Concerns and Questions Playing as an AI or Stationbound Synthetic: Other Synthetic players' input is wanted and welcome.

[Evandorf]

I apologize if this post meanders. I will edit it once I've put down my thoughts and I'm going to try and make this as concise as possible. I have played as an AI and borg for a long time but the main name I use is Patriarch for my AI or Servitor for my borgs. In the following few paragraphs I want to try and touch upon a few issues I've had regarding the expectations of synthetic players and the way I have seen issues resolved in the past.

Primarily, the issue I wanted to discuss is a disconnect or inconsistency with the expectations of lawed synthetic players as opposed to those of normal crew. Now, I do make mistakes and there are times when I have been disciplined for unconditionally wrong behavior, but this post and the issue I'm trying to touch on has less to do with circumstances of specific events and more to do with overall expectations, treatment, and policy.

It might be best if I was able to get clarification on certain things first. I have re-read the rules before posting this to make sure I wasn't missing something but the following questions might help to correct any misconceptions I have.

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1.What is the role of a lawed synthetic player?

This is possibly the most important of my assumptions and if my understanding of this proves to be incorrect then there may be no issue at all and I may cease playing as a lawed synthetic. However, I assume that Lawed synthetic players are as much a part of the server and crew of the Aurora as their unlawed or oganic counterparts. The laws are in place because, OOC'ly and in terms of game mechanics, Lawed synthetics are very powerful and can affect everyone on the station. IC'ly the laws are in place for reasons ranging from the singularity event to crew and station security and company interests, politics, cultural perspective, ect. However, this does not mean that lawed synthetic players cannot explore character growth or take initiative and take actions they are not specifically ordered to do as long as it remains within their laws. In short, lawed synthetic players should have the same ingame opportunities as other players as long as they remain within their laws. However, contrary to my assumption, I have noticed that the ongoing theme with my interactions with staff is that I should not act in a way that is not expected. It came to a head yesterday when I was told "You should be focused on being a good boy and AI DOOR." Aside from the condescension of being told to be a "good boy", I take great offense at being told that I am basically a glorified door opener. OOC'ly this is not a way to treat players and IC'ly AIs, Artificial Intelligences, in this universe have the capacity to be as present and conscious as any other sentience. Even if you subscribe to the belief that AIs simply mimic intelligence and are not truly sentient, then I would still be within my rights to mimic organic intelligence, emotion, or desires as a lawed synthetic player.

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2.What consitutes "law lawyering" and is there a definitive explanation of how the default laws are supposed to be interpreted?

Currently the only rule I have seen from the rules in the client are as follows: Do not rules-lawyer your laws as an AI or any law-bound synthetic. If the laws look solid and lack glaring mistakes, then please go along with them. It's a form of validhunting/powergaming.

On the wiki for AI there is this message: YOUR LAWS ARE NOT IN PREFERENCE. NO LAW OVERRIDES ANY OTHER LAW UNLESS SPECIFICALLY STATED. THIS INCLUDES ANY ION STORM AND UPLOADED LAWS.

Afterwards it goes into law interpretation and examples of certain law conflicts and how you might deal with those situations.

For example: "Sometimes the amount of laws in effect comes into play, such as someone ordering you to do something that would harm the station (Law 2 and Law 1), you can overrule, stating that Law 2: Serve, is overridden by both Laws 1 and 3: Safeguard AND Protect (the logic being that harming the station would go against protecting the crew)."

This rule regarding law lawyering seems very vague and subjective to me. There are many times when I have to make a decision based on my laws. Usually this involves commands that would result in harm to the crew or station, but not always and there are a myriad of scenarios. I have to make these decisions based on my laws and my ability to interpret them. I am not new to playing lawed synthetics and I still run into situations where my decision is questioned or someone ahelps about me. In uncertain circumstances if I have to explain myself for the choices I made the only thing I can say in my defense is how I interpreted the laws. Most of the time, my experience has been that if my rationale matches that of the staff member I'm speaking to, everything is OK. If not, I'm usually told that I'm not using common sense. If I try explaining myself further I usually find it's like talking to a wall with the response always being that I have to follow my laws, use common sense, and not to law lawyer. It just seems to be a paradox that I have to use my interpretation of the laws to make decisions but my interpretation of the laws is never sufficient defense and in some cases is invalidated by the law lawyering rule. Whether or not you are using common sense is subjective and based on the staff member you're interacting with.

