New Roles: Prisoner and Brig Guard

[destinycall]

I'm relatively new so it is possible this idea has already been suggested.  If so, feel free to ignore it.   

Most of my play-time has been on Paradise Station, but during the recent server downtime, I played a round on a different station and noticed that they had a "prisoner" role.    At first glance, I thought it was a terrible idea.  Who wants to be stuck in Permabrig for the whole round?   But after reading about how the role works, I changed my mind and think it is actually a pretty nice role to offer, both for RP opportunities and for new players who need a safe place to learn game mechanics.

The idea of a prisoner role is not mine, but I have given some thought as to how it might work and why it would be a good addition to Paradise, so I'll felt it was worth putting together a suggestion to see if anyone else sees the merit in this idea.

First off, here's the Prisoner page from TG station wiki:

https://tgstation13.org/wiki/Prisoner

It makes a case for why the prisoner role is a nice early role for new players who want a position that has low responsibility, but is a bit more structured and safer than being a random civilian roaming around on the whole station.    Being in the brig restricts your freedom of movement and agency, but it also gives you a relatively safe place to hang out,  talk to more experienced players, ask dumb questions, and learn some basic skills.   Many station disasters won't be able to reach you in the brig and Security is responsible for getting you to the Escape shuttle, so you can just focus on learning the game and how to roleplay with others.    

One key point is that the Prisoner role is NOT an antagonist role.   It is a roleplay-focused role, like Librarian or Clown. You are basically just a Civilian with an orange jumpsuit and a tracking implant, not a traitor or a syndicate agent, no matter what your rap sheet says.   Behave accordingly.  This means that you are restricted from acting in an excessively violent or destructive fashion.   Don't RP as a violent criminally insane psychotic who eats people and then actually try to eat your cellmate.  Nobody likes that. 

Your goal as a prisoner is to be a prisoner. Not to escape from Perma.  Not to kill the Warden.  Not to monopolize Security dealing with your annoying shenanigans.    You should not violently attack your fellow prisoners or the guards or kill anyone.   And you shouldn't be making such a fuss that Security dept has to waste valuable time on you while the station is on Red alert.   Be sure to fully read and understand the self-antag and power-gaming sections of the server rules before you take this role.   

If you select the Prisoner role, then you have signed up to be a prisoner for life. That's your job.  Do it well.    Talk to your fellow inmates.  Interact with the Security staff, when they have the time.   Plan your great escape and fail spectacularly.   Learn some new skills.   Consider how your life went wrong and how you could have chosen a different path.   If you are looking for a change of pace, try asking to be moved to the Gulag so you can work off your debt to society on Lavaland.   Or if the Magistrate is available, you could ask for a parole hearing.  Don't get your hopes up, however.    They don't call it PERMA brig for nothing.   Your appeal will most likely be declined.   You could also ask for books from the Library or a visit from the Chaplain to unburden your soul.   And if you are feeling depressed, I bet the station Psychiatrist could find time to talk with you.     Use your imagination.  

I don't know that much about the coding aspect of the game, but I think it would be neat from a role-play standpoint if the player was given the opportunity to write his own "rap-sheet" at the start of the round or select from a list of possible crimes, so his past misdeeds will be permanently recorded in his arrest record.   This shouldn't be used to justify violent or antagonist behavior.   Rather, it is a way to flesh out your character's backstory for RP purposes and show how they ended up in Perma.  You are free to consider yourself innocent of these crimes, but don't expect that belief to help you get released early.    

...

I am thinking that 2-3 Prisoner slots would be reasonable amount.   I would want at least two prisoners, so you would usually have someone to interact with who is not part of Security and probably has the time and desire to RP or help you learn.    It shouldn't be much more than 3, because I don't want the perma prisoners to be too much of a burden on the Security staff.  They already have a lot on their plate dealing with actual antagonists.     The Warden is responsible for the brig and he also sometimes has to take over at the acting Head of Security.    And he is often called upon to manage the day-to-day book keeping operations of Security, so they can keep track of threats and properly record information in a timely manner, as well as managing the armory and distributing weapons from the armory, when appropriate.   The Security Officers are frequently working outside of Security, chasing down antagonists and arresting people so they can't be relied upon to be nearby and available if the Warden needs help.

