Roundstart Equipment Documents

[iaada]

Originally started following Maintainer Meeting (27 September 2025) which brought up concerns about PRs changing round start gear, and what gear should be available. This document translates and expands upon that meeting to provide a more concrete form to the definitions, and where players get the items they start with.

[ArtisticRoomba]

My hero

[Princess-Cheeseballs]

More docs for the maintainer meeting!!!

[slarticodefast]

Thanks for taking the time to write this, like Roomba said, this is a heroic effort ❤️

[Partmedia]

Thanks for taking time to start this doc. I feel that it is not necessary to split it into so many different parts at this time, because it seems like that would just make information needlessly difficult to find. If you want a summary, maybe include a table at the top with links to specific guidelines to anchored headings below.

[Partmedia]

Overall, I feel that the document doesn't sufficiently explain the decision making process to determine whether or not a specific item should be included in a particular starting location. The purpose of the design doc is so that anyone reading the doc can with relative confidence determine if a change would be accepted or not.

If I were reading the doc, I don't think I could make a call on whether or not adding a T-ray scanner to some of the listed locations would be accepted or not.

[ArtisticRoomba]

Thanks for taking the time to write this document. I've left my thoughts on some items below.

[Hitlinemoss]

Doing a draft of applying these changes as they are currently to Engineering. One thing I'm noticing right now as I'm doing this is that a lot of what the EngiVend contains is either clothing-with-unique-function (engineering goggles, insulated gloves, welding masks, diagnostic HUD) or generic equipment (crowbars, network configurators, power cells), both of which aren't supposed to be in the departmental vendors according to the current version of this doc. This leaves the EngiVend with three total regular items (multitools, inflatable wall boxes, warning cones), which feels really really weird.

I'd probably voice the opinion that clothing with notable functional value should go in the equipment vendor instead of the clothing vendor. Aside from making the EngiVend less barren, I think it's also good practice for players to know that the equipment vendor always has all of the equipment they might need for their job (whether or not that equipment is "worn") and the clothing vendor always just has uniforms that are largely just for the sake of aesthetics (and I guess also headsets and winter clothing).

There is some new stuff we can also put in the EngiVend too, though, like metal foam grenades. That'd also help.

[keronshb]

space-wizards/space-station-14#42522

Is another good example of how bad of a QOL hit this is.

With engineers/atmos and the CE starting so stripped down it makes the game feel bare. Them starting without even a toolbelt or hardhat is very weird.

[Hitlinemoss]

space-wizards/space-station-14#42522

Is another good example of how bad of a QOL hit this is.

With engineers/atmos and the CE starting so stripped down it makes the game feel bare. Them starting without even a toolbelt or hardhat is very weird.

Starting without a toolbelt I actually think is completely fine since they just pick it up from their locker, like with the insuls or the RCD. (Hardhat I could go either way on, personally, since it's technically a free flashlight but mostly just a fashion choice.) In any case I think the main problem that PR shows is more just with the doc's guidelines for vendors.

[keronshb]

space-wizards/space-station-14#42522
Is another good example of how bad of a QOL hit this is.
With engineers/atmos and the CE starting so stripped down it makes the game feel bare. Them starting without even a toolbelt or hardhat is very weird.

Starting without a toolbelt I actually think is completely fine since they just pick it up from their locker, like with the insuls or the RCD. (Hardhat I could go either way on, personally, since it's technically a free flashlight but mostly just a fashion choice.) In any case I think the main problem that PR shows is more just with the doc's guidelines for vendors.

It makes the role feel like it's stripped down. For example if you have an engineer that latejoins and the power is out, instead of being stuck on the arrivals shuttle you could in fact help people get out a lot faster from the getgo with the tools you arrive with, rather than be stuck either with the slow as hell hand prying or otherwise. And with the hat they can at least provide a little light to help.

These implementations feel like it's trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist and it's going to make the game feel worse because of it.

[Mot2332]

This probably comes from the assumption that personnel spawn next to their locker, as is written in the document, when this is just one of many possible spawns. But to be fair, it might also be the most common spawn.

[iaada]

I disagree with your selection on the Engi-Vend for two reasons. The first is that it's lacking several of the items from the locker. From the design doc, a locker contains one set of essential gear and the vend contains two. There are several items missing in this regard.

The second reason is that there's nothing new, and no reexamination of what engineers should start with was done. It's up to the engineering workgroup to decide what is considered essential and optional gear for engineering, but this is the Engi-Vend I would have proposed:

It has a greater focus on power, containing new essential gear (a toolbox with cables and t-ray), extra expendables found in lockers, and then optional expendables (power machine boards) and gear. It possible the machine boards should be in the toolbox as well (and even cables in the vend) to make completely clear that fixing power is an essential role for engineering. The vending machine should make clear what your job does at the top, while also suggesting certain alternatives with the optional gear at the bottom. If the vending machine is completely barren that is a red flag for the role, and I don't think things are so dire for engineering.

