Regulation: Allow Capital Punishment in Emergency Situations

[Lmwevil]

So, here's the issue. 

You, a funny little Captain on the flagship of the SCC have the sole authority to unquestioningly make machinists tear the brain out of crew members. Forcing machinists to be executioners or 'executioners' (by Biesel law) to do this within the span of 2 hours without external investigations and judgement to do so. 

You, as a funny little Captain can also maroon people, including on lifeless rocks or ones inhabited by reavers where the person is assured to die to either the elements, oxygen, the creatures or time. 

Why not just give Captains the ability to in an emergency kill someone in the regs? Plenty of Captains still defacto order deaths in different wordings because at times it's straight up needed. Aka antag constantly breaking out of the brig or whatever. 

Usage of it would be as sparing as marooning or borging, but would allow for classic shit like airlocking. 

Executions would have to remain purely an emergency thing, used in cases where someone can't be held for future arbitration to decide their fate (future borging) and so on. In addition, no antag sticks around after being borged anyway because it's not what they signed up to play. So on a meta level, just let their round end. 


This could let you say to the antag "You either die, or get borged, or get marooned. Pick one." Y'know? 

This thread is slightly incoherent but I think you get the vibe. 

TL;DR  - In emergency situations when there is no other reasonable option allow Captains within regulations to apply capital punishment

[hazelmouse]

I don't have too much to add to the specifics of how this would work, but my view is that there being means to kill antagonists is really mostly a mechanical necessity. I find it very hard to believe that, realistically, the SCCV Horizon wouldn't detain everyone to be tried under Biesel law, or to be extradited to their nation of origin. The idea of immediately executing an already detained criminal on a dime, instead of keeping them detained and having them questioned at length to get information out of them and determine the extent of their crimes and further details, is incredibly goofy to me.

It's, however, mechanically important that command can do this because a lot of antagonists won't have an end to their gimmicks until they're killed. Vampires constantly fleeing security, traitors blasting out of the brig several times over, that kind of thing.

My cursory preference would be that the means of execution, whatever we want it to be, should be locked behind a clear inability to keep the subject safely restrained. If you can't do that, all gloves are off, but otherwise you're keeping them HuT for actual legal and corporate processes to address the issue post-round. No sudden executions based on a cursory or non-existent investigation unless absolutely necessary for the safety of the crew, it cheapens the weight of the act and is very abrupt.

Edited September 1 by hazelmouse

[Carver]

I would be very worried about codifying impromptu executions. We had them before, and their removal has been solely a net benefit. In any case where a Captain could order this, I would vastly prefer to see a marooning or similar as that gives the individual an opportunity to attempt to escape (and said escape may get them shot down anyways) rather than direct ‘you die now’ orders.

At the very best, all I can see this being is another headache for the staff who must investigate when it’s invariably ahelped every time.

 

P.S., don’t get me started on the extremely dangerous and undesirable doors that this would open up during canon rounds.

Edited September 1 by Carver
Can’t forget canon events

[hazelmouse]

5 minutes ago, Carver said:

I would be very worried about codifying impromptu executions. We had them before, and their removal has been solely a net benefit. In any case where a Captain could order this, I would vastly prefer to see a marooning or similar as that gives the individual an opportunity to attempt to escape (and said escape may get them shot down anyways) rather than direct ‘you die now’ orders.

At the very best, all I can see this being is another headache for the staff who must investigate when it’s invariably ahelped every time.

 

P.S., don’t get me started on the extremely dangerous and undesirable doors that this would open up during canon rounds.

Marooning offers more options, but isn't borging already as good as execution? I'm not sure I can recall a time when a borged antag didn't immediately jump into cryo.

[Carver]

1 minute ago, hazelmouse said:

Marooning offers more options, but isn't borging already as good as execution? I'm not sure I can recall a time when a borged antag didn't immediately jump into cryo.

Cyborgification takes time to prepare and isn’t carried out by security, importantly adding a layer between said department and the authority to directly kill someone who is likely unarmed. Intervention from an outside source is possible with said time.

[Lmwevil]

To be clear this would not be an action security could undertake, this would be a captain level decision just like borging, which security can't order either. 

Furthermore note my extremely important phrasing here: "In emergency situations when there is no other reasonable option allow Captains within regulations to apply capital punishment"

Note the 'no other reasonable option' section. 

[NerdyVampire]

At the very least, this should come with the strict caveat that the suspect should have successfully escaped from imprisonment (not detainment) at least three(?) times, before an execution order is valid. And the measures to keep them imprisoned should have improved with each subsequent imprisonment (+solitary, +guards, +straightjacket, +drugs, etc.). That way command staff can defend themselves against questioning from internal affairs, who can in turn defend the action from Biesel jurisdiction.

But I can understand the arguments for and against. Frankly I don't mind a bit more dystopia, but it should come with the bureaucracy we all love. 

[Lmwevil]

Ironically NerdyVampire that would make Borging (killing someone) easier than just airlocking them which is still quite funny. 

