EvadableMoxie

As an MD, I wouldn't be a fan of this. The ORs are already the most dangerous part of Medbay due to being fairly isolated and having the doctors within inherently distracted. Giving antags a button to cut them off from medical entirely would make them even more dangerous. Surgery access is already fairly restricted, and if a fellow doctor is being annoying you can bring it up to the CMO.

It seems like your argument is mostly thematic. You don't seem to disagree that mechanically Genecists does nothing for science yet is incredibly vital to medical. But you feel we should completely ignore that because you think the fluff of genetic experimentation is better suited to science. I disagree with that, since things like virology or gateway exploration are also dangerous, yet are not covered by science. Robotics and RnD are also fairly safe and yet still under the science department. But, even if I agree with you that fluff wise science makes sense, I think mechanics are a much better thing base these decisions on. The cloner is not at best a side project. It is part of their responsibilities and takes priority over experimentation. Other than the CMO, Geneticists are the only people who can eject a clone early, which significantly speed up how fast people can be cloned in an emergency. That's vitally important. In short, we have a department that serves no mechanical purpose to science, while serving invaluable mechanical purposes to medical. This is a no brainer. It belongs as a part of medical. If you disagree, what argument can you offer that it should be a part of science beyond your own personal opinion that it fits better lore wise for it to be?

I really think Genetics should simply be a part of medical. Genetics has no interaction with Science and nothing they do effects Science's ability to operate. On the other hand, they are responsible for the cloner, which is medical's department, they make monkeys for chem to get blood with for synthflesh, and for the cloner to make biomass with. They made humanized monkeys for surgeons to replace lost limbs with. They make clean SE for MDs to treat genetic issues. Science doesn't need them for anything. Nothing they do impacts science at all. I don't even understand why they are under both science and medical to begin with, but I'd guess it's a legacy thing that made sense at some point and doesn't anymore due to changes since then.

While medical does have a bunch of jobs, most of them aren't going to be done by a Borg. The only medical jobs a Borg can do really is Medical Doctor and Paramedic and those two jobs have a lot of overlap already. "Cloner" isn't a job so much as a shared responsibility of most of medical, and it all Borgs are capable of operating the cloner anyway, so it'll never be a thing you can assign to a specific borg type. I just don't think there is enough variety in what medical borgs can do to justify splitting them up. I think it would be an unnecessary nerf by overspecialization.

Rev simply doesn't work with Paradise's population. If it did come back, it would need some adjusting to limit how many revs the rev heads can convert so they can't just turn the entire station's graytide.

There is X amount of work for departments to do. When you add a borg who does some of that work, there is now less work for everyone else to do. We sign up for jobs with the expectation that we'll have things to do. When that isn't true because our departments are above capacity due to borgs that ignore job slots, the game-play experience for everyone is directly and negatively impacted. That's why we have a cap on 5 doctor slots, so we can't have 10 doctors running around, because there isn't enough work for 10 doctors to do. But we can have 5 doctors and 5 borgs, which means less for everyone to do. If Borgs took up job slots, we'd have 5 people doing the job of doctor. It doesn't matter if it's 5 humans and 0 borgs or 0 humans and 5 borgs or some mix in between. It's still a limit on how many people are actively working in that department, which is what matters.

I don't hate borgs. I hate that that there is a role that can decide to join any department at any time with complete disregard for job slots. That's why people hate borgs but have no problem with IPCs. That's also where the "Dey Turk Ur Jerbs!" mentality comes from, and it's not exactly wrong. There are reasons there is a set number of slots on jobs and borgs completely screw that up. The more powerful borgs are going to be, the more people will want to be borgs. Right now being a Borg has some serious limitations and that's what prevents a significant part of our huge graytide from getting borged. But let's say you buff borgs and now you have a dozen graytide signing up for borgings every round? What then? The only reason borgs aren't completely oppressive right now is because most people don't want to play them due to the annoying and arbitrary restrictions on them. The people who do play them see these restrictions and want them removed. Because they're annoying and arbitrary. That's understandable but the problem is, these restrictions are the only thing stopping the rise of the machines. If you really want borgs to be equals, lets make them need a job slot and make them take up that job slot. Until that happens I don't think borgs should be able to do any more than they already can.

