Westhybrid

Sorry for any offense. The entire line about bright colors and fursuits was mostly poking fun. I didn't mean to come across as a dick (but I clearly did), but my frustration following a handful of rounds, which prompted this thread, manifested itself in a lot of comments I didn't think out too well. I know it's not a serious thing and Paradise has been doing more than fine, and I didn't intend to imply it had gone downhill, it was a smaller issue that I blew out of proportion. Tired, long day, blah-di-blah. Just wanted to apologize on that front and furthermore state that I appreciate everything you've all done to make Paradise something cool, and for replying to this in spite of my rudeness. I should have been more tactful. At any rate, I understand that SS13 is a silly game that gives way to ridiculousness, and the potential for names that come with it. That said, it reaches a point where it becomes intolerable to the nth degree. It's not something I've dealt with every ten rounds or so, it's been every round, and it hasn't been only me who's seen this. It also wasn't just a recent issue. And maybe it can be attributed to the greytide, since they seem to be the ones naming themselves after references in the first place, but it does become difficult to enjoy the round and the experience. The players utilizing these names, in the instances I played with them, weren't playing to interact and do something, they were playing for the joke, and interacted as typical greytide does. And maybe it's just my personal boiling point on dealing with this specific issue, although from who I've talked to there are plenty of people that would agree to some extent that the fantasy names and other sorts can be taxing. It's completely arguable that as a server you have bigger fish to fry, and this is a small issue, which at the end of the day, fine, I can try to learn how to stomach doing surgery on walking memes. But if your server is dedicated to even a minuscule amount of RP, and it is, then it's worth promoting the use of original characters. And granted, I took things too seriously for someone who clearly hasn't been playing very often, but I do dig Paradise, I started here years ago, it's one of the few servers I used to enjoy. I obviously can't find the same level of roleplay on Hippie or Goon, and Aurora and Polaris are too stiff. Paradise has always been the one server you can find a high pop and good balance of RP, and it's why I've enjoyed it. But I'd be lying if I said there weren't issues with the server that keep me away from it sometimes, and others who I've talked to, and this was one of those issues we talk about. Which is why I felt the need to voice my frustration in the form of a suggestion after coming back to give Paradise another try. And again, I'm sorry for not presenting my argument with more care and instead proceeding to make an asshat of myself. Anyhow, that's my more rational two cents. Sorry again for the trouble. I do feel bad. Hopefully we can keep talking about this.

Coming from a High Pop server that does enforce a strict name rule and is medium-RP, this can be implemented and done here. Paradise has infinitely more staff than us, you can enforce name rules. It's more about proper judgement. Obscure shit from a Finnish TV show? Probably allowable, if not, then strike it. Mixed names like Zelda, for example? Zelda was a name before it was a video game, so literally not a problem. Point being is that this rule is enforceable and our server is a testament to that. Hell, if anything, your staff could enforce it better, given your numbers.

