Content Suggestion Allow Us To Shoot Ourselves In The Head

[Emilia Foddg]

What does this suggestion change/add/remove:​

A VGuns overhaul for sidearms which would allow us to shoot ourselves in the head and die (specifically only for pistols).

EDIT: This may also need tuning during development to assure that it's not too quickly accessible that it upsets the balance of hostage taking and other applicable situations.

Has something similar been suggested before? If so, why is your suggestion different?:​

I highly doubt it.

Possible Positives of the suggestion (At least 2):​

• + Increases value and use of sidearms, which includes perma pistols, giving more reason to buy one
  
  
• + Additional RP-friendly ways for players to kill themselves or otherwise threaten to kill themselves, in situations that could potentially benefit from it & also potentially create new directions for certain situations or scenarios
  
  
• + Gives an RP purpose for an otherwise combative thing
  
  
• + Would be extremely funny to see a D-Class with a gun in D-Block at the testing line, just holding it to their head

Possible Negatives of the suggestion:​

• == An additional suicide alternative to cyanide & VCraft chems would likely devalue both of them in a not insignificant amount of situations - Cyanide is primarily intended for escaping hostage situations, which would generally be largely unaffected by this change in the majority of circumstances and as such, would not be an effective replacement for cyanide as hostages are typically stripped of weapons among other reasons. As for chems, most chems that you can kill yourself with do so in a way that are generally not as conducive to RP, plus they are to some extent, easier to obtain and retain than a pistol, the latter of which for a lot of non-combative roles is frustrated by IC regulation of weaponry on those jobs.
  
  
• - Would mostly require fundamental and extensive changes to VGuns, may be infeasible
  
  
• - Abuse - This is something you could FailRP with (This is the reason I am suggesting this. I am suggesting this because I want to use it to FailRP. Please allow me to FailRP by shooting myself in the head), also concerns with things like doing it in a situation where you otherwise wouldn't just to avoid arrest, etc.

Based on the Positives & Negatives, why should this suggestion be accepted:​

This is something I've been wanting for a while, but never really found the time to properly think on it. I think I want to be able to shoot myself in the head. I think this has potential, even outside of event purposes, to create some interesting RP. Like, even just schizo chef RP, you can get a gun and just go crazy.

I acknowledge there are also some FearRP concerns? Like weird situations where it's obvious someone is just shooting themselves to get out of RP or to deny an SCP a kill or whatever, difficult to enforce, etc. And maybe some situations where it's... Eh, I dunno. Not sure what to think about it.

 

[Fricky Hecks]

These kinds of takes are very pearl-clutchy and incredibly ignorant of the themes already present on the server. SCP is, at its core, a military sci-fi horror universe. You cannot in good conscience push arguments like "think of the kids" and mental health advocacy with the current existing server content (we even have a padded room in Medbay, ffs) and common themes in roleplay. It's primarily because of those themes in the first place that we have the Age Rating network rule (which IMO I never understood the specific reasoning with the current age choice, I'd agree it's a tad too low for what we have already).

I agree with the abuse concern which is why I specified it in the OP - As for the counterplay argument, I want some examples of situations where it'd be hard to generate counterplay against it, because I can't particularly think of any situations where this would be too strong, primarily because of the weapon switch delay. Maybe I'm missing something there.

Regardless, your points about inappropriateness, I feel are inappropriate themselves. They are neither as noble nor virtuous as you seem to believe them to be - They come across as an attempt to guilt-trip and use real-world issues as an excuse to discourage feature development in a video game. You want to talk about things like psychological triggers and respect? How about we start by trying to use 'think of the children' rhetoric on a Brit after the 25th of July, 2025. Disgusting behaviour IMO.

Don't get confused, I'm apathetic to the idea of "think of the kids", especially considering there is (iirc) still a content warning stating that dark themes are present in the server. But simultaneously, I don't believe that solely from that content warning, it's alright to go full throttle and add every single thing that can be viewed as mildly controversial as an in-game mechanic using the aforementioned content warning as the sole reason why.

I personally don't mind the idea of suicide via gun on the server, as it is still a realistic theme and I wholeheartedly believe that roleplay can be enhanced by it, but at the same time and most importantly, it needs to actually be done well, with instances of it occurring needing to be few & far between. Someone that's proficient with roleplaying using the aforementioned theme either as part of character lore, motivation, reasoning, etc etc, that's great! Alongside this, if these themes are present during an event or a proper roleplay, anyone that has a problem with it can just say "OK, I don't like this, I'd like to back out from this."

But when that power is given nonchalantly to James Fork the Foundation Chef that shoots themselves on reaction to any attempt to arrest them or Peter Battery the Senior Researcher that plays as an overly, almost comedically depressed person that simultaneously kills themselves on reaction to any mild inconvenience, now the aforementioned dark themes that were previously few & far between and done well are now a daily, if not hourly occurrence with no forethought or care taken in the delivery of the action itself, losing a good chunk of their impact or power behind them.

Anyways, as for situations where it'd be too strong, it'd primarily pop up as a, quite literal, get-out-of-jail free card against ISD or anyone else arresting them for any legitimate reason, or simultaneously, if you have time to react to Chaos Insurgency or another hostile force trying to break into wherever you are, unlike Cyanide where it's relatively expensive decision of "Do I use the cyanide & avoid a possible RTB or Hostage-related kidnap or are they not even going to do that and I just waste a cyanide", suddenly that devolves into "I must kill myself with my pistol."

Or alternatively, in an attempt to kidnap someone, frame one, before you even realise, they've shot themselves in the head, rendering the attempt itself pointless. Now, if it had a 3 or so second startup where you're immobilized and can be cuffed without it falling under "combat cuffing", that'd work a tad bit better, as now it has a low or no cost but has a high risk to it.

