Medic question

[McGherkin]

Put it this way, what you're saying Lamp is that instead of officially recognising something that goes on already with no problem, you're just going to stop it completely and just kill roleplay.


I reckon we should public vote that.

[[TC]»Pete«]

I never said anything was final. We'll discuss it at our next meeting.

We only add new things if we think they're for the best so our community should respect that.

[McGherkin]

Any news?

[McGherkin]

Still no news? I would like a decision on this.

[Josh]

It's still being quietly discussed in the background. We have more pressing topics for our meetings at the moment, we'll give you some news when there is some.

[Nipper]

Sooo, still no solid info?

I would like to know how this ends up as I used to love razzing my medicar round with blues n twos, bout as close to a blue light run you could legally get.

Not that it matters to me now, but I would like to know just for the sake of knowing.

[McGherkin]

I'd just say 'As you were'.

[Vincent]

so a tow can use horn 4/5 to ? or did i read that the wrong way ?

[McGherkin]

Tow CAN'T use horn 4/5.

[Sadie]

Rule here say something?:

Quote:1.6. Horns #4 and #5 (shift+h) are reserved as a siren for police.

[KaraK [T]]

Adrian2k, read the whole thread, then come back to this page.

[Nipper]

Well, I guess TC have already decided and just need to let the community know.

Unless, it takes this long to decide yes or no?

Then a further 10 minutes to edit the rules slightly to reflect the decision.

Then a further 10 minutes per language for translation.

Tops.

[[TC]»Elmo«]

For the record, we did have a fairly lengthy internal discussion about this and came up with a few options. However, we stalled at a final decision as there were a few answers needed.

It's not a simple 'yes' or 'no' answer, because - in this thread alone - there are a number of variations and even several incorrectly remembered quotes of what's been officially said in the past.


The main question(s), which has been asked in a few places before and in part in this thread already:
What's the point? What do they do? What actual use have they? What tangible benefit do they give over existing units?

"Roleplay" is not a suitable answer. Yes, we appreciate that some people like to roleplay these units, and we don't want to stop that if we don't need to. However, without decent answers to the question above, there's not really any good option other than to say either "They're the same as Tows" or ban them completely, because anything otherwise doesn't make sense.

Note: officially (ie in the rules) giving them the right to use any form of siren will require InSim changes. Having cop rights (ie a suitable driving standard) would very likely be a requirement.

[[TC]►Ras◄]

I guess the only possible points of having a [MED] is basically to assist at crashes, helping tow if needed, making the scene visible to other road users and securing it by for example parking the marked car a suitable distance before the crash, and then the roleplay, suitable answer or not. Some people simply like the "blue light run" part of it.

I've been wondering something since this was brought up ages ago. I believe it's for Elmo: What thoughts did you have when making the TC medic skin?, because you kinda must have thought medic units were somewhat beneficial when you decided to implement that.

Another question that could be asked after the one Elmo posted above, is: What harm can they cause? Would there be any disadvantages to have them?

All i know is that while [MED]'s drove around unofficially with lights and sirens, it never caused any harm or show any disadvantages.

[Chill .]

Its not bad idea , but i think MEDs need insim too like TOWs . Is it real , if ambulance responding with strobes , and police come and starting chase ? I think NO . What do You think ?
-Chill

[Nitros]

I can see no likely outcome which would allow MED units to speed without the cops being able to chase them for it. You would otherwise end up with loopholes in the rules, or very complicated rules - neither of which are a good thing.

[[TC]»Elmo«]

(2012-08-03 07:43)Ras Wrote:  I've been wondering something since this was brought up ages ago. I believe it's for Elmo: What thoughts did you have when making the TC medic skin?, because you kinda must have thought medic units were somewhat beneficial when you decided to implement that.

The original TC medic skin was made back in the CnR (which later became USA) days, before anyone used InSim, when everything was pure roleplay. Back then, LFS had still had a mostly serious sim racing/drifting community and cruising (and the people who give cruising a bad name) didn't really exist. Times change.

(2012-08-03 07:43)Ras Wrote:  Another question that could be asked after the one Elmo posted above, is: What harm can they cause? Would there be any disadvantages to have them?

