Should Micros be allowed to use guns?

[Scree]

The biggest balance issue I can think of for this would be that shrink rays would become incredibly, hilariously op against security. Two shots and you've rendered them unable to use the gear they've brought with them, 'cause a non-micro sec officer isn't going to be carrying the micro-scale equipment.

Another possible balancing factor could be to apply a modifier to the character's max health, as seen with teshari, but that might be something for another thread.

[ulviiriara]

I have to agree with Scree, I have actually BEEN shot with a shrink ray as the HoS and if it disarmed me it would have been a bad day for Kate. I would have had to rely on the other two officers instead of being able to shoot myself, with the person who shrunk me able to pick me up and bugger off with nothing stoping him due to him being macroed from a shrink ray.

[Nightwing]

RE: Silver, I get where you're coming from, really I do, but in the grand scheme of things, I think there's two big points to be made about micros:
1) What are people doing relying on mechanics over RP on a high-RP server?
2) If an actual two-inch-tall creature came running up to you, attacked you, then ran away again, and you aimed a pistol at it, would it be as easy as shooting a full-grown man?

I'll split this down into two sections:

It seems to me that this issue is mostly as a result of peoples' behaviour on the server. This is a high RP environment. In a perfect scenario, mechanically firing a gun at somebody wouldn't come into the equation. We do have people, however, who'd sooner run up to someone and spam click than roleplay out a combat scenario. Surely, then, the fault lies with people like this rather than micros? I understand that logically it's not a problem that's going to be fixed even if we start cracking down on it, but there will always be people who run up to other people and use mechanics over RP, even those who don't routinely play micros. It's just harder to stop the micros mechanically.
The other scenario in which we'd use heavy mechanics is for an event. Now, events don't happen very often, which is part of why it's an event. If we had them every shift, they'd be mundane and we'd be more action-oriented. During events, especially story-oriented ones, Ace would typically enforce that all players should be normal sized to reduce friendly fire anyway. I can distinctly remember this happening in the big Redspace event a couple of years ago. If we're going to enforce that people shouldn't be micro-sized during the most mechanics-heavy times on the station, and encourage RP over mechanics for the rest of the time, why are we worried about balancing this feature for combat?

To explain my second point a little more clearly, this one breaks down a little more when it comes to balance. Right now, it's unbalanced that micros have the stats they do. That's because they're harder to hit, but have the same HP as humans, the same damage, etc. To help ease this, we added stomp mechanics, which I frequently see forgotten in favour of a gun. Simply select any non-help intent and walking over a micro's tile will incapacitate them for a few seconds. You don't even have to click them, there's no chance of failure. You can auto-stun, and indeed stun-lock micros simply by walking over their tile over and over. You just can't deal damage, because we fear the griefing potential would be too large. Therefore micros are encouraged to stick to ranged combat.
I feel that the size of micros not only eases the code (multiples of 2), but also is more realistic. As I said above, if you had, say, a mouse running across the room in real life, and you tried to shoot it with a pistol, how likely are you to hit a moving, tiny target? How likely are you to hit a stationary tiny target at range without aiming first? Rather than include some RNG miss change, this method makes it easier to miss a micro - as would be realistic - with a ranged weapon unless you're aiming at them carefully. Ideally, we'd want to increase the damage micros take and decrease the damage they deal - but this may not be quite so possible due to current code limitations.

-----

I do hope this post was coherent and explained some of the reasons behind why the game is the way it is. I could probably think of more explanation, but it's late and I'm tired.

[Wickedtemp]

The biggest balance issue I can think of for this would be that shrink rays would become incredibly, hilariously op against security. Two shots and you've rendered them unable to use the gear they've brought with them, 'cause a non-micro sec officer isn't going to be carrying the micro-scale equipment.

Another possible balancing factor could be to apply a modifier to the character's max health, as seen with teshari, but that might be something for another thread.

