[1 Dismissal] 911 what's your emergency

[MO_oNyMan]

So playing a couple of rounds without any command staff whatsoever i noticed a weird thing. Regular crewmembers are completely and absolutely cutt off any communication with the outside world while onboard the station for some reason. Consoles and faxes are all in the access restricted area and are themselves access restricted. Which leads to sufferings and desperation when the station is falling apart and antags steamrolled security and are murdering everyone and all you can do is hide somewhere on the surface praying for someone to take a command slot.

So what i suggest is implementing a phone booths in a couple of locations throughout the station (library+surface?). It adds to the aesthetics. showing that crew can call their loved ones at any time (which could get a mechanical use?) and more importantly, they can call Biesel law enforcement if they are scared for their lives.

It would let us see how Biesel deals with emergencies in its sector, won't allow the round to die down, introduce another party (since Biesel police might part interest with NT).

The call for help may still be declined or severely delayed due to various reasons (inluding poor phrasing, lack of urgency or resources or due to some major emergency Biesel has to deal with first). Prank calling Biesel police would obviously not end well with a punishment getting to the prankster either OOCly in the form of a bwoink or ICly in the form of Biesel sending a fax to the station with the request to investigate and deal with the incident. Identifying should not be a problem with voice recognition technology (due to voice recognition tech the Biesel fax would contain some identifying features of the prankster. Like age, sex, species etc.). In severe situations they could even send an enforcer themselves.

[Kaed]

Game design and balance reasons aside, I always got the sense that there is no general public off-station communication because the station is on an isolated asteroid, and, magical bluespace communications are needed to get hold of anyone in a reasonable amount of time. This makes long distance communication expensive, which leaves it reserved for higher ups.

You don't make long distances calls to your girlfriend or family when you're on company dime. That's not how it works.

I also really don't like the idea of phone booths, or bringing it 'beisel police' into the equation. This is an isolated asteroid run by Nanotrasen, it may actually be well outside of general police jurisdiction areas. Yes, it's still under human law, but it's more like being on an oil rig out at sea - you don't call the police because some terrorists invaded the oil rig, they're not going to get on a boat and come over just to tell the bad terrorists they're under arrest. No, you call your company and they decide how to resolve the problem.

[MO_oNyMan]

Actually all Biesel territory is under Biesel's jurisdiction and if space terrorists arrive the first call would be to the government to exactly get them dispatch some guns to get here and tell terrorists that they're under arrest. Bluespace magic is not really an excuse and in a sector full of pirates it's a considerable security problem to have so little abilities to communicate with an outside world. Especially considering that we're supposed to be NT flagman station in the sector or something

[Kaed]

If it was under direct Biesel jurisdiction we would have people come to the station to arrest and carry away people who committed murder, not put them in holding cells until the end of shift to be transported to the proper authorities. You would also be obligated to turn over said criminals to the proper authorities, not question them internally on the station and press charges of corporate regulations breach.

The way things are set up gives a sense of isolation from anything but Nanotrasen authority, and you can't just expect the official authorities to be a phone call away to every civilian.

[Brutishcrab51]

If it was under direct Biesel jurisdiction we would have people come to the station to arrest and carry away people who committed murder, not put them in holding cells until the end of shift to be transported to the proper authorities. You would also be obligated to turn over said criminals to the proper authorities, not question them internally on the station and press charges of corporate regulations breach.

The way things are set up gives a sense of isolation from anything but Nanotrasen authority, and you can't just expect the official authorities to be a phone call away to every civilian.

Corporate charges are something that are generally only applicable for punishments within a NanoTrasen installation, and what would be anything other than time in a cell or a fine (you are paid by NanoTrasen after all, right?) would be considered a Red-level violation, which also (within reason) probably violates a Biesel law, hence, Hold Until Transfer by default or cyborgification.

Biesel has a fleet, the Cloud belongs to Biesel, and NanoTrasen operates within Biesel (with many privileges, such as maintaining their own Internal Security force), but the ISD aren't cops. NanoTrasen follows Biesel laws first, and their own regulations second, legally speaking.

That said, there's a reason we have a Telecommunications satellite just to have inter-station communications. Having Fax machines locked behind Command access makes sense, sending a report straight to a Federal institution isn't something any civilian can do (In this sense, you quite literally contact the Biesel Government proper), or the Central Command of the most powerful corporation in the known galaxy.

Besides, NanoTrasen handles the majority of Biesel security work, don't they? You might just be causing an ERT to arrive when Biesel sounds the alarm.

