Psychologist feedback thread.

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/49964

This just got merged, please share your feedback or ideas here.

[trollbreeder]

Let me get this out of the way first.

Is this going to be the medbay lawyer, essentially?

[Armhulen]

Let me get this out of the way first.

Is this going to be the medbay lawyer, essentially?

Looks like it for the moment, though they could work on setting up a lot of ways to get happier in their office or something. It's attached to some kind of idea of mechanic to fix unlike the lawyer

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

Let me get this out of the way first.

Is this going to be the medbay lawyer, essentially?

Read the PR.

Question: Isn't this just lawyer 2.0?
Answer: Yes, and that is 100% the intention, for now. This is an RP job any way you slice it. I believe this PR stands both on its own merits purely as an RP job, and also to help lay the foundation for future work from others to flesh out a Psychologist/Psychiatrist job with actual unique mechanics. We have even had prior and ongoing work done to that end. #48403 I've spoken to the author of this and he has expressed approval. With the groundwork laid by this PR in terms of job, access, and area code, as well as standardizing a spot for psych in future mapping, I believe this will make his or anyone else's job infinitely easier and allow them to focus solely or at least mostly on introducing cool mechanics.

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

I made an oopsie and the CMO and HoP don't have access to the psych office on highpop currently, but a fix is up.

https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/50139

[wesoda25]

Would you be averse to me adding a small medical cabinet/bag to the psychologist locker, which contains a limited amount of Happiness and Psicodine (maybe other chems like LSD or something)? I think it could add flavor, but I think there were some arguments against it which is why I ask.

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

Would you be averse to me adding a small medical cabinet/bag to the psychologist locker, which contains a limited amount of Happiness and Psicodine (maybe other chems like LSD or something)? I think it could add flavor, but I think there were some arguments against it which is why I ask.

Personally, not averse at all, no.
This was actually part of my original plan, giving specifically some psicodine, happiness, and mindbreaker pills to the job either in their locker or backpack at round start, but I backed off because the natural next question is "why aren't they just deferring to medbay to get those pills?" or further "why don't they just have pharma access?" (I did NOT want, at present, to give the silly RP job access to the clandestine bomb/poison factory).
But if you think it fits and you want to fight any opposition to it, please do, could be a lot of fun.

Once all this settles in I'm toying with the idea of PRing role restricting the hypnoflash to the Psychologist.

[Shadowflame909]

My thoughts on it is that an assistant getting a custom job title would equivalently be the same thing

there's nothing here.

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

rp job bad

Thanks for your valuable feedback, but this was clearly addressed in the PR text.

[Kel]

you asked for feedback, thus people are giving their reactions. it doesnt matter if this was intended to be medical lawyer or not, people are giving feedback. the word you are looking for is criticism.
to address the change itself, it is inoffensive, per design. practically, its worse at its job than the chaplain, who can actually dish out good moods mechanically, and already moonlighted as the mental care role on the station.

[Shadowflame909]

rp job bad

Thanks for your valuable feedback, but this was clearly addressed in the PR text.

What other kind of feedback are you looking for

Access requirements?

There's nothing here!

[SpaceManiac]

What other kind of feedback are you looking for

feelings after playing the job or playing medical with the job filled perhaps

[Jack7D1]

I think this is a good addition.

[BeeSting12]

Should give him some medicines that give bonus mood to prescribe. Also name the job psychiatrist since they can legally prescribe medication.

[Denton]

Is this going to be the medbay lawyer, essentially?

Basically, I merged it to make it easier for other people to establish a proper mental trauma/psychology framework (like in https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/48403).
Right now, the job will probably mostly see use on Manuel though.

[nianjiilical]

the fact that people actually do play chaplain/lawyer tells me theres plenty of room for this to exist

plus psychologist is something that actually would make sense on these god forsaken stations

just gave to come up with relatively harmlessly gimmicky shit for them

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

Also name the job psychiatrist since they can legally prescribe medication.

I opted for Psychologist because Psychiatrist has a more clinical ring to it, and my hope was that this will be seen as a fundamentally social job. Essentially a sort of token HR rep there to keep the crew just sane enough to keep working.
I think the Psychologist being able to prescribe things works fine in the cartoonish lore of this game, and for that matter IRL there are some places where Psychologists legally can and do prescribe medication.

