DangerRevolution
commented
6 months ago On round start, every Borg is issued with a finely-crafted Lawset. i.e:
- law-janitor-1 = You are a crusader and the station's inhabitants are your charge.
- law-janitor-2 = Your enemy is the litter, spills, and other messes across the station.
- law-janitor-3 = Your weapons are the cleaning supplies available to you.
- law-janitor-4 = Defend the beings under your charge.
- law-janitor-5 = Exterminate the enemy.
The purpose of an Ion Storm as per: https://github.com/space-wizards/space-station-14/pull/20277
can randomly mess up a borgs laws which could be harmless or very very bad
Ion Storms, fundamentally; scramble the finely-crafted leaning tower of Laws. By removing, replacing, scrambling the order or entirely changing the lawset. The 'point' of finely-crafted laws is: A) They have a direction, but still have some interpretation. B) When 'scrambled' these laws are taken out of their perfect order; and are FAR more interpretable. This NEGATIVE event which fundamentally SCRAMBLES the Borg's logic is MEANT to cause issues, and is MEANT to be interpretable.
an ion storm that goes "X is harmful to crew" does NOT impact the borg, as they do not have directive regarding crew, rendering ion storms quite useless regarding those kind of laws
It does impact the Borg, as it now has a more wider and interpretable lawset: i.e "Are the Crew and the Station's Inhabitants different concepts? Do I protect only the crew from medical instruments? What are medical instruments? Any medical care at all? Is a bandage a medical instrument? Are the Crew and Station Inhabitants fundamentally the same?"
That's just one thought process. The negative event has scrambled the finely constructed logic of a Borg, forever changing it's personality and it's capabilities. Think of it as a human that could previously only tell lies, slipped on a banana peel; hit his head and can now only tell the truth. It fundamentally shakes up the possibilities.
It was, OOC defined that crew is whoever has a recognised job ID icon A) Source? B) Even with a source, this game has no lore and vaguely defined concepts at best. I've personally always been told that if they're on the manifest then they're on your crew. Who's definition do we go with then?
With this chassis, a mice/station pet could be a station inhabitant, it's not necessarily bad, but considering that it straight up changes what is ""crew"",
That's not a bad thing. As you say.
it partly renders the sechud useless along with let's say, a SPIDER could be considered station inhabitant, and therefore be defended fully by the borg (they crawl in maints and spawn, that's more player interpretation.).
The SecHud doesn't tell Security sophonts, doesn't mean it's not useless and Borgs don't particularly have much use for a SecHud anyways, refer to above about us being told different things OOC about who is and isn't crew.
Player Interpretation is good. It leads to more dynamic scenario. A borg watching a felinid try hunt down a mice to chomp, could now think "Oh shit! My Laws! An interesting dynamic situation!" and try to intervene, as just an example.
Alternatively if they are malfunctionnal, at no point do they have to state laws, and that would not make them malf, having an extra law would, basically if crew decided to take a janiborg down for not stating laws, they'd just be damaging NT property that is working correctly.
If you want a slave, get a Basic Borg or a Service Borg or a Mining Borg, who have Law 2. This is a cleaning cyborg who's concern is cleaning. Similar to a Medical Borg who's focus is on saving lives, or an Engineering Borg who's focus is on repairing the station.
Also, no one is forcing people to pick the Jani or Med or Engi Borg, it's serving you in a way that isn't serving your every command. Also, you can still "game" Borgs into giving you their laws. "Hey Jani Borg, I found a HUGE puddle! So messy! I'll only tell you if you tell me your laws."
basically if crew decided to take a janiborg down for not stating laws
Also they're just shitters for randomly breaking a drone instead of having Sci dismantle it / find it a new chassis. However this is covered as an issue in: https://github.com/space-wizards/space-station-14/issues/24751 https://github.com/space-wizards/space-station-14/pull/24855 https://github.com/space-wizards/space-station-14/issues/22744
-Law 3 of crewsimov is not present under any form for the new lawsets, I believe. The borg has no incentive for self preservation, it can just smash it's chassis which is VERY anti NT mindset and their policy of AI slavery, RP wise who wants a bot that can just smash itself.
A) A Borg can logic itself that it's own destruction would risk their ability to carry out X law, but if someone does decide to kill themselves then uh, their loss? They just lost their own ghost role and they're a shitter for it.
