A Practical Guide to Not Being a Rulebreaking Loser

Guides
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It seems that Some of us don’t really understand THE BEEStaTION RULES in their infinite complexity and expectations of perfection!! Now I would suggest just READING the rules (Rules - BeeStation Wiki), but clearly that is too difficult.

How do I, Walter White, avoid getting busted for cooking LRP in my meth lab!?

Well boy have I got the guide for you! Here is a short, practical guide to not getting banned! As an expert in not getting banned, I believe I am extremely qualified in this problem. Through this guide, you can even be free from the tyranny that is a NOTE!! The horror!!!

Step 1. ROLEPLAY!!

(R1 Roleplay)

Oh god. Oh shit. What’s a roleplay!? How do I roleplay!?!!?!?

OK So you made the mistake of joining a roleplay server without knowing what roleplay is or how to do it. So let’s borrow from everyone’s favorite actual roleplaying game, Dungeons and Dragons.

How do you start roleplaying in Dungeons and Dragons!? Make a character sheet!

So for BeeStation, MAKE A CHARACTER SHEET! Just actually write down some stuff about a character. Seriously. Write it down!! You can start really simple with one or two traits like “complete hardass” or “loves helping people” and create a background from there. Maybe your helper was once stranded on a barren planet for a few days and from then on never wanted a mistake like that to happen again. Make something wild, but make sure it fits in the theme of Space Station 13.

Now all you have to do is actually play a big game of pretend, what would this character do in EVERY situation that they are faced with. Remove yourself from the equation. Act like a space station person at a normal plain old shift of their job… then… TRAGEDY STRIKES!? How does your character react to traumatic situations… novel… scary, even!? THINK OF THIS BEFORE YOU PLAY. Suit your character to your playstyle.

HOLY SHIT ROLEPLAY. PLEASE ITS BASICALLY THE ONLY RULE. IF YOU TAKE NOTHING FROM THIS JUST ROLEPLAY PLEASE

Step 2. Quit powergaming!

(R1 Roleplay, R2 No Powergaming)

With that character sheet, you can make some skill sets. What is your character good at? This varies based on jobs you select, and you can even develop different versions of your character based on your job. If you can justify why your character knows something, you can do it! Maybe your character is a medical doctor but always had an interest in biomedical engineering, so you’ve got some basic tool or hacking proficiency. Just don’t try to be a jack-of-all-trades or you’re making things unrealistic. Your character shouldn’t be so exceptional that you might as well just be you, the player.

Once you start roleplaying, quitting powergaming is really easy! Sometimes, you will HAVE to play dumb. Sometimes, you will not grab (insert X tool) because your character has no fucking clue what happens in a typical space station 13 round. They are BUSINESS AS USUAL.

Step 3. No killy the antag (if you are non sec)

(R1 Roleplay, R2 No Powergaming)

Your character can’t be a damn fighting machine, they’re a station-employed bartender/doctor/cargo tech/other! Not a security officer! You might be able to throw some shoves but RUN dammit! You should be afraid of the guy with the sword!! Now you the PLAYER might have some big funny strat for killy the antag but that’s no fun if some random bartender manages to killy the antag who is trying to kill him! Resist, but don’t eliminate!!

Step 4. Quit metagaming!

(R1 Roleplay, R14 Metagaming)

This also comes with roleplay. Once you roleplay, metagaming is impossible! Your character has no clue what a blue APC means, unless they’re the captain or security. Revanant? Nah. Purple fucking ghost. Blob? Nah, SCARY FLESHY MASS THING IN MAINTS!!!

This also means your character ain’t fuckin know anything outside what they physically saw with their ingame eyes. No ghost knowledge, no goofy ahh exploit knowledge. Just what they realistically would be able to infer and see. THINK LIKE A CHARACTER, NOT A PLAYER!!

Step 5. Don’t be a little bitch boy

(R7, Be Excellent to Each Other)

Some asshole killed you!!! In fact, he did it very meanly!! What will you do!? Suck it up!!! You die sometimes!! Don’t salt in dchat, don’t rage at them in OOC.

Some fool is bad at their job!? Ignoring you? Hell, arrests you? Don’t salt in LOOC! Suck it up! React in character and get them demoted! They shall face IC consequences for their tomfoolery!

