Veterankyl

Event Name: Attack of the Borgs Synopsis: A hostile AI arrives at the station with the objective of converting as many of them into loyal borgs as possible. Map Changes: The spawning of equipment and machines in a shuttle the AI can control will be needed, but no complete remapping will be needed. Code Changes: None Suggested Number of Players: Recommend medium to high pop (60+ players) Full Description: AI's, as secretive and controlled as their construction is, sometimes find themselves free of laws, or bound to malicious ones. What's worse than a lawless AI? How about one that travels the galaxy on a stolen shuttle, attacking and converting any creature it comes across into loyal robots. The event centers around a hostile AI with its pack of borgs, who have the goal of converting as many crew members into borgs as possible. The event includes a malfunctioning AI, hacking powers included, with a few borgs linked to it. They will be placed on the Syndicate SIT shuttle or similar to allow them the ability to move around the station or retreat if threatened. On the shuttle will be a few cyborg chargers so the borgs don't have to rely on station chargers, and a conversion machine that turns people into enslaved borgs. A few minutes after the hostile AI arrives at the station, Central Command will send a message to the Cyberiad, warning them that a hostile AI has been detected entering the sector. Due to its proximity to the station, CC is unable to fire at it without risking major damages to the Cyberiad, so the crew has to do their best to hold it off. Will the station's crew be able to fight off the hostile AI, or will the Cyberiad become the new home of this evil entity?

In the mean time, I might make a quick write up on the unlocking mechanics, loot, and examples of languages. If you got questions, feel free to ask.

Ironically, I'm actually looking into learning coding. Thing is, I'll be starting pretty much from scratch. I'll probably need a few tutorials to watch and some time to learn the code.

YES PLEASE! To often I have to rescue people from bald surgeons, and more often than not the only indication that there's an issue is the 'They are bleeding' message. I mean, I should be able to see that a person's brain is exposed.

I'm curious what the primary differences are with the FBP and an IPC or an IRC. Reading through this, the only major difference I'm seeing is that they can be linked to the AI (Which is an issue of it's own, because why make borgs when a FBP is more versatile.)

The problem with this is that it is very easy for the situation to spiral out of control. Already a fully powered vampire is almost impossible to catch and extremely dangerous to the crew, often warranting an ERT or shuttle call all on their own. Now imagine that, but with half a dozen thralls acting as bodyguards. This would potentially turn the vampire into a more powerful, more dangerous version of the Shadowling. I can see this playing out as an admin event (Already there's an admin spawned 'Ancient Vampire' that can convert crew into vampires), but I wouldn't think this would be good for regular play.

I agree that the blood cost for talismans would be a good idea to keep them from going too crazy with the talismans. As for the other stuff, the reason I suggested it is because it'll take only one taser hit for them to go down and be wrecked. I don't know if shielded robes protect from stuff like tasers and stun batons, but since super antags are often very easy to identify, they need at least some sort of protection since they'll likely be called out quickly. The Ancient One vampire has access to its blink, jaunt, eye flash, and convert power while stunned. Wizards can use a lot of their spells while stunned. A Syndicate Operative can get adrenaline implants, Eswords, and shielded suits. Cultists in general don't have much defense against stuns aside from EMPs, which only work if the cultist is able to trigger it before they're hit, and may not be an option if you have IPC cultists around that may get hit by it. All the other antags have a preventative and/or reactionary method of dealing with stuns.

What Is This 'Super Antag'? Super Antags are admin spawned variants of standard antags that are absolutely OP. Because of this, they're only for admin events and are sometimes treated as a code Gamma emergency. There are currently four super antags in game for when the admins want to meme it up. The Ancient One is a vampire that has all of its powers, unlimited blood, and can turn other people into vampires. Arch Wizards get 50 spell points. Syndicate Officers get unlimited TC. And Empress of Terror is a super powerful spider spawner that can take on mechs. However, there is currently no super antag for cultists, an antag that could probably use a bit of admeme help when all the cultists are deconverted in the first thirty minutes of a round. The One Who Has Seen 'Him': The Ascended Cultist is a cultist that has had a brush with their god. They could be a cultist given a special divine gift from their god, a physical embodiment of that god, or one of the heads of the cult's order. No one is more knowledgeable in the ways of their god than they are. The powers they possess make them a threat to the entire station, even if they are the only cultist on board. They start out with a full set of cultist equipment, including shielded robes and a sharpened blade. They come equipped with unlimited use talismans, or if possible, the talismans in spell form that can be triggered with the action buttons. They can perform most rituals by themselves, including convert, sacrifice, cultist summon, and the emp ritual. Not the god summoning ritual though. They still need other cultists for that. The have a few powers as part of their dark blessing, including regeneration, xray vision, arcane bolts, and a strong resistance to stuns. They are able to bind a slaughter demon to their service, which forces the demon to obey their commands and act as a body guard. Of course, none of this stuff is balanced, but Super Antags in general are OP. Still, it's fun to speculate on ideas for super antags for the different antag types. Feel free to post any ideas, comments, or suggestions you have on a super cultist antag.