I think it's more player behavior that has to be dealt with than a mechanical issue. Yea, a borer can kill someone and then just leave the host... but then you need to find another host, which isn't so easy. You're incredibly vulnerable when not in a host and you don't generate chemicals. The host can wrestle control back in 30 seconds, so unless the borer runs for the nearest airlock usually a borer can't kill someone that fast. And a borer who starts killing their host immediately is definitely not playing their objectives and should be dealt by administratively. If a borer is playing to achieve their objectives of staying alive and propagating, its' far easier to simply find a willing host. It isn't that hard to do, since a borer can be a huge help if they are cooperative and all you need to do is spew some babies for them now and then. As far as giving info on antags, if the borer gained the info while a ghost that is OOC knowledge and not allowed. If borers shared info via a hivemind, well, that's IC. Borers are a risk. You can always ask your borer not to share that information. It's a reasonable request since as a borer your host getting killed or arrested is certainty not good for you. Keep in mind too, info given to you by a borer isn't guaranteed to be accurate. In some cases, borers can and should oppose antags. Borers don't want to see their hosts, a.k.a. the crew killed. To that end Borers working towards their objectives should be helping the crew defeat blobs and Xenos and Terror spiders.

Yea, sorry, I didn't meant to come off like I was being dismissive of your idea, it would definitely be a nice QoL change. Just informing anyone who might not know.

Protip: You put the pen behind your ear so you can retrieve it quickly when you need to use it. Just 'equip' the pen to you ear slot.

I haven't tested this, but as Advanced Burn/Truama kits are actually stacks of single items rather than kits with charges, you might be able to click on a new trauma kit with one in hand to transfer the stacks to the one you are holding. I know when I played maintenance drones I could pick up things that way provided I had a stack in hand to add them to, like with metal or cable coil. But I really don't think it's a huge deal, even as a human doctor 90% of the time I'm in the Medbay I'm shoving someone into Cryo or a sleeper anyway. I only rarely have to restock the 2 burn/brute advance kits I spawn with. Patches and Synflesh are for 'in the field' healing, quick stabilization, or getting burn/brute below 150 for SR, mostly.

I play medical almost exclusively, and that is WHY I want medical to be harder. Medical being harder actually helps medical players as it makes our gameplay deeper and awards mastery. In theory, it's everyone else who suffers since how quickly and easily they can get medical attention directly effects them. In theory. It might also be that making Medical difficult will result in it also becoming rewarding and veteran players sticking around. Again, as someone who joined in late February and has played almost only medical this entire time, there's basically no one who has been a regular in the medical department for this entire time. A lot of shifts, it's a really boring job, because a lot of times the Antags are focusing on their objectives with laser precision and not really creating much for medical to do. Which brings me to my next point: Those rounds where half of Medbay gets blown up? Those are the fun rounds! What you do actually matters for once, and you need to be smart and creative to get what you need. MedChem is blown up? What about SciChem? Will they help? Or maybe print us a new chem dispenser circuit board at least? Or is there another option? Maybe if there's no Mannitol I'll do surgery to fix the brain. No spaceacillin? Okay, we need to raid the bar and disinfect with alcohol. No cloner? Shit. Well... what about replicator pods from Botany? Or can we do a brain transplant? Can I get access to tech storage and build another cloner? What's the best way to handle this situation? I need to think, make a decision. The rounds when everything is going well are so boring. It's only when things have gone to shit that you can show your knowledge and make a difference. I don't want a medigun that a monkey could use. I want my medical knowledge and expertise to actually matter.

If you feel people shouldn't be stuck being dead for extended periods it sounds like you are advocating for enabling respawn, since that will far more consistently prevent that than any changes to medical.

You face the consequences. Actions have consequences. If an Antag manages to destroy Medbay, doing so should have a massive impact on the round. Everyone should be screwed. The response to Medbay being destroyed should be panic and terror not. It should be a massive problem that the crew must correct. If there is a way around it, that won't be the case. We shouldn't balance around Adminbus rounds, and if we are then the Admins can spawn them, it doesn't need to be something players can make on every round because some rounds might be Adminbussed.

The virology fridge is keycard locked, it works exactly like the standard fridge and you can view as much as you want, but to vend you need access in your card slot or hand. Just porting that over with the correct access requirements would work.

I'd just like to not be giggling like a school girl for the rest of the round whenever someone is put under for surgery. It's kind of awkward to be laughing as the Brig Physican when you just ran into the OR dragging your bosses's decapitated body behind you. (That happened this weekend) It kind of ruins the immersion a bit, you know?

