Fox McCloud
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Posts posted by Fox McCloud
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Wanted to test out the effectiveness of Nitro in bluespace beakers.
Results were...to say the least, fascinating...(the circle is where the grenade was placed)
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If/When RUST Is implemented, it will be replaced by Enriched Fuel Rods that cause the reactor to be overloaded, thus irradiating the station.
It'll be bad, but not "destroy the entire station and get everyone furious at you" bad.
In the mean time, there are legitimate cases where I'd allow the beacon's use, provided permission was got first......but I definitely completely understand where you're coming from.
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I'd like to point out the shield generator was ensuring that it was nigh impossible to actually enter the DJ station; only way in (or out) was via teleporter.
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Unstable mutagen induces a random type of mutation in the plant; sometimes it's the plant itself, sometimes the weeds, sometimes the pests...orrr it may do nothing. If it's the plant, sometimes it will just out and out kill the plant; other times it will cause it to mutate into an entirely new species.
Left4Zed does a few things: it increases potency, increases the chance of mutation, and slows (or even halts) the production of any/all produce from that plant. You may have to change out to EZ or Robust once the potency is where you want it.
Lastly is the Floral Somatory. This is a special botany only item R&D can make; it allows you to shoot two types of beams: one that increases yield and one that increases potency. Keep in mind, each time you use the potency increase one, it may not result in a total increase; you might lose potency, as well.
As terrifying as deathnettles are, the reason you never see a Botanist wreck with them is that it requires high potency to be effective and also requires a mutation to begin with. Additionally, Left4Zed will cause the total yield to drop to 0 and for the plant to never mature--you have to switch to Robust Harvest or EZ, at some point to get the plant to yield any produce.
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What is Xenoarcheology?
Xenoarch, is, in short, the discovery and proper excavation of artifacts and fossils from a bygone era.
What tools are required for Xenoarch
-Immense patience
-Space suit
-Depth Analyzer/Scanner
-Toolpick set
-Hand pickaxe
-Pickaxe/Jackhammer/Plasma cutter/drill
-Optical Mesons
-Field Generator
-Wrench
Strongly recommended:
-Mining satchel
-Ore Box
-Tape Measure
First thing you want to do is suit up and grab all the required supplies in the list---consider taking the others with you for your own convenience; they'll make life easier for---the Tape Measure in particular will prevent you from making mistakes if you don't have the greatest memory or have a temporary lapse in concentration. After you've gathered your supplies, you want to head on out to the asteroid itself; be sure to double or even triple check that you have all your goods; no other job class requires such a ridiculous plethora of items to accomplish so little--it's easy to forget just one tool and have to go back inside the station to get it.
Finding a Digsite
The actual process of finding a potential digsite is easy; just use your depth analyzer to scan any rock tiles; if it hums, then move on; if it pings, you're in business. Keep your eyes peeled for those brown rocks with white cracks in them; those tiles will always have something inside of them.
Excavation
This is the process that will rot away the minds of most Xenoarcheologists, as its tedious, math based, and requires exact precision.
Once you find a tile that pings, you'll want to take note on your depth analyzer just the very tile you're looking at (the most recent scan will be at the bottom). Here it will list the Anomaly depth, clearance depth, along with the type of find it is (potassium, iron, mercury, etc). The formulate for getting out the potential artifact is this: Substract the clearance depth from the anomaly depth; this number is the exact amount you want to mine out of the rock. How do you mine out that much, you say? Why with your handpick and pick set of course.
The hand pick and others are listed below, along with how much they clear:
Brush: 1 cm
1/6 Red: 2m
1/3 Orange: 4cm
1/2 Yellow: 6m
2/3 Green: 8cm
5/6 Blue: 10cm
1/1 Purple: 12cm
Hand Pickaxe: 30cm
First off, chuck the brush; all increments are always measured in 2, so 1 is being overly sensitive. So, you take out the proper picks or combination and being picking away...for example, if the anomaly depth was 60 and the clearance was 20, then you'd need to dig a total of 40: you could dig with 1/1 3 times, then once with 1/3...4 times with 5/6...the choice doesn't really matter; just pick precisely down to 40cm. If you forget how much you've excavated, this is where your tape measure comes in handy; it will tell you how much you've cleared so far.
