Streamline Paperwork. Or: VERBAL CONSENT IS FINE. Or: just deal with it

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I've been playing atmospherics very heavily this month and last month after most of the role clicked with me after several rounds of quiet, desperate fiddling around. Now that I have a very solid layman's grasp of atmospherics I've been doing all sorts of tweaks, experiments, and adjustments to station atmos systems. However, I have had command whitelisted players and security officers go absolutely mental apeshit over me:

1) Adding an airlock to the medical lobby.

2) Adding a set of airlocks and a window in the departures hallway.

3) Adding an extra vent or scrubber in any location what-so-ever. (I was maced for adding a vent to the central ring)

Getting back into engineering i have realized how absolutely petty the majority of paperwork requirements are treated. Reasonable additions like I listed are treated like they are deep, personal wounds to their souls. I have been arrested on the spot for adding the sets of airlocks. A head of security who's name I will not mention actually went so far as to claim acting captainship simply to go so far as to deny the ability to construct the airlock in the departure hallway or medical hallway, even when the majority of medical staff at the time agreed to it and wanted it.

What is most frustrating is that the "GET PAPERWORK IDIOT" security officers and unrelated command staff (usually the HoS) simultaneously demand that I get a CE and the respective head's approval in paperwork when these roles do not yet have anyone in them. There is no fallback in SoP if there is no direct authority in that department or a captain.

This field of paperwork on station modifications is very stifling for creativity. Unless there is a crisis which is causing structural damage engineers often have very little to do except optimist station systems, but even then that often means structure modifications or additions, like extra vents, airlocks, etc etc.

Heck sometimes we may even want to modify a department more creatively, and it can get people to cooperate, but it is then shut down.

The server is wiped and everything is reset every 2 - 4 hours when the round ends and the game restarts. It should not be such a horrific offense to modify areas of the station and it should not be such a firm and demanding requirement that so much paperwork is filled out.

It would be better if we changed paperwork requirements to make verbal consent from the head or a majority of the staff make it ok to make modifications or additions to that department, or make it a directive that without a head of staff that heads of staff unrelated to the actual department being modified mind their own business if the modifications are "reasonable and not a danger to structure and crew" or something of similar wording. If someone builds a bunch of barricades in the public hallways that is different from building new disposal outlets in some areas so people are encouraged to throw away their trash instead of spewing it around the halls, which is another thing I've personally seen engineers get yelled at over for their lack of paperwork.

I've even seen security and AI's repeatedly talking about brigging engineers for constructing in the construction area without a signed and stamp station modification form, which always makes me laugh at how stupid the entire idea is.

Paperwork is meant to keep records and cover asses, not be used as a weapon to be obstructionist and obtuse.

[Zundy]

GET PAPER WORK IDIOT.

But seriously, why not just make it so you need CE consent in this case if there is a CE, if not then just an engineers approval is fine? I wouldn't use another heads approval as they shouldn't be qualified to make that decision. Just remember you're taking your ass in your hands when you carry out work without CE permission.

[Guest]

GET PAPER WORK IDIOT.

^

 

However, I have had command whitelisted players and security officers go absolutely mental apeshit over me:

 

Lemme just lay out the context of what happened, as Jackboot has a tendency of blowing things so far out of proportion and twisting the truth of what's said in IC, in which he usually takes great offense when obstacles are present in his way that he can't reliably loophole his way out of.

Jackboot went extremely moreso autistically apeshit than he's describing of me when he was told that he couldn't build whatever the fuck he wanted whenever he wanted, wherever he wanted without telling a soul of what he was doing and why. Nevermind the paperwork, he wordlessly put up airlocks without communicating to command staff who were very obviously active and available to take inquiries, requests or respond to questions. The rule on construction can be easily handwaved if it's verbally permitted, but the issue is that Jackboot never once thought to bother to say something along the lines of "Hey, putting up airlocks in X, Y and Z sections to prevent medbay from getting totally BTFO when the hallway gets vented", which would've been more than enough to convince me... provided they actually said something before carrying out the action.