Unserious/Improper character names Unserious and Improper character names will be changed by an admin. If you continue to join rounds with unserious names, you may receive harsher consequences than just a name change. We allow names from video games and fantasy names, but forbid real life celebrity names or crude pun names. Examples including but not limited to: “Mike Hunt, Mike Hawk, Adolf Hitler, Donald Trump, John Cena, Barack Obama, xxhungdaddy69xx, gamergirlxd, Hugh Jass, Dick Payne.” I'm absolutely sure this has been talked about before, but please, please consider how exponentially poor a choice it is to let your server allow video game and fantasy names on your server. Now this might get long-winded, but holy hell is it tiring to have to perform surgery on Joe Joestar and Harambe in the span of a few days. And I know, the usual argument I see from all the Paradise players so righteously offended that someone might take away their bright colors and snowflake names and their fursuits is that Paradise is not High RP, and you're right, it isn't, but it sure as shit is not Low RP, and that's exactly what letting people play as video game, fantasy, meme and anime characters looks like. The logical portion of this is that you can't say no to nonfictional names but allow fictional ones. It's literally the most unreasonable rule in your list. They're the same thing; they're references, characters, that aren't your own. They're equally as annoying to deal with and they detract from the situation, and I'm sorry, dealing with an anime character blowing up the engine is just as detracting from immersions as if it were done by a president of the united states. The double standard has to end, and not in the way of making even non-fictional characters allowable, because then I'd have to make another suggestion thread, and it'd be much less tame. The other argument I see a lot of is that it doesn't detract from the RP or anyone's experience, which is one of the boldest lies I've heard in regards to this game. It does take away from the experience and any sense of immersion, because whatever you're doing in the game immediately has to come to a halt and make room for some guy with a reference name who is trying to make themselves out to be the protagonist. It's irking to try and hold up a conversation with these people and maintain the image in front of you when they're acting like some spunky character from a TV show. Part of the joy of SS13 are the stories that unfold out of the rounds. Some of my greatest experiences have been fastballed at me through Paradise, where each character was unique and important in their own way, contributing and piecing together the round. And while the degree of harm that reference names might do to your immersion is subjective, it should be universally agreeable that you can't craft a unique and amazing story if you have to make room for the characters of other starkly different worlds. It doesn't allow for creativity. It acknowledges a fourth wall one time too many. It's the cheapest method of ruining a roleplay setting. It's outright lazy, and annoying to deal with for anyone looking for a roleplay experience with substance, which as far back as I could remember when I started on this server, Paradise used to be the best at providing. If I seem livid, it's because I am, but don't discount my suggestion or argument so flippantly. Not being high RP does not mean you get to sink to the practices of low RP, which is exactly what parading around as an animu looks like. And better than most, I understand if you're some of the people using these reference names, that it's completely understandable to get defensive about it. It's comfortable. But you can do better than that. I'm looking for Paradise to stop allowing these reference names as a whole, but more than anything I'm looking for open discussion on this topic without it just being locked up and dismissed. That's my rant and suggestion.

Personal Log #19 Patient: Trukel 12:10: I wake up after my break in the OR to find some fool asking about surgery on the comms. Short staffed, I end up being the one to ask why. He doesn't wanna talk about it aloud, so he comes down to Medbay and tells me and some other doctor he wants to sell his organs. Which, for the unenlightened on the illegality of selling body parts, is a no-no. Fortunately for him I don't mind chopping out his lungs as long as I get a cut. 12:14: Talked with patient. Notified him. I head near arrivals back to my makeshift OR. Weld the wall, take the girder, usual business. Prep the area, not clean but good enough. Head on back to Medical. 12:15: Realized I don't have replacement lungs to transplant. Complicates things. Cannot kill a patient for them and sure as hell am not giving him my lungs. 12:19: Some cargo tech got merc'd in broad daylight. Skull missing. I'm the first on the scene, so I take what's left of him back to the Medical OR. Chop out the lungs, put all the tools I need in the freezer, head to the makeshift OR. 12:30: Met with the patient. Begin surgery. 12:31: Hear strange noises down the hall. Sounds like the energy swords the Cybersun folks used to use back in the day. Someone screams and it's not my patient. I shut all the lights off and continue surgery in the dark. 12:33: Surgery ended. Shaved time off record by a minute. No complications. Patient's ransomed lungs secured. Wall re-secured and OR hidden for another day. 12:40: Shuttle has been called, some Syndicate agents blew something up on the east end of the station. Not sure what. I'm making my way back there. 12:42: Trukel is swinging a chainsaw, attempting to murder who I assume was his target. He kills his target. Along with another crewmember and I proceed to knock him down and beat him into submission. I pick up a botanist's axe and finish the deed. I'm unsure as to how I'm going to get those credits, nor am I happy that I went through all the trouble of putting those lungs in only to kill the man using them. 12:43: An engineer is eating parts of Trukel. I severely question why I work here. 12:44: End Log.

