Drones at Roundstart.

[A4Brogan]

Some of us like the idea of drones. Me, sometimes I observe just to be a drone, because repairing a station is fun to my little diseased brain.

What isn't fun, however, is waiting a whole goddamn shift to wind up never playing. To Remedy this, at roundstart, 3-6 drone shells should be randomly generated in the maintainence halls.

[Saegrimr]

How to fix that:
Spawn as an assistant, grab some materials to help out R&D's research. They don't really need a lot. Run down to cargo and ask to grab the two pieces of silver sitting near the mining dock and use a welder on them to turn it into silver bars. That'll speed up material research. Bonus points if you want to break/law 2 your way into the vault for the gold (although robotics would prefer that for VTEC modules).

Then grab some metal bits and glass for Robotics and get them to start printing drones.

Then go throw yourself out an airlock.

[JJRcop]

How to fix that:
Spawn as an assistant, grab some materials to help out R&D's research. They don't really need a lot. Run down to cargo and ask to grab the two pieces of silver sitting near the mining dock and use a welder on them to turn it into silver bars. That'll speed up material research. Bonus points if you want to break/law 2 your way into the vault for the gold (although robotics would prefer that for VTEC modules).

Then grab some metal bits and glass for Robotics and get them to start printing drones.

Then donate yourself for the benefit of culinary perfection by suiciding in the kitchen.

ftfy

[Timbrewolf]

How to fix that:

Stop playing as an assistant or whatever and join Engineering. It's like a whole job that's supposed to focus on keeping the station in one piece. Craziness.

In all seriousness though I think adding round start drones is a bad idea. I think there's a reason roboticists have quickly stopped producing many of them: the people who get them haven't been playing them in the "unobtrustive station repair guy" they're meant to be, and instead are running around taking items meant for other jobs and printing themselves bags of holding so they can powergame what is supposed to be a pAI type second life for a player.

Leave it as it is for now until the novelty wears off. We should wait until they've settled down a bit and we're used to having them around before we talk about tweaking the availability.

[Lo6a4evskiy]

We have a serious problem when you see 70 people on the server, 15 assistants, drones, engineering is not full and people still bitching about assistant maint. Happened yesterday.

Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with people. I guess drones and engiborgs for some reason are more convenient for that or something?

[Fragnostic]

If people wanna be tiny little metal shells that zip around cleaning and fixing things, then let them. If they're printing BoH and powergaming, then server ban them for the day and let them learn. If they see a whole patch of missing floor tiles, they shouldn't ignore it and go hunt. If any admin sees a drone doing this, they're violating their laws and should be killed/banned. if they're big enough to replace engineers, then let them. Drone Station 13, baby.

This server's been destroyed by the major 'problems' that have been 'fixed' which are just the woe of a very small minority of people who want to change something they don't like wih no regard for those who enjoy such a feature. Changing the assistant jumpsuit color to random instead of standard grey made things worse. There's more gimmicks, sure, but if greytiding was the problem, it's worse now because of the same-color-tag-team people. Roaming the hall isn't safe anymore because people are now encouraged to jump in and help their buddy if they attack someone.

I like the idea of drones at roundstart, about 4 or 5. I like the idea of Ian and other pets being player-controlled at roundstart, too. It creates a sense of how things already are, as if the people there have been there for a while, same old shift at the plasma research station.

I'd really like to see specialized roundstart drones. Yellow engidrones, purple janidrones and drones with specialized lawsets so they can be waiters. I don't think they should EVER be sec, for obvious reasons. But I like the thought of little drones delivering things, but they can't talk to you and you can order them to do things that aren't impediments on other beings.

[bandit]

>drones
>waiters
>SECURITY

No. No. Fuck no. Drones ARE NOT supposed to interact with people. How the fuck is a drone going to be a waiter and not interact with people? I'm not even going to fucking address the retardation of a "security drone."

The problem is either

1) People have forgotten that engineers are even supposed to fix shit
2) It's too annoying for engineers to have to track down a slow as shit hardsuit to fix shit when drones are overall faster and better and unable to die

[Jacquerel]

why did you put security in your list as the most prominent point in all caps when his only mention of security was "I don't think they should EVER be sec, for obvious reasons"
and then mention it again as if he said "yeah we should have these" rather than literally the exact opposite

it makes what you're saying look kind of weak when you feel like you have to misrepresent who you are arguing against in order to make yourself look better, is all
like the reason to not address security drones is because literally nobody has said they were a good idea, if you had said anything against them you'd be fighting air

"your point is weak" is the generous reading when the other is just assuming you can't or didn't actually read what you are replying to

[Fragnostic]

>drones
>waiters
>SECURITY

No. No. Fuck no. Drones ARE NOT supposed to interact with people.

It's like you don't want anything to change ever, as if things should stay the exact same way they are or else it breaches some special cubbyhole safe/comfort zone.