Once you're down to this level, place the generator right up against the rock wall (with the circular disks facing it). Next, bolt it to the ground with the wrench. Swipe your ID to authenticate yourself, then open the menu up. What field do you want to select? It depends, upon what the field generator says---use this as reference:
Carbon - Trace organic cells
Potassium - Long exposure particles
Hydrogen - Trace water particles.
Nitrogen - Crystalline structures.
Mercury - Metallic derivatives
Iron - Metallic composites
Chlorine - Metamorphic/igneous rock composite.
Phosphorus - Metamorphic/sedimentary rock composite.
Plasma - Anomalous materials
Once you have the right field selected; turn it on, then get out your 1/6 (2cm) pick and excavate once more. Tada! A strange rock or potential artifact is now yours. If you follow this methodology, you will never destroy a strange rock. Now, turn off the generator.
From here, there may be 1 or 2 more potential artifacts in that tile (or there may only be 1). Just rescan it to see the new depth and repeat the process (just keep in mind what you've excavated already for your calculations).
Cracking Open Your Finds
Now that you've got a stash of strange rocks, it's time to see what's in them. Fortunately, as time consuming as excavating the rocks is, cracking them open is rather easy. Simple pull out a welder, turn it on, and use it on the Strange Rock. Tada, you got your item. On the rare case that sparks fly off the rock when this happens, try some acid on it instead.
Congratulations, you've now learned how to become a proficient Xenoarcheologist.
The Loot
Just what can you find at digsites? Is it exciting? Is it great? It has to be awesome to be so boring and painstakingly slow, right? RIGHT? Well....here's another reason why even veteran Xenoarchs are hardly ever seen; the stuff discover is literally worthless junk 9/10 times.
First off, each site is unique and can be one of several types--each digsite type has unique items. The types, in order from most common to least common are:
Forest/Garden
Animal-related
Home
Technical/scientific
Temple/religious
War/battlegrounds
Just what's within each of these sites listed here is what you can find, from most common to least common:
Forest: Plant, shell, fossil or beartrap
Animal: Fossil, shell, plant, beartrap
House: Bowl, urn (fancy looking 50 unit beaker), knife, Statuette (decorative), instrument (decorative), pen (can be regular or sleepy pen), lighter, box (can deconstruct for cardboard), coin, shards, rods, or metal
Technical: Metal, gas tank (can be filled with a random gas), teleporter beacon, random tool, shard, metal rods, handcuffs, beartraps
Temple: Cult robes, urn (fancy looking 50 unit beaker), bowl, knife, crystal, Cult Blade, soul stone, handcuffs, bear traps, katana, claymore, shard, metal rods, metal
War: Gun, knife, laser, katana, claymore, cult robes, cult blade, handcuffs, bear trap, tool
Ok, as you can see, the vast vast majority of this stuff is not that great. It's either decorative, or just an existing SS13 item with a unique description. There's a few standouts, however, that I'll explain:
Cult Blade--Fully functional and full damage (30); you'll shake if you wield it
Katanta/Claymore: Utter crap; despite claiming to be real, both are replica in nature and deal pitiful amounts of damage; might as well robust someone in the head with a toolbox--damage is only 10.
Soul Stone: Never found one, can only assume its fully functional
Sleepy Pen: You have no way of knowing if it's a regular pen or sleepy pen, as far as I know. Keep in mind this is NOT the paralysis pen that Syndicates use; this is just a pen with a lot of Chloral Hydrate in it.
