Insanity Artifact

[TotusUbertas]

Bleh noisemakers right? But what if on rare occaision... noise makers had another affect?

The basic idea is that anyone within audio range of these artifacts very very slowly begins to have a buildup of some form of crazy inducing reagent/disease.
Berserker of course is the most direct, though LSD+Meth might produce appropriate affects, or just mutagen. 

These 'insanity' artifacts would of course use the lower and more subtle, less noticeable sound maker's 'sounds'. And have to be activated like any other artifact, making them not an immediate threat. However if left untended for too long they.. well I trust we've all seen at least one horror movie where insanity cubes, spheres, or corncobs are left in the base/station a bit too long.

Be just one more thing to keep people on their toes, and perhaps even make Art lab a place traitors might stop by for a minute or two

If you see a problem with the idea, please suggest a solution before just poo-pooing it all together if possible.

[aft2001]

Well, maybe instead of a reagent it could damage brain slowly and give them undetectable mental issues that will become detectable by scans in later cycles. The person would be sort of spammed with messages, with urges, desires, or fears. It could work sort of similar to the AI laws, too! The person would "feel as though everyone's out to kill them", so they'd be justified in killing their coworkers in a paranoia fueled rage.

[Nnystyxx]

Well, maybe instead of a reagent it could damage brain slowly and give them undetectable mental issues that will become detectable by scans in later cycles. The person would be sort of spammed with messages, with urges, desires, or fears. It could work sort of similar to the AI laws, too! The person would "feel as though everyone's out to kill them", so they'd be justified in killing their coworkers in a paranoia fueled rage.

I feel like that would rapidly turn into "better get an insanity artifact so I get valid kills" or at least cause a lot of judging issues

If a coder/admin/codermin could weigh in on the idea it'd be appreciated, but we're reluctant to give people "justifications" to kill people

[TotusUbertas]

I feel like that would rapidly turn into "better get an insanity artifact so I get valid kills" or at least cause a lot of judging issues
....

As much as I like that idea, that is a good point, best to have it cause actual in game insanity like affects rather than rely on roleplaying and ooc/ic separation. Part of why I like the eventual berzerker affect is that it takes the violence out of the player's hands, remove A-Helpable complaints about it.. mostly

[HydroFloric]

It could Raja you if your near it too long but that may be to strong for this

[poland spring]

there's artifacts that generate black holes soooo a very rare variety would work. Most of the time they don't get activated anyway!!

It could Raja you if your near it too long but that may be to strong for this

[aft2001]

Well, bloodlust would give you horrifying debilitation as well as valid reasons for bloodshed. For example, you'd constantly suffer from distorted vision, terrifying hallucinations, screeching noises every now and then, a creepy tone to your game, the inability to use many machines, etc. Also slowed movement and some blindness and the inability to understand much of human speech or even speak yourself, as well as automatically lashing out.

It'd basically turn you into a crying heap of stupidity that'll maul anyone that gets too close.

Of course, the artifact would become a VERY powerful weapon. To balance it out, you'd start hallucinating a bit once you get close. Darkened/brightened vision, very minor distortions or color shifts, etc. This would all happen before the actual effects of insanity took place, so, a (competent and breathing) crew would try their best to quickly dispose of the artifact.

Another thing... There could be two types: Visual and auditory. For visual effects and insanity and hallucinations the artifact MUST be in your line of sight. The artifact itself would be blurred and it'd be surrounded by strange ripples in reality. The closer you get and the more you look at it, the worse your symptoms get, until you reach that special sort of berserker.
The auditory would have a low pitch humming sound emitting from it. Due to the low pitch and energy, it can't penetrate reinforced walls, and can't go that far, and can't go through space. However, you'd start hearing voices and creepy shit. The voices would at first seem to "ignore" you, talking about whatever, but they'd soon start referencing you, others around you, etc. Eventually you'd have urges from these voices to do horrible things, you'd go mute and deaf, and your chance to hear ghosts raises exponentially (10% chance to hear them if they're right on top of you).

This post was sort of a jumble ideas but I can't be assed to make some coherent post during school as I'm procrastinating on schoolwork.

Feel free to cherrypick good or bad ideas, since I gave a small variety of possible functions and stuff.

[TotusUbertas]

No worries, there were some amazing cool ideas in there, blood lust in particular

As for worries about it becoming a weapon, that is kinda the fun part. While weaponizing it would probly be doable, the person using it as a weapon would have to do some work, figuring out it's range, it's activating mechanics, and all while not succumbing to it's affects.

I wouldn't say it'd be too strong, since some artifacts can core an entire section of the station with a touch, this would be nasty but not cause devastation near that level. It'd also be a gradual thing, over the course of several minutes to the character upon entering it's area of effect. Might also affect monkeys but that might be unfair to geneticists.

[misto]

increase the likelihoods of some good nasty drugs in injector artifacts and you got all the insanity you need

[Roomba]

Well, maybe instead of a reagent it could damage brain slowly and give them undetectable mental issues that will become detectable by scans in later cycles. The person would be sort of spammed with messages, with urges, desires, or fears. It could work sort of similar to the AI laws, too! The person would "feel as though everyone's out to kill them", so they'd be justified in killing their coworkers in a paranoia fueled rage.

I feel like that would rapidly turn into "better get an insanity artifact so I get valid kills" or at least cause a lot of judging issues

If a coder/admin/codermin could weigh in on the idea it'd be appreciated, but we're reluctant to give people "justifications" to kill people

This is already a thing, actually. If you get space madness from a rat or the paranoia effect from a pathogen, the station will flip around, random people will announce themselves as traitors or extend imaginary probosci, and occasionally hallucinated copies of crewmembers will spawn and 'attack' you for no real damage. It's a fun effect, but sadly quite rare.

Anyhow, since it already exists in the game, it wouldn't be too hard to make an artifact that generates that effect, probably.

[TotusUbertas]

Yeah the actual insanity is in the game in various forms already, which is nice, it'd just be like the artifacts from horror movies that inflict the insanity over a wide area with very slow onset. More a means of making these things a natural problem for the station, like those rad storms or solar flares, but with the noisemaker noise replacing the announcement over radio/chat

[atomic1fire]

I do think a tator/antag artifact of some kind that could be ordered would be a fun way of doing this, but I feel like tator chaplain already fills that role.

Otherwise it could be something an admin spawns for fun on Día de Nagas.

[misto]

ok. heres an idea. you know those turret artifacts? have a type of those that shoots drug chems and space madness disease loaded in artifact tranq darts

you can make the darts silent and invisible if you want i guess