Headmin Rulings

This is a compilation of headmin rulings on various policy questions asked by players. This page does not replace the rules and whenever possible the rules should be referred to instead of this page. The rulings listed here can be referenced in ban appeals and admin complaints.

Please note: Some of these questions are for very niche/specific situations. Some of them cannot be applied the same way to every situation.

General Rulings

Vampire Policy: Vampires are not antagonists just by being a vampire. -KorPhaeron

Organizing mass grief as security or a head: Do not organize mass grief when you are in control of the security force. For context: The original question was when it was okay to remove cat ears or tails. Click the link to read the full ruling on that subject. -KorPhaeron

Adminshopping: Admin shopping is defined as going to different admins until you get a favorable ruling. It's highly frowned upon, don't do it. -Feemjmeem/Agreed with by other headmins

Mass identity duplication: Changing many people into one person via genetics/other methods as a nonantagonist. It can happen every once in a while, just don't do it every single round. -Armhulenn

IC Torture: Don't complain if you get retaliated against for it. -KorPhaeron

Admin intervention without anyone ahelping: It's allowed. -Ausops

Pile on ick ock: Pile on ick ock is defined as a bunch of people teasing someone for IC in OOCing. It's okay until it crosses the line into being spam. Admins can mute OOC/individual players if it gets to that point. -Ausops

IC reactions to OOC in IC: It's okay as long as you're not crossing the line into OOC in IC. -Ausops

Killing nonhostile admin spawned entities: Against the rules, don't do it. -PKPenguin321

Are spiders bound to the mother?: Unless there's a message saying you are, the answer is no. -Armhulenn

Using OOC to promote yourself for headmin elections: One or two lines of text is fine, spamming is not. -PKPenguin321

Silicon and Drone Related Rulings

Do AIs need a definition of Syndicate agent?: No, they know by default what a Syndicate agent is. This also applies to other antagonists. -Hornygranny

Do wizards mindswapped into a silicon have to follow laws?: Yes, they do. If you have laws then you must follow them unless you have a law zero. (When in doubt, adminhelp it.) -Ikarrus

Do silicons count as a being under drone laws?: Yes, treat them as any other crew member. -QuartzCrystal

Can you order force-borged cyborgs to pick a certain module?: Yes. -Scaredy/An0n3

Detonating cyborgs with little reason/alternatives: Don't do it. -Ikarrus

Security Cyborg Policies: Just a few random questions related to security cyborgs. If a cyborg is acting as security/releasing prisoners then this is probably relevant as well. Link to answers. -Pandarsenic

Do purged silicons have to act like a crewmember?: There are several threads on this. NOTE TO SELF: FIND MOST RECENT/LINK IT HERE. The policy hasn't changed for about three years, here's the oldest thread. Purged silicons are subject to rule one and must follow normal escalation rules.

Silicons and harm in situations where you can't tell if they're being harmed or not.: Use common sense to decide if harm is going on.

Drones and the shuttle: Drones have no reason to be on the shuttle and probably shouldn't be there. -Ikarrus | It's unlikely this will be enforced and it's possibly not even a rule anymore.

AIs asking for law changes: An Asimov silicon cannot ask their laws to be changed. -HotelBravoLima

Discussion on paladin lawset: No real headmin rulings took place here, this is mainly opinions/discussion about what the laws in the paladin lawset mean. Most relevant is Cheridan's post.

Discussion on paladin lawset: Part 2, the electric boogaloo: Most relevant post is by HotelBravoLima, which applies to law interpretation in general. "Even doing something consistent with an interpretation of laws isn't good if you're being an OOC dick about it to such an extreme, that's the policy." -HotelBravoLima

Drone Policy Guidelines: Guide to drone policy. -Stickymayhem

Are augmented humans still human?: Yes, they are. There's a helpful chart in silicon policy to help explain this, reference that and adminhelp if there's still a question. -Scones

Tyrant module discussion: Just general discussion on the tyrant lawset.

