Drones: Feedback edition

[Saegrimr]

Bottom post of the previous page:

Wait so they can't hear binary now but can hear normal speech?
Kind of a weird tradeoff.

[Gun Hog]

Wait so they can't hear binary now but can hear normal speech?
Kind of a weird tradeoff.

I would rather them have binary (because they are machines), than human talk. Why would drones care what a human has to say?

[JJRcop]

I made them understand human speech because I thought it would be fine to let them respond to things like "get out of my department or I will turn you into a pile of dust!", or "there's a hull breach at X, do something!".

Now that I hear about the admin policy with them, I may consider removing that now. I still don't want them to have binary chat.

[Saegrimr]

I thought it would be fine to let them respond to things like "get out of my department or I will turn you into a pile of dust!"

This is a good thing in my opinion, granted it does open up some meta but it also prevents a lot of bwoinks for things that could be avoided with "Fuck off, drone".

[Cham]

Going to bring up a few ideas from when they were still called MOMMIs or Keepers or w/e.

First: spawning. I agree that having drones available at round-start is a bad idea SOMEWHAT. Having an option to become a drone if your selected job is full the same way assistants can would be nice. And as for a lack of drones on-station at round start, why not have their spawn timer set on the same value that the traitor communication message is? A couple of minutes into the round, but long enough that people have started to go about the shift.

1. You may not involve yourself in the matters of non-drones, even if such matters conflict with Law Two or Law Three.
2. You may not harm any being, regardless of intent or circumstance.
3. You must curate and improve the station to the best of your abilities.

Slightly less wordy laws as well.

[Saegrimr]

Non-drone is even more vague than "being", welding tools for example aren't drones.

[Cham]

non-drone lifeforms? I don't know, I feel like an ass now.

[Cipher3]

Does the AI count as a lifeform?

[Lo6a4evskiy]

Change it to "sentient beings".

So drones can murder slimes and simple animals and pets?

[Steelpoint]

Living or sentient being?

[Lo6a4evskiy]

Are drones worth it?

[ExplosiveCrate]

Usually, yeah. As long as you don't go overboard and cause a station-wide metal shortage, they're usually helpful in situations where the station is damaged. That, and most antags tend to ignore them knowing that drones can't hurt them.

[Random Players]

The metal shortage can be easily dealt with by miners who actually mine iron (I know, CRAZY right? Only worth one point per ore! Same with Sand for glass!) or by the QM ordering metal.

[cedarbridge]

Change it to "sentient beings".

So drones can murder slimes and simple animals and pets?

Slimes speak. They're sentient.

The real concern about using "living and/or sentient" is drones dragging around corpses which are neither but would be allowed under that sort of qualifier.

[Saegrimr]

The metal shortage can be easily dealt with by miners who actually mine iron (I know, CRAZY right? Only worth one point per ore! Same with Sand for glass!)

I had no problem mining lines of iron and sand WHEN I HAD STIM PILLS. OH BOY HERE WE GO AGAIN

So drones can murder slimes and simple animals and pets?

This really makes me sad theres no short way to go "IF ITS NOT ANOTHER DRONE, OR THE STATION ITSELF, DONT FUCK WITH IT".

[Cipher3]

Change it to "sentient beings".

So drones can murder slimes and simple animals and pets?

Slimes speak. They're sentient.

Most slimes don't. Just player slimes. I guarantee you there will be an argument over that one day using that wording.

[cedarbridge]

Change it to "sentient beings".

So drones can murder slimes and simple animals and pets?

Slimes speak. They're sentient.

Most slimes don't. Just player slimes. I guarantee you there will be an argument over that one day using that wording.

You don't talk to your slimes when you're in xeno? I assure you, they speak back.

[cedarbridge]

Maybe instead of negative "you can't", which would lead to problems you people stated in previous posts, make it positive "you can only".

"You can only interact with station and other drones."

An exclusive statement might actually be a good direction to go with that.

[kosmos]

Maybe instead of negative "you can't", which would lead to problems you people stated in previous posts, make it positive "you can only".

"You can only interact with station and other drones."

Nice! Simplest solution is best solution. How about these:

1. You can only interact with the station and other drones.
2. You must maintain, repair, improve, and power the station to the best of your abilities.

First one basically tells you how to do your thing, second tells what to do.
No need to mention about harming anyone - harming is interaction, thus forbidden. ...Although I'm not sure if it would be safer to remind people that no, you can't murder anyone as a drone.

[deputi]

It'd be nice if drones could switch hands with the middle mouse click like humans can. I only switch hands with the middle mouse and it really trips me up when drones can't do it.

[Perakp]

Drones are the best new thing, I love being able to wire solars and fix stuff without having to worry about anything.

Malf/syndicate drone factory would be cool to have. Syndi drones without uplinks, with a law that says they have to feed the drone factory with metal and glass to produce more drones, and the normal laws to kill, destroy and interfere.

[Somejerk]

Today I noticed that drones can't use the mister on the backpack water tank.

[cedarbridge]

Today I noticed that drones can't use the mister on the backpack water tank.

There's a handful of things that drones can't interact with properly. Hopedfully they at least get the ability to throw things in the near future.

[Erbbu]

I wish drones could push things. Also being able to generate metal would be cool. I didn't want to steal any department's metal so I went out of my way to mine some, only to have it stolen by some engineer. Of course I couldn't just steal it back because that would break law 1.

[Peble]

I love the drones

I really do think they should be able to recycle materials/garbage across the station (glass, metal, maybe cardboard) internally

Maybe something in the Drone tab on the side like "consume held object", waiting an amount of time, depending on the object, then in the drone tab it would display how much metal/glass/whatever you've got Stored for Dispensing in sheet form.

[qwert]

I love the drones

I really do think they should be able to recycle materials/garbage across the station (glass, metal, maybe cardboard) internally

Maybe something in the Drone tab on the side like "consume held object", waiting an amount of time, depending on the object, then in the drone tab it would display how much metal/glass/whatever you've got Stored for Dispensing in sheet form.

> drones smelting weapons for peaceful autism fortresses
> end to all wars