[Guide to Internal Affairs]

Sihsse's Tips and Tricks of Being a Professional Internal Affairs Agent

First and foremost All Internal Affairs Agents must remember that your greatest asset in performing your duty is that the crew sees you as someone who is professional and can be trusted to handle their issues. If you act biased, unprofessional, or you lack sufficient knowledge in Space Law or Standard Operating Procedure, the crew are less likely to seek you out to resolve their issues or even ignore you outright. At worst you can be deemed a hindrance to productivity and may lose your position.

• Make the crew aware that Internal Affairs is open and operating. This can easily be accomplished by stopping by the Head of Personnel's Office and asking them to broadcast a station wide message on your behalf. Failing that putting up a few papers on the airlock can also let crew know that Internal Affairs is there to help, not as effective as an announcement however something is better than nothing.
• Get in contact with the Magistrate and NanoTrasen Representative.The former is your boss and can often refer cases to your office or asking you to keep an eye on things, your boss is also a very good source of information and will provide their own opinions on Space Law and Standard Operating Procedure when you're unsure of how to proceed. The NanoTrasen Representative is very interested in Standard Operating Procedure and making sure the Station functions properly, if you have complaints about a member of Command its always important to forward those to the Representative to handle if there is one on board before attempting to handle it yourself. They can also be an excellent source of cases should something between crew is brought to their attention or a department needs checked in on.
• Standard Operating Procedure: Guidelines for a better Station. Standard Operating Procedure is definitely important, however you have to remember first and foremost that they're A Set of Guidelines and Not a Checklist for Firing Someone. While someone can be fired for violation of Standard Operating Procedure you have to look at the context in which it is broken. If Genetics are handing out genetic powers to civilians without authorization, is it because they're giving them to friends for fun or is it to help bolster the crew against the Terror Spiders that are currently rampaging. Context is king in assessing a situation and the two questions you should ask yourself are always "Is the effect for the benefit of the station?" and "Is this action hurting the station and causing issues?"
• Politeness, the Strongest Weapon in your Arsenal. Being polite and cordial when approaching someone will have a multitude of effects. Not only will you often receive a much more open reception when asking questions and investigating, if an individual is being unreasonable and hostile towards you it strengthens your position when you need it. Nobody enjoys someone who screams and tries to flout authority, make sure you don't slip in to this category.
• Knowledge is Power. One of your greatest assets is the extensive library of Standard Operating Procedure and Space Law within your Office. You're expected to have a firm grasp of Space Law and Standard Operating Procedure for various departments however no single agent can remember every single procedure for every single department. If you need a refresher or you haven't memorized the SoP for a particular department it never hurts to carry a few books with you, especially Space Law and Legal Operating Procedure when you're hanging around the Brig.
• Legal Therapist with Paperwork. Sometimes an issue that crew brings to you isn't sufficient to warrant an investigation or even intervention from you and they're just looking to complain to you about it. Be open and receptive to their complaints, let them know they you're there for them and that you'll try to do something to curb the problem that they're having or even offer advice to them on how to avoid or resolve their conflict with a co-worker who is an asshole. Not only will they appreciate being able to complain but they'll thank you for your time and you'll build a stronger more positive relationship with the crew.
• Reputation is Important. If you're fresh and new to the Internal Affairs game, you won't get a lot of cases to handle. Keep your nose to the grindstone and build your reputation shift by shift and eventually you'll be known as that Agent who not only crew will listen to but even Security will come and ask for your opinion regarding things they're unsure of. With a good reputation for impartiality, friendliness, and strong knowledge in your field, you can even have Command seeking you out for issues that require your solid judgement.
• Demotions and Where You Fit In. A good Agent never threatens someone with demotion or demands the demotion of crew. If you believe an individual is a detriment to the department and is violating Standard Operating Procedure in a way that harms it, the best course of action is to seek out their Department Head and speak to them about your concerns. If you're unable to or they're busy, writing a simple report and faxing it to the appropriate Command member for their review will let you accomplish the same thing.
• Staving off Boredom. One of the biggest issues Internal Affairs have is what to do between cases. Brush up on Standard Operating Procedure and Space Law while sitting in processing. It gives you a chance to see how Security is performing and offers opportunities to give advice if you see something that perhaps a new Security Officer is doing that could be done better. Visit departments and watch them work, get a feel of when a department is operating good and when a department is operating poorly. You can even send a status report to Central Command if there isn't a NanoTrasen Representative to do so or just shoot off a pleasant message to inform them that you're there.