He went so far as to constantly insult the head of staff citing that he was violating the directive on construction, and then after refusing several requests to drop by a neutral zone to discuss the issue and hopefully not dole out anything more than a simple warning, I ended up having to signal to my officers to bring in someone on the basis of a directive violation (punishable by NoD unless specified otherwise). I informed him of the charges he was facing, told him, "Hey, pal, you really should come in or this is gonna get a hell of a lot more stupid than it needs to be". Again, he wasn't acting rationally to start with, so Poe's law, fate and personal stubborness dictated that Jackboot flee to the engineering outpost and spark a manhunt. He got hurt, got sent to med, then escaped security questioning or custody procedures because they decided on beelining straight to cryo. Fun.

So yeah, honestly, it's not as if in practice paperwork is already streamlined and it's done after the fact. Jackboot's really not suggesting anything that would change the pace of the game aside from potentially giving individuals more leeway than they need in addition to dispensing with the actual importance of having paperwork in the first place, to provide irrefutable proof that a head-of-staff authorized action took place and that whoever has the form has permission by the head of staff to do whatever the form entails.

I would rather not have debates with chucklefucks building autismforts, making the excuse that "The CE didn't say it WASN'T okay" and pretending there isn't anything wrong with carrying out undocumented action.

This suggestion would only be valid if we dispensed with privacy laws and completely streamlined the necessity for arrest/search warrants, too. Because warrants slow us down and it's totally unnecessary for gameplay and the HoS is the law anyway :^)

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

oh hey delta good to see you, glad you included your feedback, I appreciate it, and I'm glad that you're willing to expose yourself as the one I was mentioning instead of letting it be a simple analogy, so I can expand on it now.

Your entire post is proving several of the points that I laid out. See: taking this way too seriously and getting extremely offended IC and apparently now OOC.

You (Or Vira Taryk, it's blending into both here but I reasonably suspect you share your characters viewpoints and stance) took deep and personal offense at an airlock being added to the medical lobby after I asked the medical staff if they wanted it and they said yes. You have also gotten extremely angry over a set of airlocks being added to the public hallway after I discuss the plan in the engineering radios and discuss it in the public channel. You claimed acting captainship and demand a security investigation into 2 separate departments coordinating with one another, which irritated a bunch of people, most notably my atmospheric technician, because he nor anyone in engineering recognized the authority you were claiming. My character found himself under a woman actually claiming captainship of the entire station and all the authority of a captain with an entire department of armed whiners who've already had a history of immediately jointlocking him over stupid reasons, and all over an airlock in a medical lobby that the medical department was fine with. How you are not able to step back and realize how hilariously wrong this situation is from every angle flabbergasts me.

And the fact all of this happened over a single airlock, and now you have this huge long post blasting me and making personal attacks and questions of my ability as well as dramatically declaring autismforts will overwhelm the station, is absolutely bizarre and bewildering to me. Is all of this really worth it? Even with autismforts, are you really personally offended at the prospect of someone building something without your knowledge when you are not the CE or the Captain? Does a little fort out of your way and not obstructing anything seriously obliterate your ability to manage your own department?

To avoid derailment I'll touch on your authority as HoS here only once:

When you play the HoS, you give orders to the security department and delegate the department. If you want to order around engineering and medical and all the other departments who do things you do not like, and waltz in and say "No, you actually can't cooperate and do something because you didn't tell me so cancel this and if you disobey me you're brigged" then just make Vira the Captain. This is where the verbal consent or a reasonability clause would come in well, because if there is no threat to station or crew then we can encourage the HoS to mind her own damn business.

[Guest]

Your entire post is proving several of the points that I laid out. See: taking this way too seriously and getting extremely offended IC and apparently now OOC.

 

You just made an entire post before mine taking that issue so seriously. If I'm permitted to make assumptions here, since you're making them as well. It's clear you didn't drop it, and you're saying I'm the one getting offended ICly and OOCly? Have you looked in a mirror recently, or better yet, do you even read your own posts? Because it's kinda evident you're lacking in self-introspection to an extent where you project all over the place and it's kinda weird that nobody's noticed.

 

You (Or Vira Taryk, it's blending into both here but I reasonably suspect you share your characters viewpoints and stance) took deep and personal offense at an airlock being added to the medical lobby after I asked the medical staff if they wanted it and they said yes.

