Brainstorm: make toxins useful again

[icarus]

as we were talking about in the other science thread, toxins has gotten to the point where it does almost nothing good for the station, the only thing it really does that is helpful is make gas mixes for the 1 in 20 engineers who ask for one. toxins has become one of the only departments that does way more harm than good on the station, and most of the time anyone you see in there is a traitor. however, cogs pointed out that the station is a plasma research station, and that toxins should get new things to do, not get replaced

tl;dr: toxins does bad stuff, let's come up with ways to make it good again

one idea i had was that toxins could work with mechanics to make new pod parts like better engines or stronger weapons, pods use plasma for fuel but plasma doesn't seem to be involved beyond being a word

[magic mountain]

i had some code a while back to make pods run off of plasma tanks

if you just took off in a stock pod it'd run out of fuel in seconds, but if toxins set you up a burning can of fuel you could fly forever

everyone whined so much i took it out

some kind of cross department collaboration to make buff pod upgrades sounds like a great plan though, i like the way you think

[icarus]

i had some code a while back to make pods run off of plasma tanks

if you just took off in a stock pod it'd run out of fuel in seconds, but if toxins set you up a burning can of fuel you could fly forever

everyone whined so much i took it out

i don't really mean fuel systems, i mean like expanding the engine so you can use more equipment/not have to buy the nice engines in space

[Ali0en]

What if pods accepted plasma tanks as fuel, yet never ran out. Now if you make a potent mix in toxins, it boosts the pods performance (speed and stuff) by up to a certain percentage. For example, amazing mix = 50% faster pod.

Maybe this could even be measured in Octane or something so us podmasters with 93 Octane can laugh at the assistants with 72 as we speed past them at the red light.

[Sundance]

I have 2 idea's:

1: Let Centcom be a trader
Centcom would be a buyer of canisters of various mixes. This is pretty canon to me. Some hot, some cold, some high pressure, some with strange mixes. Canisters would be treated like crates, labelled and sent off, only coding-wise it would check it's atmospheric contents.

2: Add more elemental gasses + plasma reacting with them
Helium was suggested, I propose Hydrogen, Flourine and Chlorine. There's no point of adding these new gasses in unless they have beneficial uses so here's what I have in mind and a rundown of already existing combo's:
Plasma: Funky new fuel
Oxygen: Spaceman living requirement
Plasma+Oxygen: Required for burning
C02: Deadly silent killer
Plasma+C02: Expodey mix when heated
N20: Laughing till you drop
Plasma+N2O: None. I suggest leaving it so.
N2: Used in air, and in the engine cold loop (I think?)
Plasma+N2: None, although it could use a use. Suggestion required. Perhaps acts as a super fire supessor?
Hydrogen: Explodes like black powder when comes in contact with fire. Heating the canister causes a significant explosion. Useful for badness like room bombs
Plasma+Hydrogen: Super-cooled plasma + Hydrogen could make an interesting effect. Perhaps causes it to be Super Super cooled?
Helium: Squeeky gas, causes breather to pass out.
Plasma+Helium+??: Depending on the mix, it will solidify. The solid can be applied to stuff like engines like suggested in the OP
Flourine: Yellow toxic gas
Plasma+Flourine+C02 (Plasma Fleurocarbon) Coats any metalic object it touches, reinforcing it, including floors and Walls. The speed at which this happens is highly dependant on temperature
Chlorine: Invisable gas which gives burn and toxin damage
Plasma+Chlorine: Highly poisonous or healing gas depending on the temp.


I'm sure the above can be even further mixed up to give gasses a use

[VictorMAngoStein]

Balloon animals filed with toxins. It's the new loaf processor.

[Marquesas]

I have 2 idea's:

1: Let Centcom be a trader
Centcom would be a buyer of canisters of various mixes. This is pretty canon to me. Some hot, some cold, some high pressure, some with strange mixes. Canisters would be treated like crates, labelled and sent off, only coding-wise it would check it's atmospheric contents.

With the shortage of canisters as it is, unless there is a seller, this isn't really a good idea.

Gases.

Okay, so you want Chemistry II, immediately suggesting something as overpowered as Hydrogen. No. No no no. No. NO. Nope. Cease. Halt. Do not eat.

Well, I could support a visible gas causing burn damage.

[Clarks]

Canister bombs!!!

They don't even have to be bigger than tank-transfer bombs. I just want to use them for terrorism & hostage taking.

I put this in the generic science thread by mistake, it was meant to be here.

[Sundance]

I have 2 idea's:

1: Let Centcom be a trader
Centcom would be a buyer of canisters of various mixes. This is pretty canon to me. Some hot, some cold, some high pressure, some with strange mixes. Canisters would be treated like crates, labelled and sent off, only coding-wise it would check it's atmospheric contents.

With the shortage of canisters as it is, unless there is a seller, this isn't really a good idea.

Gases.

Okay, so you want Chemistry II, immediately suggesting something as overpowered as Hydrogen. No. No no no. No. NO. Nope. Cease. Halt. Do not eat.

Well, I could support a visible gas causing burn damage.

