[CLOSED PR] Allow cloning rotten people, add additional cloner defects depending o...

[github_bot]

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[FEEDBACK] [MEDICAL]
About the PR
- Removes the NecroScan
- Allows the scan of rotted people (not skeletonized, though).
- Gives people additional cloner defects on clone based on how rotted they were when they were scanned (1 defect per decomposition stage).

Why's this needed?
Might be fun?? Currently decomposition varies between 4 and 10 minutes per stage, and so the difference between 'can be cloned' and 'can't be cloned' can vary in timing pretty wildly. This eases that a bit by making you harder to clone (in that you need to be patched up after, most likely), but still cloneable so you can be Alive and stuff.

Concerns:
- Steps on Robotics' toes by making rotten people less of 'immediately borg' status?
- Makes things harder for antagonists since their victims can be cloned more often?

Changelog

Code:

changelog
(u)aloe
(*)Rotten people can now be cloned, but they'll come out with more cloner defects the more rotten they are. Skeletonized people still can't be cloned.

PULL REQUEST DETAILS

[Lord_earthfire]

Firstly, I think cloning is already far too powerfull, so i am very much not a fan of increasing the amount of cases that can be used to bring back people... except we aim of phasing out robotocists and SR (which is almost useless except someone kills jones), i guess...

Secondly, the necroscan modules is one of the few pieces of debris field/azone-loot the station as a whole can benefit from. Moving that into an intrinsic upgrade of the station makes lootcrate hunting even less beneficial for the station, which i personally don't see is a good direction to take.

[Chasu]

I fully agree with Earthfire here. Personally, I don‘t think that „might be fun“ is a valid reason for such a drastic change. Death is already not a big concern at the moment, and making rotten people clone-able would make people care even less about dying, which could affect RP, especially for antags (holding someone at gunpoint/threatening with death, for example). Additionally, this would make it even harder for roboticists, whose job is already rather boring, to get new brains for borgs.

[Kotlol]

I don't think cloning needs a buff.
I think it needs alternatives.

Death is already not the biggest issue unless an antagonist bombs medbay (and they bomb medbay A LOT in classic)

I just notice there are a lot of things like: "I am turned cluwne, everyone wants to kill me, I rather be dead then deal with curing cluwne."
Or: "I am turned into a critter, I rather be dead so I can be cloned then being this heap of nothing."

There is a lot of ways to "ruin" the round for someone that isn't death.

In my opinion this shows people rather DIE then be disabled. And i get it.. being knocked out each 10 seconds due to a faulty medical borg in an azone and such... means you are in an infinite loop of: "I can't do shit... so i rather be dead."
Cause when you are dead you can observe or be cloned.

So if you want more ways to come back from the dead... we need alternatives.
And also more ways that being disabled permanently isn't as annoying.

We do this by either making death more permanent or by making people want to stay alive longer.

This just makes people who are dead and stay dead longer... more likely to be cloned.. let alone the CHANGELING gets a HUGE ASS NERF due to this and the poor guy doesn't need more ways to be betrayed by their stealth kills.

[JOELED]

Not a fan of this change-- Seeing people toss around the idea that now you can "take the gamble" with cloning someone rotten or be safe with borging, but it's not like the person who is dead gets to have any input on that anyways. 99.9% of the time this is just going to translate to people who would normally be considered for borging being immediately cloned and then tossed in a cryotube, at least on classic, and is going to lead to people getting pissed with roboticists who decide to borg instead of cloning a rotten body. just really don't feel like cloning needs to be more ubiquitous than it already is

[KikiMofo]

Na. Death should mean something. Makes it so you fight harder to not die. Also anything that hurts robotics I'm against.

[Cherman0]

Fundamentally I dont really like the argument regarding this encroaching on robotics' domain. Roboticist is at its core already a pointless job and it needs a fundamental design pivot to something actually interesting (see https://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=21751 for discussion on that). The existing robotics mechanics of "terrible revive that you suicide out of and borg time waster" is just not fun and not worth trying to preserve.

What I'm more concerned about is buffing the already extremely powerful ability of cloning to prevent anyone from dying ever. As it stands, anyone who wants to kill someone for more than like 20 seconds necessarily needs to disable the cloner in some way, which usually entails just exploding it. I feel like implementing this change and also removing prescans would strike a good balance where a person is almost always revivable if their body is found but is almost never revivable if their body is not found (would probably require changing explosions as well so that any strength explosion does not gib all corpses).

[JOELED]

I would be a lot more interested in this if it was coupled with a removal of prescans, actually. That would deal with my concern of cloning becoming more ubiquitous.

[KikiMofo]

Fundamentally I dont really like the argument regarding this encroaching on robotics' domain. Roboticist is at its core already a pointless job and it needs a fundamental design pivot to something actually interesting (see https://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=21751 for discussion on that). The existing robotics mechanics of "terrible revive that you suicide out of and borg time waster" is just not fun and not worth trying to preserve.

Roboticists are not pointless just because you don't like being borged.

[Lord_earthfire]

I would be a lot more interested in this if it was coupled with a removal of prescans, actually. That would deal with my concern of cloning becoming more ubiquitous.

Personally, pre-scanning is the interesting part about cloning because if cloning records. If we add a way to create cloning records pre-emptively (read: gate cloning prescans behind engineering, mining or cargo interaction) i could see this being a good idea.

Roboticists are not pointless just because you don't like being borged.