 

That's a gross accusation of you, you're accusing me of playing a self-insert? Really? Furthermore, you're still on this "you're taking me violating IC rules so seriously what is the matter with you" crusade?

By the way, you don't ask medical doctors if you can install airlocks and vents in their departments and call that authorized permission, they are the absolute last people to ask in that regard, they don't have station pull past what's in their own department. Guess who do have the right to direct and guide the station as they see fit for station operation, though? Not a silly atmos tech on an enraged redpill parade.

 

You have also gotten extremely angry over a set of airlocks being added to the public hallway after I discuss the plan in the engineering radios and discuss it in the public channel.

 

You would need logs to judge whether I/Vira/whomever you think was "extremely angry" over something like this. From an OOC standpoint, is it trivial, meaningless? Absolutely, but this is a roleplay server and there are IC expectations and rules to abide by in IC, otherwise consequences occur as a result of not following them. Which happened, but you decided to be really unreasonable and irrational about the matter that the discussion the HoS tried to have with your character. The latter met the former with "aaaah women telling me what to do, do I respond rationally or-- no this is haram"! Is Unathi honor so fragile that discussions over airlock construction end up with said characters shrieking about oppression?

See how unproductive and unreasonable that is, Jackboot, or are you still taking the same close-minded obtuse approach to this as you did then?

But hey, I wasn't the one who rushed off to cryo to avoid any other IC discussion on the matter. Pardon me if I think that's a scummy move on your part, because it looked like you were ducking out so you didn't have to take responsibility.

 

You claimed acting captainship and demand a security investigation into 2 separate departments coordinating with one another, which irritated a bunch of people, most notably my atmospheric technician, because he nor anyone in engineering recognized the authority you were claiming.

 

I took acting captaincy for a total of 10-15 minutes for the sole purpose of helping out crewmembers with reassignments so that they weren't utterly bored or otherwise misassigned. I relinquished it 5 minutes prior to the issue of airlocks ever being brought up to me. At that point, I was acting as a head of security dealing with active directive violations, and as the only active head of staff at the time, I was pretty much alone and I was obligated to deal with it.

Also, there were like 2-3 engineers that round, as it was dead hour. So whether you recognized me as captain is absolutely irrelevant, as I was not acting as captain when I was dealing with the issue of you breaking the regs on construction. I was acting as head of security. You saying "I don't recognize your authority" is about as intelligent as a civilian getting pulled over by a cop and said civilian refusing to obey the laws of the land in favor of being a "free inhabitant".

is a better way to define this, and this is probably the best way to sum up the exchange between security and your atmos tech. As an employee, you are obligated to follow the regulations. No ifs, ands, or buts.

 

And the fact all of this happened over a single airlock, and now you have this huge long post blasting me and making personal attacks and questions of my ability as well as dramatically declaring autismforts will overwhelm the station, is absolutely bizarre and bewildering to me.

 

I'm blasting you because you're totally incapable of getting any of the facts straight and you seem way more comfortable pushing a narrative, overdressing your own complaints on falsehoods and inaccuracy rather than telling the truth. If anything, the only source of shit-flinging is coming from you. You're totally unable to level with people or take criticism without going into "HE SAID SHE SAID" sorts of childish arguments. Like fucking christ, you kept pinging me and bugging me over the course of two days over immigration political opinions and linking me all sorts of sooper-serious political stuff because I said "build wall" which is just a meme right now. Even though it wasn't even intentioned as bait, you took it and went on some weird crusade to try and convince me that some border policies wouldn't work or something, but anyway, the point is, I can't even tell if it's the pot calling the kettle black, because I'm starting to wonder whether I'm the kind of kettle that would be most accurately identified as a stainless steel kettle. I seriously can't fathom a world in which I'm always the bad guy and you're the stalwart protector of RP or whatever.

But still, you've totally ignored every single discussion I've had with you in private, and this is clearly not a chemistry issue because you get along with just about everyone else the same way as you do me or anyone else. You're becoming an ass, dude, and it needs to stop. It's seeping into everything you do and say.

