[add a counter to the desword]

>Security main can't baton a melee oriented item.

[Can we discuss the emagged maint drone nerf?]

They do require human intervention. An emag doesn't find and slap the drone by its lonesome or automatically. It's far easier to create and convert a golem than it is to track down a drone to emag it. 

[Can we discuss the emagged maint drone nerf?]

i ded plz nerf Is a very good summarization of the process where people are making changes to the overall balance of the game without first considering all the balance that is in place. You don't nerf d-esword because it can deflect most projectiles fired at it, because members of security are upset their tasers aren't working.  You point out that there was still plenty of options that COULD have worked if the salty player didn't just want to hit every problem on the head with their preferred tool and call it a day.

Drones have a number of weaknesses from their pitiful low health, blatant EMP/Flashbang rendering them immobile for a long period of time to their reliance on the piping network to get around. Tay's first suggestion was to remove vent crawling all together. Then they wanted to make them pAI with door access. Then we got the crap fest that is in the current build.

I was the one who suggested the timer On the understanding that the other nerfs would be removed from the PR. Spoiler, they weren't. Which leads us here today, where people who supported the nerfs are still dancing around the question as to why they were necessary to begin with. If you're going to argue 'you just don't like the PR so you're argument is invalid' you could at least come up with some half ass excuse to why any of this was necessary from the get go.

[Can we discuss the emagged maint drone nerf?]

1 hour ago, EvadableMoxie said:

1. Drones are an unlimited resource that can spawn into the round at any time without any action by someone already in the round.

I think it's basic design philosophy that there simply should not be a convertible role that can spawn infinitely without any impact from the players already in the round. 

Golems are a literally infinitely respawnable role, can be converted by cult and slings. I've seen far more golems used in this manner then I've ever seen emagged drones. And unlike the drone, the golem can't even try to evade the conversion if they aren't antag fishing. Drones on the other hand are rather obvious if they are antag fishing since the tator has to be at the fabber or the drone must track down someone they know to have an emag.

I'm just constantly astonished people act like hack drones are a round ending event, I rarely see them, in 5 years of playing this game across multiple servers I can count maybe 20 instances of emagged drones and at least one group of those was a metacomm group that got banned years ago.

Quote

The motives of someone making an argument are entirely irrelevant. Either their arguments have merit or they do not.  If they do not, you should be able to logically explain why they do not.  And if they do, then the argument should be respected for it's merit, regardless of the motivations of the one making it.  This is the very basic bedrock of debate and discussion.

 

I have to disagree strongly with this assertion. Tay's intention was to nerf hacked drones into the ground not because they upset the balance, but a because a few rare cases in which a hacked drone was able to damage the station in a manner nearly any emagged borg could. There is no sensible reason to throw multiple game changing nerfs onto a role, ignore almost all criticism in the PR, promise that only 1 or 2 of them is going to take affect and then just apply all of them. This is literally the same behavior that has seen tg borgs get nerfed into obsucrity. Not because they had some aspect of the role that was over powered, but because a few select players are so good at the role or game in general that they can reliable dunk less robust regulars with their knowledge of how the game works. Despite said roles having numerous hamstrings, limitations and hard-coded weaknesses that their opponents never bothered to get ahold because we can't have antags having unique flavors that bring different elements to the game ensuring that no single strategy, weapon or item is the end all be all for any valid hunting crew.

In the end, Tay gave no reason for the nerf to begin with, saying 'they are too powerful and annoying' without citing any examples. Changelings and Vampires are too powerful and annoying to deal with, I don't see their powers nerfed into obscurity, do you? 

 

TL;DR the entire PR was salt i ded nerf plz without any consideration for what lead to it.

[Pet Peeves of Paradise]

Basically anyone running around not on help intent. I got so sick of it yesterday as HoP running errands for my dept I just started batonning people. Yes, I'm hauling a bee crate, no if you fucking try and open it I'm going to beat you.

Anyone who works medchem and blows the dispenser. In nearly 5 years of playing this game, I've never done. Why is it so common? If you don't know how to chem. Ask. There is a literal wiki that tells you everything you need to know. If you want to make bombs, Science has their own deluxe chem lab to be an antag workshop.

Metacliques. For a while it seemed they were dying out and people were starting to play as a community. Then just the other day I have the vulp mafia trying to break into my office because I wouldn't give McFluffy access to engineering when it was pretty damn clear she wasn't going to help the CE fix the breaches and power net.

Basically any engineer and CE who doesn't at least attempt the station goal or make repairs. Yes, your autism fort looks pretty with the floor tiles. Don't mind the screams over the radio, that's just everyone else yelling that the main hallway has been breached and unbreathable for the last hour while you stole all the metal.