Bear Traps: You arm them, someone steps on them and it greatly reduces their movement speed; cannot be removed without assistance.
Guns: Basically it's just a revolver with a unique reskin --usually doesn't have bullets; downside is there's only a 33% chance that it can be loaded with current tech bullets. There's also a 33% chance it could come with its own RANDOM number of bullets
Lasers: can be a practice laser gun, full laser gun, X-Ray laser gun (!), or Captain's laser gun (listed in order of most likely to least likely to find). Downside here is there's a 5% chance that laser gun will explode when used and a 10% chance it has an unchargeable cell. Additionally, a 15% chance of having a cell with a random amount of energy--elsewise, you'll have to charge it.
So...really, the only interesting finds are a cult blade, soul stone shard, and guns which have a high failure rate. Worst of all is its all down to luck where digsites are at and luck on what items will be contained within that digsite. This is why no one gives a damn about Xenoarch and why no one keeps at it for long.
A Special Word on Super Rare Artifacts
Once in a while you may mine a tile or improperly excavate it and be temporarily blinded, then hear a keening/thunder/etc type sound. What does this mean? It means you destroyed one of the most rare artifacts a Xenoarch could hope for. How can you go about mining these consistently? Well, you can't; Xenoarch is bugged and the machines used for them are broken.
None-the-less, when you excavate a tile, there's a chance you may find some "Rocky Debris". This is easy to miss as it looks like a bunch of regular rocks glued together. That said, if you find one, be sure to use your depth scanner on it; if hums, just destroy it....that said, if the depth scanner pings when you use it on rocky debris? Take a deep breath and calm yourself; you have something super rare. Some Xenoarchs recommend just using the 2cm pick to slowly crack it open; others will chance it with the analyzer. Personally? I've never Rocky Debris with something inside it yet.
Those Super Rare Items
Just what are these super rare items? Well...it's a surprise. Sometimes it's a rare object; other times it's an "Alien Artifact". I'll leave the rare artifacts a surprise, for now, but I will briefly discuss the "Alien Artifacts".
Alien Artifacts
These are weird relics that possess odd powers; it can take on any number of shapes, but they all do the same thing--when activated, they'll produce an effect. This is why there's all those odd tools in Xenoarch; to test how to activate them. Once you pin down what it does and how to activate it, you may want to extract its energy and put it in an anomaly battery and use it for your own purposes. Be very careful with these artifacts; very few of the effects they produce are beneficial.
And there you have it...a lengthy guide for a lengthy process. I can only hope that, one day, Xenoarch is fixed, and not some SSD-inducing job with almost zero results or benefits.
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I also missed out on this vote, but I, too, vote for no rights for Nymphs.
I was more than willing to grant it to them as they have a very beneficial+helpful role for Botanist.
That said, most players have, sadly, decided to use the role to abuse their semi-all access and grief the heck out of people with it.
My vote is no rights unless they're helping in Botany.
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The Surgery room is too small. Could you make it bigger? Maybe with two tables for surgery and double the items for surgery (scalpel, retractor etc);
Again about the surgery room. The scanner there seems to be bugged. I tried using it to check if my patient was healed, but the scanner console wasn't working. I had to drag the body to the scanner outside the room.
The main issue with the surgery room, at the moment ,is the scanner; it's not normally there, by default--because it was added, it really cramps up the working area and makes it easy to intentionally or accidentally trap people. The tools and limited amount of tables is intended; it forces choice and good judgment of who to treat and when to do it.
The medical supplies (the kits) are too little. Khajiit, my doctor, usually gets one of each kit because he works at the entrance, healing any patients (well, except for some griefers and clowns...), and if needed, he can be a surgeon. (I like the color of the cap/jacket). Maybe three, or even four, of each kit. But three would be fine, i think.There's two medkits of each type; that's plenty enough--additionally, more healing items are in the NanoMed and Emergency NanoMed wall mounts. Also, the other part of it is game balance and gameplay enhancement. There should be an environment that fosters additional gameplay, not generates "push button" problem solvers. What I mean by this is simple mechanics that don't really encourage work or teamwork/interaction with other players; the Chemist exists for a reason--to make medicine for medbay and to dispense chemicals and drugs (dubious or not =p) to the general populace. Adding in more medkits doesn't really foster additional gameplay.
