ok time for a realtalk about abductors

[lmwevil]

should they be allowed to beam down into the AI core and kill it/card it FNR, it's kinda dumb and has no counterplay

[MortoSasye]

No. Simply not. It's extremely unfair for the AI.

[AnonymousNow]

should they be allowed to beam down into the AI core and kill it/card it FNR, it's kinda dumb and has no counterplay

No. Runs counter to their concept, unless we introduce mechanics to abduct an AI, give it a random quirk and beam it back down onto the station.

[oranges]

yes they should be, and otherwise if not it should be mechanically enforced because admins dont' do jack.

[wesoda25]

Make AI core a high security place they can’t beam down into.

[coiax]

It's against the rules for Abductors to recall the shuttle, and they don't do that anymore.

[confused rock]

Wraiths also do the same thing with no counterplay, lotsa shit can unfairly fuck the ai.

[Gigapuddi420]

Make AI core a high security place they can’t beam down into.

I agree with this. A small grace area to give the AI a chance would solve the issue without enforcing no fun rules on abductors.

[Ayy Lemoh]

Wraiths also do the same thing with no counterplay, lotsa shit can unfairly fuck the ai.

Wraiths have to be made and actually get to the AI core, so 10-30 seconds, then kill it which can allow an AI to call for help if he's quick.

Meanwhile ayy lmaos can bust in and get 'er done instantly.

Abductors shouldn't be allowed to do this unless the AI is really fucking with them. They aren't supposed to kill people unless there's valid reason. It's why you get (or atleast should get) punished if you set the abductee dropoff point to space or something where they'll just die.

[Deitus]

Wraiths also do the same thing with no counterplay, lotsa shit can unfairly fuck the ai.

Wraiths have to be made and actually get to the AI core, so 10-30 seconds, then kill it which can allow an AI to call for help if he's quick.

Meanwhile ayy lmaos can bust in and get 'er done instantly.

Abductors shouldn't be allowed to do this unless the AI is really fucking with them. They aren't supposed to kill people unless there's valid reason. It's why you get (or atleast should get) punished if you set the abductee dropoff point to space or something where they'll just die.

Huh? Wraiths can yeet into the ai core just as easy as abductors, and both are top tier bs
t. Someone who has been on both sides of it

[confused rock]

idea though: the ai core can see around itself already, right? you could just remove the cameras directly next to the core, so abductors can't warp in. would that work, or would the ai be a camera for those purposes?

[RogueSteampunker]

No. Simply not. It's extremely unfair for the AI.

There's plenty of things that "aren't fair" for the AI. Reinforced walls are jackshit against anyone coming by with thermite, cult and wizard practically get "one free AI kill" with wraith and shifting respectively. The whole point of the AI is the idea that it's vulnerable and easily dispatched unless someone wants to take the proper measures to protect it, a la moving the AI core when war ops hit. You can't honestly say that the midround antag who has a lot to lose by letting the AI live shouldn't be allowed the same graces just cause it doesn't immediately come into play at roundstart.

should they be allowed to beam down into the AI core and kill it/card it FNR, it's kinda dumb and has no counterplay

No. Runs counter to their concept, unless we introduce mechanics to abduct an AI, give it a random quirk and beam it back down onto the station.

I mean, their entire concept is "stealthily abduct and experiment upon unwilling subjects." I'd imagine removing the surveillance device of said subjects would be rather paramount to one's concept if surveillance is counter to your goals.

It's against the rules for Abductors to recall the shuttle, and they don't do that anymore.

There's one hell of a difference between "I wanna drag the round further and further along because fuck you" and "this AI will literally kick our shit in if we don't just get rid of it now." One is obvious rule 1 violations, and the other is looking out for one's own safety in a generally sound mindset.

Make AI core a high security place they can’t beam down into.

insert meme here about throwing coding solutions in a policy discussion

jokes aside, all this does is flip the script, and make the AI near uncounterable to abductors sans their helmets giving them one single grace.