Gateway missions. Specifically Wild West but in general. Loot pinatas designed around exploits in the code, it'd be one thing if these were VR missions and thus players could make multiple attempts without getting game breaking gear, but it's another when 30 minutes into the round some greyshit can have an L6 and more C20s than they know what to do with.

Medical personnel who don't do Body Scan printouts. These things can be a life saver, as well some level of proof that malpractice bay isn't in full effect when they can show mr corpse didn't have those injuries before walking out of medical. More IAAs need to look into how many people medical is actually saving and how many bodies are piling up.

When you try to play Warden and been goodsec, but all your sec officers are just buckle cuffing crew to chairs without even saying a word or putting a blip in their crew records, then freaking out 20 minutes later after you release them because so and so was totally an antag or assaulted someone.

HoS's who assume anything they have access to is theirs by right, from the Warden's gloves, the medkits in storage, gloves in engineering and all the ammo cargo's lathe can print. Somewhat less so but equally infuriating when Blueshit walks into medical and empties all the synthflesh from the fridge to use on light bulb burns.

Sec mains who try to use SoP and Space law to get you brigged, demoted or executed for not doing what they want, but suddenly become blind and deaf when they are the ones breaking SoP/Space Law. Bonus points for McRedshit last week who was using an emag he confiscated to access RnD.

[Paperwork]

Couldn't you just it put this on the "example paperwork" page for the wiki with the rest of the example forms

[Does the blueshield follow security or crew escalation rules?]

Quote

You are not a vigilante. Until an emergency occurs, the role of Blueshield is heavily roleplay based and, much like the Representative, you should serve as an adviser regarding Command's decisions. How you go about interacting with Command is entirely up to you, but you should always leave them feeling safe.

Additionally, as the Blueshield, you must prioritize. In an emergency, you may have to make harsh decisions, and you may need to let people die. When it comes down to an emergency, your immediate charges take precedence, so don't hesitate to let an Officer die if that means you can safely get away with, for example, the Head of Personnel. Chain of Command is also important to take into consideration. The Captain is more crucial to your mission than anyone else, with the Head of Personnel and other senior staff as less crucial, though still extremely important. The NanoTrasen Representative and Magistrate also fall under your purview, though they are of less consequence than any of your other charges.

Quote

You don't have any formal relations with the Security team. You may have Security access, but that's only so you can reach the Head of Security's office, if required. You may decide to coordinate with Security forces in investigations if there is evidence of a threat against Command personnel, but this should not deviate you from your physical vanguard. You have a pair of handcuffs in your office, but this does not make you obligated to carry out Space Law. Apprehension of criminals is their job, not yours, and your handcuffs should be used to neutralize threats to the Command staff, only for your prize to be handed off to the Warden so you can get right back to protection detail as soon as possible.

It's mostly in the Wiki. Escalation for Blueshield is circumstantial depending on what is going on. If the Blueshield sees someone dragging a welder tank past the bridge to the bar or medbay, they shouldn't be intervening beyond informing sec and giving a heads up to any relevant head their department is having trouble.

If the Blueshield happens to be standing around in a a department and witnesses a head get attacked, then they should be doing everything in their power to neutralize the attacker or get the head to safety if they don't have the means to end the conflict (such as a bunch of angry assistants trying to break into RnD to kill the RD.)

In short, if a Head of Staff is not in danger or being hampered in their job significantly, and the Blueshield themself is not in danger, they should not be getting involved in situations and only assisting in emergency or life saving situations that don't prevent them from keeping an eye on their charges.

It's also worth noting that Blueshield is NOT in the Chain of Command, they don't take orders from the Captain, Head of Security or Head of Personnel. They take their orders from CC and by proxy the NT Rep. They obviously must still observe and follow Space Law to the best of their ability but if the Captain directs the Blueshield to go set up the engine or help out in Surgery during a crisis, the Blueshield is within their right to tell the Captain to shove it unless they are escorting them down there. The only real exceptions to this being that if another Head of Staff is doing some vital work for the station, and evidence or suspicious activity suggest that head is being targeted for attack, the Blueshield can prioritize that head of staff's protection rather than babysitting the Captain/Acting Captain so long as they too haven't come under threat recently.

[Restricting people to their departments on code red]

Part of the reason is that command/security will up the alert level over a stubbed toe. SOP also states HoS is supposed to make an announcement justifying the alert, which never gets done. 

Ive gotten bag searched 30 seconds after late joining by the hos, and when I asked why we were on alert he just shrugged and said he didn't know.

[put rev in rotation]

The problem with rev wasn't stealth converts, it was the fact that loyal(ty implanted) crew would bunker down in Security and the Revs would either take over Cargo or MedSci and the round would drag on for 2+hours as shuttle was disabled and only small raiding parties form either side would ever dare leave their fortress.

