[POLL] Porting NT Drones

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Fri Sep 12, 2014 8:01 pm #28401

The poll is pretty straight forward. I'm abstaining from the vote for now to allow it to progress naturally.

Those voting "with modifications" should use this thread to explain the what and whys.

Remie Richards · Fri Sep 12, 2014 8:15 pm

No they shouldn't be ported the code is terrible and whoever wrote it is a stupid bitch.

oh wait.

Nah yeah, port away, It probably does need some tweaking though, the version on NT is my 'finished off' version of what Pete tried but didn't finish.

Reimoo · Post by **Reimoo** » Fri Sep 12, 2014 9:02 pm #28417

Would you mind explaining what drones are first?

MedicInDisquise · Fri Sep 12, 2014 10:06 pm

From what I understand (and how most servers with drones handle it) they are basically assistants with an AI connection that have tools. Their job is to maintain the station but everyone knows their real job is to build wood floors everywhere and :B everything instead of :d everything.

But really though, they have the basic engineering set and are supposed to help make sure that just because an engineer fucked off and a bomb happened, we don't evacuate immediately. Which.. is actually a good thing to stop. We've been discussing how to fix this problem in a few threads, and drones who are supposed to fix it could help a lot. Of course, this is Sybil and as we all know Sybil cannot have fun things without ruining them.

IT also adds a new engineering room that generates these drones. If you are:

a. Dead
b. The Drone Fab is still up

You can respawn as a drone.

Gun Hog · Post by **Gun Hog** » Fri Sep 12, 2014 10:47 pm #28436

MedicInDisquise wrote:From what I understand (and how most servers with drones handle it) they are basically assistants with an AI connection that have tools. Their job is to maintain the station but everyone knows their real job is to build wood floors everywhere and :B everything instead of :d everything.

But really though, they have the basic engineering set and are supposed to help make sure that just because an engineer fucked off and a bomb happened, we don't evacuate immediately. Which.. is actually a good thing to stop. We've been discussing how to fix this problem in a few threads, and drones who are supposed to fix it could help a lot. Of course, this is Sybil and as we all know Sybil cannot have fun things without ruining them.

IT also adds a new engineering room that generates these drones. If you are:

a. Dead
b. The Drone Fab is still up

You can respawn as a drone.

Our drones are different. They have no tools or item slots, only "hands". They are built by the Roboticist, ghosts simply click on one of the shells to enter it. A ghost can respawn as one as many times as it likes so long as there are shells remaining. They cannot operate the fabricator, so they will only exist if R&D has provided research and they are printed off by the Roboticist or greater silicons.

The modifications I propose are NIGHT VISION added to their meson + material vision (x-ray vision without mobs). They spent most of their time in maintenance, so they need to carry flashlights everywhere to see anything. In addition to that, a basic toolset (the tools you find in the syndicate toolbox) is needed since they mostly do repairs.

MedicInDisquise · Fri Sep 12, 2014 11:09 pm

Gun Hog wrote: Our drones are different. They have no tools or item slots, only "hands". They are built by the Roboticist, ghosts simply click on one of the shells to enter it. A ghost can respawn as one as many times as it likes so long as there are shells remaining. They cannot operate the fabricator, so they will only exist if R&D has provided research and they are printed off by the Roboticist or greater silicons.

The modifications I propose are NIGHT VISION added to their meson + material vision (x-ray vision without mobs). They spent most of their time in maintenance, so they need to carry flashlights everywhere to see anything. In addition to that, a basic toolset (the tools you find in the syndicate toolbox) is needed since they mostly do repairs.

Thanks for explaining it better then me! I think it would be GREAT on /tg/ if sybil didn't ruin fun features all the time.

Cipher3 · Post by **Cipher3** » Fri Sep 12, 2014 11:16 pm #28442

Basically, the drones are little builder things with laws not to interfere with living people in the round in any way (including an esword marauder, NO YOU CAN'T HELP THE DEAD PEOPLE DRONE) that repair the station/make autism forts. They're kinda nice, and really after the initial burst of 'NEW THING GIMME' they weren't even seen that much, so the drones weren't really an obstructive force on the round.

Aurx · Post by **Aurx** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 12:03 am #28445

Port MoMMIs instead of these snowflake totally-not-MoMMI abortions.

Reimoo · Post by **Reimoo** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 12:47 am #28454

What would be the difference? Are they not the same thing?

