Remove Hygiene Motive from RP

[Dhaidburt]

Fair points all around, stink is probably the only time I actually notice that my thirst and hunger are low too. I usually keep a lunch packed, but I still have to go out in the hallway and sometimes see things happening. Removing hygene rather than replacing it with something else could have a knock-on effect where nobody eats anymore either, since there's only debuffs now.. which you may or may not notice the 2 small squares in the top right of your screen.

I think we could have a different solution from removing the decay or removing hygene. What if we had additional options for slowing the decay, but made things take longer to get back to your department? Freshly laundered clothing could provide a hygene buff, potentially eliminating the decay for 2-4 minutes or longer. And while you're waiting for your clothes to wash, you chat up with someone who's next in line! More opportunities to proactively fight hygene issues rather than only reactively.

[mintyphresh]

And the "making fun of" part has so far, also from my experience, created RP rather than disrupted it. The one person that is too involved in their project being called out very often can be pulled in a conversation that way. Being called stinky does get people, and its a very easy way to hook them onto a conversation (after they took a shower).

My gripe with people getting made fun of for this isn't about disrupting RP, it's that people getting made fun of isn't really... nice. Do other people really need to see and experience with their noses that John McTider didn't shower? I can see the value of having a motive whose consequences are so in-your-face (thanks Solenoid for the good post!), but threat of public shaming for neglecting any motive really shouldn't be the reason why people take care of it.

Stink lines are like the game sticking an embarrassing sign on your back-- People can be nice about it, sure, but having that on your back makes people judge you regardless of circumstance.

I'm all for making the other two more obvious to the player (you ever tried to stand up when you're malnourished and go blind for a few seconds?), or even to other players, and I haven't seen people take the social consequences of stinkyness too far over here, but I think having people become Marked For Shame from sitting in a chair all day is something the game would be better without.

This raises an important question, though: if hygiene continues to exist without decay, then what's the point of having it? Without decay, it wouldn't serve the same purpose as the other two motives, of encouraging people to leave their department... And the "punishment mechanic" concept that I posted earlier doesn't really hold water, either. As Joeled mentioned, we already have staining mechanics for things like blood.

Maybe it is time to rework hygiene's consequences, or remove it entirely-- All three motives encourage players to leave their department and socialize, but hygiene is the worst of the three because:
1) low hygiene is unpleasurable for characters in the same room as the stinker, forcing them to either ignore it (which takes you out of the character somewhat) or cut off RP early (which takes you out of the conversation);
2) the act of showering itself isolates a person from RP and doesn't interact with any department's work (You still have to walk to the cafeteria for food and drink, just as you would a shower, but inviting someone to chat in the shower with you probably shouldn't happen here);
3) low hygiene motivates the player by threatening them with embarrassment (can't really put into words why I think shaming people as a game mechanic is bad)

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What if we had additional options for slowing the decay, but made things take longer to get back to your department? Freshly laundered clothing could provide a hygene buff, potentially eliminating the decay for 2-4 minutes or longer. And while you're waiting for your clothes to wash, you chat up with someone who's next in line! More opportunities to proactively fight hygene issues rather than only reactively.

Love the idea of giving washing machines some mechanical use... I like this a lot

[TDHooligan]

one of the big issues is that messy liquids lower hygiene a huge volume almost immediately. as a chef, murdering a monkey for organs immediately sets me to ~20% hygiene from full, even if i'm in an apron. if i don't get bled on i barely notice i need to shower, but when shifts get messy i'm almost permanently stinky and there's no point fighting it.

[Ikea]

imo chemprot should protect from hygiene decay from chems and cap it at like 80% protection

[JOELED]

one of the big issues is that messy liquids lower hygiene a huge volume almost immediately. as a chef, murdering a monkey for organs immediately sets me to ~20% hygiene from full, even if i'm in an apron. if i don't get bled on i barely notice i need to shower, but when shifts get messy i'm almost permanently stinky and there's no point fighting it.

this is what really gets to me, the way reagents interact with it is just so annoying to deal with

[NanoDano]

Personally I think hygiene is more an inconvenience than anything, but maybe soap can be added to use while taking a shower to drastically decrease the rate at which you get stimky

[Kotlol]

Didn't Hygiene used to determine if you could get sick or not?

Anyway.... removing it is dumb. If anything it just needs to be nerfed how fast you lose hygiene or else there is NO POINT in cleaning and NO POINT in going to the bathroom.

Insted add easy items that will increase hygiene. Cause in the old days we maintained our hygiene by washing our hands 20 times, but now at a lower hygiene wich is just 1 bloody fight later... you can't do that.
Anyway we just need more items that interacts with or protects it. Like wearing certain ugly plastic clothes will make sure your hygiene drops 75% less faster, but you look like a complete tool.

[mintyphresh]

Didn't Hygiene used to determine if you could get sick or not?

Anyway.... removing it is dumb. If anything it just needs to be nerfed how fast you lose hygiene or else there is NO POINT in cleaning and NO POINT in going to the bathroom.

It did, and people would get themselves dirty on purpose to spread disease. It was *worse* back then, being griefy rather than just unpleasurable like it is now.

