Remove arrivals alert and change civ/arrival mech a little

[Midaychi]

 

As a preface: This suggestion is mostly to benefit antags. It has a side benefit of helping the customs officer.

 

First step: Remove arrivals alert.

 

Why?: There are very few in character benefits to the arrivals alert. Even for the few that there are, it doesn't work in a sensible way.

 

The ic benefits of having arrivals alert:

1. You know when you man the customs station

2. You know when to stalk the hallways to drag a newcomer into maintnence

3. You know when someone boards your station, but it never announces people who come through arrivals, just people who spawn on the darn shuttle. Kinda dumb. You'd think they'd announce anyone who came through those doors or the ERT but no.

 

The OOC benefits of having arrivals alert:

1. You know that a person just recently joined

2. You know if Robin Rainwater needs to be set to arrest the moment they step foot on the station.

3. You know that because the arrivals never announced someone, then they must not be new arrivals and must be fakes!

 

 

It's just plain dumb, hurts antags and allows attentive people to meta. Remove it.

 

 

--

 

The next step: Have civilians spawn without an id card, and have them not registered on the crew manifest.

 

Make it so that the customs officer (or HOP/Recruiter if the customs officer isn't availible) has a box of civilian ids and a Civilian ID computer. The computer allows them to add people to the crew manifest and give them basic id levels. The computer would not accept normal id cards (besides for verification slot), and would not allow you to give someone all access (that's the HOP's job). This is so the civilians can be registered/wander about the station/visit the hop or recruiters office.

 

Why? This and the removal of the arrivals alert console would allow cunning antags to infiltrate the station. It would allow Vox Raiders, Nuke Ops, Wizards, and Admin Event spawned people to legitimately infiltrate the station as civilians and avoid the constant meta that often gets them caught. Assuming of course the customs officer doesn't catch them, as it suddenly also gives the Customs Officer job EXTREME IMPORTANCE, as it originally should have been.

 

This would also allow cunning existing antags like traitors/changlings/vampires to lay low and change their identities, and then attempt to sneak back aboard under the guise of new civilians. No longer are burned antags forced to ruin the station for everyone! Now they have an option, if they're cunning enough to do it!

 

[Eldrin-Kanthos]

This just seems to make antags easier. If someone comes aboard and us not announced, then they are IC suspicious, not OOC. Besides, most antags I see get in unnoticed, maybe vox raiders and nuke ops have trouble, but that is the point, they have to have difficulty.

[Midaychi]

 

It would only make antags easier if the station staff was pre-occupied or inexperienced. A proper customs officer would still mean that said antags would have difficulty, as they would at least have to be unsuspicious and make up a good cover story.

 

Also, holy shit, an actual reason to use the x-ray machine. Searching people to make sure they're not bringing illegal things onboard. THE CONCEPT, MY MIND.

 

We have the tools to defeat this stealth tactic, but the stealth tactic is rarely used because there are meta-concepts described above in effect. Remove those concepts, and bam suddenly the stealth tactic is used more, bam suddenly customs officer is the hero the station needs.

 

 

TL;DR:

>IT WOULD NOT make it easier for antags, unless the crew made it easier for them by not using the tools already available to them ingame<

 

[Midaychi]

As a Fringe benefit, it suddenly makes customs officers worth keeping tabs on/keeping loyalty implanted, because an antag customs officer would become far more impacting than as they are now; basically a fancy security officer.

[Fj45]

Makes customs far too important and simply leads to confusion with new crew members mixing with old.

[Midaychi]

 

Makes customs far too important and simply leads to confusion with new crew members mixing with old.

 

Can you elaborate on that first part?

If you mean "The station would suddenly require customs officer for every round"

Not necessarily, if anything it would encourage customs officers to be more plentiful because of their importance. Heck might even need two customs officers slots.

 

Also, it would mean that a good hop would ask security or trusty employees at round start "We don't have a customs officer, so can I get a volunteer to get their id updated and man it?"

That easy. It's like not having a HOP at roundstart. Someone will fill the role eventually.

 

A good fix would be to lower customs officer to 10 KP. People still have to earn it but it becomes much more common for people to have.

 

AS to the second, part I'm not sure what you mean?

 

'New crewmembers mixing with old'?

You mean people with new identities or something?

Any way I look at it, I can't help but think that all it would do would give the detective something to do besides pretending to be a security officer.

 

 

(Edited 'cause I was being a dick for no raisin)

 

[Fj45]

 

Sorry, bit tired.

Ok, lets say the CE turns up but as theres no arrivals message nobody notices him. He then doesn't get a status report on the ship and whatnot. Arrivals messages are needed otherwise it gets confusing who is new or not. It also helps with rev rounds as people can warn them before they take a stroll and get flashed.

 

[Eldrin-Kanthos]

You cannot be changed to a karma job by the HoP, unless you unlock it. You can mechanics wise, but I was told by admins that unless you have unlocked it you can be in trouble.

[Midaychi]

 

That does make a little sense I guess, but said ce could easily say over engineering channel ":e hey CE here, what's the status, just arrived" and effectively have the same thing. As for warning, I dunno that's tiptoeing the meta train a little and rev'sll be camping the hallway of that one way street there anyways.

 

I guess if people want to keep arrivals alerts, wouldn't it make sense to expand it to announce people that board the arrivals area, and not just through the arrivals shuttle? What if they come out of the gateway? Or are a special ops squad? Wouldn't it be important for the crew to know that the ERT has arrived? Or the squad? Wouldn't there be a message for when heads leave the station and when they return?

 

Arrivals are helpful but it's information that the entire crew really doesn't need. Especially not to the half-ass meta way it's been implemented for years.

 

[Midaychi]

 

You cannot be changed to a karma job by the HoP, unless you unlock it. You can mechanics wise, but I was told by admins that unless you have unlocked it you can be in trouble.

 

Weird. I meant more just giving people access levels and manning it in their absence though. Pretty sure admins wouldn't mind that.

 

[Eldrin-Kanthos]

 

You cannot be changed to a karma job by the HoP, unless you unlock it. You can mechanics wise, but I was told by admins that unless you have unlocked it you can be in trouble.

 

Weird. I meant more just giving people access levels and manning it in their absence though. Pretty sure admins wouldn't mind that.

 

Manning the position with all the access IS the job. If it became so important for customs, then it would have to be a nobleman job.

 

[Midaychi]

Could just remove customs officer as a karma job then, and make it a security officer subjob title instead?

[ClarkPark]

Customs sometimes is more of a bother than a help Not sure if making them required would be good. Makes sense IC-wise, but the time you wait in those lines is just awful.

[Fj45]

Agree. Worst thing is the idiots that force forms even when spiders or xenos or whatever are everywhere.