I actually wouldn't support any drastic change in health. It'd make the hardest type of patient to treat also one of the most urgent cases. Doctors cannot see where a micro's health bar is at with the HUD. They can SEE it, but unless you look real fuckin' close, it's difficult to see what level it's at. Triage with micros is abysmal as it is. Lowering their health, as much as it makes sense balance-wise, would make it even more difficult... As for shrink rays, "This is a for-fun tool used for size change RP. Mechanical abuse of this feature will result in an OOC consequence. So don't.", maybe add that to the examine text.

AS FOR THE ACTUAL THREAD...

Yeah. Micro's probably shouldn't have guns. You can't even tell if a micro HAS a gun, unless you manage to examine them before they run off-screen, and that's only if you happen to see them in the first place. A micro could have the damn HoS rig and an assault rifle, and as long nobody catches an 'examine', nobody would see it. And even if they do, what could they even do to stop them. Course... I do have a bit of a bias here. Having been pestered by micro characters in the past, by them purposefully trying to blend in with the floor tiles so they can sneak into areas they don't have access to, and having seen more than one case of a micro evading sec.

Sure, you can step on them. But IIRC -I could be wrong on this- all they have to do is click an arrow key, and they're out, if you use a disarm-step. Harm-step, you'd need to run them over, and over and over and over to even do anything.

So... Yeah. Voting 'No' for this.

[BossVoss]

Hi, folks. First post here; I've been playing on the station on and off for six months now; and I just wanted to add my perspective to the conversation here. I appreciate the server being high-RP, and from my perspective, mechanics are secondary in that they serve a useful purpose in moderating disputes when players disagree on how the RP should unfold. When those mechanics facilitate RP, that's great, but when they interfere with RP, that presents a problem. One way that mechanics can interfere with RP is when they impose an arbitrary rule set that doesn't logically follow from the RP, forcing the characters to shrug and accept without reason.

Here's an example of a problem: A few months ago, my character had been the victim of abuse, and the next shift, she contacted Security to ask about nonlethal self-defense for future situations. When she asked if using a shrink ray to effectively incapacitate an assailant was a viable course, the Security staff told her it would make the assailant more dangerous by making them difficult to aim at while still capable of as much harm. There was no possible explanation for why reducing someone from six feet to six inches in size would mean they have as much melee strength, could wield the same deadly firearms, or could sustain as much bodily damage. It cut off that route to future roleplay that would have involved subduing and carrying a would-be attacker like a baby bird (which would have been great ). In that way, the mechanics interfered with roleplay, and that's a problem.

I agree with Nightwing above me that micro-sized characters should be remarkably difficult to hit. That's an aspect of their physical volume that logically follows from their being micro, and it presents new opportunities for roleplay by forcing those trying to capture them to change up their tactics.
I also agree with others in this thread that micros should not be able to effectively use firearms that are either too large for them, or would do negligible damage if scaled down. Allowing them to do so leaves them unbalanced mechanically, and it does not logically follow from the roleplay. Disallowing them, however, presents new opportunities for roleplay by forcing them to adapt to other tactics, such as evading and hiding, or hit-and-run with weapons that are not size-dependent, such as drug injections or chemicals.

In the situation that Ulviiriara outlined above, it is my impression that the HoS being shrunken to a state of near-helplessness would be interesting roleplay. The HoS would rely on the other officers to take down the perpetrator, or flee and regroup. Would this make shrink rays incredibly dangerous? Yes, and that logically follows from the roleplay, expanding on it and giving new RP opportunities. Perhaps that means making shrinking technology restricted to certain personnel that require its use, and that in turn produces new possibilities for illicit activity in smuggling those items out, generating more roleplay on the station.

Those are my thoughts. I would love to see VORE move closer and closer to a state where the mechanics and roleplay overlap perfectly, and I think the present motion is a good step in the right direction.

[Scree]

I actually wouldn't support any drastic change in health. It'd make the hardest type of patient to treat also one of the most urgent cases. Doctors cannot see where a micro's health bar is at with the HUD. They can SEE it, but unless you look real fuckin' close, it's difficult to see what level it's at. Triage with micros is abysmal as it is. Lowering their health, as much as it makes sense balance-wise, would make it even more difficult... As for shrink rays, "This is a for-fun tool used for size change RP. Mechanical abuse of this feature will result in an OOC consequence. So don't.", maybe add that to the examine text.