We already have a mess system without hygiene that encourages people to shower. Dirty clothes. Transitioning to just this version doesn't require people to strip to get clean, either, which I always thought was weird.

[Kotlol]

Didn't Hygiene used to determine if you could get sick or not?

Anyway.... removing it is dumb. If anything it just needs to be nerfed how fast you lose hygiene or else there is NO POINT in cleaning and NO POINT in going to the bathroom.

It did, and people would get themselves dirty on purpose to spread disease. It was *worse* back then, being griefy rather than just unpleasurable like it is now.

We already have a mess system without hygiene that encourages people to shower. Dirty clothes. Transitioning to just this version doesn't require people to strip to get clean, either, which I always thought was weird.

No I mean removing hygiene is a dumb idea. The disease mechanic being gone is GOOD.

But I think lessening the becoming dirty when blood splatters near you is annoying. I do think hygiene being ignored needs to do something to the player and only the player... But I am not going on that.

Right now.. hygiene is just... "Annoying" and "annoying" means "Pointless"
So making it easier to manage is better.

[Frank_Stein]

Maybe hygiene should be more closely related to the other motives? Like, if your hygiene is too low you won't be able to eat because you're too grossed out to. Wouldn't really be a concern until you needed to eat, and washing up for supper is just a good idea to begin with.

[Spyritdragon]

While I can see the point a bit in how it can be disrupting to RP, I dont really find I experience that disruption terribly much in practice. I think the 'shaming' thing so far hasn't gotten too negative, and it's pretty light anyway - heck, if anything 'people will call you smelly' is the main counterpoint I've seen given when I've floated the idea vaguely of hygiene having a gameplay impact.

Personally, I feel it really does add to RP for me, though - not just that, but also the feeling of immersion in the game. I enjoy how it makes me wash my hands as a doctor, how it makes me seek out the showers, even with no others around - it makes my character feel like a person much more than a sprite in a computer game. I feel like the stinklines are a pretty innocent way to motivate someone to take care of the need without forcing you to, and I think I've met way more people on my way to/from the showers than it's ever disrupted RPs for me. Heck, I think I've probably had as many laughs from washing someone in the laundry machine as the times I've felt it's really pained me in my RP.
Not only that, but I think the fact the hygiene stat motivates keeping a clean station is a huge plus, too.

One thing I do think sounds like a wonderful idea though is having freshly laundered clothing tie into it - if your clothes stayed laundered for a longer while and stopped any decay to your hygiene, we'd have neat conversations around the laundry machines happen occasionally, and there'd be a better way to take care of it long-term.

And I also 100% agree that the speed you get dirty at in icky chems feels reaally overtuned sometimes - it's no fun for a single surgery or slip in a blood puddle to immediately send you to the showers, even though that may be a bit realistic. So I'd definitely be up for seeing that adjusted a bit. But hygiene in general, I'd honestly be sad to see go.

[Silent Majority]

I still wish we had like...a spacebux deoderant that worked like 5 times or something to insta clean you. Like thats it. Something we could have to basically just...not have to stop rping because we smell like a poop took a shit or our other lovely messages.

[Wisemonster]

I will add to this, that a Devera board interdictor (the one that reduces miasma) will prevent passive hygiene decay for any mobs under it's influence. So you could ask an engineer to build one in the location you want if you don't like having to clean yourself so often from the passive decay. Though these interdictors are usually only built next to the cloner, if they are made at all. It also doesn't prevent decay from things like getting covered in blood.

[mintyphresh]

I will add to this, that a Devera board interdictor (the one that reduces miasma) will prevent passive hygiene decay for any mobs under it's influence. 

Not sure of the logistics on that-- how's the power draw? Is it cheap/fast to make? Can it be moved easily?

Even if all those things are ideal it still doesn't fix the core problems that hygiene has. No matter how little you have to do it, if you don't change how it's restored or what it's consequences are, it will always be the worst of the three motives.

If that Devera interdictor actually restored hygiene, I'd set one up in the bar in a heartbeat -- that'd be phenomenal.

[Meggal Bozale]

Can't really say anything unique here, I just flat out agree. I've played a few rounds on RP recently and it went from 'oh haha, I am role playing, I must act like I am a living human being' to 'oh my god I did this FIVE MINUTES AGO' and it's just not fun. Hunger and thirst I at least interact with a potentially present chef/bartender, but the frequency of it just becomes frustrating. I don't see how being forced to shower constantly has enhanced the little roleplay I have done. If anything, it's made it worse.

Though, that's a lot of my attitude to the other motives. At some point, you have to either embrace or detest the fact that you are going to drop what you're doing to make it go away, or live with whatever debuff you get. (And thirsty(?)'s halving of base stamina regen is BRUTAL.) I think in the case of food/thirst it's nice (but I feel it should be one thing, since both serve the same purpose -- visiting the Bar), and really there could be a replacement of hygene to be more... enhancing of roleplay.

I don't think throwing spacial interdictors or whatever into the mix helps either, but it does prod at what I'm getting at above - involving engineering into the hygene equation allows for interaction between players on a motive.