Pharmacy: Do They Really Need All That

[babayetu83]

Rather than encouraging Chemistry to make more of them, this has instead just resulted in medbay usually making do without them. I strongly feel we need better comms about requests though if any of this is ever going to lead to medical relying on chemistry more for things. A way to see requests as being worked on would be a huge game changer.

I can talk a bit about the reasons for this. What made me, to some part, stop supplying medbay with chems IS the pharmacy.

Nothing feels more disheartening than throwing all kind of chems into the interlink to find only 1 or two bottles being used.

Or running into chemistry and finding bottles upon bottles of perf and pent already on the table.

People will only work for a department if they perceive their work as worth it. Noone likes to do every round something that nobody will ever use. I personally would rather make chems i can personally use than of chems potentionally noone uses.

good thing the science department is good for more than just chemistry

[Spyritdragon]

Yeah the reason scientists don't make medical chems is because medical already has their own entire chemical station, why bother when someone already made a pent-perflou-omni-reagent mix in a third of the time it takes you to even ask.

I think a lot of the aforementioned replies, but succinctly summarised in this, is why I'm a strong supporter not of removing pharmacy, but of letting chem be exclusively equipped for making the fancier chems, and make it really difficult or even impossible to get these in significant amounts in the pharmacy.

The chem rework almost did this with pentetic acid - let's go the final mile and close the instant-reaction loophole, make pent something you have to ask chemistry to make. Change the salicylic acid ingredient in perfluorodecalin for something fancier, or add another ingredient to it. Pull the atropine from the nanomeds, and/or make the acetone-phenol amounts not match exactly so as to be easily distillable from oil. There's so much potential fun in the chem rework, and it can make chemistry feel useful providing things to medbay that are truly cool to them, without depriving medbay of the ability to have a pharmacy to play around in with some other chems, or keep themselves stocked up on styptic powder and potassium iodide.

[Solwra]

As someone who enjoys being a "pharmacist" doctor, I personally believe if you're going to restrict doctor's access to chemistry you should create a dedicated chemist or pharmacist role that can work on beneficial chems so the scientists are not obligated to run errands working on chemical requests.

[Cal]

As someone who enjoys being a "pharmacist" doctor, I personally believe if you're going to restrict doctor's access to chemistry you should create a dedicated chemist or pharmacist role that can work on beneficial chems so the scientists are not obligated to run errands working on chemical requests.

This is largely off-topic, but I legitimately think the best way of going about this would be delegating a-zone adventuring to staff assistants to scientists are less likely to grab the job and run off, wheras people who are interested in chemistry or artsci or toxins will do that instead and not run off, at the very least being on-station to be asked these things at all.

[Kotlol]

As someone who enjoys being a "pharmacist" doctor, I personally believe if you're going to restrict doctor's access to chemistry you should create a dedicated chemist or pharmacist role that can work on beneficial chems so the scientists are not obligated to run errands working on chemical requests.

That sounds like a good idea but basically you are a medbay member in science.
And in some maps Medbay is NOT next to science or atleast a lil distant away.

I do not agree with removing pharmacy still, but having it able to gain chemicals fast like via a transport system would be the 1st step.

I think Pharmacy needs to be reworked NOT removed.

[Solwra]

As someone who enjoys being a "pharmacist" doctor, I personally believe if you're going to restrict doctor's access to chemistry you should create a dedicated chemist or pharmacist role that can work on beneficial chems so the scientists are not obligated to run errands working on chemical requests.

This is largely off-topic, but I legitimately think the best way of going about this would be delegating a-zone adventuring to staff assistants to scientists are less likely to grab the job and run off, wheras people who are interested in chemistry or artsci or toxins will do that instead and not run off, at the very least being on-station to be asked these things at all.

That may be good, however it seems that scientists often gravitate to tele science. Whenever I've been a scientist it seems like artifact and telesci always gets filled up with other scientists fast compared to toxins and chemistry, this may just be my experience though but it definitely feels like there's just more interest in those areas. It often leaves chemistry to be a void and since the scientist slot may be filled, you will often not be able to do chemistry even though the lab is completely empty (unless you tide in there or get HOP to give you access). 

Having a chemist role in my opinion doesn't take that much away, if you want to experiment with chemicals on your shift you can pick that role, perhaps have both departments use interlinks to request chems so there's more interaction happening there. 

This is just my take on this matter, I understand the idea of being present on station, but you cannot guarantee that even with that the scientists won't leave to go do telescience anyway unless it's access restricted away from them.