Disclaimer that there isn't a CCIA set-in-stone policy on all of this. It really depends on the Staff and CCIA online at the time of a situation where contacting Biesel over NT would be seen as viable. I can tell you, it's not often.

 

I also really don't like the idea of phone booths, or bringing it 'beisel police' into the equation. This is an isolated asteroid run by Nanotrasen, it may actually be well outside of general police jurisdiction areas. Yes, it's still under human law, but it's more like being on an oil rig out at sea - you don't call the police because some terrorists invaded the oil rig, they're not going to get on a boat and come over just to tell the bad terrorists they're under arrest. No, you call your company and they decide how to resolve the problem.

Not entirely true. You will probably alert the company because that's what your communications are set to, but most off-shore oil rigs, or even commercial ships passing near the territorial waters of a nation will have a radio chart to set their radios to those of local (Coast Guard, probably) frequencies to alert them in the event of an issue. What is true, is that you don't alert the police. Police don't deal with Somalian Pirates taking over your ship, the military does. Biesel doesn't have a big military, and did you know many of their security contracts are with NanoTrasen? NT's already in a position to do more for the Aurora (We didn't forget about the Icarus, did we?) than Biesel is, it'd make sense that it'd ultimately fall back on the Corporation to deal with the issue, unless the Corporation was the reason (revolution?) that there was an issue.

 

If it was under direct Biesel jurisdiction we would have people come to the station to arrest and carry away people who committed murder, not put them in holding cells until the end of shift to be transported to the proper authorities. You would also be obligated to turn over said criminals to the proper authorities, not question them internally on the station and press charges of corporate regulations breach.

The way things are set up gives a sense of isolation from anything but Nanotrasen authority, and you can't just expect the official authorities to be a phone call away to every civilian.

This is what happens. Prisoners get transported to the NTCC Odin, and then get arrested by Biesel Authorities (ideally). Police don't maintain starships in Aurora's lore (Not that I know of, at least), and the Biesel Navy won't get mobilized to maneuver one of its ships to transport a Scientist who shot a Bartender.

[MO_oNyMan]

If it was under direct Biesel jurisdiction we would have people come to the station to arrest and carry away people who committed murder, not put them in holding cells until the end of shift to be transported to the proper authorities. You would also be obligated to turn over said criminals to the proper authorities, not question them internally on the station and press charges of corporate regulations breach.

The way things are set up gives a sense of isolation from anything but Nanotrasen authority, and you can't just expect the official authorities to be a phone call away to every civilian.

 

Biesel should maintain some presense within their borders. And they would respond to calls and come to arrest people on the station except there's no way to make such a call for some reason. Moreover most of the problems are expected to be solved by NT themselves (that's why they have security and ERT) and that gives NT the ability to cover some things up, but after the shift the criminals that were HuTed are handed over to Biesel authorities for trial and sentencing and all that jazz. All charges of corporate regulation breach are technically just fines and reduction of payment. The only "real" sentence is HuT, which is holding someone on private property until they can be handed off to the law enforcement, which is what NT technically is obligated to do if someone on their station broke Biesel law. Internal questioning is a part of security systems on NT facilities and is a part of corporate investigation (because you wouldn't want to fine or hand someone off to Biesel police without them actually doing anything wrong).

The sense of isolation is created only because of inability of civilians reach proper authorities for some reason. But i can and i should expect official authorities to be a phone call away from every civilian because (at least in my country) we have a number of hotlines to reach governmental emergency services (including the police hotline)

All in all police calls would be reserved to some specific situations as NT is expected to care of its own problems with ISD and ERT and the call would likely be relayed to NT authorities on more than a couple occasions but the ability to reach the Biesel authorities should exist and the inability to do so for anyone except command staff with a proper ID is a considerable security risk.

And as for balance Biesel police would be like underequipped ERT (uniforms, badges, bulletproof vests, sec belts, pepperspray, flash, baton, cuffs, taser, .45 (or any other handgun) with lethal ammo, heavy vests and assault rifles/shotguns in their trunks) arriving in pairs on their own small shuttle and having visitor access as a standard police unit. Maybe a swat team would be somewhat better equiped with breaching charges, masks, grenades and slightly better weapon and armor choices but they'd be somewhat rare as in "why not ERT at this point".

[Azande]

So playing a couple of rounds without any command staff whatsoever i noticed a weird thing. Regular crewmembers are completely and absolutely cutt off any communication with the outside world while onboard the station for some reason. Consoles and faxes are all in the access restricted area and are themselves access restricted. Which leads to sufferings and desperation when the station is falling apart and antags steamrolled security and are murdering everyone and all you can do is hide somewhere on the surface praying for someone to take a command slot.

