An experiment.

[warcrimes]

force sec roles to be filled at a certain % of pop.

I would really like that. Lord knows if it would be of any benefit, it just gut feels like the right course.

How difficult is it to implement? 
lets say you wanted like, 10% sec, could you just make every 10th pick override into security? 
Or here's a real wierdo suggestion - what if every 10th pick (starting from a random 0-9th pick so the heads arent always excluded) was both their civilian and security role? i.e. Security Chef, Security Janitor, Security Assistant, etc - Start with the standard civilian uniform, corresponding ID + Sec access, and a backpack with all the sec gear they'd normally need in their off hand. 

That way you can "fill" sec, but also not get roundstart suicides from people who really REALLY wanted to make borgers. They can just make borgers from brigmates.

[Vitatroll]

Roll antag roles based on pop > Roll sec roles based on pop > Roll job roles based on preferences > Spawn the jerks.

Simple is probably best. Of course I'm an idiot who likes the idea of it being completely random, like antags. Late joiners would have to be dealt with I guess. Sec r ded or understaffed? Congrats, latejoiner! You are now teh lahw.

[Xeram]

Or here's a real wierdo suggestion - what if every 10th pick (starting from a random 0-9th pick so the heads arent always excluded) was both their civilian and security role? i.e. Security Chef, Security Janitor, Security Assistant, etc - Start with the standard civilian uniform, corresponding ID + Sec access, and a backpack with all the sec gear they'd normally need in their off hand. 

That way you can "fill" sec, but also not get roundstart suicides from people who really REALLY wanted to make borgers. They can just make borgers from brigmates.

Can we all pause and look at this for a second, not once ever in all of my thinking about this had I ever even considered something close to this and reading it made my expression light up in a way I haven't for a long time.

This is pretty much the logical conclusion of "Everyone hates security, vigilantes don't get nearly as much hate and get the job done". Turning the soulcrushing job of securing and defending the station into a much more localized, secondary goal of (hopefully) appropriately spaced crewmates. Basically going from hired mall cops to station millitia.

[amaranthineApocalypse]

Well this thread has been completely derailed -_-

[OMJ]

force sec roles to be filled at a certain % of pop.

I would really like that. Lord knows if it would be of any benefit, it just gut feels like the right course.

How difficult is it to implement? 
lets say you wanted like, 10% sec, could you just make every 10th pick override into security? 
Or here's a real wierdo suggestion - what if every 10th pick (starting from a random 0-9th pick so the heads arent always excluded) was both their civilian and security role? i.e. Security Chef, Security Janitor, Security Assistant, etc - Start with the standard civilian uniform, corresponding ID + Sec access, and a backpack with all the sec gear they'd normally need in their off hand. 

That way you can "fill" sec, but also not get roundstart suicides from people who really REALLY wanted to make borgers. They can just make borgers from brigmates.

you're smart this is smart

[Ed Venture]

force sec roles to be filled at a certain % of pop.

I would really like that. Lord knows if it would be of any benefit, it just gut feels like the right course.

Please for the love of god someone do this.

[Wisecrack34]

My 2 cents, despite being one of the newer players:

I like playing Sec.

I hate playing Sec the way I'm supposed to, I'd rather run around pretending to be friends with an antag or broadcasting PSA's from the Radio Station

Give Sec some leeway for being silly and fun, they're mall cops not trained soldiers







Also yes to the experiment, if only for 2 or 3 days. The point is to get hard evidence on how players react knowing there isn't any form of Security, knowing that one isn't going to spawn in and ruin their looting fest. On the note that there's never Sec, 1 in 3 rounds has Sec either half way or all the way filled for me, don't know what you guys are talking about :P

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[Ed Venture]

Give Sec some leeway for being silly and fun, they're mall cops not trained soldiers

This is already allowed. You can play the role how you want as long as you don't break the rules.

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After finding out how the playerbase reacts to it then what? Where do we go from there? How would it make things better? Goonstation has a serious case of Apathy so I doubt anyone other then the players here on this forum will even care.

[Wisecrack34]

If a Traitor notices that the only people equipped to deal with them at round start are the Cap and the MD (Who by now has ran off to genetics or chemistry in an attempt to become god incarnate) they MAY play differently than normal.

The point of this experiment would be to determine if and how. If OP was talking about removing Sec for a month then i'd have the same stance but simply trying to figure out how all our speculation holds up in the field for a few days doesn't seem like that bad of a idea.

Of course this is mostly just my take on it, worst case scenario these days could be a shit show of people bending the IC rules and total chaos with the Captain being impeached and impaled every round for the sake of shits and giggles :P

[Ed Venture]

Speaking for myself but if I was a traitor and knew only a few people may try and stop me I'd just rampage like normal. I agree the only way to stop rampages is for the crew to stop them as they happen, but all I seen from new players these days is them complaining the combat is too hard and so they stopped trying. Even though it's not that hard currently and if they knew what it was like 10 years ago they would not complain.

You want to experiment with the game to encourage fun and to get the crew to fight while getting antags to try something new? Then it's gonna take alot of effort from everyone in the community to shift things around again. Just kickstarting something like that would take a huge effort. But how do we do that? Nerfs? Reworks? Taking roles out of the game just to see what happens? The last option again just seems like a lazy way to shake things up by taking depth out of the game and giving players less things to do.