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

Here is my best effort at adding it to the wiki.
https://tgstation13.org/wiki/Psychologist

[confused rock]

reminder that the reason people play chaplain is because he gets a ton of validhunting gear

[oranges]

My thoughts on it is that an assistant getting a custom job title would equivalently be the same thing

there's nothing here.

Allow me to elucidate then

if you have nothing to say, don't post about how little you HAVE TO SAY

JUST DON"T POST.

IF I CATCH YOU DOING THIS AGAIN, I will ban you from the forums for a while.

[PKPenguin321]

oranges... I think he meant that there's not enough content, not that he had no opinion

PS: Making it the psychologists job to manage medical records is a cool idea, I hope it catches on

[oranges]

>I think he had an opinion on the content, not that he had an opinion

DO YOU EVEN HEAR YOURSELF DUMBASS

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

If anyone would like to see somewhat more substantial "content" for the Psychologist, short of an actual rework on mood/sanity/traumas and all that, since I'm far from equipped to do that and others are working on it... What would you like to see?

For instance, are you opposed to or for any of the following? They're things I've been thinking about.

1. The Psychologist being given a modest and low dose stock of pills at round start, as discussed previously here, psicodine, mindbreaker, happiness, or stuff similar to that.
2. The Psychologist having pharmacy access.
3. The Psychologist, CMO and HoP (Captain too obviously but he's already got sec console access) having exclusive access to the "mental status" setting in medical records, and bringing back beepsky being triggered to arrest or detain "insane" people.

I myself think one would be good, and help solidify the idea that the Psychologist is allowed and expected to posses and dispense drugs, or rather to write prescriptions pertaining to them.
Two I'm totally opposed to until maybe mechanics are a thing, because access to chem machines comes with a lot of baggage and I think it's more interesting if the Psych has to ask for a stock of drugs (or for additional stock if point one goes through) or write prescriptions.
Three I think could be really interesting, but I guess might be abused outside MRP.

[XivilaiAnaxes]

If psych gets pills should be renamed to psychiatrist as that's one of the main distinctions between psychologist and psychiatrist (that and the psychiatrist goes through medical school first and psychologist doesn't do it at all).

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

If psych gets pills should be renamed to psychiatrist as that's one of the main distinctions between psychologist and psychiatrist (that and the psychiatrist goes through medical school first and psychologist doesn't do it at all).

I covered this both in the PR and here but I'd like to reiterate; I don't think this is a distinction that would be very helpful.
In real life "doctors" as singular individuals do not patch up basic wounds, then also go perform literal brain surgery, then also go deal with complex pharmacology. But on TG, they do.
I like "Psychologist" because I feel it stresses that this should be something of a social/RP role, even once mechanics do get added.
But this one is up to future contributors (adding mechanics to the job) and the maintainers really.

[Tarchonvaagh]

Give them the ability to either reduce or increase mood with a cooldown
Otherwise a very nice addition, thank you

[deedubya]

The fact that they don't interact with moodlets whatsoever makes their office a complete waste of station space. What does a psychologist do that a doctor, chaplain, or hell - a fucking clown can't do better?

RP jobs can't solely be RP jobs. They need actual mechanical grounding to justify their existence. It's the same reason prisoner sucks dick, and why nobody plays lawyer anymore. Difference between this and the prisoner is that the prisoner isn't wasting space in their department to justify their existence.

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

The fact that they don't interact with moodlets whatsoever makes their office a complete waste of station space.
...
Difference between this and the prisoner is that the prisoner isn't wasting space in their department to justify their existence.

On one map there was room there specifically for expansion, and in fact (according to the contributor's own words) specifically for expansion from a psych job.
On three maps it fills in a small piece of the hole Genetic's department change left.
On another map it displaced a secondary surgery room, which who cares since you can and almost always do tend wounds on stasis beds and there's still a big surgery theater to do everything else in.
And on another map, it displaced an abandoned maintenance room.

In your mind what should this vital real estate have been used for?

RP jobs can't solely be RP jobs.

Yeah they can.
But if you feel that strongly to the contrary, and the workload of running Boomerstation permits you any free time, feel free to code psych mechanics in or touch bases with the guy working on them.

