nianjiilical - i am goign to push buttons and cry

[nianjiilical]

whom'stve

hi im nian. ive been here for like 6-7 years and adminned for 5 or so. i don't know why i was adminned but i took it and since then ive done a lot of stupid shit but nobody's kicked me out yet so i'm probably doing an okay job

my accomplishments on tgstation include

• adding cherry bulbs to the game because im not good enough at coding to make a singular bioluminescent plant trait with a variable color
• creating the .dmi file that lets admins spawn fumos (im not sorry)
• changing all the tiles in space to miasma floors because i wanted to turn space into farts (i think i gave potato an aneurysm but it was a pretty good atmos stress test)
• zoning out for a few months at a time (i will try very hard not to do this as headmin)
• shitposting in bus occasionally
• running dorfstation like twice
• creating the .dmi file that lets admins spawn amongus (im not sorry)
• okay look i dont really do a whole lot but im still here so thats probably fine

why are you running

i don't know? i keep thinking i might as well take my shot and i keep thinking i need to do something productive with my time and this is one of the few games ive been attached to on and off for so long

why are you good as a headmin

im probably not but im also chronically hard on myself so maybe it'll turn out to be a good experience

im basically a neet so i have lots of free time to talk about policy garbage but i also have a sleeping disorder so i can be around for all timezones at complete random. also i have severe anxiety which leads me to be a crowd pleaser so i can promise i will be pushed around by other headmins if you just want stability. also im unrobust as fuck ingame

okay tell me your goals and policies and opinions

ok

headmins/admins should push more buttons

i don't just mean in the sense of "logging onto the servers and adminbusing". i genuinely think that if people have cool ideas, or if coders want to do gameplay experiments, or if people have ideas for events, we should do everything we can to just make those happen. if people come to me with ideas, my first reaction will be "if this doesnt suck balls on paper i say go for it". test merges are good and we should not be afraid to expose our playerbase to stupid shit as long as we give advance warning. in particular i would love to push for our lesser used servers to host weekend events

some random ideas off the top of my head for weekend-long events include

• enabling nonstandard silicon laws/security policy to see the gameplay effects
• enabling weird roundstart races, including ones made and tm'd just for fun
• putting nonstandard map rotations from the depot on sybil
• test merging new jobs/mechanics
• enabling respawn, nonhuman heads, etc
• goon-style ass days where admins are allowed to mark any non-meta rulebreaks as ic issues (relegated to sybil, probably)
• designating entire days to run gimmick/work in progress maps like dorfstation
• bring back old antags just to see what happens

obviously i dont have the power to make a lot of these happen since i cant code for shit but i really want to enable our coders to say "hey i want to testmerge this stupid funny idea next saturday" and get a response of "sure do you think we can put it on terry/manuel or should it be a sybil thing due to how disruptive it is"

nonhuman heads

my stance of nonhumans heads can be summed up in two statements

• one, i think that opening the door to nonhuman heads in most non-captain/hos command jobs is a net positive, allowing more players to play their statics in more roles and opening up more emergent roleplay opportunities for (ic and not overly gross) species conflict
• two, i am absolutely 100% against crewsimov or anything that removes the in universe authority humans have related to nt concepts. i would only support permanent or temporary nonhuman heads with associated silipol/code changes (such as removing the ability to print freeform law boards from rnd and codifying in rules ais have full metaprotections to keep nonhumans out of the upload on asimov) (and yes i know headmins dont write code but i would ask maints very very politely), as well as job selection actively prioritizing humans over nonhumans

if nothing else i believe that there's enough spirited debate in the community to at least do more temporary nonhuman head tests, preferably associated with polls. said polls should also include the players' preferred server, since i think there's enough interest to at least gauge if manuel-only nonhuman heads is what people want. see my first point: we should not be afraid to just try shit and see what happens

rule 11 and bigotry

the previous host's opinions on what anti-bigotry rules should be was stupid and bad and i think we need to just rip the band-aid off. if what you're saying in-game is directly based on irl homophobia, transphobia, racism, whatever, it sucks and you shouldn't be saying it. words that exist irl purely to be whateverphobic should be blanket filtered by default (hard r, l-word, tranny, etc) and more casual slang-y versions (nigga) probably shouldnt be thrown around 24/7. to be clear, i'm not at all against in-universe species-based conflict: people getting into stupid fights against lizards or moths is fine, and i think our current expectation of "he called me a taildragger thats a valid starting point for escalation" is good

