FalseIncarnate

This might not be a bad way of handling it, though the process will likely be irreversible, like snipping the tips off gloves. It won't make it un-usable by everyone else, but it will always show as "Prescription MediHUD" or such.

This is not entirely true. The laptop will gain a couple uses depending on the access of your ID at the time of purchase. For example, an atmos tech will be able to access an atmos alert program from his laptop, or a medical doctor can view medical records from hers. There was an issue with the detective and security records, but I believe this has been patched recently. Engineers can even get the ability to view the power in the entire power net if they set it up right. That aside, the laptop system is a bit lackluster, I definitely agree. Outside of some specific jobs (such as those mentioned above), the laptops are an incredibly expensive arcade machine at best. Perhaps, since this IS in suggestions, we can use the thread to collect suggestions on potential additions to the system for consideration and possible coding?

I'll run this past the other admins (since it's kinda a balance thing) and look into coding in the self-shock if they give the greenlight. The drenched thing might be tricky to do, but having it ignite you when covered in fuel shouldn't be too hard since there should already be proc's for igniting people that could be called.

This is definitely true. I have personally hunted down the captain or HoP to be promoted to acting CMO multiple times because we didn't have one or they utterly ceased to exist early in. As things stand, a player in a Head role already has higher expectations placed on them by the crew, as well as by the admin team. If you go SSD as a head without notifying an admin beforehand, you will likely find a job ban on all command roles in place when you return. Exceptionally incompetent / irresponsible heads also can receive job bans from their role, command, or even their entire department for failing to do their job adequately. So while the only requirement to enlist in a head role is meeting the time lock, the admins are able to blacklist you from the roles if you can't play them properly. Adding an additional whitelist would simply over complicate the matter, and lead to additional whining when people get command job bans.

For clarification, this is a chance on attack, not simply while holding the prod, correct? If that is the case, I very much agree with the suggestion as it helps offset the power of this rather easily obtainable weapon. Worth pointing out that the "no shock" gene mod should also protect you from backfires, while perhaps being drenched would increase the chance if possible? And god help you if you are covered in something flammable when it backfires.

time vs reward This is where I'd like to step in and say that such an object already is in the code. In fact, botany, atmos, and I believe chem (might be wrong on this last one) each have a version of the Mister. More or less, it's a backpack water tank with a retractable hose. The main issue, as I have been told, is not the feasibility of this item. Rather, it's weakness is that our code does not support extinguishers actually cooling a tile. This probably is a limitation imposed by ZAS, so it sadly would be difficult to restore the Mister to its intended glory. Implementing it as a way to water plants and act as just an alternate extinguisher would be simple, but rather lackluster for its potential. A gas release valve would be nice for tanks, but I think it should be something like the tank transfer valves in toxins, to avoid random civvies from emptying every tank they find.

The Crew Records section of the forum (linked above by fj45, but here it is again: viewforum.php?f=32 ) pretty much is exactly what you are looking for. The template is there for those who want to use it, and is in no way mandatory or enforced (unlike the ban appeals template). I've read a couple introductions and records that do away with the template in favor of something more creative, and this is of course welcome! If you are thinking something more in line with backstory anecdotes however, I think no one will complain if you include them in the crew record as a separate post/comment in the same thread as your record. Stories about rounds have their own section though.

I feel like I've seen that Diona suggestion before, and I remember liking it. However, the code needed for it would be immense, and I think that allowing them to control machines in this form would be problematic. The idea that they can literally grow off of the station and create livable areas is cool, but the potential for grief from being able to just build walls everywhere would make it rather problematic. Giving Tajaran a slightly increased sensitivity to sound would be an interesting addition. As it stands, their only real weakness is currently a lower heat tolerance. I know lore-wise, Unathi are unable to digest plants, so if we wanted to work off that, we could have plants either not give them nutriment or (if in large enough amounts) make them sick/throw up.

... is there more to say? Just don't let him out unless your plan is to cause chaos with him.

IPCs (Machine People) are a fantastic example of this point. While they are immune to a lot of things, they also have a number of weaknesses and drawbacks such as their EMP vulnerability, alternate revival (arguably more difficult), and recent exclusion from some antagonist roles. A common practice is to try and balance every bonus with a drawback if you are aiming for something considered "fair". In many games this may be as simple as "well, this is a really strong weapon, so let's make it really expensive/hard to get", or as complex as "using this powerful sentient weapon too much will corrupt your mind and slowly turn you into a slave to it's own will" (cursed weapons are great). While the special "radio" for Greys would be interesting, giving them the ability to sense the death of other greys is going to cause more race gangs to form than someone calling a Tajaran a "filthy catbeast" in the bar.

