Goonhub
02-24-2015, 09:00 AM
Alright, here's my cyborg module lowdown extravaganza. I've double-checked this to the best of my ability, but if anything's off in some fashion, let me know. I tried to make this as simple as possible, not sure if I succeeded.
Standard
Pros: Efficiency Ugrade, gets a fire extinguisher for improvised jetpacking
Cons: Very little functionality beyond typical cyborg function. Camera monitor still has that piss-awful dropdown menu.
Verdict: Useless even by the standards of the infamously useless Staff Assistants. Pretty much never used except to nab the free Efficiency Upgrade.
Solution: Give them more potential for mischief. If the Brobot is the fun-loving, tune-spinning robot of parties, and if the Standard cyborgs are meant to be robotic Staff Assistabts, they could be effectively prank machines in contrast to that. Give them an upgrade or gadget allowing them to mimic nearby voices a la the buttbot, let them pseudo-emag machinery into doing hilarious antics (Fill a computer display with "poo" until repaired! make Beepsky talk like a stereotypical gruff cop! Make the Amusing Duck start meowing!) and any other number of humorous shenanigans. Why start an uprising of murderous killbots when you can recreate the grey tide in robot form?
Engineering
Pros: Can interface with canisters and electrical wiring. Useful in repairing broken APCs and electrical repairs/upgrades in general.
Cons: Can't do much else. If there aren't any electrical problems to repair, there isn't very much for it to do.
Verdict: Very useful in some situations, but those situations don't happen very often, frequently leaving these cyborgs with little to do but make wire art.
Solution: Since merging with Construction is implausible, we could expand upon the mechanics functionality and give Engineering borgs a built-in ruckingeur kit and reverse-engineering fabricator, letting them accept materials and spit out items on the fly as desired. Got a blob problem but mechanics is fucked? Let the engieborg produce guns en mass to combat it! Comitting traitorous deeds? Subvert an engieborg to serve as your personal, mobile weapons rack. If this is a bit too much, maybe restrict the fabricator to distinctly non-dangerous items. This lets the engieborg retain its previous functionalities while serving a worthwhile purpose when there isn't anything to repair.
Janitor
Pros: Always slip-proof all of the time, all the floor-wetting fun of the janitor in robot form.
Cons: Some of the fun tools available to janitors (mousetraps, cleaner grenades, floor buffer) are absent, you actually have to listen when people tell you to stop wetting the floors (unless you're rogue/emagged)
Verdict: A stunted janitor with fewer unique gear and the requirement to actually do your job and clean shit when people ask you to clean shit lest people start shouting Law 2 at you. Without the ability to buff floors, toss cleaner grenades at people, or steal people's shoes and set mousetraps, these borgs quickly become all the tedium of the Janitor with only a portion of the fun.
Solution: For one, give the janitorborgs more gizmos and gadgets. The inability to pick up and drop things makes this rather difficult, but a few simple additions would make them more efficient and entertaining cyborgs to play as. A built-in mop bucket would be a godsend, since pulling the mop bucket around tends to be a crapshoot. Increasing the capacity of the water-holding containers would reduce the number of times you need to run back to a water tank. The trash compactor functionality as mentioned earlier would be really cool, letting the cyborg serve as a walking disposals chute. (Though, of course, you can't put people in it.) Many other ideas are possible, and other people could probably come up with more.
Construction
Pros: Infinite resources for (de)construction of all the things you need; of particular note is the infinite RCD. Gives you plenty of things to do in the event that there somehow isn't a hull breach. Lets you make some kickass wireart. Deconstructing the station as a rogue cyborg is horrifyingly effective.
Cons: Not much you can do aside from making (and breaking) stuff, still somewhat dependent on humans for larger-scale construction projects.
Verdict: Easily one of the best cyborg modules...to the point that people rarely pick anything else.
Solution: A minor nerf of the fact that the construction borg has infinite resources would probably help balance it out with the other modules. Giving the RCD an independent charge meter that has to be recharged at a docking station, possibly do the same with the floor tiles and other construction supplies. As was mentioned at some point before, giving the construction borgs the ability to plan constructions using the ABC-U or even giving them the planning tools usually found in construction mode would be cool.
Hydroponics
Pros: Immediate access to weed, chainsaws for chopping plants/faces
Cons: Inability to smoke weed, can't load plants into the splicers
Verdict: Without the ability to properly use the splicing machines, these cyborgs are restricted to the basemost botany tools. Not very fun. Furthermore, the cyborgs can't do very much with the plants they grow; they can't smoke weed, they can't throw melons.
