/tg/Station 13

https://github.com/tgstation/-tg-station/pull/8761

Stunprods, cablecuffs, and spears are about to go.
Yes? No? Discuss.

Absolutely fucking no.
I can't fathom a reason for the removal of these items, which provide rudimentary restraining and stun capabilities for non-security/non-antags.

one guy actually said a good idea

make stun prods not fit in backpacks

Antags need cuffs to kill people?
When did people get this unrobust?

Please don't remove cuffs. They're incredibly useful for restraining others without the need for a kill.

Don't do this. Stunprods aren't just useful for subduing someone in melee non-lethally if you don't have a stunbaton, or as an offensive tool for antags, but I use them in R&D for Combat 3.
I-I mean, they're useful for other things as well - in fact, they're one of a Revolutionary's weapons of choice.

Cablecuffs, similarly, are good for restraining someone. I use them in Security when I don't trust the cuffed person to attack me when I uncuff them, and I don't want to waste zipties. They're easily-available, which means an antag who wants to hold someone hostage instead of just killing them can do so. It gives crew an opportunity to restrain someone without having to resort to putting them into crit.

And spears? Nobody really uses spears for greytide combat. I use them as a clown for my IMPERIAL SOLDIER gimmick (Ave, Imperator, morituri te salutant), and occasionally they're useful as carp-hunting tools. They're bulky, so you won't see anyone using one for proper greytiding, as the PR suggests.

I'd suggest just making it punishable to make stunprods/cablecuffs without a reason - 'Security found an emag' is a reason, but 'CODE BLUE TIME FOR VALID' isn't. This would mean cracking down on people who misuse the weapons (or who are just crazy-prepared slash powergaming), not the weapons themselves.

Considering I was admin booped within the last week for shooting someone into crit and then dragging them to medbay rather than cable cuffing them, I think this is actually the opposite of what Adminbus wants.
But of course the left hand doesn't know what the right hand's doing etc. etc.

You were bwoinked for critting someone and dragging them to medbay? That's my #1 favourite 'EMT versus grifflord' strategy. I applaud you.

Really, though, stunprods and cuffs are necessary. How else do you plan to semi-stealthily take down the HoS as a ling?
And spears have never even been a problem, except with people who have one on their back, two in their hands and drag one behind them. And they get brigged and have them confiscated anyway.

TheNightingale wrote:You were bwoinked for critting someone and dragging them to medbay? That's my #1 favourite 'EMT versus grifflord' strategy. I applaud you.

Really, though, stunprods and cuffs are necessary. How else do you plan to semi-stealthily take down the HoS as a ling?
And spears have never even been a problem, except with people who have one on their back, two in their hands and drag one behind them. And they get brigged and have them confiscated anyway.

If I have no solid evidence they're a traitor, but they were still doing something shady enough that I'm not taking chances, I'd rather take them down then sort it out afterwards.
Someone breaking into the PA room as a Librarian is pretty high on the shady meter. And hey, if they weren't a traitor, and they were just being an asshole, lesson learnt by being shot. (In this case, they were actually a traitor)

The problem with stunning someone, cuffing them and dragging them in for questioning (whether as Security, an involved party or even as your resident vigilante) is that inevitably, when you're going through the hallways, someone (probably in a grey jumpsuit, budget insulated gloves and a wallet for their ID slot) is going to drag them away from you, uncuff them and release them. Bonus points if they disarm you and you fall to the floor, dropping your {self-defence weapon of choice}.

People don't do that as much if you're dragging a critical body to medbay, even if they're in cuffs.

What the fuck am I reading.

There's really nothing to be said that hasn't already been said.

Nothing wrong with prods or spears.

Cable cuffs should go though, being able to effectively stun someone for an unlimited period of time with an item that is made from an item that is literally laid out in the open all over the station is terrible

How are you supposed to subdue literally anyone unless you're sec then? Your options are: Crit them or sedate them.

Almost like its really difficult to non-lethally subdue someone in reality! Seriously, its easier to bash someone's head in than to take them alive.

