Munks

A more apt comparison would be to naval vessels, which have, yes, Captains aboard as the ultimate authority when out at sea. And yes you are never going to see the ship's captain just deciding to take the day off and serve food in the cafeteria because he just loves the workplace so much. It is indeed an issue with people too attached to their special snowflakey characters that job slots are filled and they refuse to play anyone else, so they come on as visitor and then try to involve themselves with station affairs. This is especially awful lately with certain Heads of Security walking in and demanding a sitrep/authority as a visitor. There is already regulation within the Station Directives specifically barring Command characters from being bumped up from visitor in-round, regardless of circumstances. It's not often enforced because the visitor head in question tends to be in close contact with their metabuddies who allow them to nose into Command business as a Visitor just out of nepotism, but its there. It'd be nice if this could be extended at least to security as well.

And there's the issue with this whole thing: the most common application of allowing characters to be inter-departmentally trained is and will continue to be Security mains going teehee imma combat medic. The problem with this, besides making it difficult for antags to get things done when every officer doubles as a Paramedic, is depriving medbay (paramedics especially) of the job they signed up for. Ideally, even if people are trained in medical, there should be IC regulation barring them from administering medical treatment beyond basic first aid and keeping people alive long enough for actual medics to arrive, for liability reasons (just as tends to be the case with real world employers, you are generally restricted from administering health care regardless of your training unless you're actually on the job because it opens up a world of possible lawsuits if you fuck up or even if you don't). Such regulation could bar non-medical personnel from administering anything beyond basic first aid just like visitors are not allowed to hop in and start doing their job regardless of training.

Moonlighting as an EMT is a thing even in real life, so if the character is old enough to have attained such certification and there's actual reason for it then I don't see why not. That said, there should actually be reason for it -- EMT work is exhausting, long hours, and emotionally and physically draining, so Sec mains shouldn't just be doing it because they want to be IC ~combat medics~ or something. If the normal job one plays is rewarding enough that they can live comfortably I think it's an rp failure to get into something so exhausting just for fun. High level roles though -- things that require undergraduate and ESPECIALLY graduate degrees -- I just don't see it. It's one thing for Skrell, but most people aren't going to have the education to get deep into more than one field, but it can't be limited because as soon as it's allowed for one it's allowed for everyone. If you're so attached to a character that you can't bring yourself to play anything else, and you have to retcon the shit out of them to try and work them into another department, that's a failure on your part and something I don't think we should accommodate. It's the very nature of this game that bad things happen to everyone at one point or another and this kind of fixation with one single flake isn't something I see any benefit to enabling

Agreed, its a convenient fluff thing to have and not so critical as to circumvent interdepartmental cooperation. It just needs fruit planted from the garden to be handed over to the chef, or even just "candy" from the vendors, for chocolate-flavored lollipops

Can't the kitchen make candy? Just place an order, you know, interdepartmental interaction?

While I wasnt there for the incident brought up earlier, I am satisfied with how it was handled and his underlying reasoning for doing what he did. Though the backstory is somewhat generic, I don't consider that to be reason enough to go for a denial -- there's nothing outright bad about it and he demonstrated adequate knowledge of IPC lore to get whitelisted for it in the first place so I think it's excusable to give him the benefit of the doubt and focus more on his qualifications. The character itself has more than enough reason to exist as a current Chief Medical Officer, but more important, the player has no reason not to be. They are very reliable as a coworker in the medbay, more than enough to compete with the current roster of CMOs we currently have to work with. I am also as satisfied with his understanding of what heads of staff are for as I am with his understanding of the gameplay. In short, the worst thing about this is the backstory not being very memorable -- thats not nearly enough to overshadow the positive attitude he's shown here both with his app and its defense, nor his competence as a doctor within the game itself. A solid +1.

I appreciate the feedback and I'm glad this was brought up first because I'm sure my past behavior is going to be the biggest obstacle to getting this accepted. I'm not unaware of the reputation I've built among some and I'm confident that I've made headway in this regard and will prove as much should my app be accepted.

With the focus taken off of playing a sec terminator I'm at least willing to give it a shot just to see how it works out.