Fun fact: reducing someone's max health only affects how much positive health they have. If we dropped their maxhealth to 50, they'd still have to hit -100 before dying like anyone else. So while it'd only take 50 to drop them (instead of 100), it'd still take 150 (compared to 200) to kill.

[Slayerhero90]

votin yes and proposing a solution without any understanding of the feasibility of it

1: make micro sprites a little bit bigger. this would assist with a number of other nuisance details about micros like being damn invisible and looking like cigarette butts
and/or
2: apply some sort of scaling damage output to the sizes while possibly reducing uncritted health so that micro firearms and melee weapons do significantly reduced damage to those they strike

then still, unless things have changed since i stopped showing my face around these parts, the mechanical difficulties inherent to no-rp pvp combat with micros should only present themselves with griefers, consensual no-rp combat, and maybe micros running from sec. i can't think of any other situations in which a regular micro player will be no-rp fighting without breaking rp convention/tact

[Arbon]

This has always confused me, why are people concerned about micros using GUNS when guns are the one area in which they have no real advantage? Doesn't shooting their tile shoot the micro, meaning you don't have to be pixel accurate? Its only melee in which micros could move about and evade so they were impossible to click directly, and the solution to that was to add stomping mechanics so you never have to click. I do suspect that based on Wickedtemp's experience or even Kayleen's objections that stomping at current isn't powerful enough, and I feel we should have copied Citadel's old route to balancing micros. A stomp knocks them down, stuns them, and disarms them, while lasting a long enough time to get the micro into cuffs. And I feel that there should be some way to keep a micro held in hand from simply stepping out of your grip with a one-click resist.

Taking away guns though? Thats not going to stop people who abuse the micro sprites to gun down everyone with a shotgun. Most greifers use explosives anyway.

The LAST time this was brought up "Oh arbon, just switch to an all-explosive arsenal" was what people outright suggested to me, which I felt hilarious in that my own micro security character hardly ever uses guns. Always preferring the non-lethal stun baton ... which I can't access anymore unless HoS because Detectives aren't allowed to have melee weapons. Is that really what people want instead? Rather than fire a taser, they want a micro to walk through a room, drop a grenade, and keep walking with an explosion going off behind them? This style of hit and run, make sure you are never seen combat is what you wish to encourage? Can't even follow the beams to see where they went?

Sure it can happen anyway, but why teach the entire server that this is what's expected of a micro?

This huge issue with taking away guns is that far too many people assume guns are the only weapons or the best weapons, and making sure a micro can't shoot means that you will never see a micro in combat. The reality is that so long as combat is possible, combat is going to happen. Be it with players, as part of an event, or against NPC mobs. It doesn't even have to be a gateway mission, there are and have been times where an NPC mob appears on station. The difference here is what style of combat would you expect a micro to be utilizing, and what styles do you with to encourage? At present "Grab a toolbox or a stick and get up really close to bash them in the foot" or perhaps grab an entire stack of floor tiles and start throwing them as you run.

So every micro in combat starts playing shadow of the colossus ... pew-pew from a distance just doesn't make sense, nope, only reasonable for a micro to get in your face and bash you with a hand-held weapon. No possible way lasers could be dangerous even while underpowered laser pointers are noted to be a safety hazard IRL.

In regards to shrink rays I'm a bit confused as to why shrinking a target in self defense wouldn't work or why security told you against it, once shrunken simply begin to stomp on them. If you have an actual gun in your hand, start shooting them. Neither of these things require you to click the target directly, so why exactly would making them harder to click directly remove your ability to fight them? To be fair Arbon as HoS has given people training sessions in how to take down a micro, because it does require different skillsets and making heavy use of the stomp mechanic is your friend. But shrink and then stomp is perfectly viable mechanically.