Aurx · Post by **Aurx** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 12:59 am #28455

Reimoo wrote:What would be the difference? Are they not the same thing?

Drones are to MoMMIs as retarded children are to normal humans.

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 1:02 am #28456

Reimoo wrote:What would be the difference? Are they not the same thing?

I only really messed with them once directly on Artyom when Sybil was down, but in a word, yes.

All drones have laws that are nearly identical to the mommi lawset. The difference is mommis have onboard tools and drones have hands. The upshot is, drones can operate consoles, place and replace power cells in APCs, etc. I remember the next we built that round included an autolathe and protolathe.

One little feature that I thought was really cool is that they don't obstruct squares they pass through. You can run right through somebody and you don't even get the help-intent shuffle.

I also do appreciate the design where the drones are only even a thing if RnD/robotics wills them to be. You can control their population as a human on the station and gives the roboticist something else to do after they're done braining the station and auging each other.

Gun Hog · Post by **Gun Hog** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 1:16 am #28462

Please poke and prod RR to port this as well: https://github.com/NTStation/NTstation13/pull/772
Either those, or a special MMI that accepts pAIs as well as brains.

Remie Richards · Sat Sep 13, 2014 10:27 am

Gun Hog wrote:The modifications I propose are NIGHT VISION added to their meson + material vision (x-ray vision without mobs). They spent most of their time in maintenance, so they need to carry flashlights everywhere to see anything

Could just give Drones a built in light.

Gun Hog wrote:Please poke and prod RR to port this as well: https://github.com/NTStation/NTstation13/pull/772
Either those, or a special MMI that accepts pAIs as well as brains.

I never finished that due to a finicky Runtime related to MMIs and Mechs.
I was supposed to get the runtime to MrPerson as he was working on fixing some mech stuff at the time but I forgot to.

EDIT:
What's this? A random port of drones to tgstation plus brand new built in light and built in storage slot? Yep! https://github.com/tgstation/-tg-station/pull/4809

Raven776 · Post by **Raven776** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 3:43 pm #28552

I see absolutely nothing wrong with adding people back into the round after they've been moidered so they can stop ahelping admins a thousand times over someone murdering them when it was a changeling/traitor/nukeops/chefwhodidn'tknow or all of those in one.

More or less, they rebuild the station. They do the most tedious of things ever to keep everything working and they don't fuck with anyone whatsoever. They're not even supposed to fuck with blob or AI or anything.

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 4:22 pm #28568

One thing that occurred to me that I never thought to ask...

and drones be emaged?

Raven776 · Post by **Raven776** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 5:24 pm #28585

No and they really, really shouldn't be able to be emagged.

As a whole, drones can turn into a destructive force capable of removing the entire station from existence if enough exist.

Separately, drones are a non-entity with a capacity to do anything and get away completely unscathed.

And on Sybil, there would just likely be TOO MANY of them...

QuartzCrystal · Sat Sep 13, 2014 7:38 pm

I like the idea of them coming out in force whenever there's a lot of deaths (because usually that means there's a lot of station damage, which justifies why there's suddenly so many drones around).

I only voted "Yes" if humans can pick them up and wear them as hats.

bandit · Post by **bandit** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 8:32 pm #28620

Why shouldn't they be able to be emagged? Each drone can undo other emagged drones' work, and if you manage to emag an army of drones you deserve to have your sustained destruction. Plus, if what was said upthread is true there aren't even that many of them.

Remie Richards · Sat Sep 13, 2014 8:51 pm

QuartzCrystal wrote:I like the idea of them coming out in force whenever there's a lot of deaths (because usually that means there's a lot of station damage, which justifies why there's suddenly so many drones around).

I only voted "Yes" if humans can pick them up and wear them as hats.

They CAN be picked up, but they're not hats (Yet, it wouldn't be hard to make them hats at all, I just need a sprite for when someone wears the drone)

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 11:46 pm #28672

Raven776 wrote:No and they really, really shouldn't be able to be emagged.

As a whole, drones can turn into a destructive force capable of removing the entire station from existence if enough exist.

Separately, drones are a non-entity with a capacity to do anything and get away completely unscathed.

And on Sybil, there would just likely be TOO MANY of them...

Drones certainly aren't indestructable. They can't even speak (in their current mode.) Even then, I'm not seeing how a drone armed with a toolbox or even 40 drones with toolboxes would be able to "remove the entire station." As bogo said, if I manged to emag 40 of the suckers, I've already earned a payoff.