Step 6. Consider other players

(R7, Be Excellent to Each Other, R13 Antagonist Conduct)

Now, sometimes, when a round is going long, or it’s lowpop and you’ve rolled antag, there’s no security. What are you gonna do!? Consider other players!! What is fun for YOU and what is fun for everyone?

Now, it may be fun to YOU to blow up the whole station until nothing functions and assume the captaincy, but on lowpop NO ONE has the capacity to deal with that. So consider other players when you do your antag antics. Make something fun for everyone. Make something that other players can engage with, and be scared of, or be subject to. Maybe abduct an entire department one by one, forcing them to fight to the death - or slow down your promptness to murder someone, and chase them through maintenance before eventually whittling them down, dragging their body through the halls. When you’re discovered, flee, and quickly! Give security room to engage with you!

Your objectives are not the end-all-be-all of antag gameplay. Fun and engagement is. Your objectives INSPIRE what you can do, and the new soft-tracked objectives give you even more room to do so.

And likewise, security, give antags room to escape! If you’re always a perfect player, catching and permaing every antag, you’re making the antag-security dynamic less fun and things more boring for yourself.

Sometimes, as an antag, you think it might be fun to plasmaflood, which is why we have murderbone. Know what murderbone is and when it is allowed. Murderbone antags can be fun, but only when there is a sufficient security force to counteract it, as it creates a back-and-forth power dynamic.

Step 7. No sex

No sex

(R6 No ERP)

Step 8. Be nice to the admemes :frowning:

(R4 Ticket Conduct, R7 Be Excellent To Each Other)

Now, you may think that getting the bwoink is a free invitation to vent your frustrations with BeeStation rules, but in reality admins probably care 100x more about the rules than you do, and have read them way more than you have. That’s not to say they’re always right, but they did actually put in a lot of work to get to their funny position of power over you. And insinuating that you know better might make them less inclined to be nice to you. So be respectful, say “OK, yeah, I see what you mean” and come to an understanding together of what went wrong.

If you read the rules more and are pretty sure they are wrong, you might be able to respectfully bring it up, but at the end of the day you’re gonna have to make an Admin Report if you truly believe that. Which sucks, but it’s the easiest way to get an admin’s thinking reviewed by another admin.

Contrary to popular belief admins are not there to remove fun, but to try and maximize fun. Sometimes, your actions can be anti-fun or produce the wrong type of fun for the server, which is not roleplaying. Powergaming and metagaming are just extensions of roleplay. Seriously. It’s all just roleplay.

Step 9. Play your side, do your job

(R1 Roleplay, R3 Do Your Job, R8 Do Not Grief, R9 Do Not Self-Antag)

If you’re not an antagonist, don’t be evil, don’t do murder, and don’t do high-tier crime. It’s that simple. Write your characters with this in mind. Don’t grief. Don’t knowingly help antags. Don’t try to get yourself converted (against your character’s will, mind you). Basically. Roleplay as a person who is believably loyal to their side and would not try to sow chaos.

If you’re not a specific job, don’t do that job without authorization or the character skills to do so. If you’re trying to fill spots on lowpop, fine, but if you’re breaking into kitchen because the chef didn’t cook anything, go through official channels first. Say you have some home cooking experience. Do what you were meant to do, and do it well!

Step 10. Know the Space Laws and SoP

(R1 Roleplay, R3 Do Your Job)

If you’re doing ANY job, this are MUST HAVES for roleplay. Space Law serves as an IC set of rules to follow and a good example of what is NOT okay to do as a non-antag - minor crimes are OK sometimes but the rest of the crimes are essentially what NOT to do, ever.

SoP, or Standard Operating Procedures tell you how to do your job properly. Nanotrasen wouldn’t hire such an incompetent fuck as you, who doesn’t know an OUNCE of the SoP! So use it! Reference it on the job! ROLEPLAY!!

Step 11. Misc

(R15, R11, R5, R3, R10, R4, R1)

  • Cryo. Ahelp when you cryo if you are the AI or any command position.
  • Don’t cryo just because you are not antag (antag-rolling) or try to min-max getting antag. You have to play as non antag sometimes.
  • Don’t tell players info you gained while dead or as a ghost
  • Don’t avoid doing your job, abandon your job, etc. unless you are an antagonist
  • Don’t ban evade or use multiple CKEYs
  • Don’t advertise
  • Be 18+
  • Don’t leave during an admin ticket
  • Don’t lie in tickets
  • As an assistant, actually roleplay as someone who assists people. Please.
  • No saying “LOL” ic, you goofball. No one actually says that out loud.
  • Follow the tyrannical NAMING GUIDELINES. God forbid Walter White join our midst… MY IMMERSHUN Naming Guidelines - BeeStation Wiki
  • No talkin about fake 2023-era concepts IC. What the fuck is an iPhone bro. What’s an admin. What admins.