Command

The main piece I want to respond to is the worry over item scarcity. Scarcity of command items has been status quo for a long time, but it's also unclear what is okay to be slightly less scarce. This doc takes a hardline approach of definite scarcity, where by design the captain doesn't have a spare armor to hand out. If an antag succeeds in stealing a Head locker, that Head loses ALL those items instead of just some.

I feel the strongest point is the vulnerability of a role (command especially) after spawning, but I'm unconvinced this vulnerable period is a bad thing. If you're late to work, you feel that consequence of being in a rush to get ready which aligns with what your character (presumably) feels. I feel this pushes players in general to ready up round start instead of checking the manifest and late-joining, which I see as a (perhaps not widespread?) problem due to how antag selection primarily cares about bodies on station.

[Hitlinemoss]

Adjusted the engineering draft with the proposed EngiVend changes above (see that PR for details).

As long as we're on the topic of vendors, I do have another question: how "specific" do we want a department's vendors to be? i.e, do we typically want each individual subdepartment to have a full pair of vendors, or is it okay to consolidate them with the department's "main" vendors? I mostly ask this because with the drafts I've done so far I've noticed two specific cases:

• There's no clothing vendor for Salvage; do we think Salvage uniforms should be placed in the CargoDrobe, or should we make a new vendor for those?
• There's no equipment vendor for Atmospherics; do we think things like holofans, air grenades, and gas analyzers should be placed in the EngiVend, or should we make a new vendor for those?

I'll note that the design doc already mentions that not every single role needs its own vendor (mostly in the "Combined Vendors" section), though I'll also note that said section is somewhat vague (only mentioning to use combined vendors "due to some specific nature of that role" with no examples).

[iaada]

I would put salvage clothes in the CargoDrobe, similar to how paramedic clothes are in the MediDrobe. They're the same department, and I don't see it as a big deal if a Cargo Tech puts on some overalls.

Atmospherics fits the bill for a combined vendor due to the number of unique items they have being rather short. Their tool vendor would only have a few items.

[keronshb]

Together they should supply exactly two naked players with all their necessary gear (two complete sets of essential equipment and uniforms).

This is extremely limiting. This feels like it's made for more HRP than it is for how we want our servers.

[Hitlinemoss]

Together they should supply exactly two naked players with all their necessary gear (two complete sets of essential equipment and uniforms).

This is extremely limiting. This feels like it's made for more HRP than it is for how we want our servers.

I think it's generally good practice to have a specific idea of "how many players should a department be able to equip roundstart", and vendors are part of that. Though I think 3 might be slightly better than 2.

I will also note that for clothing vendors specifically, the clause of "stock should be split for items that are effectively identical (such as headset or jumpsuit variants)" might be a bit annoying in some cases. Most obviously, if we only stock vendors for 2 people and we treat jumpsuit variants as identical, the case of "I want to get a jumpsuit from the vendor, but someone took the only other jumpsuit and now there's just a jumpskirt left and I don't want to wear a skirt" (or vice versa) will be pretty common.

[Hitlinemoss]

I would put salvage clothes in the CargoDrobe, similar to how paramedic clothes are in the MediDrobe. They're the same department, and I don't see it as a big deal if a Cargo Tech puts on some overalls.

Thought: given how differently salvage plays from cargo I'd probably say it's more analogous to something like chemist or atmos tech (wheras a paramedic generally has the same tools and accesses as a regular doctor), so a combined vendor might be better.

That's a department-specific thing to iron out though so I should probably keep my thoughts on the matter on the actual draft for Cargo.

[iaada]

Together they should supply exactly two naked players with all their necessary gear (two complete sets of essential equipment and uniforms).

This is extremely limiting. This feels like it's made for more HRP than it is for how we want our servers.

I agree it's limiting but not that it's extreme. The department vending machines are not meant as the primary source for a player's essential gear (they're meant as a backup source for that) but as the primary source for optional gear. Necessary gear is gotten from lockers which are mapped equal to the role spawns for that map, with these vendors providing 2 extra sets on top of that.

And if a vending machine does run out of stock that's still not "extremely" limiting unless we write off vending restocks as a meaningful design. Restocks are not hard to purchase, nor should the need to buy one once in a while be seen as a negative. If anything it just suffers from the recurring pain points of buying anything from cargo.

I will also note that for clothing vendors specifically, the clause of "stock should be split for items that are effectively identical (such as headset or jumpsuit variants)" might be a bit annoying in some cases. [...] the case of "I want to get a jumpsuit from the vendor, but someone took the only other jumpsuit and now there's just a jumpskirt left and I don't want to wear a skirt" (or vice versa) will be pretty common.

The Drobes are completely overstuffed at the moment. I think ideally I want better control over the stock (like making vending machines work off of entity tables) so that you could have a result other than 20 items with one stock each. But barring that, is it so bad if the Drobe only has pants when you want to wear a skirt? Ask HoP to print you one, don't wear a department uniform, or accept that it's a pants kind of day. Again vending machines are only the most convenient source of items, not the only one.