I do think that Cable Cuffs need to be either removed or made harder to make, since as noted above you can make them from one of the most common items on the station.

But has that ever really been an issue? We've had cablecuffs coming from a common as fuck item for ages and it's never been anything gamebreaking. Why does it warrant a change now, all of the sudden?

It looks like literally nobody except the pr creator agrees with this change so there's no need to cry coder conspiracy

I play almost exclusively sec roles, and i think this change would be bullshit. There will be no way to combat sec without a revolver. Is MrPerson just trying to remove assistants being able to arm up with ghetto weapons or what? Being stunned and cuffed is better than being straight up killed because it allows for interesting traitor gimmicks beyond use gun on head. And spears are famously mediocre until the new embed code came along, how are they a problem?

lumipharon wrote:How are you supposed to subdue literally anyone unless you're sec then? Your options are: Crit them or sedate them.

So... like the old days then

Im all for the removal of stuns, but if you are gonna do it, make sure there are other methods to capture people.

Yeeeah, this is just compromise bait. Fuck vemoving them, and fuck nerfing them equally.

And some people actually don't believe the hug-box is real, just look at how the game used to be. You should feel horrible for even thinking of a change like this.

Phalanx300 wrote:And some people actually don't believe the hug-box is real, just look at how the game used to be. You should feel horrible for even thinking of a change like this.

u mean... like before we had cablecuffs or spears?

I hate this idea on a personal and admin level.

We're trying to encourage people to kill each other LESS when there's not a compelling reason, and as others have said, nobody but the HoS, Warden, or Security Officers will have a single way to subdue a person that doesn't also end their life. Unless the Chemist makes sleep toxin syringes or something, which we also had a big problem with and had to try and prevent.

Nothing I've seen suggests either prods, nor spears, nor especially cablecuffs break the game or cause any problems whatsoever. They fill a useful role sometimes, and this is going to hurt low-rankers and antagonists the most.

What I find most interesting from this entire discussion is the idea many people have that Stun Prods are essentially a piece of standard issue equipment that everyone on the station has.

Players misbehaving, misusing the tools provided on the server, and acting in a way that isn't conducive to good gameplay is a problem for the rules and admins.

Coders should not be adding/removing/changing items like this in an attempt to administrate the playerbase through code. If validhunting and vigilantism are problems on our server, it's probably best solved by addressing the standards we set for the playerbase and what is expected of them then trying to take away the toys they do it with. There may be circumstances where that's not the case, where the presence of certain items is actively encouraging people to behave a certain way, but I don't think that's the situation here.

Please let the administrative staff solve this issue, if it's truly an issue, rather than jump to removing items like this. It's a bit hasty.

-off topic part removed-

An0n3 wrote:Players misbehaving, misusing the tools provided on the server, and acting in a way that isn't conducive to good gameplay is a problem for the rules and admins.

Coders should not be adding/removing/changing items like this in an attempt to administrate the playerbase through code. If validhunting and vigilantism are problems on our server, it's probably best solved by addressing the standards we set for the playerbase and what is expected of them then trying to take away the toys they do it with. There may be circumstances where that's not the case, where the presence of certain items is actively encouraging people to behave a certain way, but I don't think that's the situation here.

Please let the administrative staff solve this issue, if it's truly an issue, rather than jump to removing items like this. It's a bit hasty.

These items literally don't serve any purpose but to

a) enable antags. Which is dumb, antags should get cool antag weapons. I'm still on the fence about spears though because they do help a bit in rev, but even then I'd rather see a hoard of toolboxers than spear-wielders.
b) enable validhunters. Boo hoo.
c) enable people trying to non-violently subdue someone breaking into their work area. Ok, that's fine, but I'd rather have a more general solution to this problem than "everyone has a stunprod and cablecuffs!". And the proposed nerf to stunprods not fitting in backpacks absolutely ruins this option anyway. And quite frankly, not everyone has access to cables on-the-spot. Like the bartender, what's the bartender supposed to do if someone is breaking in? Geneticist? Virologist? What if someone's breaking into Xenobiology or Toxins? Run off to grab wires? Make them in advance? Fuck that.