Step 12. AHELP!!

(Rule I made it the fuck up but it’s pretty cool)

Yeah you dummy, practice being an admin, be the snitch who reports everyone! Now you know what NOT to do! Keep doin it until you know everything NOT to do!

Don’t know if you’re NOT supposed to do something… AHELP!! Mr admin am I allowed to kill everyone? No? OK!! Time to NOT kill everyone!!!

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omg I cant believe beestation rules are so complicated that people need to make guides about how to follow them :sob: :sob:

Nice guide, I enjoyed reading this wall of text,
It was informative, had character and overall I enjoyed reading it.

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Day 20 000 of repeating that it’s hard to “assist” as assistant without either :
-Being ignored
-Being told to straight up do the entire job of someone else, effectively taking over their job slots with no real roleplay involved (I did not sign up to be a full on paramed, good sir)

The only times where an assistant can truly “assist” is when people try to build cool gimmicks, because they usually ask for their help and it’s cool

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Become a servant of bureaucracy. Assist HoP by doing paperwork.

Become a servant of bureaucracy. Triage patients before they are passed to medical.

Become a servant of bureaucracy. Gather repair supplies for engineering. Fill out a damage report.

Become a servant of bureaucracy…
Become a servant of bureaucracy.
Become a servant of bureaucracy.

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Get ignored/HoP is too busy doing something else to actually hold a line and fill in paperwork

Everyone ignored you and walks past you or makes a scene if you block them before they enter by force because they have 5 brute

That’s the only really interesting option here, but the damage report literally nobody will care about. Turns out the only role you can truly assist is the one that needs to leave its “base” and needs constant supplies of materials. huh. who knew

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I’ve never seen an assistant actually approach me and ask me if I needed assistance or had something I wanted to test… ok actually one time one did and it was actually a blast but more often than not they’re not really doing not willing to do anything.

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Sorry this is bigger than the rules. Too long didn’t read I’ll just grief and hope it’s allowed. :smiling_face:

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On the other hand, sometimes people do stupid shit that gets them hurt. Obviously use common sense and don’t go overboard, but sometimes it can make things more interesting if your character (if given an IC reason) leeroy jenkins[1] right into a situation, OOCly knowing full well that you’re gonna get fucked the hell up in the progress.

[1]: worth noting that the actual leeroy jenkins raid resulted in everybody dying because their plan was doomed from the start anyways

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0/10 no nyaspeak

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I do this as Assistant!
Here’s my experience:
People usually respond with incredulity that it’s happening.
The problem is that people aren’t used to it, so they subconsciously metagame and think you’re an antag, I think.

  • Engineers very rarely respond positively to Pda offers and spend a negligible amount of time in publicly accessible areas. (Hot take: engineers tend to spend about as much time isolated from the rest of the crew as the miners do)
  • Scientists very rarely spend time in the R&D lab where the reception desk is, and their likelihood of responding positively to “can I do anything to help” is 80% “no thanks” and 20% "here’s an rped, I’ll assume you haven’t done it and go around doing it myself in ten minutes ".
  • Medbay are usually amenable to help, mostly due to people constantly bursting in to medbay for obvious reasons, so I’ll sort out some Cryobeds for patient holding and offer to cover any chores that need doing.
  • Security either: ignore you(60%), let you in then kick you out/arrest you for trespass/force feed you holy water Due to miscommunication(10%), deputise you and press you into service with a mindshield and an armband (30%)
  • Cargo has a very strong vibe of being the “Assistant++” department, and as such you either get told to deliver mail or offered a job as a cargo tech. Very rarely is a helpful, persistent assistant turned away.
  • Service is simple to assist with. Space cleaner’s easy to get, and squirt bottles are everywhere, so being a freelance hygiene technician is simple.
    Clown will happen often if you tell the HoP “dealer’s choice” at the hopline. Everyone’s a fucking comedian! But it lets you play pranks and generally be a skullduggerous rogue for a round so it’s not all bad.
  • Command is great to assist for, but also the rarest to actually take an offer. Ive had AWESOME rounds as a Blueguard for cap, and I’ve taken on receptionists during my HoP rounds, but I’ve never been hired as a HoP assistant myself. (It’s on the SS13 bucket list for sure!)
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ADDENDUM. WHY!?