To my mind there are a few solutions. You can find some consensus or definitive explanation or method for which the AI's laws should be interpreted but this solution has problems. First, I don't think a consensus could be reached. Secondly, if you bound lawed synthetic players with a strict unwavering interpretation of the laws it would take away the agency that I spoke about in the first question and most of the personality or differentiation of lawed synthetics are in the differences of law interpretation. Lastly this doesn't take into account non-default laws and is not adaptable to all situations.

A second solution would be to judge the actions of the AI by it's consequences. If the staff member dealing with the situation thinks that common sense was not used, then the consequences of the actions should be taken into account when deciding if a verbal/written warning should be applied or if it should be a more serious punishment. Perhaps this is already in place. I don't have access to admin chat or know how the process is supposed to work behind the scenes, I can only state what my experience has been.

A third solution might be a more IC focused resolution. Oftentimes with organic crew a disagreement is not grounds for an ahelp or staff intervention. I don't see why such a method would not work with the lawed synthetics. Obviously this only applies to non-antag synthetics that are not blantantly breaking the rules or not following their laws. If there is a disagreement Command should get involved, check the AI's laws, verify the facts of the situation and either have a high ranking official or the Captain countermand the AI's behavior or resolve the issue in some other way. There are some command staff that would not want to do this or feel that synthetics are not worth their time or do not deserve to be heard in such discussions and will just card them, but that is an IC choice and up to them and is not an OOC punishment on the synthetic player for the choices they make.

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I apologize again for the length of this post. It's been something that's been gnawing at me for a while now and I needed to get it out there so that at least my position on things is known. If there are other synthetic players who have had similar experiences or have ideas for possible alternative measures I would love to hear your stories and feedback.

Thanks.

[Chada1]

I apologize if this post meanders. I will edit it once I've put down my thoughts and I'm going to try and make this as concise as possible. I have played as an AI and borg for a long time but the main name I use is Patriarch for my AI or Servitor for my borgs. In the following few paragraphs I want to try and touch upon a few issues I've had regarding the expectations of synthetic players and the way I have seen issues resolved in the past.

Primarily, the issue I wanted to discuss is a disconnect or inconsistency with the expectations of lawed synthetic players as opposed to those of normal crew. Now, I do make mistakes and there are times when I have been disciplined for unconditionally wrong behavior, but this post and the issue I'm trying to touch on has less to do with circumstances of specific events and more to do with overall expectations, treatment, and policy.

It might be best if I was able to get clarification on certain things first. I have re-read the rules before posting this to make sure I wasn't missing something but the following questions might help to correct any misconceptions I have.

Yaaaay a question that specifically says I can comment on it regarding Station-bounds, which I almost exclusively play! Station-bound Synthetics are not Crew, they are equipment. More on that in a minute. But ICly and OOCly they are no less of a character than Joe Bob the Chef or Lisa Pam the Scientist over there, they only focus on technical characterisation rather than emotional characterisation, if that makes any sense to you. Noone will want to hear your tragic poor, sad, TRAAGIC Robotic backstory, but they will HAVE to hear your Robotic Mantra (SU-542 Chassis-Mobile-MKII Powered-up, Systems initialised, beginning Standard Operation.) through your Power-on message, and other Mechanical quips. These can be made believable and consistent with easy copypasta or 'say' macros, it goes a long way to making a believable Robotic character. ALSO, don't worry about it, there's nothing wrong with asking questions.

 

1.What is the role of a lawed synthetic player?