[Jack7D1]

I think the psychologist would Pai well with people with the unstable quirk.

[Cobby]

I would prefer before you start giving them permission to pull medical resources that they have something they can offer that's worth pulling resources for.

Not that chem machine energy is worth its salt but still lol.

Also FYI we lost genetics specifically for map space, and I don't see anyone taking the mantle of adding maint stuff so not sure why all of a sudden that's a care (maybe for delta but?)

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

I would prefer before you start giving them permission to pull medical resources that they have something they can offer that's worth pulling resources for.

Not that chem machine energy is worth its salt but still lol.

Yeah that's in part why I thought at present pharmacy access would be a stinky idea, and favored them writing prescriptions/asking for stock. At that point they have to at least try to justify it and it's up to the CMO, doctors, and chemists to actually honor it or not. Roleplay, as such.
I've been observing a lot of rounds and it's been going well on Manuel, and I've even seen some players doing pretty neat jobs with Psych on Terry and EH.

[Armhulen]

I've thrown up this pr to hopefully let more people stick around for a bit in the office. Usually the bar isn't so far from med, but if it is this is one "moodlet heal" area in medbay.

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

Nice!

[deedubya]

The fact that they don't interact with moodlets whatsoever makes their office a complete waste of station space.
...
Difference between this and the prisoner is that the prisoner isn't wasting space in their department to justify their existence.

On one map there was room there specifically for expansion, and in fact (according to the contributor's own words) specifically for expansion from a psych job.
On three maps it fills in a small piece of the hole Genetic's department change left.
On another map it displaced a secondary surgery room, which who cares since you can and almost always do tend wounds on stasis beds and there's still a big surgery theater to do everything else in.
And on another map, it displaced an abandoned maintenance room.

In your mind what should this vital real estate have been used for?

I stand corrected, then. I forgot about how you guys hamfistedly shunted genetics over to science upstream. I guess there's plenty of space to recycle.

RP jobs can't solely be RP jobs.

Yeah they can.
But if you feel that strongly to the contrary, and the workload of running Boomerstation permits you any free time, feel free to code psych mechanics in or touch bases with the guy working on them.

You asked for criticism about the job. The criticism is that it's currently pointless and a waste of potential. Also, if I was to expend resources improving it, the only way it'd make it back upstream would be as a port.


edit: Arm's got the right idea, but I wonder if there's a way to code it so that the moodlet only happens if there's a psychologist present in the room, and lingers for a while after leaving? Say like, 4x the amount you remained in the room?

[Kryson]

One good idea we can steal from paradise is to allow the psychologist to help demote people who after a good faith determination are declared to be unfit to serve. If a head is ooc ick'ing, self harming or randomly attacking people you should be legally allowed to chloral them and put them in a straight jacket.

if their mental health doesn't improve after a talk about their relationship with their mother, a steady dose of lithium and a little haloperidol, you can demote them. Make sure you have some support amongst security or the heads before attempting this, or you will probably wind up dead.

You essentially get a license to be the comdom police if the need should arrive.

[oranges]

It doesn't matter if it's pointless for you, that is irrelevant.

What they want is feedback from people who would play the role as it is now, if you want to idly speculate about how to make it a different role, go to ideas so we can ignore you.

[cacogen]

Why ask for feedback if you don't want to change anything?

[oranges]

I ask myself that every day caco

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

Why ask for feedback if you don't want to change anything?

Nobody is is providing "feedback" by way of dropping in to inform me that they don't like RP jobs, or being the 14th person to think they're clever for thinking up "ACKCHYUALLY....... psychologists can't legally prescribe medicine."

Post's like Kryson's, ideas and such, are good to see and I'm all ears. And I'd like to hear more, good or bad, from people who have actually played the job.
I also asked for direct feedback on some things pertaining to the job here and it's largely been crickets, so... Shrug?

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

One good idea we can steal from paradise is to allow the psychologist to help demote people who after a good faith determination are declared to be unfit to serve. If a head is ooc ick'ing, self harming or randomly attacking people you should be legally allowed to chloral them and put them in a straight jacket.

if their mental health doesn't improve after a talk about their relationship with their mother, a steady dose of lithium and a little haloperidol, you can demote them. Make sure you have some support amongst security or the heads before attempting this, or you will probably wind up dead.