So the way I see it, the items are poor fixes to bigger problems that encourage people to play the game in a negative way.

to answer one of your points: The bartender shotguns them then smashes vodka on them until they braindead, the geneticist beats you into crit then monkies you, and the virologist weakens you with a punch and sends you out the space pipe.

MisterPerson wrote:-snip-

All three problems you explained are behavioral problems with the playerbase.

No offense but correcting those issues and figuring out solutions to them isn't your job.

Let the other half of this machine do that work. If you have situations in mind that have shown this to be a huge problem to you you should bring that up with the administrative staff instead of coding in your own fixes, please. What I'm hearing is that you don't hate these items, you hate what you've seen people to most commonly use them for. The task of correcting that is a job for the other side of this whole shebang.

Bartender has a shotgun and has wires in his backroom iirc along with the metal and glass
Who the fuck breaks into Viro or Genetics
Why are people breaking into places deep inside one of the more secure departments

Anyways, I don't think this change would see an increase in lethality being used. Just a decrease in shitty player behavior and mindsets.

Not all antags have access to anags weapons.
Not all antags that have access to antag weapons choose, or wish to have them. Are you really suggesting all traitors for example, must spend their tc's on weapons, narrowing their creativity? Also getting arresting with a prod as opposed to an e-sword is a significan difference.

Do you really think they 'enable' valid hunters?
Valid hunters will hunt valids regardless of what you do to nerf items.
If they can't stun and cuff people, then they are perfectly allowed to just disarm them and beat them to death.

cablecuffs let any non sec, subdue people across an awfully large number of situations, not just shitters breaking into places. How am I supposed to kidnap somehow without cuffs? break into cargo and hack the autolathe? Rob the brig? Yeah, naw.
The barman has a shotgun for a reason, and other departments are just that - departments, just because on guy doesn't have cuffs, doesn't somehow make their existence invalid.

And for the 20th time, stun prods aren't even that prevaliant. science and engineering has access to large numbers of powercells - cargo can order some if need be, but other then that, there's like, 2 publicly available cells on the entire map. For 60 people.

This is seriously a non issue. Are we going to hugbox it so much that you have zero worry about ever getting stunned by a non sec/e-bow traitor ever?

Edit: why is Hug-box censored, what the hell.

@An0n3:
The task of correcting the tools available to antagonists is an administrative one? That makes no sense.

lumipharon wrote:Not all antags have access to anags weapons.
Not all antags that have access to antag weapons choose, or wish to have them. Are you really suggesting all traitors for example, must spend their tc's on weapons, narrowing their creativity? Also getting arresting with a prod as opposed to an e-sword is a significan difference.

They all should.

lumipharon wrote: cablecuffs let any non sec, subdue people across an awfully large number of situations, not just shitters breaking into places. How am I supposed to kidnap somehow without cuffs? break into cargo and hack the autolathe? Rob the brig? Yeah, naw.
The barman has a shotgun for a reason, and other departments are just that - departments, just because on guy doesn't have cuffs, doesn't somehow make their existence invalid.

Not everyone having access means it's a poor solution to a universal problem.

lumipharon wrote:And for the 20th time, stun prods aren't even that prevaliant. science and engineering has access to large numbers of powercells - cargo can order some if need be, but other then that, there's like, 2 publicly available cells on the entire map. For 60 people.

If they don't matter that much, then why even have them? Clearly they do matter or nobody would give two fucks about removal.

We don't need to correct the tools available; we need to correct the attitude with which people misuse them.

TheNightingale wrote:We don't need to correct the tools available; we need to correct the attitude with which people misuse them.

Biggest complaint about changeling I've heard is that lings don't have enough murder tools available to kill people, so they have to rely on stunprods.