About the entrance. A idea would be to take out the last two scanners on the left wall, put the CMO office there, and the first scanner would stay there, while the CMO office could be changed to a place for more scanners, without the walls. It might be VERY helpful, as it would be a straight line: Entrance --- Scanners --- Surgery.The general feedback on the medbay has been very very positive; during our first two weeks of operation, we got more positive comments regarding its layout than all other positive comments on other areas combined, I don't think it's a good idea to change the layout like that, at this point. The purpose of the office being central is so he can monitor or access everything quite easily (while watching).
Alien doctors could really use a wirecutter inside of the medbay instead of travelling outside, facing the dangers of the panana peels and the wet floors just to grab one. Also, flashlights. And replacement lights.Reason why Tajarans and Unathi have to snip their gloves is because they get really large side-benefits instead (increased melee damage+chance to cause bleeding on hit, can't get fat, and cold resist, for Tajarans, for instance); it's part of game balance and I feel this is legitimate downside the class should have (including traveling to specific locations to deal with the downside). As for replacement lights, again this falls under the additional gameplay; doctors shouldn't have every little tool as their disposal to fix every little problem in their department--they're there fo specific specific medical problems.
And the last.... McArthur Wing! D<Again, the biggest problem with that area was it took away from gameplay and didn't enhance it; it just made medbay impervious to power outages.
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It's ok! Don't get too discouraged; just keep working at it.
Also farmbots are supplemental help; they're not 100% optimal, nor should they be (or Botanists could just set up a few and go do whatever they wanted). They only activate when the lights on the tray pop up.
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I would love this integrated as a verb so you don't need to flick back to the core to change channel frequencies and mics. As the AI you should capture all radio chatter logically but give the option to enable/disable certain channels. Maybe even a way for crew to "jam" the AIs listening ability also for short periods could prove crucial in a malf round
just a thought 
I think that the AI using the intercoms is kind of the whole deal with an AI, it is supposed to be hard like that (thats what she said)
I pretty much agree; as much as I'd love for it to be easier, the AI is the single most powerful entity on the entire ship and has more power, in a short period of time, than anyone else; the AI really isn't in need of "buffs".
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It's an interesting design, but it has quite a few issues:
-Botanists will have to walk much farther now to get water
-The Seed extractor is located in a 1x1 area that is easy to trap people in (or you'll have to wait for someone to finish doing what they're doing)
-The front desk location is incredibly jammed; again, easy to trap someone or just plain get frustrated waiting for someone to move.
-Much further walking to have to get seeds, fertilizer, and medicine (and to grind up plants)
-Farmbots are now going to be incredibly irritating to have/use because:
--the crowded and many 1x1 space means it will inevitably have to be incessantly moved, a lot by Botanists because it's crowding or wedged itself in a 1x1 space
--Provided the Botanists are standing at the entrance or center of their "C" styled plots, it means the bots will be unable to utilize or help out with nearly 25% of the plots.
I appreciate your input on this and your design (nice diagram), but it, unfortunately, has some major issues, and contrary to your design intent it doesn't really increase efficiency, I'm afraid. It optimizes for total possible volume, but completely sacrifices on total space, movement efficiency, and access in order to do it; it also has "scaling" problem---With the previous Botany you could scale up to 4-5 Botanists without a gigantic issue (I realize there's only 3)--under this setup, you're locked with pretty much 3, as any more than that and they'll be crowding each other incessantly.
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Updated main topic.
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It's amusing, but it doesn't really have a good point, per se.
