/tg/Station 13

Specifically Xenobio, Cook, and Mining?

My thoughts are that there is a ton of content and you're not going to be able to accomplish everything in one round.

What are your thoughts for why these three jobs seem to be constantly filled and leave the least amount of burn-out?

Weird way of asking "what's your favorite job and why?"

Long ago, I've said that mining draws some of the worst people on the server to it. Since lavaland's novelty faded, and bringing it's loot to the station became stale, I don't think it's as true anymore.

i've never seen xenobio be "filled" since its not really a job that gets filled

mining will always be a fun job since its one of the only jobs that changes round by round, even if you think it's only a little / could be better, it's still vastly better than most other jobs on the station.

for example: atmos got old for me because it's the same shit every round, even with all the new shit i came up with there's only so much you can do until it gets monotonous doing the exact same setups every round. if you have fun doing that and like making people happy getting like 200k research points at roundtime 20 minutes with bombs + sm research then go ahead.

not much different for chemistry (though i havent explored this job much but doesnt seem very fun to me at a glance, could be wrong), robotics, toxins, botany, virology, genetics, cargo, at some point you just feel like you've done it to death.

on the other hand mining is pretty much the same stuff but i find myself in many different situations since not everything can be done perfectly, getting randomly shot by a watcher off screen is no fun but its certainly something different that keeps you on your toes.

honestly lavaland could definitely benefit from a few things

random events, what if a worm just ate like a 5x255 hole in lavaland like a damn laser that would be hilarious

larger z level / the necropolis, having more to explore is just more fun.

elite mobs, certain versions of mobs that are just stronger, imagine like the ancient goliath freezing / magma watchers, except they're actually threatening. hell imagine like megafauna version of that.

some way to reset the map would be nice as well, even if its something minor like all the tendrils just coming back up after you beat legion or something.

I liek go pet slime nd b kawii sliem grrrrl

It's fun to feed people, even virtually. And every little praise of your cooking feels nice. But it only works if rounds last longer than 30 minutes, and people actually come to eat food. And if they also engage in lightest of roleplaying; not just grab shit and run.

yeah jobs like botanist and chef and bartender work best during lowpop, 2 hour rounds

i like lawyer because you are an assistant with brig acccess

Janitor, scientist, med doc (new stasis + defibb changes make it lots more fun), assistant are pretty much all I play as of late.

As for why I play them its because I want to. Scientist and med doc have cool content, assistant is flexible and can be whatever you want (believe it or not I don’t tide very much anymore), and janitor is fun because janitor.

Really don’t know whats your obsession with burn out dude the only foolproof way to fix that is the same as always, just take a break.

Cook is one of my favourite jobs because there’s a heavy emphasis on creativity. As a chef, you can go ham, rennovate your café, make menus, and cook exotic dishes that most players have never seen. Or, you can sit back, flip a few burgers, and engage in RP with hungry crewmembers. With economy, you can accept tips that you can use to pay an assistant for musical ambiance, or play the music yourself while cooking with one hand.

It’s similar to clown, in a way. You can be as extravagantly creative as you want to be, with the difference being that most crew will have to visit the mess hall at some point, meaning your efforts will be seen and appreciated by pretty much everyone.

I play security to kill people.

That said, doctor because I'm hella robust at it. I can fix/remove all your limbs in no time at all.

I used to be botanist because I liked growing flowers and growth serum wheat.

i like playing ai because you can lean back and bants with the crew and make fun of idiots who can't get basic things right despite hundreds of hours of experience while also passively being both the most powerful and the weakest being on station

I am a sucker for a good construction game, so I tend to roll Engineer. Its the job that allows you to play around with the most systems in the game, and it lets me flex the lego building child in me with fun builds.

Back when I played I often exclusively played as AI/Cyborg for a time. Specifically maining medborg.

Playing under an entirely different ruleset to most players and acting as an arbitrator while crew are trying to beat the tar out of each other is immensely satisfying to me.

One of the SS13 moments I recall as my favorite is when two feuding assistants were brawling in the medbay, and I was doing my best to shove and pull them away from each other when one shouts "WAIT!" and they both agree to a cease-fire, as to not upset the medical cyborg.

i greatly enjoy assistant because nobody ever expects anything of you and you can go and do your own thing without being tied down by responsibilities or watchful eyes. an assistant's role is what you make of it, and i'm very much attracted to that sort of open-endedness, because it allows creativity to spark in ways that just no other role could possibly do

AI is good because you can barely pay attention and still play. You can alt tab, or even play another game. Two games at once, because time is money.