Agreed. People only suicide upon borging because getting cloned if far too convenient and these people developed a spoiled attitude due to this.

[Kotlol]

In my opinion robotcists need to do more then just borging to begin with.

They do with lil robots but they don't upgrade those robots or make unique versions.

I like to again try to say: Robotcists needs more then being just the "Borg doctor"
It would be cool if they could develop things like genecists do.
"Mutations but for borgs and robotic parts."

Example: "You can now add a chip that regulates energy flow better, but may cause overheating problems."
For borgs: "Less power consumption but take 15% more damage on heat damage"
For those with robotic limbs: "Decreased Stamina use for said limbs, but also take more damage from heat."

Now we got robotcists able to develop upgrades/sidegrades for borgs/limb users. Thus giving them more work to do and possibly more clientel to justify the 3 robotcist job limit.

As far as I played robotcist. You mostly only need 2 for if it's busy. The 3rd one mostly becomes an extra doctor... heck if it's low pop shift. Robotcists are LITTERLY the "other doctor" doing the healing and such.

But if one can research upgrades while the others preform surgery and install chips.. suddenly we got a fun department!
ALSO JUST GIVE THEM ROBUDDY ACCESS! I still for the life of me do NOT understand why SCIENCE has this when most of science sticks to Chemistry, Artifact and Tele-sci. But once they do the robobuddies once.. they are done.

[Chasu]

In my opinion robotcists need to do more then just borging to begin with.

They do with lil robots but they don't upgrade those robots or make unique versions.

I like to again try to say: Robotcists needs more then being just the "Borg doctor"
It would be cool if they could develop things like genecists do.
"Mutations but for borgs and robotic parts."

Example: "You can now add a chip that regulates energy flow better, but may cause overheating problems."
For borgs: "Less power consumption but take 15% more damage on heat damage"
For those with robotic limbs: "Decreased Stamina use for said limbs, but also take more damage from heat."

Now we got robotcists able to develop upgrades/sidegrades for borgs/limb users. Thus giving them more work to do and possibly more clientel to justify the 3 robotcist job limit.

As far as I played robotcist. You mostly only need 2 for if it's busy. The 3rd one mostly becomes an extra doctor... heck if it's low pop shift. Robotcists are LITTERLY the "other doctor" doing the healing and such.

But if one can research upgrades while the others preform surgery and install chips.. suddenly we got a fun department!
ALSO JUST GIVE THEM ROBUDDY ACCESS! I still for the life of me do NOT understand why SCIENCE has this when most of science sticks to Chemistry, Artifact and Tele-sci. But once they do the robobuddies once.. they are done.

I agree, but I think that this would fit more into the roboticist's dilemma thread.

[Ikea]

I think prescanning is just bad in general because it strips a lot of control out of an antags hands, it doesnt matter if you go out of the way to gib a body if they were prescanned. Not to mention, prescanning allows you to get back into the game much quicker compared to if your corpse had to be found, which also ruins a lot of the impact of dying. The minimum interval to skeletonize may need to be upped to like 7 minutes with this change, but this change seems like itd go great with a prescanning removal

[Kotlol]

I think prescanning is just bad in general because it strips a lot of control out of an antags hands, it doesnt matter if you go out of the way to gib a body if they were prescanned. Not to mention, prescanning allows you to get back into the game much quicker compared to if your corpse had to be found, which also ruins a lot of the impact of dying. The minimum interval to skeletonize may need to be upped to like 7 minutes with this change, but this change seems like itd go great with a prescanning removal

Nerfing prescans shouldn't be too hard.

Have it be that the older the scanning file is, the more likely defects show up.
Now pre-scans are only good for like 5 mins and you have to get "re-scanned" to sync up.
This also means it's PREFERED to find the dead body and "re-scan" that to lower defects by a lot.

Only SECURITY gets this luxury to avoid it with "Data-disks"
Because files do not degrade on "Data-disks"

Thus adding another layer to cloning by taking data out of the cloner with "Empty Data disks" and storing them safely.
Now even antagonists do NOT have to bomb the cloner to kill pre-scanned victims, but only have to take their data disks as if they kill their victim 30 mins after being scanned last... the clone will likely suffer "Puritan" problems.

So now: "People who frequently get scanned" and "Security" are the ones who are safests from defects.
And those who scan at the start of the round and die 7 mins later... might get some nasty defects.

So now pre-scanning still has a use, but it's limited and it forces more interaction with the cloner and more possiblities of sabotage.
Also stuff like "Fresh DNA samples" would also be a fun limiter as the old stuff causes more defects.

So less "pre-cloning and pre-scanning" as it can punish you!

[Ikea]

I think prescanning is just bad in general because it strips a lot of control out of an antags hands, it doesnt matter if you go out of the way to gib a body if they were prescanned. Not to mention, prescanning allows you to get back into the game much quicker compared to if your corpse had to be found, which also ruins a lot of the impact of dying. The minimum interval to skeletonize may need to be upped to like 7 minutes with this change, but this change seems like itd go great with a prescanning removal

Thus adding another layer to cloning by taking data out of the cloner with "Empty Data disks" and storing them safely.
Now even antagonists do NOT have to bomb the cloner to kill pre-scanned victims, but only have to take their data disks as if they kill their victim 30 mins after being scanned last... the clone will likely suffer "Puritan" problems.

This just means that on classic doctors will be too busy and prescanning will be worthless. On roleplay since doctors are terminally bored all disks will be baked up and hidden that way prescans are even more safe from antag involvement.