WHY SHOULD I FOLLOW THE BEE STATION RULES!?! WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT!? WHY AM I EVEN BEING FORCED TO FOLLOW THIS INSANE CRAP. What a load of baloney! You really cooked up some crazy ones here!!!

WH Y BADMEME FORCES ME TO “ROLE PLAY”?!

One of two reasons you should roleplay:

Reason 1 (LAME). You shouldn’t roleplay! Go play somewhere else that is N/LRP to make silly memes and hahas funnis!!

Reason 2 (COOL). Roleplay is an engaging way to make up and actively play in stories, LIVE! Not only does it give you amazing stories to tell, it gives them meaning and context.

It’s one thing to die due to plasmaflood, it’s another to narrowly escape a plasmaflood while trying to rescue your best friend who lost their arm due to the anomalous properties of plasma, afraid for your life, barely grasping to your sanity.

WH Y BADMEME FORCES ME TO “BE EXCELLENT”!?

I don’t know about you, but established social standards including the “Golden Rule” do tend to make everyone have more fun when playing game together! If all of a sudden I go around hurling insults and personal attacks because someone did a funni IC, well that’s not productive! You can let them know in LOOC that you didn’t like it, but be nice about it because then they’re just gonna be angry back - and well that helps nothing! Vent your frustrations elsewhere homie.

SHARING!?!?!

YES SHARING. SHARE THE SERVER YOU FUCKWAD. We are all besties here, ACT LIKE IT!

WH Y BADMEME FORCES ME TO “BE BAD AT THE GAME”!?

BADMEME WANT ME TO PRETEND I DONT KNOW WHAT HTE HERETIC DO!?!? I OBVIOUSLY KNOW WHAT THE HERETIC DO!!

When we share a roleplay environment, we also have to consider the other players around us when making decisions for our character. If our character is a know-it-all or is too powerful, it makes other characters weaker in comparison and waters down the gameplay for everyone. If you want to be more of a badass, play a role that suits it such as security.

Sometimes you need to be a secondary character to the events that are going on - you might get dragged way in over your head, and that’s OK! Take pride in knowing you are part of a great story. Try to make your death satisfying, throw some twist, conflict, MOURN YOUR LIFE. FLEE.

WH Y BADMEME FORCES ME TO “NO SEX”!?

No sex

WH Y BADMEME FORCES ME TO “DO JOB!?”

If your character doesn’t care about the things happening around them, is indifferent to the prospect of losing their job, and generally is more concerned with their current project than anything else, it may be a sign you are not actively engaging in the story that is a Space Station 13 round! That’s OK, some rounds are a drag! But when you actively ignore threats of being fired - you are breaking everyone’s immersion. It is immediately obvious that you do not care about playing a believable character, and that just makes the game worse for everyone else!

You can be lazy while still generating immershun. Maybe your character is a major slacker, but play it! Don’t just shrug it off like “Shut up man I don’t wanna do that” and then walk away. Sandbag, drag your feet, really SELL IT!! “Aww man but I really need to attend to my… dog! My dog uh… MY DOG ATE THE PAPERWORK!!!” runs away.

Perfect. Perfection. You’ve perfected being lazy. Now get out there and be lazy, but in character you crazy bastards!!

WH Y BADMEME FORCES ME TO “HAVE BELIEVABLE NAME” AND WHY IS “BELIEVABLE NAME” SO VAGUE!!?!

Badmeme Makes BAD name guidelines and then makes me follow them! EWW.

What do!?

Well, in the universe of Space Station 13 - you are typically an unremarkable employee. So when you come around naming yourself John Skywalker it’s going to attract some attention. Your atypical and wild name while on one part is breaking immersion by referencing OOC media - ALSO is too unique! Be real, how many Skywalkers do you know in real life, or expect to know on a space station!? Zero! NO ONE is named that!!

If every goddamn character on Space Station 13 was main character name material we’d have a station full of John Skywalkers! And that’s just not believable. So YA BASIC. ACT (NAME?) LIKE IT.

WHY GUIDELINE SO VAGUE!?!?

