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Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sat Sep 18, 2021 11:43 pm
by kieth4
I think the title explains it well, I don't believe it's good for the round to allow the animals to do these things.

It brings rounds fully to an end when you get midround spiders or dragon, you're pushing them back and fighting them off it's an entertaining experience and the crew is winning, then from the corner of your eye you see Giant spider 324 dragging around a can of plasma or n20 or whatever the fuck gas burning half the station down or putting them to sleep then you see Giant spider 320 smashing scrubbers and the distro and all that other shit. Suddenly the station is fucked and you're forced to call the shuttle. This might be an extreme example but I don't think spiders should be able to use complicated knowledge such as that of gasses or the workings of pipes to grief the station

They shouldn't be able to instantly figure out that dragging around a can of plasma or n20 or whatever the fuck spreads this gas across the station at most they should be able to smash them for the sake of smashing but that's it.

It's silly because every single time this spawns it FORCES a shuttle call because of these situations which isn't ideal.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sat Sep 18, 2021 11:55 pm
by Mothblocks
I agree in the sense that simple mob antags should not be fucking around with things like the SM, but I think the best path for that is through code, just like how we did with swarmers.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sat Sep 18, 2021 11:55 pm
by Armhulen
agree with the above post, this is really solvable

swamers not being able to hit certain things should be a component

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sat Sep 18, 2021 11:57 pm
by iain0
I agree that the meta-playstyle of spawner antags like fish and spiders creates a disposable zerglike mentality that isn't really a good fit with the game or makes much sense in a play style, having zero value for your own life creates some pretty garbage situations.

Code changes would be useful to help incite any real change here, most obvious answers being
1) death to certain things prevents you respawning (meh, dont like this one)
2) inability to damage certain classes of objects ; pipes, fuel tanks, gas canisters, and anything else that later turns out to be an issue, to turn the antags more into a team fight rather than a rush of suicide bombers.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 12:07 am
by Mothblocks
I would want it so that spiders pulling/pushing around tanks is a lot slower, but they should still be able to hit them, I've had great environmental combat moments with it.

Things like pipes/APCs/whatever would be blocked from attacking, just saying "they don't taste good" or whatever.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 12:10 am
by Fikou
i think this ruling will cause weird inconsistencies
if it is just space dragons and spiders, what about xenobio spiders? do they know how machinery works? if yes, what's the difference between xenobio and sentience spiders?
if its not, is it every simplemob antag? what about xenomorphs? they arent simplemobs, but they are aliens, would they know how machinery works?
then if we go further, what about the random sentience event? those mobs know stuff, right?
what about ghost possessed mobs from that wizard event? we can assume they are probably in their "feral" state, so would they not know?

i think the only sane solution is a code one

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 12:14 am
by Waltermeldron
I agree with mothblocks, this would be better as a code change rather than as a policy change.

Otherwise, why stop at space dragons and spiders using knowledge they shouldn't normally have? Players are allowed to use knowledge they wouldn't reasonably have. If we're capping what knowledge can be used, why wouldn't you extend this to humans too? Assistants wouldn't reasonably know how to create chemical explosives or set the SM up. They're allowed to do both because using this knowledge isn't prohibited on LRP servers.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 12:32 am
by iain0
Mothblocks idea seems good.

Regarding ability capping, the difference is, an assistant could learn those other things if they wanted to, a brain can have gone down any number of different paths in its life. An infinite number of spiders put in an infinite number of rooms containing chem masters will only make things by mistake, never by intention (nor can they make chem masters, or containers, or...). Lock an assistant in a room for 30 hours with enough incentive to learn chemistry, they can at least do some basics.

Simply it's not even meta knowledge, it's meta intelligence levels entirely. Though they can always be mega magic super intelligent space spiders I guess, but mostly they just seem to be spiders.

