Respawn Crew (for ghosts and other waiting players)

[Roomba]

I've always thought that 'let the dead play again' was generally code for 'the round's gone on long enough, but some people get really mad if you say it like that'.

In any case there's usually more to it than 'there's a lot of dead people.' If there's that many dead early in the round, then chances are the station is in very bad shape and it's easier to call the shuttle than patch the station up. If it's late in the round, chances are the living people are getting a little bored of the round and want a fresh start.

The station is great and all, but most jobs can't really sustain themselves for extremely long rounds. Engineering is notorious for having nothing to do most of the time. The chef runs out of food, the QM isn't around, and no one is eating anyway. The doctors have no one to heal, the AI is either braindead or desperately wishing he was. I'll take disappointing the one scientist trying to one-man the solarium and the geneticists becoming superhuman demigods over keeping a slowly dying round on life support.

[The Grim Sleeper]

What about those old suggestions to allow ghosts to play in the VR?

That doesn't solve anything!

My problem is forced server resets because of all the ghosts being excluded form normal gameplay and the lack of permanence the constant resets bring to actions.

Putting them in the VR will mean the servers will still be cluttered with ghosts but now they will also be condemned to the boring VR simulation. There is a good reason the arcades are always deserted! Shit, even the scientists who need to use VR for bomb testing, by rule, usually test their bombs everywhere else because the VR is an extremely limiting and buggy mess!

[Haprenti]

Those against this idea take it to the extreme.
Unless it was implemented haphazardly, people wouldn't be able to abuse it to get late-join antag by chain suiciding, and it wouldn't make death meaningless (Well maybe still a little bit closer to that).

If there are limitations, like, not being able to respawn for 20min (or more ?) after you've just died.
The feature could even be activated/deactivated depending on how many players are alive at the time and how many ghosts are still there.
You could also enable it only for players who died on Z-2, or whose body was gibbed.
Then force a change of identity, and there, respawned.

[The Grim Sleeper]

The station is great and all, but most some jobs can't really sustain themselves for extremely long rounds.

This is a good point.

I could counter that the engineers are in a good position to take over duties from QM and mining, or that they shouldn't ALWAYS 'just hellburn and piss off', or that the chef job depends more on what the botanist supply him with then what is spawned at the start of the round and how creative he is with what he gets... etc.
But these are only relevant when people are willing to co-operate for the good of the station, and not so much when people just want another chance at blowing it all to shit.

But I still think Goon would benefit from a 'non antag'-respawn mechanic, even if it's only for the RolePlay server.

[Haprenti]

Aren't engineers supposed to make reparations on the station ? They should have even more things to do as time goes by and as the station gets blown bits by bits.

[The Grim Sleeper]

Aren't engineers supposed to make reparations on the station ? They should have even more things to do as time goes by and as the station gets blown bits by bits.

Yes. Thumbs up for you Haprenti.

Why did I forget that?
...
Oh right, nobody ever get's the get the chance to repair a breach cause people call the shuttle at the drop of a hat.

[atamusvaleo]

I am still in support of having a non-antagontist, name changed respawn option on Destiny.

edit: to clarify, by non-antagonist, I meant that respawning would not allow you to roll antag. Regular crew members, dead traitors, lings, etc are all able to respawn, just not as an antagonist.

[Roomba]

I haven't played on the RP server for a while, so I can't exactly speak to the current stats of affairs there, but last I went there rounds tended to trend towards two hours and above. with 90% of the crew braindead in their rooms by hour two and the only people alive desperately wishing they had a way to call the shuttle. The station really isn't made for or meant to last forever.

Maybe I'm biased because I share that sentiment, but I definitely feel like I've seen the view 'yeah, I don't really have all that much time for spacemen anymore and can only play about an average hour-long round or so a day" more than 'woo, hour three of roaming a powerless, empty station as an assistant. Best day ever.'. Especially on the RP server, where it's generally frowned upon to go around doing whatever you like and not doing your job. I can only be entertained by dunking X into a dryer and having a fried X pop out of it for so long. If people want to do something new, and the best way for them to do that is to call the shuttle, why not let them do so?

I don't really think shuttle calls due to the death of all the antags is the endemic problem you're making it out to be - at unreasonable times, at least. It used to be more common when I started out, but recently it's usually only used as a justification when the round's gone on a good while and everyone playing is generally in agreement.

[atamusvaleo]

I like the idea of a cooldown. Maybe extend the body rot time on bodies and make it so once your uncloneable/unborgable, you can respawn? I'm not sure how long that takes now.

[Wire]

Mildly related: I have been working on Ghostdrones for, well, a long time now (because I'm a shit person it has taken ages). Ghostdrones are little weak robots that dead people can control in order to perform maintenance on the station and just generally look all cute and stuff. Maybe that will help towards this "issue".

[Ed Venture]

I remember you talking those in IRC Wire and people seemed to like that idea. Can't wait to see what they look like.

[ZeWaka]

Mildly related: I have been working on Ghostdrones for, well, a long time now (because I'm a shit person it has taken ages). Ghostdrones are little weak robots that dead people can control in order to perform maintenance on the station and just generally look all cute and stuff. Maybe that will help towards this "issue".

This definitely seems like a good idea. Not many engineers ever do the little maintenance jobs that are needed around the station.

[Frank_Stein]

Mildly related: I have been working on Ghostdrones for, well, a long time now (because I'm a shit person it has taken ages). Ghostdrones are little weak robots that dead people can control in order to perform maintenance on the station and just generally look all cute and stuff. Maybe that will help towards this "issue".

This and VR are both good.

Exactly what levels of maintenance would the drones do? Are they kinda like the current janitor bots, the floor bots, or a combination? Do they get built beforehand and rely on ghosts to pilot them or do they have their own NPC behaviors that they carry out when not occupied? Assuming they can't speak themselves, are they privy to hearing all conversations, just AI talk, or nothing?

[babayetu83]

Mildly related: I have been working on Ghostdrones for, well, a long time now (because I'm a shit person it has taken ages). Ghostdrones are little weak robots that dead people can control in order to perform maintenance on the station and just generally look all cute and stuff. Maybe that will help towards this "issue".

i like that idea but i must know whether or not they will be able to scream/fart/birdwell

[Frank_Stein]

Scream, hopefully
[video=youtube]youtu.be/cLqNmMH4hsg[/video]