Ling isn't heavily reliant on stun prods because prods are op game breaking or anything. Ling is dependent on them because ling is garbage, intentionally so. If you can't stand to make antags decent while the improvised weapons are around I don't know what to say to you this compunction is long standing and bizarre.

Cult has its own weapons leaving what rev? For whom sheer numbers might prevent the few easily made prods coming to the fore and that is fine the real weapon in rev is those numbers.

Edit: Lings can kill people that is not the problem. They are one dimensional and expected to be jacks of all trades. Getting better at killing people will just induce another crippling nerf.

I'm unlocking this topic to allow conversation to continue, seeing as MisterPerson locked it and being the OP of the PR being discussed.

Just because you closed the PR doesn't mean that discussion should end abruptly here.

There really isn't anything else to add. I have no plans on doing anything else on this topic in the near future.

Which is dumb, antags should get cool antag weapons.

Security catches you with an esword or ebow it's pretty much game over. Good luck explaining that you "just found it on the ground". Get caught with some shit stick stun prod and it's a bit easier to bullshit your way out of it by claiming you made it because some dick weed was chasing you around and shoving you.

MisterPerson wrote:These items literally don't serve any purpose but to

a) enable antags. Which is dumb, antags should get cool antag weapons. I'm still on the fence about spears though because they do help a bit in rev, but even then I'd rather see a hoard of toolboxers than spear-wielders.

b) enable validhunters. Boo hoo.

Lots of things enable antags and valid hunters, some more than or equal to cablecuffs, stunprods, and spears, here's a small list of things off the top of my head.
-Doorhacking
-Camera disabling
-Access requirements
-Maintenance, literally designed to be a place for antags to do shady shit in
-AI laws
-Toxins, which has no productive purpose, I have seen a whole one person use bombs for mining in my years of playing here
-Chemistry
-Buckets
-Spray bottles
-Stuns in general
-The ability to pump plasma into the distro loop

Also toolboxes are a straight up improvement from spears because last I checked people without hats can get knocked unconscious by toolboxes to the head. As much as coders try to make it otherwise stuns are still king. Especially one hit RNG stuns that prevent you from screaming for help because you're unconscious.

MisterPerson wrote:c) enable people trying to non-violently subdue someone breaking into their work area. Ok, that's fine, but I'd rather have a more general solution to this problem than "everyone has a stunprod and cablecuffs!". And the proposed nerf to stunprods not fitting in backpacks absolutely ruins this option anyway. And quite frankly, not everyone has access to cables on-the-spot. Like the bartender, what's the bartender supposed to do if someone is breaking in? Geneticist? Virologist? What if someone's breaking into Xenobiology or Toxins? Run off to grab wires? Make them in advance? Fuck that.

So the way I see it, the items are poor fixes to bigger problems that encourage people to play the game in a negative way.

Each department used to have their own unique way of robusting folks but they were all steadily nerfed into the ground or new rules made them illegal to do.

>antags should have antag weapons and nothing else

When I started playing in the wonderful toybox/sandbox of SS13 I thought to myself "if only there was a very strict set of tools designed to do X, I hate all this freedom"

Glad to see we're finally headed towards that reality.

The only thing I agree with is the prods not fitting into backpacks, and i'm surprised this hasn't been brought up sooner. Metal rod + glass doesn't, so why would metal rod + battery + wirecutters?

The rest is just absurd.

I thought this was a joke when I heard about it but at least everyone knows better than to let this shit go through.

Coders plz think before you even want to push through this shitty changes.

You guys do know the PR was closed several hours ago?

Steelpoint wrote:You guys do know the PR was closed several hours ago?

and in the end it was just an excuse to force people to compromise. Have fun never using stun prods again.

There was no forced compromise, there isn't even a followup PR. Why do people keep saying ridiculous things like this?

Jacquerel wrote:There was no forced compromise, there isn't even a followup PR. Why do people keep saying ridiculous things like this?