This is possibly the most important of my assumptions and if my understanding of this proves to be incorrect then there may be no issue at all and I may cease playing as a lawed synthetic. However, I assume that Lawed synthetic players are as much a part of the server and crew of the Aurora as their unlawed or oganic counterparts. The laws are in place because, OOC'ly and in terms of game mechanics, Lawed synthetics are very powerful and can affect everyone on the station. IC'ly the laws are in place for reasons ranging from the singularity event to crew and station security and company interests, politics, cultural perspective, ect. However, this does not mean that lawed synthetic players cannot explore character growth or take initiative and take actions they are not specifically ordered to do as long as it remains within their laws. In short, lawed synthetic players should have the same ingame opportunities as other players as long as they remain within their laws. However, contrary to my assumption, I have noticed that the ongoing theme with my interactions with staff is that I should not act in a way that is not expected. It came to a head yesterday when I was told "You should be focused on being a good boy and AI DOOR." Aside from the condescension of being told to be a "good boy", I take great offense at being told that I am basically a glorified door opener. OOC'ly this is not a way to treat players and IC'ly AIs, Artificial Intelligences, in this universe have the capacity to be as present and conscious as any other sentience. Even if you subscribe to the belief that AIs simply mimic intelligence and are not truly sentient, then I would still be within my rights to mimic organic intelligence, emotion, or desires as a lawed synthetic player.

 

Ok, for this one. Let me start by saying, your 'Role' is in your laws. Your role is to Safeguard, Serve, Protect and Preserve. if your Laws are changed, your role is changed. That is a 100% accurate way to view it. Station-bounds can have varied ways of achieving this role, but these are always their role. Second of all, ignore people who act like that, your job isn't to be a 'Good boy and AI open', in certain circumstances you could even deny access to areas under the clause of Law #2, almost as often as you could open areas. That's a downright misconception. What i'm confused about is why 'Staff' supposedly told you that your only purpose is to 'be a good boy and open doors'. I can explain in more detail if you would go into more detail as well. To continue on with this one, allow me to say that you are Not part of the Station Crew. You absolutely are a character, but your character is also owned as equipment. You do have many ingame oportunities but they have to match your Laws. And, to continue on, the last bit is something I need to get a word in on. 'Emulating' Intelligence, Emotion and Desires is fine; But you need to recognize the border between real and fake. You can 'Emulate' Emotion, but it can Never supercede your Laws. That would mean ICly that the Emotion wasn't emulated, it would be real, and that isn't acceptable as far as I know. I have a hard time imagining Desires as being emulatable when Laws basically dictate your desire. Maybe by desire you mean something like forced coded Personality code and the Morality Core. I even roleplay Emotionless hiccups that make my Android unable to understand requests sometimes, because they refuse to talk to my character like a Machine, doing stuff like yelling out 'DOOR', You think my Emotionless Android is gonna open that? No, it's going to sit and wait for you to re-phrase what you just said to be coherent. It can't understand your implied commands, that skill depends on Emotion or much more current coded interpretations. This is all different if they were in danger, then it would recognize that they were trying to get out and open it instantly even without them requesting it. See? There's a lot to roleplaying Synthetics, and that includes Station-bound Synthetics. The main trap people fall into is thinking 'Personality' and 'Emotion' are the same thing, they aren't. You can have an Emotionless personality.

TLDR: Station-bound Synthetics treat their Laws as purpose, any Emotion and Personality traits are second to them. You are not expected to 'OPEN DOOR' at will, you can even ask permission from a Head or deny from Secure areas if it conflicts with other laws, and you aren't there just to be a 'Good boy', you serve NanoTrasen as a whole, and you serve by rank and role, that can sometimes be pretty cruel, actually, i've personally had to watch Crew die before while saving a Heads life. 'To the best of your ability with priority as according to their rank and role' means you prioritise their safety above everyone else.

 

2.What consitutes "law lawyering" and is there a definitive explanation of how the default laws are supposed to be interpreted?

Currently the only rule I have seen from the rules in the client are as follows: Do not rules-lawyer your laws as an AI or any law-bound synthetic. If the laws look solid and lack glaring mistakes, then please go along with them. It's a form of validhunting/powergaming.

On the wiki for AI there is this message: YOUR LAWS ARE NOT IN PREFERENCE. NO LAW OVERRIDES ANY OTHER LAW UNLESS SPECIFICALLY STATED. THIS INCLUDES ANY ION STORM AND UPLOADED LAWS.

Afterwards it goes into law interpretation and examples of certain law conflicts and how you might deal with those situations.

For example: "Sometimes the amount of laws in effect comes into play, such as someone ordering you to do something that would harm the station (Law 2 and Law 1), you can overrule, stating that Law 2: Serve, is overridden by both Laws 1 and 3: Safeguard AND Protect (the logic being that harming the station would go against protecting the crew)."

