What is the goal of departments? What gameplay purpose does stratifying jobs among them complete? What image or narrative qualities should be found in each, should be unique to each?
I feel that departments have withered in both gameplay and experiential presence these past years. Observing any high population LRP round will show that most department communication channels are radio silent(idk bout mrp).
This issue has knock on effects for many gameplay loops which have been delegated to departmental content and improving departmental presence may alleviate some of the dysfunction of them.
What is a department?
The following is what a department is. Increasing any of the attributes listed will increase the presence of the department.
- A series of areas in the station map gated by access restrictions or other means of separating department members from non-members. This can be as simple as a long detour which disincentivizes non-members from entering department areas as is the case for cargo and its soft control over lavaland. A player playing shaft miner feels that lavaland is cargo's workplace despite there being no access restriction on public mining.
- A series of jobs which are grouped together under a department. Players who are in these roles should be exposed to their fellow department members more often, possibly serving to create a unique departmental trust which may complicate otherwise trivial interactions with the antagonist narrative core of the game.
- The job design infers; A series of expectations or responsibilities had by other players as to the actions taken by a player during the course of the round. A department is similarly expected to complete certain tasks while it is functioning. The less expectations a department has, the less presence it holds as its function becomes irrelevant
- Resources which a department is provided and of which its members feel an obligation to protect. These are both tangible game resources and intangible ideas such as the responsibilities above(example: religious authority, command authority, the engine, the disk)
- A collective interest of its members which leads to evaluations of gameplay and social decisions which are divorced from non-members. The more similar two department's interests are, the less of a presence each holds
- Our infiltration gameplay relies on the presence of restricted areas on the station map. If a department's members are more indifferent to trespassing, the more our infiltration gameplay is boiled down to a series of tool interactions.
- Our stealth antagonist gameplay is enriched by a concern for one's co-worker's perspective of the stealth antagonist.
- Our job content transcends its popular perception of mindless repetition of bland gameplay by being a team exercise in mindless repetition of bland gameplay advocating for one's departmental needs.
- Our non-stealth antags, blob and nukies, and something else idk, are enriched by the change in dynamics between departments as crew see themselves as a station united.
- There exists an idea of Space Station 13 in every player's mind. A station not of tiles and valids, but a station of people, of archetypes. The tyrant security officers, the territorial research director, the quarter master ever so frustrated with his dead mining team. The scientist hidden away deep within his lab, every tile from the door pulling his mind towards the possibility of his solitary fortress being the perfect homicide scene. The bureaucratic HOP. The engineering team working on some stupid station extension. These are the images you download byond to see These are the images which make SS13 more than air simulation amongus, more than a story of NT vs S, which make it more than just a referential thing devoid of any identity of its own, but the images are faded, only the clumsy clown and kleptomaniac assistant accompany us now, the station is empty, filled only with players who want the same things you do, who have the same relation with every other player.
