Change loyalty implants to sanity implants

[sdtwbaj]

I know, I know, the conversation's been done to death already, but I don't think it's been put into a suggestion as a sanity implant, last time I can recall was to straight up remove the implants. Here's my own little proposal.

Captain, HoS, and everyone else that normally is, is still implanted. However, instead of the implant whispering in their ear 'you're NanoTrasen's bitch', they're more of a protection. They keep a person implanted with them sane and somewhat level headed, how much so can vary by each character. Mechanically speaking, it's exactly the same as an LI with only one difference, that being it would allow the implanted to become, not start as, revs.

As it stands right now, the LIs are basically a way for other players or staff to powergame one's character to a specific course of action with nothing more than a "you have to because implant!" Frankly, I think this is a direct opposite to the point of being a roleplay server--having the ability to create and express a character as you see fit.

They would still not be able to start as antags except loyalist-based ones, it'd still take extra power to vamp them, and they'd be unconvertable. but it would add the possibility of a bit more depth for characters. I don't imagine people will behave that differently, but when it comes to it, a person will be able to make a decision without someone off in the distance crying out 'but the LI says you can't!'.

Less restriction, fosters RP, doesn't change the mechanics that have us holding the LI so near and dear to our hearts.

Edited January 6, 2018 by Guest

[Kaed]

This doesn't make sense to me from a lore perspective.

By declaring it a mindshield implant you are tacitly acknowledging that conversion-type antagonists exist and that higher up positions need to be protected from them. This his canonically encouraging metagaming from the perspective of the Nanotrasen administration. At least a loyalty implant makes vague sense from the perspective that they are trying to ensure their loyalty to the company, and it just has the side benefit of helping against theoretical antagonists.

[LordFowl]

This doesn't make sense to me from a lore perspective.

By declaring it a mindshield implant you are tacitly acknowledging that conversion-type antagonists exist and that higher up positions need to be protected from them. This his canonically encouraging metagaming from the perspective of the Nanotrasen administration. At least a loyalty implant makes vague sense from the perspective that they are trying to ensure their loyalty to the company, and it just has the side benefit of helping against theoretical antagonists.

 

An inconsequential complaint - of course mind altering implants exist - that is what a loyalty implant is, after all, isn't it? The technology already exists that confirms the presence of "slave implants", and NanoTrasen of course has the most experience having designed some themselves. With the loyalty implant removed for whatever reason, it still stands in their best interest to keep their key personnel shielded from subversive control, which if not a common counterintelligence technology is still certainly an extant one, and thus a significant threat. The "lore perspective" is easily shifted to suit the needs.

[Kaed]

An inconsequential complaint - of course mind altering implants exist - that is what a loyalty implant is, after all, isn't it? The technology already exists that confirms the presence of "slave implants", and NanoTrasen of course has the most experience having designed some themselves. With the loyalty implant removed for whatever reason, it still stands in their best interest to keep their key personnel shielded from subversive control, which if not a common counterintelligence technology is still certainly an extant one, and thus a significant threat. The "lore perspective" is easily shifted to suit the needs.

 

???

What 'slave implants'? There is nothing in-game to suggest that such a thing exists, though certainly not from any lack of effort on my part and more from people being intensely resistant to the idea of adding more mechanics that subvert their character's free will.

Nevertheless, the loyalty implant is at the current time not any kind of slavery device, it's a weak plot device to justify their strong loyalty to the crew and pretending that people who have them are intrinsically trustworthy so that during certain antagonist rounds it can come up. It is in no way in canon defined what the loyalty implant does or how it works, or that it intended to prevent them from being enthralled by a vampire or turned into a cultist for an otherworldly being. Sure, that's what it's actually there for, but we can't just go around declaring that in character or we are basically knocking on the fourth wall of the narrative we set up.

The argument is not inconsequential, you're just injecting lore that hasn't been displayed in any way thus far (that I'm aware of) to try and claim I'm quibbling minor details.

Point is, I don't support this idea. I don't think we should start acknowledging that antagonists exist in the game setting if we are trying to create a self-contained canon where people at large don't know they exist on a round by round basis.

[LordFowl]

You are quibbling minor details - the lore of the device is not a major blocking issue, and this becomes readily more apparent when you yourself admit that there is currently a dearth of lore available on the subject, thus great potential to fill it with lore that justifies the existence of a more concrete apparatus than the loyalty implant. The lore that I am "injecting" serves as an example of one such explanation.

The loyalty implant, "slave" implant or not (while you are correct in identifying that its exact function is unclear, it is without a doubt a mind-altering device by its very nature), is an example of technology that exists canonically and that NanoTrasen would have an interest in defending it's high personnel from - hence the mindshield.

