Comms supply issues

[Abigail886]

So there is a limited amount of comms on station, everyone spawns with one but if they switch jobs they need to find one in a locker... but what if we run out of those? There is no way to get more from what I have been told. And playing as HoP I have noticed people coming to me for a new headset. So I propose we make it so the HoP has a vender in their office that they can dispense headset keys at. Similar to the PDA cartages. People come by anyways looking for them and I dont see why they wouldnt have the ability to set up the new hire with communication things as well.

[Frank]

Its not the worst of ideas but sometimes you have to sit back and think "can this be abused?" 

And it can. We already have traitor HoPs giving out AA and opening 30 clown slots all the time. Now sec comms can be incredibly useful and hard to come by so giving HoP the ability to freely distribute comms might make the shifts even more chaotic. 

I'm not saying it should not be added just because it can be abused. It should however be announced somehow that 'x is printing comms to x channel' or something like that. Maybe the AI should get notified? I don't know. 

[Generaldonothing]

Pretty strongly against this idea for the following reasons

• Departments already start with quite a few cypher keys, I believe the lowest is 7? in the service deparment, I see /absolutely no way/ that you are going to realistically run out of cypher keys unless you are handing them out like candy simply because you can.
• If this gets added, it begs the question, should bowman headsets become produceable as well? My answer to this is hell no (they are in limited supply for a damn reason), but it would be rather inconsistent as everything else is produceable on station at that point.
• This encourage the HOP and Captain to hand out cypher keys to "critical members of staff", which would normally be antag counters in the form of the chaplain, and other heads. This is gonna end with the most powerful roles on station getting stronger, and make putting down a head for good even more of a pain in the ass. 
• The fact that HOP can hand out cypher keys now will make antag HOP even more cheesy, and would encorage the HOPs to just turtle in their office and get greytider #4521 to go steal them the funny armor or kill a random assistant. 
• This idea is also underdeveloped, can you please give specifics and clarify if it would hold any other items? (where would it even go, their office is already crammed tight)

[MattTheFicus]

There doesnt need to be a Security Comms Key Vendor for antags to break into and steal from. Departments have spare headsets anyway. Strongly dislike the HoP, who as an antag basically gets free AA already having this too.

[Charliminator]

I am gonna be honest. I don't see how this could be abused that hard. the HOP already starts with sec comms so its not like the HOP would abuse this if they were an antag. I suppose if the HOP is giving out sec comms to other people? but then, they are just instantly gonna get found out cos ooh antags have sec comms! HOPs vendor for sec comms is empty! wonder what happened there!!!!
 

10 hours ago, Abigail886 said:

I have noticed people coming to me for a new headset.

I imagine that this isn't because headsets ran out, instead that they don't know where to find them. 

[Generaldonothing]

16 minutes ago, Charliminator said:

I am gonna be honest. I don't see how this could be abused that hard. the HOP already starts with sec comms so its not like the HOP would abuse this if they were an antag. I suppose if the HOP is giving out sec comms to other people? but then, they are just instantly gonna get found out cos ooh antags have sec comms! HOPs vendor for sec comms is empty! wonder what happened there!!!!
 

I imagine that this isn't because headsets ran out, instead that they don't know where to find them. 

In a vacuum this wouldn't be too abusable, after all, HOP has all coms already! Not like they have much use to the tot HOP after all. However, a tot HOP can find all their traitor friends and give everyone access to every single channel... without the risk of needing to take headsets on their own. This effectively gives all the HOP's friends free information about every single department off the bat, without needing to do a thing except press the funny vending machine's buttons a few times. Now, this is certainly an issue, but to me is not the biggest problem. I'm very concerned that a meta will form where sec/heads go to the HOP round start and request additional coms which outside of being a pain in the ass, is less of a liability than additional access. It also just makes it so that there is an extremely easily accessible machine that you can just punch a few times or use to obtain every single com type for you and your metafriends. To me at the very least, this will make people take many fewer risks when antagging and generally make the idea of getting new coms channels less of a goal, and more of something that just kind of happens. It is infinitely easier for an antag to steal/hack into a vending machine to get every single cipher key than it is to punch a hole in a locker for a single key. 

[LiberatedWaveMan]

10 hours ago, MattTheFicus said:

There doesnt need to be a Security Comms Key Vendor for antags to break into and steal from. Departments have spare headsets anyway. Strongly dislike the HoP, who as an antag basically gets free AA already having this too.

This isn't 100% related, but I have always been averse to HoP being able to roll antag since they have free all-access, can suspend and steal from all accounts on-station, and can get all comms channels with minimal effort; If the captain has a mindshield, you'd think the HoP would get one too

[lewc]

Yeah, I feel like I very rarely (if ever) see players run out of department headsets. Even for sec, it's much easier to get your hand on a new headset than a new baton. The only time I can really see a shortage of headsets emerging is if a) a vamp has a penchant for removing people's headsets in maint and keeping them, or b) HoP goes on a hiring spree and fills a new department with more people than they have lockers. If a necessity really arises, it'd probably be worth just asking CentCom for a shipment of new headsets or working with intercoms.

 

That being said...

 

Some sort of tool or encryption key rewriter that could change one key into another (that isn't sec/command) might be neat QoL for the HoP. A 1 to 1 tool that requires you to exchange an encryption key for another or convert one type of headset (with its original encryption key) into another would make it harder to really meme with every comms channel, since the HoP will probably be a little suspicious if you come back with three different headsets.