Solution: At the very least, give them a built-in plant splicer or some other way to splice plants. Maybe give these cyborgs built-in terrariums for on-the-go weed-growing. I'm still an advocate for the creation of the Catering borg, myself.
Mining
Pros: Starts with some fairly nice mining gear from the start, doesn't need to breathe.
Cons: Doesn't start with mesons, can't upgrade their gear and consequentially cannot mine any ores with a hardness rarting of 4, can't do anything with the ores they mine, rendered completely redundant by the presence of a human miner.
Verdict: I have never seen this used. At all. Any half-competent miner can do its job leagues better than it can, and it has absolutely no edge above human miners whatsoever.
Solution: Honestly, just retool it entirely or scrap it. I can't see anything that a miner cyborg would be capable of doing that a crew member can't already do.
Medical
Pros: Nigh-infinite healing supplies, able to reply to emergency situations efficiently, pretty much a walking ambulance. Scalpel is very good for stabbing humans as a rogue.
Cons: No saline-glucose for shock treatments, and lacks some of the more esoteric medical treatments.
Verdict: The other module that is by far one of the best due to its expansive functionality that, in essence, makes it a medbay on wheels. It has no special tools, but it effectively combines the tools of the normal medic.
Solution: Again, nerf the infinite patches. As a medborg, you can pretty much cover someone in patches in no time at all. Either decrease the extent to which the patches heal you or make them work on a charge.
Chemistry
Pros: Can fill people with all sorts of nasty chemicals. Second only to the Construction borg in terms of potential for danger. Immune to accidentally poisoning itself.
Cons: If a chemborg isn't rogue, there's very little good it can do due to its inability to harm humans. Furthermore, without the hands to pick up external resources and put them into beakers, it can't even access the full repertoire of chemistry.
Verdict: Very scary if an AI subversion has occurred, but otherwise, they are extremely limited in what they can do, and even more limited in purpose. Chemistry is inherently dangerous by its very nature, and that doesn't parse very well with a job that isn't typically allowed to impose danger.
Solution: Give it more things to do, mainly. More research functionality would be great, but aside from that, I'm kind of struggling to figure out what to do with it.
Brobot
Pros: Sick beats.
Cons: An inherently gimmicky module, has very little practical application.
Verdict: Useless and gimmicky, but that's the whole point. Doesn't require very much change, and it's only picked by people who hvve forsaken productivity anyways.
Solution: No changes are required, really.
Standard
Pros: Efficiency Ugrade, gets a fire extinguisher for improvised jetpacking
Cons: Very little functionality beyond typical cyborg function. Camera monitor still has that piss-awful dropdown menu.
Verdict: Useless even by the standards of the infamously useless Staff Assistants. Pretty much never used except to nab the free Efficiency Upgrade.
Solution: Give them more potential for mischief. If the Brobot is the fun-loving, tune-spinning robot of parties, and if the Standard cyborgs are meant to be robotic Staff Assistabts, they could be effectively prank machines in contrast to that. Give them an upgrade or gadget allowing them to mimic nearby voices a la the buttbot, let them pseudo-emag machinery into doing hilarious antics (Fill a computer display with "poo" until repaired! make Beepsky talk like a stereotypical gruff cop! Make the Amusing Duck start meowing!) and any other number of humorous shenanigans. Why start an uprising of murderous killbots when you can recreate the grey tide in robot form?
Engineering
Pros: Can interface with canisters and electrical wiring. Useful in repairing broken APCs and electrical repairs/upgrades in general.
Cons: Can't do much else. If there aren't any electrical problems to repair, there isn't very much for it to do.
Verdict: Very useful in some situations, but those situations don't happen very often, frequently leaving these cyborgs with little to do but make wire art.
Solution: Since merging with Construction is implausible, we could expand upon the mechanics functionality and give Engineering borgs a built-in ruckingeur kit and reverse-engineering fabricator, letting them accept materials and spit out items on the fly as desired. Got a blob problem but mechanics is fucked? Let the engieborg produce guns en mass to combat it! Comitting traitorous deeds? Subvert an engieborg to serve as your personal, mobile weapons rack. If this is a bit too much, maybe restrict the fabricator to distinctly non-dangerous items. This lets the engieborg retain its previous functionalities while serving a worthwhile purpose when there isn't anything to repair.
Janitor
Pros: Always slip-proof all of the time, all the floor-wetting fun of the janitor in robot form.