If you don't support the idea you will need a better reason than "it acknowledges antagonists!" to convince me. It does no such thing. At best it acknowledges the existence and threat of mind altering technology, such as implants or drugs or hypnosis or any other million of other things that NanoTrasen would be interested in defending against, and the existence of these things is already a given and indeed proven by the existence of the loyalty implant, so I fail to see the issue.

[Kaed]

With the current playerbase environment of the server, i.e. one that actively resists the idea of mind control as a mechanic, creating a situation where it's acknowledged as a serious technological threat that needs to be defended against in turn by technology is creating a gap between game mechanics and lore.

At this time, the only things that exist in game that alter someone's behavior and allegiances drastically (without yanking their brain out and putting it in a machine) are supernatural in nature, namely vampires and cultists. At best, I would say that loyalty implants are better placed as a shady proprietary technology concept exclusive to Nanotrasen's relationship with their high ranking officials and not as a sort of standard for the galaxy at large. They didn't create loyalty implants to protect against something they invented themselves, which is why they work as a standalone concept.

If you want to replace them with 'mindshield' implants, you by definition also open up from a mechanical and lore perspective that 'enslavement implants' should be available certain antagonists. Now, I personally like the idea of enslavement implants. I had some of my most fun rounds on other servers by using them as a traitor or such.

But whereas loyalty implants can exist as an independent concept due to their vagueness, you can't just replace them with mindshields without something that does not currently exist in the game code for them to be in opposition of that isn't supernatural. And I don't think people would support adding that into the game, because they sure didn't when I brought it up before.

Even if they did, we're right back to the same argument about acknowledging antagonists. Admittedly, traitors are some of the least canon-obtrusive antagonists, none of their equipment registers as crazy alien or space monster or supernatural, and you don't really have to pretend that you don't understand what an e-sword or rifle is if you see them being swung around.

But I should also point out that if you allow people to acknowledge that mind control implants exist by having minshield implants, you are also opening the window for people to demand the crew be regularly scanned for implants once subversive activity is noticed, which somewhat defeats the very purpose of them existing as a secret subversive tool by placing them in open visibility to command staff at all times.

[sdtwbaj]

An inconsequential complaint - of course mind altering implants exist - that is what a loyalty implant is, after all, isn't it? The technology already exists that confirms the presence of "slave implants", and NanoTrasen of course has the most experience having designed some themselves. With the loyalty implant removed for whatever reason, it still stands in their best interest to keep their key personnel shielded from subversive control, which if not a common counterintelligence technology is still certainly an extant one, and thus a significant threat. The "lore perspective" is easily shifted to suit the needs.

 

???

What 'slave implants'? There is nothing in-game to suggest that such a thing exists, though certainly not from any lack of effort on my part and more from people being intensely resistant to the idea of adding more mechanics that subvert their character's free will.

Nevertheless, the loyalty implant is at the current time not any kind of slavery device, it's a weak plot device to justify their strong loyalty to the crew and pretending that people who have them are intrinsically trustworthy so that during certain antagonist rounds it can come up. It is in no way in canon defined what the loyalty implant does or how it works, or that it intended to prevent them from being enthralled by a vampire or turned into a cultist for an otherworldly being. Sure, that's what it's actually there for, but we can't just go around declaring that in character or we are basically knocking on the fourth wall of the narrative we set up.

The argument is not inconsequential, you're just injecting lore that hasn't been displayed in any way thus far (that I'm aware of) to try and claim I'm quibbling minor details.

Point is, I don't support this idea. I don't think we should start acknowledging that antagonists exist in the game setting if we are trying to create a self-contained canon where people at large don't know they exist on a round by round basis.

 

They’re designed as a sanity implant, and stop someone from having a mental breakdown or flying off their rocker. That can also mean that a conversion antag would have a hard time subverting it, it’s basically a mental hardening.

[Munks]

Heads of Security and Captains should be relied on to act in the best interests of Nanotrasen, if this is a source of conflict for your character enough to want it changed then its probably an issue with your character, not the implants

Our legion of ATLAS Heads of Security/Captains are already bad enough without removing the only thing that forces them to place NT above ATLAS

[LordFowl]

That's not really what an implant does, however. This was decided upon the last time this implant controversy came up a few months ago - people would prefer the mechanics of what an implant actually does to be so vague as to be pretty much useless and almost completely unenforcable except in the most extreme of circumstances (to which point you could just say NT wouldn't hire a character in such a circumstance to such a high position), to the point where the implant's purpose is clear OoCly, just a mechanical way of keeping high value targets out of the immediate reach of antaggery. The mindshield implant accomplishes the same while being more true to itself and without bothering with the vague nothingness of the LI.