Did you know??
1. There is the a canister manufacterer that makes empty canisters + everything else
2. Hydrogen is the first natural elemental gas that exists at room temperature
I didn't just suggest these things without thinking of it. What's wrong with toxins being similar to chemistry, only you have temperature has a major co-factor to how things are applied?

[Marquesas]

I have 2 idea's:

1: Let Centcom be a trader
Centcom would be a buyer of canisters of various mixes. This is pretty canon to me. Some hot, some cold, some high pressure, some with strange mixes. Canisters would be treated like crates, labelled and sent off, only coding-wise it would check it's atmospheric contents.

With the shortage of canisters as it is, unless there is a seller, this isn't really a good idea.

Gases.

Okay, so you want Chemistry II, immediately suggesting something as overpowered as Hydrogen. No. No no no. No. NO. Nope. Cease. Halt. Do not eat.

Well, I could support a visible gas causing burn damage.

Did you know??
1. There is the a canister manufacterer that makes empty canisters + everything else
2. Hydrogen is the first natural elemental gas that exists at room temperature
I didn't just suggest these things without thinking of it. What's wrong with toxins being similar to chemistry, only you have temperature has a major co-factor to how things are applied?

1. I did forget about this. Oh jolly joy though, we have to rely on mining.
2. Excuse me you're suggesting something that takes no effort to make and explodes. Sounds overpowered? Classic you.

[Sundance]

What if pods accepted plasma tanks as fuel, yet never ran out. Now if you make a potent mix in toxins, it boosts the pods performance (speed and stuff) by up to a certain percentage. For example, amazing mix = 50% faster pod.

Maybe this could even be measured in Octane or something so us podmasters with 93 Octane can laugh at the assistants with 72 as we speed past them at the red light.

Totally missed this idea, this would be cool.
Addendum: Scrap different engines altogether have different burns in plasma tanks make pods fly diffrently.
High burn would cause it to run faster, the presense of hydrogen would make the pods enertia less exaggerated, (thus handling better) Introduce a coolant system on the pod which is in charge of various things like the speed you can fire and use the wormhole, so you can use a plasma based coolant.

1. I did forget about this. Oh jolly joy though, we have to rely mining. No really this is a good thing and I should be supporting inter-departmental things like this
2. Excuse me you're suggesting something that I actually hate fun secretely and didn't really read your post. If I did I probably would of realised that the explosion caused by the hydrogen is only really useful is you wanted to create a chain reaction

Fixed that for you marqy

Sounds overpowered? Classic you

Please don't make a fool of yourself again. This is a suggestion forum not a bitchfest.

[Captain_Bravo]

enertia

Inertia.

( )

[Chike101]

Copy/Pasting my idea from the other thread

It's called Toxins, right?

What if they could mix some barrels of toxic, radioactive, glowing green goo to sell (or make glow sticks)? They would sell for a reasonable price in QM. The engineers can use it as fuel, because they ran out of char to burn. The chef could use it as icing for his cake. The traitors can kidnap people and threaten to lower them into this shit unless they get enough cash, who knows. Bunch of ideas.

Depending on the mix, it could have good effects? Neutral effects? Oh God Why effects?

[QP Evergrande]

Perhaps something to do would be to add new chemical reactions to the game that required higher temperatures than the reagent heater can achieve? So you set up a fire reaction in chamber A to heat up a gas mix or beaker full of chemicals in chamber B. I don't know what those would be, but they would have to be pretty interesting to justify the trouble you'd have to go to.

One thing that comes to mind is taking common ores (mauxite/molitx/pharosium) and smelting them to produce rarer ores (Maybe requiring the presence of gas mixes, with the closer the gas mix is to an ideal ratio the more efficient the reaction?). Then you smelt rare ores to produce high-selling ores. I don't know if it would make things easier overall, but it would at least give another option for acquiring that stuff. Miners, bless their hearts, just aren't efficient enough or, oftentimes, existent enough to fulfill the station's needs. So many great items are hardly ever seen because you don't have the materials. Of course, that would mean making some significant modifications to toxins and to the game as a whole.

1. Create new super-heat resistant/heat-blocking floor tiles and walls, which require more than just standard metal to produce.
2. Create new reinforced pipes (VERY IMPORTANT) able to handle high pressure better, as well as a way to reinforce existing pipes
3. Add some way to both add and remove objects from the chambers without having to enter it (a chute? Something like the floor flusher in the brig used to remove prisoners?)
4. Improve the temperature sensors and pump control computer so they can tell you when the temperature in the chambers is holding stable
5. Also add a pump control computer function that controls heat bleed from one chamber to the other in some way.
6. Add a cold loop to all reaction chambers (The contents of which do not interact with the chamber itself) so you can cool down the chamber after heating it up.

Actually, now that I think about it, if it's going to be used this way, it would be better to move the toxins lab to a new area, perhaps near the cargo bay and engineering? Give engineers, scientists and QMs access (You know, to increase the potential havoc). Then in the space where toxins used to be, you put that particle accelerator lab some people in the SA thread were talking about.

A while back I cut together an image of an improved cargo bay I'd love to have (shameless plug: it's in the "The cargo bay I wish I could have" thread). Maybe I should do the same for this new toxins/smelting/mixing lab.