Goonhub
07-31-2023, 06:02 PM
Usual character names: A bunch, but my most recognizable would be HECATE, Asteria Perses, Hyperia Perses, Verily Rubico, Evelynne Silverstone, and LAMPADE.
BYOND username: Arahimine
Discord username: Spider#6446
Goon server you play: 4
Reason for Application
In the simplest possible terms: I'd like to help! For a little background, I've been playing on Goonstation for almost 3 years now (my 3rd anniversary is coming up on the 16th of September). I began as an AI main, before slowly transitioning into a mixture of Medical and Security play. Nowadays, some of the most anxiety I feel when playing is seeing that fateful 'x has earned the Fish medal!' pop up and immediately worrying about their experience, and I figure that, hey, I do absolutely love teaching mechanics and try to do it whenever I see an opportunity to - so why not formalize it? I've got plenty of experience in just about every facet of the game under my belt (as you'll soon read in the Game Experience section) and I'm always eager to share it.
(Also, purple is my favourite colour. I HAVE to be purple.)
Game Experience
With the noticeable exception of my partial Engineering blind spot, I'm confident that I know Pretty Much Everything that might come up during an average round. I like to offer assistance over the radio when I remember to & when we have names in the department that I don't recognize. But, more in-depth... (brace yourself, this comes out to over 3k words)
Medical
In General: My pride and joy! Medical is my main department, and (I believe) the one I've spent the most time in. I know off the top of my head the function of every NanoMed chemical, the exact dosage-to-damage ratios for common treatments (for those wondering: charcoal cures TOX at about a 1.1-to-3 rate) as well as more obscure or rarely-used tidbits, like filling the cloning pod with chemicals, poisoning surgical tools and attaching both a defibrillator and a health analyzer upgrade to the cryopods (a habit of mine.) Medical Director is absolutely my main non-silicon role, and I've come to adore slow-paced medical roleplay. Even when a person seems to be in a hurry, I always try to at least get down basic details like asking the circumstances of their injury, asking them to extend their arm for hypospray injections, etc. Also, autopsies are a blast and something I highly recommend Medical regulars try and do more often, especially in assisting Security.
Genetics: I haven't quite memorized most of the mutation combinations, but I understand everything about Genetics more or less perfectly, including best practices with individual mutations (e.g. empowering Physically Fit instead of stabilizing it). If there's no Geneticists at roundstart, I'll sometimes make a habit of starting up the basic researches in advance, so that any incoming genenerds don't have to wait for their materials to regenerate.
Robotics: Once upon a time, Roboticist was my main role. That still lives on within me in any Medical Director round that lacks a Roboticist, as I usually make sure that we have a SICC cyborg available, a shell for the AI, and a set of four blanks in the rewriter. Once you've gotten the basics of constructing a cyborg frame down, there's not too much to learn that's really specific to Roboticist - the most I can think of would be the aforementioned rewriter blanks, the steps needed to replace parts on an existing cyborg, or actually using the oil cans scattered around the lab. Needless to say, I'm experienced in all of this.
Security
In General: Both presently and historically, I'd describe Security as my other main organic role. There was a good while years back where I unabashedly sucked at it, but as the years have gone by, I think I've improved. My strategy, what with being on the RP servers, has long been to speak first, be amicable, and hesitate with accusations and arrests. I love giving crimers a long-winded clarification on their rights as a prisoner.
Antag Handling: I have a bit of an unconscious procedure for handling antags, which goes something like "I won't pursue you until you actually start using your toys/abilities to harm players or noticeably disrupt the station," with the obvious exception of when the antagonist is being loud and obvious. This is easily the most tricky and contentious part of Security, and I do second-guess myself every now and then, but I'm rather confident in my judgment and Security play nowadays.
Detectiving & Forensics: THIS is my favourite part of the experience, by far. As alluded to with my mention of autopsy in the Medical section, I just love to investigate, interrogate, and draw conclusions based on evidence. Despite this, I'm still an Officer main rather than a Detective main, and always defer such matters to the Detective when we have one.
Communication: While forensics and investigation are my favourite thing in Security, this is probably what I'm best at. As an Officer, I make sure to be quite active on the radio, checking up on my partners in crime-stopping regularly and reporting my own status. Every now and then, if we have someone newer or someone who seems aimless, I'll try and give them something to do.