For that reason, I would suggest that along with Prisoner, a new role of Brig Guard should be added.   This role would have similar duties to the Warden, minus the managerial tasks and command authority.    As a brig guard, you do not perform arrests (if there are any active security officers).  Instead, you focus on prisoner management duties.  You can process new inmates into the brig, record their crimes, transport prisoners around, and use non-lethal force as appropriate to restrain prisoners.   It's your job to maintain the smooth operation of the brig and also to protect Security and your prisoners if they are under threat.  You should work with the Brig Physician to ensure that prisoners receive medical care and also provide adequate food and entertainment options to meet your prisoners' basic needs.  As a brig guard, you are also responsible for transporting prisoners to the Escape Shuttle at the end of the shift.   If a prisoner successfully escapes, you are NOT involved with tracking down and capturing the prisoner.  That's a job for a Security Officer.    Your job is to not let the prisoners escape in the first place.  So be sure to do your job.  Also, before playing as a Brig Guard, you should be sure to read up about Space Law and the appropriate cell timers for different offenses.   Double-check with the Warden if you are unsure about how to process a particularly difficult inmate.   Also, familiarize yourself with appropriate use of force to subdue inmates.   It should go without saying that you should not be beating up or killing your prisoners.  That's not your job.   You are supposed to maintain order, not abuse your authority. 

I would think that 1-2 brig guard slots would be reasonable for most rounds.   In the absence of a Brig Guard, the Warden can take over their duties, but having a dedicated guard or two would free up the Warden to act in a more managerial fashion as well as providing him with back-up for dealing with unruly prisoners or managing a larger number of inmates.    Like Prisoners, I think Brig Guards would be a useful role for newer players who are interested in learning more about how to play Security roles.   You will learn a lot about the type of people who get arrested and how to process different crimes appropriately as a Brig Guard and should get a pretty good handle on Space Law.     This would allow newer players to contribute to the running of the department without taking up a Security Officer or Detective slot.   And it would be a better job for someone who wants to be part of Security but isn't terribly robust or someone who is interested in learning how to be a good Warden.   It is much easier to deal with unarmed prisoners than a changeling or shadowling, but the skills you learn in the brig and the confidence that brings should translate to more serious combat situations. 

.....

What do you think?      Would these roles be a good addition to Paradise Station?

[Crazyhair]

now vampires don't have to get sec for blood, but the prisoners! I do like the idea though.....but don't know about the "others".

[robveelben]

This is a idea that has been suggested more then once. In my opinion the current perma brig is to small to have a prisoner role also when security is understaffed having a prisoner to deal with aswell can be annoying to say the least. Then the brig guard I have a few issues with that in essence they are warden assistances. Even tough it can be a good job for people to learn to become warden I do not think it provides much more use then that. Those who are interested in becomming warden can just stay in brig to assist the warden.

I just do not think paradise is a place where this will work well or really need to have it. There is enough roleplay and we have more need to fix some of the other jobs that are lacking then having new jobs that will need a lot of work just to make it work.

[Viz]

The warden is already the 'brig guard'. The job is not usually very busy contrary to the popular belief assuming you're competent. I actually play it to relax.

I'd like the prisoner role to exist here though. There's people who genuinely enjoy perma roleplay and uhh.... yeah. Can't exactly end up there in a sensible IC way as non-antag. 

[Rurik]

1 hour ago, Woje said:

I'd like the prisoner role to exist here though. There's people who genuinely enjoy perma roleplay and uhh.... yeah. Can't exactly end up there in a sensible IC way as non-antag. 

I second this. Exact same topic came up a long long ago, and Ill say now what I said then. Prisoner role would be awesome.

Admittedly though, there'd have to be some discussion on if said prisoner role can attempt escape, help fellow eoc prisoners escape, how far they could go in attempting escape, etc. 

[MarsMond]

A problem with brig guards is that antagonists can have goals inside the brig, so as example a sacrifice or just the wardens gloves. Now, with a bit of time, they can wait for the brig to be clear short of a warden and maybe the brig physician, with the rest of the security force being too far away to respond to a quick strike. Now the brig guards would add two bodies with disablers to that, and more people that can raise an alarm if the antagonist has dispatched the warden otherwise silently.