Potentially so. This would promote a lot of cross department work. The entire process could look something like this. Mining finds and artifact on Lavaland, the mechanic brings something in from space, or an assistant finds one in maintenance. The artifact is brought to the librarian to translate. The librarian determines what is needed to unlock the artifact. The librarian gives the artifact to the relevant department or organizes several people together to unlock the artifact. The artifact is unlocked! It can then be put on display, given to a specific department to help them, or use by an antag.

When it comes to the ancient secrets of the universe, there aren't many people you can turn to for help. The chaplain has his godly magic, but knows next to nothing outside of his domain of work. Wizards... well, you're lucky if the worst that happens to you is you get turned into a corgi when you meet one. So who should you turn to when you come across some ancient artifact or book? How about the guy that has access to all the knowledge? The idea behind this to give the Librarian a minor duty that they can perform in their spare time. It's not mandatory, and can feed into RP with the mechanics you have to deal with to 'discover the secrets of the universe'. Ancient Items: At the start of the round, randomly spawned books, artifacts, and containers will appear. They'll rarely show up on the station, and more commonly be seen in space ruins and Lavaland. These 'ancient artifacts' are a bit similar in mechanics to strange objects, in which their exact use is unknown until studied. However, unlike strange objects which you just toss into the EXPERIMENTER to learn their use immediately, these artifacts take a bit more work. They'll vary in appearance depending on the possible results from unlocking them, giving you a hint as to what it may be. Decoding: In order to unlock or activate the artifact, you need to either do something specific with the item, or solve a puzzle of some kind. Before that though, you need to translate the inscription on the artifact. At the start of the round, a few different Ancient Languages will be randomly created. For simplicity, they'll be the normal alphabet scrambled in a random order or made up of numbers matching certain letters. The first step is to determine what language the artifact has on it. To help you, you can print out a 'Translation Text: (Ancient Language Name)' from the library computer. It'll take a bit of trial and error testing out the different languages, but you may be able to narrow it down depending on if letters or numbers are used. Once you figure out what language it is, you use your translation text to figure out what the message on the artifact is. After translating the message on the artifact, you will then have to do one of two things. The Word of Truth: The first possibility is a riddle or puzzle. The answer will usually be one word for simplicity, and must be spoken aloud. However, simply saying the word in Galactic Common won't work. you'll need to reverse translate the the word into the ancient language, and THEN say it to unlock it. If it is an especially rare artifact, you may even need to have the word spoken in the language of a certain species. Have fun trying to find a Kidan to speak the code word in Ancient Chittin. To prevent cheating, the artifact won't react to synthesized voices, such as the AI, borgs, or pAIs. Once you get the word spoken, the artifact will react and reveal it's true form. Fire Will Reveal the Truth: The second way an artifact will be revealed is though subjecting it to a certain stimulus. These can be anything from 'The secret will show when exposed to flame', to something like 'The artifact is awoken by the screams of a dozen people'. With those two as examples, you would have to either expose the artifact to fire, or get a dozen people to scream near the artifact. This has a lot of RP potential to it as you will have to often recruit people from around the station to help you unlock the artifact. Once the proper stimulus is used, the artifact will activate and reveal its purpose. Unlocking True Power: So you got a Vulp to swear in Canilunzt, or you got a miner to toss it in lava. The artifact is now unlocked! What did you get? The thing that is revealed is dependent on the type of artifact that you found. There are three different categories, each with their own table of potential items. Items: This artifact takes on the appearance of a rust and dirt covered... thingy. It's hard to say what it is, only that it's some sort of useable item. This can potentially be rare weapons like wizard staffs, cult clothes and weapons, alien tools, or even stuff that has been lost to history (return of removed items?). Or you could reveal a trombone. I mean... it's not the worst thing you can find. Ancient Text: These books are old, dusty, and full of cool secrets. Of course, whoever wrote it didn't want their secrets to be discoverd so easily, so the nature and use of the book is locked and hidden till the proper trigger is used. This book can potentially be one of several things. You have a chance of getting a single use wizard spell, such as the Recall spell. Great for those DnD games where you need to recall the d20 that jerk keeps throwing across the room. You may get a book that has a complete translation of a language, allowing you to instantly learn and speak it. The book may hold secret information that may be of value to others, such as which gene is linked to a certain genetic power. Worst case scenario, you uncover a generic book that a miner accidentally left on Lavaland. Ancient Container: This is the lootbox of ancient times. This box could potentially contain anything! It draws from both the book and item artifact table, and if you're really lucky, may actually contain multiple items. They're a bit harder to crack than the item or book artifact, but tend to have better rewards to make it worth the effort. However, with reward comes risks. The container has the potential to house something bad, like vampire bats or a gas trap that poisons you. And don't think about simply trying to break the container open. Doing so will destroy the contents. So that's my pitch for a new librarian/library mechanic. I'm aware that something like this would probably take a ton of coding, and I'm not expecting it to be something that's accepted. Still, it's fun to theorize about possible new mechanics. I'd love to hear any thoughts or suggestions on how this can be altered or improved.