Drones and atmospherics: Improving atmos is okay. Cutting pipes/turning off plasma is not okay. Fighting the symptoms of plasma in the distro is fine though. -Shadowlight213

Spacing brains, MMIs, and intellicards: You can always do it as an antagonist, you should have a very good reason as a nonantagonist. -Dorsidwarf/Ausops

Cyborgs alerting the crew they're about to be emagged: You can tell the crew you are about to be emagged, but once you have traitor laws, you must follow them.

AIs shutting security down because of law one (discussion): This is already covered in silicon policy. Here's the discussion thread on it.

Is mindswap considered harm?: No, but if an Asimov silicon has mindswap and is ordered not to use it by a human, it can't use it. This is kind of an edge case. -Jordie0608

Holoparasites and Asimov: Holoparasites aren't human- a cyborg can attack the holoparasite but not the human. If the parasite recalls and the human is in critical, the borg must give him medical attention. -KorPhaeron and Shadowlight213

AI's law zero: The law zero that a traitor AI gets means that it is an antagonist and it can ignore all other laws. -KorPhaeron

Is slipping human harm?: Only if the object they're holding falls on them and causes brute damage. -Ausops

If a borg linked to a rogue AI is emagged then does the emagged laws or AI law zero take priority?: Very niche case and is probably impossible since emags should sever the connection to the AI. Starmute made a good post on AI law priority if you are confused.

Are AI laws applied retroactively?: No. You'll have to read this thread to understand it, the question doesn't really provide enough context. -Hornygranny

Silicons and Fight Clubs: It's considered self harm if they're willingly fighting. Silicons shouldn't interfere if it's self harm. If they're being forced to fight, it's human harm and silicons should intervene. -Thunder12345/Agreed with by headmins

Roboticists making unslaved borgs for no reason: Link to relevant thread. The discussion derailed into code discussion but the ruling is that roboticists cannot make unslaved borgs for no reason.

Asimov and gang dominators: This can probably be applied to other nonharmful antagonist objectives. If a human orders you not to destroy it, don't destroy it. Other than that, Asimov does not forbid you from destroying it. -Ausops

Drones and permabrig: You can go in to fix damage. You might still get dronebanned if you let people out, it will likely be handled case-by-case.

Additional discussion on what drones can and can't do: Linked here.

Asimov and Corpses: Corpses aren't human. You can't space them for no reason though. -Shaps/Lzimann

Do caks remember past lives?: Yes. Not really silicon policy but it's related to MMIs/borging. -KorPhaeron

Calling silicons rogue for little/no reason: Against the rules, don't do it. -TehSteveo/KorPhaeron

AI suiciding to prevent subversion: Context: If an AI knows it will be subverted and cause human harm, can it suicide? Example, clock cultists breaking into core, desword traitor in upload about to subvert, etc. It's allowed. He says it should be bannable not to, but you won't get banned for not doing so, it's up to the player. -KorPhaeron

Asking to be deconstructed and then outing person who emagged you as an emagged borg: Don't do it. -PKPenguin321

Potential Law One Violations: "Prioritizing "potential future law violations" is a fucking terrible idea, since it makes silicons able to handwave basically any law two request with "yeah but if i let you in there you might potentially attack somebody inside, law 1 violation!!!"" -PKPenguin321

Silicons and Prisoners: If a nonharmful prisoner asks to be released, it can be released. If a harmful one asks to be released, don't release him unless security is harming him. In all cases release prisoners being harmed by security. (assuming all prisoners are human and you are asimov) -PKPenguin321

Letting people in to upload laws: If the person has a right to be there, such as captain/RD, then you must let them in unless they've harmed people in the past or have announced intentions to upload harmful laws. -Armhulenn

Are drones valid?: Only if they do something to annoy you. Mass killing drones for no reason is not okay. -KorPhaeron

Drones building autocloners: Fine unless done to interfere with other players. -Ausops