Remove most use of Isolation cells in perma

[AdmiralGigatron]

the Isolation cell is mainly just barely off hard round removal, where there is quite literally no way out unless you're an antag, and likely only 1 or 2 people know you are there, EG. the guys who locked you in there, so no one can get you out easily. Personally, I think the Iso cell should only be used for people like antags who could break out of perma any day, any time (rust heretic or people with tools at their disposal at any time)

[Vekter]

We don't have any specific policy at this time regarding using isolation cells. If someone is using it as a method of round removal when there's no purpose to putting you in it, you could get with us and we could investigate, but I don't know that we'd actually have anything to do or say with this beyond "it's equivalent to permabrigging".

Have there been situations where someone has put you in there without a valid reason? I'm curious to know if this is a major issue or if it's only happened once or twice to you.

[warbluke]

I've been given time in the iso-cubes after repeat escapes fairly frequently. It's been around two years but I do also vaguely remember being put into isolation cells on my first arrests of the round as a tider after I got good enough at escaping that sec mains started to catch on. Of course then I start preemptively cutting escape holes into isolation cells so the sec mains had to start pre-preemptively shoving me in a straightjacket or delimbing me and it just kept escalating on and on and on until the pop died and I returned to playing sec.
Let me tell you if you're the sort of person who insists on seeing a round to the end so long as there's the slightest chance of freedom or revival then the isolation cell is a special sort of hell. Sure you can try to tab out and read something but every ambient noise, every stray flicker at the corner of your eyes, every single little thing could be someone opening the door and giving you your chance to escape. So you sit there staring at yourself bucklecuffed and straightjacketed and legcuffed and muzzled on the bed watching the camera sprite go back and forth and re-reading every single station announcement trying to figure out if it can somehow impossibly lead to your freedom.
Longest I've lasted before quitting the game in shame and dwelling on it for the rest of the week was only around 45 minutes but man it sticks with you.
On the other hand actually escaping gives you a very delicious rush of endorphins and adrenaline comparable to getting a perfect nukeops mission off.
Please remove isolation cells they cannot be good for me.

[Itseasytosee2me]

99% of criminals ghost in the isolation chamber just before the warden comes to free them (based on a true story)

[Vekter]

I'm not sure that any kind of policy is the solution here as much as it would be to just remove them from the brig, though I would say that I can imagine someone's just going to bring construction materials and make a new one.

This is a rough one. I guess we could mandate that someone needs to have done something to warrant execution and attempted to escape before they can be put in there, but I'm not sure it's something we would be interested in administrating given how ambiguous it could be.

[AdmiralGigatron]

Have there been situations where someone has put you in there without a valid reason? I'm curious to know if this is a major issue or if it's only happened once or twice to you.

actually the reason WHY I made this policy: I tried to kill myself on one shift in perma (manuel, muh are pee) the AI noticed, called sec, sec stopped me, and when I revealed I was going to blow my brains over the walls, they decided "yeah isolation for the entire shift is good"

only 2 people knew I was there, until some guy got curious of what all the banging was. if that map was, say, meta or delta, I would never have been found or noticed

[Vekter]

Have there been situations where someone has put you in there without a valid reason? I'm curious to know if this is a major issue or if it's only happened once or twice to you.

actually the reason WHY I made this policy: I tried to kill myself on one shift in perma (manuel, muh are pee) the AI noticed, called sec, sec stopped me, and when I revealed I was going to blow my brains over the walls, they decided "yeah isolation for the entire shift is good"

only 2 people knew I was there, until some guy got curious of what all the banging was. if that map was, say, meta or delta, I would never have been found or noticed

Not really relevant to the thread itself, but I would have adminhelped the AI - voluntary harm is not human harm.

[dendydoom]

as warden i've used the isolation cells a few times, usually for perma prisoners who attack other perma prisoners, prisoners who regularly escape, or much more rarely, to temporarily store someone because perma was bombed or hit with a meteor or something and the other brig cells aren't available.

i see it as a temporary solution that should only be used for a very short amount of time. it does indeed remove someone from the round and gives them no agency to their character. even people in the public cells can talk to sec or visitors through the window.

if you're put into isolation without a confirmed reason or length of time, it's always worth ahelping it, until we come up with more of a concrete policy response.

[TheLoLSwat]

Idk if policy would really do anything here, since the cells seem to be working as intended and being thrown in permabrig means that you shouldn’t be getting out anyway. It is infinitely harder to escape from and magnitudes more cruel than just throwing them in perma with a “please don’t break things and escape ” but if you antagonize security to the point where they are willing to psuedo RR you by tossing you in an isolation cell then you gotta take the consequences of your terrorism on the chin and wait for the next round.