BYOND key: Munks Character names: Izzsi Saeed, Ss’rite Ketriss How long have you been playing on Aurora?: Some months to a year at most, I got my first whitelist in March of last year Why do you wish to be on the whitelist?: Interest in trying out new roles, particularly with Internal Affairs Agent and Head of Personnel due to their relative focus on roleplay compared to roles such as CE, CMO, HoS Why did you come to Aurora?: I was interested in playing a server that actually enforced some standard for roleplay and in-character activity. Previously I had frequented lowRP settings where there was a vague sense of playing a character but limitations on playing a feasible character (self-preservation, realistic IC knowledge as opposed to characters mastering entire departments, and some sort of professional responsibility) were characteristics I had missed. When I started looking for higher roleplay solutions I was referred to Aurora by a friend. Have you read the Aurora wiki on the head roles and qualifications you plan on playing?: Yes Please provide well articulated answers to the following questions in a paragraph each. Give a definition of what you think roleplay is, and should be about: Roleplaying is adopting a persona to participate within a hypothetical, fictional setting, forming a collective overall story through your own participation combined with the actions of those you’re interacting with. It is important on a server such as this to put effort into considering your character as an individual entity, taking into consideration their own loyalties, obligations, wants, needs, and so on, as well as factoring these in to influence the decisions you make through this character. These may not necessarily need to coalesce with those of the person playing the character: for example, while a player may wish to board the shuttle at the end of the round because this counts as “surviving” in an out-of-character perspective, from an in-character perspective they may have professional obligations such as providing medical assistance, assisting in repairs, or processing a criminal. It is vital to roleplay that one learns to separate what is satisfying to them as a player and what is satisfying to their character as its own entity, and learn to balance the two – just as it might not be as satisfying to let a fleeing criminal in maintenance get away when you could easily give chase and kill them on the spot, it might not be satisfying to others, and the story as a whole, if you abandon a heavily injured character whom the criminal attacked in order to chase after and kill them. No one is expected to completely eschew their own satisfaction, but it’s within the spirit of roleplay to allow the story to continue, possibly at the expense of your character or your own sense of personal satisfaction, so that a greater narrative can result. What do you think the OOC purpose of a Head of Staff is, ingame?: Heads of Staff, in game, provide the backbone of station functionality. Moreso than just being a standard departmental member with extra access, they are there to provide leadership and enable greater cooperation not just within their own department, but between their department and the station as a whole. In addition, though I do not believe Heads of Staff should be expected to be a god of their respective department and able to run every subdivision with their eyes closed, they should be generally competent enough to assist those under them and to ensure their department makes a basic, standard contribution to the functionality of the station as a whole: Chief Medical Officers should understand medicine enough that those in need of medical treatment retrieve it, even if they themselves can’t speedrun through every possible surgery off the top of their head; Heads of Security should understand the purpose and limitations of the different types of officers that work under them and keep them in line and working properly even if the HoS character itself is an unrobust bureaucrat, so on. In other words, though its important for the head of staff to be competent in the department they’re leading, its more important that they understand the significance of their role as a leader and lead with the proper intention and make use of the extra authority and access given to them to ensure that their department contributes properly to the round in progress. Furthermore, specifically relating to IAAs (considering thats my main interest to play currently), Agents are tasked with handling civil complaints and being a first line of defense when it comes to misconduct within the round. To me, a good Internal Affairs Agent could not only continue to further roleplay where overzealous, line-crossing behavior on the part of the crew could end an antagonists' round prematurely, but also resolve situations in a round that otherwise may have escalated to a full on IR filing or something necessitating staff involvement. Personally, I feel that most of the time it is much more beneficial to roleplay for infractions to be handled by those in the round, and IAAs play a key part in this by both assisting in resolving disputes, and when all else fails, providing for an in-character avenue of staff intervention rather than the hand of god reaching down and resolving conflicts. What do you think the OOC responsibilities of Whitelisted players are to other players, and how would you strive to uphold them?: In addition to being leaders in gameplay, whitelisted players hold a responsibility to other players due to the in-character authority given to them. A head of staff, depending on how they are played, can suppress the development of a character, or allow it to flourish. A poorly played head of staff can drive players away from the department (or even server), and a well-played head of staff can turn a one-off, random generated character into something that the player looks forward to returning to. There are active heads of staff that I actively avoid playing and sharing a department with if possible, because they consider the “perks” of being a head of staff to be a mere reward to be taken advantage of, rather than a tool to enable better RP and the development of those under them both as characters and players. As someone with plenty of complaints to give about many heads of staff, I can say with full confidence that I do not plan on turning around and being the same type of head of staff I am so outspoken about. Even in departments in which I am less than stellar at, if I were to end up playing, I would listen to those under me and strive to leave the round better for my participation, giving subordinates a helping hand if they need it, and distance when they don’t. Please pick one of your characters