Okay, kids. Story numero uno. Let's go back in time to 2014. I'm Head of Security, and I've been verbally abused in this occupation enough to register finally that this shift I don't feel like fucking up. There's not a lot of people in Station Sec tonight. Me, a brig physician and a comatose detective. Looks like I'm on patrol. It's maybe five minutes into the shift. No big deal, I'm just strolling along. Mostly quiet. I decide to visit Medbay, thinking, "what the fuck could go wrong here." Plenty. I decide to go into the Security checkpoint(back when we had a Security checkpoint), and mull things over before the clown was inevitably violated. Outside my door in the inner parts of medbay, I see a crewmember doing something strange. Looks like a normal greytide. I open my door, asking what the hell he's up to. He stares at me. ~He's just staring. He's not saying shit. Why isn't he saying anything.~ Greytide A, as he will be further referred to, goes up and tries to disarm me. Jokes on him, my hands are empty. Not wanting to initiate the very fickle switch in the HoS's mind that reads "break his spine claim ignorance of law and brig for infinity," I give him the benefit of the doubt and say, "Hey pal, I need you to take a step back." Greytide A pushes me back into the security checkpoint. Now I am disgruntled. I take my baton out to show him I mean busines- He knocks me down and takes my baton. By badge of honor stolen by a man in a gray jumpsuit wearing a bear head, I am now beginning to suspect some shit may be awry. He begins to pull out zipties. Now, at this point, I realize two possible things are happening. Either Taken 4 is being filmed and I have been grossly uninformed about my role or I am about to be culted or killed or have my face stolen. I get up, leaving my baton in his filthy greytide hands, like he is a common farmhand who just stole Excalibur. I manage to push him out back behind the security door through sheer luck and panic. I think, ~He doesn't have access. I'm good. I can call this in to my brig doc and Vege-tective and call it a day.~ He has stolen my headset without my realizing it. Even my sprite shows shame. More doctors show up outside the security-medbay office. I yell at them, "hey, there's a lunatic that stole my shit, be careful, and get help." They are not saying anything. They're gathering outside and not saying anything. What is this Children of the Corn bullshit. As one of them tries to climb over the security desk, I open the door, crack one of the doctors in the head and make a mad dash back to Station Sec. I close myself behind the doors of Station Sec, finding a homely feeling with my disconcerned brig-doc and my unconscious detective. **WARNING, A LEVEL 5 BIOHAZARD BLAH BLAH BLAH.** The Revolutionaries own Virology. They have released a virus that makes people emit plasma. I feel like I am in a chess game with the CDC. I try to explain to the crew through the loudspeaker that Revolutionaries had made an attempt on my life. The greytides claimed I was "the man" trying to "keep them down." . Fast forward about 25 minutes. In that time, they have managed to take control of Medbay, R&D and most of the eastern side of the Station. Captain's dead, go figure. CMO was never there. Research Director dipped off the his fucking space-island resort. Chief Engineer hiding. HoP non-existent. I am the last goddamn Head on a station of people wanting to kill Heads. I discover from my completely welded Security bunker that the only department not compromised is Cargo. Apparently no one visited them. They had no idea shit had hit the fan. They were still ordering Corgi crates and loving life. I praised their ignorance as bliss and told them to lock the fucking doors. A beacon of hope arrives on station. We hadn't had a new arrival for a long while. Some medical doctor with competence. (Probably Heather Somna. That woman is the patron saint of space healing.) I immediately PDA her the situation and tell her I need off this hellhole. She arrives, puts me in a locker, and I sit there like I'm about to be smuggled across the border of some forlorn country. I explain to her Cargo are the real MVP, and she drags me down the hallway to Cargonian safety. Along the way, we are stopped by one of the chump greytides who was rounding up anyone who hadn't said "Fuck the system" yet. My doctor friend tried to explain the situation. I was clutching my telescopic baton with harm intent. I felt like Anne Frank. Greytide B opens that locker, and I drop out of it like Ghostface from Scream, beating the everloving shit out of him before he stops talking and the Doctor closes the locker again, walking on like nothing happened. I've never committed a drive-by from a medical locker in my life. We get to cargo, a guy from mining opens it up. He kindly gets us through cargo to mining, the revolutionaries close on our tail. The CMO arrives on the station, and the Doctor goes back to arrivals to get him to Mining. We have now formed the Underground Railroad, and the Doctor is now some sort of space-Harriet Tubman. I'm on the Mining Station now, with the Miner. He's showing me around the place, giving me a room. I feel like I'm being treated right at a Best Western. He starts acting funny. ~What the fuck now.~ I think. Says he needs a doctor. ~Why.~ I think. **WARNING, A LEVEL 5 BIOHAZARD** Plasma starts filling the room. I have no access to these mining doors as we both start to suffocate and die from toxin damage. I have survived crazed lunatics and undergone an hour and a half shift in blatant fear only to be subdued by some asshole's plasma flatulence. My death alarm goes off, most certainly letting the Doctor know her efforts were in vain. I go off into the graveyard in righteous rage, mad about my stun baton and resentful of the existence of the Virology department.