Lack the body form to suit that intelligence - too limited normal ways of interacting with the world. Couldn't even make tools to do chemistry, yet alone learn it. Give em a few billions more years of evolution.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 8:19 am
by Waltermeldron
iprice wrote: Regarding ability capping, the difference is, an assistant could learn those other things if they wanted to, a brain can have gone down any number of different paths in its life. An infinite number of spiders put in an infinite number of rooms containing chem masters will only make things by mistake, never by intention (nor can they make chem masters, or containers, or...). Lock an assistant in a room for 30 hours with enough incentive to learn chemistry, they can at least do some basics.

Simply it's not even meta knowledge, it's meta intelligence levels entirely. Though they can always be mega magic super intelligent space spiders I guess, but mostly they just seem to be spiders.

Lack the body form to suit that intelligence - too limited normal ways of interacting with the world. Couldn't even make tools to do chemistry, yet alone learn it. Give em a few billions more years of evolution.
If something is supposed to be dumb and unintelligent, we'd make them an AI mob.
If something is supposed to be smart or able to adapt and learn, we usually make them players. These aren't the typical normal spiders that you can easily kill, they're deadly, they can strategize, they don't charge at you blindly. Their body doesn't let them use human-made objects, but they can still use their mouth to drag around or smash such objects. A spider would learn that fueltanks explode if they saw one explode, and since they're all connected by a link to their broodmother, all spiders would basically know this. If they are not supposed to be smart enough to learn things then they really should just be an AI mob.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 9:56 am
by Stickymayhem
As an alternative non code simple fix, this might be worth distinguishing between for LRP and MRP servers

MRP antags are already under greater constraints and this seems a reasonable extension of that.

LRP is more mechanically focused (since the players are powergaming harder, the antags can powergame harder)

Elegant solution I think

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 10:10 am
by Mothblocks
This is a problem I've openly talked about to Indie several times, it's definitely something we should solve on LRP as well, though having a general MRP ruling seems fine just for future-proofing.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 12:56 pm
by Ryusenshu
I think a code solution is definitely needed here, since spiders can create as many eggs as they want after all, and even after they are discovered it might already be too late.
If they all go suicide bomb/ break sm / flood atmos it just isnt really reasonable

With Carps, i could actually understand it a bit, they are summoned and speak common after all. And we already had a nerf to their spawn rate
Mothblocks wrote:I would want it so that spiders pulling/pushing around tanks is a lot slower, but they should still be able to hit them, I've had great environmental combat moments with it.

Things like pipes/APCs/whatever would be blocked from attacking, just saying "they don't taste good" or whatever.
That would be one way of doing it, them stopping from dragging stuff in general would be my ideal though

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 2:09 pm
by Agux909
wyci

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 10:15 pm
by Armhulen
Stickymayhem wrote:As an alternative non code simple fix, this might be worth distinguishing between for LRP and MRP servers

MRP antags are already under greater constraints and this seems a reasonable extension of that.

LRP is more mechanically focused (since the players are powergaming harder, the antags can powergame harder)

Elegant solution I think
you gotta consider that every time a simplemob player controlled creature is made it is never ever made with the intentions of sabotaging atmos/sm and blowing the station up, yet this is what unequivocally all simplemobs controlled by players lead to if they are allowed to move freely and antagonize

like, it's just not fun anywhere and it's always a subversion of the antag

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sun Sep 19, 2021 11:47 pm
by Misdoubtful
What is the all inclusive list of things that fall under this then? All Simple mobs?

Very interested in a response to Fikou.
Fikou wrote:if it is just space dragons and spiders, what about xenobio spiders? do they know how machinery works? if yes, what's the difference between xenobio and sentience spiders?
if its not, is it every simplemob antag? what about xenomorphs? they arent simplemobs, but they are aliens, would they know how machinery works?
then if we go further, what about the random sentience event? those mobs know stuff, right?
what about ghost possessed mobs from that wizard event? we can assume they are probably in their "feral" state, so would they not know?
This feels like it should be a lot more inclusive to have the desired effect rather than just spiders/dragons. Meanwhile sm / atmos blob not having a placement blacklist. Consider slimes that break sm apc's for example too. Is a list of simple mob grief worth considering? Like those apcs, and gravity gen bonking.