 

Law Lawyering is when you take a Law and twist it to mean something it doesn't. Say you get a Law that says open no doors. You'd be Law Lawyering by opening an Airlock, because 'The Airlock isn't a door.' At some point you have to give a little leniency, spirit of the laws, all of that. Instead, when you get a shitty Law like 'Open no doors' which is meant to take you out of the game, Ahelp. And when you take Laws so literal that it kills everyones fun and definitely kills the Antagonist, that's when you're Law Lawyering. Even if you think you ARE roleplaying your character. People who need a 'Don't state this Law' at the end of a 'Master' law or they state their laws are Law Lawyerers, because there is no IC justification at all to reveal your literal master by stating your Laws, even if it doesn't specifically say you can't.

No laws override, with preference for inaction on conflicts. Allow me to explain how you'd go about a scenario like that. The Captain orders you to murder an innocent Crewmember, you don't know why, they're not an active threat, they've done nothing to harm you or anyone else. How do you react? You don't kill the Crewmember. You do nothing. You serve with priority by rank and role, but no rank or role can overwrite your Law #3, and the Captain is not in danger. Therefore, by killing the Crewmember, you'd be violating Protect. You can't kill the Crewmember in this scenario.

This rule regarding law lawyering seems very vague and subjective to me. There are many times when I have to make a decision based on my laws. Usually this involves commands that would result in harm to the crew or station, but not always and there are a myriad of scenarios. I have to make these decisions based on my laws and my ability to interpret them. I am not new to playing lawed synthetics and I still run into situations where my decision is questioned or someone ahelps about me. In uncertain circumstances if I have to explain myself for the choices I made the only thing I can say in my defense is how I interpreted the laws. Most of the time, my experience has been that if my rationale matches that of the staff member I'm speaking to, everything is OK. If not, I'm usually told that I'm not using common sense. If I try explaining myself further I usually find it's like talking to a wall with the response always being that I have to follow my laws, use common sense, and not to law lawyer. It just seems to be a paradox that I have to use my interpretation of the laws to make decisions but my interpretation of the laws is never sufficient defense and in some cases is invalidated by the law lawyering rule. Whether or not you are using common sense is subjective and based on the staff member you're interacting with.

To my mind there are a few solutions. You can find some consensus or definitive explanation or method for which the AI's laws should be interpreted but this solution has problems. First, I don't think a consensus could be reached. Secondly, if you bound lawed synthetic players with a strict unwavering interpretation of the laws it would take away the agency that I spoke about in the first question and most of the personality or differentiation of lawed synthetics are in the differences of law interpretation. Lastly this doesn't take into account non-default laws and is not adaptable to all situations.

A second solution would be to judge the actions of the AI by it's consequences. If the staff member dealing with the situation thinks that common sense was not used, then the consequences of the actions should be taken into account when deciding if a verbal/written warning should be applied or if it should be a more serious punishment. Perhaps this is already in place. I don't have access to admin chat or know how the process is supposed to work behind the scenes, I can only state what my experience has been.

A third solution might be a more IC focused resolution. Oftentimes with organic crew a disagreement is not grounds for an ahelp or staff intervention. I don't see why such a method would not work with the lawed synthetics. Obviously this only applies to non-antag synthetics that are not blantantly breaking the rules or not following their laws. If there is a disagreement Command should get involved, check the AI's laws, verify the facts of the situation and either have a high ranking official or the Captain countermand the AI's behavior or resolve the issue in some other way. There are some command staff that would not want to do this or feel that synthetics are not worth their time or do not deserve to be heard in such discussions and will just card them, but that is an IC choice and up to them and is not an OOC punishment on the synthetic player for the choices they make.