for this section, and provide well articulated responses to the following questions. Character name: Luxo Khazarazir Character age: 33 Please provide a short biography of this character (approx 2 paragraphs): Khazarazir was born to a modest family in a coastal city within the People’s Republic of Adhomai, supportive of the war efforts even if their active participation was limited. Young and starry eyed, Luxo would spend a great deal of time at a local theater in his neighborhood, which played mostly propagandized military dramas where the People’s Republic earned victory, honor, and respect in its successful battles against the royalty and dissident factions. In particular, he fell in love with the heroic officer leading his troops in battle and securing victory through superior tactic and leadership without ever firing a single shot of their own. Though money was tight, split between multiple siblings, assistance from his parents and money scraped together through odd jobs and a laborious stint with a cargo shipping fleet based out of his city enabled him to begin pursuing higher education with the Nal’tor College of Career Excellence at the age of 20. Though what he had amassed would not be enough to fully complete his technical education, it would carry him long enough to get his foot in the door with local military recruitment who would offer to further fund his education in return for a mandatory contract with the Republican Navy upon completion. Upon his graduation with a Bachelor’s in Business Administration from Nal’tor, Khazarazir quickly began his training with the Republican Navy, struggling but ultimately working his way through the pipeline as an officer. Now a young Lieutenant, Khazarazir was assigned to duty aboard a submarine. The very nature of the craft meant a tight crew manifest, and that meant Luxo had a small team to rely on to keep his boat supplied and even smaller room for error. Ultimately a strenuous -- but enriching -- experience, Luxo continued building his qualifications and came through unscathed, if not somewhat exhausted. Later, he would move to a larger ship, where he would be part of a larger team organizing the transport of cargo and troops to the front line. Thankfully, here he was part of a larger team, and with his hours not so lengthy as they were aboard the submarine, Khazarazir was able to begin studying for further certification within the supply field, in addition to his standard qualifications as a Naval officer. Proceeding through his negotiated contract with the Republican Navy, Khazarazir being subject to hectic, unreliable scheduling, often inadequate supplies, and vague but alluring exposure to the corporate side of business management through his industry certification process, began to consider the possibility of continuing his career in private industry. Khazarazir remembered many of his fellow Nal’tor classmates, as well as a few of his siblings, going to work for Nanotrasen. He also knew Nanotrasen as a close collaborator with the Republican government, and thus was naturally inclined towards them as a private sector employer. Once he was at the tail end of his commission as an Officer, he began seeking out Nanotrasen recruitment personnel, and though he’d leaned initially towards work as a Quartermaster, his position as a Naval Officer and higher education opened the possibility of him being an Internal Affairs Agent, a position of higher responsibility and compensation which he happily accepted. A yearlong internship with an IAA office aboard the NSS Canes Venatici, primarily spent fetching coffee and sorting mail, resulted in his acceptance as an Internal Affairs Agent proper, initially assigned to the NSS Aurora. What do you like about this character?: I enjoyed writing this app due to the opportunity to look into real-world work experience for Naval supply officers, and to put what I learned into building a reasonably down-to-earth military background for Luxo that explains how he got to where he is, and why he looked towards Nanotrasen as an employer due to the promise of a higher quality of life standard than his previous tenure with the Republican Navy. I believe the pursuit of better living is realistic and down to earth for a character but still open-ended enough to leave its execution open for roleplay. What do you dislike about this character?: This is a new character written for this app, so I haven’t has much experience with it to be able to say I actually dislike something about it. However, as far as downsides to his personality go, the intention is that his background as a military officer combines with the influence of his loyalty implant to make him somewhat distant and cold, though still ultimately professional and well-intentioned. What do you think makes this character fit to be a head of staff?: His experience in the Republican Navy, though very trying, was intended to set a believable starting point for his career with Nanotrasen. Though he’s inexperienced in corporate life, just as I am inexperienced with head gameplay, his knowledge of the subject matter is still there and he has all the underlying knowledge and experience required to perform well with Internal Affairs, especially after his internship prepared him for the different style of busywork and corporate politics present in the industry. Please provide well articulated answers to the following questions. How would you rate your own roleplaying?: When I wrote my last application, I acknowledged that my roleplaying was average at best. I’m hesitant to say more than that about myself, however I nonetheless believe I have progressed greatly since then. Since then, I have turned my focus away from Security gameplay, which has been a great help to improving my roleplaying on the server as I had much more time to sit down and interact with people playing medical, and no longer instinctively viewed those interacting with me through the lens of potential antagonist, as since I began playing Medical I largely stopped caring about whether or not someone was an antag in general. I believe I am ready to take up Head of Staff responsibility. Extra notes: Luxo Khazarazir previous existed for a very short time on the station, so he may be present in my stats already. Playing him a few times on station, his general idea was similar to how he is presented here. He was not played much and I don’t believe anyone would even remember his earlier conception, so I chose to sort of retcon his previous work aboard the station and further develop his career history as well as his current position with Nanotrasen, going from history in supply worker and Quartermaster-hopeful to a much older business manager and IA-hopeful. Thanks for reading.