Robustitude: IIII'm terrible! Just awful. I do manage to occasionally land a lucky shot with my beloved wavegun, but aside from that, most of my skill as an Officer really does lie in coordination and negotiation.
Research
In General: Research is probably my least played department, and certainly so in recent time. Despite this, I understand most things about it fairly well.
Telescience: As far as Research goes, this is my specialty. I've made numerous DWAINE programs to make use of telescience, including an automatic offset calculator, and I've also countless times made PDA programs to control it completely remotely, including across z-levels. Despite this, I usually stay stationside - I do love a good azone, but only with a group, and I've only really completed a very small handful. (Retention Center is a masterpiece.) I am, however, a big fan of the Hidden Workshop.
Chemistry: I hold the dubious honour of being one of the probably-less-than-a-few-dozen Goon players to actually understand how to use the ChemiCompiler. Actually, I've in the past gone to lengths to automate Chemistry: I'm an avid programmer in my spare time, and I've made scripts to generate exact chemgroups from just a user request of what chemical they want and how much of if they want to be made. Useless, of course, since the chemgroup change. What's still marginally useful is my Lua ChemiCompiler translator, which takes simple and easily readable table instructions and outputs valid Chemfuck code to do whatever you like. I know most secret chem recipes (though I seldom make most any of them) and have a particular love of mass-producing energy drink whenever the mood strikes me (read: whenever I want to give all of Security heart attacks because they pathologically refuse to listen to me when I tell them THREE SIPS AT A TIME.) Needless to say, I'm very knowledgeable here.
ArtSci: My weakest real avenue of Research. I know how to run Artlab, I just have no real passion for it and no significant history in doing it. I know the shortcuts with DWAINE commands, as well as basic tricks like grabbing a cyborg arm from the Robot Dock instead of pestering Robotics for it, the telltale examine text of bombs and cyborg converter artifacts...
Toxins: I'm only not classifying this as my weakest area because, haha, implying Toxins is a real division of Research. I've never touched the thing - it has some value in teaching newer players what gases react in which ways, but in my honest opinion, it could be dropped from most maps with no loss (Nadir certainly agrees.) I find it a bit ironic that it's so neglected given that lore-wise, Space Station 13 is meant to be a plasma research station, but oh well.
Engineering (and Supply)
In General: My weakest section overall, but I'm far from completely blind here.
Harmonic Siphon & Catalytic Generator: My love. My LOVE. The Siphon is the most fun I've had with Goonstation's mechanics in... probably my entire time playing. I literally wrote the book on the thing - there's a 5k word guide I put in the Discord's #write-stuff channel detailing the exact mechanics of how it works (along with a hearty dose of my terrible, terrible sense of humour.) You can still find it if you scroll up far enough. But, yes - I understand absolutely everything there is to know about these two things, and with the Siphon in particular, I think I've taught more than a dozen people how it works. I'm always, ALWAYS eager to teach more folk the joys of the brrrr machine.
Nuclear Engine: Nnnot really. I understand the basics of the engine, but not its intricacies, and I'm not the littlest bit spiteful about it having taken so much attention away from the Siphon on Nadir. I could certainly operate it if needed, but I doubt I could provide much guidance on how to do so - it'd have to involve a lot of trial and error to jog my memory.
Thermo-Electric Generator: I understand the TEG fairly well - maybe not the exact mechanics of what's going on under the hood, but I know how to operate it. I couldn't tell you how to make a hellburn or an advanced pipeburn, but I sure can tell you how to make it blow up or how to make it go steady for most of the round.
Singularity Engine: There's not a whole lot to know here, is there? The singularity is notorious for two things: danger, and simplicity. The only three pieces of non-basic knowledge I can muster up are filling the plasma tanks to capacity (as they're dispensed only partly full), setting up a feeder pipe, or making a bigulo, but these are really all just for flexing or breaking power records.
MechComp: As I mentioned in the Research section, I'm an avid programmer and so I have something of an affinity for MechComp. I've not explored it nearly as much as I'd like to, but despite that I've made some amusing stuff - my favourite being a walking locker with an attached microphone. That doesn't sound so impressive, except it runs on only one wifi component, and therefore one wifi frequency from a linked PDA program. The PDA telescience relay mentioned in the Research section also counts under this.