How would you even go about fixing this with policy? Have another “even worser” tier of crime that’s still below execution so you can toss them in?

[AdmiralGigatron]

How would you even go about fixing this with policy? Have another “even worser” tier of crime that’s still below execution so you can toss them in?

temporary holding (prisoner tried to break out? patch the hole and keep them in there until its done. maybe put timers on those cells) throwing people who can break out into the unbreakable cube (rust heretic)

[Vekter]

Idk if policy would really do anything here, since the cells seem to be working as intended and being thrown in permabrig means that you shouldn’t be getting out anyway. It is infinitely harder to escape from and magnitudes more cruel than just throwing them in perma with a “please don’t break things and escape ” but if you antagonize security to the point where they are willing to psuedo RR you by tossing you in an isolation cell then you gotta take the consequences of your terrorism on the chin and wait for the next round.

How would you even go about fixing this with policy? Have another “even worser” tier of crime that’s still below execution so you can toss them in?

I think OP's intent is to have it codified that you should only be using isolation cells in cases where a prisoner is violent against other prisoners or a genuine escape risk. The concern appears to be that there are security players who are throwing people in there on first offense because they know they can't get out and don't want to deal with them doing so. This could pretty easily be covered under rule 1, IMO. You shouldn't be de facto removing someone from the round without a very good reason, and I think it should only really be used as an alternative to actually round removing them.

Anyway, that's all to say that I'm not certain this needs to be codified in rules, as rule 1 should reasonably cover it. I think we might just need to be more open to folks that they should be letting us know when this happens so we can look into it.

[dendydoom]

Idk if policy would really do anything here, since the cells seem to be working as intended and being thrown in permabrig means that you shouldn’t be getting out anyway. It is infinitely harder to escape from and magnitudes more cruel than just throwing them in perma with a “please don’t break things and escape ” but if you antagonize security to the point where they are willing to psuedo RR you by tossing you in an isolation cell then you gotta take the consequences of your terrorism on the chin and wait for the next round.

How would you even go about fixing this with policy? Have another “even worser” tier of crime that’s still below execution so you can toss them in?

i genuinely believe that in many cases execution is preferable to rotting in isolation or anything like that, because at least execution gives you a confirmed end to your story in that round. obviously in certain high intensity and dangerous situations, a field execution is performed without much ceremony, but in any other case i believe that it's a genuine opportunity to offer someone meaningful rp before ending their round.

having them taken to the chamber (or site of whatever other execution method you have prepared), reading them their crimes and sentence, asking them if they have any last words, and then killing them is a good and dramatic ending. hell, one time i've seen someone give a prisoner that was to be executed their request of a final meal. that is some truly excellent rp.

rotting in an isolation cell isn't an ending in the same way. there is no dramatic finality. you either sit there and stare at the wall or close the game.

[Vekter]

i genuinely believe that in many cases execution is preferable to rotting in isolation or anything like that, because at least execution gives you a confirmed end to your story in that round. obviously in certain high intensity and dangerous situations, a field execution is performed without much ceremony, but in any other case i believe that it's a genuine opportunity to offer someone meaningful rp before ending their round.

having them taken to the chamber (or site of whatever other execution method you have prepared), reading them their crimes and sentence, asking them if they have any last words, and then killing them is a good and dramatic ending. hell, one time i've seen someone give a prisoner that was to be executed their request of a final meal. that is some truly excellent rp.

rotting in an isolation cell isn't an ending in the same way. there is no dramatic finality. you either sit there and stare at the wall or close the game.

I tend to agree (fucking shocker) and will consider talking to some of the maptainers about a removal of isolation cells from the maps in rotation. I'm not sure how they feel about them and I doubt it's really a big enough issue for us to expend too much energy getting it done, but if we feel strongly enough that it could be beneficial, I don't see why not.

E: I talked to maptainers, the general vibe seems to be "probably handled better by administration".

[bingusdingus]

I feel like isolation cells work on paper, but in practice there really isn't a reason for them to be there that doesn't already have a better IC solution. If they have to exist, just make it a smaller perma for a singular prisoner with the bare minimum. There are plenty of other places a prisoner could be placed that can separate them from other prisoners with limited opportunity for escape, if they are really that dangerous, then execution is also an option. It feels like a strange middle ground that exists for extremely petty RP that involves round removing someone without actually round removing them. Knowingly keeping someone in an isolated space where there is absolutely nothing to do, and they can't escape is just purposefully going out of your way to make someone have a bad experience.

[Constellado]

As long as the *psych* isolation cells in some maps stay I am all for it.

[kieth4]

Isolation cells are pretty much the same as RR. If they're not being used for that ahelp- or ahelp if you get chucked in one forever. Not much else can be done as their existence is a mapping thing and not an us thing.