New Code Discussions: Shells v Androids

[Dreviore]

I'd love the idea of replacing them with androids. But why can't we mix the monitor heads with androids?

I also loved the kinda synthetic hate that resulted in tagging. And restricting jobs for them.

I like the android idea assuming they can be virtually indistinguishable from humans. Leading to a little more confusion for synthetic haters.

Think Fallout where the syths are so well made they're virtually indistinguishable from humans. But there's a lot of hate.

[Carver]

I'd love the idea of replacing them with androids. But why can't we mix the monitor heads with androids?

As noted above, monitor heads are still available with this added.

 

I like the android idea assuming they can be virtually indistinguishable from humans. Leading to a little more confusion for synthetic haters.

That will no longer be possible, for better or worse you cannot exactly mimic the appearance of any race with this change, although you can look somewhat similar to any of them assuming you have said species whitelisted to you. Cats with android bodies will retain cat ears and tails, and so on with lizards, humans can have faux hair and beards, etcetera.

[Dreviore]

I'd love the idea of replacing them with androids. But why can't we mix the monitor heads with androids?

As noted above, monitor heads are still available with this added.

 

I like the android idea assuming they can be virtually indistinguishable from humans. Leading to a little more confusion for synthetic haters.

That will no longer be possible, for better or worse you cannot exactly mimic the appearance of any race with this change, although you can look somewhat similar to any of them assuming you have said species whitelisted to you. Cats with android bodies will retain cat ears and tails, and so on with lizards, humans can have faux hair and beards, etcetera.

 

Well that makes the entire idea a lot less interesting.

[Carver]

Well that makes the entire idea a lot less interesting.

It can also be mentioned that adding in skins to resemble the species you're an android of is a very, very simple matter from what I've seen of new prosthetic model/skins being implemented within this system. I would hope though that it would still require a whitelisting for said species if you want to look like it, for obvious RP quality reasons.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I really liked Shells. They were unique to Aurora. They also provided a lot of interesting scenarios and situations - not just in the narratives of our lore but on the station itself. It was difficult to tell at a glance if someone was a robot or not, so we had an entire thing where we coded in methods of tagging and tracking the shells because everyone was afraid of them, like the synths in fallout 4.

Adopting Polaris' code for them would be fun and all, but it would remove a small part of Aurora's own identity.

[Guest]

I really liked Shells. They were unique to Aurora. They also provided a lot of interesting scenarios and situations - not just in the narratives of our lore but on the station itself. It was difficult to tell at a glance if someone was a robot or not, so we had an entire thing where we coded in methods of tagging and tracking the shells because everyone was afraid of them, like the synths in fallout 4.

Adopting Polaris' code for them would be fun and all, but it would remove a small part of Aurora's own identity.

 

They did create some interesting situations. They were weird, though.

I believe the time has mostly passed when it comes to our current shells to be basically carbon copies of actual biological lifeforms. It would most likely be mandated system-wide, in my opinion, for shells to start adopting more easily identifiable synthetics as the standard. I'd be cool with stealthshells still existing in the lore as illegal models intended for espionage, politics, spygames, and so on, but I think people would be more relaxed with knowing who to iongun and who not to iongun.

[Guest]

Yeah, I know meh lorz are actually kinda broken here, but I prefer the Polaris ones. They look much better. Maybe, at some unforseen moment in the future, someone figures out how to import Shells as well, assuming anyone would want to play them alongside the Polaris ones.

There is a boom in advanced technology and industry coming up in Sol Alliance. We can handwave the new models with a mix of reasons, among which can be Delta's as well.

[Dreamix]

It's fine, I guess.

Can the 'Morpheus', traditional IPC skin be restricted to the proper IPC's with posi-brains? Also, without a IPC whitelist, you should only be permitted to create borgs (full-body prosthetics, not actual 100% synthetic robots).

[Carver]

Can the 'Morpheus', traditional IPC skin be restricted to the proper IPC's with posi-brains?

I don't see the point of arbitrary restrictions when said restriction wasn't even present for Shells.

[Dreamix]

Can the 'Morpheus', traditional IPC skin be restricted to the proper IPC's with posi-brains?

I don't see the point of arbitrary restrictions when said restriction wasn't even present for Shells.