As for the prisoners themselves, we do have the lockable muzzles, but security would need to supervise the feeding on monkeys then. A bit of an extra load that takes at least two officers. 

Whats a bigger issue is where they are rulewise: If they count as a normal crewmember, escaping is really only possible by walking out during a graytide virus, and even then the manhunt for the escaped perma prisoner will tax securities time, even if they can only offer limited resistance. It may also result in a bit of an OOC trust, as people know they have to follow certain rules, which may be used well, knowing they are there for some RP, or it could be bad, giving the "mutineer and murderer" prisoner role parole rather than the agent who stole the blueprints without harming anyone to deal with another situation.

If they are allowed to do more than just a crew member, what would stop this role to become a bigger problem to security than the "normal" tide? Pushing an officer over and throwing them at the door is not enough to escape, so you'll need to get their ID. But if you are already stripping them, the headset and glasses can't hurt, and a new jumpsuit with disableable sensors is needed, too. That's too far for a normal crewmember at least, but for that prisoner, it may be allowed, maybe after following some escalation rule, but that'll also be problematic. Ome of the more common bwoink reason already is self-defence taken too far, which is basically an escalation rule, and the prisoner rule would be primed for that.

Lastly, i think in universe, perma is more a long-term holding area, rather than a prison. That explains the rather small size. It's a science station, not a prison one, hold agents and vampires until the next chance to send them off to NT for further handling, so the crew transfer.

[destinycall]

I have been giving the question of prisoner escape some serious consideration because I think it is something that definitely would come up pretty consistently with anyone who is playing as a prisoner and it would require clear rules to prevent recurrent problems.    I have an idea for how it could work, although I may not have considered every angle.

From an RP-perspective, I think it is reasonable to expect that most prisoners would want to escape, if the opportunity presents itself, and some would try to create an opportunity or plan out a more elaborate escape attempt.   But from a game-perspective, this is not an antagonist role and shouldn't routinely result in major incidents that occupy Security Officers and lead to major damage to the station or serious injuries that involve even more crew to fix.  Typically, the prisoners should only be allowed to take up the time of the Warden and his Brig Guards, which is reasonable considering prisoner management is their primary job.  The rest of Sec would operate unchanged because prisoners should, for the most part, stay prisoners and remain in the permabrig or labor camp.

In fact, the rules regarding self-antag specifically mention that a non-antagonist cannot intentionally break people out of perma-brig without administrator approval.  I think it is reasonable to assume this includes breaking themselves and other prisoners out of perma by force.   

In my opinion, a prisoner should be free to take advantage of a momentary lapse in security to slip out of custody.   But they are not allowed to harm other prisoners or guards to secure their escape.  They are held to the same standards for violence as a regular civilian with respect to server rules, so it would need to a non-violent or steathly escape attempt.  Bar of soap on the floor, run out through an open door, hide in a locker. That kind of thing.    If they are considering a more elaborate escape or want to do something that might result in injuries to crew or damage to the station, the plan should be cleared ahead of time by contacting an administrator for approval.   The admin can determine if a daring escape attempt would be a fun challenge or an unwanted distraction for rest of the station.   

This solution would allow prisoners to dream of escape, but would hopeful mean that they are mostly just dreaming about it, rather than actually doing it.     It should be hard to successfully escape.    Really hard, but not completely impossible. 

 

1 hour ago, MarsMond said:

A problem with brig guards is that antagonists can have goals inside the brig, so as example a sacrifice or just the wardens gloves. Now, with a bit of time, they can wait for the brig to be clear short of a warden and maybe the brig physician, with the rest of the security force being too far away to respond to a quick strike. Now the brig guards would add two bodies with disablers to that, and more people that can raise an alarm if the antagonist has dispatched the warden otherwise silently.

Yes, the presence of brig guards would make sneaking in Security undetected harder.   But shouldn't Sec being a hard target?     