Packeteering: I used to be quite the shitter with this when I was newer, and I'm pleased to say I've mostly retained knowledge of how to packet hack despite not having really done it at all for most of this year.
Mastery of the Quarter: One of my least-played roles for sure, but there's not all that much to it. I suppose Quartermaster knowledge mostly falls under how to manipulate the stock market, usually done with horrific economic abuse of catering crates, and some ultra nerds even set up semi-automated belt feeds with MechComp teleporters - I've never done that, but I'd love to some day.
Mining: Also something I rarely play, and also something without much deep knowledge to it, though this time I do know a little something - a very obscure feature of the mineral magnet that allows you to reliably get literally any asteroid you want. I have no idea if such falls under secret content, so I won't be mentioning it here. Nonetheless, the fact that I have 6k Nanotrasen Reputation (pop quiz: how many of the people reading this even know that mechanic exists?) should be proof enough that I know what I'm doing when it comes to Mining.
Civilian
In General: Not my least-played department, but far from my most - and yet, I do enjoy it.
Catering: Something I've come to enjoy dearly. Bartender and Chef form counterparts in my mind, with Bartender being more social and Chef being more mechanical, but both roles having elements of both playstyles. There's not much to say knowledge-wise here - I've memorized a few drink and food recipes, but there's no experienced player of either role that doesn't have the wiki page open in the background. If I had to give advice, it'd be bucking the recipes entirely - make your own things! A custom drink combo, or making use of the Chef's stews and custom sandwiches to make new dishes entirely - a philly cheesesteak as a steak and cheese sandwich, a bowl of pho as a chicken nugget stew with noodles... go nuts!
(Actually, there is one caveat: many of the wiki's recipes give imperfect times for cooking dishes, most noticeably with how many chef pizzas turn out to be terrible quality. I have a few corrected timings written down in a notepad which result in great quality food, and I'm always glad to share them.)
Spiritual Services: It took me almost 3 years to play Chaplain for the first time, and I'm thoroughly regretful that it did. Chaplain is in an odd state compared to the rest of the roles because mechanically, it has almost nothing to do - even Vampires, Wizards and Wraiths, which Chaplains have a tangible mechanical advantage against, are still better dealt with by Security. Instead, the Chaplain's role is mostly social, and this is why I've come to love it. So, the advice I'd give to a new Chaplain is more or less the same I'd give to any RP player: strike up a conversation!
Janitorial: Like plenty of other roles, there simply isn't much to playing the Janitor - you have your tools, they're largely self-explanatory, and that's it. There's a few tricks: when using a mop to clean up stains, clicking on the tile beneath the mess instead of the mess itself will allow you to mop back up your water, preventing your mop from drying out. Like so many newbees, Janitor was the first role I played aside from staffie, and I still remember some of the interactions I had in it to this day. (Mostly falling out the back of the Manta.)
Silicon
In General: My original main, and what I'm no doubt most recognizable for as HECATE. I've since transitioned into primarily playing organics, but... you know what they say: you can take the player out of the silicon role, but you can't take the silicon role out of the player.
Laws: I'm pretty goddamn good at both writing and 'creatively' interpreting Laws, though in the former case I usually try and leave some abusability for the sake of the fun of silicon players. Individual gotchas like the exact definition of 'override' are often tripping new players up, and I think it's something very worth mentoring people over.
Command
In General: Would it be fair to say that this is also my main department alongside Medical? Command has always scratched an itch for me, and I've never been able to put my finger on it - but judging by my affinity for AI, it might just be the ability to have your fingers in so many pies. I love interacting with people, and being their boss is a fantastic excuse to do that. As mentioned in my Medical summary, my main role is that of Medical Director, and I do love checking in on my department, greeting everyone around roundstart, inquiring about personal projects, and offering assistance whenever I see someone that I don't recognize.
Antagonist
In General: Something I've shied away from for years, and am only now dipping my toes back into now. I enjoy antagging a great deal, and I think I'm becoming rather decent at it.
Spy Thief: My favourite solo antag role by far, combining the fun toys of Traitor with the active impetus and guidance of just what you should be doing - it's a perfect cure for the all-too-common problem of having no idea what to do as an antag. The one crucial piece of advice I'd give is this: USE THE GPS VERB IN YOUR COMMANDS TAB. I've played spief many a time, and it's always a joy to try and convince people to give up their precious family heirlooms/honest-to-god limbs for... some reason or another.
