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Prisoner Role/NanoTrasen Prisoner Repurposing Program


Farcry11

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This is an idea that's been rattling around in my head for a while: the ability to start, and continue through the round as, a convicted criminal. I feel this role would open up quite a few RP avenues, improve character development, and make the game world feel all that more developed.


"Prisoner" would be a choosable role in the preferences screen. Ideally, you'd only be able to /start/ the round as a prisoner, much like a cyborg, and wouldn't be able to join later. You'd spawn in the permabrig, clad in an orange jumpsuit, feet shackles, and handcuffs. Potentially the jumpsuits could have an altered sprite to identify the prisoners as "hardcore" and not plain old offenders from the crew (I.E, a red exclamation point on the back, or something similar). Ideally, players would write down their prisoner character's crimes and convictions in their security records section, allowing Sec to handle them appropriately (I.E, being very careful around the man who commited quintuple homicide with a cafeteria fork).


Now, I know what you're thinking: "Farcry, you dumbfuck, why would NT send prisoners to a research station?" My answer to that question is a new (decidedly evil) corporate initiative: the NanoTrasen Prisoner Repurposing Program. Externally, it's a PR move by NanoTrasen- they're making prisoners of all types useful, teaching them life skills in NT installments across the galaxy! In reality, of course, the intention of the program is much more sinister: prisoners are used as a source of cheap labor, or worse- on secretive research installments such as the NSS Aurora, prisoners may be used as test subjects rather than cheap miners. This could give our more emotionless scientists some new toys to play around with (I.E, a researcher running a study on pain measurement using a convict and a remote-controlled electropack). All human testing would be performed out of public vision, per NanoTrasen orders.


And for players that don't want to spend their rounds as a guinea pig, there's the labor path. Prisoners who choose to repay their debt to society by cutting through the 'roid are outfitted with an explosive collar (or some other remote killing device, if that's too evil), and escorted to a Prisoner Mining Outpost by a guard, likely using a shuttle docked at the brig. There, the prisoners can don snazzy orange hardsuits (recolored mining hardsuits, most likely), take up a pick, and begin bringing in minerals. If prisoners try to use their relative freedom on the asteroid to escape, their designated handler (or the HoS, if the handler is unavailable), can remotely detonate their collar via PDA, killing the prisoner instantly if they are still wearing it.


And possibly, if you're -really- in to in depth prison RP, you could choose to spawn at the snowy prison compound Frances made (though where's the fun in that? There's no horrible, Mengele-esque experiments going on over there). Just an idea.


I think being able to play as a permanent prisoner could be really fun, and the addition would only require very minor spriting and mapping work, if any. Tell me what you think!

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Interesting idea. Would give security more to do on extended/slower rounds, especially the warden, and any officers manning the security checkpoint.


I'm not sure how I feel about letting them be used as lab rats, though. Something like that would bound to get out to authorities, and I would think NanoTrasen would want to avoid condemning press as best as it could. It might-emphasis on might- attempt this on some of it's other, darker, more higher security stations, such as Convert's god-less shithole where you don't have a prayer in hell of ever seeing a pension, Arcadia station, where apparently, very controversial experiments take place, and live human specimens are treated quite cruelly.


As it stands, I like the prospect of a prisoner role being on station. But it needs some tweaking. Perhaps we could say they were detained near the Aurora, and are being kept there (because we were the closest structure with secure holding facilities?) until they can be transported to the Odin for Alliance retrieval?


We had something like this on D2K5. Worked out quite well. Then again, we had a much larger prison area to accommodate this, as quite a few bald, thirty year old prisoners were frequently occupying security.

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Okay, since I've been shortworded, here's my main issue with this: I lack faith in certain members, individuals, of our community to execute RP properly as this role. It will be used as an excuse to self-antag, or to introduce the "3edgy5u" type of roleplay that is generally listed under the BadRP rule and has no place here. Speaking of having no place here, I will bet you that 75% of the characters created for this role will have no place on the Aurora: they would have to be model prisoners, or have some other, very good, reason to be sent here. The serial killers, former nuke-ops, whoever, would not be sent here, barring a very damnably good reason.


Yes. We can job ban. No, I refuse to bring that excuse up, as this would be too much work for staff to go through. Think old-old Aurora, without a Head whitelist. That level of work (Far Cry, you ought to remember).


Now. Where do I see this fitting in? Very carefully, which is how I am treading here, as a whitelisted/applied for role for a specific character. Basically, staff review process. And even then, I would wish to keep these numbers to a minimum. And with strict guidelines in place (you cannot join without n-number of Sec active, you will be implanted for tracking and loyalty, etcetera). Why the latter? Because NT are not, contrary to popular belief, idiots. And even this idea, I'm simply toying with.


I will keep reading opinions as they creep up, however.

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I've experimented a little with this. My assistant Artie Dilligence, who usually is only sent to the station with a delayed cyborgification order in hand, and a vague backstory. I don't think it's impossible to do, but I think it's an option that could be risky with public release, as Skull said.


That said, I think forced labor is an option that should be explored more in response to crimes around aurora, in place of permanent brigging.

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No.