Well, there has to be something that "pushes" the player to apply for IPC whitelist. If Polaris's cyborgs/androids aren't really different from proper IPC's, there's just no point of having IPC whitelists. You may as well just declare your cyborg a, well, cyborg (brain used as a processor, with programmed unit loaded in it), and if that's the right word, bypassing the IPC whitelist entirely.

Huh. I have no idea. I just want whitelisted IPC's to be different from other cyborgs/androids.

Also, shells weren't really any different than IPC's in our old-code. There weren't really any mechanical differences, other than the brain that pops up after gibbing.

[Carver]

Well, there has to be something that "pushes" the player to apply for IPC whitelist.

So far the plan seems to be locking this entire feature behind the whitelist, both Positronic and Cybernetic Androids, with the whitelist being a general "Synthetic Crew/Being able to use the Full Body mechanical parts button" whitelist. That would be ideal atleast so people would read the lore and have a general understanding of the various types of Synthetics, and their differences.

Ultimately with this whitelist option it would be just the same as before with the Shell whitelist, people without it can still use their limbs (Which received a very nice buff), organs, etc. They just won't be able to be a full-bodied robotic crewman, just as they couldn't be a shell before without a whitelist.

Hell, trust me, from what I've seen it's generally a very unwise idea to entrust a playerbase with any kind of unwhitelisted non-'basic human' species.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Yes, shells were weird. That's why I liked them. We had a whole evolving narrative about the fact they can look just like us. They were also unique to Aurora. Abandoning them for these androids would just make us another bayclone. We've lost a lot of what makes Aurora Aurora in this code transfer. I am a bit sad that we're losing a major part of what set us apart from other bay emulators.

[Carver]

I will state yet again that importing more skins to allow for resemblance/identical appearance of a race is incredibly simple, but due to the nature of the skins themselves you just can't really recolour it to have an orange cat or some other crime against nature.

[Jennalele]

I'm actually with Jackboot on this one, we've already lost a lot of things with the transfer that we may not see back for a long time, if at all. Shells were kind of wonky and they had some odd things to them, but they were ours. I'd be really disappointed to see them go.

[Ordessa]

I too am with Jackboot. I loved the quirky, weird shells, and the tagging system looks great. The polaris models for me look way too... Thin? They seem like the inner working of a robot, where armor would be placed on top, not a 100% working robot. I admit I still don't understand shells, ipcs and the like, but I have a feeling allowing people to make their chars synthetic would be over used, similar to how a disproportionate amount of crew on the station have mechanical hearts limbs. Just my two cents.

[Dea Tacita]

I'm actually with Jackboot on this one, we've already lost a lot of things with the transfer that we may not see back for a long time, if at all. Shells were kind of wonky and they had some odd things to them, but they were ours. I'd be really disappointed to see them go.

 

What she said.

[Carver]

I admit I still don't understand shells, ipcs and the like, but I have a feeling allowing people to make their chars synthetic would be over used, similar to how a disproportionate amount of crew on the station have mechanical hearts limbs. Just my two cents.

You'd be surprised but people already did this with shell code. I don't imagine it will be too much more common if this new feature gets whitelisted, aside from maybe being a fad for a week like Vaurca were, and Shells when they were added.

[Mofo1995]

So, I just watched Blade Runner again, and it made me want to come into this thread in the defense of shells. I really liked the narrative which was being spun about synthetic rights and distrust of synths. But, I'm not a whitelisted IPC player, and so, I understand if these two cents aren't pocketed.

[Skull132]

@everyone Saying that we're somehow losing Shells.

Please go over this post in specific: http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=84&t=5289#p52897

And tell me what about this does not match the old description of the Shells :l Cause what I'm seeing is literally a leaner, cleaner, better (code wise) alternative with exactly the same substance. And my present plan is to literally port it, and restrict it to Shell whitelist.

[Dreviore]

@everyone Saying that we're somehow losing Shells.

Please go over this post in specific: http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=84&t=5289#p52897

And tell me what about this does not match the old description of the Shells :l Cause what I'm seeing is literally a leaner, cleaner, better (code wise) alternative with exactly the same substance. And my present plan is to literally port it, and restrict it to Shell whitelist.

 

I would but I'm not authorized to read that.

[Carver]

@everyone Saying that we're somehow losing Shells.