[kontakt]

Honestly I think two sets of gear in the vends may be too much.
Per the doc, marathon would have seven lockers to cover the four station engineers and three technical assistants. That's nine RCDs and insuls round-start.

[iaada]

Curbing that availability of items might require some proper "ownership" of lockers, so that the gear inside isn't free to take for anyone in the department. Something where the first locker you open is keyed to your ID and only you (and your department head) can open it, but you're unable to open another one. It's not a fully fleshed out idea but variants of this idea have been floated elsewhere and it would help to control item scarcity.

But barring big system changes, 2 sets is where I landed on to make vending machines feel like a proper source of gear. More than 2 and the availability is too high, 1 feels insulting if it's meant to supply a whole department. At 0 you run into trouble with the "Dynamic Environment" pillar of having no absolute scarcity, requiring these items to be available somehow (likely cargo). By being in a vending machine this scarcity problem is solved with one cargo order, which I find a simpler balance concern. "How much is an engivend worth," vs. "how much does every individual item an engineer uses worth." (Though what anything is worth is itself a difficult problem.)

[LevitatingTree]

If you're late to work, you feel that consequence of being in a rush to get ready which aligns with what your character (presumably) feels.

Having your weapons, pinpointer, etc in your unguarded office already pushes captains to rush there when they spawn, but removing this much of their gear and leaving the most important member of the crew (and their AA) totally defenseless until they reach their office is a bit much. Either way, a player getting stressed out isn't necessary to roleplay a character being in a rush.

This is accentuated in rounds where more captains spawn, like the clerical error event, which goes from a fun gimmick to several armorless AA-holders running around the station (it makes sense for them to get disablers from sec in lieu of the unique laser pistol, but it'd be weird for them to borrow security armor plates too).

Also, things like the captain's gloves -- easily identifiable in scans and usually only ever equipped by the cap -- don't do much to disguise their identity: if anything, they make it easier to spot the captain with forensic scans since you wouldn't even need to check their DNA. I'm honestly not sure why gloves need to be so restricted in the first place, since you could just get colored gloves on the arrivals shuttle if you really wanted to hide your identity even better than department-specific (or person-specific) gloves would.

I feel this pushes players in general to ready up round start instead of checking the manifest and late-joining, which I see as a (perhaps not widespread?) problem due to how antag selection primarily cares about bodies on station.

I feel like it'd be more appropriate to address the antag selection issue directly than to punish players for ever joining a round after it starts; either way, we'd probably want someone to join late into a captainless round to fill the role, disincentivizing that by making it harder seems antithetical.

The "no gear" thing also means secoffs that join while their department is inaccessible (spaced, broken-into by antags) would very probably just die if they tried to combat the threat, specially if other seccies also died (and the complete lack of armor makes them easy targets for their sec radio and ID). This also applies to HoS and Warden if their armored clothing is restricted too.

In either case, I'm not sure what problem this'd be solving: sec (to get anything more than their starter gear, check consoles and brig, etc) and cap (to secure the pinpointer and get weapons) would both need to go to their areas either way, this just makes it harder, or even impossible (in sec's case), for them to handle situations where they couldn't get to them. Even for non-latejoiners who spawn in their department, this just seems like a decrease in QOL that makes roles feel stripped down at roundstart until they take a few minutes (or longer, for newer players) to gather the things they'd need to start doing their jobs (see keron's above comments).

[LordEclipse]

I'm fairly certain we used to have sec spawn in without equipment and it sucked ass because a lot of the time you need to do something right away, but because you arbitrarily spawn without tools to do your job, you just kind of have to let people die?? I feel like Command and Security need to have exceptions to this idealistic doc. You shouldn't be punished for latejoining or spawning in arrivals, this isn't a competitive game and I would prefer we not push the game further in that direction for a net negative. I don't think that applying this to every role is a great idea simply because some roles are strictly more powerful than others with their access. Captain no armor AA? Free AA high pop, helpless low pop because the traitor already looted your equipment and killed security. Perhap it isn't properly understood how horrifyingly powerful AA is and how detrimental it is to the station for it to be lost in a lot of cases

[YoungThugSS14]

very well written, these changes went well with medical doctors so I can't wait for this to be merged and have it applied to other jobs

[YoungThugSS14]

You should have a quick little mention of hardsuit storage that most command members get.

[iaada]

I added it as the start of lockers alongside "some roles additional items might be placed around their starting room."

[YoungThugSS14]

You should mention that some jobs have an actual dresser to substitute as their wardrobe (command)

[iaada]

I don't want to have an aside to mention it when the section is less about specific jobs and more about vending machines in general. I feel like this might be better addressed in a mapping document, but to be completely honest I don't think it needs to be explict. If a change of clothes is something we absolutely want command to have access to, I would have it in the lockers section alongside command's "specialized gear."

[YoungThugSS14]

lgtm, nothing but a humble contrib though