 

When you play the HoS, you give orders to the security department and delegate the department. If you want to order around engineering and medical and all the other departments who do things you do not like, and waltz in and say "No, you actually can't cooperate and do something because you didn't tell me so cancel this and if you disobey me you're brigged" then just make Vira the Captain. This is where the verbal consent or a reasonability clause would come in well, because if there is no threat to station or crew then we can encourage the HoS to mind her own damn business.

 

No. The HoS can intervene into departments if they receive reliable information that corporate violations are occurring beyond a reasonable doubt. You received zero verbal consent on the part of a head of staff (in the absence of a Chief Engineer, in which there was none) as listed in the regulation regarding lawful construction of station structures. A simple "Hey I'm doing this for this reason, OK?" would've sufficed, but either it didn't cross your mind or you were willing to skip out on it because you were lazy.

I will add as a final note to this stupidly long-winded reply to your own post riddled with inaccuracies and such, if you break any regulations without good reason and justification for doing so, then you can expect just about any HoS taking issue with it.

[Nanako]

By the way, you don't ask medical doctors if you can install airlocks and vents in their departments and call that authorized permission, they are the absolute last people to ask in that regard, they don't have station pull past what's in their own department.

 

you seem to be contradicting there. if stuff is in their department, then they have decisionmaking power over it

The regulation on station modifications states that they can be done either with CE approval, or with the unanimous approval of the department in question. he got the latter, i think you really should have dropped the issue then. i was serving under you as a cadet that day, and i thought you were being kind of over the line. He got the approval from medical, and thus complied with the regulations

I asked you quite distinctly on common channel if you were vetoing it with acting captain powers, and you clearly responded that no, you were only doing it as head of security. In which case, your authority to meddle with engineering ended there, and imo you had no right to pursue it farther, since his actions weren't a threat to station security

And also, autismforts sound fun, i've never seen one. and for that matter, i've never seen anyone build a turret at all

[Guest]

I assumed at the time that the airlocks were not already constructed. I ended up finding out they were already built at the time I had "vetoed" it as head of security, when I really just said "No you can't do that because it's against construction rules and regulations", which seems fairly simple and really difficult to interpret in a negative fashion.

Jackboot thinks that I am the devil, however, and he'll remain thinking that way, if I know him well enough.

At which point though, in regards to the airlocks and the vent additions, the "damage was already done" in the sense that they went and violated the regulation prior to me saying "no" which did not change anything other than me being forced to take measures to have a discussion with them in person and explain why the regulation was in place and why it should not be broken.

Before Jackboot's character went full metal autist thinking I was apparently going to throw them into jail forever and assuming the worst of me, I did have a diplomatic scenario planned out. They reacted in a way my character did not anticipate, so plan B ended up having to be put into play. Was it handled elegantly? No, not really, but inter-department relations are a two-way street. Give and take.

[DatBerry]

I think the paper work is stop people from doing stupid unneeded modifications like walling off hallways.

But then security tried to arrest me over turning the 3x2 table in the locker to a 3x1 and a few stools as a assistant, saying it was "vandalism"

But i gotta say, i having even MORE airlocks in primary hallways to make moving around even more slower triggers me a lot

[Guest]

But then security tried to arrest me over turning the 3x2 table in the locker to a 3x1 and a few stools as a assistant, saying it was "vandalism"

 

I would consider that not valid for arrest (as in, the officers themselves would be breaking their own laws by illegally detaining someone over false pretenses), as it's only cosmetic.

I absolutely understood that the airlocks were there for the purpose of not venting the entire medbay and screwing up the atmos in the med lobby in addition to the east hallway, but that's not something my character knew and it was never explained because of that.

Anyway. Verbal consent by head of staff is already fine under the reg for non-cosmetic construction additions to the station. When no communication or accountability happens is what issues will start because it sets a really bad precedent and it makes the implication that engineers are allowed to start toelining certain construction projects without telling anyone what they're actually doing, which is definitely not how engineering procedure works.

[Bedshaped]

Being constantly tangled in a web of bureaucracy is probably the most realistic aspect of this game.

[Taintedglory]

Ima throw a hat in here for a few things.