A Final Word. Internal Affairs Agents are there as problem solvers on behalf of Central Command and NanoTrasen, you're there to make sure the station functions properly and that the crew are at least doing their jobs to a reasonable extent. A good Internal Affairs Agent can handle a myriad of issues on station without Central Command even knowing there was a problem to begin with and knows when to shoot off a fax to the big bosses when the problem is beyond their capabilities. Always exhaust every option available to you in contacting the appropriate Command Members before grabbing the attention of the big guys at Central Command. Having the Magistrate and/or NanoTrasen Representative add their signature and stamps to your report can also lend it considerable weight and show its something that needs their attention.

[mech nerf?]

Mechs are only as good as the individuals piloting them.

I've seen plenty of mech pilots who got absolutely wrecked by Spiders, Xenos, and Blobs either because they got careless or because of a superior tactic in handling the situation.

I've also seen the opposite since Spiders, Xenos,and Blobs are only as good as the player controlling them and sometimes you're just faced with someone who knows how to deal with you.

As a Queen of Terror I've been trounced on by a Durand because it happened to catch me in a long hallway and I ended up making a mistake. I've also blown up a Durand and Gygax before playing the same role when I had more space to maneuver and with backup from other spiders to help bring it down.

[Terror Spider Update Thoughts]

18 hours ago, Kyet said:

I could make it so that gray spiders have a similar alpha (transparency / hard to see) as xeno hunters do whilst on a web. Would have to test that idea. My main concern is that if I have to check "is this spider standing on a web?" every tile they move, that might be too many checks.

Make it an ability the player activates then when they're no longer on web it deactivates so the check process isn't perpetual and encourages lurking within the webs.

[The Karma System's Flaws and Possible Solutions]

In response to what you see as a problem.

• Karma isn't meant to be something you receive consistently, its something you earn because someone felt you deserved it. Being able to consistently earn Karma actually makes a worse system because its now no longer something rewarded its something handed out because you did x,y,z. It makes it less meaningful to receive it.
• Players are not entitled to play Karma Jobs/Races because X amount of time has been played. Much like the Karma Points themselves these items are rewards for accumulating Karma. We always appreciate players who follow rules and play the game properly, however you really shouldn't need to be rewarded for doing what you're expected to do to begin with.
• I can agree with the difficulty in giving karma sometimes, especially if you're holding on to your karma until round end and if you want to reward it to someone earlier it can be a bit of a challenge to find them.

The Karma system is in place to allow players to reward other players for a multitude of reasons. Maybe the player being rewarded was the doctor who saved someone's life in a quick fashion and prevented the player from having to wait out time in death until being cloned. Maybe it was someone who did a silly prank and got a few laughs. Maybe it was someone who created something exceptionally complex and interesting. The reasons for being rewarded Karma can vary greatly since its at the whim of the players. Your proposal of replacing the system would remove a system that rewards players and implement one that just hands out goodies via checklist.(eg Player plays round until end, gets 1 point. Player has played X amount of rounds, unlock this job!). As for improving the current system, we actually have a verb that lets you award it to anyone, its called the Award Karma verb. If you use Award Karma to Player it only selects from those around you. Award Karma selects everyone eligible to receive Karma during the round.

[Heyo...it's a sorta new player here]

Glad to have you with us and even more pleased that you're enjoying yourself!

A few things to help you get started first and foremost make sure you've read our rules.  They're not hard to follow at all, basically boils down to not being a dick and to treat players how you yourself would like to be treated. Whenever in doubt, you can always contact Admins to clarify if something is against the rules or if something confuses you about them.

I'll just drop these here as well since they're very useful for new players.

https://nanotrasen.se/wiki/index.php/Guide_for_beginners

https://nanotrasen.se/wiki/index.php/Standard_Operating_Procedure

https://nanotrasen.se/wiki/index.php/Roles

https://nanotrasen.se/wiki/index.php/Lore

The last link is exceptionally good if you'd like to make your role play more immersive with the universe that is provided.

Welcome to Paradise!

[Temporary]

3 minutes ago, EvadableMoxie said:

Yes, all kidney's do is cause 0.1 to 0.3 toxin damage per tick if you have coffee in your system. That's it.

Not even that, it actually requires the kidneys to be in a specific damaged state for coffee to cause toxin damage if I'm reading that correctly.

[OHSA Brainstorm]

Watch it'll either be me or Tully who'll be playing the paperwork bastard during the event. Gird your loins people.

[Remove Or Rework Stable Mutagen]

I've actually used it to create a replica to transplant a brain into. 

Rather than remove or rework ahelp it.

Trolling with stable mutagen is definitely something we crack down on.