In the end, unless someone wants to actually code a solution, the policy should remain that abductors are well within their rights to remove the AI at their notice. It isn't right to effectively tell a stealth antag that the counter to stealth can't be removed for their own safety, cause being a stationary bunch of cameras tends to leave you vulnerable and that isn't okay.

[PKPenguin321]

what if we made abductors invisible to silicons but also unable to warp into the AI core
"Our anti-AI detection mechanisms would go haywire if we were to warp directly up to it. Aborting."

[Ayy Lemoh]

what if we made abductors invisible to silicons but also unable to warp into the AI core
"Our anti-AI detection mechanisms would go haywire if we were to warp directly up to it. Aborting."

only if invisible to silicons.

we still need to be able to use the ss13 camera footage for x-files episodes.

Huh? Wraiths can yeet into the ai core just as easy as abductors, and both are top tier bs

Wraiths are technically faster to warp in but killing takes time. Abductors, assuming they already had the ai intellicard, take longer to warp in but using a radio silencer and intellicard is faster.

Wraiths still give more time to call for help unless the AI sees the ayy warp in or can hear. Most of the time, they don't hear.

[wesoda25]

Why would abductors need to counter an AI? They are supposed to be a quiet antag who rides under the radar. If the AI presents a problem to you as an abductor you are shit at it.

[Ayy Lemoh]

Why would abductors need to counter an AI? They are supposed to be a quiet antag who rides under the radar. If the AI presents a problem to you as an abductor you are shit at it.

You can't actually abduct anyone if the AI is rogue and makes people cut the cameras.

Nor could you abduct people if the AI is able to kill or wound your mothership agent. edit: yes, you could solo abduct as a scientist however if this was a rp server then that would clearly be powergaming. it's also more risky if you want a reason that isn't but muh rp. doesn't stop me from doing it as a meme though ayy lemoh

There are some other scenarios that are rare and could still happen yet I don't feel like it would help to go well if john johnson takes your baton and all the cameras are emped while you have only a modified trigger kpa then how will you avoid being tased by a assistant blah blah blah.

Only good reason is if the AI is rogue and therefore people cut the cameras though.

[PKPenguin321]

Why would abductors need to counter an AI? They are supposed to be a quiet antag who rides under the radar. If the AI presents a problem to you as an abductor you are shit at it.

??? have you never played AI or abductor? AI can basically see anywhere in an instant, if they're just panning around there's a good chance they'll catch an abductor warping in to no fault of the abductors. it happens all the time

[wesoda25]

Never been a problem for me, I make sure AIs attention is diverted. And if AI IS watching, just give up on capturing that one person. Its not that hard I don't think. Its a big station, AI can only see so much.

Abductors shouldn't be encouraged to impact the round too heavily.

[PKPenguin321]

Never been a problem for me, I make sure AIs attention is diverted. And if AI IS watching, just give up on capturing that one person. Its not that hard I don't think. Its a big station, AI can only see so much.

Abductors shouldn't be encouraged to impact the round too heavily.

if that's your reason to disagree, then the solution i proposed should sit well with you

what if we made abductors invisible to silicons but also unable to warp into the AI core
"Our anti-AI detection mechanisms would go haywire if we were to warp directly up to it. Aborting."

[zxaber]

Abductors shouldn't be encouraged to impact the round too heavily.

From what I've seen, it's really not that uncommon for abductors to start handing out "release the singlo" objectives, so this is a bit of a moot point.

Anyway, if the AI knows about the wizard or abductors, they can throw beepsky into the turret blind spot. If they get singled out first, then hopefully they have time to warn the crew of their killer and make life for the antag harder. Wraiths just meme-teleporting onto the sat is bullshit, but two counters do exist (Moving the AI to somewhere hidden, and having a borg fill up from a blessed water tank and bless the satellite), and in my experience the AI usually knows about possible cult well before getting hit.

[Cobby]

The Abductor hat acts as an agent ID in that the AI can't track you already.