[put rev in rotation]

Gang would be fun. Rev? Please no. Not without serious tweaks to how it works and a hard time limit (say 90 minutes max) before the round ends in a draw or mutual loss to both sides (say CC sending DS, killing the loyal crew for failing to stop and put down the revs in a timely fashion as per protocol, and killing the revs because revs.)

[What do we classify IPC as?]

Silicon based intelligence.

[Can we discuss the emagged maint drone nerf?]

IMO? Change the Drone Sprite when emagged so the 'eyes' glow red or they have some obvious "That drone looks suspicious" visual clue about them. Remove the drill (they never needed this anyways nor does it fit the MO) and replace it with an E-Dagger and ensure there is an inhand sprite for when the dagger is active. Keep or remove the 360 second timer, though the server as whole needs to consider if there really needs to be a 10 minute timer on drones, one of the few thing I like about tg drones is that drones can occupy shells, if crew doesn't want or is worried about rogue drones they can destroy the shells or make more as needed.

[Can we discuss the emagged maint drone nerf?]

Had it been only the timer, or the removal of the drill, or limiting their mobility and table  pass, it may have been acceptable nerf. But this nerf was the quintessential 'i ded plz nerf' response to a problem that could be solved with two clicks of an ion rifle or less. Most if not all the nerfs should be reverted and some new method implemented, as well as certain people coming to understand that 'No interference' does no mean or equate to 'run away from all crew on sight'

[Vox Defense Force]

To save our dustless groves from any griffon tide attack!
From vicious skreky dustlungs who once again door hack!
We unleash all our robustness, we not cut greytide any slack!
The VDF deploys!

The Armalis prepared for any nukeskrek threats!
Cargo orders crates, robotics makes they mechs!
And nothings can withstand our vicious corgi pet! 
The VDF deploys!

Our kin have now dwindled, we's fall back to quill's stoop
The Valids has now multiplied and converted massive mooks!
We's better call shuttles before we all breathe O2!
The VDF deploys!

[Warden Rework]

The problem in my opinion isn't that there are often too many prisoners for the Warden to handle, It's that Security officers aren't doing their job and doing a proper hand off of prisoners to the Warden. I.E. Security officers are just buckle cuffing a random person to a chair in processing and wandering off. They aren't checking and updating records, they aren't preparing evidence for review and they barely, if ever, are giving a verbal hand off to the Warden.If Officers are doing their job, and not just the fun parts of chasing people down and beating them, Warden is actually a fairly easy job. The HoS should definitely be helping and in the brig as much as the Warden if not more so, yet most seem too eager to patrol or sit on the bridge even if the Warden is drowning in 'prisoners' who have no criminal record or evidence of wrong doing.

[Remove Security]

5 hours ago, ZN23X said:

Damnit, I was trying to think of something new to post that would get me lots of reactions. Foiled again.

Time to write up my "Remove Spess" post...

Remove walls. Its 2558 people!

[Remove Security]

*Mimes a bike horn*

[Why is there so much hate towards Paradise station?]

Paradise in my experience might be one of the more diverse communities on SS13, which are traditionally small and niche. Para on the other hand boasts some 250+ regulars per week from the stats that I've seen made public, and there is a wide variety of players from RP styles to how various antags and game situations are handled. Even the staff doesn't fit into one trope. From the outside, people notice something they don't like quickly, become innately aware that said thing is allowed and to some extent protected (not allowed to verbally assault or attack in game for example), which makes those outsiders feel such a thing is promoted by the community as whole. Throw in that a lot of the people who bash a SS13 server have been banned or otherwise chased off by the community, and you get a real sense of privileged nerds raging that someone is playing a game in a way they don't like.

[Civilian "objectives"]

Station Goals were inherently flawed because they don't involve the station. DNA Vault comes the closest to being a crew wide objective, but still falls short as the bulk of the work is being done by the Botanist and Xenobiologist. Meteor Shield and BSA both can be accomplished by a competent engineering crew in the span of 30 minutes. Meteor Sats literally can be dragged to any old point in space, activated and have someone spam the computer to turn it on. Doesn't need power or babysitting. Even if an antag decides to sabotage it, why would they? They can't summon meteors to begin with and the shield doesn't inhibit the antag.

BSA, while slightly more interesting, is similarly woefully unchallenging with minimal interactions on the crew. Find a secluded 14x4 area or larger, plate it, wire an APC to it and set up the consoles and equipment. Done. Find a Random GPS and fire. Antags have a little bit fun they can have with this, but its still not overly interesting once set up and the crew has very little they can do with it or consequences of setting it up since few people have access to GPS anyways. The reality of the situation is that the BSA and MS could be incorporated into regular station rounds with minimal impact overall, as a meteor shield would be set up alongside the engine early on the BSA just added to what ever engineering only fort they decide to build.