[Admin Note Policy and Transparency]

2 hours ago, Trubus said:

Notes should expire after a year, I have bans I had two years ago still being used against me. (Admin/Mentor applications)

I find it unfair because as a player, I have changed a whole lot and being told no due to perm ban and notes 2+ years ago is the reason why.

With all due respect, this statement here basically paints us as always holding every transgression a player has ever made against them and that we disregard any signs of improvement a player may have made over the course of being here and really can't be seen in any other light.

If that wasn't your intention to make us out to be such petty and vindictive individuals perhaps you should put more thought and care into what you post, particularly since it also doesn't reflect well to us if you're making us out to be your enemies especially those of us who have worked very hard to help those who do wish to change and be a more positive force for our community.

[Admin Note Policy and Transparency]

@Dinarzad

Allow me to take your statement point by point then.

5 hours ago, Dinarzad said:

Not being able to see your own notes leads to confusion and bewilderment.  It's curbing another avenue for problem players to recognize a downward spiral and any chance for them to right that behavior.  It focuses solely on the punishment for doing something wrong rather then giving that player a chance to self correct.

Players are well aware when we warn them since we get confirmation that they understand the warning, any of you who have been warned know we expect a reply. There shouldn't be any bewilderment or confusion about notes unless the player forgets the warning in which case maybe they should write it down since we will almost always note it in their file if we do warn them.

Receiving multiple warnings from the administration team should be a clear indicator of a player's downward spiral and be enough for them to think "Hey, maybe I should change my behavior and improve myself so I stop being warned by the staff and I don't get banned." Having access to their notes privately isn't going to help this unless you're speaking that it can jog their memory of past transgressions, at that point I refer you to the fact that if their memory is that poor about this maybe they should be keeping their own set of notes.

Notes are not focused solely on punishment, it is a way for us to share information with each other regarding either administrative actions taken against the player or if we want to say something positive for other administrators to consider. All players are given ample opportunity to self-correct considering its incredible rare for first offenses to be banned, usually requiring individuals to make multiple offenses at the time or show an utter disregard for playing nice with others and following the rules.

5 hours ago, Dinarzad said:

The inability to talk about bans on discord in addition to not being able to see what you've been doing wrong, it's stacking the deck as much as possible into preventing a problem player from correcting his behavior BEFORE it comes to a head and requires a ban, instead of taking the "Ounce of Prevention" we've opted for multiple pounds of "Cure

The inability to talk about bans publicly is mainly because individuals 9 out of 10 times will salt about their bans. They'll complain that the staff was too harsh or that they didn't do it and that the staff has an ax to grind against them. There really isn't much constructive to be gained about talking about a ban to the general public since they'll likely not know about the situation and only receive a story, more often than not, spun to make the individual complaining look like a victim and to rally support against badmins. Allowing players to do so and then just banning the individuals who do those actions really doesn't change anything, since the individuals who want to talk about their bans publicly are usually the ones who want to salt about it and the ones who don't realize "Hey, I fucked up and I really don't want to draw attention to this fuck up of mine." I know I personally wouldn't want to talk publicly about a ban if I ever received one since it isn't exactly something to write home about. As for stacking the deck, there are staff available to speak to them regarding their behavior if they honestly want to change, there's absolutely nothing preventing anyone from contacting us and asking "Hey, what can I do to be a better part of this community?"

Saying that being able to see notes and discuss bans will suddenly have the community policing itself and take a weight off our shoulders as prevention instead of cure hasn't taken into account the variables of friends and, cliques people of like minded nature who will not only agree with the individual that the administrator is wrong but will also reinforce the bad behavior, hell it happens even without the discussion of bans and notes being made available and nothing will really change that aspect.

As for players who have been banned for oopsies so to speak, if its just a singular oopsie incident there really isn't a lot of work involved in the appeal process, it only becomes an issue when multiple oopsies have occurred. At that point there really isn't an excuse for them not taking the opportunity to change their behavior if they've been banned/warned multiple times over the same oopsie or just general oopsies with multiple rule breaks.

5 hours ago, Dinarzad said:

In addition, if a player has access to their own notes, they run out of excuses for continued misbehavior real fast. A player can't claim they didn't know something was a problem, when they had full access to see those notes and see that it WAS a problem, they could have seen it at any time and didn't care and continued to break rules and tow lines anyway, which helps lead to more open and shut cases, it's a more telling sign of someone's attitude as a player and whether or not they're any good for the server.