One: I think Jackboot is right, the HoS (Or any Head really) shouldn't flip their shit when the Engineers do beneficial construction, construct private, or just be helpful with the way their department is supposed to be.

Two: I think that you shouldn't have to do paperwork for every last thing, but thats up to the Heads at the round.

Three: when no heads for the department is around, the department makes its own agreements/agreements with other deparments they are working for.

Edited June 13, 2016 by Guest

[Dreamix]

How about, let's not make the station an engineering's playground.

[Jboy2000000]

Regarding Modification, Optimization, and Upgrades of the station - Station Directive 5

To clarify the expectations and obligations of Engineering staff, to what extent they can modify or alter the station, and general expectations thereof.

All non-structural forms of modification, optimization, or upgrades to station equipment are permitted so long as the modifying engineer is qualified and has obtained written permission of all staff resident to the department in question. Large-scale structural modifications or additions require written and stamped consent from either the Chief Engineer, the Captain, or (in absence of both) a delegated representative of Command staff.

 

Ill say this, according to this, it seems what Boot did was hardly large scale, so as long as he had approval of ALL the doctors, and any present CMO at the time, it should be fine. Now depending on what people think is large scale may change, but adding an airlock is silly to think that, same with the airlock and window.

However, wanting, or even making it required to have paperwork to modify the atmospherics, like adding scrubbers and vents makes sense. You're playing with the station's air.

[Guest Complete Garbage]

How about, let's not make the station an engineering's playground.

In what way will making verbal head/interdepartmental consent a viable alternative to a mountain of paperwork turn the station into 'engineering's playground?'

Engineering should be allowed to improve shit, and if they're harming the station or getting everyone's rocks hot, then brig/demote them for negligence.

I'm getting tired of people who get all like 'change bad, old good' over the most innocuous fucking things.

[Butterrobber202]

As a Engineering fuckboy, I would like to see this, I have made (stole) a decent design for Departures and the bar, but it gets shutdown when Sec doesnt Enjoy Zuberi's Mead Bar and Departures w/ seats.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Delta the entire engineering department had already fucked off into space and convinced me to join them and we had built an outpost away from the station after your angry ranting. It had been a good half hour before I returned to the station to go to medical then went into cryo because I was tired IRL. I did not immediately sprint to cryo, stop trying to make me look bad to improve your argument, it's scummy, and focus on the actual suggestion here instead of trying to revolve it around what a terrible person I am. I don't think you're the devil, so also stop playing the victim card, it would be appreciated.

 

I have made (stole) a decent design for Departures and the bar

Things like this, when I play HoP, I just say "Go ahead" and fill out the paperwork myself. I was going to say "Things like this would need paperwork" but I remembered all the times I just said "go ahead" as HoP and there was never any problem, everyone dealt with it. As HoP I also frequently have windows and a windoor added to the kitchen counter when I'm nickle-and-dimeing the crew.

 

However, wanting, or even making it required to have paperwork to modify the atmospherics, like adding scrubbers and vents makes sense. You're playing with the station's air.

 

J-Jboy no. More vents/scrubbers are the most innocuous things you can do as an atmospheric technician. There's no risk to them at all. The thing that makes them dangerous is when you exploit the air alarm and vent the room.

Atmospheric technicians also do heft modifications to atmospherics 99% of the time because its layout can be drastically improved in many, many ways. If we enforced the rule as hard as Delta clearly wants to enforce it then we would need paperwork to improve our pumps, add more piping, add new coolers... The atmospherics job itself would be completely dead because we'd enable some settings on the computer then sit around until a breach.

 

How about, let's not make the station an engineering's playground.

 

OK so did you read the suggestion because this wasn't saying give engineering absolute authority it said to let verbal consent or a department consenting be enough for modifications in their department.

I want to make a greater point that many things proceed just fine if you just ASK the department or head of staff and they agree with it and you do whatever it is you were going to do. When I play command i use paperwork for myself and I do as much of it myself as I can. It's a record keeper and a way to cover your ass if you do something dangerous, not something you throw in someone's face. Requiring paperwork before you do anything is only prancing around the statement of "I don't want this happening".