[sdtwbaj]

Bump to be honest. I changed it to sanity implant instead of mindshield implant, to better outline what I was thinking.

[Scheveningen]

The loyalty implant has always been much of the same in thematic in line with inhibitor chips. Unless this has changed by [mention]Senpai Jackboot[/mention] 's definition.

I've no idea why you think a chip that simply enforces the thought process: "Never go against the interests of the corporation" - isn't a fathomable thing a very powerful corporation with very powerful enemies would do to ensure loyalty among their high-ranking personnel, sdt. What's honestly wrong with it? It makes sense and creates an interesting moral greyness that adds a necessary depth to roleplay in the higher-risk roles.

Loyalty implants stop Heads of Security and Captains from being limp-weenied cowards that fork over the station and the company assets in exchange for quite literally anything such as "no wait don't kill my captain's gf" or whatever. Instead they have no choice but to fight to the potential death to defend company resources which is far more interesting than having the two most (arguably) important job roles decide to give up doing their job because they encounter a situation they don't want to deal with and take seriously. That's largely the OOC purpose of it; to enforce interaction with antagonists when it comes down to it, and enforce their loyalty to the supposed company they worked so hard to attain status for.

Mindshields are dumb and only encourage metagaming, which isn't a problem on servers like /tg/ or whatever but it's pretty common to simply ask for a mindshield so that the cult/revs/gangs have to expend extra effort to kill you instead of either flashing you, stabbing you with a pen or dragging you over a glowing crayon rune. It would easily become a problem here because you adopt the exact same stigma and expectation for a roleplay environment that does not have the exact same stigma and expectations as its source environment that the feature came from.

[sdtwbaj]

My ongoing problem with them is, like I said, shoehorning a someone into doing something that may very well be entirely against their character, which is the complete opposite of what RP is supposed to be—approaching a situation as one’s character. It does have some upsides like driving conflict to prevent surrender, but it also does stupid shit like forcing a skrell captain to demote themselves for yet another “lol demote the aliens” rev round. It’s used to basically say “fuck your character, do this.”

If the concerns you have are more narrowly bound to captains who would place themselves over the station, it can always be said that someone like that would never end up in a position like Captain or Head of Security, and then administrative action starts. Frankly, LIs don’t really have the effect you’ve described anyway, as evident by the fact that there are captains who’ve surrendered, exposed the disk, put their own well-being at the top of their mind, and so on without any special attention being paid to it.

As far as metagame goes, it's not hard to declare that the implants are expensive and can only be implanted as part of a CR punishment.

[Scheveningen]

It’s used to basically say “fuck your character, do this.”

 

ok thats your opinion but for other characters that aren't lawful good anti-corporate superheroes it suits them just fine.

 

Frankly, LIs don’t really have the effect you’ve described anyway, as evident by the fact that there are captains who’ve surrendered, exposed the disk, put their own well-being at the top of their mind, and so on without any special attention being paid to it.

 

Did you report them at all or are you just saying this in hopes it'll devalue any of my points?

[Kaed]

My ongoing problem with them is, like I said, shoehorning a someone into doing something that may very well be entirely against their character, which is the complete opposite of what RP is supposed to be—approaching a situation as one’s character.

 

No.

No it isn't.

Roleplaying is about taking on the role of someone who isn't you. That includes anything that could happen to that character to change them. Even in real life, people's personalities and goals can change. Emotional trauma, war, cult indoctrination. As a years long veteran of tabletop games, I can tell you that people's characters do not stay the same from how they start over the course of a campaign. And things move a lot faster here in 2 hour chaos simulator.

It is only on this server where people believe they should be allowed to exist in a special little safety bubble and forced antag conversion is mean and ruins 'teh rps'. Or in this case, that implanting people with behavioral altering technology destroys their character.

Listen. How a person acts based on an outside influence does not change who they are, at their core. If someone is holding a gun at you, and tells you to call Nanotrasen your daddy, it doesn't mean your character has been completely derailed into something else and is now a nanotrasen loyalist, it means you are being coerced into it. The principle is the same if it is mystical influence or technological implants. People are complex, multilayered creatures and it's difficult to realistically say 'X would never do that!"

If people continue to go into rounds with the expectation that their character will never be pressed to act outside of a set of parameters they chose, and that it's 'bad for roleplay' when they do, then they are not mature roleplayers. This is a freeform roleplay medium where bad things are expected to happen. You go every non-extended round knowing this.

I really don't see why we need to remove loyalty implants. They're just fine as is. They fit in with the metaplot of ambiguously nefarious corporation way better than 'sanity' implants, which seem to imply people in charge of a station somehow need mental bolstering.

[Butterrobber202]

Also came here to yell about why this is a not great idea, but I see Kaed and Delta have it covered.

Still -1 tho.