Job-training programs on the holodeck

[alexpkeaton]

 

One of the things I dread is playing a job for the first time where few, if any, others are alloted and others can't or won't assist you in doing your job. Access restrictions, demand of crisis situations that require your attention or everyone else's, etc. Engineering and medbay are two good examples of this.

 

I am reluctant to become an engineer. There's so much I don't know and for what I do know, I usually need to keep a wiki open right next to me for the steps I forget. So, I spend a lot of time scavenging the maintenance tunnels as a civ, scavenging for an hour to find a coin that will allow me to buy the lone pair of insulated gloves in the youtool that is inevitably gone when I insert it at 13:30. Also, cargo sends me around the station getting forms in triplicate for a pair of

ultra-contraband criminal gloves needed for breaking in to everything

insulated gloves. Cargo sends me to the HoP who sends me to the CE, then the CE ignores me. Then it's off to the caverns to find enough materials to actually create anything. Random sec officer searches you and asks WHAT ARE YOU DOING? Just trying to learn, friend. PERMA for the criminal scum!

 

There must be a better way.

 

To my suggestion: put all the materials and tools (perhaps a couple of youtools on steroids) and a working airlock and APC in a holoprogram. Break things down, build them back. Create amazing devices and learn how to be robust when meteors start bombarding the station. Try to walk out with anything, it disappears. End the program and start again. Hold demonstrations where an engie teaches others how to do things. Maybe add a button which will create a breach in all except atmos effects that needs to be fixed. No job demands and CE's wondering why you signed on if you were useless, no denied cargo requests, no hassle in acquiring materials, no learning from a jail cell.

 

If something like this is feasible (and it may be really not, so I apologize to any coders I've frazzled), maybe this can be expanded for other jobs. Chemist and chef are two jobs with a lot of demand from the station, rarely a partner that isn't SSD, and specific access restrictions that prevent others from coming in and/or using your equipment. Perhaps a holomedbay with cryo, surgery theater, etc. If you can't summon up holopatients, just put a crowbar and a knife in there to inflict the injuries that can then be holohealed.

 

I don't want to make this overwhelming, and even one very small and simple holodeck training to test the idea out would be fun too. Thoughts on interest and feasibility? Thanks to the coders for everything you do already.

 

[Garoon]

 

The holodeck is rarely used and often ignored, so this would give it some actual use beyond the probably one or two times a week it's actually used. I'm no coder though, so I haven't the slightest as to how strange the holodeck code would be. I'd support it though.

Who knows, maybe there can be different emag uses for the holodeck other than the carp, like maybe a holo-plasma canister emitting real plasma instead.

 

[Spacemanspark]

 

Who knows, maybe there can be different emag uses for the holodeck other than the carp, like maybe a holo-plasma canister emitting real plasma instead.

/tg/ has that exact thing.

It's so fucking OP, though, holy shit.

 

[Holyass]

 

I like this, It can help new players and old player out too.

 

 

+1

 

[improvedname]

 

Who knows, maybe there can be different emag uses for the holodeck other than the carp, like maybe a holo-plasma canister emitting real plasma instead.

/tg/ has that exact thing.

It's so fucking OP, though, holy shit.

 

If only emagged holodecks converted stamina damage to real damage

 

[Holyass]

bump

[Keroman]

 

Here's a thought, and I'd like to know what you guys think.

 

 

What if there was a job category for people who wanted to instruct lessons in the holodeck? These could be people whose knowledge in-game has been verified by a HoP or NT Rep and approved to teach.

Now that I type it out like that it sounds very much like a de-facto whitelist which I didn't really intend. Forget that idea.

 

Maybe add some code so that anybody can set themselves as an "Instructor" in the character setup screen, kind of like how you can set your relationship with NanoTrasen. You choose to show up as an instructor and in-game it shows in the Crew Manifest next to their job title like this:

Maxwell Edison (Scientist - Instructor)

 

That way players who want to instruct are super easy to find, but players who'd rather just be left alone won't have to worry as much about getting bothered by new players with questions about a job. Or maybe it could be as simple as adding a new news feed to one of the news computers listing players who are willing to give instruction. You know what? I'm going to start doing that when I play. I'll open up a news feed for anyone to post to to state what department they're in and that they're willing to give lessons to new players. No new code needed at all.

 

Now if there's a holodeck with learning programs I could imagine someone asking for an instructor to come show them how a job works just to get them alone for antagonist purposes. As long as the Instructor player lets someone else know where they'll be and who they'll be with it should be relatively safe. You could also stipulate in the rules that holodeck training is not to be used by antagonists to trick their target in any way, but honestly I think it should be up to the Instructor to cover their own ass in case.

 

[Tauka Usanake]

 

I support Instructor sub-job only if you can get drunk while teaching.