Traitor: My second-favourite solo, and as far as antags go, what may well be a hotspot for mentor help between the incredible variety of unique and sometimes complex items, as well as the rather limitless possibilities of just what you CAN do with those items.
Vampire: Most likely my least favourite antag, both to play and to fight, though I have played it quite a fair bit. I feel like there's very limited RP opportunities here, and not nearly so many playstyles even compared to something like Changeling.
Changeling: I have such a mixed opinion of Changeling - it probably has the most obvious RP potential of any of the solos, and I have something of a personal rule to immediately shift into and impersonate anyone I consume so as to keep things interesting. Despite this, I do have the gripe that it's impossible to gain power as a Changeling without killing, unlike Vampire and Arcfiend. The specific mechanics of consuming someone also trip up new players often (I know they did me) and I'd be happy to be a stinky little mouse hiding in the breast pocket of an unholy abomination, telling them how to brutally devour an innocent crewmember.
Arcfiend: The final of our non-human trio, and something I'm pretty experienced with. I've never been a fan of how arcfiend victims can't be revived as mini-antags like thralls and lingcritters can, but I'd say it's countered out by how Arcfiends are fully capable of gaining power without killing or even hurting people
Salvager: The newest antag type! I've only played Salvie a small handful of times, and fought against them about that many, but there's not too much mechanical complexity to them once you understand the (fairly self-explanatory) gear.
Conspirator: RIP. At the least at the time of writing, Conspirator is disabled pending rework. I know why, but I do miss it. The prospect of advising players on this is tricky, and I suspect it's for the exact reason it was disabled: Conspirators just have very little to go off of. It's almost all up to player creativity. Nonetheless, I have fond memories of this one, such as an absurdly elaborate scheme to impersonate a certain Engineer... by mixing stable mutagen with a sample of their blood taken from tricking them into eating dry cereal. That's still one of my finest antag moments, I think.
Gang Leader: Something still quite new to RP, and I've only played it twice, but good lord do I LOVE it. There's something so special about the premise, with your fellow employees still being employees and still having that degree of civility while being pitted against your fellow crewmembers - and the intrigue mixed into it all, all while trying to manipulate or fight back against Security! I find Gang to be more or less the perfect RP gamemode and I'm sort of stunned that it's taken this long to come back. Beyond strategy, there's not too much mechanical knowledge I feel that a mentor could impart here, though, aside from just explaining what some of the available items are.
Horribly Cursed Knowledge
DID YOU KNOW that all horizontal fire alarms are rotated incorrectly? That's right! As we can see from the default vertical sprite, the green button is meant to be on the bottom, and the red flashing one on the top, but sideways alarms are the wrong way up - as far as I'm aware, this is the case on literally every in-rotation map!
![[Image: DUvR68u]](https://imgur.com/a/DUvR68u)
I will neither confirm nor deny that this entire mentor application is an elaborate ruse to trick people into cursing themselves with this knowledge.
Admitted Flaws & Areas of Improvement
I've been a very socially anxious person for my whole life, and Goon has really helped me come out of that shell, but I still struggle a bit with starting conversations and offering advice without needing to be asked first. I've been trying for a while now to buck that (especially in Command and Security) and I think I've been doing well with it so far, but I'm still not perfect. Here's hoping, right?
Historically, some of my AI roleplay would brush against the ever-icky 'silicons as slaves' topic. To my credit, I always made strongly sure that this would only ever come up when interacting with players whom I full well knew were okay with the subject (usually, they'd be the ones to engage me about it first) and never ever in an accusatory manner towards those players or characters - but even so, I've been making a concentrated effort in the past few months to cut it out entirely. (Not that my poor machines aren't still miserable when it comes to other aspects of their existence. I'm not THAT kind to them.)
As I alluded to in the packet hacking section, I used to be just awful about it, and I'm shocked that I wasn't bwoinked more often. I'm happy to say that I've done nothing approaching self-antagging in well over a year, and in the time since I came back (May 2022) from my last hiatus every single admin interaction I've had has been purely positive - really, I'm only putting this paragraph here for completion's sake.
Previous bans: None that I'm aware of - I've certainly never seen the popup.
Thank you for reading through this horribly verbose wall of text, believe me I'd have put it inside spoiler sections if this forum had that feature! (I was going to include a section on each map, but lord almighty this is already too long.) Criticism and feedback, both on the text itself and my play in-game, are always welcome, and in fact are half the reason I'm doing this.