Ayys have always been less of an antag and more of a hostile faction since we disallow them explicitly from murderboning, so i'm wondering if we could just kind of toss it in there? If the AI tries to antagonize you then you're welcome to fight back but you shouldn't preemptively kill the AI. Fluff wise killing it would raise suspicion about abductor activity in the sector which could compromise this and future missions, so you only want to do it when it is truly necessary.

[skoglol]

Whenever I play abductor, I attempt to keep to the flavour text and try to leave as little impact on the round as a whole as possible. That said, I have been forced to kill an AI before, just due to the sheer number of hostile borgs and level of interference they were running. This was after kidnapping and returning it, then attempting to subvert it to our cause twice (followed by vox: "Laws updated"). I have also been party to malf checking a few AI's, but have put them back after checking their laws. This is due to them acting sketchy, and us not getting objective points for dead people.

My point is, some times killing the AI is necessary and disallowing it would be shitty.


That said, I do think abductors could benefit from being held to their flavour text a bit more. It seems some abductors go out of their way to steal ID's and such from their abductees for no reason. Okay if there is IC reasoning, but if you are just doing it to be shitty.. well.

[obscolene]

Killing the AI is always my first objective as abductor. It's literally required to do if you don't want abductors to be outed in the first 5 minutes. If you try to use 'but that's never happened to me' as anecdotal evidence then I guess the AI that round was pretty shitty.

[Istoprocent1]

Giving Abductors Digital Camouflage similar to Changeling's one sounds the best approach.

[wesoda25]

Ok so PKP’s suggestion but I think maybe they should get an AI detecting multitool as well (or some futuristic AI detector) as another precaution.

[BeeSting12]

Abductors should be allowed to warp into the AI cote and kill it. It's a valid counterplay against one of their biggest threats, if you don't like it then make it so abductors can't do it codewise instead of making a policy against what is basically a common sense thing

[Vaina]

There's plenty of things that "aren't fair" for the AI. Reinforced walls are jackshit against anyone coming by with thermite, cult and wizard practically get "one free AI kill" with wraith and shifting respectively. The whole point of the AI is the idea that it's vulnerable and easily dispatched unless someone wants to take the proper measures to protect it, a la moving the AI core when war ops hit. You can't honestly say that the midround antag who has a lot to lose by letting the AI live shouldn't be allowed the same graces just cause it doesn't immediately come into play at roundstart.

/thread

[Lumbermancer]

Just use flash and call Pingsky and/or Pingsky should be prepped next to your core the moment there's a threat of anyone teleporting into it.

[WarbossLincoln]

Abductors should be allowed to warp into the AI cote and kill it. It's a valid counterplay against one of their biggest threats, if you don't like it then make it so abductors can't do it codewise instead of making a policy against what is basically a common sense thing

I agree with the bee, it should be a code thing if it needs to be a thing at all. If you decide "you can't ever do X under any circumstance" then they shouldn't be physically able to do so.

[Pizzatiger]

Personally I like to go down and abduct the AI and give it a radio so it can still talk to the crew. Its nice to have your own little pet AI who will learn to love you via frequent pettings and the stockholm syndrome

[ThanatosRa]

What about incentive to keep the ai alive without subverting it.

[Yakumo_Chen]

Abductors killing the AI for no reason is pretty shitty and is in line with them murdering crew for no reason. Abductors base is completely inaccessible from anyone else and anything dead there (like a carded AI) is effectively cremated and out of the round. If abductors need a better reason to kill crew then "they want me dead" then they need a better reason to kill AI then "it could out me".

Abductors have plenty of tools to evade the AI (including an already built-in agent card), and it could feasibly just give it an AI law to ignore abductor activity. There shouldn't be any reason they need to go out of their way to kill the AI, especially "within 5 minutes of spawning". Unlike wizards and cults, abductors aren't supposed to be an active lethal threat to the crew and should not be abusing their tools to take players out of the round completely, which is a standard abductors are already expected to go by.

abduct the AI and give it a radio

radios don't work off the z level though...