Araa Planek and Erana'Weshi Xoqia both stand out to me as some of the more reliably competent and well-roleplayed heads of staff I've had to interact with and I'd be very interested to see some more thoughtfully played Unathi running around, solid +1

Very hard -1 right now. This alone. You're a self-admitted powergamer that wants to use IPC for its mechanical advantage and inability to feel pain/no fear RP to take everyone down. This being the core concept of your application, along with considering how you constantly try to tell people what to do because "regulations" as a stationbound without even being security module you're the last person I want to see playing security at all let alone IPCurity. Then you're not going to care much for IPC because they still have only info related to their department.

The only people this would benefit are those who get a kick out of authority but are too incompetent for a Head whitelist. If it's a timed unlock, then it'd just be the same situation we're in now except now bad players would arbitrarily have authority over other officers, and if its a whitelist thing then we could do a lot more good by just making cadetship itself mandatory for new Security characters

Sliplocker McWeldspace the traitorous Chef finds you checking crates in maint and shoots you. Fortunately, you manage to scream HELP MAINT over comms five times, but by the time people figure out what maint you're in and get to you, you're at 120 brute. Stabilized, you're brought to medbay and rushed immediately on the spot into the OR because the surgeons managed to not be SSD or off in the bar getting drunk. After around 15 to 30 minutes for your bone repair, internal bleeding, and implant removal, and you miraculously not dying in the OR, you are wheeled down to the patient ward. Well, now damage heals at 2 points per minute. Enjoy your hour long break! This is fun! Even if you actually did think this through you are wrong and arbitrarily making everything more tedious and slow does not make for an entertaining video game. Which is what this is. A video game. Not real life. Video games are meant to be fun, not be made realistic in the most boring sense possible. Surgery and healing take time to occur, just like real work shifts are more than 2 hours long, and just like you don't have a decently high chance of being shot or falling off a cliff at work every few hours. If this somehow ever managed to see the light of day, as long as I am capable, I will no longer use medbay at all when injured and just turn my sensors off and enter a cryopod so i can respawn in 15 minutes rather than have to be sitting around doing nothing for half the round.

People probably have an issue with it because your very first proposed Unathi is one that is basically anti-unathi in character. The entire point of these is to make people show at least some degree of understanding so we dont just have a bunch of Paradise-tier fursonas running around. I'd go out on a limb and say that this character is what the whitelists are here for. It's not even Ouerean, so I dont know why you brought it up, it's still a Moghean unathi that rebelled against pretty much everything unathi are about and faced no consequences from it because she's just that special except for being a Guwan which she accepted willingly out of stubbornness even though it should be one of the worst things that can happen. I shared a discord with you and got to listen to you whinge about not giving a fuck about "autistic" lore back when you wanted to app for Tajara because you just wanted to be a cat for the purpose of being a cat, and that you couldn't be assed to write out why you want to play a species or what makes RPing different which makes me a bit skeptical now seeing you continue to so vehemently insist on something like this that goes against everything Unathi are about. Everything about this character relies on subverting Unathi culture and society; not even just in the way she acts which would be one thing, but how others react to her, which is where the doubts about your intentions come in.