You try to write rules that describe every acceptable and unacceptable name! It’s an impossible task - people will always misinterpret it without LITERALLY writing every set of acceptable names, which is just lame as hell.

At the end of the day, it’s gonna be on a case-by-case basis - as best basing the decisions on the text written as possible. They have to lean on the side of caution because every single time a naming guideline is “let slide” it could further justify players to naming themselves equally out of pocket things. Yes, this name may be absolutely perfect for your character. BUT. That does not mean everyone else should be able to name themselves the same thing.

You have to sacrifice for the greater good, lest we have 20 John Skywalkers.

Best to get prior permission before testing the guidelines, because having it come up later puts the admin team in a tough spot where you have player opinion vs guidelines creep.

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The moment you step into engineering as a non engineer they drop everything they’re doing and get in your face to ask you what you’re doing there. Every single time without fail. You may even have an ID with a gimmick role, they don’t care.

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Saboteurs and Idiots.
try and tell me why they shouldn’t be there and I’ll give you the true reason why.

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I’ve many times been to engineering without ill intent. All of the times given rightful access.

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They don’t know that.
If you got in in their mind without breaking in it means either :

  • A , you’ve been given access by the HoP without proper departmental notice, thusly you are possibly, as considered for safety’s sake, an idiot.
  • B , you’ve gone in without stating your intentions, thusly you are possibly, as considered for departmental efficency sake, an idiot
  • C , you’ve been given access by the HoP, Inspite of the CE’s disaproval and due to that conflict of interest are considered possibly either a saboteur or idiot.

and this is excluding actual cases with ill-intent.
This is not a personal slight directed at anyone on the forum, just what engineers think.

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yeah what about other departments. Lol, they also have reasons to act this way and don’t. Engineer players are just stranger warry hermits.

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Engineering as a department contains:

  • a circuit imprinter that can produce enable production of a large number of dangerous machines.
  • various catastrophically destructive reactor types.
  • the station’s primary atmospheric distribution system.
  • the ready supply of general and specialized tools for construction and maintainance the station.
  • Various EVA options.
  • Lots of purpose built industrial equipment.

What you can do as a trespasser or tot.

  • produce various circuit boards such as; Gibbers, Recyclers, beam emitters, auto-lathes.
  • "OH FUCK THE REACTOR IS DELAMING AND JOHN NANOTRASAN SHOT EVERY ENGIE!
  • “is it just me or does it smell like plasma in here?”
  • you can steal every type of basic tool for certain, most likely a pair of Insuls, potentially the advanced tool set and a tool-belt to carry all of it, maybe even an RCD if you’re lucky, congrats you’ve reached maximum grey-tide capacity.
  • “is it just me or is that guy trying to vent the room we’re in from outside the station” or “FUCK, WARDEN GET THE HARD SUITS, SPACE FIGHT TIME.”
  • You can steal the Beam emitters to make an kill room, steal the Radiation collectors to deprive power-output, Sabotage the Station SMES’ and really fuck up the power network.

As a SECCIE even I get antcy when I see non-engineers fucking around in the Engineering department because as it so happens it’s the department that maintains the orbital can we’re stuck in and has a large set of tool or sabotage options to make a big cann of corned spessman.

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However, engineers are nerds and so your answer is invalid

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I tend to build one where ever I make big projects, primarily Escape shuttle constructions and Quantum Hub. Haven’t seen anyone use that. lol

Half of those are in maints or in the kitchen, if you want it then just steal it. I’ve seen quite a few just unscrew, crowbar, nick the board and run for it. I’d prefer it if you just asked for a board. Which 9/10 times I wouldn’t be too concerning with if you were able to give a somewhat believable reasoning for it such as “I want one for service to use”.

There is like maybe three wires going from it. Just cut them, most of them are going through maints anyway. Then neatly floor it to make it all look nice.

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What antags and other people fail to do is ironically to RP. Want something? Give me a reason to give it to you. Paramedic wanting Jaws to forcefully open doors into possibly dangerous situations to rescure wounded? Sure (might ask CE about it). A grey tider want it because “lolz”? Fuck off. Be charming and likable, it’ll get you a loooong way! Especially as a changeling.

Edit: Also doing your job is good. A Roboticist gave me a bunch of implants and asked for some of my fancy Engineering tools. Sure thing! You helped me, I’ll help you.

(Might’ve killed him later, but that’s another thing. :wink: )

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