Traitor items - A few revision suggestions

[AzuleUtama]

I wanted to make a list of potential revisions based on the data from LPSpartan’s log on what traitor items were not being bought by players very often.

The items I had a look at were not solely selected on the basis of “No-one bought them so they must need changing!”. If that was the basis then this list would be much larger! When going through all the items at the lower end of the table, I asked the following questions before considering them:

Is the item job-specific? - This one’s pretty obvious, as they can’t be bought by most players during an antag round and are likely to be at the bottom of the purchasing list. Note that they weren’t completely excluded because of this. There are a couple of job items I feel are a tad on the weak side but they don’t have flaws big enough to make the list below.

Is the item there as more of a gimmick? - Some of the items you can buy are mainly intended for interesting RP scenarios, such as the briefcase full of cash for bribery and the chameleon stamp for forging documents. Then there’s the more ridiculous ones such as the balloon. These obviously aren’t going to be bought as much as a gun or energy sword but that doesn’t mean they’re heavily flawed, just more suited for trying something a little different as an antag (or showing off!).

Is the item dedicated more towards mass murder than anything else? - A lot of traitor items are designed for killing, but some are really only intended for killing or disabling a large amount of people. Unless someone has hijack, they are unlikely to buy these items due to them have limited use for their objectives or the risk of collateral damage when going after their target with them. Two good examples include the Energy Chainsaw and Atmos grenades which were both close to the bottom.

With that out of the way, here are 3 items I felt could be improved in some way in the hopes of more players using them during a traitor round:

Military Belt

This issue with this tool is that wearing it will get you valid hunted by most of sec and called out by any crew members who know it’s contraband. This is regardless of whether it actually has anything in it. It does allow you to store multiple syndicate items in one easy location, but is a bit pricey for this luxury considering it needs to be hidden in your backpack the entire time, which means you cannot quickly access said items unless you take the belt out.

I felt it could be improved by modifying the item’s graphic and name to resemble the standard toolbelt and remake it into a separate item called the “Traitor’s Toolbelt”. This would allow you to wear it and not raise any suspicion while having somewhere to keep your questionable tools. It could have a close examination text to let anyone searching you know it’s not a normal belt (example: “Can hold various tools. This model seems to have additional compartments”). Price could also be optionally lowered to 2 TC to make the item a little more appealing and keep it at the same price as the other “disguised” clothing items (cham suit, no slips).

Pictures!

Note that regular tools will also still show up graphically in the belt as they are added.

 

Prototype Bone Repair Kit

The main intention for this item as an agent is to provide a way for you to repair broken bones after your antag status has been made known to everyone on the station and going into medical will likely get you brigged.

However its usefulness is questionable when you consider the benefits of another traitor item - The DNA scrambler. This item clears your wanted status pretty much instantly (as long as you hide or dispose of your other syndicate gear and any identification) which will allow you to get fully healed in the medbay without getting arrested, works instantly without stunning you, is actually a standard contraband item rather than a dangerous one and is cheaper than the bone repair kit (4 TC vs. 6). You could even get an agent ID card alongside it and make everyone think you’re a different person with almost no suspicion.

Given the repair kit’s downsides in comparison (doesn’t help with removing your wanted status, won’t heal any other injuries requiring surgery, will get you permabrigged if found on you and stuns you for a long time while it repairs bones), I would argue it should be cheaper than a DNA scrambler. The price could be lowered down to 2 TC so as to make it an item you could buy with leftover TC if you’re in a bind.

Optionally, its name and description could remove the reference to it being a prototype and instead being a standard medical tool for agents (since it seems slightly odd making a stolen prototype that cheap).

Picture!

 

Dart Pistol (“Chemical Kit”)

The Dart Pistol is reliant on you finding or creating toxins to arm it with. This is all well and fine if you’re in a job such as chemistry or botany but many jobs lacks the ability to easily gain access to most useful toxins unless they break into the chem labs, beg botany for questionable seeds or procure a portable chem dispenser.

Its usefulness could be improved by adding a “Chemical Kit” to the uplink. This would allow antags to get a range of useful toxins they can use with the dart pistol without the need for a chem dispenser or even knowledge of mixing chems. None of the toxins I've picked out for the kit are ones that can only be gained by the “poison bottle” uplink item. All the bottles in the kit could be made or grown yourself if you know how, making this more of a time-saver for those with the skills to DIY.

Here is a list of the toxins I've picked out for the kit (Note that bottles will be 30u rather than the 40u poison bottle variant):

Amanitin - Somewhat tricky to get ahold of outside a poison bottle, but felt the kit should have something a little more potent in it. A stealthy poison without any immediate symptoms until it all kicks in.