So... Here goes nothing.
BYOND username: Arahimine
Discord username: Spider#6446
Goon server you play: 4
Reason for Application
In the simplest possible terms: I'd like to help! For a little background, I've been playing on Goonstation for almost 3 years now (my 3rd anniversary is coming up on the 16th of September). I began as an AI main, before slowly transitioning into a mixture of Medical and Security play. Nowadays, some of the most anxiety I feel when playing is seeing that fateful 'x has earned the Fish medal!' pop up and immediately worrying about their experience, and I figure that, hey, I do absolutely love teaching mechanics and try to do it whenever I see an opportunity to - so why not formalize it? I've got plenty of experience in just about every facet of the game under my belt (as you'll soon read in the Game Experience section) and I'm always eager to share it.
(Also, purple is my favourite colour. I HAVE to be purple.)
Game Experience
With the noticeable exception of my partial Engineering blind spot, I'm confident that I know Pretty Much Everything that might come up during an average round. I like to offer assistance over the radio when I remember to & when we have names in the department that I don't recognize. But, more in-depth... (brace yourself, this comes out to over 3k words)
Medical
In General: My pride and joy! Medical is my main department, and (I believe) the one I've spent the most time in. I know off the top of my head the function of every NanoMed chemical, the exact dosage-to-damage ratios for common treatments (for those wondering: charcoal cures TOX at about a 1.1-to-3 rate) as well as more obscure or rarely-used tidbits, like filling the cloning pod with chemicals, poisoning surgical tools and attaching both a defibrillator and a health analyzer upgrade to the cryopods (a habit of mine.) Medical Director is absolutely my main non-silicon role, and I've come to adore slow-paced medical roleplay. Even when a person seems to be in a hurry, I always try to at least get down basic details like asking the circumstances of their injury, asking them to extend their arm for hypospray injections, etc. Also, autopsies are a blast and something I highly recommend Medical regulars try and do more often, especially in assisting Security.
Genetics: I haven't quite memorized most of the mutation combinations, but I understand everything about Genetics more or less perfectly, including best practices with individual mutations (e.g. empowering Physically Fit instead of stabilizing it). If there's no Geneticists at roundstart, I'll sometimes make a habit of starting up the basic researches in advance, so that any incoming genenerds don't have to wait for their materials to regenerate.
Robotics: Once upon a time, Roboticist was my main role. That still lives on within me in any Medical Director round that lacks a Roboticist, as I usually make sure that we have a SICC cyborg available, a shell for the AI, and a set of four blanks in the rewriter. Once you've gotten the basics of constructing a cyborg frame down, there's not too much to learn that's really specific to Roboticist - the most I can think of would be the aforementioned rewriter blanks, the steps needed to replace parts on an existing cyborg, or actually using the oil cans scattered around the lab. Needless to say, I'm experienced in all of this.
Security
In General: Both presently and historically, I'd describe Security as my other main organic role. There was a good while years back where I unabashedly sucked at it, but as the years have gone by, I think I've improved. My strategy, what with being on the RP servers, has long been to speak first, be amicable, and hesitate with accusations and arrests. I love giving crimers a long-winded clarification on their rights as a prisoner.
Antag Handling: I have a bit of an unconscious procedure for handling antags, which goes something like "I won't pursue you until you actually start using your toys/abilities to harm players or noticeably disrupt the station," with the obvious exception of when the antagonist is being loud and obvious. This is easily the most tricky and contentious part of Security, and I do second-guess myself every now and then, but I'm rather confident in my judgment and Security play nowadays.
Detectiving & Forensics: THIS is my favourite part of the experience, by far. As alluded to with my mention of autopsy in the Medical section, I just love to investigate, interrogate, and draw conclusions based on evidence. Despite this, I'm still an Officer main rather than a Detective main, and always defer such matters to the Detective when we have one.
Communication: While forensics and investigation are my favourite thing in Security, this is probably what I'm best at. As an Officer, I make sure to be quite active on the radio, checking up on my partners in crime-stopping regularly and reporting my own status. Every now and then, if we have someone newer or someone who seems aimless, I'll try and give them something to do.