[Guest]

I did not immediately sprint to cryo

 

That's exactly what you did.

 

Atmospheric technicians also do heft modifications to atmospherics 99% of the time because its layout can be drastically improved in many, many ways. If we enforced the rule as hard as Delta clearly wants to enforce it then we would need paperwork to improve our pumps, add more piping, add new coolers... The atmospherics job itself would be completely dead because we'd enable some settings on the computer then sit around until a breach.

 

I never said that. Delete your account, you are embarrassing.

 

OK so did you read the suggestion because this wasn't saying give engineering absolute authority it said to let verbal consent or a department consenting be enough for modifications in their department.

I want to make a greater point that many things proceed just fine if you just ASK the department or head of staff and they agree with it and you do whatever it is you were going to do. When I play command i use paperwork for myself and I do as much of it myself as I can. It's a record keeper and a way to cover your ass if you do something dangerous, not something you throw in someone's face. Requiring paperwork before you do anything is only prancing around the statement of "I don't want this happening".

 

I literally just agreed with you, if you actually sought out verbal permission from a head of staff in that case then it would've been fine. But you didn't, and now you're trying to say that you did and everything needs to change around you because you got in trouble for a legitimately stupid thing to do. Please delete your forum account.

[LordFowl]

A friendly reminder that this is a suggestions thread, not a player complaint thread.

Heads of Staff that are blatantly abusing paperwork to infringe on other's people entertainment for no reason other than they have a stick up their ass are violating one of the core rules of being a Head of Staff; the idea that Head's of Staff are obliged to create a more enjoyable round for all the crew by virtue of their elevated authority.

Furthermore, our paperwork already has plenty of clauses that allow leniency, and I'm 99% verbal consent is already a thing.

[Guest]

Heads of Staff that are blatantly abusing paperwork to infringe on other's people entertainment for no reason other than they have a stick up their ass are violating one of the core rules of being a Head of Staff; the idea that Head's of Staff are obliged to create a more enjoyable round for all the crew by virtue of their elevated authority.

 

What the portion of the community that establishes itself as the anti-paperwork circlejerk fails to realize is that paperwork creates accountability and record of authorized action taking place by an individual, it covers the ass of the employee and the supervisor above them. It creates a relationship that is effectually, on the side of the employee, "I have the support of my boss to carry out this action, come at me brother", and on the side of the boss, "I am supervising and taking responsibility for whatever occurs under my oversight, I support the actions being undertaken by this employee and I will defend their right to carry out the action until they do something outside of the agreed terms."

This is a really simple, yet unheard-of concept likely due to the fact that human nature likes to irrationally demonize anything they don't like. They call this confirmation bias, and it's a huge logical sin, because it leads to incivility and general stupidity and dumb behavior stemming from it.

 

Furthermore, our paperwork already has plenty of clauses that allow leniency, and I'm 99% verbal consent is already a thing.

 

All the more reason to file it if it's necessary, if not then just tell someone. Paperwork for projects can be filed retroactively, but it needs initial approval before the action can be carried out.

NanoTrasen is a ultra-massive chain corporation. The NSS Aurora/Exodus are extremely expensive operations. I work at a chain diner and a chain fast-food restaurant. Both of the operations are country-wide. These are both expensive, and to certain extends, fairly hazardous operations that I work at, especially what with my positions considering I handle raw meat, have to carry heavy loads, document received shipments and ensure every single field has ink in it, and I have to exercise procedural cleanliness and a uniform appearance so that I don't suffer from accidents or cause cross-contamination violations. I would literally be nowhere if I did not follow the procedures.

We're a heavy roleplay server and the bureaucracy is the hugest part of the workplace. Antagonism is honestly filler and it's intended to test the established order we have in place. It's supposed to challenge every single crew member to be able to solve these issues while still staying in character and sticking with procedure. Paperwork is part of this, and so is communication. We wouldn't be heavy RP if we decided to handwave these facets for an easier gameplay experience.

[Guest Menown]

Generally as an officer, I try to suggest retroactive approval by informing a Captain/CE. I really don't think security should be going out of their way to brig everybody they can, given keeping people at work and making NT money seems higher priority than having John Smith screaming in a cell for ten minutes.