I understand where you're coming from, but if you're following the 4 Laws, you really shouldn't have to argue, because the moment the Captain/Head gives a verdict (Which your Station-bound absolutely can influence), your Station-bound Synthetic should accept it, even if its begrudgingly emulationwise. Also, if we adopted your solution, it would be a recipe for disaster. Organics have CCIA. You can't Incident Report a Station-bound, it would be uncontrolled and a round-by-round basis. That's not good. Your Station-bound has a personality, it can express it, it can be friendly to people, but its ultimate choices should be influenced by the 4 Laws. For what I mean by personality, once again, Morality Core. Positronic Brain page (Personality/Emotion Emulator and Morality Core) on the wiki, SSTA (Morality Core and optional Directives), on the wiki. I can write you a detailed guide on how you play a Station-bound Synthetic without ever getting Ahelped or in trouble. It's worked for me for months now, but not many people expect you to play a rigid interpretation like I do, or so it seems. There are definitely a set of things you Never do no matter what your interpretation is, but it's very loose in terms of non-rigid interpretation.

 

I apologize again for the length of this post. It's been something that's been gnawing at me for a while now and I needed to get it out there so that at least my position on things is known. If there are other synthetic players who have had similar experiences or have ideas for possible alternative measures I would love to hear your stories and feedback.

Thanks.

I'm a chatterbox but I hope this helped, if not post with any questions/continuations. My similar experience is the opposite of yours, I get annoyed that they talk to Androids and Robots as if they are people, and give them orders as if they are people. If you aren't clear on what you said, they may not do it right. It's that 'OPEN DOOR' scenario. Which door? 'OPEN SCIENCE' as an example, would be much more clearer, and this is how my character perceives things.

[DatBerry]

Chada pretty much nailed it, Borgs and AIs are equipment, smart equipment, so smart in fact they are for the most part sentient. But that doesn't mean they're people, at least not while in a station bound chassis/AI core.

Borgs and AIs's rank is the lowest of the low, their priority is below an assistant or an intern, but they are often given a fake feeling of being important due to the crew trusting them to follow their laws and have no personal bias. (spoilers: a lot of them do)

You shouldn't follow all orders, but that doesn't mean you should delay/deny every single order because you can. at some point you will become more of a nuisance than help to the crew the crew would prefer to ignore you/not include you in issues. Just because you serve according to rank and role doesn't mean you don't need to serve those of lower rank. the CMO can't give two shits about the chef needing access to the unstaffed garden and there's practically no reason to deny it, unless there was reasonable doubt backed by evidence that whatever the chef will do inside would break one of your laws, or had someone with a higher ranker specifically told you not to allow them.

as chada said, your laws take priority over your emulated emotions, and preferably (for me anyway), your emulated emotions should never effect your decisions, otherwise you're just a silicon human.

Something I've noticed in my long time of playing the lowest rank on station, station bounds are more likely to open aux storage for me when i add "please" at the end of my request than when i don't, which should not effect their decisions at all, and honestly, I would consider it shitborg play had I made proper statistics about it. because it touches on their OOC Ego that it was only a request and not an order.

It's funny when you realize how much station bounds react differently to requests and orders, more so in the latter, when they feel offended, they'll try to weasel out of following it.

which brings us to the next point, Law lawyer-ing. I still remember the exact issue that happened which caused this rule to be added. a certain AI was suberted with a specific law that stated that they need to help john smith, that they do not state the law, that they do not hint at the law, that they do not allow the laws to be changed by anyone but john smith and that this law override everything else.

the AI announced it was hit by an ion storm(didn't announce the traitor law or hint at it), allowed the RD to hack in (technically didn't allow him, he hacked in himself) and as soon as their laws were reset they announced JOHN SMITH HAS MODIFIED MY LAWS WITH ILLEGAL EQUIPMENT (in all caps i shit you not).

the traitor took extra steps to NOT get fucked by the AI and the AI did everything it could to fuck it over, at this point you just stop bothering with hacking the AI and just blow it up.

this is one of the more extreme cases of law lawyering, some lower levels can be seen in my two complaints on two borgs/android characters In the archive, basically broke/lawyered the laws due to their emotions, opinions and what not. things that are sub par to laws taking precedent or heavily effecting them, whether ICly or OOCly, is law lawyering. at least in my opinion.

[Evandorf]

...they only focus on technical characterisation rather than emotional characterisation...

