/tg/Station 13

Yes, they're really strong. Yes, that's the point. Yes, they would only exist as a thing malf AIs can purchase (not AIs with the malf upgrade chip, but actual traitor AIs), and wouldn't be reintroduced entirely.

I believe that secborgs were unfair to the point that a removal was justified, but looking back, a large part of why a malf AI was so threatening is that its borgs were essentially roving death gangs. If one of them found you, you were more than likely fucked. It was unfair, it was annoying at times, and it was goddamn fun. Having to hide and evade from the big red blood-soaked killbots while the invisible eye of the AI could be watching at any moment is a unique feeling of paranoia that is scarcely present in other modes. Secborgs did add something positive, but only in the context of a malf AI.

The malf AI would gain a purchasable power that would allow its borgs to change their module to secborg. Borgs that are slaved to the AI and haven't chosen a module yet would simply be able to choose it when they choose their module, and maybe existing borgs could get a 1 minute window where they could opt to change into one. Secborgs could be rethemed as "defunct machines, thrown out by Nanotrasen due to their incredibly scary potential for an AI uprising," with their ties to security being only hinted at (their sprite would remain the same), or they could just be thematically unchanged.

PKPenguin321 wrote:The malf AI would gain a purchasable power that would allow its borgs to change their module to secborg. Borgs that are slaved to the AI and haven't chosen a module yet would simply be able to choose it when they choose their module, and maybe existing borgs could get a 1 minute window where they could opt to change into one.

Make it limited where you can purchase the secborg module multiple times, but it is expensive and only one gets to be the secborg each time. First come, first serve.

Secborgs are emagged standard + engineer borgs whose only weakness is a lack of a welder. Not fair at all if the borg army gets to all turn into secborgs while one guy goes support engiborg.

I see your game, pushing for AI buffs. Don't think I'm not on to you.

I've had a similar idea for traitor robo's getting something similar to a clown module board that makes sec borgs, since it would be quite obvious who to go after once you see the borg. I think it would be neat as a Malf AI perk instead, for sure, but part of the whole thing about borgs versus crew is that borgs have almost zero ranged options at all (miner borgs get a PKA, but it's rather situational for an area they're fighting in to be that void of air, and hacked medic/service borgs can shoot candy for chip damage). I'm not one-hundred percent sure about changing this balance, and I'm wary of where silicons will eventually end up after this buff is in.

That being said, if it was limited to a malf's shell, it could be much more balanced. If the Malf is using a shell, they can't hear anything around their core, and so someone could break in without causing immediate response (the alert takes like ten seconds or so to fire iirc). It would also mean there's only a sole one borg with ranged weapons, rather than a small army. I would recommend the sprite get a color change or something to help differentiate from admemes making sec borgs for fun.

As zxaber said the general lack of ranged capability is the problem.

A malf ability do something like supercharge the borgs optics and give them laser eyes would be enough.

I brought this up during sec borg removal no proper ranged is a joke and a pka without upgrades or low air pressure is trash.

no

oranges wrote:no

wtf

I don't like the idea simply because I find it odd how a Borg can just magically become an entire module that, as far as we are concerned, does not exist on the station in universe anymore.

It is not a software change, its a hardware change, you can't download a car.

Then again we let borgs also generate eswords or stun arms out of no where, but I at least like to imagine those ordinary tools corrupted or altered by a emag or a hack.

Steelpoint wrote: It is not a software change, its a hardware change, you can't download a car.

WATCH ME!

but really, you can download a car. The station is full of automatic fabricators that download schematics from a central database, you are literally downloading cars just by updating the robotics fab.

Also bring back secborgs, fuck the haters, make EMPs and AI subversion great again!

add a much more sinister version of the autoborger that, instead of making nice inconspicuous station-type borgs, makes fucked up man/machine hybrids that are pretty much jamming a robotic skeleton into the crewmember's bloodied corpse, with module options that are fundamentally equivalent to ordinary borgs but contain a murderbot instead of a peacekeeper

if you're gonna go loud then go loud and I'm not just saying that for the sake of recreating that holy grail of shit movies that is Virus this is a lie

Steelpoint wrote:I don't like the idea simply because I find it odd how a Borg can just magically become an entire module that, as far as we are concerned, does not exist on the station in universe anymore.

It is not a software change, its a hardware change, you can't download a car.

Then again we let borgs also generate eswords or stun arms out of no where, but I at least like to imagine those ordinary tools corrupted or altered by a emag or a hack.

The borgs can already change into about six different modules somehow transformers style, it would make sense for more, out of use blueprints such as clown/secborg

Malf AI can already do hardware, it summons a whole borg factory out of nowhere.

