Telescience
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The teleporter lab, not to be confused with the Teleporter Room, is where scientists go to conduct telescience. This involves plotting coordinates into a computer in order to send or receive items through the teleporter pad. With practice, you can pick up items from a specific tile anywhere on the station and even deep space.
Note that abusing the teleporter to steal everything that's not nailed down when you're not the traitor will land you in a world of trouble.
Holy shit, this is just like Star Trek!
A word of warning
Before we get into the actual mechanics, there's a few things you should know. Firstly, using the teleporter successfully requires a decent grasp on mathematics. Secondly, randomly plotting in coordinates may trigger anything from violent bursts of flame and paralyzing explosions to monster invasions. This is why you should keep a flame extinguisher at hand and consider lowering the blast doors to the teleportation pad.
Operating the teleporter
When you enter coordinates into the targeting computer, it alters them through a function following the form of "t=mb+c" where B is what you put in, T is what it results in, and M and C are constants you have to solve for. Note that the computer alters X and Y coordinates separately, so their functions will be different! This math formula changes every round. The Z coordinate identifies the map. One Z level will be the station, another will be the Mining station, etc. The Z coordinates also change every round, so the only way to confirm for sure which one is which is to use coordinates of known landmarks.
Decoding the teleporter
The basic thought of the procedure is to grab a couple GPS units and start solving systems of equations.
- Pick up two GPS units, and reassign the identifier on one of them to something easily noticeable, like 'TELE' or 'TEST'. Optionally, name your personal GPS 'BASE' or 'MINE' or something.
- Drop the test GPS on the teleporter pad, then walk over to the teleport computer. Be sure to close the seal around the teleporter; failed teleports can sometimes cause nasty blowbacks like an eruption of flame, and you don't want that on you.
- Input random X, Y, and Z coordinates. X=50, Y=50, Z=5 is a good place to start. Don't try to start at 0/0/0 because the teleport is likely to be invalid, which will cause Bad Things. If you get an invalid teleport message, wait a second or two to make sure you're not about to suffer any ill effects. When things are calm, adjust the coordinates that were said to be invalid and try again.
- After the teleport happens, use your personal GPS to get the coordinates for where the test GPS ended up. Write these coordinates down.
- Click 'Receive' on the teleporter to retrieve your test GPS.
- Increase the computer's X and Y inputs by 1. Send the test GPS again.
- Read the coordinates off your personal GPS and write the coordinates down.
Using this data, you can figure out the 'm' constant by simply looking at how much the coordinate changed. So if your first test resulted in coordinates (40,59) and your second test resulted in the coordinates (45, 61), you know that 'm' is 5 in the equation for the X coordinate, and 'm' is 2 in the equation for the Y coordinate.
Using this new data, you can then solve for the 'c' factor in both equations. The math is simple enough to be put into a spreadsheet, so if you find yourself annoyed at the time this takes, make your computer do it for you!
A Decoding Example
This is a concrete example of decoding the teleporter.
First test:
Input: X=35, Y=43
Result: X=131, Y=120
Second test:
Input: X=36, Y=44
Result: X=134, Y=124
Solve for 'm' factors:
X equation: 
Y equation: 
Solve for 'c' factors:
X equation: 
Y equation: 
Final equations:
X equation: 
Y equation: 
Or, rearranged to how you'd actually use it (since you know the X and Y you want):
X equation: 
Y equation: 
Advanced use
- Cyborgs are able to use the teleporter computer remotely. This allows them to send themselves through the telepad and back without a partner.
- Anyone lost in space with a GPS can be saved, provided you've figured out the random elements of the coordinates.
- You can click the number in the Telescience computer directly to input even mixed numbers, such as 107.25 or 85.5. This is useful when your m factor is not 1.
Evil Genius Section
Traitor uses
Congratulations, you are a traitor scientist and the world is literally at your fingertips. As if bomb making and other science mischief wasn't enough, the potential uses for the teleporter are many. Remote theft, remote arson, remote bombing, remote kidnapping? There's remotely nothing you can't do. Just keep in mind that "bases" that belong to other antagonist roles (such as the Space Wizard and Syndicate shuttle) are hidden away on z-levels, completely impenetrable by any means and will simply fizzle the teleporter's feeble attempts to teleport in there.