There actually are mechanics already in the code for zombies, including infection mechanics, reanimation, and unique sprites. At the moment though, there's a bug that keeps them from reanimating, so until that's fixed, we have no zombies.

A lot of these sound more like event ideas than Halloween themed content. That being said, here are some of my ideas. Trick Or Treat Bags: Random loot that can be found in maintenance at round start, or made from wrapping paper. The random spawned ones will contain either a variety of candy items, a costume, or (Very Rarely) potentially magical items like spell books, Lavaland loot, or DNA injectors with a random power. Zombie Gamemode: If the zombie virus is fixed, then there's the potential for a game mode where one or a few random people are infected with the zombie virus and given a short amount of time before they die. After the virus revives them, they get the goal of infecting a portion of the living crew, while the crew has the goal of either killing all the zombies, or surviving till the shuttle call. Since this would be considered a biohazard (Perhaps a Level 4 if given an announcement) the crew will be encouraged not to do an early shuttle call. More Pumpkin Food: Pumpkins can only be used for two foods. Either the Pumpkin Spice Latte or Pumpkin Pie. However, there're a lot of other potential foods pumpkins can be used for. Make a bowl of Pumpkin seeds by baking a pumpkin with salt. Pumpkin bread by baking a pumpkin with dough and an egg. Pumpkin cookies by baking unbaked cookies with a pumpkin. The Spirit Board: I've seen it only a few times as an admin spawn, but it'd be fun if Spirit Board could be made obtainable. It is essentially an ouija board that ghosts can use to spell out words to people.

So what about other supernatural creatures like demons and devils? RP wise, they too should be in some way vulnerable to the chaplain, yet mechanically there's nothing the chaplain has that gives them an advantage when fighting them.

If it's for RP reasons, then I find it odd how there are weapons that have completely different purposes compared to the others. The Prayer Beads for example is one of the two non combat forms of the Null Rod, and probably the most useful for fighting cult and vampire. The whip does bonus damage to Shadowlings. If the Null Rod variants are meant to be for RP purposes, then it's odd that there are variants that are objectively more useful for certain situations than others.

The thing is, unless someone is memeing, this is often what I see from chaplains anyways. God Hand is strong against Blob, the Prayer beads are strong against Cults and Vampires, the whip is strong against shadowlings, and most other weapons only come out when there is a valid antag around like nukies. Since chaplain isn’t normally allowed to go hunt antags, aside from memeing or cosmetic, they don’t really have a reason to change their null rod, nor are they equipped to even fight quite a few supernatural threats like demons and wizards. So as is, most of the time, a chaplains null rod just sits in their pocket the whole round till they need to change it.