Lumbermancer wrote:AI is good because you can barely pay attention and still play. You can alt tab, or even play another game. Two games at once, because time is money.

AI OPEN LAW 2, AI ROGUE, IGNORING ORDERS

I joined security to kill people.

Borg is fun because you have AA, which means it's easy to do favours for people. Borgs are also very hardy, so it makes rescuing people from danger a lot easier. Binary is the coolest voice channel, both aesthetically and gameplay-wise IMO. It makes it very easy to form a rapport with the other silicons and the fact that its usually quite secure is always an added bonus. I like borg more than AI because I enjoy actually being on the ground and doing stuff/interacting with people. AI becomes more fun for me when I have a shell.

I enjoy playing cook every once in a while because it's nice when people come and eat your food. It makes you feel a bit more involved with what's going on in the station, because you'll usually see everyone at least once.

I like making robuts.

I have no idea what draws people to cook, other than that it's annoying as shit to move slow because nobody is making food. Maybe people just like the idea of preventing other people having that problem.

Mining is always full because it's something to actually do (fight mobs) and the rewards are for the most part unique to mining and powerful. It's also pretty much a guarantee that you're not going to need to interact with a bunch of people unless you want to, and as silly as it sounds for a multiplayer game I think some folks probably value that.

Folks probably like xenobio because there is this huge theoretical space to play with. I think it probably turns out that only a few of the effects are really useful and made often, but at least there's a space to experiment in. Virology is kind of the same way, to a lesser extent, but with it comes the bonus of being able to kill the entire station. Given that I literally never see people doing anything with slime extracts beyond asking for red, I'm guessing the xenobio scientists keep their favorites pretty quiet (or they get killed too soon in the round to do anything useful).

I like playing cargo tech. You rarely are expected to do anything important other than wander around the station. There's no RP requirement for the job to be interesting. I don't even like ordering guns and engines and the usual cargo memes. I kinda just like being an assistant with legit disposals and autolathe access and a good chance at free yellow gloves.

Janitor's fun for similar reasons. You end up poking your nose in everywhere and finding assholes and cults and so on, but nobody expects you to actually do anything about it.

I used to like atmos, but it's rare to actually need to do the nominal atmos jobs, and in those situations the station's often pretty well fucked anyhow or engi borgs do the job for you. Trying to actually fix atmos problems is pretty futile anyhow, since they're usually stationwide and you're just one person running around to air alarms, or pulling one scrubber, or with one firefighting set--and it's ALL the air alarms that need fixing, or EVERY room full of plasma and ready to go off. At that point people are bailing out of the station anyway, so aside from trying to keep the route to the shuttle clear there's not a lot to be done. There's a reason fusion memes are memes.

But like probably everyone else in the game, I choose a job based on how much fun I think I'll have doing it, usually based on what other jobs are taken and how far along the round is. Rarely I'll take a job that I know I can do passably well that it looks like the station needs. I personally avoid jobs that require dealing with other peoples' bullshit (cook, bar, sec and medical, except genetics), because there's no joy for me in chasing idiots around or having mouthbreathers shout demands at me that I can't fulfill because of someone else's laziness.

W65 wrote:I have no idea what draws people to cook, other than that it's annoying as shit to move slow because nobody is making food. Maybe people just like the idea of preventing other people having that problem.

I like playing Cook because
1: Kitchen and hydroponics tends to be ignored by everyone, so it's a great place to be away from people.
2: You're only expected to get food and that's it. No big obligations.
3: There are a lot of options for cooking in a myriad ways, even without Botany intervention.
- For example, once I used rats that people brought me from the maint tunnels for making my döner kebab with "totally cow meat burgers".
4: There are some very complex recipes in cook that you can do in extended, and a lot more quick n' dirty stuff you can do in non-extended.
5: You can have a gimmick and RP without everyone accusing you of "not doing your job properly"

in general Service and Supply are the comfiest roles. Science can be comfy but they play with dangeorus power.

Let me break it down for you
Assistant/Clown/Mime/Janitor - People who are bored with the game/veterans
Security/Command - People that got bullied at school or in their social circles so they need something where they can pretend to have power
Engineering - Autists
Medbay - Noobs and ERPers
Cook - Chads
Botany/Science - Powergaming gayboys
Silicons - Masochists
Cargo - Powergaming gayboys and Noobs

I like the bar / kitchen because I get complimented for not being deep fried clipboard chef / bare-ass bottles of liquor left out on the counter barman. You can pass the time with other unhurried people and create a little oasis in the whirling gyre that is "The Game".