The next major patch will be containing some massive map changes, including the reintroduction of additional away missions. The Gateway will now be a much more dangerous mechanic, and as such has had it's access requirements adjusted. Speak to your local Captain, HoP, or RD about undertaking missions on their behalf, and be slaughtered in new and exciting locales!

I would like to point out a few things regarding this line specifically. First, there is a space loop already in place in atmospherics. It is (at round-start) only connected to 2 connector ports, but is rather easy to incorporate into an atmos configuration. I personally use them in my systems which (despite all the head-butting I've done with Fj45 on the matter) does work quite well. Second, it is an incredibly viable method of cooling, as it performs better as the internal pressure (and temperature) rises. This means that it gets better when you need the cooling most: during fires. It can also super-cool large amounts of a gas, such as N2 for the supermatter (which is on it's way out) or CO2 for killing. Third, due to it's existing piping, there is little busywork in setting up a cooling loop. The default one most people use (the coolers) is simply adjusting 2 valves, turning on a pump, and setting the coolers themselves. Even my set-up, which is a bit more intensive, is only a couple minutes of work to get completed and active. If anything, I'd support MORE work for atmos techs, because once the system is running there is very little work to do until there is a fire or toxin leak. Experimenting with the pipes is completely optional and typically not done by many people. The space loop does work, though under normal conditions, such cooling is rarely needed. Space heaters mainly exist so that in the event someone messes with an air alarm and drops the thermostat or there is a leak of ultra-cold gas, you can fix the temperature issues faster. It's also a free power cell if you never intend to use them.

https://soundcloud.com/stephanosrex/honk-honk-butt Jokes aside, i have noticed the hydro-bot, but never understood why it was disabled. Perhaps i'll look into it's runtimes sometime... because I apparently am the hydro-coder.

I will admit to having done this once. I was halfway to EVA by the time the customs officer and his lackey were able to scramble out of their office to come after me. They never did catch me, and I'm pretty sure that I might have gotten heavily beaten and brigged if they had managed to catch me. When they arrested a guy for "falsifying his forms" by listing what they claimed to be an "incorrect age", I knew it was time to skip the line. EDIT: Back on topic though, I've got an idea of how to replace both the embassies, customs, and reimburse anyone who bought Customs Officer. I'll run it all past the other admins and such before I go into much detail, but it involves the NT Recruiter, Gateway, Medical's Sec post, and Visitor's Passes.

Hallucinations are definitely not as varied as they should be. Flashing colors probably would be an easy thing to add, since we could essentially just scavenge the code from space drugs. Many people largely ignore the effects of the hallucination as long as it doesn't knock them out, so variety would re-add that sense of "oh god what is going on i don't even" that hallucinations would realistically trigger. A funny side thought would be to have very low hunger trigger special "food" hallucinations where random objects suddenly appear as delicious looking food for a brief moment. "Mmm... that steak sure looks good... Wait, why am I chewing on this multitool?"

Quick point of clarification, this is their Process Scheduler. They say it's supposed to replace master controllers, but it seems to work alongside it code-wise to handle things more efficiently. That aside... I have been working on this for about 2 days now, and am hopefully nearing a point where it seems to be working and at a state where it will be considered safe to post a PR for it. I got into contact briefly with the guy who is managing this release, and they were able to give me a little help getting it integrated. I'm now trying to update it a little since he posted a commit for it after I had already started messing with it. Unrelated but not really: BYOND is such a pain. Updating one file ends up with runtimes from a completely unrelated file. Progress has been slow, but it IS being worked on.