I meant, what if they could have specialized lawsets in order to interact with any other beings for the sole purpose of, say a waiterdrone, serving foods and beverages. They'd be bound to their laws in the sense that they can't be a detriment to any other being in any way, and their purpose is to serve. Hell, there could be medidrones: drones with the sole purpose of healing other beings who are hurt, but a law specificly stating that the drone cannot force someone to submit to healing and must not ever be pulled or grabbed unless the being verbally allows the drone to do so. Also, dead people are not considered hurt. And they should have the standard law stating they can't destroy the station in any way. This would prevent metagaming, but make it possible to zip around helping people as a little metal mass of cuteness with a syringe and a medical light.

[Timbrewolf]

We have to put restrictions on them, otherwise they're too potent as station repairers. They're not fully fledged Engiborgs, but they are super fast engineers who don't need to worry about internals, have all access, and can table crawl.

There's this process called "balancing" where you have to consider what a new thing takes away from other jobs just by being really good at things. Where you have to make sure there aren't too many of these things running around at any given time so that someone blowing up parts of the station is still a threat, still a reason to think about calling the shuttle.

If you want more drones available at round-start, try playing as a roboticist and building some then.
I mean, are you suggesting this because you really think it's good for everyone to have more drones
-or-
Is it just good for you, and you want to play as a drone more often?

[cedarbridge]

a waiterdrone, serving foods and beverages.

This is called a service borg.

[bandit]

Exactly. And medidrones are essentially mediborgs. I'm fine with changes, I'm not fine with duplicating shit we already have.

[Fragnostic]

If you want more drones available at round-start, try playing as a roboticist and building some then.
I mean, are you suggesting this because you really think it's good for everyone to have more drones
-or-
Is it just good for you, and you want to play as a drone more often?

I've been jobbanned from playing drone for a while now. I also have no intention of appealing it as of now. It only makes sense that there are drones since the shift started, and they are so cute just zipping around fixing and cleaning.

This is called a service borg.

Ohhhh yeeaaah. I remember now. That's already a Borg type. Huh, I must've forgotten since it's rarely ever used.

Exactly. And medidrones are essentially mediborgs. I'm fine with changes, I'm not fine with duplicating shit we already have.

There's a HUGE difference, okay? Medibrogs are these aesthetic trainwrecks that look creepy and make people unwilling to get healed by. A specialized drone, like a medidrone, would be a cute pink little fella that zips through the halls injecting people with meds and patching them up. Hell, I'd knowingly take a syringe full of plasma by a medidrone simply for the sake of being attended to by such a neat little package of autonomy.

[paprika]

Someone should just add shells to the maint loot spawner system or something.

[Zsword]

Iunno but at roundstart, but i think it would be nice if drones atleast had access to like, a Flooring Tool that came with like, 10-20 floor tiles of Rods and Tiles to quick patch holes, cause I don't like that drones are dependant on finding tools/metal to patch the station with, when those types of resources are usually in much higher demand. Other than the obvious 'take it from engineering' Drones are dependant on a steady supply from Cargo/Mining which, they're not allowed to augment in any way, barring prioritizing repairs in those zones... with materials that the squishy organics have already taken all of. @.@

[Timbrewolf]

There is a catch 22 with them in that they're not supposed to be stealing resources from other departments, but very often the publicly available materials disappear very quickly. Having them each start with some small supply of raw materials wouldn't be so bad.

Beyond patching holes they can (and should) repair hacked or disabled machinery. There's some other stuff they can get up to as well, they're not totally useless without some materials.

Here's the thing:

Being a drone is supposed to kinda suck and sometimes feel pointless. The original idea and the intent behind them isn't to be a free engiborg you can spawn as when you die. You're basically electronic vermin, a giant metal cockroach that scuttles around the station and fixes things when it can. They're based on these things:


http://farscape.wikia.com/wiki/Diagnostic_Repair_Drone

If you're super excited to want to be one and you want to expand it into all these new things and buff them and whatnot you're totally missing the point and getting excited over something that is supposed to be a shitty second life for someone who died and we wanted to give them something to do instead of just complain in dead chat. You should not want to show up just to be one of these things. You should want to play as your character and do your thing and if shit sucks and you die, well hey at least there's this.

Improving Drones too much or giving them a more concrete position on the station (like roundstart availability) is a horrible idea that totally subverts the very reason they were added to the game in the first place. They're not supposed to be replacements for engineers or engie borgs. They're a shitty second chance at staying in the game and still feeling like you're playing.

[dezzmont]

Counterpoint to that is that being a drone should be decent enough to feel like a valid way to spend your time after you die. It shouldn't be as impactful as being alive but designing for unfun is a mistake. After all, Janitors, Borgs, and Clowns came about originally as punishment mechanics of some sort.