Cyanide - A very lethal poison, but it's slow to reach the point of killing and has very obvious symptoms.

Formaldehyde - Causes some toxin damage, but can also change into Histamine which can deal brute damage and blind people.

Sulfanol - Knockout poison with a bit of toxin damage. Takes longer than a sleepy pen to kick in and won’t last as long.

Capulettium Plus - A double action toxin that both silences whoever has it in their system and makes them appear dead.

Fliptonium - Causes a silly spinning effect. Thrown in as a bit of a joke chemical, but can be useful when mixed with other chemicals in fooling people into thinking that they’ve only been injected with something harmless.

Syringe - One free syringe to fire with the dart pistol, or use for other forms of application.

I decided on a price of 6 TC for everything combined. This came out at 2 TC for Amanitin due to being somewhat hard to get through normal means and 1 TC for everything else except Fliptonium due to it not really doing anything useful on its own. I don't feel as though any of these poisons are too over the top and at that price you could only buy it twice with a dart pistol or 3 times without, preventing people from getting too much lethal poison in the event they go overboard with it.

Pictures!

The cyanide bottle has it's own model as it already existed in bottles.dm and didn't need to be created from scratch like most of the others.

 

I figured coding the items myself in a test server would better help showcase them off, but if any coders are interested in knowing, adding in all the changes above took a little over an hour to do. Do note that I could have easily missed some other necessary changes alongside these since I've not been coding in BYOND for very long!

Please let me know if any of these suggestions are actually good ones, and if they could potentially be improved or fixed in the event they are too strong.

Edited November 3, 2018 by AzuleUtama
Its a DNA Scrambler, not a mulligan shot.

[Eler00]

Funnily enough, I thought about ways to make the military belt better myself. My idea was to make it either able to store larger items, or to make it come preloaded with some goodies when bought, such as a combat knife, handcuffs, a flashbang and a teargas grenade. Some tactical/combat equipment that would make it low-cost 'grab-bag' of items. I even thought about making the exact contents random.

 

I like your idea more, though. Making it look like a toolbelt yet able to hold weapons and stuff would make it actually useful. As for the toxin kit, it might be a bit cheap for the cost, but seems neat. And yeah, bone repair kit seems a tad overpriced.

[AzuleUtama]

37 minutes ago, TDS said:

Funnily enough, I thought about ways to make the military belt better myself. My idea was to make it either able to store larger items, or to make it come preloaded with some goodies when bought, such as a combat knife, handcuffs, a flashbang and a teargas grenade. Some tactical/combat equipment that would make it low-cost 'grab-bag' of items. I even thought about making the exact contents random.

I actually had the exact same idea at first for pre-loading the belt, but I felt that traitor items in general should aim for more stealth than all out action (admittedly, the items I planned to add to the belt were a tad more lethal than yours!). It would also mean if someone actually did want just the belt, they would have to fork out a lot more to get it.

[Scrat]

I would suggest making a PR for these changes, I actually really like all of them.

[Spartan]

I could maybe be talked down to having the bone kit to a 4, but the 2 seems extreme. It's an extremely powerful item, and the DNA scrambler is good to a point.

[AzuleUtama]

13 minutes ago, Spartan said:

I could maybe be talked down to having the bone kit to a 4, but the 2 seems extreme. It's an extremely powerful item, and the DNA scrambler is good to a point.

I can agree that I was perhaps a little too excessive with the price reduction proposed, but I don't see how the item is overly powerful?

Repairing bones wherever you are is very nice, but considering the time it takes to kick along with the fact it won't fix any other issues you might have internally (bleeding, organ damage) doesn't make it seem that powerful to me. Unless I'm missing something out entirely with it?

[Birdtalon]

The Mulligan Shot isn't something that's in our codebase?

[AzuleUtama]

1 minute ago, Birdtalon said:

The Mulligan Shot isn't something that's in our codebase?

My bad there, I meant the DNA scrambler.

[Kryson]

I agree that some kind of buff to the poison bottles are needed.

2 tc for a poison bottle is a ridiculous cost given how overcrowded the map is. Poisons are often not worth using outside a few select ones, clever mixes and the really cheesy ones(nanites). 

I think a poison kit that includes amantin is interesting, because it at least it prevents the victim from being able to run to medbay and get cured the instant they start feeling sick.

Not so sure about the other inclusions, i have not tested formaldehyde much but sulfanol and cyanide are very slow and underwhelming on their own.