Anyway, the ALTERNATIVE to this is to make all criminals HUT and that marooning and borging cannot be done on ship, and need a long due process back on biesel before their guilt is assured and then they are borged. 

People just incidentally die to lethal force or extraordinary circumstances 


Edit: 
To clarify, I think either Captain should get access to the ability to kill people with whatever caveats that has. Because they have access to remove you from the round in 2 ways, both of which are boring but still murder (literally speaking not legally). Borgification that antags will cyro from every time, and marooning which is basically murder or dropping a dangerous criminal on an inhabited world.

Or all forms of murdering detained people (marooning, execution, borging) cannot ever be done in round and it's just overuse of lethal force that ends up with fatalities. All such rulings such as marooning are done by internal affairs after they investigate a matter (removing the godly power of the Captain to fucking murder their crew with 0 oversight)

It's either one or the other.

[dessysalta]

I disagree that it should be outwardly "allowed" for captains to order an execution. I would rather see anything along the lines of a precedent or special circumstances blurb just to clarify how the SCC cares about executions and whatnot (because obviously they don't with enough reason behind it and they've found many ways to say "it was an accident/they died from their injuries/etcetc" rather than "Yeah we killed the hell out of that guy. Killed the Christ out of him.") 

That said, "Captain Authority" has always been a thing and the captain specifically is exempt from otherwise normal rules or regulations that have to be followed during crises. It says basically no matter what the captain says you should follow it and only question them after the fact. Obviously OOCly it's still a struggle but it's always going to be a struggle because character death whether on-ship or not is a complex thing that shouldn't be decided for funsies.

I also think the HoS should have the ability to order everything short of an execution but that's neither here nor there.

 

[GeneralCamo]

It feels like this should require a tribunal or something similar. To add a check against abuse, add an opportunity for more roleplay, and potentially allow the antagonist to escape.

[Carver]

9 hours ago, Lmwevil said:

To be clear this would not be an action security could undertake, this would be a captain level decision just like borging, which security can't order either. 

Furthermore note my extremely important phrasing here: "In emergency situations when there is no other reasonable option allow Captains within regulations to apply capital punishment"

Note the 'no other reasonable option' section. 

Note when I mention security, it’s in the context that the act of cyborgification is carried out by Robotics. The ‘execution’ of said act is carried out by either the Roboticist or a Surgeon. Thus my note of adding an important layer to the whole deal.

[Mr.Popper]

As Dessysalta sorta touched on, legalizing execution isn't really necessary when it's just as achievable indirectly. Just look at how uncontainable antags are treated now. It's pretty common for them to be shot to death by Security, even though a regulation busybody could argue "OMG you used excessive force you could've taken them alive!!!" The reality is that, 9 times out of 10, no one will scrutinize Security for killing a massive menace late in the round. Corrupt characters, especially command, are a great natural source of spice so long as they aren't breaking server rules. But trying to justify their actions through IC laws for OOC convenience destroys this moral ambiguity. Why would anyone be tempted to take sketchy actions if the regs already make their job easy?

Another issue is the OOC redistribution of gameplay. Reducing the number of shootouts for security, borging for machinists, or marooning for pilots in favor of the Captain straight up killing the antag with no room for error is pretty lame. A lot of antag rounds already have the issue of command and sec being the only departments involved, antag interaction doesn't need to be further concentrated in the crew's upper echelon.

[Triogenix]

From a lore perspective - Eh. Technically this is already the case with Code Delta, the "whatever means necessary" clause. Additionally, we already have the following within the Standard Operating Procedure;

Quote

The vessel's assigned Captain has full authority over the operation of the vessel and the attached shuttles. They are authorized to shut down departments at their discretion, reassign crew members, issue direct orders to all crew members of the ship, and take actions within reason that may violate regulations in non-standard situations.

The Captain is trusted to act in the best interests of the company, crew, and vessel they are assigned to. Any complaints or concerns over the Captain's decisions should be addressed after their orders have been carried out, and after the situation that prompted those orders has been resolved.

So, captains can already order executions, it's within the remit of their authority. Sure, it might be illegal/not within reason, but that is supposed decided/adressed after the fact, once the captains orders have been carried out, as stated above. After the fact the captain can be arrested for whatever the HoS thinks he broke with regulations, but I think given the wording of the above it's abundantly clear that;
a) The captain is allowed to violate regulations in non-standard situations
and
b) The crew and rest of command is required to follow the captains orders until they are completed, or the situation is resolved(according to regulations)

Therefore I don't really think this accomplishes anything that we don't already have.

Edited September 1 by Triogenix

[Lmwevil]

I admit where I may not be right the entire time, thank you for attending this thread-talk (dad joke)

Trio is right yeah, fundamentally the Captain can just do this anyway as long as it doesn't break server rules and it adds characterization to those who are corrupt enough to do so (without breaking server rules). 

The original intent of the thread was mostly to have what is already server culture (gunning down uncontainable antags) codified in some way, but it probably doesn't matter at the end of the day.