 

But yeah, this would be a nice addition. I'd give it a light karma price just to make sure everyone doesn't freaking become an instructor, or maybe an even smaller price for any single job to become an instructor in. You're kind of submitting to more RP when you do this so I see no reason why you shouldn't have to earn this.

 

[Keroman]

I agree 100% with Tauka's post. I would pay 5-10 Karma to be listed as an instructor for the Science department. It's possible that such a role could actually generate more Karma for the instructor, assuming the player being taught remembers they have Karma to spend.

Edited November 5, 2015 by Guest

[Kevak]

I would like that kind of thing.

[alexpkeaton]

 

I REALLY like Keroman's idea of instructors, and for a small karma unlock price. That with job-training holodeck programs would make Paradise unique among the servers, and I think would discourage a lot of greytiding/self-antagging from idle hands.

 

A few ideas:

- Perhaps creative wardens could agree on a set period of instruction time in a skill in lieu of imprisonment for non-violent offenses that would otherwise merit 10+ minutes of brig time. A certificate of completion could be required. Perhaps a karma-unlock job much like brig physician could be made specifically for an in-house "Corrective Education Director" whose purpose is to coordinate instruction as alternative sentences, either instructing personally or by using the pool of active instructors.

- Some ideas on karma unlock prices for instructors:

-Security Officer: No karma price: Admins manage who get these. Must be fluent in SoP, Space Law and have experience in all sec roles.

-Bartender, Paramedic, Scientist: 3 Karma

-Chemist, Roboticist, Medical Doctor: 5 Karma

-Surgeon: 5 Karma plus MD certification

-Engineering, Mechanic: 5 Karma

-Atmos: 10 Karma and/or admin nod

-Toxins: 10 Karma

-The practice range for security can be ported to the holodeck and that space used as a second interro room. Splitting up pairs can be valuable. Prisoner's dilemma, anyone?

 

And last but not least...

-Certificates of completion can be put on someone's personal description, with the names of their instructors. How can you cross-check that? The library. Take the certificates of completion, using IC signatures that can be matched, get them stamped by the Captain or HoP at the time, then bind them all together in the library and added to the database. That way, they can be accessed and verified in other rounds. EDIT: Or, add a special "CentComm" stamp that can be spawned only by an admin to stamp the certificates.

 

[Dinarzad]

I don't entirely agree on dividing Surgeon and MD karma unlocks, since surgery is part of an MDs job, Surgeon is simply an alternate title. Titles simply make you a 'specialist', if there's nothing but Surgeons in medical someone still has to go play nurse and man the front desk.

[Citinited]

 

A large problem I see is that the holodeck is abusable with near enough any item that turns into something. For example, setting the simulation to courtroom and wrenching all the chairs into metal allows you to take that metal outside the holodeck. Rinse and repeat until you have unlimited metal. I don't really see a fix for this without adding a tonne of code to prevent it being abused for infinite metal / circuitboards / chemicals / whatever.

 

Want to learn a department? Buddy up with one of the regulars and ask them to help you. Alternatively, just play the hell out of that department for a few rounds. (Yes I know you said it's daunting, but... do it! It's not like you're expected to be someone who does it 100% every time.) Try memorising some of the easier stuff (how to take down a reinforced wall, how to construct an APC, how to make some of the superior chemicals, how to fix internal bleeding) and soon enough you'll be able to do those things with ease.

 

[Tauka Usanake]

 

wrenching all the chairs into metal allows you to take that metal outside the holodeck

I recall that being fixed.

 

[Nomzy]

 

THE SECRET SHHH

On a serious note, it's still here.

 

[Citinited]

 

wrenching all the chairs into metal allows you to take that metal outside the holodeck

I recall that being fixed.

 

Oh, okay then.

 

[Holyass]

time to abuse it and tell all!

[Spacemanspark]

 

wrenching all the chairs into metal allows you to take that metal outside the holodeck

I recall that being fixed.

 

Oh, okay then.

Ya, I remember reporting that on the Github, was kind of surprised nobody had reported it before.

 

[alexpkeaton]

Bumping this after 2 months of inactivity.

[Shadeykins]

 

+1.

 

I don't see any downsides to this suggestion.

 

[Professor Cupcake]

 

Wait, I gaven't already shown my support of this? Dammit.

 

+1

 

[Sothangel]

This would be a great addition.

[Cupcakes_n_Hacksaws]

The BestRP server had a holodeck machine similar to the one in Goon's, but it had chem machines, metal/glass, tools, space areas, and all sorts of shit you'd need to just test random shit out. Not sure why, but it got taken out after like 3 days. point being, If THAT server can get shit like that, I can't imagine why this server can't do something similar; Fuck, it'd even allow for crazy thunderdome matches where dying just pops you out of the holodeck machine.