So what i suggest is implementing a phone booths in a couple of locations throughout the station (library+surface?). It adds to the aesthetics. showing that crew can call their loved ones at any time (which could get a mechanical use?) and more importantly, they can call Biesel law enforcement if they are scared for their lives.

It would let us see how Biesel deals with emergencies in its sector, won't allow the round to die down, introduce another party (since Biesel police might part interest with NT).

The call for help may still be declined or severely delayed due to various reasons (inluding poor phrasing, lack of urgency or resources or due to some major emergency Biesel has to deal with first). Prank calling Biesel police would obviously not end well with a punishment getting to the prankster either OOCly in the form of a bwoink or ICly in the form of Biesel sending a fax to the station with the request to investigate and deal with the incident. Identifying should not be a problem with voice recognition technology (due to voice recognition tech the Biesel fax would contain some identifying features of the prankster. Like age, sex, species etc.). In severe situations they could even send an enforcer themselves.

 

You're working on a research facility that is dealing with trade secrets of NanoTrasen. You will not find phones or devices of personal nature in /any/ private research lab of a company. Full stop.

My next point, IT IS A GAME. We do not need a full legal system thrown in to justify A GAME. Seriously dude, you need to let this kinda stuff go. I already suggested having a Biesel Police Officer replace the detective role - that was shot down by Jackboot basically.

NanoTrasen manages a large portion of NanoTrasen space, the government has little to no reason to operate where NanoTrasen is - NT has a full security department of officers with equal training, NT has a fleet in the area keeping the area secure from pirates. NT is basically the jurisdictional authority of their area in space, with Biesel stepping in as required as a federal authority when required - but rarely, the government serves at the pleasure of the Corporation.

[MO_oNyMan]

You're working on a research facility that is dealing with trade secrets of NanoTrasen. You will not find phones or devices of personal nature in /any/ private research lab of a company. Full stop.

Aurora is not a super sekrit research fascility it's just about mining phoron and doing some tests on it (supposedly. Noone really researches phoron on Aurora). The only "real" secret on Aurora is the nuke knowledge which regular crew doesn't have access to. And that's leaving aside the fact that keeping a fail-safe mechanism a big deal secret makes no sense. Aurora has visitors, Aurora doesn't have enough security and most importantly Aurora doesn't have an actual subject of research to become a serious closed research facility

 

My next point, IT IS A GAME. We do not need a full legal system thrown in to justify A GAME. Seriously dude, you need to let this kinda stuff go. I already suggested having a Biesel Police Officer replace the detective role - that was shot down by Jackboot basically.

???. "We don't need more indepth features because it's a game" is not even a real argument. It's strictly the other way around.

 

NanoTrasen manages a large portion of NanoTrasen space, the government has little to no reason to operate where NanoTrasen is - NT has a full security department of officers with equal training, NT has a fleet in the area keeping the area secure from pirates. NT is basically the jurisdictional authority of their area in space, with Biesel stepping in as required as a federal authority when required - but rarely, the government serves at the pleasure of the Corporation.

Biesel is its own governmental entity although heavily influenced by the NT. Nt is still a corporate entity although having a lot of power and influence over Biesel. Biesel is still required to take care of its citizens, its borders and its problems. That's exactly why Biesel police and navy (however small it might be) exists. Yes, they are able to push most of its issues to NT but if a Biesel citizen requires protection it's the job of Biesel government to do protect them (that's why they pay taxes). They can outsource it to NT, they can use its own resources but in the end the entity that must care about Biesel citizens is Biesel itself. Moreover if NT itself (who's supposed to be the authority in the sector) is the problem Biesel has to make sure the incident is sorted out, because Biesel has its laws that are supposed to be followed on its territory

[UnknownMurder]

While this suggestion does potentially make the game a whole lot interesting however I do not wish to see more government involvement on Aurora Station as a result of this and here's four reasons why:

 

• The OOC people actually making their contribution to Aurora Station community have already proven itself by emphasizing and focusing on the fact that Aurora Station is a private station. Here's the message of you not being able to understand by what is a private property doing in Biesel's jurisdiction. Aurora Station has their right to keep their corporate information in secrecy from any prying eyes.
   
