Remove secborgs

[Renomaki]

 

I don't have much of a problem with secborgs myself.. Although I do hate how they tend to be one of the more picked jobs, along with engineering borgs. It seems to be the most popular choices, with medical borgs being the second most popular, and janitor and entertainment borgs being the least popular..

 

Hell, how often do you even SEE entertainment borgs? If only they had more features, maybe more people would play those. Even the janitor borg, as unpopular as it is, can do a lot despite not having arms, which makes it more common compared to the least used borg on the station...

 

If secborgs were removed or heavily nerfed, all that would happen is the number of engineer and medic borgs would rise. I'd rather find a way to make it so players wouldn't just lean towards the funnest borg job (or when a malf round happens, the most tactical choice).

 

Again, I'm not too bothered, and in some cases, thankful to have security borgs when security is running short on staff. They could use a little tinkering maybe, but then again, ALL the borgs could use some tinkering to kinda change the status quo and give the lesser picked borgs more reason to exist.

 

[Spacemanspark]

Wasn't there once a suggestion to give service borgs a laser tag gun?

[Taaketa]

 

Regard service borgs. They ARE the most useless to be honest. They can't really mix drinks, they can barely do any paperwork and they are totally useless to the AI.

 

Anytime I play borg I will always differ my module to the AI's desire. If an AI lets me pick then I generally go Mining. But my preference when given a choice is Engineering module if the AI doesn't want me mining.

 

[SomanB]

 

I don't really get the problem here.

 

The summary I'm picking up here, is that some Sec borgs are valid hunting and therefore should be removed? That seems like a terrible reason to remove an entire aspect of gameplay because of player action rather than it's something caused by the module itself. I'd like to see / hear examples of the valid hunting they do though. I've seen it mentioned several times but no real reasons provided.

 

I play BOT||tek regularly and generally I follow a simple pattern for arresting people.

 

1: Do they have a warrant? If yes, arrest, detain and take to sec.

 

2: If no, are they currently commiting a crime. Did someone state they commited a crime? If, yes. Request detainment. Is it gree? Don't pursue, other alerts, pursue, detain. Note resistance.

 

3: Nothing happening, no outstanding arrests? Patrol maint, inspect everything. Record notes constantly.

 

Plenty of people have addressed the weakness of borgs. It's not just EMP or flashes. High-cap cell borgs can maybe stun someone 10 times before their battery runs try and that's if they are fresh from the charger, which is rare. They are MUCH slower until they get VTECH, if they get it. Laser pointers (blinding), even laser tag guns (Fogging), screw driver opening a door are obsecticals against a sec borg.

 

 

And THIS sums up the gripe a lot of people have about sec borgs. Nowhere is mentioned "follow my laws", and any time laws get brought up, it's always a twisting explanation on why Law X justifies relentless validhunting.

 

"Oh yah I'm on corporate well antags might damage the station ergo I must validhunt my cyborg butt off." I mean, if we wanted to go with a hard interpretation of Corporate, the last thing a sec borg would be doing is hunting due to the following logic: "I am more expensive to replace than crew. Ergo, crew should hunt down the antags, while I remain safe from harm."

 

Thing is, playing a sec borg that DOES stick to it's laws is a great way to, at best, be locked down, and at worst, blown. On Crewmisov, prevent the cap from killing what is nominally a crewmember....it's easier to lockdown/blow the borg, than to make that run to an ID console to terminate an ID.

 

[Vivalas]

 

So far the only problems I see stated here are:

 

1. They are good at their job. So? Security Officers are too. I'd much rather play a regular sec officer than a borg. Stun immunity (but not really) isn't worth all the drawbacks.

 

2. People are dicks when playing them. This I agree with. But, so what? We have admins for a reason. If a sec borg is being shit, report the problem, so it actually gets fixed, so the asshole that is bad at playing sec borgs STOPS playing them. I've never been for removing features "because people can grief". The number of issues I've had with bad sec borg players is nowhere near the amount needed to justify this as a chronic problem that needs fixing.

 

Just because you can't greytide with immunity then disarm spam the sec borg that comes to arrest your ass means that sec borgs are OP. They have a niche role, and that is about it.

 

To summarize, officers are better all-round to everyday security tasks. They are adaptable. Greytider? Whip out the pepperspray. Greytide? Whip out the flashbangs and riot gear. Hostiles? Whip out the pew pews. Rogue engineer? Whip out the hardsuits.

 

Sec borgs can do certain things better than officers, yes, but their overall performance is subpar. Their role is one of assault. Few people go up against sec borgs directly while unprepared. Their conventional stun immunity makes them great for prowling maintenance during high alerts without worrying about being killed or kidnapped. Their design is suited towards direct action and combat. If you go up against a borg 1v1 unprepared, you will lose every time. They are also decent against greytide (unless they have flashes), and have a few other uses, but they also have tons of disadvantages. They can't interact with most objects, meaning you can trap them easily. They can't navigate past panel'd doors like crew can by whacking the door with an ID, they have to recharge constantly, and probably the worst of all, one flash pretty much spells death for a cyborg unless they have backup. Not to mention their lack of an effective area stun weapon, or any sort of lethal ranged weapon short of being subverted.

 

Security officers are more general purpose. Sec borgs are more specialized. The latter is not even closed to being OP, and eliminating an entire role is not really justified because some people play it badly.

 

[davidchan]

 

Porting /tg/ peacekeeper borgs would be rather amusing. They don't do a whole lot except annoy people and give security all access via law 2, but being a hugbot they'd be fun in an RP setting (compared to /tg/ that is}

 

Removing the sec borg. No. tg removed the borg. Nothing changed. They removed Default borg batons, nothing really changed. AI has been removed before and silicons have gotten numerous tweaks and nerfs because they are the easiest target for dunked people to salt against, because they have specific antag uses and rarely mix with other antags, where nerfing actual means for the crew to valid hunt would similarly reduce an antag's own ability to use that against the crew.

 

A few bad players, who didn't even make up the majority, were abusing the module without following the rules of role. The admins didn't care to crack down on them partiially because all AI lawsets outside of Robocop have enough room for interpritation and lots of Captains and HoSs were making free form laws to encourage valid hunting. This goes right into /tg/'s thought process in that any antag status is freedom to kill and murder, but the crew is equally free to deal with antags that have been exposed. AI/Secborg teams were just much faster and more coordinated, so people got tired of being dunked and removed them rather than learning to play the game better and not recklessly go on murder sprees.

 

tl;dr secborg did nothing wrong. When played properly and not used as an excuse to valid hunt it's a balanced and often underpowered role that excells at supporting security rather than replacing it like other modules can suppliment their own departments. Crack down on players who valid hunt and report them for toxic and bad silicon behavior, not remove the entire role because a few bad apples.