It's not inciting cooperation of the crew and its not making the chef do something inherently dangerous, either. Sure, it'll be good for a laugh or two, but it doesn't really foster gameplay.
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A few little tweaks/issues/things missing from various areas; changes will be removed upon implementation or rejection.
Species
-Make Tajarans and Skrell spawn in with a pair of sandals instead of their regular job's shoes
-Implement mag-sandals
-Up hardsuit usage to 3 uses per kit (for head, suit, and magboots)
-Implement stun gloves for snipped/mangled gloves (though this may need to remain as a legitimate downside due to Skrell+Tajarans doing extra melee damage)
Syndicate/Antag
-Add Manhack grenade (3 manhacks for a grenade) to syndicate uplink; will likely cost 5+ telecrystals and be counted as a "blatant" weapon like energy swords and energy crossbows.
Jobs
-Chaplain: Make Bible deal the random hurt/healing damage instead of the null rod.
-Clown: Possibly implement clown shop on PDA
Cargo Crates
-Add 2-3 Tank transfer valves to the Plasma Assembly Crate.
Grenades
-Rebalance grenade-casing grenades and large grenades to have differences (currently large grenades require level 3 or 4 combat, but have no difference from a grenade made from single sheet of metal).
-Despite the fact that the igniter assemblies go INSIDE the grenade, I still think it would be best for the IR created a beam outside of the grenade to individuals can create trip mines without employing plasma bombs.
Toxins
-Increase remote signaler, proximity, and timer count to 6 (each)
-Make combiners and filters have science access (instead of atmos)
-Add console to view gas composition, pressure, and temperature of the burn chamber (also needs sensor in burn chamber)
-Make Tachyon-Doppler Array functional.
RD's Office:
-Break "biohazard lockdown" button into 3 separate buttons: (1)Science lockdown (2)Toxin's lockdown (3) Xenobiology lockdown
Virology
-Remove restrictions on Gibbingtons, Monkeyism, UFB, and Suicidal Syndrome which prevents Advanced Viruses containing these from being infectious
-Increase chance of Advance Viruses for being a random event to give Virologist something to actually do (not uncommon for 10+ rounds to be played and the Virologist isn't needed). Advanced Viruses are not to be confused with things such as Pierrot's throat, Straight Gibbingtons, Roboticism, etc (the latter can be cured with chemistry or eating particular things; Advanced Viruses are 4 stages and can only be cured by a Virologist+his equipment).
Primary Tool Storage
-Implement Primary tool storage as seen on test server Deep Space Testing Initiative Gamma (the one with the multitools). Pic included of what it currently is NOT and what it should be changed TO:
Atmos Maintenane (above the pool)
-The purpose of this room is that if main atmos gets poisoned, the valve can be flipped and security can run off of the oxygen canister for a while; currently the valve is incorrectly positioned and the oxygen canister is hooked up to nothing. Pic included of what it currently is NOT and what it should be changed TO:
Atmos
-Add Pipe Dyer
Medbay
-Remove scanner from surgery room (causes mobility+space issues)
-Change clone pod starting biomass to 150 and re-adjust cloning cost to 150 per clone (down from 3000 starting cost and 3000 cost per clone).
Mining+Research Asteroid
-Make it so that calling the research/mining shuttle will automatically make the airlock of the dock close (this will greatly greatly cut down on accidental depressurizations of the docking bays)
"Antagonists without objectives" rounds.
in Suggestions
Posted
Strongly disagree with this. Baystation is still very much wanting to stay in the past and focus on insanely heavy roleplay, while the general shift in SS13 is towards moderate to light roleplay.
Removing objectives just effectively means that traitors can do whatever the hell they want, from blowing up the entire station, to slowly capturing the entire crew and mercilessly torturing them for no reason for the next hour (or more).
I think this is a very very bad idea, especially when the general shift/focus on roleplay is changing.
I'm up for silly objectives, but not this.