All i know is that while [MED]'s drove around unofficially with lights and sirens, it never caused any harm or show any disadvantages.

MEDs tend to fall in 3 categories:
Those who do it for the roleplay
Those that have lost their cop rights, but still want to drive fast with sirens.
Those who just want to drive fast (usually with sirens) without being bound to the cop rules.

The first group is good, the second two are the ones who usually cause the problems.
The ones in the second category typically lost their cop rights due to poor driving, so they end up causing chaos as MED instead. The final category typically show very little care to other road users and speed around all the time, because there's nothing really stopping them.

I'd say that a good proportion, if not a majority, of Meds fall into the second categories. We don't really see a huge number of problem cases, because the overall number of Meds is very low, but that doesn't mean that there aren't problems.


As Nitros said, a large part of the problem is creating uncomplicated, enforceable rules, which require properly defined roles before we can even begin seriously thinking about.

(2012-08-03 07:43)Ras Wrote:  I guess the only possible points of having a [MED] is basically to assist at crashes, helping tow if needed, making the scene visible to other road users and securing it by for example parking the marked car a suitable distance before the crash

All of this can already be done by other Tows, Cops, or HwA (if available).

The only thing anyone's thought of that Med/Res can possibly do that's different is to legally get to the scene faster, with lights+siren. Now, lights+siren would (according to Chuck) imply that they have the same priority as Cops in a chase do. Does a tow situation warrant such a high priority? If it can, then they shouldn't be allowed to use sirens when not on acall, but how would this be enforced?

[BMW-gek]

Quote:The ones in the second category typically lost their cop rights due to poor driving, so they end up causing chaos as MED instead

Easily solved. When you loose your COP right you loose your MED rights.

The main problem would be giving the MED's a roleplay on the server. There have to be a insim command for MED's only they can respond on the emergency call and get as soon as possible to the place of the accident.

If you classify MED's in the same priority like COP's you can expect more accidents with the civilian cars. If you disallow the MED's as a priority vehicle then the roleplay doesn't fit completly.

[Speed]

Code:

Heavy Crash Between A and B
A Calls Tow.
Paramedic is on his way to A .
Tow is on his way to A .

I think the [MED] should have something different.

My idea is that medics are only able to ''speed and use sirens'' when there is a heavy crash between A and B and one of the persons calls a tow.

(With a rule that [MED] only will be able to speed when they respond to a ''Heavy Crash'' call on for example : Highway 1 and they are only allowed to speed till they are on the location where the tow/medic is called

A heavy crash could be 2 cars lying on there side on the highway so caution should be on its place in time.

This would make it a more kind of a roleplay I think

[[TC]»Elmo«]

(2012-08-04 11:05)BMW-gek Wrote:  Easily solved. When you loose your COP right you loose your MED rights.

See the end of post #53

(2012-08-04 18:51)Speed Wrote:  I think the [MED] should have something different.

My idea is that medics are only able to ''speed and use sirens'' when there is a heavy crash between A and B and one of the persons calls a tow.

(With a rule that [MED] only will be able to speed when they respond to a ''Heavy Crash'' call on for example : Highway 1 and they are only allowed to speed till they are on the location where the tow/medic is called

A heavy crash could be 2 cars lying on there side on the highway so caution should be on its place in time.

I had a similar idea last night after writing my last post while writing notes on how it could possibly work.

Allowing Med/Res to have priority only if the crash is causing a blockage in a dangerous place makes sense for roleplay and could be a general benefit.
So, the question then is how to implement and enforce it?


In an ideal world, the InSim would know where would be classed as dangerous and only permit the medic to have priority if the person who called the tow is actually in a dangerous place.

That would be technically possible, but the roads' physical shape would have to be manually mapped out for each layout, which will be very time consuming (and probably need custom software writing to help make it less tedious). I'm not sure exactly how efficient this would be to calculate, so doing this may or may not add significant load to the server.

Unfortunately, it isn't as simple as that (if you can even call that simple), because we must also consider what should happen if the towee gets moved into or out of a dangerous place and how this change would be effectively communicated to any medic en route. We would also need a reliable method of letting the InSim know that the tow has been completed.