>AI ACCESSING >Dossier File Located. >..Running Decryption*** >..Running AntiVirus*** >Clearance Registered. Approved. Employment Record 54552-Y. Name: Ico, Darius Age: Twenty-Eight (28) Gender: Male Race: Human Blood Type: O+ General Occupational Role(s): Chief Medical Officer Head of Security Security Pod Pilot Surgeon Chemist Biography: Mr. Ico's records prior to employment with our facilities is cluttered at best, but not in complete disarray. In 2550, Mr. Ico graduated second in his class at Lowell City Medical University on Mars. With the hopes of becoming a surgeon, Mr. Ico began work on independent colonial medical vessels throughout the Sol and Alpha Centauri systems, respectively. Mr. Ico continued this work for little over a year before his records seem to cut short. The assumption can be made that Ico made an error during an operation or committed a crime that resulted in the termination of employment, and possible incarceration. Mr. Ico did not appear back on the grid until 2554, where according to few security feeds we managed to tap into, Mr. Ico appeared to be based out of the Hellrock Mining Asteroid, where he was seen dragging out the body of an unspecified tajaran from what could be assumed was his operating suite. According to sources of former Hellrock criminals who now lie within NanoTransen's protective custody, Ico was considered the go-to surgeon for a price. One of the criminals in questioning also hinted at Ico's reliability when creating explosives, as he has a knack for chemistry during his time on Mars. While Ico was not the deadliest threat at Hellrock, the general consensus of those we have questioned is that Ico could handle himself, and he played his skills to the public in order to survive. Darius was considered an equal part in the social hierarchy at Hellrock, and apparently had multiple low level criminals watching his back as he tried to keep them stitched together. It is unknown what caused Mr. Ico's steep fall between working at prestigious hospitals to jury-rigging surgeries out of a former prison camp. What is known is that in the time between his termination of employment and the time he was in Hellrock, he lost his left arm. Mr. Ico's records fall through our fingers again after the testimonies, but only to reappear working for Cybersun Industries as a medical consultant and combat medic in 2557. Mr. Ico's personal testimony contributes to this, describing his time working with Cybersun "more violent." Mr. Ico went on to say that, >Accessing Audio File (Ico_Tape-034) "working with them (Cybersun) was a temporary thing. They weren't NT, but they were the next best thing, and they hire right out of Hellrock. They needed people out in the field hitting your supply ships and messing with your transmission relays. So that's what they asked me to do. And if one of their goons took a bullet, I'd be the one to have to fish it out. And I'd have to shoot back. Working with Cybersun is not a job that provides longevity. I don't feel like dying for that." Mr. Ico is now working at one of our public facilities, the NCS Cyberiad. He has stepped up to multiple roles while on board, and has proven himself to be a very capable department head, even when under pressure. It is under direction and the recommendation of the Internal Affairs department, however, that Mr. Ico not be considered an employee to place large amounts of trust in. In addition to that, we recommend his past transgressions against the company will warrant his disposal in the event that he becomes aggressive and/or outlives his usefulness. Sincerely, Internal Affairs, Central Command Division Qualifications: -High quality medical training. Medical Degree from Lowell City Medical University. -Combat Training with Cybersun Industries (REDACT AT EARLIEST CONVENIENCE) Employment Records: Darius Ico's current employment has been consistent with the general occupation roles listed above. He has excelled in the departments he's worked, with varying success otherwise. In his time, he has repelled numerous cases of revolutionaries while serving as a department head. Security Records: (To be updated.) Medical Records: Prosthetic Left Arm. Personnel Photo (Appearance text): (To be updated.) Commendations [only to be added by admin]: Reprimands [only to be added by admin]: Other Notes:

One of the few reliable engineers.

