Make only empowered smes blocks arcfiend powers

[Angel]

Currently, you can get stabilized or even reinforced smes, and it will heavily counter an arcfiend, making you resistant or even immune to some of it's abilities. I am aware the gene was made rarer exactly because of this interaction, but I still believe it's silly that a gene can just hardcounter an antagonist this easily, with reinforced not even being able to be countered with mutadone.
By making it so only empowered smes can make you immune to arcfiends, it forces you to chose to sacrifice some stability to be able to get such immunity, and also makes it always able to be countered by mutadone, which makes it more fair as it's strange that a gene can so easily disable most of an antagonist abilities.

[Snowy :D]

Agree, its an uncommon interaction but no gene should have the ability to invalidate an antagonist’s entire move set.

[RSOD]

if removing non-empowered's effectiveness is off the table i want it to just be a temporary resistance - after a few strikes you lose your SMES gene, reinforced or not
but yes, i think empowering it should be neccessary at the very least to be on par against an arcfiend

[GARGATHUGANOKSREVENG]

Agree, its an uncommon interaction but no gene should have the ability to invalidate an antagonist’s entire move set.

to be fair it's easy enough to just take someone down with a toolbox. should they really have to rely on the crutch of their own abilities when regularly killing is that easy?

[Asterion0]

Agree, its an uncommon interaction but no gene should have the ability to invalidate an antagonist’s entire move set.

to be fair it's easy enough to just take someone down with a toolbox. should they really have to rely on the crutch of their own abilities when regularly killing is that easy?

Relying on the 'crutch' of your abilities is the main point of nonhuman antags in the same way traitors, nukies, and spiefs have to rely on the 'crutch' of their exclusive items. It would be equally as silly if there was a super rare QM req called 'C-saber armor' that was normal armor and completely prevented all C-saber damage!
Especially if you consider that distributing stabilized SMES human is VERY easy as geneticist, and at least some crew are going to grab it, even if it's not a lot. And as you've said, that one staffie is now on equal grounds with the Arcfiend, with the backfup of both security and a medbay not hostile to them to fallback to (which the Arcfiend especially is unlikely to have, as their 'optimal' gameplan is punching Genetics APC, and hacking medbay's vendors for mutadone)

[glowbold]

I dislike flat blanket immunities in general. What if the SMES gene "shorted out" after you would have otherwise been shocked, and then recharges for a short period of time. It'd still be good to get in general and against arcfiends, but it won't brick-wall them the same way it does now.

[Emimiyu]

Been said on discord. SMES feels like if you can copy chaplain training to everyone in regards to arcfiend. It should be at least empowered rather than 100% nulifying arc powers on regular smes. Regular smes should decrease the damage just not 100%

[GARGATHUGANOKSREVENG]

It would be equally as silly if there was a super rare QM req called 'C-saber armor' that was normal armor and completely prevented all C-saber damage!

well, now they HAVE to add the 0.01% chance for c-saber armor to appear as a req reward

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What if the SMES gene "shorted out" after you would have otherwise been shocked, and then recharges for a short period of time

Regular smes should decrease the damage just not 100%

I like these suggestions better than flat-out nerfing SMES human against arcfiends though

[Taylorstar]

If standard SMES gave you the defibrilated status after taking a large enough shock (not like a small jolt from a machine or door) I think that would be a good tie in and would allow medical staff to potentially defibrillate SMES users with enough spam.

[Asterion0]

A 'shorted out' status effect would be cool, and having the main appeal of empowered SMES human being that you can't get shorted would be nice. Also maybe apply it to Arcfiend's inherent SMES human gene just so you don't have them suddenly vulnerable to other Arcfiends after a single hit (Although I think it's already empowered maybe?).
Also kinda gives a buff to the baton special if it counts as enough of a shock to temporarily short out the gene

[Lord_earthfire]

Blanket immunities are a good thing because they are intuitive, impactful and promote backup plans. With that said, i feel they can take more effort, so tying that to empowered smes is a good idea.

The "shorting out" ideas thrown around here, however, are simply overdesigned in my opinion. Which effects should trigger them? Arcfiend only would be too inconsistent. Door shocks and hotwired apc's would just be immunity with extra steps again. Just make baseline smes be half effective against arc flashes and be do e with it.

[Kotlol]

Putting my hat into the situation.
Pure immunity to ANTAGGORY suuuuucks.

Genetics putting immunities on the table against specific things or making people uber robust is something I kinda hate as an antag.
Since if everyone is immune to fire... now all fun fire gimmicks are off the table cause it will just be an "annoyance"
Unless you want to fill the oxygen levels with lots of mutadone so no one has those, but at that point that is too much work just so you can fire bomb.

The REASON we allow Chaplains to be immune to specific antags is because.. the chaplain is a SINGULAR SPAWN and IS NOT SECURITY.
It's a simple civilian with a bonus that only it has. It can also be an antag themselves thus unreliable... It can also be useless in another round and an easy victim.

So let me say a few things about SMES now from a history of SMES-ery.

1: SMES used to give immunity to stun weapons as well. Thus immunity for security weapons/turrets. THIS SUCKED BALLS since now only the detective could do anything about these guys with it's stun bullets (Wich did work). Also sunglasses gave immunity to flashes, any of em. WICH AGAIN.... sucked.
Now imagine every dang grey tider just getting these 2 and security basically couldn't do anything but go lethal on your ass even if you aren't an antag.
This is why there is still a reaction of: "EMPOWERED SMES IN BOOTH! REMOVE IT" happens... even if the immunity is gone.

2: SMES also makes insuls null and void. Wich is fine actually.... it's what SMES is designed to do.

And that's it.. yea just two points.

The reason I do not think the ARCFIEND should be countered by 1 mutation is very simple.... "ARCFIEND DETECTED GET SMES EVERYONE"

However... in my opinion? SMES should allow 2 things actually.
SMES humans give MORE drain for the arcfiend. Thus if they restrain you and drain you.. they get triple as much energy, but IN RETURN. They cannot use their heartstopper on you and you take 75% less damage from electricity from an arcfiend. (They still burn you).

It's a better trade off.... since now it's worth MORE for an arcfiend to hunt you down while being a harder target.

[Taylorstar]

While I love the idea of play counter play action reaction, and Smes not only making them a tougher target but also a more rewarding one such as giving extra juice or maybe causing multiple violent electrical sparks making the situation almost too volatile for normal people to approach.

Another idea could be that SMES makes a person permanently ionized to the arcfiends abilities meaning that a jolt or shock etc could fling them across the station.