Add a stowaway role

[Gromnax]

As the new station is a ship, it makes sense for some people to board it without being authorized or even known by NT.

This change would make sense with the marooning punishment added to the lore.

They would begin with a nameless ID able to open maintenance doors but no other doors, and would not begin with a PDA or a headset. Instead, they might begin with low quality ghetto tools for medicine, surgery, growing food...

If we allow for multiple stowaways, we might even think of a channel they could use in their own headset. They wouldn't be able to hear general besides sitting near an intercom.

This might be a very good role for unique roleplay interactions. Security's behaviour on them could vary, and some members of the crew could hide them as long as they don't commit any serious crime, for instance. This might add conflict and drama even without real antagonists involved (which often ends up in gunfights anyway).

 

What are your thoughts on this?

[DeadLantern]

This was on bay. It was interesting there.

It should definitely not happen every round. Like Merchant, but the likelihood of it happening less than Merchant. A whole gang of stowaways is a neat idea as long as they aren't actively malicious.

I'm not too against it. But the difference between the Torch and the Horizon is that it is very hard to hide on the Horizon... It's cramped. It would be difficult to evade the public eye, but it might be fun.

Tentatively I support it, it would be fun as long as it's rare. Treat it like a neutral event.

[Roostercat]

This can pretty easily turn into funny guys that try to murder station chars on extended and things like that. It can get to the point of not being very believable as well. I'd prolly only support this if it was a rare event, like Deadlantern said. As an aside, Marooning is probably too intense for a stowaway, given marooning is a capital punishment iirc. Maybe just HuT.

[Gem]

3 minutes ago, Roostercat said:

This can pretty easily turn into funny guys that try to murder station chars on extended and things like that. It can get to the point of not being very believable as well.

i second this. i personally don't want to see stowaways on the server. i feel like it would get old very fast. it would basically be a mechanically endorsed greytiding role.

[Gromnax]

A stowaway's objective, by definition, should be to stay hidden until they get to their destination. It's very different than a pirate-sort of things, which you seem to be describing and would be an actual antag role.

A real stowaway has no interest into committing murder.

24 minutes ago, DeadLantern said:

Treat it like a neutral event.

Exactly.

 

We had the event of the lone lost explorer on the Aurora, whom came in his capsule on the asteroid. This wouldn't be too different.

[Gem]

3 minutes ago, Gromnax said:

A stowaway's objective, by definition, should be to stay hidden until they get to their destination.

if their goal is to never be seen, what's the point in adding them then? the lone explorer for example was visible to the crew and got to interact with them, whether they chose to be hostile or not.

[Gromnax]

Just now, Gem said:

if their goal is to never be seen, what's the point in adding them then? the lone explorer for example was visible to the crew and got to interact with them, whether they chose to be hostile or not.

They would be forced to get out for sheer survival (food, medical supplies and whatnot). Trying to fake being part of the crew could be fun too.

Icly they should never be seen, oocly the objective would obviously be to create drama aboard.

But really, the "funny guy that murders people on extended" sounds like a non issue to me. That's not how being a stowaway should work and is a reportable behaviour anyway.

If you want to see things they could do, you can think about the old maintenance bar we had on the aurora. They could run underground things like that, which existence would be spreaded by ear, for example. Or act like forced assistants if they can't do anything else. Or be authorized to stay if they mine stuff...

The possibilities are endless.

[Flpfs]

Why would a state-of-the-art ship have stowaways? It's not immense, where would they live? The ship isn't some city-sized behemoth with hidden compartments and everybody would likely know eachother, plus all crewmembers are registered on the records system and all of them hold occupations or are registered as passengers. Where would the stowaways live? The more questions you ask, the less it makes sense. 

 

• All persons are registered, making stowaways impossible
• Food, drink and rest would require you to use a dormitory's shared facilities, and the other 4 people living there would notice a literal nobody hobo in their private kitchen.
• Cryogenic storage registers the persons sleeping in it, and it would surely alert security if a person without any registration used it, leading to you being unfrozen and arrested

 

This is an idea that makes no sense from a lore prespective at all.

 

Besides that, I think it's a bad idea and a literal copy from Baystation, which is cringe. Aurora isn't meant to be bay with a different setting + civillian.

[Alfa1561]

It could be fun and presents an opportunity for roleplay and intervention by authorities that doesn't involve direct antag tier conflict, but at the same time doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

 

It's an exploration ship. Typically, stowaways are hitching a free ride to the next port of call. The Horizon is heading off into deep space for long periods of time, so why would someone stow away on it instead of some cruise liner or cargo ship?

[Carver]

I would understand them perhaps being an element introduced during (and/or after) a future arc, but to have stowaways from the very get-go would be strange. Either way I would hope for them to be very rare and not every round, otherwise you risk giving Command a strong excuse to have maintenance thoroughly searched on the regular.

[MattAtlas]

A stowaway ghost spawner with a very low chance (so it doesn't happen for rounds on end) could be interesting, but a dedicated stowaway role will not happen.

[DeadLantern]

For all the people saying there is no lore reason for a stowaway to be on the ship: of course there is. Their reason is just not the normal stowaway reason to get to the next port whatever. Perhaps they were someone who lost their job with the SCC and is now slumming it in the maint shaft because they can't go home with no income, so instead they went "missing". Maybe they were an EE agent sent in to the Horizon to spy as a crew member but their cover was blown so they had to go "missing." Just make up the reason--to say there is no reason for a stowaway to be on board is on the same level of saying there is no reason for ninjas to be on board.

Additionally, as said in the OP, they would be growing their own food, doing their own medical aid, etc. They would not reveal themselves to the public eye unless it was a dire situation.

And yes, it should be a really low percentage of happening. But it's these kind of interesting events that we need on the NBT to keep it fresh. Cool and interesting roleplay encounters that are not necessarily tied to an antag.

Also, we also "copied" the overmap system from bay, I don't think it's a bit dumb to say we can't do anything that Bay does. It is not like they invented the concept of a stowaway.

[Myazaki]

The Horizon could easily gain a stowaway since it has people visiting the ship from away-sites. Don't really understand the objections on that basis.

If it is to be a thing, it should be an extremely low chance.

I did not enjoy it on Bay mostly because it frequently interfered with my traitor gimmicks when the ship was more likely to go to blue alert -- You're essentially adding a role that simulates 'traitor runs around maintenance and sec chase them for a while', which is... not the best kind of antagonist and not that fun for any antagonists in the round to have to work around.

If it does get added it needs some more thought into how the role should affect other players than bay's stowaway had.

[EJJ]

This has the potential to be interesting, but a stowaway role needs a way to interact with the ship that isn't filching everything that isn't nailed down, never being seen or instead running around upping their access until they can get wherever they want. Without goals or rules as others have said this can easily just turn into the greytider role where the role just emphasizes smashing and grabbing whatever and distracting from the antag of the round/splitting security/command's focus.

Perhaps it could be more interesting as an antag game mode where several players are picked as the stowaways and have to find some way to get themselves proper access to their assigned roles and do their jobs. Though that brings in the issue of stealth antagging where either you don't see the antag the entire game or the antag ends up discovered because of one or two inconsistencies sec/command picks up on and ends up brigged because of a single mistake.

In the end a lot of this will require a lot of thought.