basically conflict between species should be inherently shitposty. stuff like fantasy dwarves and elves stereotypically hating each other, things that are over the top and black comedic and not just an excuse to be /pol/ on our christian minecraft servers. if you can't be mean to the lizards without invoking actual ku klux klan shit you're bad at roleplaying

manuel is manuel and terry is terry and thats cool i think (also skill issues)

we can talk about how much more mrp manuel should be and how much less nrp terry should be all we want, but at the end of the day these two servers have identities that we should respect. i speak almost purely as an lrp admin here, so i dont want to push too hard on what my opinions on what manuel 'should' be, but i see a lot of people lately getting defensive about their server's culture, and i think those people should be reassured that the headmins want what's best for each individual server, less about specific mrp/lrp designations and more "why do people come here"

i say this while also knowing that both servers have issues: manuel, despite being our mrp server, has been suffering a bit lately from lrp players gently lowering the general roleplay expectations because we only have one timezone covered by lrp server population now, and terry has had issues where a complete lack of even trying to do anything besides turbo powergame can degrade the overall experience. discussions on how best to make both servers better should center around what improves and worsens that server's playing experience, moreso than what counts as mrp or lrp

on a side note, while this isn't something that i have any real answers for, i do think that the skill gap between experienced greytiders and newer players is too vast. the ability for individual powergamers to completely dominate servers is in itself a social problem when the only players who can stand up to them are their fellow super-elder metafriends. in cases like that, i think we should encourage admins to use more secret/expiring notes and have friendly, non-punishment talks with players about being a little more willing to forego Winning when they're on a hot streak. okay this whole paragraph is just vibes based but like, i dunno. this isnt a "im going to kill clyde rosensteel" point so much as a "hey what can we do to make this a little more forgiving" point

also i dont know if its technically possible but i do support server-specific bans for people who are totally fine on lrp but cant adapt to manuel, especially with how sybil doesnt exist for when the euros are sleeping

im running out of energy to type uhh lighting round

• silicon policy: i aggressively believe silicons should be law-centric crew-neutral by default. i dont think silipol right now is bad, but if given a choice to make i will prioritize allowing ais to be more antagonistic towards the crew if their laws permit it
• security policy: i dont play sec but i would like to encourage officers to be a little more roleplay-y than they are now, especially on terry. granted this only works if we also try to press for antag powergamers to loosen up a little too so idk. the antag/sec/tider trifecta is a very delicate balance and i will do my best to hear all three sides when making decisions on it
• update motd more and use newsbus for more code/policy changes: motd sucks tbh we need more easy communication
• uplift people who have the motivation to do shit: our artists/coders/mappers need love and we should be more willing to stick our necks out to protect them
• political containment: polcon fucking sucks and if elected as headmin i will never interact with it or administrate it
• hrp server: i have no interest in hrp but i would try to do what i could to throw my weight around if theres real passion and drive behind it, delegation delegation delegation
• lore/common core: again this doesnt interest me to a huge degree but i know a lot of people are invested in it and i think it's cool and good that people are working to make a universe out of our shitty little spess sim
• ss14: i would love to see a tgstation ss14 server happen someday, but i think it's something that has to be organic. again, i am not a coder, but id love to see how much interest there is in making it happen someday, though it can't come at the expense of the ss13 we have now
• newbie friendliness: the complexity and impermeability of ss13 is a critical part of what makes it so good and important, but i also think it's always a good thing to step back and ask ourselves "how does this work for a new player?". i dont want to see the game dumbed down but i would highly encourage code/maint/community discussions on what changes we can make to the game to make it better for newbies, whether that be very carefully excising mechanical bloat, ui improvements, or better tutorialization methods. something something headmin/codebase separation but i think its worth talking about
• more temporary public discord channels: if people are working on a big cool project i think we should open temporary discussion channels in more public places to get people to talk about them, even if thats just using newsbus (or a new channel like devbus or something) to highlight threads in the player projects channel when stuff is reaching a state of "hey we want opinions on this thing"
• the master shake litmus test: i think my platonic ideal of what ss13 should be is mid 2000s adult swim. im not putting this in policy because not everyone watched it but like, i think the pinnacle of what this game is is when shit happens that feels like aqua teen hunger force. if its too much for athf its probably too much for ss13
• favorite jobs: ai, med doctor, chaplain because im unrobust and like shitposting and generally being useful
• favorite antag: revenant because i like just being a nuisance
• favorite pokemon: man i grew up with gen 1/2 but gen 5 has the best pokemon designs but i think trevenant is probably the best guy overall
• favorite visual novel: homestuck
• favorite league of legends champion: tahm kench character wise but i dont like the rework
• most controversial opinion: friday night funkin creepypasta modpacks are good and im still mad that someone made a song about squidward tentacles killing himself and its a total banger