Cons: Some of the fun tools available to janitors (mousetraps, cleaner grenades, floor buffer) are absent, you actually have to listen when people tell you to stop wetting the floors (unless you're rogue/emagged)
Verdict: A stunted janitor with fewer unique gear and the requirement to actually do your job and clean shit when people ask you to clean shit lest people start shouting Law 2 at you. Without the ability to buff floors, toss cleaner grenades at people, or steal people's shoes and set mousetraps, these borgs quickly become all the tedium of the Janitor with only a portion of the fun.
Solution: For one, give the janitorborgs more gizmos and gadgets. The inability to pick up and drop things makes this rather difficult, but a few simple additions would make them more efficient and entertaining cyborgs to play as. A built-in mop bucket would be a godsend, since pulling the mop bucket around tends to be a crapshoot. Increasing the capacity of the water-holding containers would reduce the number of times you need to run back to a water tank. The trash compactor functionality as mentioned earlier would be really cool, letting the cyborg serve as a walking disposals chute. (Though, of course, you can't put people in it.) Many other ideas are possible, and other people could probably come up with more.
Construction
Pros: Infinite resources for (de)construction of all the things you need; of particular note is the infinite RCD. Gives you plenty of things to do in the event that there somehow isn't a hull breach. Lets you make some kickass wireart. Deconstructing the station as a rogue cyborg is horrifyingly effective.
Cons: Not much you can do aside from making (and breaking) stuff, still somewhat dependent on humans for larger-scale construction projects.
Verdict: Easily one of the best cyborg modules...to the point that people rarely pick anything else.
Solution: A minor nerf of the fact that the construction borg has infinite resources would probably help balance it out with the other modules. Giving the RCD an independent charge meter that has to be recharged at a docking station, possibly do the same with the floor tiles and other construction supplies. As was mentioned at some point before, giving the construction borgs the ability to plan constructions using the ABC-U or even giving them the planning tools usually found in construction mode would be cool.
Hydroponics
Pros: Immediate access to weed, chainsaws for chopping plants/faces
Cons: Inability to smoke weed, can't load plants into the splicers
Verdict: Without the ability to properly use the splicing machines, these cyborgs are restricted to the basemost botany tools. Not very fun. Furthermore, the cyborgs can't do very much with the plants they grow; they can't smoke weed, they can't throw melons.
Solution: At the very least, give them a built-in plant splicer or some other way to splice plants. Maybe give these cyborgs built-in terrariums for on-the-go weed-growing. I'm still an advocate for the creation of the Catering borg, myself.
Mining
Pros: Starts with some fairly nice mining gear from the start, doesn't need to breathe.
Cons: Doesn't start with mesons, can't upgrade their gear and consequentially cannot mine any ores with a hardness rarting of 4, can't do anything with the ores they mine, rendered completely redundant by the presence of a human miner.
Verdict: I have never seen this used. At all. Any half-competent miner can do its job leagues better than it can, and it has absolutely no edge above human miners whatsoever.
Solution: Honestly, just retool it entirely or scrap it. I can't see anything that a miner cyborg would be capable of doing that a crew member can't already do.
Medical
Pros: Nigh-infinite healing supplies, able to reply to emergency situations efficiently, pretty much a walking ambulance. Scalpel is very good for stabbing humans as a rogue.
Cons: No saline-glucose for shock treatments, and lacks some of the more esoteric medical treatments.
Verdict: The other module that is by far one of the best due to its expansive functionality that, in essence, makes it a medbay on wheels. It has no special tools, but it effectively combines the tools of the normal medic.
Solution: Again, nerf the infinite patches. As a medborg, you can pretty much cover someone in patches in no time at all. Either decrease the extent to which the patches heal you or make them work on a charge.
Chemistry
Pros: Can fill people with all sorts of nasty chemicals. Second only to the Construction borg in terms of potential for danger. Immune to accidentally poisoning itself.
Cons: If a chemborg isn't rogue, there's very little good it can do due to its inability to harm humans. Furthermore, without the hands to pick up external resources and put them into beakers, it can't even access the full repertoire of chemistry.
Verdict: Very scary if an AI subversion has occurred, but otherwise, they are extremely limited in what they can do, and even more limited in purpose. Chemistry is inherently dangerous by its very nature, and that doesn't parse very well with a job that isn't typically allowed to impose danger.
Solution: Give it more things to do, mainly. More research functionality would be great, but aside from that, I'm kind of struggling to figure out what to do with it.
Brobot
Pros: Sick beats.
Cons: An inherently gimmicky module, has very little practical application.
Verdict: Useless and gimmicky, but that's the whole point. Doesn't require very much change, and it's only picked by people who hvve forsaken productivity anyways.
Solution: No changes are required, really.