[JOELED]

I do not agree with removing pharmacy still, but having it able to gain chemicals fast like via a transport system would be the 1st step.

That's what the interlink does?  Unless there's something I'm missing here

[Flaborized]

I co-devved the chem rework/additions and have some scattered thoughts about the pharmacy and chemistry/doctor interaction. I don't think my opinion on this is the be-all-end-all or anything of course, I just have thought about this a whole lot. It's also quite a lot of rambling because I'm not very good at being brief, not necessarily because I have a lot to say.

Prior maps didn't always have full pharmacies, but they've (since I started playing in 2018) had chemistry dispensers in pathology before then, so they've *effectively* been self sustaining for chem production for as long as I've played. (Also Clarion and Destiny always had built-in pharmacies AFAIK). I think it's probably obvious that the choice to not give condensers or barrels specifically to medical is a way to make chemistry better at doing the job they're specifically built to be able to do, if doctors get to make chems they definitely shouldn't be as good at it as the role that's more dedicated to it. Future developments to chemistry should (in my view) reflect this and keep the pharmacy a few notches behind the Real Lab.

I greatly prefer maps that have integrated medbay and research, and I think maps like Donut2 or other maps that have them completely disconnected are basically non-starters for actual consistent teamplay between the two departments. Basically every interaction I've had where I've meaningfully worked together with someone (from either side) has been on maps where you can actually talk and see the scientists/doctors from your work, and maps where they're on opposite sides of the station just weren't built to facilitate this IMO. It can still happen, since the game is very open ended and players can pretty much will this into existence if they really want to, but many maps just make it much, much easier. The interlink also helps with this potentially, but it's just been my experience that directly talking has the biggest chance of success. This isn't realistically fixable but I think it's a non-insignificant hurdle for trying to design interdepartmental interaction in general.

I also think medbay isn't setup to really badly *want* most of what chemistry can provide, at least with consistency. I find that when playing doctor, synthflesh is very convenient and nice feeling to use, and pent has moments where it really shines, but 95% of what you treat is handled very very effectively by the baseline chems that you get tons and tons of. I think perf is often the most effective chem that you don't start with (MD locker not withstanding) that chemistry can make for you, since it can often trivialize medical situations that would otherwise be pretty tricky or time sensitive in my experience. I think all of this is hard to change; the game is fully balanced around styptic, sulfadiazine and charc, lowering general supply would feel unfun because when medical runs out of meds they like, can do literally nothing pretty often which feels pretty bad and would likely be very frustrating if it occurred more often than it does now. Think about how it feels in comparison when you play QM and miners drag in a crate full of highly valuable ore for you to sell; the payoff is very large and you're genuinely usually given a sizable boost, but chem doesn't have much capacity in my view to do something similar.

I feel many good coop experiences in games rely on symbiotic setups. Scientists don't actually get anything direct from medical that medical doesn't give to everyone else, and I think that could be *an* avenue for cooperation that's not just like, there for the sake of it. In the idealized version of interdepartmental cooperation, it should feel really cool to have an on-point chemist backing you up as a doctor, and then you can also give them back something for their trouble that they want, and you just cycle yourselves together and feel like a group working together to one goal, but this is really hard to implement in a way that doesn't feel forced in my experience.

This all sounds pretty negative but I don't think this is a lost cause or anything. When you're a chemist and someone thanks you for making synthflesh or something, it can feel great, and when you're a doctor and you get to use super duper chems it also feels pretty slick. I think trying to hone in on these elements (the fun parts) is tricky and touching the balance of medical supplies is delicate and sensitive. Trying to make producing medical chems more fun so working with medbay felt like a fun videogame and not a chore you had to do was one goal of the chemistry rework. I'd like for chemistry to feel like a useful and fun thing to have working behind you as a medical player without making medical players feel like we've stripped them of all their equipment or something, or like either department is being 'forced' into the cooperation. It's not easy though trust me!!

TLDR: I think it's possible to make chemistry and medical cooperation more fun and good but it's complicated and a lot of work. (I guess that may have been obvious)

[Kotlol]

TLDR: I think it's possible to make chemistry and medical cooperation more fun and good but it's complicated and a lot of work. (I guess that may have been obvious)

Basically what I been saying.. "You need to rework maps and systems completely"
it is possible, but it requires so much work. it is essentially a rework of what we know of science and medbay.