Cipher3 · Post by **Cipher3** » Sat Sep 13, 2014 11:50 pm #28673

40 anything with toolboxes could remove the entire station.

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 12:02 am #28675

Cipher3 wrote:40 anything with toolboxes could remove the entire station.

Eventually. Even then, as I said, I'd consider that a fair payoff.

mrpain · Post by **mrpain** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 12:27 am #28678

They have HANDS?!?! Wow, finally, someone who might actually possible set the engine up!

Raven776 · Post by **Raven776** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 8:45 am #28702

The problem is that emagging a single one would be too easy, and then you've got a drone that could very easily get an RCD or even a bomb. They can use consoles and nothing is actually stopping them from doing toxins other than their laws.

And it would also make people abusing their drone status nearly impossible to pinpoint or punish. There are some people who simply don't understand the laws as written and will clown around as drones or pull bodies, and if the possibility that they're emagged comes up, you can never know when these drones are just being stupid or not.

If you'd introduce something as lulzy easy and powerful as emagging a drone, you'd have to find something just as easy to fix the emagged drones (who can ventcrawl) like a console that can blow specific drones and/or test their integrity.

With that said, it would be hilarious throwing the little drones at people and watching them get moidered by the tiny metal hands.

Remie Richards · Sun Sep 14, 2014 9:22 am

mrpain wrote:They have HANDS?!?! Wow, finally, someone who might actually possible set the engine up!

This happens regularly on Artyom, Drones just darting around the singulo containment and building the engine.
Although a lot of the time they steal a lot of tools, lots of resources and some circuits and build big machine dens in maint.
it's great.

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 9:55 am #28705

Raven776 wrote:If you'd introduce something as lulzy easy and powerful as emagging a drone, you'd have to find something just as easy to fix the emagged drones (who can ventcrawl) like a console that can blow specific drones and/or test their integrity.

You realize its totally possible to combat a full borg without rushing to the RD console right? Right?

Remie Richards · Sun Sep 14, 2014 10:30 am

Update!

- Working with JJRcop drone internal storage is now a UI button
- Drones can now speak to other drones, other mobs see "Drone (135) chitters"
- Drones can now be worn as hats increasing their cuteness factor 3 fold.

bandit · Post by **bandit** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 10:33 am #28710

Raven776 wrote:The problem is that emagging a single one would be too easy, and then you've got a drone that could very easily get an RCD or even a bomb. They can use consoles and nothing is actually stopping them from doing toxins other than their laws.

And it would also make people abusing their drone status nearly impossible to pinpoint or punish. There are some people who simply don't understand the laws as written and will clown around as drones or pull bodies, and if the possibility that they're emagged comes up, you can never know when these drones are just being stupid or not.

Drone laws should be treated like silicon laws. If a drone is doing toxins to griff, BWOINK! If a drone is pulling bodies, BWOINK! I think people adminhelping instances of shitty drones -- if you see something say something -- will make this mostly a non-issue. I mean, some people simply don't understand Asimov, and yet we still have borgs and they work fine.

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 4:41 pm #28763

Remie Richards wrote: - Drones can now be worn as hats increasing their cuteness factor 3 fold.

Yeah yeah, but when will drones be free to WEAR hats?

Remie Richards · Sun Sep 14, 2014 5:29 pm

cedarbridge wrote:
Remie Richards wrote: - Drones can now be worn as hats increasing their cuteness factor 3 fold.
Yeah yeah, but when will drones be free to WEAR hats?

Holding that one back until the Main PR gets in.

/tg/ has to consider the Base Drones from NT, and now the 3(ish) features added for the new /tg/ version, so I'd rather not delay the PR anymore.
It IS planned though, so far as I have the code in my head already, just using the human hats and lowering them down a few pixels so they fit on drones instead.

Fragnostic · Post by **Fragnostic** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 6:42 pm #28784

Hnnnng this so great just like cats could be worn as hats when clicked on in Goon, I think.

Reimoo · Post by **Reimoo** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 8:24 pm #28802

Raven776 wrote: If you'd introduce something as lulzy easy and powerful as emagging a drone, you'd have to find something just as easy to fix the emagged drones (who can ventcrawl) like a console that can blow specific drones and/or test their integrity.

IIRC drones are pathetically weak and can be destroyed in a few hits with anything. In fact, I think they are valid as well. IC consequences for doing that are still justified though. Correct me if I am wrong on that.