In all cases, the hardest part about the crew objectives is just getting Cargo to order and deliver the crates, be it they not having the points or sending it to the wrong department for some silly reason. Or just refusing to approve an order they haven't seen before. Why CentCom directed goals aren't sent to the station for free, or automatically, is beyond me.

Proper station goals should be ones that require 10-20 people attempting to work in coordination. A fire at the kitten orphanage leaving cargo with a crate full of kittens needing foster care by the crew with green text points awarded by how many are alive at the end of the round, well fed and not feral or otherwise hostile due to bad care. Space Refugees (ghost roles) needing food, medical care and shelter while NT looks for some port to offload them at, some with ulterior motives and side-antag status. Intercepted Data files that require decryption and various puzzles that need to be solved. Experimental new systems installed ot the Cyberaid that require testing, repairs and improvements, or even NT in the midst of negotations with a 3rd party and using the Cyberaid to bank roll said negotiations with random demands cropping up every 15 minutes that could range from exporting X number of items, repairing a shuttle that docks at arrivals or helping cure or weaponize a virus sample being sent to the station.

[Civilian "objectives"]

Having ones that actively encourage non-antagonist players to harass or instigate problems on the station? Not such a good idea. I think instead having minor, open ended objectives would be fine. 'Open a shop' 'Fix the old bar' 'Collect x items.',

My main stipulation in adding these, is that they should all require some level of crew interaction to fulfill. So, not maint diving scavenger hunts, but rather trading or stealing a fluff item from every major department.

@ZN23X@Alexkar598 I believe the main point of this topic is aimed at the fact that Civilian/Assistant jobs have little motivation to do anything, and usually break off into cliques or roam maint looking for things to do. Giving them non-antag related objectives might give these jobs and people some inspiration to do something to interact with the crew in a manner that isn't valid hunting or looting. Having 5 random Civs get an identical 'Throw a Party' objective might have a few of them realize others are throwing a party, and cause them to team up or even work against each other in attempts to have the better, bigger party. Objectives like these are meant to nudge people who might not be creative or otherwise motivated to find their own fun into do something that could be interesting for others to watch, interact with but not necissarily something that would put them at odds with Security (unless they chose to pursue their objective in the most greyshirt way.

[Surgery should be able to attach peg legs]

And then what, add cargo points for exporting limbs and organs? We rimworld now. Start hat production.

[Hiring Sec From the Manifest]

7 hours ago, Fethas said:

To put it simply, rejecting a person solely on the basis they did not late join and were on the manifest to start with is both meta and power gamey. We do have a powergaming rule now.

It is WITHIN RIGHT for a hos to reject a transfer when asked. IT IS NOT COOL if the mindset for rejection was 'well they may be bad cuase they were already on the manifest and did not late join the shift.'

Thats what bad.

The reason it probaly hasn't been bwoinked in the past is cuase people didn't notice and the powergaming rule is fairly recent. Also it should have been bwoinked in the past but that was then and in hindsight.

I'll take reasons Security shouldn't be 100% garunteed to never have antags in their department for 200 Alex.

[Making the Singularity and Tesla equal]

The only real consideration between the two is sabotage potential. One destroys the station and everything it touches, the other kills pretty much everyone who gets unlucky to come across it but the damage can be minimized in some areas by moving Grounding Rods into positions.

Neither of them are interactive to any degree, much less so than the super matter. The singularity mostly goes unused because of the EMP and radiation making it all but impossible to approach and deadlier it if escapes containment some how. Until power net rebalanced so wattage means something and engineering gets a revamp so any of the four engine setups can be built and maintained round start there is much of an argument to focus on those two.

[Making the Singularity and Tesla equal]

While I agree the engines aren't balanced, who cares? Power literally means nothing and making it a binary on/off switch in engineering would have most players none the wiser. Anything over 300kW, which the Turbine + Solars can create, means nothing. We have no use for excess power and all three main engines (Supermatter, Singularity and Tesla) all produce many times over the useable max power to begin with, the only thing interesting about them over something like turbines or TEG is the sabotage potential.

 

Until the power grid is more than 'Yes we have power' and 'Oh no, someone forgot to wire the engine' there is little point in trying to balance the engines.

[E-Dagger and Metagaming woes]

Someone needs to code a false bottom internals box that can hide 1-2 tiny objects in it and requires a specific emote or programmable action to view the hidden inventory, if sec wants to metagame that and go through a few dozen possible emotes/item combos to find the item, let them waste their time.