[The Grim Sleeper]

An idea, on a derailed thread.

For what it is worth, I liked your idea. I don't think it would have worked, vigilantism is already a problem, making it an enforced state would not improve things, but raising awareness of that might invoke actual change. And No-Sec-Week would sure as hell raise something.

Really though, Sec isn't the only understaffed department.
But nobody is really concerned about the lack of chefs, AI, QM or miners. (Ffs, mushroom doesn't even have a proper mining/forge, why is it even in rotation). Perhaps we need to know Why we need Sec so badly (which the experiment would have tested, but popular opinion is not facing that way.)

[Grek]

I'm going to go with an pretty out there suggestion and say that the problem isn't security as a role, but rather changelings and mindslaves. Yes, really. Hear me out here: What's the one big difference between a redshirt and some random vigilante?

It's not equipment; there's all sorts of ways for a vigilante to get their hands on a taser or a stun baton. It's not skill, because anyone can be a regular security officer. It's not access, because the HoP gives all access away like candy these days.

The big difference, the reason why Security exists in the first place, is that the redshirts are 100% guaranteed not to be antagonists at roundstart. As an ordinary spaceman, seeing a redshirt is supposed to mean that you can relax and let your guard down - the reshirt isn't going to randomly ambush you and neither will anyone else with them in the room. Or, at least if they do, they'll think long and hard about how to take you both down without eating a face full of taser. Take two spacemen and put them in the same room and you'll see both of them back slowly away on the off chance the other guy is an antag. Add in a security officer and they can suddenly 'trust' each other to at least not try anything right that second. It's like having these little red islands of tranquility and civility roaming the station eating donuts.

Changelings and mindslaves ruin this by making it possible for you to run into antagonist security. There's no trust, no sense of safety, just more of the same suspicion and dread that comes with staring down any other heavily armed stranger in a dark maintenance tunnel. There's no safety in numbers anymore, so people try for safety in obscurity - they fuck off to whatever deserted corner of the map is least likely to get them murdered and hide there, not interacting with anyone or anything. Since everyone is alone and silent, we get silent rampages where people get picked off one by one. No witnesses, no reactions, mass apathy.

If you want to revitalize Security, the first step has got to be to do something to keep Security trustworthy all round long. If there's a officer hanging out at the bar and you can actually sit down next to them and be appropriately confident that they're not a ling and they're not going to devour your drunk ass, you can start nucleating public gatherings in public places again. Suddenly a bunch of giant brick walls get thrown up in front of rampagers - it's pretty easy to murder a geneticist 1v1 in the monkey pen, but it's hard to kill the bartender, a security officer and two greyshirts all at once without anyone ratting you out. But in order for that to happen, there needs to be at least a couple people on the station with a bright red sign painted on their back that credibly claims they're 100% guaranteed not to be the person trying to kill you and that it's okay to be in the same room with them without constantly being on your guard.

[Wisecrack34]

Reminds me of a thread I posted a while back about making heavy armor (Helmets, vests, etc) sting proof. The fact that you can sting a guy dressed in full swat armor makes Security more of a joke in those situations.

[Firepower]

Honestly I agree with a lot of what was said earlier, being that security can't really enact any serious consequences on people. Murder is for the most part out of the question unless the person is a confirmed antagonist. So if you're just a shitter devoting your round to messing with security without any real reason, the worst security can do is throw you into the brig for a couple minutes... Where you can just cause even MORE trouble by smashing the windows of the brig, fighting security when they try to stop you, escaping and making security chase you again, etc.

I don't think 2-3 minutes in the brig is really a deterrent to anyone. I'd appreciate it if the prison station were brought back. On Donut I would occasionally lock up the worst offenders in the gas chamber and pump N2O into their cell for the rest of the round because I just couldn't handle dealing with these shitty players anymore. Not that I'm suggesting N2O gas chambers, but some way to remove the ability for a staff assistant to fuck with security for the remainder of the round would be swell. If that means bringing back the prison station then cool.

Maybe then security would be taken more seriously and the culture surrounding security would change a bit.

[Wisecrack34]

Honestly I agree with a lot of what was said earlier, being that security can't really enact any serious consequences on people. Murder is for the most part out of the question unless the person is a confirmed antagonist. So if you're just a shitter devoting your round to messing with security without any real reason, the worst security can do is throw you into the brig for a couple minutes... Where you can just cause even MORE trouble by smashing the windows of the brig, fighting security when they try to stop you, escaping and making security chase you again, etc.

I don't think 2-3 minutes in the brig is really a deterrent to anyone. I'd appreciate it if the prison station were brought back. On Donut I would occasionally lock up the worst offenders in the gas chamber and pump N2O into their cell for the rest of the round because I just couldn't handle dealing with these shitty players anymore. Not that I'm suggesting N2O gas chambers, but some way to remove the ability for a staff assistant to fuck with security for the remainder of the round would be swell. If that means bringing back the prison station then cool.

Maybe then security would be taken more seriously and the culture surrounding security would change a bit.

A bit much work for a potential pay off, I wouldn't be opposed to having a locker with an O2 pump and a group of prisoners spaced though

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This thread has been derailed enough with an overwhelming amount of people against the experiment lets carry our suggestions to a suggestion thread