Captain

Captain's Quarters. Note the fine state the captain has kept his Bonsai Tree in.

The boss man of the station. Gets a swanky green and gold suit, and golden ID card, a kickass hat, and a gun. Can go anywhere, do anything, and shoot people in the face. The only room he can't enter is the HoS Office. Technically has the responsibility of running the station and making sure things work correctly, but is typically either an incompetent boob, a power-crazed psycho or just doesn't care and will use his power to conduct experiments, run gimmicks, and get hammered. In all of the above cases he will frequently get shot in the face by traitors or syndicates or eaten by changelings because they want to jack his cool shit. Funnily enough, while Security Officers can't be traitors, the Captain himself can.

New Player picked as the Captain?

Don't panic. Captain isn't the hardest job on the station by far but it will require a clear mind and working knowledge of the game, its mechanics, and people and the jobs they do. There are also some critical bits of information you're going to need:

The Nuclear Authentication disk you spawn in your pocket with is an objective for the red-suited Nuclear Operatives. In fact, if the enemy gets it and takes it back to their home base, they can detonate the entire station in nuclear fire. That's bad. Stashing it somewhere out of the way might work, although that could just lead to it being lost easier. The best way is probably just to keep it either on yourself or on another Head officer. Store it in your box and then store that in your pack; people sometimes forget to search there even if they get the jump on you. Be aware that some Nuclear Operative enjoy bursting onto the bridge five minutes into the round to get dat fukken disk.

If you leave your Spare ID in your quarters' bathroom, it's almost guaranteed now that somebody, antagonist or otherwise, is going to break in from space and steal it, along with your hand teleporter. If you see anybody running around labeled simply Captain, they stole your spare ID! Approach with caution, at the very least. There's an energy gun in your secured locker, along with some regular armor if you don't like the jolly green giant look. The hand tele, insulated gloves, multitool+screwdriver will get you out of a lot of bad spots. Everyone wants your things, so don't be too surprised if passersby yank your ID and hat off when you tase yourself/slip on spacelube/get spit on, though some people will be more likely to help you up. Try to recover critical or valuable items if they're taken.

You have free run of the station, so use it to the fullest. People will ask you for help with things pretty frequently, so be a cool dude and help them out with whatever it is, later, when you've been beaten unconscious or shot or shoved in a locker those people will help you! sometimes. Be wary of anyone who wants to "show you something" in maintenance. Sometimes it can be tempting to play supercop traitor hunter extraordinaire as the Captain. You can do this, especially when Security is gone or useless, which is not necessarily an uncommon occurrence. There are a lot of negatives to this, though, and some people think it's more fun when the station is broken and changelings/vampires/other traitorous fiends roam the halls in packs.

The job of Captain can be difficult but it's not really due to technical challenges. Individual jobs are delegated to lesser people while you command from on high, after all. Just remmember that you're in charge, you're giving the orders, and it's your responsibility to control Security and make sure the station isn't exploding. Or, if it is, which is more likely, then work with your resources and show leadership to try and stop things. If the situation is truly crtiical and the AI, who normally calls the Emergency Shuttle nowadays, is not available or not listening to you, then you'll need to call the shuttle manually. Do do that, get to a Communication Terminal, either on the Bridge or in your quarters, and insert your ID into the slot below the screen when the window pops up. Then type the following: "Login, then COMMaster, then Link, then Call." After you've made the decision to call it, remove your ID and reset the computer. For extra security, use a screwdriver to remove the screens from the terminals. The shuttle can be recalled, until the ETA passes the six minute mark, in which case it's going to arrive no matter what.

As captain you want to:

• Keep an eye on the Head of Personnel, he's probably not unterrible! If he's handing out all-access, reprimand him. If he's just gone, try taking his place and helping whoever needs ID help for a bit. That builds a lot of goodwill.
• Resolve disputes between players, usually even the dumbest slapfight can be defused ingame.
• Beat up troublemakers! Make sure they don't beat you up and steal your neat stuff.
• Make sure Security isn't being poo this round. Make sure prisoners aren't being abused and they have proper brig times. Make sure nobody's busting into Riot Storage.
• Deep fry things!
• Deep fry troublemakers.
• Burst into the Kitchen and make cakes! Burst into Chemistry and commandeer a machine and make terrible icing!
• Burst into Robotics and demand a Machine Translator Implant. Burst into Genetics and demand superpowers.
• Burst into the Cargo Bay and demand they order ten crates of guns. Burst into Engineering and demand they set up the Singularity.
• Die trying to set up the Singularity yourself because you didn't use the EngineMaster program.
• Burst into AI Module Storage occasionally and make sure they're still there. Technical Storage also has a Reset module handy.
• Use your PDA to set the status display to fun things! It can even send messages to people if main comms aren't an option.
• Give the AI terrible Freeform laws! Force it to suicide immediately too.!
• Make sure the AI's laws are normal or at least won't bite the crew in the ass! Reset them if they're bad.
• Make assistants fight to the death!
• Recruit assistants for a social experiment!
• Have the assistants sign a waiver!

What do you do if someone is trying to grief you? Either they keep robusting you, taking really important shit like the Nuke Disk, ruining everything, etc. If somebody's griefing you as the Captain you have to decide whether to have Security and yourself handle it (in situations with low-grade shitlording going on) or, if things get too bad or Security is not an option, adminhelp it. No, seriously. Griefing is not acceptable on the Goonstation servers and as the Captain you need to be able to do your job free of some asshole. If that asshole is a traitor of some flavor they're unlikely to be punished, but you might as well try in case they're just a random person.

Crew Objectives

As a loyal crew member, you can sometimes be assigned some strictly optional objectives to keep yourself busy while you wait for something to happen. As captain, you can expect to see the following:

Don't lose your hat!
Just what the man says. Don't let some hooligan steal your awesome Captain's hat.

End the round with alcohol in your blood stream.
Take the wine out on the bridge and drink it as the round's winding down. Or just get drunk all round.

Syndicate Captain

You have access to pretty much everywhere and everything, and yet the Captain barging into random departments to mass produce laser guns or brew up cyanide does tend to attract unwanted attention. If you feel like going on a rampage, subvert the AI on your side and just start lasering anything that moves. You can boss around Security Officers to do your bidding, though if they're mildly competent or there is a Head of Security around they may quickly mutiny and try to put you down. The Head of Personnel can also pull together a revolt against you if you're being less than subtle about your treason, so consider a pre-emptive strike against anyone who would dare stand up to you. With no organized resistance, few crewmembers will be bold enough to try a head-on attack against you.

Alternatively you can ditch your objectives entirely and run whatever hilarious gimmick you've always wanted to, just now with the ability to silence nay-sayers and party poopers with hot laser fire.

---