Well penguin posted a picture of the comrpomise but it was deleted for some reason

Saegrimr wrote:The only thing I agree with is the prods not fitting into backpacks, and i'm surprised this hasn't been brought up sooner. Metal rod + glass doesn't, so why would metal rod + battery + wirecutters?

The rest is just absurd.

tbh I don't know why you can fit enough metal for 700 metal rods in a backpack either

it's less realism and more gameplay 'balance', in the same way they liquidated stungloves for being sneaky, they want to remove sneaky quick stunprodding from prods stored in bags. But that's an entirely subjective thing to discuss with really no real right or wrong.

Fact is that if you make stun prods bulky items, nobody will ever use them outside of random Assistants fucking around or riots/revs/cult. Lings killing their victims rather than absorbing them alive will become even more popular. Antags will have less non-lethal options. Crew will have less non-lethal options.

...and powergamers will just find something else to use.

Alex Crimson wrote:Fact is that if you make stun prods bulky items, nobody will ever use them outside of random Assistants fucking around or riots/revs/cult. Lings killing their victims rather than absorbing them alive will become even more popular. Antags will have less non-lethal options. Crew will have less non-lethal options.

...and powergamers will just find something else to use.

Lets be honest, most antags use stun prods to make it easier for them to then kill someone. Changelings get to combine a silence sting with a stun prod for a guaranteed kill while Traitors can use the prod to leave ambiguity on their antagonist status.

I will also restate my opinion that I'm wary of the idea being given that the crew need to have a stun prod on hand, or at least the implication's being given that the stun prod is highly integral to game play and the crew.

Steelpoint wrote:

Alex Crimson wrote:Fact is that if you make stun prods bulky items, nobody will ever use them outside of random Assistants fucking around or riots/revs/cult. Lings killing their victims rather than absorbing them alive will become even more popular. Antags will have less non-lethal options. Crew will have less non-lethal options.

...and powergamers will just find something else to use.

Lets be honest, most antags use stun prods to make it easier for them to then kill someone. Changelings get to combine a silence sting with a stun prod for a guaranteed kill while Traitors can use the prod to leave ambiguity on their antagonist status.

I will also restate my opinion that I'm wary of the idea being given that the crew need to have a stun prod on hand, or at least the implication's being given that the stun prod is highly integral to game play and the crew.

so now lings will just armblade people to death. Traitors will esword people to death.

If you want to remove stuns then by all means. I hate stuns. However this isnt removing stuns, just the stun weapon non-Sec players get.

I just don't understand it.

I could understand the stun gloves being removed, they were kind of cheap with how hard they were to see, and they were replaced with visible items.

But this.

You're stripping away the ability for any non antagonist that isn't sec to defend themselves.

You're taking away the ability for people that aren't security to deal hostile people in a way that won't kill them.

Are only sec officers allowed to get into fights now? Are they the only ones allowed to fight nuke ops, or try to stop wizards?

This isn't a simple change, not in the least. This is a literal statement that this server doesn't want assistants to be able to fight against anyone in any meaningful way that isn't just stealing sec shit.

Revolution rounds are now even fucking harder on revs, cult rounds are now even fucking harder on cultists, nuke ops now just have to bomb sec and they've pretty much won.

I'm just...really? The fact that this is really up for debate, that this is the path the server is going down.

Honestly, while you're at it, you might as well go all the way with it.

>Remove any slip from water
>Remove the disarm intent
>Bare fists now hurt the attacker when attacking armored enemies
>Choking has no effect on someone with an appropriate set of gear
>Flashbangs now have no effect on syndicate hardsuits, and someone with a helmet and glasses

I'm not really mad at this, just really sad. This entire game has always flat out encouraged the assistant trying to be a hero, Be robust, get good, etc, but updates like this really spell out the fact that what people want from this game is so radically different that this server just can't exist in its current state.

It used to be a good middleground between the absolutely batshit goon, and the insanely RP-heavy bay, but this division between the coders and the players will kill this server.

This has just proven that /tg/ doesn't know what it is anymore, and it just bums me out.