I agree drones should be unrobust little things but they should be able to get enough done to do some interesting things, like for example being goofy and working as a swarm to expand the station like weird little robot keepers. That said I do agree that starting as a drone is basically like starting like a crappy engineer and is kinda pointless. If you want to do it for RP reasons or just for catharsis of not having responsibility or a target on your back I suspect an admin would do it for you if you prayed. I would be more interested in making sure that becoming a drone was guaranteed so we can finally phase out the permanent inactivity of death. That shit should have no place in the game, death shouldn't be punished by a time out.

[Timbrewolf]

Death needs to have some consequence that is not good.

It's already kind of ridiculous how the cycle of die -> cloned -> die -> borged -> die -> drone'd/xeno'd/used-for-a-badmin-event works out. People are so happy to throw themselves into antags face first or start fights and cause damages because they know that the downside to what might happen if you fuck that up kinda doesn't exist.

Death already isn't a time out. If you really cared that much and all the other alternatives just weren't good enough for you, there's also a whole second server with plenty of room on it for people to go play on if you choose.

Drones are infinite. You can keep dying as them and coming back as new ones. That alone is reason enough NOT to give them freedom or too many options and abilities.

EDIT: If we're just talking about giving ghosts something fun to do, I've had an idea for awhile that keeps them from messing around with the round proper that deserves its own thread (https://tgstation13.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=2173)

[Lo6a4evskiy]

Honestly, drones should require someone inside the round to trigger them for them to accept ghosts, like pAIs or golems. I've no idea why any ghost can just get into one at any time with no limitations. They are also dirt cheap and easy to produce, I often see robotics print out a dozen shells.

[Remie Richards]

There is an in round trigger for them, the shells being created.

[Lo6a4evskiy]

And you can produce them by dozens, as opposed to golem runes which require plasma and extensive breeding.

[Remie Richards]

and? The Availability of the trigger is irrelevant. your argument was that they should have one, when they already do.

[Lo6a4evskiy]

and?

And I can produce 20 drone shells, hide them somewhere with supplies and become an engineer with 20 lives.

The Availability of the trigger is irrelevant.

Then I encourage you to place a facehugger in every room.

your argument was that they should have one, when they already do.

k

Returning back into the round should be a privilege. Death should matter.

As it is now, drones are humans without the need to wear anything, a little harder inventory management and a bunch of useful abilities like tablewalking and ventcrawling. Oh and you also can ignore everyone else, which is just lovely.

[dezzmont]

Returning back into the round should be a privilege. Death should matter.

While you have sold me on the idea of drones being an imperfect solution due to the phylactery scenario and I no longer support drones as the logical solution to death, these two statement is erroneous. Death mattering and death being an end to game-play are seperate thoughts. It doesn't need to be a punishment or a time out to matter. And the idea that getting back into the round must be a privilege needs to be more substantive or be quantified. You can make death matter a lot without making it require players to stop playing, the key just needs to be that any automatic after death gameplay can't have massive impact on the round or the entropy death has on the station.

[Steelpoint]

If you want Death to matter you have to, imo, not only make dying hard to achieve but also make it extremely hard if not impossible to be revived. Not only does SS13 have cloning technology, but we now have defibrillators that can bring you back from death within 5 minutes of dying.

Death is a inconvenience.

[mrpain]

How to fix that:
Spawn as an assistant, grab some materials to help out R&D's research. They don't really need a lot. Run down to cargo and ask to grab the two pieces of silver sitting near the mining dock and use a welder on them to turn it into silver bars. That'll speed up material research. Bonus points if you want to break/law 2 your way into the vault for the gold (although robotics would prefer that for VTEC modules).

Then grab some metal bits and glass for Robotics and get them to start printing drones.

Then go throw yourself out an airlock.

That implies that science is actually doing their jobs or know what the fuck they're doing. No one I've talked to ic or ooc seems to know what research levels are needed for drones. I only see them in maybe half the rounds I play in.

I'm honestly ok with like one being added roundstart. I dont see the harm.

[Remie Richards]

How to fix that:
Spawn as an assistant, grab some materials to help out R&D's research. They don't really need a lot. Run down to cargo and ask to grab the two pieces of silver sitting near the mining dock and use a welder on them to turn it into silver bars. That'll speed up material research. Bonus points if you want to break/law 2 your way into the vault for the gold (although robotics would prefer that for VTEC modules).

Then grab some metal bits and glass for Robotics and get them to start printing drones.

Then go throw yourself out an airlock.

That implies that science is actually doing their jobs or know what the fuck they're doing. No one I've talked to ic or ooc seems to know what research levels are needed for drones. I only see them in maybe half the rounds I play in.

I'm honestly ok with like one being added roundstart. I dont see the harm.

I made them the same values as radio-MMIs, 2 Programming 4 Bio, because I am so original.