We’ve all been there; you’re playing a round, maybe you’ve got a project, maybe you’ve got plans for a fun gimmick, and some dude runs up and sleeping carps you into an early grave, takes you to lavaland, and chucks you into the lava with no hope of recovery.
You’ve just been round removed.
Now you might be the type to enjoy midround spawn or ghost roles, and more power to you if that’s your preference!
But I (and I’m certain many other folks on bee) really only play for a contiguous story through-line to the shift.
With the changes to death memory RP rules (namely no matter how you die, if you die, you lose all memories of who killed you, the circumstances, etc), there is even more flexibility for how we treat our victims as antagonists.
So I’m here today to offer some thoughts on round removal. More specifically, how to be a “Bad Guy” without being a “bad guy”.
I’m going to focus on syndicate antagonists for this guide, since the other game modes, whilst still occasionally causing round removal, tend to also serve as a method of letting players get back into the game (ie xenomorphs RR people, yes, but they also have at very least a one to one reintroduction into the round as more xenos. Basically a conversion game mode, if you think about it.) and others, such as Heretic, have been altered to not need to RR people at all!
So traitors, agents, incursionists! Syndies of all stripes! Have you considered the other ways you can assassinate someone without taking them out of the entire round?
It can be as simple as waiting for the shuttle to be called before you make your move. Being dead for five minutes stings a lot less than being dead all round.
But say you get the perfect opportunity to kill someone and hide the body early. What then?
Borging
Well did you know that borging someone counts as a completed assassination? It’s true! Not only are you assassinating the person, but you’re also:
1- removing the soul from the corpse to make it utterly unrecoverable! this is what I feel makes this way of doing things apply even to powergamers, so you really have no excuse to not at least think about this way of doing things. you can hide a body, maybe even destroy a brain, but there’s only one way to get rid of a soul, and that’s to transfer it to something else.
Even a brainless body can be recovered with a replica pod.
2- creating yourself an ally with AA The resulting borg, if you’re able to get the thing made in a private place and have made sure to disable the AI link before chucking in the MMI, is in a perfect location to flash > emag > crowbar > emag > crowbar. Suddenly not only have you got rid of your target, but now you have a borg ally with AA, that due to never having been linked with the AI is a complete X factor for your proceeding plans without raising suspicion at all in security or the AI!
Don’t have an emag? Stuck in robotics with a robo right around the corner? too bad, oh well… Except, the character in the MMI doesn’t know how they died. Simply say to the MMI that you found their brain and cannot clone them, slap them in a borg, and tell them not to bother security with any mention of yourself (say it would waste their time if the borg is on efficiency, merely order them not to if they’re asimov or crewsimov), and send them on their way. They cannot ask to be unborged without breaking silicon policy and thus the rules.
3- Last and certainly not least, you are giving the player on the other side of the screen a contiguous game experience. If you’ve emagged them, you’ve just given them a free antag round. if you haven’t, they’ve got an opportunity to experience silicon gameplay and an interesing story beat to work off of. It’s a win win.
Hypnotizing pesky coworkers
Say you’re an explorer and have had the WEWLAD in your ear to let you know you’re a syndie. the only problem is: there’s a pesky exploration partner there, and he’s not responding to your code words! He’s sure to report to security if you start using the exploration shuttle for nefarious deeds… He’s very clearly a collateral kill waiting to happen. What now?
Well you could murder him and throw him out an airlock, but frankly, where’s the fun in that? (not to mention someone may stumble on the body, or if you’re in bluespace there’ll be a whacking great sign visible to anyone with an orbital console saying “STRANDED DEAD PERSON HERE” with a station-wide ANNOUNCEMENT giving you away!)
no, there is a far better option. Or even a number of options!
1- sleepy pen > hypnoflash > “you are a syndicate agent working for [character name here]” - The classic combo. Congratulations, not only have you not round removed someone, you now have a comrade in arms who is most likely excited for this free antag round!
2- Morphine/anaesthetic gas > Hypnoflash - This is basically the same as above but spending less TC. of course, you’ll need to find some way to get the knockout juice…
3- Alien brainwashing surgery - If you’ve got alien surgery researched, access to surgery tools and some way to render your target unconscious (see above) or merely trick them into letting you perform head surgery on them, this allows you to brainwash them without needing any TC at all!
Conclusion
I’m sure there’s other methods for completing an assassination without round removal, but it’s important to note that these methods also work for security and command players, with the added caveat that any hypnosis or brainwashing will need to be done after you remove the mindshield from their heads.
But to be completely honest leaving a naked corpse of a seccie in front of medbay has a certain flair that really is undeniable, and it’s not like they’ll be able to ID you as their killer. see how many bodies you can rack up. Hell, if you want to delay their return destroy or hide their ID or chop off a limb or two. But round removal? You can do better.