Please go over this post in specific: http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=84&t=5289#p52897

And tell me what about this does not match the old description of the Shells :l Cause what I'm seeing is literally a leaner, cleaner, better (code wise) alternative with exactly the same substance. And my present plan is to literally port it, and restrict it to Shell whitelist.

And, as I've noted several times and to supplement Skull's post, it is very feasible for a spriter, or even a coder with absolutely no spriting experience, to port over some basic/sensible "skins" that can go alongside the ones included in the package. Such as a human caucasian skin, human pale skin, etc. You can still look like people if you ask! The only thing you lose is the ability to look like a rainbow mess with neon parts, or a smurf.

[Jboy2000000]

Well, it sounds a lot like Shells, just with needless extra bits and bobs we're going to have to wait for you to port around instead of giving us the old, bit-less bob-less thing we already had and liked. Plus, one of the coolest things you could do with Shells was make them look like other speices beside human, and... Yeeeeaaaaah.

So yeah, on paper they sound a lot like Shells. But they don't FEEL like Shells, looks like an upgrade, feels like an upgrade. Its like a game that removes something, and calls it a feature.

Not to mention we already have Shell ingrained into our lore, and we already have an on-station story arch playing because of that, only because of Shells. Coders put work into making that happen, lore writers put work into making that happen, players put work into making that happen. Im not keen on tossing that to the side for what feels like a downgrade.

[Mofo1995]

Well, it sounds a lot like Shells, just with needless extra bits and bobs we're going to have to wait for you to port around instead of giving us the old, bit-less bob-less thing we already had and liked. Plus, one of the coolest things you could do with Shells was make them look like other speices beside human, and... Yeeeeaaaaah.

So yeah, on paper they sound a lot like Shells. But they don't FEEL like Shells, looks like an upgrade, feels like an upgrade. Its like a game that removes something, and calls it a feature.

Not to mention we already have Shell ingrained into our lore, and we already have an on-station story arch playing because of that, only because of Shells. Coders put work into making that happen, lore writers put work into making that happen, players put work into making that happen. Im not keen on tossing that to the side for what feels like a downgrade.

 

So, I could be wrong, but I think the spiehl that's being spat here is that it would be trivial to just make new shells with this new android system for all cosmetic intents and purposes. Except now with newer cleaner code. And that the only major difference now is you can't have absurd skin colors. Which all seems pretty neat to me if I'm understanding this correctly.

[Skull132]

Well, it sounds a lot like Shells, just with needless extra bits and bobs we're going to have to wait for you to port around instead of giving us the old, bit-less bob-less thing we already had and liked.

 

Okay, so you missed my entire point on how the work required would be pretty much the same. Tracking. Please do read the posts again.

On a tangential note: importing androids would take less time, as they are built on the same frame as our current code is. Shells use much older, and much more snowflake code systems which I would have refractored (reviewed and recoded with the goal of generalization and standardization), before letting the Shells pass.

 

Its like a game that removes something, and calls it a feature.

Beyond what I'm about to address below, you have yet to point out anything else that would be removed from the game by using Android code for our purposes, instead of Shell code.

 

Plus, one of the coolest things you could do with Shells was make them look like other species beside human [...]

This can be added, naturally. Anything can be added. And since the pre-existing systems exist in Android code as well, (the capacity to add custom tails, horns, whatever), it should not be exorbently difficult.

 

Not to mention we already have Shell ingrained into our lore, and we already have an on-station story arch playing because of that, only because of Shells.

And those can be maintained, no? Whether lore refers to these androids as Shells, magicians, or cupcakes is irrelevant to me as a coder. If we did go with androids, they would be integrated, quite smoothly I imagine, back into the lore as Shells, or whatever else the folks feel like having them.

[Guest]

@everyone Saying that we're somehow losing Shells.

Please go over this post in specific: http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=84&t=5289#p52897

And tell me what about this does not match the old description of the Shells :l Cause what I'm seeing is literally a leaner, cleaner, better (code wise) alternative with exactly the same substance. And my present plan is to literally port it, and restrict it to Shell whitelist.

 

I would but I'm not authorized to read that.

 

http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=5289

Skull goofed, it's in this thread (announcement forum) but he had linked it in a subforum link leading to Aurora Heads of Staff, which all boards can view announcements.