The simplest reworks would be:
"Splitting Science into dedicated roles insted of "Scientist" , now we get "Chemist, Tele-expert, Artifact Research, Toxin Handler, Robotcist (already exists but this is for the buddies) and programmer (for dwaine and such)."
This is basically the 1st best step but as we tried that with engineering.. by splitting engineering and mechanics... they got refused later and it's better.
Also some maps have unique mechanics for science like our favorite acid station.
So splitting even chemistry from science is gonna be a hassle alone due to this.

Another easy fix recommended is a "Chemist"  who only works in pharmacy.

But right now... Chemistry bounties seems to be the 1st step.

The thing is ... interdepartment cooperation needs to benefit both uniquely, but also... science is such an odd beast of a department unlike Engineering.

Removing pharmacy would lead into science being hassled for chems when they run out or the bar.
Changing Pharmacy to a degree would help.. but science needs a reason to help em.
Splitting science so people do not fight over departments wil lead to the "Mechanics vs Engineers" problem.

[cheekybrdy]

I've said my piece on this overall on the thread this came from and what I've said there can be grabbed off other responses here but something else here I think should be addressed: pharmacy currently doesn't just substitute medical's demand from chemicals but due to how open medical is means that the demand is reduced from other departments due to pharmacy basically being open roundstart (could be a more classic issue) bar I guess does this too but its more a necessary evil then big pharma, I feel like the best option would be something like a buffed free public minimed, and maybe having the room reworked into medical's public fast solution. I'd much rather menthol, analgesic and epi pills like the minimed be what pharma is easier to supply and have styptic and silver sulf be more doc only.

[Meggal Bozale]

Despite all the medchems, I would actually argue the variety in their use is very limited. There are a few missing holes that chems could fill right now which gives chemistry a bit of a boost. But first:

Removing the pharmacy or nerfing it in any manner would do poorly for maps where it is difficult to find an alternative way to get into chemistry. I think the obvious difference between interdepartmental cooperation of chem and med is that, unlike the chef's food, you aren't making such a difference between life or death with the supply of medchems. Whether or not medbay gets a resupply of spaceacillin from chem after a traitor dumps out all the medvends, gets a restock cartridge, etc. will change the fate of those inflicted with grave fever (or whatnot), who will otherwise be uncurable and die. (Ignore cloning please its dumb no takebacks >.<)

I would take robotics as the prime example as a department that functions without interdept. cooperation, but does better with it. You can reclaim metal sheets from the station, wires, etc. from tech storage, or other random places. Or, you can ask for unlimited supplies of these basic materials from QM. Both extend your usual supply, and tech storage is always a usable option if there are no QMs/cooperating QMs. Meanwhile, a decent miner will give you more ores than you know what to do with before you could ask. The point with this interaction is its OPTIONAL, and ENHANCES productivity. It is not the sole means of which a department may have the resources to, say, save a life which is only able to be made into a cyborg.

Now take the pharmacy, and chemistry, and medbay. Medbay doctors get a pretty easy/practically unlimited supply of the basic chems. And if they need a little more, they can spend a few minutes in the pharmacy to get better chems. Problem here is, like if this was robotics, it's like if you could find claretine around the station. Removes the need to go mining! Boooo. But what if you didn't have a pharmacy? What if robotics had no extra metal? Well, you'd have to just work with what you got. Save who you can, clone who you don't, shrug when they're puritan. Not a great way to run a medbay. Of course, you could have asked chem, but there's no scientists in there interested and the one who is around is currently running around with a csaber.

I would say the pharmacy problem could be solved by not letting doctors make advanced chems, but that wouldn't help either. There's no chems inbetween "medbay starting chem" and "the best chem for (thing)" for doctors to make in this scenario, since starting chems are, again, basically unlimited. 2000 styptic/sulf in every nanomed plus!!!! WHAT!!

What should really happen is we get some inbetween chems. Styptic is a good brute healer with -1 brute per chem per touch (with limits)! Synthetic flesh is even better (focus on brute), with -1.5 brute per touch! So where's the room here for an inbetween? 1.25? Not really significant enough to warrant a chem, is it? Synthflesh takes a lot of time to work with now, so I think a simple brute chem that's more advanced than styph is in touch. I'm not going to list out specific chems, but I hope this gives you an idea of what i mean-- room for improvement when medbay is alone with the pharmacy, but room for chemistry to shine when they mass produce superhealing chemicals.

The real problem here is that the way interdept cooperation is worked with needs to be more nuanced. I would hope to see medbay getting to use their pharmacy for better than stock intermediates (in small, personal-level quantities) vs. chemistry getting to mass produce the BEST of it all, which medbay can't even try.