Raven776 · Post by **Raven776** » Sun Sep 14, 2014 11:20 pm #28842

If there was ever a time on Sybil that I could stick a couple piles of metal on the ground in front of cargo and say aloud, 'Oh wow, I wish the gaping hole that was once medbay was somehow fixed with this all,' and it actually happened, it would be a good day.

And nothing's better than playing drone stealth ops to get that R&D set up in maintenence.

Can drones mine?

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 3:11 am #28882

Raven776 wrote:If there was ever a time on Sybil that I could stick a couple piles of metal on the ground in front of cargo and say aloud, 'Oh wow, I wish the gaping hole that was once medbay was somehow fixed with this all,' and it actually happened, it would be a good day.

And nothing's better than playing drone stealth ops to get that R&D set up in maintenence.

Can drones mine?

They have hands. They can operate consoles. Theorietically you could set up an autism fort on the roid if you wanted to brave the mobs

Saegrimr · Post by **Saegrimr** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 3:38 am #28885

Give em at least the full toolbox suite and mesons.

Remie Richards wrote: - Drones can now be worn as hats increasing their cuteness factor 3 fold.

Drones wearing drones?

Also Aurx the only thing I want ported over immediately is the RPD you guys have. Atmos fucking dream machine right there.
I absolutely hate the retard list menu you have to go through with MoMMIs to pick tools. The gui is so much nicer here for borgs.

cedarbridge · Post by **cedarbridge** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 3:51 am #28887

Saegrimr wrote:Give em at least the full toolbox suite and mesons.

They have two hands and (now) a storage slot. Tools and toolboxes aren't hard to scavenge.

Arete · Post by **Arete** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 4:09 am #28889

Saegrimr wrote:Give em at least the full toolbox suite and mesons.

Seems like it'd invite traitors hunting drones for their tools. Though, that might be a good first attempt at balancing how any station sabotage would get fixed up much more quickly.

Remie Richards · Mon Sep 15, 2014 7:18 am

Saegrimr wrote:Give em at least the full toolbox suite and mesons.

Remie Richards wrote: - Drones can now be worn as hats increasing their cuteness factor 3 fold.
Drones wearing drones?

Well, While drones can't wear hats themselves (yet, it's planned) this would be possible, and I don't see why not. Although if I do allow drones to wear drones I expect little squads of 2 drones stacked on each other roaming around ready to burst out into a swarm and collect things they may want.

Also something new. For all the old Drone players who had the misfortune to be picked up, you can now move while in an item form to jump out and uncurl from a ball and run away.
So basically you're now only a hat if you want to be a hat. You can still talk worn too.

Raven776 · Post by **Raven776** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 4:22 pm #28948

cedarbridge wrote:
Raven776 wrote:If you'd introduce something as lulzy easy and powerful as emagging a drone, you'd have to find something just as easy to fix the emagged drones (who can ventcrawl) like a console that can blow specific drones and/or test their integrity.
You realize its totally possible to combat a full borg without rushing to the RD console right? Right?

They can be, but imagine fighting off 5 drones in a crew that has 20 drones and they can ventcrawl.

Drones are like beepsky in that you need to click ON THEM to fire AT THEM. They can ventcrawl like monkeys, and while they can't use guns they can slip and presumably do something to damage people while in drone form if you let them get emagged.

If you're lucky enough to get the ion rifle, you're fine, but if you're up against 5 emagged drones and you don't know which five are the emagged ones compared to safe ones, you're screwed.

bandit wrote:
Raven776 wrote:The problem is that emagging a single one would be too easy, and then you've got a drone that could very easily get an RCD or even a bomb. They can use consoles and nothing is actually stopping them from doing toxins other than their laws.

And it would also make people abusing their drone status nearly impossible to pinpoint or punish. There are some people who simply don't understand the laws as written and will clown around as drones or pull bodies, and if the possibility that they're emagged comes up, you can never know when these drones are just being stupid or not.
Drone laws should be treated like silicon laws. If a drone is doing toxins to griff, BWOINK! If a drone is pulling bodies, BWOINK! I think people adminhelping instances of shitty drones -- if you see something say something -- will make this mostly a non-issue. I mean, some people simply don't understand Asimov, and yet we still have borgs and they work fine.

This is under the idea that they can be emagged. If they can be emagged, then people won't know when to do admin bwoinks.