Robustitude: IIII'm terrible! Just awful. I do manage to occasionally land a lucky shot with my beloved wavegun, but aside from that, most of my skill as an Officer really does lie in coordination and negotiation.
Research
In General: Research is probably my least played department, and certainly so in recent time. Despite this, I understand most things about it fairly well.
Telescience: As far as Research goes, this is my specialty. I've made numerous DWAINE programs to make use of telescience, including an automatic offset calculator, and I've also countless times made PDA programs to control it completely remotely, including across z-levels. Despite this, I usually stay stationside - I do love a good azone, but only with a group, and I've only really completed a very small handful. (Retention Center is a masterpiece.) I am, however, a big fan of the Hidden Workshop.
Chemistry: I hold the dubious honour of being one of the probably-less-than-a-few-dozen Goon players to actually understand how to use the ChemiCompiler. Actually, I've in the past gone to lengths to automate Chemistry: I'm an avid programmer in my spare time, and I've made scripts to generate exact chemgroups from just a user request of what chemical they want and how much of if they want to be made. Useless, of course, since the chemgroup change. What's still marginally useful is my Lua ChemiCompiler translator, which takes simple and easily readable table instructions and outputs valid Chemfuck code to do whatever you like. I know most secret chem recipes (though I seldom make most any of them) and have a particular love of mass-producing energy drink whenever the mood strikes me (read: whenever I want to give all of Security heart attacks because they pathologically refuse to listen to me when I tell them THREE SIPS AT A TIME.) Needless to say, I'm very knowledgeable here.
ArtSci: My weakest real avenue of Research. I know how to run Artlab, I just have no real passion for it and no significant history in doing it. I know the shortcuts with DWAINE commands, as well as basic tricks like grabbing a cyborg arm from the Robot Dock instead of pestering Robotics for it, the telltale examine text of bombs and cyborg converter artifacts...
Toxins: I'm only not classifying this as my weakest area because, haha, implying Toxins is a real division of Research. I've never touched the thing - it has some value in teaching newer players what gases react in which ways, but in my honest opinion, it could be dropped from most maps with no loss (Nadir certainly agrees.) I find it a bit ironic that it's so neglected given that lore-wise, Space Station 13 is meant to be a plasma research station, but oh well.
Engineering (and Supply)
In General: My weakest section overall, but I'm far from completely blind here.
Harmonic Siphon & Catalytic Generator: My love. My LOVE. The Siphon is the most fun I've had with Goonstation's mechanics in... probably my entire time playing. I literally wrote the book on the thing - there's a 5k word guide I put in the Discord's #write-stuff channel detailing the exact mechanics of how it works (along with a hearty dose of my terrible, terrible sense of humour.) You can still find it if you scroll up far enough. But, yes - I understand absolutely everything there is to know about these two things, and with the Siphon in particular, I think I've taught more than a dozen people how it works. I'm always, ALWAYS eager to teach more folk the joys of the brrrr machine.
Nuclear Engine: Nnnot really. I understand the basics of the engine, but not its intricacies, and I'm not the littlest bit spiteful about it having taken so much attention away from the Siphon on Nadir. I could certainly operate it if needed, but I doubt I could provide much guidance on how to do so - it'd have to involve a lot of trial and error to jog my memory.
Thermo-Electric Generator: I understand the TEG fairly well - maybe not the exact mechanics of what's going on under the hood, but I know how to operate it. I couldn't tell you how to make a hellburn or an advanced pipeburn, but I sure can tell you how to make it blow up or how to make it go steady for most of the round.
Singularity Engine: There's not a whole lot to know here, is there? The singularity is notorious for two things: danger, and simplicity. The only three pieces of non-basic knowledge I can muster up are filling the plasma tanks to capacity (as they're dispensed only partly full), setting up a feeder pipe, or making a bigulo, but these are really all just for flexing or breaking power records.
MechComp: As I mentioned in the Research section, I'm an avid programmer and so I have something of an affinity for MechComp. I've not explored it nearly as much as I'd like to, but despite that I've made some amusing stuff - my favourite being a walking locker with an attached microphone. That doesn't sound so impressive, except it runs on only one wifi component, and therefore one wifi frequency from a linked PDA program. The PDA telescience relay mentioned in the Research section also counts under this.
Packeteering: I used to be quite the shitter with this when I was newer, and I'm pleased to say I've mostly retained knowledge of how to packet hack despite not having really done it at all for most of this year.