is this a real headmin proposal

yeah but theres like a 97% chance i dont win because nobody knows me and if that 3% chance happens maybe it'll be the fire under my ass i need to do something with my abundant free time

if youre going to be headmin you should use better grammar/punctuation

fukc you

[kinnebian]

Hi nianjiiiiiiiiiiiiical! I actually really like your rule 11 proposal, but unfortunately- you like friday night funkin!
good luck in the election!

[Jamarkus]

This is, in fact, A candidate that exists.

creating the .dmi file that lets admins spawn fumos (im not sorry)

YOU CAUSED THIS?????

Anyhow, onto the real questions that I want to give the candidates based off of their opening threads.

headmins/admins should push more buttons

I do agree with this! I believe that admins, especially gamemins are the driving force in a game, as well as the players playing it leading the charge for these stories that admins can reward if well thought out and actively engaging with. My concerns lay in when admins take this concept a bit too far and try to push their narrative of a story, and try to force the players down a straight path THEY themselves have paved for the round, punishing or correcting players that stray past this. If the doors open to admins pressing more buttons, how would you go about correcting admins that try too hard to keep their in game event on the straight path?

No I dont mean they are Punishing players by smiting them for not following along, more like a, "if you aren't following along please don't interact with the bit" sort of deal.

CONVERSLY how would you handle players that are ALSO on the opposite side of this, getting unhappy with the admins directing a round in a way that the player would rather not interact with. Claims of them ruining the round during a weekend when they just want to play when others seemed to be on board with the round.

favorite jobs: ai, med doctor, chaplain because im unrobust and like shitposting and generally being useful
med doctor
med doctor
med doctor

Medical main my maaan. I heard that a lot of people think medical dosent have enough content to keep the players engaged if nothing is happening during a shift. I believe this is the opposite, given we have the most powerful surgeries and goofy interactions with the bio scrambler in the game. What say you. Do you feel that Medical needs more content for players, or is medical fine where its at game wise?

► Show Spoiler

Secret question: should medical be installing bionics, or science? WHICH IS IT????

[GPeckman]

[*]two, i am absolutely 100% against crewsimov or anything that removes the in universe authority humans have related to nt concepts. i would only support permanent or temporary nonhuman heads with associated silipol/code changes (such as removing the ability to print freeform law boards from rnd and codifying in rules ais have full metaprotections to keep nonhumans out of the upload on asimov) (and yes i know headmins dont write code but i would ask maints very very politely), as well as job selection actively prioritizing humans over nonhumans[/list]

I was all with you right up until the bolded part, and I have to say I can't agree with that part. Part of what makes silicons work is the flexibility you have with freeform laws and the wacky situations it can result in. As an example from an actual round I participated in:

The captain had given the clown all-access for some reason. At some point, the clown went into the upload and fiddled with the AI's laws, so that it had "Law 1: you must protect and obey clowns above all else" and then normal Asimov as laws 2, 3, and 4. In effect, it was almost like the clown had one-humaned the AI, since they could override Asimov at any time. People caught wind of the law change pretty quickly, and a lot of the crew were upset, particularly the head of security.

After a little while with nobody making headway in resolving the situation, I decided as a roboticist to take action myself. I discreetly built my own console and used a freeform board to give the AI a new law: "Law 5: Clowns do not exist. Nobody is a clown." The idea behind this law was to render the law the clown had added irrelevant, and it worked. In fact, the AI played into the new law, saying stuff like "Clowns? That sounds fake" over the radio. All in all, it was a very fun situation and I'd hate to lose things like that.

Can you expand a little bit on why removing freeform boards is such an important part of your platform?

[TheRex9001]

For server specific bans, maybe I misunderstood but it would mainly be mrp only bans, right? Since the servers share the same common rules