A fair portion of your cover effects already are in place. If someone is aiming at you and there is a person/mech between the two of you, the middle-man would take the hit when the shot is fired. Walls obviously are walls, so only an XRay shot would pass through to hit you from the other side of the wall. Earth said there is a chance to have a flipped table block the shots, which if the case, could be adjusted to make it more prominent and possibly worth flipping tables in a shootout. I'll have to check the code and do some testing on that to see how it works (if it works). Being able to hide behind a console would be very circumstantial, as most are currently against walls already. Those that could be used in as cover (like in surgery), would need to be damaged by the shots. Maybe instead of giving a chance for the shots to miss, the console instead absorbs a couple hits before the monitor gets blown out and the shots can continue as normal. After the fight, you'd just need to replace the glass in the console to fix it, just like ones damaged from explosions. And don't shields have a chance to block shots already? I know the energy shield does, but I don't know if the riot shield and legionnaire shield have any real protective value. Again, something to check in the code and some testing. As for shielding from explosions, that would probably require a bit of recoding for the way explosions are calculated and handled. I know walls *seem* to decrease the explosion's effect in a given direction, and a table probably wouldn't be strong enough to really withstand the explosion unless it was a weak one to begin with.

As was explained on the server in the OOC chat regarding this subject, I would like to clarify a misconception. The electrode still is present, and does NOT pass through windows. It has a limited range, and will fizzle out harmlessly upon reaching it's maximum range. It can also still be dodged, but is an instant stun if it manages to hit you before reaching max distance. The disabler beam is also still present, and does pass through windows like a normal laser. It deals stamina damage (pain), so it requires a couple hits to drop someone, just like the taser BEFORE the instant-stun rework. Tasers have been completely replaced by the new Advanced Taser, which has 2 modes. The first mode fires electrodes like the previous taser. The second mode fires the disabler beams. It can fire twice as many disabler beams as it can fire electrodes for a given charge, and can be toggled just like an energy gun to switch between it's two firing modes. It is still a completely non-lethal, non-harming weapon. The misconception seems to be that the new taser combines the two modes, which it does not. Just like an energy gun has stun and kill settings, the Advanced Taser has electrode and disabler beam settings. Only the electrode mode is an instant stun, and utilizes electrodes as explained above. Only the disabler beam mode can pass through windows, and utilizes the disabler beams as described above. The energy gun had it's stun setting changed to use the disabler beam instead of the electrode as well. Advanced energy guns shoot the electrode. These are still subject to the same abilities and disadvantages as those fired from the Advanced Taser. TL;DR: Electrodes are instant stun, max 7 range before fizzling out harmlessly, and are blocked by windows. Disabler beams are stamina (not insta-stun) based, can pass through windows, and have a longer range. The advanced taser switches between the two, not combines them.

Transferring reagents from plants to prepared food is a cool idea. I remember one round when I ate a meat pie the chef had prepared and began getting the Space Drugs effect because the chef and botanist had used some ambrosia in the dish to give it some healing properties. However, I think this was more along the lines of they ground up the ambrosia and then injected the pie with the reagent mix from the grinder. I'm not sure how difficult the system would be to code in to effectively transfer the reagents over, but would definitely open up some new potential for non-antags and antags alike through planning. It would also be funny to watch the chef get arrested for poisoning people, when the botanist is the true traitor.

If we increase the potency of pest spray, Diethylamine would need to be increased as well to keep things balanced. Also, toxicity would be upped to offset this increase in power. Pest spray is the cheap and easy method, but far from an ideal remedy. For the record, Pest Spray lowers pest level by 2 per can, while Diethylamine lowers is by 2 per UNIT. Pest spray also increases the toxicity of the tray by 4, while Diethylamine does not add any toxicity. You can get Diethylamine from hacking the Nutri-Vend or by bugging chemistry. Alternatively, you could ask Science ever so nicely to get you the parts to build a fully upgraded portable chem dispenser in hydroponics and have all the Diethylamine, Ammonia, and Unstable Mutagen you could hope for.

Having a second doc on hand definitely is a great help for patching them up quickly. Additionally, if you can manage to get your hands on some Hivelord remains, you can instantly bring someone back from the dead and back to full health by cramming the remains down their throat right after you zap them to life. Oh, and more defib units can be made in a prolathe. Contact your local science department for more!

My main concern with this is the fact that IPCs are a karma-locked race. By allowing people to become them through gameplay like this, I feel that would severely lower the value of having spent the karma for players who already own it. However, to have the capability of repairing an IPC who's been 99% destroyed is something I'd very much support. Printing off new torsos would be great, but I don't see a reason to create new heads, as the only case this could be useful would be when the subject is debrained and the head is forever lost to the mighty singularity.