If I see anything, I inform the CE/Captain and suggest they approve the changes retroactively through paperwork, or at the least just have the stuff fixed and changed back if it's easy enough. That way, everybody's happy and nobody's sitting out for a stupid amount of time.

[Garnascus]

Retroactive approval can and should always be a thing that can happen. If you're trying to railroad a side project or something or even reverse it entirely because someone didnt get a signature then you need to re-evaluate yourself... Anyway these situations blow up in such a stupid way every other round. "where is your paperwork for X". "EXCUSE ME I DONT NEED PAPERWORK FOR X BECAUSE Y". "YES YOU DO NEED PAPERWORK FOR X AND Y DOES NOT APPLY TO X BECAUSE OF Z". Shut up, shut the hell up. Like these situations are so easy to solve, "hey you didnt get paperwork, thats ok do it next time or fill it out in a bit".

On the flipside, just let a head of staff know when you want to do minor alterations. thats not an unreasonable request...

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Retroactive approval can and should always be a thing that can happen. If you're trying to railroad a side project or something or even reverse it entirely because someone didnt get a signature then you need to re-evaluate yourself... Anyway these situations blow up in such a stupid way every other round. "where is your paperwork for X". "EXCUSE ME I DONT NEED PAPERWORK FOR X BECAUSE Y". "YES YOU DO NEED PAPERWORK FOR X AND Y DOES NOT APPLY TO X BECAUSE OF Z". Shut up, shut the hell up. Like these situations are so easy to solve, "hey you didnt get paperwork, thats ok do it next time or fill it out in a bit".

On the flipside, just let a head of staff know when you want to do minor alterations. thats not an unreasonable request...

 

May we make this official IC and OOC policy?

[MrSmooooth]

Not an engineer here, but a frequent Quartermaster. Paperwork is a solid half of my job. I need to rubber stamp orders, print invoices, ensure deliveries are signed for, and generally maintain a paper trail so when Urist McTater says cargo ordered those guns for him I can say those guns never came through the cargo dock, here's the paperwork to prove it. I see alot of paperwork pass my desk, and I try to use it to generate Roleplay. Unless I'm busy, you'll never see me use disposal shipping. I'll insist on in person deliveries and signing for most large orders. Doing this gives me a chance to get out of the cargo deck, and roleplay with other people.

One thing I do often is tell people to get an order stamped by a relevant head or the captain, before I'll order something particularly expensive/dangerous for them. I cannot tell you how many people try to get the AI to order items for them when that happens. Unless you've given me reason to want to obstruct you, I'm going to streamline the process, and the most you need to do is get a stamp and sign on the dotted line.

Keeping the above in mind, paperwork is both my best and only legal weapon as a quartermaster. Without a paper trail, I can't cover my ass/cover up my own shady dealings, I can't stonewall orders that are detrimental in some fashon(No, Urist McCMO, you DONT need an energy weapon crate, and Urist McScientist probably doesen't need an emitter either) either by virtue of being hazardous in some fashion if mis-handled(Virus Crates, Weapons, Emitters, ect.) or by simply being so expensive they drain our ability to fill other orders. (HOS, you want HOW MANY GUNS? 400 points worth? Not happening, even if we had the budget, which we do not.) I will order you almost anything on the list, and even a fair number of things that aren't, but without paperwork, my job becomes alot more empty, and I have less ability to resist silly, dangerous, or pointless orders.

Just throwing in my two cents from a paperwork centric job.

[Guest]

Unless you've given me reason to want to obstruct you, I'm going to streamline the process, and the most you need to do is get a stamp and sign on the dotted line.

 

This has been policy for myself for the past year. Fill out the necessary forms, get a head to sign and stamp to show they approve and continue on their merry day.

Please do not pull a Jackboot and take every measure to defy command staff and effectively take apart the already streamlined system of bureaucracy because you enjoy causing drama and the only reason you're still in the community is to shit up everyone else's video gaming experience because you can't find any enjoyment in it.

[Arrow768]

I dont see any issues with the current system of paperwork we have.

Filling it out takes not even a minute and it covers your ass if something goes wrong.