If you need a distraction, perhaps you could help those prisoners break loose.   Give the brig guards something to deal with, so they don't have time to chase after you.   The prisoners would likely also be an advantage to some antagonists, like abductors, cortical borers and spiders, since they would be trapped and unable to run away.   Vigilant guards might be able to save the prisoners from such an attack, but there's no guarantee that they will notice in time or intervene successfully.

 

1 hour ago, MarsMond said:

Lastly, i think in universe, perma is more a long-term holding area, rather than a prison. That explains the rather small size. It's a science station, not a prison one, hold agents and vampires until the next chance to send them off to NT for further handling, so the crew transfer.

My thoughts regarding why there might be prisoners in the brig at the start of the round is that I assume that from an in-universe perspective, stuff was happening before the round started.   Therefore, crimes could have taken place on the shuttle ride over to the station or after the shuttle arrived which resulted in one or more people getting sent to perma before the game started from the player perspective.    Another in-universe explanation might be transfer of a prisoner from a nearby space ship or station that lacks the proper facilities for prolonged incarceration.  They handed off the prisoner to the NSS Cyberiad for safe keeping and eventual transport back to Central or to a more secure prison facility, just like our prisoners will eventually be handed off to someone else when the crew transfer happens.

Regarding size, when you take into account the labor camp on Lavaland, there is adequate room for a couple of extra prisoners at round start.    If things start to get crowded both locations, it might be worth holding a parole hearing or two.  Perhaps some of your prisoners have reformed.   Or perhaps see if any of them want their freedom bad enough to accept cyborgifcation.   They won't be human anymore, but at least they'll be free.  Sort of.    Okay, not really.   But they'll be out of the brig! 

[ZN23X]

Long time security main here.

And actually playing Warden and Brig Doc are my favorite roles because I love just hanging around the brig.

On the warden side, in my experience sometimes things are so slow that you're begging for something to do. Sometimes its so chaotic that you could have three other people helping you and it wouldn't be enough. However, during those times that I need extra help as a warden there is usually someone available whether it be HOS or an officer available. And sometimes they won't be. That's kind of security in a nutshell though. Frequently the station snowballs into a level of chaos where it's completely unmanageable even when security is fully staffed and competent. That's not even taking into account the times that you have the inexperienced security. Sometimes security is a well-oiled machine sometimes it's a cluster fuck. 

I also wanted to note that regardless of what SOP says, the warden is not always the person who becomes acting HOS when the need arises. It typically just ends up being whoever is willing to take the plunge whether they be warden, officer, or otherwise...and its usually an officer. I'm pretty sure I've even seen the brig doc become acting HOS once.

Now my feedback about the brig guard from my experience as a brig physician. The brig physician is a unique role because your only job is to give medical attention to people in the brig (duh). This means that sometimes you are busy the entire round with a rotation of surgeries and other injuries and sometimes you literally don't have one patient for the entire 2 hours. On the slow rounds you get to observe processing and shoot the shit with other bored security or prisoners. That can be fun from time to time but it's still nice to be able to need to deal with a medical problem from time to time.

Brig guard would pretty much be something similar to a brig physician minus any medical responsibilities, with the added bonus of getting to rough up a prisoner from time to time. I foresee the role being quite boring regularly.

Another example would be, magistrate is often a role where you would sit around trying to find RP but the magistrate at least has bridge access, authority, command comms, the ability to oversee IAAs and such. Even with all that being a magistrate can be mind-numbingly boring. Brig guard would lack any of these responsibilities or access so they would be even more hard-pressed to find something to do.

This can even be the case for the warden from time to time despite their laundry list of responsibilities.

I guess the short version is, other roles that already exist that are bound to the brig that have more responsibilities than this brig guard can still be boring from time to time despite having so many more responsibilities. I know that round start prisoners could alleviate this and I'll get to that later on.

Something like the brig guard role has come up from time to time over the years. Whenever one of these roles comes up it should always be pointed out that any security officer can play this role if they would like to. They can work the front desk. They can assist the warden. But due to the fact that they are an officer they also have the freedom to leave the brig and help in the field when the need arises. A brig guard would just be an officer who is restricted to staying in the brig.