The Tier system that I implemented does use different mutation chances based on the volume of the mutagenic reagent. For unstable mutagen, the lowest chance Tier (Tier 1) is 1-5 units, with 6 units being the start of Tier 2, which would explain why 10 units seemed much more effective than 5 (because it is). When you dropped back to 5 again and tried twice, you were using the lower Tier's chances again, which would explain the apparent lack of any effect. Radium has larger ranges for the Tiers, so you'll need more of it to trigger higher tiers than you would if you were using unstable mutagen. It wasn't a case of diminishing returns, it was simply a game of chance that felt like diminishing returns due to the significant differences between Tier 1 and 2 mutation chances. For the record: There are 4 Tiers for mutagenic reagents. Tier 3 is the lowest one that can result in a species shift. All chances are increased by the mutation modifier stat given by Left 4 Zed. It is possible to reach 100% chance on Tier 1, though this requires gallons of Left 4 Zed. I've been avoiding openly posting the exact specs of the system, but you can either PM me for them or decipher the code for them if you wish.

I think this would be a great idea, especially if we make xenoflora a more general science job and not simply a subsection of xenobiology. It will place them closer to the research area where they would be able to obtain their Floral Somatorays (and the Advanced version when I finish making it), while also making it more visible to the scientists (which would hopefully lead to it being more used). When I reworked our botany, I looked at Bay's current version of botany. I tested out their version which, as you explained, holds the reagents longer and spreads the effect out over time. However, one thing I disliked about their system using this was the lack of apparent control and the extreme randomness it caused. While I acknowledge that the mutation system should feel uncontrollable to a degree (you literally are dumping a radioactive goop in and seeing if it changes), I felt their system wouldn't be a solid fit for our style of play. True, obtaining specific conditions such as bio-luminescence is difficult, but I hesitate to say it is any more difficult here to obtain them than it is on Bay. While our system will only produce 1 mutation with 5 units and theirs may produce up to 3, the chances of said mutations occurring is quite different. One thing that confuses me is your assertion of there being some sort of diminishing returns? Apologies if I misunderstood your meaning, but the system does not have diminishing returns on the mutations. The chances will not change based on the number of previous mutations (or attempts), and increasing the dosage actually increases the chances due to the tier system that was created for the rework. The only times that the chances (for a given amount of mutagen) are lowered is if the mutation modifier (increased with Left 4 Zed) is lowered. However, I do like your idea of a fertilizer mutagen, and I am quite tempted to experiment with implementing such an addition. This would definitely use a system more akin to Bay's current version, prompting multiple mutations over time instead of the more instant effect that our system uses. It would likely be a sort of dual-function reagent that replenishes nutrients while sparking mutations, and making it available in the biogenerator wouldn't be too outlandish in my mind. If you would like, I'd be more than happy to discuss this topic with you further, as well as work with you to develop botany / xeno-botany further. Adding new plants and mutants is also something I would like to look into, and would I feel collaboration on such would be a great idea.

First, I know that with Baystation, you are able to set (in the character setup menu) a preferred latejoin spawn point, with options being the arrival shuttle, gateway, and cryodorms. Allowing people to join at cryodorms would be plausible with some porting of their code, though all this really does is help avoid new people spawning on a shuttle that got blasted by a meteor or other disaster, as well as bypass the customs. Second, I like the idea of sprucing up cryodorms, even if it IS really meant for people leaving the game. As it stands, you dump a person into cryo, then wait for the message saying they entered long term storage (i think about 5-10 minutes), with no real in-game idea of when they are to be removed. For a traitor with an SSD target, this can be rather frustrating, since you don't get your objectives updated automatically until the person enters long-term storage, and you don't get any real indication of how long that will be. Perhaps some sort of timer display would be useful, so you can check to see how long it is until the pod gets cleared. Alternatively, taking your idea of the cryotrain: If the system were to be set to clear all occupants on a single, set interval, you'd be able to have a better idea of when the pods are to be cleared. You could time this to have your job slot freed almost as soon as you need to leave, and allow traitors a better understanding of when their objective is to be updated. You can toss in some sort of little effect/animation to make it look like the pods teleported away their occupant to Sleep Station 13 for the benefit of anyone watching. Just rambling a few ideas on the subject, but I do agree the cryodorms area is rather poorly communicated in it's purpose to a new player. Most people see a room with a row of green machines and have no clue what it's for without asking, as it doesn't effectively convey that the pods remove the player's character from the game and reopen the job slot.