Prisoners are wards of the state; the station is not a state-run facility. Its prison does not live up to federal specifications for actual prisons, and I see literally no reason for any government to hand over their prisoners to a private corporation when they can keep them locked in the places they're supposed to be.


You have a workshop in the prison. You don't send the prisoners to a workshop.


A research station is not a prison station. The entire concept of this idea is ridiculous.

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No.


Prisoners are wards of the state; the station is not a state-run facility. Its prison does not live up to federal specifications for actual prisons, and I see literally no reason for any government to hand over their prisoners to a private corporation when they can keep them locked in the places they're supposed to be.


You have a workshop in the prison. You don't send the prisoners to a workshop.


A research station is not a prison station. The entire concept of this idea is ridiculous.

I agree with this reasoning. Nanotrasen is not a sovereign state, and it is silly to make it one. Sure, subvert the existing government infrastructure, but just making it into a sovereign state outright just kills the plausibility for me, and just seems like such a gigantic wasted opportunity.

That's nice and all but totally irrelevant.


Research station. Prison station. They are mutually exclusive.

Seconding this as well.


This doesn't seem to make much sense at all. It seems more like a thrown-on feature included because it 'sounds cool', without thinking out the implications or whether it even fits. That is a very poor way to add content, regardless of how many excuses (and these are excuses) are made for it.

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Well, if you guys hate the idea of integrated prisoner roles/test subjects so much, I'll back off it.


But I maintain that there should be a restructuring of the current prison system, as in: (optional) hard labor, to reduce jail time or give perma-briggeds something to do, or giving perma-briggeds the option to participate in research tests to (not very likely) improve their situation, etc etc.


At present, when you get tossed in the perma brig, you can't do anything except wait around, chair RP, and maybe slip up a guard with soap and attempt a haphazard escape. Which is boring, round-killing, and desperately in need of a change.

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If you can't do the time, don't do the crime.


At no point whatsoever does NanoTrasen sentence or condemn a criminal with the backing of the state. Brig time allotted for breaching corporate regulations =/= prison time given for breaking the law. You can and will serve a dual sentence for assault on the NanoTrasen vessel and then be arrested and formally charged by the police should there be enough evidence and if the victim wants to press charges. In fact, the people are only in permabrig so they can be held until transfer where they will be given to police custody to face trial for their charges. Three hours in the permabrig is shit compared to the ten years you'd get for felony possession of a controlled substance.


NanoTrasen does not have the authority to appoint forced labor as a punishment, not do they have the authority to perform executions, or pursue federal charges against any person. They are not the police. They are not the court. They are not the judicial system. They are in the middle; they hold the suspect until they can be transferred to police custody where all necessary data (which includes case files, witness testimony, and evidence) are handed over as well to pursue a conviction.


I want harsher laws. Selling drugs is a felony. You'd get between ten to fifteen years. Assault is a misdemeanor that can carry sentences up to five years and more.


Put a cryo tube in permawing. Problem solved.

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NanoTrasen does not have the authority to appoint forced labor as a punishment, not do they have the authority to perform executions,

 

Erhm, as a Research Station, and with your current statement, I wonder why we have both lethal injections, and an execution room that can gas someone if needed. Why do we have an execution chamber and injections if NanoTrasen isn't permitted to execute.

Also, saying NanoTrasen isn't a government isn't to far off, sure, in Sol and Tau Ceti, it's only a super-powerful corporation, but the wiki says that it acts as a government in outer-systems. Of course, that doesn't apply here in Tau Ceti, but just saying.

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I like to see this as an event, I have character in mind who's had a checkered past and such. No, not one who enjoys murder and the like. So it in event form would be a good idea I'd say, especially for extended. Also, on another note it would be interesting to step away from a research station theme and move onto something else that NT would find profit in... though that'd only be food for thought.

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prisoners may be used as test subjects rather than cheap miners. This could give our more emotionless scientists some new toys to play around with (I.E, a researcher running a study on pain measurement using a convict and a remote-controlled electropack). All human testing would be performed out of public vision, per NanoTrasen orders.

 

I can already picture it, emo haircut scientists with japanese names doing the most cringeworthy edgy RP with some prison schmuck while Linkin Park plays in the background.

Unless the rules are changed to allow XxxxSephirothxxxX to become an acceptable character name, I dont think this is going to be a good idea.

R&D is going to fill with Sonic OC-esque psychopaths in seconds, anything that comes out of there will have a tragic backstory which involves the death of at least one parent.

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prisoners may be used as test subjects rather than cheap miners. This could give our more emotionless scientists some new toys to play around with (I.E, a researcher running a study on pain measurement using a convict and a remote-controlled electropack). All human testing would be performed out of public vision, per NanoTrasen orders.

 

I can already picture it, emo haircut scientists with japanese names doing the most cringeworthy edgy RP with some prison schmuck while Linkin Park plays in the background.

Unless the rules are changed to allow XxxxSephirothxxxX to become an acceptable character name, I dont think this is going to be a good idea.

R&D is going to fill with Sonic OC-esque psychopaths in seconds, anything that comes out of there will have a tragic backstory which involves the death of at least one parent.

 

C-Coldsteel?

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