And in that note, the confusion would be more likely to happen when the drone was doing stupid clownish shit like slipping people or stealing people's stuff. You go from a nice normal shift to suddenly it's the drone apocalypse (not really) because this drone isn't ignoring your existence. Making numerous more IC channels to flow through would make punishing any offenders nearly impossible. And if there is a chance that the drone who just polyacid sprayed you is rogue instead of just the angry antag who you dunked come back for revenge, it'll be difficult to make an ahelp right away to unfuck your round if possible.

And the difference between this and borgs is that drones are near infinite and impossible to identify. If you think people can be a shitler, watch how much of a shitler they can be with two hands and ventcrawling.

Besides that I just think an emagged drone would be too powerful for the risk inherent in finding and emagging one in the first place (None).

QuartzCrystal · Mon Sep 15, 2014 4:28 pm

I like the idea of drones just being a background happening that the crew don't have to think twice about. The drones have the law to not interact with the crew and just upkeep the station, the moment drones are possibly emagged is when suddenly being in a room alone with one is potentially dangerous.

I like the idea drones scurrying around and being completely ignored (unless someone wants a stylish hat that is).

peoplearestrange · Mon Sep 15, 2014 4:33 pm

I like to imagine drones are simplistic "skutters". Just their to do maintenance and repairs and everyone is so used to seeing them scurrying about that they are simply ignored.

Remie Richards · Mon Sep 15, 2014 5:09 pm

Don't worry guys, Emagging is not planned.

Raven776 · Post by **Raven776** » Mon Sep 15, 2014 5:21 pm #28964

B-But muh arguments...

Remie Richards · Mon Sep 15, 2014 6:02 pm

Raven776 wrote: If you're lucky enough to get the ion rifle, you're fine.

Uhh, does this work? because it shouldn't atm (admittedly if it does work, it's a feature) Drones are /mob/living/simple_animal not /mob/living/silicon, So by inheritence they don't have the ion rifle weaknesses.

Raven776 · Post by **Raven776** » Tue Sep 16, 2014 5:08 am #29058

Actually, I don't know personally. I see people scramble for the ion rifle to go drone hunting on Artyom from time to time, but I've never seen them KILL anything with one... They might try and just waste all of the ammo. I usually don't bother trying to kill even a 'rogue' drone for very obvious reasons.

JJRcop · Post by **JJRcop** » Tue Sep 16, 2014 6:37 am #29061

Drones now have a "pull" button when you're pulling something.
If people remember it from NTstation it didn't have a pull button so you had to use hotkeys to stop pulling something, well now you have the option to click a button, because some people still use those instead of hotkeys.

Also.. they can no longer use robot talk-- What was that? No, I didn't say anything, carry on.

peoplearestrange · Tue Sep 16, 2014 11:36 am

JJRcop wrote:Drones now have a "pull" button when you're pulling something.
If people remember it from NTstation it didn't have a pull button so you had to use hotkeys to stop pulling something, well now you have the option to click a button, because some people still use those instead of hotkeys.

Also.. they can no longer use robot talk-- What was that? No, I didn't say anything, carry on.

The AI should still have someway to directly talk to them. To direct them towards hull damage etc. Seems a bit ridiculous that an AI wouldnt have "control" over a swarm of repair drones.

Incomptinence · Tue Sep 16, 2014 1:06 pm

Pretty much any player controlled mob should have pull since I don't think we have any mob that CAN'T pull. Well maybe not the AI or blob.

JJRcop · Post by **JJRcop** » Tue Sep 16, 2014 2:39 pm #29108

Incomptinence wrote:Pretty much any player controlled mob should have pull since I don't think we have any mob that CAN'T pull. Well maybe not the AI or blob.

Drones could already pull, you just needed to use the "Stop-pulling" verb or press Delete to stop pulling, I just added a stop pulling button that the other mobs have.

Possibly an update but it's up to RR

- Made drones vulnerable to EMP.
- When they are EMP'ed they can't move for a little while, there is no damage taken.
- Made drones able to hear binary chat, but they cannot speak in it.

RemieRichards#4

(Also in order to make it work I had to allow drones to be stunned in the first place, so if you ever think about attacking beepsky scot-free think again.)

Incomptinence · Tue Sep 16, 2014 2:45 pm

Yeah meant stop pulling button. Also great as an indicator of when you ARE pulling.

Should NT Drones Be Ported to TG?