Once again, nothing is stopping the player from remembering or taking note of their own warnings. They don't need access to administrative notes regarding this. Its very clear to us if an individual doesn't remember or doesn't care, the latter usually from multiple notes over a steady period of time The excuse of, I don't remember, is rather flimsy to begin with since it is a rather memorable moment to have an administrator contact you. I remember when I was contacted THE VERY FIRST TIME over something that didn't mesh with the rules over a year ago. Not only do I remember the administrator that contacted me I remember the conversation we had as well as the contents of it and let me tell you, my memory can be quite awful, I'd forget my own birthday if it didn't actually serve a purpose.

The only way I can think of players forgetting multiple times we've contacted them, which usually is the case before it leads to a ban, is if they've grown accustomed to it and simply don't care. That or they're living in a 30 First Dates scenario where they relive the same day over and over again because of memory issues. If I can remember something from well over a year ago, it really isn't a stretch to think the average person can remember a MONTH ago.

As for individuals who say "Well Bryan, what about notes from several months ago? From half a year ago? A year ago? Am I expected to remember that?" Usually no, those don't get taken into consideration if there's a large block of time between notes or when your last note is from a long time ago. Its when players start accumulating a good amount of notes after that long period of time we'll start referencing that since it either indicates A) That person stopped playing for the block of time and that's why there're no notes or B) They've burned themselves out and stopped caring.

Giving them the opportunity to look at their notes and saying "Well, you didn't look at your notes you had ample opportunity to change." well, they're not going to change regardless if they have their notes available to them. People who want to change will change regardless if they have access to their notes because they realize they've done wrong and they want to become a positive force for the community, to share in the fun and the laughs and are usually genuinely upset that their actions have impacted others in a negative way. People aren't going to magically want to start bettering themselves because they can see our notes and be reminded of their poor behavior at that time and making them public to everyone would just end up with players looking at other players notes and being shamed, even if they are good players now and had issues in the past, something There are people who will use it intentionally to shame or will bring it up in conversation not with the intention to do so but ultimately leading to that same outcome, something that I am vehemently against.

After addressing these points I'll leave you with some others.

• There are notes that as stated before aren't administrative actions taken against the player but opinions of the administrative staff regarding behavior that may potentially be detrimental to the community or a potential rule break. Nothing is gained from players knowing these observations and it very much can be used to say "Hey, the administrative staff hates me! LOOK I HAVE PROOF! BADMIN SAID X ABOUT ME!" which is only a negative for us because then it makes us out to be the enemy.
• There are notes that contain information about other players, things that players have said to us that we don't wish to divulge because it can open up the floor to other players not trusting the individual or ostracizing the individual completely because they ran to Staff to "tattle" on them. Nothing productive will come of this and the fallout from these actions would just create more work for us and ruin the game for those people who actively help and try to keep the server a good place for others by bringing these things to our attention.
• It can place a barrier between the staff and the player base as some players are friends with staff and we have to do our duty as staff before being your friend. Nobody likes seeing something unflattering being said about them and it could negatively impact the relationships we have with those individuals in the community which would eventually end up in there being a divide.
• As Necaladun pointed out, we'd have players requesting alterations or removal of notes which could very well increase our workload since we'd have to investigate the legitimacy of the note itself on a case by case basis.

[The psionic [New antag]]

26 minutes ago, McRamon said:

This psionic sounds like it is a valid antag, like wiz, sling or nukies.

Hate to be pedantic about this but Shadowling are not a valid antagonist nor do I think the psionic should not be treated as a valid antagonist. Individuals seeking to kill the Psionic just like a Shadowling would be subject to violating our Valid Hunting rules. 

[The psionic [New antag]]

5 hours ago, farie82 said:

Suggestion (Ranged, Channel, Upgraded will speed up the channelling, Cost 2)
Implant a custom idea into the brain of a victim. The victim has a chance to notice that he’s being influenced. The longer the psionic focusses on the victim the longer the suggestion stays. Each step will increase the duration with 1 minute. Each step having the chance that he will notice. After you cancel the current step progress you will implant the suggestion in to the brain of the victim. This is an objective that he has to achieve. After the duration he’ll lose his memories of what happened during the suggestion. Same idea as the chaplains staff

I'm a bit concerned regarding the ability of the player to give what I assume would be a custom objective. There are a lot of ways that this can be abused outside of what it was intended for since the player themselves can customize the objective and how the ability is defined the individual who receives the objective has to complete them. An example I can think off the top of my head is.

Quote

Kill all mindshielded personnel.

This would give the player receiving the suggestion essentially a free pass to go murderbone Security.

Quote

Cause as much chaos as possible.

Basically a hijack objective at this point since the definition is entirely too loose.