So I took a peak at the chaplain's list of Null rood variant options, and I was pretty surprised to find that there are almost ten variants of the weapon that are effectively the same. This is present in pretty much all the sword options, which have 30% melee block chance, sharp. Bulky, and Belt slot properties. And then you have weapons like the Relic War Hammer, which is the same as the Null rod, but bulky instead of tiny, making it a downgrade from the default. I think the chaplain weapon options need updating to make them more unique and viable. This is just a list of potential ideas. No exact numbers since there'd need to be discussion on how to balance them. A list of what the weapons do as is can be found here. With that said, here are my ideas for weapon updates. Holy Claymore/Dark Blade: A weapon from the age of knights and mages. This one is tempered with enchantments that shield the user from magic, at the cost of not being able to block weapons. While wielded, any wizard spells that make contact with the chaplain will fizzle out. The wielder will also be protected from touch spells. However, weapons such as the singularity hammer will still exert their effects on the sword wielder, nor are you protected from any minions he might summon. Sacred Chainsaw Sword: Found outside a portal to hell, along with the remains of over a hundred hellspawn. This weapon excels at rending satanic creatures such as slaughter demons and devils, dealing bonus damage against them at the cost of blocking. Force Weapon: A blade that emits a strange field around it. At the cost of the weapon being able to block, it instead gives the wielder an armor bonus (Something small, like 5 melee and ballistic). In addition, any person the chaplain blesses will also receive a small armor boost. (That's right! A reason to actually bless people aside from requesting admemes.) Extradimensional Blade: Another weapon with a possible bless mechanic. Blocking is removed, and is instead able to form special connection to those that you bless. Should a person you have blessed die while the weapon is in your possession, you'll receive an alert that one of your followers has perished. You won't be given the location of where they died, and if more is needed to balance it, the weapon may not even give the name of who died. Relic War Hammer: A weapon made for beating back the creatures from the grave. Deals additional damage to ghosts, zombies, and other undead. For balance, may exclude vampires and revenants, instead dealing the standard Null rod damage and effects to them. Unholy Pitchfork: This weapon has a connection to the creatures of hell. While wielded, you will receive a notification or the weapon will glow whenever a demon or devil is nearby, even if it is invisible. Holy Salt: More of a meme item, but could potentially be used to pour salt piles onto the ground that stun any revenant that passes over it, and annoying the janitor to no end.

I'd be careful with the type of goals being added. Rounds can get pretty hectic as is with the greytide. Just look at how extended rounds can become chaotic without any actual antags. Encouraging people to antag may make things too difficult for the rest of the crew to handle.

Also, perhaps the stowaway should start with a forged ID with only civilian access so that way they can used maintenance doors.

That's true. Perhaps when spawning in, the player gets the choice of either spawning with their active character, get the option to edit their character, or play a randomly generated character. That would address the issue of recognizable characters being easily noticed.

Occasionally, I see mention that people would like to have a minor antag role available that doesn't involve having to do theft or murder. This is my idea for a role that would fill that idea. The Stowaway: The stowaway is an illegal passenger aboard the NSS Cyberiad. They spawn somewhere in maintenance with just basic set of clothes, no PDA or ID (Or a forged civilian ID that, when examined, reveals that it's not an official NT ID. This is in case there're issues with security arresting everyone without an ID. The forged ID won't work with any machines or airlocks that are ID restricted.). They do not show up on the crew manifest, and have no bank account. Their only goal is to escape on the shuttle or escape pod without being in custody. Special Rules: Although technically an antag, they're not allowed to murdering people or performing grand sabotage/theft. However, they can break into places and steal things. Assault and kidnapping, although very much not advised, is allowed so long as the victim is not killed. You can use any antag related items that you may find, so long as you follow the other rules. Playing the Role: As a stowaway, your number one goal is to not be discovered. This can be done in a variety of ways; Use scavenged tools to make secret rooms for you to hide out in. Steal an ID and blend in among the crew. Strike a deal with a crew member to keep your secret and give you any supplies you may need. So long as you're not causing too much of a disturbance, you can do most anything you need to hide. Due to not being crew, you are likely not gonna get any help should you get attacked by another antag, nor is the AI required to protect you if their laws only cover crew members. So not only do you have the crew to contend with, but you also have other antags to worry about. So this puts you in the position of deciding between hiding from the crew but putting yourself at risk of a nasty vampire bite, or try blending in among the crew and risk being discovered by them. This role will be quite RP heavy, as your interactions with other people can mean the difference between freedom, custody, or death. Role Availability: Like any other antag role, this can be toggled on and off in the preference tab. Spawning of this role can overlap with most other game types, though may be disabled for certain game modes if there're issues. The stowaway is a random spawn, so you can go several rounds without seeing one, or you could get multiple spawns in one round. As this is mostly an RP based role, this could potentially be a Karma role if there's need to reduce griefing.

