Roleplay Servers: Remove securitrons' baton and cuffs

[smilg]

Securitrons as they exist now, are an unwelcome interruption to most roleplay moments. They mindlessly rush in and assault their target with no nuance - are they a target? attack!. They destroy narrative tension, cause unnatural escalation, and force their victim to make an unpleasant choice. Opening fire on a mere NPC nevertheless provokes panicked, unmeasured return fire from other players. And, many RP players actually rush to turn off alerted securitrons, so the players can finish their chat! That is not a good sign.

Those are just some of the problems they present to roleplay. Let's talk about their balance.

Securitrons, flat out, are too strong on RP. Many other PvP/social games have tried out AI bots, with the goal of augmenting PvP interactions. For the most part, they decided that the bots ought to be weak and non-threatening. Here, securitrons are round-removing threats. They can even clip through standing humans and rush down their target, often with the element of surprise. On RP, antags don't spend as much time gearing up, gaining power, laying plans - they're busy roleplaying! There's fewer antags, with the same quantity of SecOffs and bots. And weaker antags, because they have extra rules to follow - rules that securitrons don't.

So what can be done to them? If, say, the baton and cuffs were removed, they'd improve the game, but become useless. Here's some less threatening things they could do instead:
- Have a paint marker with melee range. They alert, they chase you, paint you. They leave already-paint targets alone. The paint works the same as 40mm paint marker rounds. Unfamiliar with those? They give a status effect that makes you leave orange footprints. It also paints your skin prisoner-orange indefinitely, until you shower.
- No weapon, but alert Security with a PDA message once it reaches its target.
- A whistle. Just a whistle. It chases you ceaselessly, whistling and wee-wooing.

These ain't the only replacement ideas, or even the best ones. However, I'm firmly convinced that securitrons having batons and cuffs needs to be removed.

[Silent Majority]

I do want to point out that we have a non rp server.

[DisturbHerb]

Hard no. Their baton and cuffs being outright removed is too great a step in attempting to address these concerns. I would sooner rather see a solution where securitrons have to be actively deployed/tied to a specific patrol area rather than roaming the station/periodically return for charging or something/limit themselves to a set number of stuns and cuffs before needing a manual refill.

[Retrino]

respectfully, securitrons really arent that strong. you can easily bait and kill them in three hits with only a welder. if, as security, you are wanting a stand off with an antag, there are ways to keep securitrons from interfering. you can set them to guard a specific area, set the person to something besides arrest status, have the ai turn them off, or coordinate with your fellow secoffs to make sure any incoming bot is redirected.

as an antag, just… run away from them? while i do see the merit in instances of “lol beepsky rushed in and arrested the antag during a hostage situation”, there are very easy player actions that can be taken to prevent that. rp is not a mcdonalds play pen the robots can Fight

[smilg]

I do want to point out that we have a non rp server.

It's an RP-specific thread.

Hard no. Their baton and cuffs being outright removed is too great a step in attempting to address these concerns. I would sooner rather see a solution where securitrons have to be actively deployed/tied to a specific patrol area rather than roaming the station/periodically return for charging or something/limit themselves to a set number of stuns and cuffs before needing a manual refill.

These are different nerfs to their strength, but they don't address any of the damage they do to roleplay.

[CaptainJeb]

What about if securitrons xould only engage if someone was set to arrest?

I think beepsky can definetely ruin narrative tension and it forces escalation when rp has a expectation of a slow build up and escalation through the round. Sothey can have a rounds worth of effort ruined by a non player.

Im not sure how to balance it i also think securotrons make things funny and ive had a round i built up to be tense and learns stuff (me) got chassed by 6 beepskys built by robotics and battoned.

It was funny and silly.

