SS2 QBR Breaker

[67436d32da17avoodoo47]

yes, ND has done wonders in more than one area, the ability to load essentially infinite amount of dml mods at the same time not being an exception.

[67436d32da2ddvoodoo47]

updated to 1.01, now you'll get one random item after frobbing the pad, accompanied by the spawn effect. also killed off the now redundant Polito mail about her activating the QBRs that would normally be received near the first machine (and makes no sense with this mod active as all the QBRs are permanently busted).

the scripting isn't exactly beautiful, but hey, whatever does the job, right?

[67436d32da7bdsarge945]

updated to 1.01, now you'll get one random item after frobbing the pad, accompanied by the spawn effect. also killed off the now redundant Polito mail about her activating the QBRs that would normally be received near the first machine (and makes no sense with this mod active as all the QBRs are permanently busted).

I was going to suggest this when I got that email, but then forgot about it. Nice work!

Will the new update work with an existing game?

EDIT: It works fine so far. I haven't tried it on any previous QBRMs though. The only problem with my current deck was the QBRM was already sparking, but the button otherwise worked fine.

[67436d32da927tiphares4]

i would love a version which removes the QBRs altogether.. they always seemed too unrealistc and immersion-breaking for me.. too much more like science-fantasy...

[67436d32daaa9ZylonBane]

Riiight. So you're fine with strong AIs, psychic powers, tools that can instantly repair any device, med beds that can instantly heal any injury, stasis field guns, anti-gravity generators, teleporters, replicators, interstellar starships, and reality-warping FTL drives. But QBRs? Well that's just silly!

[67436d32dab7etiphares4]

: /

[67436d32daef3Kolya]

ZylonBane Didn't you recently replace a midwife in the BOTM with a shotgun hybrid, because you felt it was illogical for her to be there?  I guess we all draw the line at different points.

[67436d32db286tiphares4]

Riiight. So you're fine with strong AIs, psychic powers, tools that can instantly repair any device, med beds that can instantly heal any injury, stasis field guns, anti-gravity generators, teleporters, replicators, interstellar starships, and reality-warping FTL drives. But QBRs? Well that's just silly!

Well, for almost most of those things i am willing to put my suspension of disbelief in there - for the sake of the experience of being marooned on a deep space vessel, one of my favourite sci fi tropes since i watched alien and similar things - except for Qrbs and psi-powers for example (although i intended to do a psi-only run for years, but never pulled through, but thats another story i guess..).

As for interstellar spacehips: maybe i just pretend i'm on an interplanetary ship instead of one heading to tau ceti; med beds = auto-doc units executing conventional surgery with accordingly long off-screen time, replicators = conventional good-dispensers, etc. etc.

would be all good stuff to be remodded too.. to make for an authentic hard sci-fi experience.. wouldn't it?

[67436d32db8b4ZylonBane]

ZylonBane Didn't you recently replace a midwife in the BOTM with a shotgun hybrid, because you felt it was illogical for her to be there?  I guess we all draw the line at different points.

Yes, because of the game's own explicitly stated reasons for why cyborg midwives exist. Completely different from some mushy "I'm okay with this superscience but not this other superscience."

would be all good stuff to be remodded too.. to make for an authentic hard sci-fi experience.. wouldn't it?

No. The replicators being replicators is the only way it makes sense for them to dispense BULLETS.

[67436d32dbf0cRoSoDude]

Yes, because of the game's own explicitly stated reasons for why cyborg midwives exist. Completely different from some mushy "I'm okay with this superscience but not this other superscience."

Except the reasoning is flawed.
SCPb4 changelist:

Midwives 1467, 1469 nowhere near any eggs. Midwives should only be in the BotM near eggs.
//fixed, replaced with shotgun hybrids 1616, 1467

Objections:

• Irrational had Body of the Many consist of the hardest enemies that fit the fiction (Cyborg Midwives, Invisible Spiders, Rumblers, Psi Reavers) because it's supposed to be a challenging final area. Shotgun Hybrids are fodder by this point
• It makes substantially less sense for a Shotgun Hybrid to be anywhere in the Body of the Many, since they'd get instantly consumed by the flesh already (the first stage is the parasitic worm taking over, but if they're already in the body they'd just be eaten for biomass as soon as possible)
• I can think of several locations where Cyborg Midwives are nowhere near any eggs elsewhere in the game, such as their introduction in the storage transitway at the bottom of Engineering, or the ones you can meet in Hydroponics hallways that can easily be assumed to be walking between hatcheries, which could similarly be assumed to be the case in BotM

[67436d32dc1fatiphares4]

No. The replicators being replicators is the only way is makes sense for them to dispense BULLETS.

btw.: i've never bought bullets from goods-dispenser-automaton in the whole 22 years since i play this game..

[67436d32dc4b9Kolya]

Yes, because of the game's own explicitly stated reasons for why cyborg midwives exist.

They were created to tend to the eggs, yes. But that doesn't mean that they can't exist anywhere else.

[67436d32dc855sarge945]

Riiight. So you're fine with strong AIs, psychic powers, tools that can instantly repair any device, med beds that can instantly heal any injury, stasis field guns, anti-gravity generators, teleporters, replicators, interstellar starships, and reality-warping FTL drives. But QBRs? Well that's just silly!

Everyone has a limit. None of those things are implying the human race has literal access to immortality the same way QBRs do. Everything else may be just as silly but likely has far less implications for the world of the game. Especially since characters like Delacroix die long after the QBRs are reactivated, yet doesn't respawn. I can see how that would wreck someone's brain. There's always a point where suspension of disbelief breaks, and it's different for every person.