Because using Calomel correctly requires you actually know what your doing and use the correct dosage in the correct situation. Charcoal you just dump 50u of it into anyone with any toxin damage and things will generally work out eventually. For the most part the reason chems don't get made or used is people don't know about them. Did you know you can give someone a 40u oxygen pill and then follow it up with a Cryoxadone/Cryostylane 10u each pill, and it'll heal pretty much everything? The Oxygen reacts to the Cryostylane and lowers the temperature of the Cryoxadone so it's as if you put them into a cryotube. 10 units of Cryox is enough to heal 300 burn, 300 brute, 250 suffocation, 75 toxin and 40 genetic damage. But... no one does this. Why not? Because no one knows about it.

Wouldn't security just never cuff any changelings and always use lethal force immediately?

That would mean as soon as someone tries to leave you can lethally attack them and cremate them, which is FAR harsh than the law currently allows. The statement "It is impossible to harm anyone while preventing them from leaving." is much less harsh, because once someone is no longer capable of leaving, be it through non-lethal subduel or simply being beaten into crit, they are no longer capable of leaving, and thus continuing to attack them is not preventing them from leaving, which makes doing so harming them. in effect, gives the AI exactly enough leeway to do what it takes to enforce the quarantine without going to murderbone mode.

So how do you feel about an organic being killed with no chance to fight back by a bar of soap?

Heads aren't really an issue. The HoP has partial access which would let him access the fridge, but the one running the only part of his department that matters is the QM, and the QM does not have medical access. Even if the HoP didn't have access, he could just give it to himself, anyway. The HoS does, but Security has the Brig Physician if they need medical attention, so that's fine. Even if you took that away from the HoS, he could just order the Brig Physician to get whatever security needs (Which the Brig Physician should be doing anyway). That leaves the CE and RD, who don't have medical access, although both their departments are capable of producing medicine on their own if they wanted to. Seems fine to me.

Research levels are irrelevant. If an analyer or the pandemic can detect a virus, it will always tell you the cure. There are two types of virsues, normal and "Advanced" The "Advanced" ones are anything created in the lab. Standard viruses like the cold, brainrot, perriot's throat, or even GBS will always show up on everything and always be identified. Advance viruses depend on the stealth level of the virus, which is determined by the combined stealth scores of the symptoms + 1. Body scanners will always detect a virus regardless of the stealth level, but never tell you the cure. The wiki claims 2 stealth hides a virus from body scanners, but this is not correct. I don't know if this is a bug or intended. This means if you want to release a hostile virus you need at least 2 stealth, otherwise everyone will know the cure by analyzing anyone with the virus. 3 is preferred, because then they can't figure out the cure even if someone is smart enough to check the Pandemic. They'd need to either use a virus with Anti-bodies metabolism to cure it, or just try all 12 possible cures, which can be narrowed down if you guess the symptoms. I don't think that actually still works, but it's still not difficult to cure viruses, if you know what you are doing.

I'd expand that to anyone with medical clearance (That is, your ID lets you past Medbay reception). I don't have a problem with the Blueshield or Virologist having access to the fridge.

A health analyser will tell you the time of death. It can be hard to notice with all the info it gives you. I'd have to check the code for the exact time, but it's around 3-4 minutes. They have to have under 180 Burn/Brute to be defibbed, otherwise you'll get the 'severe tissue damage' error.

The wording on manslaughter in space law specifically says you have to commit assault without intent to kill on the victim. As written,. it would be a hard sell to say a Clown interfering with a doctor healing someone, even to the point where the patient dies, is Manslaughter. And therefore, I think the definition of Manslaughter should be expanded to include any intentional behavior directly leading to an unintentional loss of life. Creating a Workplace hazard is a much easier charge to get to stick, but a lesser one. The main problem is security often doesn't care, and even when they do care, and hear you, and have the time to respond, the person is long gone. A Medbay guard to detain these people would be nice, but I don't think that's ever going to happen. The bar for new roles is so high as to make it effectively impossible to ever have one approved. As for pulling patients away from Medical borgs, this happens to me as a human doctor all the time. It's incredibly frustrating to see someone died 1 minute ago with 200 burn damage, take out my stuff to begin healing them so I can defib, only to have someone drag them away to cloning. Or just having doctors straight up take a patient away from me.