  
• Some of us actually sought of less government involvement and more corporation policies. If there were more government involvement, we will be starting to see Aurora Station in white and black and leave out of boredom/too much control. If you want to learn more about government involvement; we have discords for this.
   
  
• What Xander says about this being a "GAME" is a real and valid argument. You, sir, have chosen to neglect this argument. I shall go into details of this argument for you. This is a game that we are meant to enjoy to have fun while sticking to this environment. If an emergency do appear, it is better for Command Staffs to take their time to write up an emergency report in fashionably order than everyone trying to call the police and spout random things.
   
  
• Biesel is not United States of America.
  

[MO_oNyMan]

The OOC people actually making their contribution to Aurora Station community have already proven itself by emphasizing and focusing on the fact that Aurora Station is a private station. Here's the message of you not being able to understand by what is a private property doing in Biesel's jurisdiction. Aurora Station has their right to keep their corporate information in secrecy from any prying eyes.

If Aurora being an all in secret facility with extremely tight security protocols to keep the NT secrets away from everyone it should be one. Right now it doesn't nearly feel like it for reasons mentioned above. If you want to pursue a closed research object gimmick we should pursue it and move actively in that direction. If we don't - we shouldn't pursue it and instead move in a different direction without allowing this arguement to hinder the growth of the setting.

 

Some of us actually sought of less government involvement and more corporation policies. If there were more government involvement, we will be starting to see Aurora Station in white and black and leave out of boredom/too much control. If you want to learn more about government involvement; we have discords for this.

Government involvement does not mean too much control especially in existing setiing. Quite the opposite. The government counterweights the ultimate corporation power allowing more room for maneuvers and freedom. Less government involvement and more corporation policies is fine, but in out situation it's no government involvment at all. Which naturally leads to too much control coming from the corporation having the abolute power over every aspect of the life on-station.

 

What Xander says about this being a "GAME" is a real and valid argument. You, sir, have chosen to neglect this argument. I shall go into details of this argument for you. This is a game that we are meant to enjoy to have fun while sticking to this environment. If an emergency do appear, it is better for Command Staffs to take their time to write up an emergency report in fashionably order than everyone trying to call the police and spout random things.

Here's what that argument looks like

My next point, IT IS A GAME. We do not need a full legal system thrown in to justify A GAME

Basically dismissing any feature that is more or less in-depth for a light hearted game. A HRP ss13 game should be interesting. A great chunk of it is making it believable. That's what HRP on ss13 is built upon. Believability and complexity. That's what makes it fun. The example of a game with similar aesthetics that banks on something other than believability and complexity is Mario. We're playing to witness and create stories, which means that the world they unfold in should be believable and in-depth, have an internal logic. That's why explaining everything with blue-space magic is bad form and is avoided. If emergency does appear it is preferable that command takes time to write a report. But if there's no command staff it's not fun for both the crew getting slaughtered without any chance and antags whose most considerable challenge is the bartender with beanbags. Calling police =/= spouting random thing. It's a natural and believable reaction of a human being to a life-threatening emergency, which in turn makes the environment more believable while also not letting a round to come to a stop on dead shifts and thus making the experience on station more fun.

 

Biesel is not United States of America.

I'm not sure what was supposed to be relayed by this point but yes, the above statement is true

[Kaed]

This is going to be a little blunt, so forgive me for this but I'm going to get this out here.

I believe the point that they're trying to convey that you are missing, is that they don't want police in their game, you do. I have seen precious little support from anyone in this thread, and a whole lot of you trying to jam what your vision of the game is down everyone else's throats.

I understand where you're coming from, believe me. I frequently have standards that I'd like to be put in the game that don't match the standards of the majority of the rest of the community about what they want in their game.

And I'm telling you, I don't think that the game would be improved by adding police call boxes to the station. It creates redundancy for the sake of itself. It is coding bloat, to introduce the idea of calling up a crippled ERT with less gear and authority and the added downside that any chucklefuck can call them by picking up a phone. It undermines the round progression and the command structure by giving the power to call reinforcements to every member of the crew. Its sacrifices a lot of what already makes rounds exciting, by trivializing its impact and making it accessible to everyone.

And that's only looking at it from a gameplay perspective. From a lore perspective, I still hate the idea of police having an active presence on a private research station way out on the fringes of space. The analogies that you're drawing, apply to the country that you currently live in. Not here. This is more like living on one of Saturn's moons and trying to call the the Earth police to come over and arrest someone. You're being unreasonable and ignoring the logistics involved.