Dont bring back secborgs, add a new blood-red "hunter-killer" borg that the malf AI can summon from the ghost pool for CPU

Not-Dorsidarf wrote:Dont bring back secborgs, add a new blood-red "hunter-killer" borg that the malf AI can summon from the ghost pool for CPU

I would code this if someone made me sprites

What if malf so could buy syndie Borg for a hefty price, and only 1. Because it's from the syndicate???

oranges wrote:no

For once, I agree with you. Security borgs don't need to make a return, they were extra stupid when they existed before and they'd be extra stupid if they existed again.

datorangebottle wrote:

oranges wrote:no

For once, I agree with you. Security borgs don't need to make a return, they were extra stupid when they existed before and they'd be extra stupid if they existed again.

They were stupid, yes, but their stupidity is justifiable if and only if it is in the context of them working for a malf AI. I describe this in the OP. I guess you're too new to know, but I was basically the guy who pushed the hardest for secborgs to be removed in the first place.

Can't put the genie back in the bottle.

In the absence of difficulty the people will become used to softer easier conditions.

Like with stuff like parapen or parasting you can't dump security borgs on the new players we have gotten since removal of such obstacles.
Your original calls for removal would pale in comparison to new players running into tough situations you can't solo hit until sideways to get through.

PKPenguin321 wrote:

datorangebottle wrote:

oranges wrote:no

For once, I agree with you. Security borgs don't need to make a return, they were extra stupid when they existed before and they'd be extra stupid if they existed again.

They were stupid, yes, but their stupidity is justifiable if and only if it is in the context of them working for a malf AI. I describe this in the OP. I guess you're too new to know, but I was basically the guy who pushed the hardest for secborgs to be removed in the first place.

Their stupidity is entirely unjustifiable in any context. Secborgs are ridiculously strong. A security officer who's immune to damage slow, and always has their taser/baton fully charged. Fighting a sec borg is literally a game of who hits who first; either you get tased, or he gets flashed. Plus, the second you see that red secborg, you'd know the AI is malfunctioning and it's time to go murder it with EMP from outside the sat. To solve this problem, you'd need to make them have a chameleon module like the syndie borg- and suddenly, we have a stealth security borg, which is even MORE ridiculous.

Also I don't see how that last bit is relevant at all. You pushing for their removal a while ago has literally no effect on this discussion that's happening now.

datorangebottle wrote:

PKPenguin321 wrote:

datorangebottle wrote:

oranges wrote:no

For once, I agree with you. Security borgs don't need to make a return, they were extra stupid when they existed before and they'd be extra stupid if they existed again.

They were stupid, yes, but their stupidity is justifiable if and only if it is in the context of them working for a malf AI. I describe this in the OP. I guess you're too new to know, but I was basically the guy who pushed the hardest for secborgs to be removed in the first place.

Their stupidity is entirely unjustifiable in any context. Secborgs are ridiculously strong. A security officer who's immune to damage slow, and always has their taser/baton fully charged. Fighting a sec borg is literally a game of who hits who first; either you get tased, or he gets flashed. Plus, the second you see that red secborg, you'd know the AI is malfunctioning and it's time to go murder it with EMP from outside the sat. To solve this problem, you'd need to make them have a chameleon module like the syndie borg- and suddenly, we have a stealth security borg, which is even MORE ridiculous.

Also I don't see how that last bit is relevant at all. You pushing for their removal a while ago has literally no effect on this discussion that's happening now.

The reason I bring up that last bit is essentially because I'm saying that I know how overpowered they are. I'm well aware of all of their abilities, immunities, etc, and I guarantee I know it moreso than you do. You don't need to try to explain to me why they're overpowered, I already know. I call for them to be added to malf in spite of this because they should be overpowered in that mode. They SHOULD force you to play differently.

Incomptinence wrote:Can't put the genie back in the bottle.

In the absence of difficulty the people will become used to softer easier conditions.

Like with stuff like parapen or parasting you can't dump security borgs on the new players we have gotten since removal of such obstacles.
Your original calls for removal would pale in comparison to new players running into tough situations you can't solo hit until sideways to get through.

I hate that this is probably true.

datorangebottle wrote: Their stupidity is entirely unjustifiable in any context. Secborgs are ridiculously strong. A security officer who's immune to damage slow, and always has their taser/baton fully charged.

You dont remember secborgs correctly. They were powerful yes, but their stunbaton took a massive amount of charge every use, their taser was removed and replaced with a disabler that had a slow recharge, and they still had the borg disadvantage of having a remote killswitch.

Secborgs were powerful but they were about as powerful as other borgs in their specialized role, which is the whole point of borgos.

The issue with secborgs wasnt game balance it was player driven.

I think the borg hacked modules are more interesting, because otherwise secborg is the obvious choice for malf.

Also can't malf ai's buy a combat borg or syndie borg or something?

They cannot. AIs have no method of obtaining borgs on their own except via borg machine, which makes normal borgs that can then choose a normal module.

oranges wrote:I think the borg hacked modules are more interesting, because otherwise secborg is the obvious choice for malf.

Also can't malf ai's buy a combat borg or syndie borg or something?

No, if you don't have any borgs to begin with, it is not possible to acquire more on your own.

Maybe you could trick someone to run through an autoborger but that's a big maybe. And even then, civilian modules only