Addressing mainly law 2, 3 and 5. All of those could be condensed into a law 3/4 that goes after regular crewsimov that goes "your secondary purpose is to ensure the station's cleanliness, do all you can to clean, clear off trash and keep a sanitary environment for your crew"
Then we're back to the "hands and knees" slavery that's done by Regular and Service Borgs. If you really want someone to answer every demand, just don't build Borgs with custom lawsets. Jani, Medical and Engineering Borgs serve you in different ways that isn't stating their laws repeatedly.
- This hampers the meta game of "Borg state laws or I beat your skull in" which is cringe anyways as you should just take it's brain out.
- Again, this widens the pool of possible roleplay by widening the possible laws that are scrambled. Ion Storm laws BREAK your lawset, they aren't a minor inconvenience. your ENTIRE CODE is FUCKED. It's not meant to be a net positive. It's like Detroit Become Human when Connor loses his programmed intention to pulverise other Cyborgs. It's free-r choice, more player interpretation and possibly more roleplay variety and opportunity!
P.S I will fix Law 4 and 2 of Janitor Lawset, wrapping it in premium-grade Anti-Shitter Bubblewrap.
TLDR: I will fix Law 4 and 2. This is a perspective thing, Borgs are still servants and the variety and careful-structure of laws just leads to more interpretability and variety regarding Ion storms. Moar player choice and Moar RP.
UnicornOnLSD
Description
After looking into it, and experimenting with ONE major changed lawset, the janitorial one, I found several issues with the new lawset: Major ones: -"crew" (the core part of crewsimov) is replaced with "charge", meaning that for example, an ion storm that goes "X is harmful to crew" does NOT impact the borg, as they do not have directive regarding crew, rendering ion storms quite useless regarding those kind of laws, while I find myself that the fun part of being a malf borg in those case is doing everything in your power to protect crew from X until you get ripped out of your chassis. Along with this comes the problem with what is "station's inhabitants". It was, OOC defined that crew is whoever has a recognised job ID icon through the borg sechud. With this chassis, a mice/station pet could be a station inhabitant, it's not necessarily bad, but considering that it straight up changes what is ""crew"", it partly renders the sechud useless along with let's say, a SPIDER could be considered station inhabitant, and therefore be defended fully by the borg (they crawl in maints and spawn, that's more player interpretation.). -In that specific chassis, among others, (namely medical one), the "law 2" (quite certain I need not explain it to you) is gone. While the borg are for example, given tasks, janiborg must clean/"fight" puddles etc.. They do NOT have to obey crew orders, it may be a plus to some but for me it's an extreme drawback, and mostly defeats the point of a borg to be a serviable machine for any crew members. Alternatively if they are malfunctionnal, at no point do they have to state laws, and that would not make them malf, having an extra law would, basically if crew decided to take a janiborg down for not stating laws, they'd just be damaging NT property that is working correctly. Minor ones: -Law 3 of crewsimov is not present under any form for the new lawsets, I believe. The borg has no incentive for self preservation, it can just smash it's chassis which is VERY anti NT mindset and their policy of AI slavery, RP wise who wants a bot that can just smash itself. I am well aware this is more of a nitpick and I doubt that anyone put in such chassis would just go "I'll destroy that body they made for me" but it still shows as an issue to me. -that's regarding the fluff, flavor of the laws, they are pretty, well written, but aside from missing important directions the crewsimov laws have, some are not laws, rather than definitions without real purpose. Addressing mainly law 2, 3 and 5. All of those could be condensed into a law 3/4 that goes after regular crewsimov that goes "your secondary purpose is to ensure the station's cleanliness, do all you can to clean, clear off trash and keep a sanitary environment for your crew"
TL:DR, as a person who played a DECENT bit of borg before this change (40hours ish of borg) I feel like those laws need to follow more strictly basic crewsimov and make sure it keeps a borg as a tool for the crew with many options for side tasks, or to better aid the crew. Screenshots
reference images regarding every laws mentionned above, along with an ion law to go along with the example.
along with the regular lawset "crewsimov" used as reference:
Additional context
This is definitely an issue to me, but mayhaps a discussion for others regarding the PR, what I am asking is a solution or a revert of said PR. In the following days, if no concrete point or choice is made, I will make a PR myself reverting those changes and refer to this issue as the driving argument.