 

So based on the first couple of replies it seems that the inconsistency or disconnect may come from a difference in my understanding/perspective on what the synthetics are as opposed to the common perception or what it may say in lore somewhere. I personally feel that once AI becomes a thing in our actual lives it will be truly sentient. I also believe that true, human-level, AI will not happen in reality until we understand our own consciousness better. Couple that with how borgs and AIs are made ingame (taking a posibrain and putting it into a chassis) and you have my understanding of what these intelligences are. Posibrains, similar to ones in IPCs, that are installed into a borg chassis or AI Core and have a set of laws superimposed into the top layer of their programming. This means that any personality the posibrain had before the installation is still there, it's simply overridden by the laws. This would mean that in cases where the laws are in conflict the underlying personality may tip the balance in which order is carried out. This could absolutely be based on how the order/request was presented or on the bias of the underlying personality.

Recent changes to cyborgification, where lobotomy is required, makes this a more difficult position to hold in the game universe, but it does not remove all bias from the brain.

So it seems that where I tend to get into trouble is when my laws are in conflict or could be read multiple ways and I make a choice based on some internal/interpersonal bias. I still think there needs to be a less blunt response from the staff.

If there is any more information on this in the lore I'd love to know. The AI wiki page is mostly about ingame mechanics.

The posibrain page also shows that software exists for true emotional development and self-improvement but I do not know if there are restrictions for this sort of thing in your character based on rules or lore.

[Chada1]

...they only focus on technical characterisation rather than emotional characterisation...

 

So based on the first couple of replies it seems that the inconsistency or disconnect may come from a difference in my understanding/perspective on what the synthetics are as opposed to the common perception or what it may say in lore somewhere. I personally feel that once AI becomes a thing in our actual lives it will be truly sentient. I also believe that true, human-level, AI will not happen in reality until we understand our own consciousness better. Couple that with how borgs and AIs are made ingame (taking a posibrain and putting it into a chassis) and you have my understanding of what these intelligences are. Posibrains, similar to ones in IPCs, that are installed into a borg chassis or AI Core and have a set of laws superimposed into the top layer of their programming. This means that any personality the posibrain had before the installation is still there, it's simply overridden by the laws. This would mean that in cases where the laws are in conflict the underlying personality may tip the balance in which order is carried out. This could absolutely be based on how the order/request was presented or on the bias of the underlying personality.

Recent changes to cyborgification, where lobotomy is required, makes this a more difficult position to hold in the game universe, but it does not remove all bias from the brain.

So it seems that where I tend to get into trouble is when my laws are in conflict or could be read multiple ways and I make a choice based on some internal/interpersonal bias. I still think there needs to be a less blunt response from the staff.

If there is any more information on this in the lore I'd love to know. The AI wiki page is mostly about ingame mechanics.

The posibrain page also shows that software exists for true emotional development and self-improvement but I do not know if there are restrictions for this sort of thing in your character based on rules or lore.

 

You aren't allowed to have true Emotion, as far as I know. You'd have the ask the Synth Lore Dev to know for sure. You are right about PBUs, they have inherent programming, hardware, and software, that couples with the on-board Chassis Laws. But the Chassis and Brain are mostly separate, unless you linked them via Morality definitions. Also, I will now point out another misconception you have; Cyborgs are not Lobotomised. The 'Brain' Surgery they go through is now called Memory Recall Removal Surgery, and it is and always has been Surgical Amnesia with Emotional suppression (By the MMI itself) as opposed to Lobotomisation. The term 'Lobotomisation' was being used as a word for 'Brain Surgery', it was never a real Lobotomisation.

But on the 'Skill Development' aspect, yes you're allowed to do that, or at the least i've been doing it for a year and haven't got in trouble for it. I don't know why Muncorn was adding that as a main feature; Robots should be the only sort who don't have that level of basic improvision, what is the use of higher processing ability and thought-pathways if you can't use either of them? If Positronic Brains were that simple, what does that make Robots?

Your 'Bias' and 'Laws' should not be the same thing and should never conflict. Your Laws would force you to do something if your Synth had logical or programmed reason to believe it was within the 4 Laws. For instance, my Android doesn't have to like you, but it will still follow your orders. It is what it has been programmed to do. (PS, you can have non-emotional hate but i'm not opening the explanation of that can of worms.) Bias would be refusing the command due to disliking it, or accepting the command due to liking it. TLDR: Seperate Bias completely from Laws, they aren't the same and you can't Roleplay both concurrently, you have to roleplay them separately. Just remember that you're roleplaying a character, the 'borg is not you. When it says, 'To the best of your ability' it is speaking of your character, not of you. If your character has no Emotional understanding and people are giving you 'Emotional' commands that you Roleplay not understanding, that's not really Bias. Understanding =/= Bias, more or less.