I myself pushed for a "medbay guard" years ago. I actually had (still have) paperwork that I used to give to the HOP so I could become this role. It was interesting because I would spend the first half hour of a round just simply trying to get approval to work the job. If I ever got that job added as an official round start job it was then going to be my goal to have a guard added for each dept. How naive I was back then...any kind of guard role added to any department, even security, makes things harder for antagonists. It can already be plenty hard enough for them. Security being too busy and not having enough hands to deal with everything that needs to be dealt with is part of what makes things interesting. It opens up more opportunity for different things to happen.

I don't have a problem with somebody trying to become a role like this through the head of personnel but I don't think it should be added as a permanent role. There have been suggestions to have a "security cadet" role added as well. This is another role that can be obtained through the head of personnel. Needing to obtain the role through the head of personnel also adds to the RP aspect of it.

I kind of went on too long here about just the brig guard. The tl;dr for prisoner is I think it's a bad idea for balance, management, and cultural reasons. Some of those reasons have been expressed by others but I'll elaborate in a later post when I have time.

I hope this feedback helps.

(How many times did I say "time to time" in this post...

...you might say I said it from time to time :honk:)

Edited August 16, 2021 by ZN23X
FROM TIME TO TIME

[MisterMan]

I do like this idea, but I feel like it would be better suited for a ghost role of sorts. Perhaps a prison complex in space, with guard roles that can be there or not, and rules that don't allow prisoners to leave the complex itself, but allow escape and to kill any visitors, if there are any. This would address all the issues MarsMond brought up, but still allow for escapes without effecting the rest of the round and its antagonists.

[Machofish]

I could see this idea working to a limited degree: as it stands, permabrig tends to be treated as a form of extended death row—it's not a matter of "if" a permabrig prisoner escapes, it's a matter of "when", and security tends to treat them like that. A 'prisoner' role who has no malevolent intent towards the crew but is still in custody would encourage officers to be less spiteful towards everyone in perma.

That said, there's a lot that would need to change with how perma exists before the prisoner role would make sense:

• This may sound strange, but roundstart prisoners would need permission to help their inmates escape and to potentially undermine security if they get the chance. Their role shouldn't be restricted to snitching on imprisoned EoCs.
• Permabrig would need to be expanded and sensibly-built.
  • Firstly, permabrig itself would need to be relocated entirely so that escaping it takes actual preparation. At present, a prisoner in permabrig with no gear, no outside help, no incompetent sec to loot, and no preparation can still break out just using the stuff inside the permabrig itself. Basically the process is to use the permabrig stools to shatter a window, use the window debris to break some other things inside perma and eventually a prisoner can accumulate enough gear to make a spear to break through the airlocks without electrifying themselves on the window grilles. This is to say nothing of how laughably easy it is to break into perma from space and get the perma detainees safely into maintenance without needing to offer them any internals or EVA gear of their own. If EVA is somehow too much effort, someone from the outside need only falsewall or thermite their way into the execution wing. At present, the only way to keep someone in perma is if they want to be in perma.
  • The brig does not have enough starting equipment to support any more than 5 perma detainees—and even that is pushing it. A high pop traitor round can have as many as fifteen traitors, and yet the brig only has enough uniforms and space to properly put 5 people in perma. Permanent sentences can also be done using the gulag (very risky to put any more than 3 people into permanent labor, since the gulag is designed so that officers have to exit the shuttle in single-file where the prisoners can set up a choke point on the other end), or exile (all it takes is 2 prisoners and a surgery kit and they can remove their exile implants. Gateway explorers will also help exile prisoners for free because sEcUrItY bAd.)

During a round of traitors, security will start out in a position where they don't have enough space or equipment to manage any more than 5 detainees, and giving them perma prisoners to manage right from the offset would further reduce that number. If these issues were fixed, then I would be supportive of a dedicated 'prisoner' role.

[TheYeetster]

as admin punishment you could be forced to play prisoner role for then next X rounds, and if you die/ghost you're not able to rejoin the round. somewhat of a soft ban for EORG instead of temp bans.

[Viz]

46 minutes ago, TheYeetster said:

as admin punishment you could be forced to play prisoner role for then next X rounds, and if you die/ghost you're not able to rejoin the round. somewhat of a soft ban for EORG instead of temp bans.

That encourages people to do it. A punishment is supposed to be a punishment.