[MO_oNyMan]

All the points mentioned in the previous post were already adressed and explained (some of them more than once)

so i'll adrees the new one instead

And that's only looking at it from a gameplay perspective. From a lore perspective, I still hate the idea of police having an active presence on a private research station way out on the fringes of space. The analogies that you're drawing, apply to the country that you currently live in. Not here. This is more like living on one of Saturn's moons and trying to call the the Earth police to come over and arrest someone. You're being unreasonable and ignoring the logistics involved.

 

Biesel is the main planet of Biesel republic and the heart of its operations. On the orbit of that planet resides (among other things) Odin - a NT command center. People that leave on Biesel travel to Odin every day to get to Aurora (and most likely other NT stations in Tau Ceti) for their shift. After getting through Odin security procedures people get on the shuttle to get to Aurora. Shuttle trip between Odin and Aurora takes a grand total of 2 to 5 minutes and goes back and forth every 15(?) minutes or so. So taking this into consideration calling the Biesel police from Aurora is comparable to calling the police station that is a block away from your house. That's the unreasonable logistics involved.

[Kaed]

Biesel is the main planet of Biesel republic and the heart of its operations. On the orbit of that planet resides (among other things) Odin - a NT command center. People that leave on Biesel travel to Odin every day to get to Aurora (and most likely other NT stations in Tau Ceti) for their shift. After getting through Odin security procedures people get on the shuttle to get to Aurora. Shuttle trip between Odin and Aurora takes a grand total of 2 to 5 minutes and goes back and forth every 15(?) minutes or so. So taking this into consideration calling the Biesel police from Aurora is comparable to calling the police station that is a block away from your house. That's the unreasonable logistics involved.

 

That's not how things work.

https://wiki.aurorastation.org/index.php?title=Bluespace

Bluespace drives, which is what you are referencing here in the shuttles that transit back and forth between the station and the Odin, are very expensive, and usually only found on rich people and military vessels. The reason why it is so trivial to shuttle people to the station is largely because Nanotrasen is very rich, having a near monopoly on phoron production. A bluespace drive is not something you would attach to a police ship so they can warp across the solar system willy nilly, responding to distant calls and burning expensive bluespace crystals and phoron every time. Is that what taxpayer money is going to? I strongly doubt it.

Even if police shuttles have bluespace drives, there is also the problem of getting landing clearance and information on where to go, because you have to warp to a bluespace beacon or risk ending up somewhere bad, like inside a wall or another ship. Yes, there is probably several in the Aurora they could use, but if you think that police officers are allowed to drop in at will on a private research station because someone called them on the bluespace telly-phone (also, who's paying for the bluespace crystals in these phones so you can make personal/emergency calls as a non-command member?), I don't think you're really grasping what logistics means. Certain antagonist types arrive without asking, but they're criminals, they don't care about following legal procedures about trespassing on private property. In all likelihood, they'd contact Nanotrasen, and be told to go away, we'll handle it internally.

It would be more likely to see a response from, say, a private military unit hired by the company who owns the Aurora, equipped with powerful weapons on company dime and sent to resolve the problem. Oh, wait... we already have that! I guess a group of under-equipped police officers would just be redundant and unnecessary, like sending in a second security team. Because we already have one of those.

At best, I can see this being an alternative to sending an ERT that happens once and a while. The bad ERT, where instead of receiving a bunch of armed ex military, you get a disappointing mass of coppers who are quickly slaughtered by the antagonist(s) who caused the ERT call in the first place.

[MO_oNyMan]

That's not how things work.

Bluespace drives, which is what you are referencing here in the shuttles that transit back and forth between the station and the Odin, are very expensive, and usually only found on rich people and military vessels. The reason why it is so trivial to shuttle people to the station is largely because Nanotrasen is very rich, having a near monopoly on phoron production. A bluespace drive is not something you would attach to a police ship so they can warp across the solar system willy nilly, responding to distant calls and burning expensive bluespace crystals and phoron every time. Is that what taxpayer money is going to? I strongly doubt it.