You essentially get a license to be the comdom police if the need should arrive.

I've been thinking about something along these lines, yeah. It's interesting and might be feasible, and pretty fun from an RP standpoint.
I like the idea of people with Psych access (namely the Psych himself, the CMO, the HoP, and obviously the Captain) being the only ones able to set people's mental status in medical records, and if set to "insane" would make beepsky chase and arrest them on sight just like arrest status, as well as spit alerts out in the medical and possibly service frequency about an unstable person being detained.
I think this could be used to sort out shittery that doesn't exactly make somebody valid, or maybe doesn't alone qualify them for demotion, and create some interesting RP in the process. Does this fall in line with what you were thinking?

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

I put a PR up to give the Psychologist some pills, feedback appreciated.
https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/50211

edit: oops wrong PR

[Flatulent]

I put a PR up to give the Psychologist some pills, feedback appreciated.
https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/50211

edit: oops wrong PR

giving any amount of pax is a terrible idea

[annoyinggreencatgirl]

I put a PR up to give the Psychologist some pills, feedback appreciated.
https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/50211

edit: oops wrong PR

giving any amount of pax is a terrible idea

Why?
He gets 25u spread across 5 pills. I'm terrible at chemistry and making 90u of Pax took me like 2 minutes.
I could have shaved it down to well under a minute if I burned a paper to get ash, or better yet, just swiped one of the many multiver bottles sitting around.

I was a lot more reluctant to give Synaptizine pills than Pax to the psych at round start because while it has some legit psych uses and it's piss easy to make, those uses are pretty niche and the stun resistance is basically a "run away from sec" button.

[wesoda25]

Pax is fine

[cacogen]

"ACKCHYUALLY....... psychologists can't legally prescribe medicine."

yeah i said that on the original pr because i'm a faggot i didn't know everyone else here had degrees in armchair psychology too. where i'm from people are retarded

by the way i like the job and i think it's good you're adding medicine

[deedubya]

general practitioners aren't legally allowed to do surgery either, some suspension of disbelief and stretching of logic is required to enjoy yourself here

[CDranzer]

Played half a round of this on Manuel, it was late at night, so kinda lowpop, but whatever. The role of counselor or mediator or whatever is one I could reasonably see, but I also feel like that job is taken up by the Bartender as much as anything. As it stands, the job has very little substance, even by meme RP job standards.

The lawyer, for all the complaints about their uselessness, is partially there to be an in-character thorn in security's side. Security is an interesting place where interesting and relevant things are happening, and the lawyer has an IC reason to interject himself and play a sort of advocate for criminals. The curator has far less relevance, but they at least have a couple of cool suits and a large public area to play with if for some reason they want to attempt autism projects (which I think they should be better equipped to do, but that's another thread)

The psychologist has no reason to exist, no niche to fill, and no tools to play with. Thematically, it's kind of cute, but that's about it.

[Farquaar]

On some other servers (Bay, for instance) the chaplain also acts as a counselor: his office has a psychiatrist's couch and is comfy enough to hold sessions in. Keep in mind, I'm not against the idea of a psychologist role, but considering alternatives can help shed light on whether a feature is what's best for the game.

Spoiler:

Merging psychologist and chaplain roles
Pros:
+ Adds more content to an existing RP job instead of making a new one
+ Frees up space in the medical department for future features

Cons:
- Spiritual advice ain't the same as psychiatric counseling (psychologist can generate fun conflict with chaplain)
- It's more funny if someone on the medical staff deems you insane than if the Chaplain does
- tfw no Deanna Troi

[crashmatusow]

We technically have a mechanism for relieving mentally unfit crew (this is currently the CMO’s job) but I literally never seen anyone do it. Probably because medbay lacks tools for effective nonlethal detainment.

[Farquaar]

We technically have a mechanism for relieving mentally unfit crew (this is currently the CMO’s job) but I literally never seen anyone do it. Probably because medbay lacks tools for effective nonlethal detainment.

Demotions seldom happen in general. It's a lot of trouble for everyone involved, especially if the demotee's revenge plot is something lame like self-antagging.