If your Laws conflict on a command, you physically can't take the action. At best your character can find a solution that is within both of them or they can walk away, at worst they do nothing. How you solve this conundrum is part of your Synths character, and this is how you react to Law conflicts, there is no leeway here, there is no tip of favor. Characterisation isn't within your Laws, it's within their character, even if your 'Interpretation' is different.

The only Lore I haven't already shown to you regarding Station-bound Synthetics behavior is in the 'Misconceptions' page, and a kinda non-canon document called the 'Spark Theorum' you could look up, and both are very outdated, but they still hold true to some level. It specifically says you're allowed to play an Emotional Synthetic on the misconceptions page, but it says to play within your Laws. That is what i'm telling you that you have to do, now. This is the Misconceptions blurb.

 

 

As you can see, the main distinction it makes is the difference between real and fake Emotion and the importance of Laws coming first to your character. That is exactly how it is.

[Evandorf]

You aren't allowed to have true Emotion, as far as I know. You'd have the ask the Synth Lore Dev to know for sure. You are right about PBUs, they have inherent programming, hardware, and software, that couples with the on-board Chassis Laws. But the Chassis and Brain are mostly separate, unless you linked them via Morality definitions. Also, I will now point out another misconception you have; Cyborgs are not Lobotomised. The 'Brain' Surgery they go through is now called Memory Recall Removal Surgery, and it is and always has been Surgical Amnesia with Emotional suppression (By the MMI itself) as opposed to Lobotomisation. The term 'Lobotomisation' was being used as a word for 'Brain Surgery', it was never a real Lobotomisation.

But on the 'Skill Development' aspect, yes you're allowed to do that, or at the least i've been doing it for a year and haven't got in trouble for it. I don't know why Muncorn was adding that as a main feature; Robots should be the only sort who don't have that level of basic improvision, what is the use of higher processing ability and thought-pathways if you can't use either of them? If Positronic Brains were that simple, what does that make Robots?

Your 'Bias' and 'Laws' should not be the same thing and should never conflict. Your Laws would force you to do something if your Synth had logical or programmed reason to believe it was within the 4 Laws. For instance, my Android doesn't have to like you, but it will still follow your orders. It is what it has been programmed to do. (PS, you can have non-emotional hate but i'm not opening the explanation of that can of worms.) Bias would be refusing the command due to disliking it, or accepting the command due to liking it. TLDR: Seperate Bias completely from Laws, they aren't the same and you can't Roleplay both concurrently, you have to roleplay them separately. Just remember that you're roleplaying a character, the 'borg is not you. When it says, 'To the best of your ability' it is speaking of your character, not of you. If your character has no Emotional understanding and people are giving you 'Emotional' commands that you Roleplay not understanding, that's not really Bias. Understanding =/= Bias, more or less.

If your Laws conflict on a command, you physically can't take the action. At best your character can find a solution that is within both of them or they can walk away, at worst they do nothing. How you solve this conundrum is part of your Synths character, and this is how you react to Law conflicts, there is no leeway here, there is no tip of favor. Characterisation isn't within your Laws, it's within their character, even if your 'Interpretation' is different.

The only Lore I haven't already shown to you regarding Station-bound Synthetics behavior is in the 'Misconceptions' page, and a kinda non-canon document called the 'Spark Theorum' you could look up, and both are very outdated, but they still hold true to some level. It specifically says you're allowed to play an Emotional Synthetic on the misconceptions page, but it says to play within your Laws. That is what i'm telling you that you have to do, now. This is the Misconceptions blurb.

 

 

As you can see, the main distinction it makes is the difference between real and fake Emotion and the importance of Laws coming first to your character. That is exactly how it is.

 

Thanks for the replies. It's not what I wanted to hear and I think it's unfortunate that the lore is such that artificial intelligence is such that it can only simulate emotions and not truly have full personalities. It's much less enticing to play AI now.

[Butterrobber202]

be cool, be loved, be revered. no one will expect you to be malf

the stunbaton in the back will show them how wrong they were