[Waffleloffle]

honestly if you find yourself in a gamestate where beepsky will massively fuck up whatever scene you have going on, you just haven't done a good job scouting the proper setting for it. there's plenty of places on-station where beepsky doesn't or cannot go, and he's like... laughably easy to distract or put out of commission. this is a nonissue and weakening beepsky specifically for the sake of some hypothetical Antag Scenes would mechanically make security's job much MUCH harder in almost every round going forward

[chemtrails]

in most maps, except the smallest ones, an antag who's being careful and already set to arrest by security should already be on the lookout for security. a securitron is easy to avoid. you can outrun them, hide in a locker, hide in a disposal chute. i get it's all based on reaction time, but so are many things in the game already.

the only cases i can think where maybe a nerf is needed is maybe in the case of arrests from jailbird, underage drinking, pissing in public, etc etc. even then.. usually sec just lets you go. if anything, it enhances roleplay because there's certain things that will piss off the securitrons and you get to interact with security.

in the case of antags, if your contraband is out and showing, it either means you didn't get a contraband license from security, or you're an antagonist which security would have deduced anyway. even in cases where beepsky rushes in and arrests someone who was set to arrest while they're speaking to security, it would have happened anyway. it's a rude interuption, but them getting arrested was already going to happen if you were set to arrest.


the short point of it: if youre already set to arrest and you dont wanna be caught cuz ur doing evil stuff sec doesnt like, you should already be evading securitrons. they rarely go through maintenance, for one. they're FAR more easy to evade than human sec, and they can see if youre set to arrest too.

[DisturbHerb]

Beepsky as he is right now is a known obstacle to committing antagonistic acts. If you got caught by him, maybe you got careless or outwitted by the Sec team or were just plain unlucky. The presence of securitrons are a positive addition to Sec vs. Antag fights and I don't think this dynamic should be taken away even if, well, being caught can certainly be a little bit annoying.

Additionally, he's an NPC; his preprogrammed behaviour is inflexible and can oftentimes be exploited to one's benefit; this should be part of the RP experience. I think the presence of Securitrons should be noticed, they should be obsticles, but they should not be insurmountable. And at this point, securitrons are far from insurmountable.

[DasBrain]

So, here is an interaction as I remember it. Or invented it.

The Detective sees Traitor McTraitor run away from an area, goes there and sees a Barrel of Monkeys.
TraitorMc Traitor is set to arrest to ask him about this.

Two Security Officers see Traitor McTraitor walking down the Hallway, and ask him to stop, they have a few questions.
"Hey, the Detective saw you running away from the area where a Barrel of Monkey was. How can you explain that?"
"Well, what would you do when you see a Barrel of Monekys?"
"..."
Enter Beepsky.
"Mind if we search you?"
"I'm already cuffed, so I can't really say no, can I?"

---

I have seen beepsky cuff a suspect several times while they was already in Secs custody - sometimes Beepsky sees them in a Security Checkpoint with 2 Security Officers, who did not cuff the suspect and ask a few questions, just to bolt in, stun and cuff them.
Which is annoying for both of Security and the suspect.

[TDHooligan]

sounds more like an issue with using 'arrest' for 'soft interrogation'.

as for roleplay moments/interjections by beepsky, make *snapping at a securitron with Security Training dismiss beepsky from whoever they're targeting.

[Cal]

The real fix here is for someone to make the menu that pops up when you hit beepsky and other small borgs much faster and snappier, pain in the ass to try to click that little "off" when the menu has a half second delay already

[aft2001]

Perhaps make clicking on a small bot when you have access instantly turn it off, and then when you click on it again, it instead brings up that menu with the on button so you can adjust its settings too.

[CalliopeSoups]

Personally I'd like this, securitrons are a big motivation killer for RP antagging for me, a reason I haven't played it in a while. I don't like interaction between real people hurried and cut off cause this little demon ball patrols the station at 50mph and might have it out for you for one of many reasons. Or on the other hand it's not beepsky, in which it most likely has auto patrol turned off and won't leave you be even when you hide. There's ways to get around them sure, but it's more of an RP pacing issue than a difficulty one for me, even if I'm biased against the little buggers in the first place. They're old and clunky so a general improvement would be great but I wouldn't be upset with a band aid fix like this for now. That's just my view though and I haven't played RP in ages, I think any solution would be a good one with securitrons really.

[Zombie]

What if Beepsky wasn't smart and didn't recognize crimes but could only look for suspects that sec manually set, like two different wanted statuses, the regular we have now that picks up jailbirds, underage drinkers and so forth and an additional that can only be set from secmate that makes Beepsky / securitrons seek you out?