[4dplanner]

It rarely is for no reason, though. Just panning around is enough to catch abductions relatively often, and the AI will then tend to call down the entire crew on you to prevent beamup. Personally I tend to leave it since it makes abductor gameplay a bit more fun and challenging, but there definitely are (even IC) reasons to kill the AI.

[Pizzatiger]

Abductors killing the AI for no reason is pretty shitty and is in line with them murdering crew for no reason. Abductors base is completely inaccessible from anyone else and anything dead there (like a carded AI) is effectively cremated and out of the round. If abductors need a better reason to kill crew then "they want me dead" then they need a better reason to kill AI then "it could out me".

Abductors have plenty of tools to evade the AI (including an already built-in agent card), and it could feasibly just give it an AI law to ignore abductor activity. There shouldn't be any reason they need to go out of their way to kill the AI, especially "within 5 minutes of spawning". Unlike wizards and cults, abductors aren't supposed to be an active lethal threat to the crew and should not be abusing their tools to take players out of the round completely, which is a standard abductors are already expected to go by.

abduct the AI and give it a radio

radios don't work off the z level though...

The green portable radios works basically anywhere. Thats what makes them useful compared to a headset

[lmwevil]

radios aren't part of this thread, just conduct of abuctors

additionally: if you are an abductor and take the nuke disk i'll announce you're about to be bombed unless you return it, idk why they can take it off the zlevel (someone fix this please)

[BeeSting12]

It's because it's the Centcomm z level.

This isn't about abductor conduct, it's a code issue. Abductors have every reason to get rid of the AI and no reason to keep it alive. I don't care to think about finding a solution for that but there's a few ways to go about it that don't involve adding to chapter 53 of our text book of rules. Make it impossible for abductors to warp into the AI core, give abductors an objective/incentive to keep the AI alive, etc.

[Ayy Lemoh]

give abductors an objective/incentive to keep the AI alive, etc.

the mothership needs a new fucking pilot AI and it sure as fuck won't get one if the noob sectoids pew pew the AI to death.

Without a pilot, the mothership UFO can't fly. If it can't fly then it can't reach Earth. If it can't reach Earth then no fucking weed for anyone

[Anonmare]

I've been a nuking malf AI once and an abductor agent beamed down, carded me before Pingsky realised there was a threat. His scientist buddy followed afterwards, picked me up, wiped me and beamed the agent back-up and there was genuinely nothing I could have done.

Don't say "just use use cyborgs lmao", I didn't have any and they had literally just spawned in - there was no possible way I could have prepared for that.

Abductors don't even need to beam into the AI core, they can just nab an AI Upload and print off a freeform core module whenever someone's not looking and upload an "ignore me" law literally anywhere on station, since their teleport doesn't need to actually see an area to function (you can beam into static just fine, like you could in clockcult).

[zxaber]

Would we lose anything if abductors were unable to use (or perhaps even pick up) any item that doesn't spawn on their ship? Like a more aggressive form of golem hands? Maybe add some fluff text of "That item is not correctly sterilized, and as such contact with it should be avoided".

The biggest issue that I know of would be abductors being unable to place items back on a human that they strip. But abductors don't need to strip anyway, right? Don't their tools go through clothing or something?

[Shadowflame909]

^ Abductors can't use guns and don't come with heals.

Why do any more than this?

[WarbossLincoln]

Don't say "just use use cyborgs lmao", I didn't have any and they had literally just spawned in

Long after silicons have been nerfed to near impotence there are still people salty about that time a sec borg dunked their murderbone and will talk shit and think they're all powerful.

[TribeOfBeavers]

We decided that abductors should be allowed to take action against the AI, should they choose to do so.

This is in line with our policy on antagonist freedom, and doesn't fall under rule 1, as abductors often have legitimate reason to disable the AI.

It would also cause a lot of administrative headaches, as well as frustration for the abductor players, to have a crewmember that is protected under the rules bit also able to make your lives/task extremely difficult.

I understand this can be frustrating for the AI, but we felt a code solution was more in line with this situation than a policy one.