You're forgetting that one of the major reasons NT has so much influence over Biesel is because NT itself gets the major part of military and law enforcement supply contracts. Dropping the fact that it would be completely unreasonable to NOT have a couple of units specifically equipped for responding to distant calls i imagine there's a law enforcement presence established MUCH closer to the Aurora for the sole reason of upholding Biesel law in that specific area of Biesel space. You are also forgetiing that a good amount of station crew are tax payers. Is Biesel neglecting the protection of its citizens within its borders because "they are not close enough for us to bother". I strongly doubt it

 

Even if police shuttles have bluespace drives, there is also the problem of getting landing clearance and information on where to go, because you have to warp to a bluespace beacon or risk ending up somewhere bad, like inside a wall or another ship. Yes, there is probably several in the Aurora they could use, but if you think that police officers are allowed to drop in at will on a private research station because someone called them on the bluespace telly-phone (also, who's paying for the bluespace crystals in these phones so you can make personal/emergency calls as a non-command member?), I don't think you're really grasping what logistics means. Certain antagonist types arrive without asking, but they're criminals, they don't care about following legal procedures about trespassing on private property. In all likelihood, they'd contact Nanotrasen, and be told to go away, we'll handle it internally.

Oh yeah, police vessels would have to get clearence to get on a private research station for responding to an emergency call. You know, just like a number of other completely unrelated to the station and its affairs visitors that get onboard Aurora in the beginning and throughout every shift. And why do we have to explain phones with bluespace magic again? If you want to send message, you can contact law enforcement HQ in your area (which is how things work in our world). Or you could record your message in a message box on the shuttle (that cruises between Aurora and Biesel every so often) and then get it automatically relay it to whoever you sent it to (maybe for a small fee). Bluespace magic is not the universal answer to everything, stop treating it like such.

In likelihood Biesel would per say contact NT about the call. However seing how NT is adamant on getting clearence to send any help to avoid unnecessary profit loss (every mean of emergency call on station is locked behind a command id access) and is not too keen on jumping into the frey for regular crew they will most likely tell Biesel police to check what is going on letting them waste their resources to deal with paranoid crewmember or with a risk that is not worth mobilising ERT. And the situations where NT itself is the problem still exist.

Yes the calls would get delayed and take longer to respond than ERT but they would be possible.

 

It would be more likely to see a response from, say, a private military unit hired by the company who owns the Aurora, equipped with powerful weapons on company dime and sent to resolve the problem. Oh, wait... we already have that! I guess a group of under-equipped police officers would just be redundant and unnecessary, like sending in a second security team. Because we already have one of those.

Private military and law enforcement are completely different entities that have completely different priorities. Not to say that private military is not always available because there are shifts that don't have any command representatives aboard. But emergencies don't tend to care about whether you have a stray RD to deal with them. Security can put up some resistance but they're after all security. Cops are more experienced and better equipped to deal with a deadly situations at hand because they operate in an uncontrolled environment as opposed to security officers that canonically only deal with average Joe crewmembers but not before these crewmembers went through a tight screening, searches, background check and psych evaluation process on their way to Aurora.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

The Thing would be far less impactful as a horror movie if the protagonists could just call the cops to be rescued in 20 minutes.

SS13 would be far less impactful as a survival roleplaying game if we could call the cops whenever we wanted.

We are in an isolated research facility. You can already send a distress beacon. If there are no heads of staff and you can't break into the captain's office to grab the spare then how can you still rely on enough ghosts to be ert-lite?

[MO_oNyMan]

The Thing would be far less impactful as a horror movie if the protagonists could just call the cops to be rescued in 20 minutes.

SS13 would be far less impactful as a survival roleplaying game if we could call the cops whenever we wanted.

ss13 is not a survival rpg and aurora is not a horror movie (at least not a generic shift. Some events obviously play this card but then the ability to call ERT is usually removed by admins). The physical inability to call for help is not a vital part of the gameplay. And almost every time when the ability to call ERT was artificially removed due to events it didn't benefit the round dynamic.

 

We are in an isolated research facility. You can already send a distress beacon. If there are no heads of staff and you can't break into the captain's office to grab the spare then how can you still rely on enough ghosts to be ert-lite?

I'm not sure what ert-lite means. If it means "ready to play ERT" than i would argue that there doesn't have to be a fully armed squad of commandos steamrolling through antags to keep the round going. 1-2 officers that could orginise the crew, keep things rolling back and forth and maybe try to evac the remaining population of the station would be more than sufficient. At least you wouldn't be forced to hide in maint for 1,5 hours waiting for a transfer vote while ninja with full access cuts off legs of anyone he manages to get a hold of

[LordFowl]

No. This is the function of the ERT. The idea of just calling up a police cruiser from the telly by dialing 911 presents numerous problems as have been outlined above. If we really wanted crew to call for emergency response forces they would use the same ERT system that is in place. That said there is no reason for crew to have telephone boxes to call ERT - if they need to call ERT they have the resources to do so, or those resources have been deprived of them by more resourceful antags.

Voting for dismissal.