Or you realize a welder and a wrench makes easy access in Cog1 is good enough to copy paste, and serves as a door for classic and a barrier for rp. IUNNO!!!!

[TDHooligan]

What should really happen is we get some inbetween chems. Styptic is a good brute healer with -1 brute per chem per touch (with limits)! Synthetic flesh is even better (focus on brute), with -1.5 brute per touch! So where's the room here for an inbetween? 1.25? 

this is how you get /tg/chem with all its really boring intermediates like "heals 2 brute but hurts your liver" vs "heals 1 brute but hurts your left eyeball"

goon's always been about discrete features. 


there is also a functionally identical med/sci discussion thread in general that i've voiced my take on.  but ill reiterate it in short here:
medchem is now way more time consuming from slow reactions and cooling etc. so i do not want to do it for others if i'm already busy with my own medchem.

[Glamurio]

This is less of an issue about the Pharmacy, and more of an issue with how Science functions as a department.

Science, frankly, needs an overhaul or rework in terms of what function it should serve on the station. Far and wide, it is one of the most optional "major" departments because everything they do is something you can do another way elsewhere, and places like the Pharmarcy or the fact that even Bartenders sometimes have a Chem Console in their backrooms are a sign of this being the case. Chems can be made without Science being involved, and that's a crux of the issue.

Artifacts and adventure zones are another aspect of Science doing things that benefit nobody, I'm not saying to remove those features, if anything they should be more commonly involve the crew, but by and large it just aids to make Scientists do Science by themselves instead of others. And if they're not doing that, then they might be found knee-deep in Chem research basically ignoring anybody around them and just tinkering away.

What Flaborized mentioned is so unbelievably important, maps where Science and Medbay work together in tandem and close proximity are so vital and genuinely facilitate a more cooperative gamestyle because people see each other. Remember the term "MedSci"? That sure hasn't aged that well. Science has barely anything to do with the Medical department anymore, but it really should. Reintroducing these departments to one another I think is the actual key to solving the phamacy issue. The pharmacy should still be located in Medbay, but it should be operated by a Scientist whose job is to make chems.

Bar a full rework of every map and combining both departments, an intermediate solution could be to introduce a new job, or rather, make the pharmacist a main job. Tie the chem console and pharmacy to an Access via ID and introduce maybe a two-slot job like the geneticist that spawns in the pharmacy and works there with the primary role being "scientist who makes med chems" and a sub-role being "heal people who are dying outside". Basically, if Roboticists fuse Engineering and Medical, let this new role be a fusion of Science and Medical. Give the Medical Director the access too for rounds where you don't have a pharmacist so that Medbay can continue to make chems when necessary, but prevent regular doctors from making chems.

Essentially, have a "Medical Scientist" that incorporates the original definition of MedSci and cross the bridge to tie these departments together. This new role has access to Science and can enter both departments, and as such has access to advanced tools should they be necessary.

[Kotlol]

Artifacts and adventure zones are another aspect of Science doing things that benefit nobody, I'm not saying to remove those features, if anything they should be more commonly involve the crew, but by and large it just aids to make Scientists do Science by themselves instead of others. And if they're not doing that, then they might be found knee-deep in Chem research basically ignoring anybody around them and just tinkering away.

I mostly want toa dd that Artifacts and Azones DO infact benefit the station. Just more indirectly. Azone loot could benefit the station.. but mostly doesn't so this one is more on the "doesn't benefit anyone."

Artifacts on the other hand benefits the station always. If it's a good artifact like a healer artifact or a waterer artifact it benefits medbay and botany.
Heck some artifacts benefit other departments too like a teleporter artifact given to security. Or a gun artifact that fully drain stamina with 1 shot.
Surgery artifacts are "useful" for medbay again.

But that's just RNG, atleast selling artifacts gives more budget so yea... it always benefits the station regardless of the artscientist. (Well unless they never sell)

The last thing we always overshadow is... "Genetics"
Since Genetics is TECHNICALLY Science since it's the only one who uses the RESEARCH BUDGET. But it's always next to medbay and the cloner.

Also if we are reworking science insted.... Have the robotcists be part of science too and have them have access to the robobuddies. 
To this day... no real scientist uses them except the RD to have a bodyguard (and good luck getting it to work)
But robotcists mostly have nothing to do.. so why not give them that acces too to work on a robobuddy for something?
infact overhaul robotcists too.