Mastery of the Quarter: One of my least-played roles for sure, but there's not all that much to it. I suppose Quartermaster knowledge mostly falls under how to manipulate the stock market, usually done with horrific economic abuse of catering crates, and some ultra nerds even set up semi-automated belt feeds with MechComp teleporters - I've never done that, but I'd love to some day.
Mining: Also something I rarely play, and also something without much deep knowledge to it, though this time I do know a little something - a very obscure feature of the mineral magnet that allows you to reliably get literally any asteroid you want. I have no idea if such falls under secret content, so I won't be mentioning it here. Nonetheless, the fact that I have 6k Nanotrasen Reputation (pop quiz: how many of the people reading this even know that mechanic exists?) should be proof enough that I know what I'm doing when it comes to Mining.
Civilian
In General: Not my least-played department, but far from my most - and yet, I do enjoy it.
Catering: Something I've come to enjoy dearly. Bartender and Chef form counterparts in my mind, with Bartender being more social and Chef being more mechanical, but both roles having elements of both playstyles. There's not much to say knowledge-wise here - I've memorized a few drink and food recipes, but there's no experienced player of either role that doesn't have the wiki page open in the background. If I had to give advice, it'd be bucking the recipes entirely - make your own things! A custom drink combo, or making use of the Chef's stews and custom sandwiches to make new dishes entirely - a philly cheesesteak as a steak and cheese sandwich, a bowl of pho as a chicken nugget stew with noodles... go nuts!
(Actually, there is one caveat: many of the wiki's recipes give imperfect times for cooking dishes, most noticeably with how many chef pizzas turn out to be terrible quality. I have a few corrected timings written down in a notepad which result in great quality food, and I'm always glad to share them.)
Spiritual Services: It took me almost 3 years to play Chaplain for the first time, and I'm thoroughly regretful that it did. Chaplain is in an odd state compared to the rest of the roles because mechanically, it has almost nothing to do - even Vampires, Wizards and Wraiths, which Chaplains have a tangible mechanical advantage against, are still better dealt with by Security. Instead, the Chaplain's role is mostly social, and this is why I've come to love it. So, the advice I'd give to a new Chaplain is more or less the same I'd give to any RP player: strike up a conversation!
Janitorial: Like plenty of other roles, there simply isn't much to playing the Janitor - you have your tools, they're largely self-explanatory, and that's it. There's a few tricks: when using a mop to clean up stains, clicking on the tile beneath the mess instead of the mess itself will allow you to mop back up your water, preventing your mop from drying out. Like so many newbees, Janitor was the first role I played aside from staffie, and I still remember some of the interactions I had in it to this day. (Mostly falling out the back of the Manta.)
Silicon
In General: My original main, and what I'm no doubt most recognizable for as HECATE. I've since transitioned into primarily playing organics, but... you know what they say: you can take the player out of the silicon role, but you can't take the silicon role out of the player.
Laws: I'm pretty goddamn good at both writing and 'creatively' interpreting Laws, though in the former case I usually try and leave some abusability for the sake of the fun of silicon players. Individual gotchas like the exact definition of 'override' are often tripping new players up, and I think it's something very worth mentoring people over.
Command
In General: Would it be fair to say that this is also my main department alongside Medical? Command has always scratched an itch for me, and I've never been able to put my finger on it - but judging by my affinity for AI, it might just be the ability to have your fingers in so many pies. I love interacting with people, and being their boss is a fantastic excuse to do that. As mentioned in my Medical summary, my main role is that of Medical Director, and I do love checking in on my department, greeting everyone around roundstart, inquiring about personal projects, and offering assistance whenever I see someone that I don't recognize.
Antagonist
In General: Something I've shied away from for years, and am only now dipping my toes back into now. I enjoy antagging a great deal, and I think I'm becoming rather decent at it.
Spy Thief: My favourite solo antag role by far, combining the fun toys of Traitor with the active impetus and guidance of just what you should be doing - it's a perfect cure for the all-too-common problem of having no idea what to do as an antag. The one crucial piece of advice I'd give is this: USE THE GPS VERB IN YOUR COMMANDS TAB. I've played spief many a time, and it's always a joy to try and convince people to give up their precious family heirlooms/honest-to-god limbs for... some reason or another.
