; those atmos doors to the east and south are set to allow engineer access, whether intended or not. They still can't get to the guts of atmospherics, as the windoor blocks them.

There are merits to allowing engineers to keep this access, for repairs. The downside is that they CAN switch pumps to optimize airflow, but perhaps that small opportunity is not such a big deal. Again, my PR does not change this; they already can do it.

As an aside, I also agree with locking the tank computers behind atmos access, but that is something a future PR may have to handle, as that is a different discussion than a map change.

Edited July 22, 2023 by Doxxmedearly
update PR link