For me personally, I don't really care that much. My problems with QBRMs are the way in which they trivialise significant parts of the gameplay, which is why I use this mod. I don't really care how they affect the universe of the game. Removing them entirely really has no gameplay benefit, would require significant work, and wouldn't really add anything of value. It's probably not worth doing, even if anyone actually wanted to.

I guess the best solution I can offer is to pretend they are scanning machines or something. The mod removes the email about them, so you're free to dream up whatever your own explanation is for these broken machines.

[67436d32dc9d6Kolya]

I would enjoy a version of this mod where activating the QBRM starts some relaxing muzak playing inside and no enemy can enter. That would make it a happy place to store items and regenerate (mentally).

[67436d32dcaeevoodoo47]

to provide a technical answer to the original question - yes, a complete QBR removal mod would be possible (basically, put the lights out and slap a fake wall over it), but impractical (custom objects required, and the mod would have to be SCP exclusive). so not worth doing - the current mod will have to suffice.

[67436d32dcf3dJDoran]

Different things have different degrees of subjective believeablility, even if they are all actually impossible.

A good example is one I read that said most science fiction fans will willingly suspend belief for something that's impossible if it sounds possible, but not for a possible thing that sounds impossible. Imagine a story where there is a bomb on Earth that is powerful enough to destroy the entire Solar system. Probably impossible, but it's a story and the readers will accept it as such.

Now imagine that the bomb is on a countdown, and in ten seconds it will detonate, and destroy the sun, the Earth, Mars, Pluto, etc. The Hero rushes into the room, goes to the bomb, opens the front compartment, and is faced with a keypad. The only way to stop the bomb from detonating is to key in the defuse code on the keypad. The problem is, the hero doesn't actually know what the defuse code is, only that it's a twelve digit number. So the hero thinks "Well, I have nothing to lose", then he randomly presses a key twelve times, and the bomb stops, with a message "Bomb disarmed". That is possible, though the chances against it are monumental (999,999,999,998 to 1, I think), but no one would regard that as a good end to the story, despite it being possible. It just doesn't seem believable . Whereas if the hero was a cyborg from another dimension, who teleported in and froze the bomb in a time lock, it would somehow seem much more acceptable, storywise.

And I have to agree with Sarge946 here, I always felt that SS2's back-from-the-dead booths felt like the game was expecting a little too much from me, suspension of disbelief-wise. Most of the rest of the game was fine, but not a magical cure for death. If the QBR system could somehow tell when you were almost dead, then would teleport you to the booth, heal you 100%, and then release you, that would still serve the same game purpose, but even though the science required to do this would still be impossible, it would seem to be much less 'impossible', I think. than the mega-impossibility of bringing back to life a dead person.

They could even justify it story-wise, by saying that your character, like everyone who travelled on the star ship, had had an implant that monitored his/her life-signs, and if the implant recognised that the host's body was so damaged that death was imminent then the implant would broadcast a "Retrieve me and heal this human" signal to the nearest QBR booth.

Mind you, even as they are, the SS2 QBR thing does seem more believable in SS2 than in Bioshock. In System Shock 2, the few times you hear people talking (who might or might not be people...) they have other things on their mind so they don't comment on such an amazing thing as a get-out-of-death machine, but in Bioshock, you hear lots of splicers, who are bored, or worried about dying etc, yet none of them seemed concerned about having such a phenomenally useful machine at hand, and trying to get it to work for their own advantage. You'd expect some technically minded citizens of Rapture to try to get their own DNA accepted into the system (since, by the time you get to visit Rapture, the Vita Chambers are keyed to only work with Andrew Ryan's DNA), or at least to hear them talking about this.

[67436d32dd206ZylonBane]

to provide a technical answer to the original question - yes, a complete QBR removal mod would be possible (basically, put the lights out and slap a fake wall over it), but impractical (custom objects required, and the mod would have to be SCP exclusive). so not worth doing - the current mod will have to suffice.

Just rebadge them all as Orgasmatrons.

[67436d32dd2fbvoodoo47]

don't temp me.

[67436d32dd41asarge945]

Bioshock being terrible at everything isn't exactly news.

But yes, I second making them orgasmotrons. All aboard the ship of the future, if you know what I mean

No sense getting caught with your pants down... Except in this place

[67436d32dd6eaKolya]

Just rebadge them all as Orgasmatrons.

The sim love units are basically that.

[67436d32dd800voodoo47]

like I'm gonna haul my ass all the way to Rec every time I feel like I need a holo-companion.

[67436d32ddb25JDoran]

Bioshock being terrible at everything isn't exactly news.

It isn't even remotely correct, either. Bioshock was a terrible System Shock 2 sequel, since it was stripped of so much that made SS2 so great, but judged on it's own, it's a good, though not great first person shooter. And it did do some things really well; the setting is very atmospheric, Rapture does have a real 'feel' to it. The lore is interesting, the sound is well done and adds to the atmosphere and forboding. The plasmids are interesting, and fun to use, and the first half of the game is a lot of fun to play.

On the minus side, Bioshock is not a game for anyone looking for complicated or thought-requiring game mechanics. The atmosphere and enjoyment level falls of a cliff half-way through the game, the end boss fight isn't just un-enjoyable to fight and bafflingly easy to beat, but it lacks any imagination at all (which is amazing, given the imagination and ideas that went into the rest of the game), and replaying the game when you're overly familiar with it all does tend to feel like you're playing through a procession of scripted events.

On top of which, the game wasn't moddable, unfortunately.  Imagine the mods that talented fans would and could have made for the game. But sadly, it wasn't to be.

[67436d32ddc59sarge945]

So you're telling me a game that, by your own admission turns to complete shit after the first half, is good.

Interesting.

[67436d32ddd46Kolya]

Right, things are either shit or not. Stop confounding us with those multivalent ideas of yours, JDoran!