Rather than having the player able to set the objective themselves, maybe have it so that you can pick an objective from a pre-set list of objectives available that would work with the gameplay of the Psionic or like Abductor have it assign a random objective from a pre-made pool of objectives so that it avoids players abusing the hell out of this feature. It will also take a bit off of us so we're not having to double check each and every time this ability is used.

[hello there]

Welcome to Paradise! We're very happy to have you here as well as very pleased that you're having a great deal of fun with us!

I hope to see you having fun in game and that you have many wonderful adventures with our community.

Here are a few links to help you get started so you don't flail around too much on what to do.

• https://nanotrasen.se/rules/ Very important, most of these are common sense don't be an asshole to other people however it doesn't hurt to read them so you know what we do and do not allow while you're playing with us.
• https://nanotrasen.se/wiki/index.php/Guide_for_beginners A guide that will help you begin your journey with us in creating and playing a wonderful character to join our vast and varied crew.
• https://nanotrasen.se/wiki/index.php/Roles A list of various jobs you may or may not be hired in to when you play with us. Each one is linked to its own page to give further detail of the job and each job page can contain links to very helpful guides on how to do various things regarding that job. Knowledge is power so make sure you at least take a cursory glance.

I hope this helps you in settling in with the community in sharing the many different adventures you will have with us. Once again welcome to Paradise! We're glad to have you.

 

[Wages]

It'd be an interesting concept and one that I'd support if credits actually had more use than it currently does beyond getting stuff dispensed from vendors and the discussion of persistent economy has already taken place with the general consensus being that it'll provide an unfair advantage to individuals who are able to dedicate more time to the game than individuals who are unable to along with the ever wonderful category of people who will find a way to game the system and abuse it (see "This is why we can't have nice things.")

Otherwise there's really little risk to gambling your credits away and if you really do need more you can get them through more illicit means. Though it isn't required for you to have them and its more of a convenience thing.

[Reach the highest number without an admin posting]

Oh my seems you guys forgot @TinnCatt is an administrator!

So not only am I kicking this back to zero where it should be, we can just dip down into the negatives as a refresher.

-1

[PhantasmicDream Art]

I'm sure he's only sniffing it for freshness.

[What would your IC or antag Pokemon move set be?]

1. Double Team

2. Harden

3. Glare

4. Pain Split

[Marriage is Complicated]

I remember the last marriage attempted, witnessed it as HoP.

Everyone really did get eaten by a slaughter demon.

[Hello fellow space dwellers]

Welcome to Paradise!

Since you've been linked to the wiki, the forum guides, and all the other helpful tools that'll make your stay hopefully a comfortable and adventurous one, I'd like to point out that you can also contact our mentors in game for any questions that aren't covered by the helpful material provided.

This can be done by going to the Admin Tab and selecting the appropriate verb for contacting either Administration (For all your needs regarding rules and rule breaks.) or Mentors (For all the in game stuff like how to make paper airplanes.)

You can also hit F1 to bring up the menu to select either of them.

It may take some time but a mentor or administrator will get back to you.

I'd also like to mention to not be intimidated when deciding whether or not to contact us, you're not a bother and if you are we'll definitely tell you. We're here to help you for when you need it!

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[Screenshot thread!]

Welcome to NSV: Dabbing Vox

[The Issues with Vulpkanin (They Make No Sense)]

Just to axe the chocolate should be poison for Vulpkanin, because why not they're dog peoples, chocolate is poisonous to everyone the reason why dogs are more affected than humans is the component theobromine which humans can metabolize more quickly than dogs, meaning it builds up to toxic levels within dogs more quickly than humans, and also the ratio of chocolate ingested to body mass, larger dogs consume more chocolate than smaller breeds before suffering ill effects. Biology of Vulpkanin isn't necessarily a mirror of canines and it could easily be that they metabolize chocolate in an entirely different way, hell for all we know about how Vulpkanin metabolize theobromine it could heal them or give them super powers.

Even if they were human sized dogs, because of body mass alone they would have to ingest a greater amount of chocolate than what a person realistically would or would have to each chocolate frequently enough to reach that critical level of toxicity.

So yeah, adding it for anything other than "Lol they're dog people" doesn't make any amount of sense what so ever, hell it'd even be a stretch if they were "Lol dog people."

[MAJOR: SEC Smartguns]

I like the concept but, it only really works if the majority of your player base who like to play Security are responsible enough not to abuse it and frankly some days I wouldn't trust Security with an uncomfortably warm piece of toast much less the equipment we have for them now.

 

Nice idea but it falls under the category of "This is why we can't have nice things."

[Reach the highest number without an admin posting]

Just for the record, we're in the negatives now boyos.

-3

[Reach the highest number without an admin posting]

-1

Why? Just to set you back further.