Traitor: My second-favourite solo, and as far as antags go, what may well be a hotspot for mentor help between the incredible variety of unique and sometimes complex items, as well as the rather limitless possibilities of just what you CAN do with those items.
Vampire: Most likely my least favourite antag, both to play and to fight, though I have played it quite a fair bit. I feel like there's very limited RP opportunities here, and not nearly so many playstyles even compared to something like Changeling.
Changeling: I have such a mixed opinion of Changeling - it probably has the most obvious RP potential of any of the solos, and I have something of a personal rule to immediately shift into and impersonate anyone I consume so as to keep things interesting. Despite this, I do have the gripe that it's impossible to gain power as a Changeling without killing, unlike Vampire and Arcfiend. The specific mechanics of consuming someone also trip up new players often (I know they did me) and I'd be happy to be a stinky little mouse hiding in the breast pocket of an unholy abomination, telling them how to brutally devour an innocent crewmember.
Arcfiend: The final of our non-human trio, and something I'm pretty experienced with. I've never been a fan of how arcfiend victims can't be revived as mini-antags like thralls and lingcritters can, but I'd say it's countered out by how Arcfiends are fully capable of gaining power without killing or even hurting people
Salvager: The newest antag type! I've only played Salvie a small handful of times, and fought against them about that many, but there's not too much mechanical complexity to them once you understand the (fairly self-explanatory) gear.
Conspirator: RIP. At the least at the time of writing, Conspirator is disabled pending rework. I know why, but I do miss it. The prospect of advising players on this is tricky, and I suspect it's for the exact reason it was disabled: Conspirators just have very little to go off of. It's almost all up to player creativity. Nonetheless, I have fond memories of this one, such as an absurdly elaborate scheme to impersonate a certain Engineer... by mixing stable mutagen with a sample of their blood taken from tricking them into eating dry cereal. That's still one of my finest antag moments, I think.
Gang Leader: Something still quite new to RP, and I've only played it twice, but good lord do I LOVE it. There's something so special about the premise, with your fellow employees still being employees and still having that degree of civility while being pitted against your fellow crewmembers - and the intrigue mixed into it all, all while trying to manipulate or fight back against Security! I find Gang to be more or less the perfect RP gamemode and I'm sort of stunned that it's taken this long to come back. Beyond strategy, there's not too much mechanical knowledge I feel that a mentor could impart here, though, aside from just explaining what some of the available items are.
Horribly Cursed Knowledge
DID YOU KNOW that all horizontal fire alarms are rotated incorrectly? That's right! As we can see from the default vertical sprite, the green button is meant to be on the bottom, and the red flashing one on the top, but sideways alarms are the wrong way up - as far as I'm aware, this is the case on literally every in-rotation map!
I will neither confirm nor deny that this entire mentor application is an elaborate ruse to trick people into cursing themselves with this knowledge.
Admitted Flaws & Areas of Improvement
I've been a very socially anxious person for my whole life, and Goon has really helped me come out of that shell, but I still struggle a bit with starting conversations and offering advice without needing to be asked first. I've been trying for a while now to buck that (especially in Command and Security) and I think I've been doing well with it so far, but I'm still not perfect. Here's hoping, right?
Historically, some of my AI roleplay would brush against the ever-icky 'silicons as slaves' topic. To my credit, I always made strongly sure that this would only ever come up when interacting with players whom I full well knew were okay with the subject (usually, they'd be the ones to engage me about it first) and never ever in an accusatory manner towards those players or characters - but even so, I've been making a concentrated effort in the past few months to cut it out entirely. (Not that my poor machines aren't still miserable when it comes to other aspects of their existence. I'm not THAT kind to them.)
As I alluded to in the packet hacking section, I used to be just awful about it, and I'm shocked that I wasn't bwoinked more often. I'm happy to say that I've done nothing approaching self-antagging in well over a year, and in the time since I came back (May 2022) from my last hiatus every single admin interaction I've had has been purely positive - really, I'm only putting this paragraph here for completion's sake.
Previous bans: None that I'm aware of - I've certainly never seen the popup.
Thank you for reading through this horribly verbose wall of text, believe me I'd have put it inside spoiler sections if this forum had that feature! (I was going to include a section on each map, but lord almighty this is already too long.) Criticism and feedback, both on the text itself and my play in-game, are always welcome, and in fact are half the reason I'm doing this.
So... Here goes nothing.