Also, you get to work in a location that's just defensible enough to make you feel like you're in a "Dawn of the Dead" scenario. When the zombies start to clamber over the counters, it's time to drop the shutters or board up the bar. Except instead of a shopping mall full of zombies,it's a space station full of mindless,faceless bar patrons with stupid names that think it's fine to throw their glasses after they're done drinking like animals.

tinodrima7020 wrote:Let me break it down for you
Assistant/Clown/Mime/Janitor - People who are bored with the game/veterans
Security/Command - People that got bullied at school or in their social circles so they need something where they can pretend to have power
Engineering - Autists
Medbay - Noobs and ERPers
Cook - Chads
Botany/Science - Powergaming gayboys
Silicons - Masochists
Cargo - Powergaming gayboys and Noobs

I assume the omission of Curator, Chaplain and Lawyer must surely have been intentional, since they are RP roles with no relevance unless a specific antag is present (Cult, Demons).

I play engineer because it's the most open job, and because I really like the SM. It's very moddable, and I've enjoyed getting a firm understanding on it.

I enjoy Security because I can enforce peace.

I enjoy Roboticist, because I'm autistic.

I like bartender because spiking drinks with various chems never gets old.

Engineer, because of versatility.

Get antag? Awesome, you can now build a great fort/base if a team antag, or a great death trap if tato.

Nonantag? Awesome. If the roundtype is made evident, you can immediately start supporting your team. Make a difficult disposals loop to fool nukies, even if it only leads to the death of one or two. Fortify sec/cargo and build a guillotine/execution machine for sec if it's revs.
Even if the roundtype isn't evident, you can go help any department you desire. Build an automatic loading system for Cargo. Build a Chem dispenser for botany. Do what scientists don't, and actually go hand out upgrades to people who aren't just Chem and mining.

bobbahbrown wrote:i like lawyer because you are an assistant with brig acccess

stop lying bobbah you dont play the game

I like lawyer since I have my own office but not required to do much of anything. Smoke cigars while watching security is always fun.

I like playing a sec officer and letting prisoners go when their security records weren't updated with their crimes

teepeepee wrote:I like playing a sec officer and letting prisoners go when their security records weren't updated with their crimes

I gotta ask, how do people deal with the crossfire between the powerhungry command/HoS/Warden/other Sec officers, and the general crew alternating between calling shitsec or calling sec incompetent for not doing enough?
it's gotta be pretty off-putting to deal with pressure from all sides while having to deal with antags and being expected to be robust enough to stop them.

Calomel wrote:

teepeepee wrote:I like playing a sec officer and letting prisoners go when their security records weren't updated with their crimes

I gotta ask, how do people deal with the crossfire between the powerhungry command/HoS/Warden/other Sec officers, and the general crew alternating between calling shitsec or calling sec incompetent for not doing enough?
it's gotta be pretty off-putting to deal with pressure from all sides while having to deal with antags and being expected to be robust enough to stop them.

A) they don't. Security is a stressful job and most people either don't play it or get banned from it because if the pressure. TG player base is especially toxic and anti-security and is the reason the department is perpetually undermanned.
B) Completely ignore it, continue to be the hero the station needs, not the one it deserves. Anyone who protests gets town in the gulag. If you're going to make life hard for security they will make life hard for you.

Calomel wrote:I gotta ask, how do people deal with the crossfire between the powerhungry command/HoS/Warden/other Sec officers

you don't, just step aside and let them figure it out themselves, self-demote if they try to drag you into it, mutinies never work out, officers trust their HoS too much

Calomel wrote:and the general crew alternating between calling shitsec or calling sec incompetent for not doing enough?
it's gotta be pretty off-putting to deal with pressure from all sides while having to deal with antags and being expected to be robust enough to stop them.

shittalk them back, it's part of the fun
also tatoo rule 10 to the inside of your retina if you wanna play sec, your salt levels will go through the roof if not
I play not to be a hero but to die trying, also I never neglect my duties and I don't free prisoners while their sentence is running when a team antag is confirmed and I know they're not part of it, I treat it as if they'd done it after the antag is revealed
your inmersions are safe with me