The daily "plz give me tacticool uniform items belonging to the spess marine government that nanotrasen doesn't even like". Is this not something you can achieve just by using the loadout option beret? Can't you wait until you actually feel attached to and understand your own character before getting special space marine berets for her? You make it sound like getting your own fancy custom beret is a prerequisite for actually rping your character properly. Are you not a security main? Why should you be running around wearing military police garb from an opposing faction rather than NT's own ISD uniform?

Why carry such a treasured, important, irreplaceable heirloom to work every day tho Especially something that big and fragile

I know, but it should be a matter of principle. It's a bit odd to see folk walking about cutting up rags. You don't see people "walking about cutting up rags" you just take a bedsheet and cut it and thats the end of that. By this matter of principle it's also odd to special order in a crate on a space shuttle that just contains an old wash towel.

Can't you just produce these by cutting up bedsheets? There's a few linen bins with 20 bedsheets each across the station that never get used ever, and I don't see anyone making an issue of it if you just ask them to get you a bedsheet from one. Alternatively you can just steal one from the dorms and no one will even notice let alone care.

This is a good train of thought but what will happen is they will continue to quietly dominate the crew except now its even easier for them to run away should Security actually manage to garner enough IC evidence (and support) to go after them. The "hey i found something cool in maint come look haha you don't have any IC reason not to come with me bro don't make me ahelp" will continue and if they somehow manage to give Sec justification to go after them they'll just drop shadows and run away. You assume antags actually want to be robust vs relying on the same easy shit round after round The bit about being able to pop shadows and use them to pop up on the other side of the window does sound nifty but I'm not sure if it outweighs giving vampires an escape utility that will be nothing but an annoying get-out-of-jail-free card, not quite on par with wizards' blink/jaunt but still a tedious inevitability whenever a vampire accidentally goes loud

Command are important (relative to the rest of the crew anyway, not really NT itself), that's why they get their very own escape pods to get offstation with. The point remains that they're escape pods, not tiny shuttles, and as such they don't have the facilities to navigate to an entire different station on their own. Requiring pickup is inconvenient but from an in character perspective you're not going to be using them so often to make it necessary to replace it with an entire shuttle. Ship's captains in real life are important, and life rafts are inconvenient. Captains still ride life rafts rather than getting their own little speedboat to ride to safety on. Also there are ladders leading to them. Thats what the maint hatch leading behind the elevator is for

This is intentional, I think if you examine signs visible in the area it explains it better. The pods just eject out into a debris field, but once they're launched they have to await pickup. They're not little mini shuttles, they don't have guidance systems, you have to wait in the pod (ICly) until you're retrieved. Escape pods shouldn't be seen as miniature escape shuttles, especially like they were on the old map where people would just take them because they're closer than the shuttle. Not getting to interact with others is a slight tradeoff for taking the easy route instead of making your way to the shuttle. Characters actually should be taking this into account and seriously considering the matter if they're thinking of taking an escape pod on round end, because I'm still seeing people just doing it because it's closer than the shuttle. Pods are for emergencies.

playing cargo I have never ever had scientists come in asking for paper, folders, cameras, etc. Without them spawning in science, scientists just go without them or scavenge them themselves, not go to cargo. The magical answer to interdepartmental interaction isnt just "deprive everyone of everything and force them to be friends"

Considering we now have a frequent Medical Resident that thinks they're in residency to become an EMT I think some documentation on Medical Resident and how it works is especially needed.

Fix the maint (security, medbay, science, engine radiator) airlocks.

The little labyrinth area port of science currently exists solely to be an incredibly obvious hideout for antagonists to complain about you to the admins over if you don't pretend not to notice it being walled off. I don't think there'd be much of a terrible loss from turning it into a workspace for science, though i still think that the bulk supplies of cameras, clipboards, folders, etc. would do well from a flavor perspective to start in a little supply closet rather than be strewn out across the room.