Even better, it's perfectly viable thematically, as you and the target simply rollplay out the effects of that new size. In this server you really shouldn't be considering it an option to shrink ray random combatants (there are people who will quit the server if they are forced into that, even despite the fact you can simply change your size back with a single click in the top menus) and if you do have permission to shrink ray someone in a scene, then they really shouldn't be making mechanical combat against you at all.

Last topic is the mechs. I am sorry Demicus, but if we actually had reliable access to a Mech that would make perfect sense. But I am not forced to use one, adore whenever I get to use one as sec, and even when my policy is: "All gateway missions require a mech, if you can't manage a riply then don't bother going" I still hardly ever manage to access one. You need a robotisist, you need a miner, you need both of them to be working, you to make sure the miner started before the robotisist, you need someone to willingly grant you access, you need someone of authority and ability to allow you as security to have access, and then once you have them you are not allowed to walk the station with them casually either.

As expected, I vote no. Arbon rarely uses guns, I loathe guns as a concept because they are boring, not being able to use guns won't affect me in the slightest (Throw the stun baton is my go-to ranged attack for thematic reasons) and my biggest reason is that this is a nonsensical idea that will cause more problems than it's worth, and take one step toward removing micros all-together. As I'm seeing many people suggest by just making the micro larger. Its not a slippery slope if thats what people are actually coming up with.

[Aces]

I want to point out that although a nimble micro might have an advantage in a melee fight, that advantage is balanced by stomping mechanics if used effectively.

Guns are not just imbalanced, they let micros attack with total impunity. That is not okay. I have no problem with micros using other weapons. Plus, we already discussed code to nerf micro attack power, which is not possible with guns. However for the purposes of this vote, like I said, we are ignoring alternatives for now, just in case they do not come to fruition. They probably will, but I promise nothing yet.

Upping the size of micros would only barely mitigate the problem. I'm okay with that, but it still doesn't resolve the problem as we'd like it to.

Lastly, the argument of "well then don't RP shit" is just not valid. Even our best roleplayers still abuse this ability, which means that the ability is, by its own nature, encouraging abuse. Therefore, it should be removed. Changing the rules and punishing players who use a feature that is intended and natural is very bad for the server's health. Bad features like this that otherwise seem completely within reason of what is expected to be possible and realistic in the game's confines should be removed/changed outright, not blocked by rules, if they cause problems. That would be like if I added a feature for players to shit on the floor for people who liked scat, then banned them for doing it because "it breaks peoples' prefs." While not untrue, it'd still be idiotic of me to add the feature in the first place. In this case, the only difference is we're talking about a feature that always existed because we didn't remove it when we added our own feature that screwed up the natural balance of the game.

For the same reason, we no longer have Blueshield. Sure, some good RPers were good with it, but everyone else was just complete shit and caused problems. We removed it. By its very nature, it caused problems.

[Wickedtemp]

This huge issue with taking away guns is that far too many people assume guns are the only weapons or the best weapons, and making sure a micro can't shoot means that you will never see a micro in combat. The reality is that so long as combat is possible, combat is going to happen. Be it with players, as part of an event, or against NPC mobs. It doesn't even have to be a gateway mission, there are and have been times where an NPC mob appears on station. The difference here is what style of combat would you expect a micro to be utilizing, and what styles do you with to encourage? At present "Grab a toolbox or a stick and get up really close to bash them in the foot" or perhaps grab an entire stack of floor tiles and start throwing them as you run.

Think about it this way.

Why the hell would a 3-inch crew member actually be involved in combat. From an RP perspective, you'd think they'd look up at their foe, and just go "FUCK ME, RUN AWAY!", because if a micro fights a macro, http://www.mrinitialman.com/OddsEnds/Sizes/sizes.html?base_ft=20&base_in=0&comp_ft=0&comp_in=5 this is what they see. That little tiny black sliver? That's a micro, at 5 inches in height. Going up against a macro, at 20 feet.

What sensible person wouldn't run away and hide?