Also this:
Waltermeldron wrote:If something is supposed to be smart or able to adapt and learn, we usually make them players. These aren't the typical normal spiders that you can easily kill, they're deadly, they can strategize, they don't charge at you blindly. Their body doesn't let them use human-made objects, but they can still use their mouth to drag around or smash such objects. A spider would learn that fueltanks explode if they saw one explode, and since they're all connected by a link to their broodmother, all spiders would basically know this. If they are not supposed to be smart enough to learn things then they really should just be an AI mob.
There is a dog. Then there is a dog with the proper intelligence of a person.

It seems weird to pluck at rule 2 from the standpoint of knowledge of gameplay mechanics. Code is a cool solution. Knowing something and NOT having the means to deal with it / interact with it is far more interesting, and far more fool proof.
Characters are otherwise allowed to know everything about ingame mechanics ...

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 12:53 am
by oranges
Mothblocks wrote:I agree in the sense that simple mob antags should not be fucking around with things like the SM, but I think the best path for that is through code, just like how we did with swarmers.
do your job admin jannie

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 1:37 am
by Mothblocks
later

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 2:02 pm
by Indie-ana Jones
Mothblocks wrote:This is a problem I've openly talked about to Indie several times, it's definitely something we should solve on LRP as well, though having a general MRP ruling seems fine just for future-proofing.
Probably need a better way to block mobs from hitting things than how swarmers do it. You don't want to acoknowledge how swarmers do it. But yeah I'm down for whatever

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 2:35 pm
by Tlaltecuhtli
fire is more bad for spiders than crew tho

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 6:06 pm
by Noodlecat
The only problem with a code fix is that this is easily exploitable and does not account for sentient xenobio spiders.
Spiders could now be countered by someone lugging around an empty canister and, as they are unable to attack it, that person would be very hard for the spiders to attack. This is even worse with dragons as people can just make a unstoppable barrier of canisters.
Sentient spiders from the australicus traitor item would also be effected, nerfing it significantly. Spiders should also be able to attack apcs.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Mon Sep 20, 2021 8:21 pm
by Mothblocks
Which is why zero of my suggestions are to stop them from attacking canisters or to stop them from pulling! Just to make those very sub optimal strategies if they're not a part of your existing environment.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 8:29 am
by Ryusenshu
Is it possible for spiders to receive stamina damage over time when pulling and stamina damage (or %damage) per hit when hitting larger objects?
Cause this would make them less likely to do so, speed is important after all

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 9:48 am
by CMDR_Gungnir
Ryusenshu wrote:Is it possible for spiders to receive stamina damage over time when pulling and stamina damage (or %damage) per hit when hitting larger objects?
Cause this would make them less likely to do so, speed is important after all
If their intent is to suicide bomb, I don't think stamina damage would bother them.

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 1:08 pm
by Mothblocks

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 2:07 pm
by Ryusenshu
CMDR_Gungnir wrote: If their intent is to suicide bomb, I don't think stamina damage would bother them.
they can actually survive a welderbomb blast, but crew will be knocked down and may lose a limb for that, giving enough time for the spider to finish em

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Tue Sep 21, 2021 4:19 pm
by Agux909
based

Re: Disallow spiders/space dragons from having advanced knowledge of gasses and pipes and sm

Posted: Sat Oct 23, 2021 4:18 pm
by NamelessFairy
No, spiders and carp can have knowledge of advanced systems but as a minion antag they should always prioritize their team/leaders best interest over causing random destruction.

Headmin Votes:
NamelessFairy: No
Dragomagol: No
RaveRadbury: No - Spiders and carp can understand smashing things as it pertains to the success of their directives.