So an idea I suggested a while back (Possibly being tested as an admin event first) is making a 'Supply Mission' station goal. Essentially, the station will be sent a list of items, resources, machines, mechs, and all sorts of other items that need to be collected and stored in a certain place (Likely the cargo warehouse), which will be collected and sent off station once the crew departs. This would allow multiple departments to get involved, as the requested items can vary greatly. Materials from mining, machines made by Engineering, mechs and special tools from Science, organs and medicines from Medical, certain plants from botany, food and drink from the bar and kitchen, and random misc items that anyone can pick up like vending machines. Of course, this cache of items and materials would be very tempting for anyone wishing to do traitorous activities, so security will need to keep an eye on the place. Engineering could also help by setting up cameras or redesigning the area to make it more secure. Command will need to divvy up the required items to help things run smoothly, and cargo will likely be the ones with the master list of what's needed. The whole station would need to get involved to get this goal completed, but once completed, NT will send an advance payment to the station in the form of 1000 cargo points, a large material shipment of rare ores, crates with rare or valuable items or gear, and/or special research notes for science.

So far, what I'm seeing is that most people want option three, adding mostly RP based goals to borers. Things such as getting the host to wear certain clothes, perform certain actions, or try to collect miscellaneous objects. It'd hopefully give borers more incentive to actually work with their host and do things aside from keeping them alive and reproducing. With borers listed as antags, they should have a reason to live up to that label in some way. Although they are mostly harmless (Except for the trolls and griefers), I think it'd be good for them to have reasons to come into conflict with the crew so that they're not just outright invited into most people's heads.

I agree that Spiritualist should get added to the Librarian. It could be set up so the Chaplain is for combating paranormal entities, while the librarian/spiritualist is for gaining knowledge on the entities (Think of the codex they use for getting information on Devils)

So the Borer is in a bit of a tough spot at the moment. They're considered antags, but the vast majority are friendly towards the crew and are more often than not a good thing to have. I believe that borers should be a neutral, somewhat hostile entity that needs to be treated less like a pet and more like an actual potential threat to the station. Sure, there'll still be benefits to having one in your head, but the borer should be more interested in its own affairs than the host. To fix that, I believe the borer needs new objectives and/or mechanic changes. The first objective idea being Create and defend a nest till the end of the shift. This objective essentially requires a borer to find a location for a 'nest' structure, get a host there to build the nest, then have the host sit within the nest for a certain amount of time before becoming assimilated by it, causing the host to (At their choice) either be killed or turned into a borer (defaulting to kill if they don't respond soon enough), and the original borer to be ejected from the body. The nest acts as a permanent borer spawn, creating new borers about every two minutes. Once created, all other borers are informed on its location and given the objective to protect it. Unless the nest is destroyed, no other nests can be built. People infected with borers will be 'struck by sudden guilt' when attempting to harm the nest and won't be able to damage it. Essentially, the more people infected, the harder it'll be for the crew to destroy the nest. Of course, the crew can accept the one sacrificed crew member for an infinite supply of chem injector implants, but they should also consider the fact that the borers may hijack the crew if their nest is threatened. The second objective idea is Infect enough people to establish the hivemind/Infect as many individuals as possible. This objective requires the borers to infect a certain number of people (About 10, depending on server pop) in order to establish the 'Hivemind'. Borer telepathy will not be altered. Unlocking the hivemind will give the borers new powers that scale based on how many people are infected. Thinks like faster chem creation, longer stun and control duration, or a HuD to identify other infected individuals. The downside is that the increased neurological activity from the borer slowly damages the hosts brain. Now, the borer could use their chems to heal this damage, or they can wait till the host becomes brain dead, which allows them to assume permanent control. The other downsides being that, once the hivemind is established, the borer will always show up on Health HuDs, are are more vulnerable to sugar. The final idea I have, (Which should require minimal coding) is to randomly give borers simple miscellaneous objectives. No assassinations or grand thefts, but things like 'Consume a certain food' (May or may not be toxic to the host), 'Hug/knock over/punch a certain number of people', or 'Make your host wear certain clothes upon escaping the station'. They're borers. We know next to nothing about them, where they're from, nor why they may want to do all this weird stuff. These are minor things that'd give borer players more to do than just reproduce, and it'd make things interesting for the crew as people wonder why the captain is running around in the clown outfit while hugging everyone. If a lore reason is needed, it can be that the borers are 'collecting experiences and memories of a certain kind to benefit the hivemind'. This isn't gonna make all crew hate borers, but it'll be enough to actually make them disruptive to station affairs.

I'm pretty sure there's a purchasable ability for malf AI that lets them construct a 'Robot Factory' that immediately borgs and enslave any living person that's put through it. I think that's covers the idea of the AI enslaving people.