Goonhub
03-17-2021, 09:23 PM
(This post was last modified: 03-17-2021, 09:48 PM by Stephmo. Edited 1 time in total.)
I originally posted this in 2019 in a similar thread that has since been locked or deleted. Not much seems to have changed with the detective since then so I will post my thoughts again:
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I love playing Detective on RP so this is an important topic to me! Currently the Detective is suffering from an identity crisis split between Law Enforcement Detective and Private Investigator. On one hand this allows the Detective to played in multiple ways with all kinds of characterizations, and that's great! On the other hand this leads to confusion regarding the Detective's status as a "legitimate Security Officer".
First, let's take a moment to define a few things:
Detective: "A person, especially a police officer, whose occupation is to investigate and solve crimes."
Okay, fairly straight forward. A Detective is (usually) a law enforcement officer whose time is spent investigating crimes. A Detective, as a warranted officer, is permitted to respond to criminals with reasonable force and make arrests. A Detective is beholden to the law enforcement agency they are part of and they must follow the law as it pertains to other law enforcement agents.
Private Investigator: "A freelance detective who carries out investigations on behalf of private clients."
Also pretty clear. A Private Investigator, or PI, is not a member of law enforcement. PI's are beholden to the private firm they work for or, if independent, no one at all. As a private citizen a PI must follow the same laws as other civilians. Unless given special permission from the a governing body, a PI typically cannot use force against their fellow citizens or make arrests. PI's are typically licensed by a government and tend to have gun permits.
The Detective, as they are currently portrayed in SS13, is treated as simultaneously a Detective and a Private Investigator, both mechanically and in flavor/lore.
Great! Now that we have pictures of both sides of our coin, let's see where the Detective in SS13 stands when compared to these two occupations.
Law Enforcement Detective
First and foremost it means our Detective is a master of information gathering. The unique toolset for Detectives makes them powerhouses of surveillance, as their job title would indicate. However more problematically, this overlap with Security means our Detective exists in criminal handling limbo, having the authority to act as an officer, but not having access to the tools necessary to keep an officer safe while doing so. What we have is a character that is either a Law Enforcement Detective with limited access to Security equipment and parts of the station, or a Private Investigator hired by NT and given special permissions to use force and arrest civilians.
Yuck, neither of those sound very good to me. Okay, so what can be done? Luckily for us this won't take much to fix and we even have a few options!
The Detective becomes a Law Enforcement Detective
The Detective becoming a Law Enforcement Detective would give the crew a clear idea of the Detective's authority on the station. The Detective would enjoy the same tools and protections as their fellow officers, but still have their tools to allow a focus on investigating. A foreseeable issue with this is the Detective could just default to a Security Officer role, but that happens anyway, right? In this case it would at least be within the realm of justifiability.
The Detective becomes a Private Investigator (But could still totally be called Detective) would create a clear separation between the authority of a Security Officer and a Detective. The Detective would not be on the station to enforce the law, but to focus on investigation. The Detective, as a private citizen working for Nanotrasen would be beholden (but not necessarily loyal) to Nanotrason and the station's Security, Captain, and Heads. This also creates a situation where Security could arrest a gun crazy Detective.
I'm out of stuff to say for now. What do you guys think? Also thank you for reading if you made it this far!
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Reading back over my original post and seeing additional suggestions in this thread, my preferred solution to the "detective problem" would be to reframe the detective as a Private Investigator with the following changes:
The Detective becomes a Private Investigator
Make the changes and rename him to Inspector!! Then he can gadengts all the unsppections andd crim as an antag and not a self antag
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I love playing Detective on RP so this is an important topic to me! Currently the Detective is suffering from an identity crisis split between Law Enforcement Detective and Private Investigator. On one hand this allows the Detective to played in multiple ways with all kinds of characterizations, and that's great! On the other hand this leads to confusion regarding the Detective's status as a "legitimate Security Officer".
First, let's take a moment to define a few things:
Detective: "A person, especially a police officer, whose occupation is to investigate and solve crimes."
Okay, fairly straight forward. A Detective is (usually) a law enforcement officer whose time is spent investigating crimes. A Detective, as a warranted officer, is permitted to respond to criminals with reasonable force and make arrests. A Detective is beholden to the law enforcement agency they are part of and they must follow the law as it pertains to other law enforcement agents.