Name: Drew West Age: 25 Gender: Male Race: Human Blood Type: O+ General Occupational Role(s): -Head of Security -Blueshield -Medical Doctor Biography: West was born in a large, sprawling city, home to many cultures and their people. He was also surrounded by NT advertisements and propaganda, and despite his skepticism of Nanotransen's conduct and work ethics, he found work with them. Prior to that, he had worked in independent cargo transport as a small-time guard, which in a crime-ridden city taught him plenty about the protection business. Eventually finding there to be little pay or benefits in cargo transport, and wishing to get away from planetside, he decided to apply for work on the Cyberiad. Initially taking on smaller roles, he dabbled in each department, with the exception of the science labs. Working in Engineering, Cargo, Medical, he finally settled with Station Sec, beginning as an officer under a strict team that showed him the ropes. He excelled in this department, eventually moving his way up through the ranks. Lost his left arm after a Syndicate Operator chopped it off per their objective, although he survived the assault. Soon after, he replaced it with a robotic prosthetic. Considers himself a strong leader when there are major events and threats, but not so well at managing smaller crimes and the Brig itself. West is a man that works well with a team that trusts him. He is known to be a little bitter when joking around, but otherwise is civil. He prefers not to involve Centcomm personnel in Cyberiad's activities, as he always seems to have a conflict of command when ERT personnel show up. Whether or not this has put him at odds with Nanotransen is unknown to him, but he figures that as long as he keeps a strong defense of the station, they'll overlook his demeanor. While his skepticism towards Centcomm is resolved, he trusts his command staff and security teams strongly, believing that the Cyberiad's staff can bunker down any threat they face. Qualifications: -Command Training -Advanced Security Training -Advanced Engineering Training -Medical Training -Vital Combat Experience against; Syndicate Personnel, Hostile Vampires, Syndicate-Led Revolutionaries, and Cultists. Employment Records: Joining the NT has presented West with many opportunities in multiple departments. Working within engineering taught him how to fix the station proper, working in medical had taught him important surgical techniques, but security has been his homestead. Working as an officer, he quickly learned the dead giveaways of all sorts of criminals and threats to the station, and how to act against them. Eventually, he was given command of some of the Station Sec security teams, and put them to good use in combating revolutionary, cultist and syndicate threats to the station, although less effective against alien threats. Is shown to maintain composure under pressure. Security Records: -Reprimanded in early training for collecting and stowing away Syndicate contraband and weaponry. -Questioned for carrying a PDA on suspicion of aiding the syndicate on possible objectives, but was not convicted due to lack of evidence and exemplary prior service. Medical Records: -Prosthetic Left Arm and Hand. Personnel Photo (Appearance text): A light skinned man. Dark red, short cut hair, with a grown-out beard of matching color. Has a very calm demeanor and look to him. Stands at six foot three with green eyes. Has a left arm robotic prosthetic. Engraved on it is a message saying, "Left Arm Missing, If Found Return To This Address:" . Commendations [only to be added by admin]: Reprimands [only to be added by admin]: Other Notes: Betrayed by Hudson the Space Bear too many times.