Private Investigator: "A freelance detective who carries out investigations on behalf of private clients."
Also pretty clear. A Private Investigator, or PI, is not a member of law enforcement. PI's are beholden to the private firm they work for or, if independent, no one at all. As a private citizen a PI must follow the same laws as other civilians. Unless given special permission from the a governing body, a PI typically cannot use force against their fellow citizens or make arrests. PI's are typically licensed by a government and tend to have gun permits.
The Detective, as they are currently portrayed in SS13, is treated as simultaneously a Detective and a Private Investigator, both mechanically and in flavor/lore.
Great! Now that we have pictures of both sides of our coin, let's see where the Detective in SS13 stands when compared to these two occupations.
Law Enforcement Detective
- Can use non lethal force and arrest due to access to handcuffs, flashes, helmets, and flashbangs (Security access as well as SecVends in the Detective's Office on CogMap1, Destiny, and Oshan provide these tools)
- Access to all of Security, including brig cells. (Except lockers).
- Access to SecMate, issuing tickets/fines, issuing arrest warrants.
- Uniformed.
- No access to Security Officer specific equipment (Stun batons, barriers, sec HUD, tasers, armor)
- Detective has their own office separate from Security.
- Mostly civilian access on station. (Exceptions are forensics related Morgue, Medbay, etc.)
- Possible Antagonist (The Detective is not beholden to NT)
- Not uniformed.
- Monologue mentions retiring from Security.
- Firearms Carry Permit
- Bulk of available tools in Detective's Office are forensics and surveillance related, indicating mainly investigative role.
First and foremost it means our Detective is a master of information gathering. The unique toolset for Detectives makes them powerhouses of surveillance, as their job title would indicate. However more problematically, this overlap with Security means our Detective exists in criminal handling limbo, having the authority to act as an officer, but not having access to the tools necessary to keep an officer safe while doing so. What we have is a character that is either a Law Enforcement Detective with limited access to Security equipment and parts of the station, or a Private Investigator hired by NT and given special permissions to use force and arrest civilians.
Yuck, neither of those sound very good to me. Okay, so what can be done? Luckily for us this won't take much to fix and we even have a few options!
The Detective becomes a Law Enforcement Detective
- The Detective becomes as loyal as a Security Officer (Non-antagonist)
- Station access privileges in line with Security Officers.
- Gain their own Security Gear locker in their office, complete with body armor.
- Detective's Office is moved to (or much closer to) Security.
- The Detective receives a uniform (or at least a badge) indicating they are law enforcement.
- Access to the Security sector and SecVend machines is revoked.
- Ability to use SecMate to issue tickets, fines, and arrest warrants is removed.
The Detective becoming a Law Enforcement Detective would give the crew a clear idea of the Detective's authority on the station. The Detective would enjoy the same tools and protections as their fellow officers, but still have their tools to allow a focus on investigating. A foreseeable issue with this is the Detective could just default to a Security Officer role, but that happens anyway, right? In this case it would at least be within the realm of justifiability.
The Detective becomes a Private Investigator (But could still totally be called Detective) would create a clear separation between the authority of a Security Officer and a Detective. The Detective would not be on the station to enforce the law, but to focus on investigation. The Detective, as a private citizen working for Nanotrasen would be beholden (but not necessarily loyal) to Nanotrason and the station's Security, Captain, and Heads. This also creates a situation where Security could arrest a gun crazy Detective.
I'm out of stuff to say for now. What do you guys think? Also thank you for reading if you made it this far!
----
Reading back over my original post and seeing additional suggestions in this thread, my preferred solution to the "detective problem" would be to reframe the detective as a Private Investigator with the following changes:
The Detective becomes a Private Investigator
- Access to the Security sector and SecVend machines is revoked.
- Ability to use SecMate to issue tickets, fines, and arrest warrants is removed.
- Starts with non-lethal rounds only.
- Improve forensics capabilities solely for Detective, or slightly reduce forensics ability of Security. (Honestly no idea what this would look like)
Quote:Posted by warcrimes - 1 hour ago
detective is meant to inspector gadget.
go go gadngest get go kill lethals
he crime, he solve crime,
i don;t have a p,lan
Make the changes and rename him to Inspector!! Then he can gadengts all the unsppections andd crim as an antag and not a self antag