 

[Tay]

- Abuse - This is something you could FailRP with (This is the reason I am suggesting this. I am suggesting this because I want to use it to FailRP. Please allow me to FailRP by shooting myself in the head)

Thank you for being honest

 

[Emilia Foddg]

Don't get confused, I'm apathetic to the idea of "think of the kids", especially considering there is (iirc) still a content warning stating that dark themes are present in the server. But simultaneously, I don't believe that solely from that content warning, it's alright to go full throttle and add every single thing that can be viewed as mildly controversial as an in-game mechanic using the aforementioned content warning as the sole reason why.

I can agree with this, yes - Now that I think about the existing content warning, IMO it feels a little toothless and could reasonably be interpreted as being there just for liability reasons. It also doesn't really cover some of the things you can already encounter on the server? Like there's a lot of dark themes like torture RP, psychological RP, a lot of different medical RPs I can think of - Like, if you're a first-time player and you have only that warning, you wouldn't reasonably expect to end up running into those kinds of situations from that warning alone, it might be a surprise.

I'd advocate some kind of further expanding on the content warning just to cover those areas and make it clear to as a player that these things are present on this server and may be encounterable, but I feel you then run into the inverse problem of having people anticipate/expect it and behave strangely as a result - A change like that may even encourage more suggestions along the lines of this one.

Either way, while related, that's a bit of a different suggestion topic and has some issues to work out with how exactly you'd word the final warning and such. But I would leave my statement at "even the current warning is insufficient." I guess that's food for thought for SL+, what you say here does generally make sense, though.

I personally don't mind the idea of suicide via gun on the server, as it is still a realistic theme and I wholeheartedly believe that roleplay can be enhanced by it, but at the same time and most importantly, it needs to actually be done well, with instances of it occurring needing to be few & far between. Someone that's proficient with roleplaying using the aforementioned theme either as part of character lore, motivation, reasoning, etc etc, that's great! Alongside this, if these themes are present during an event or a proper roleplay, anyone that has a problem with it can just say "OK, I don't like this, I'd like to back out from this."

You have a point - But I feel that to an extent, this is beyond the semi-serious RP scope of the server. It's kind of a grey area IMO, I agree it needs to be reasonable, but at the same time it needs to be flexible and not too strict.

But when that power is given nonchalantly to James Fork the Foundation Chef that shoots themselves on reaction to any attempt to arrest them or Peter Battery the Senior Researcher that plays as an overly, almost comedically depressed person that simultaneously kills themselves on reaction to any mild inconvenience, now the aforementioned dark themes that were previously few & far between and done well are now a daily, if not hourly occurrence with no forethought or care taken in the delivery of the action itself, losing a good chunk of their impact or power behind them.

Again, kind of a similar issue here - On one hand, roleplay is not really at a high standard, nor should it be; That keeps it accessible and relaxed. On the other hand, that's not an excuse to unnecessarily degrade RP quality. It's this whole grey area I brought up. I appreciate the concern and acknowledge it. It's my estimation that what this can contribute to roleplay is worth risking what it can detract from it. It's possible that we can start applying existing rules to it, but then it becomes an issue of enforcement.

Additionally in your given example, you can easily do this already by replace the gun with say, Oil and other damaging chems from the chem vendor, even though yes, using pistols for this would make it less of an inconvenience to do to an extent - With a gun, you'd still have to either pay for a perma (which you still have to equip at least... What, once a session? from the armoury), or just regularly go to the armoury each life and get a handgun for this purpose. I can see this being more convenient than developing a whole pipeline to just get a supply of enough self-damaging chems to reliably and regularly kill yourself with, although the outcome is generally the same.

I did also have a brief stint where I ran around the site just randomly killing myself to """""create RP.""""" It was very fun and engaging to my recollection.

Anyways, as for situations where it'd be too strong, it'd primarily pop up as a, quite literal, get-out-of-jail free card against ISD or anyone else arresting them for any legitimate reason, or simultaneously, if you have time to react to Chaos Insurgency or another hostile force trying to break into wherever you are, unlike Cyanide where it's relatively expensive decision of "Do I use the cyanide & avoid a possible RTB or Hostage-related kidnap or are they not even going to do that and I just waste a cyanide", suddenly that devolves into "I must kill myself with my pistol."


Or alternatively, in an attempt to kidnap someone, frame one, before you even realise, they've shot themselves in the head, rendering the attempt itself pointless. Now, if it had a 3 or so second startup where you're immobilized and can be cuffed without it falling under "combat cuffing", that'd work a tad bit better, as now it has a low or no cost but has a high risk to it.

I agree, this would also need tuning to assure that it's not too quickly accessible that it upsets the balance of hostage taking and such. I have added this to the OP.

 

[JustAChef]

+support

 

[Zen]

Would this conflict with FearRP to some degree?
The already existing systems have overrides to protect game integrity, what's stopping someone from committing suicide at every possible convinent situation unless specific rules were in place to directly stop certain situations from occuring.

The... same systems. To be gagged you have to be in restraints, so you couldn't use a gun anyway. To me, this just seems like a cheaper option but which is useful in less situations (can't strip cyanide, can strip weapons; you get restrained before you get gagged; etc.). It also just makes sense that you should be capable of doing it if you have a gun.

 

[IGNVexary]

These kinds of takes are very pearl-clutchy and incredibly ignorant of the themes already present on the server. SCP is, at its core, a military sci-fi horror universe. You cannot in good conscience push arguments like "think of the kids" and mental health advocacy with the current existing server content (we even have a padded room in Medbay, ffs) and common themes in roleplay. It's primarily because of those themes in the first place that we have the Age Rating network rule (which IMO I never understood the specific reasoning with the current age choice, I'd agree it's a tad too low for what we have already).

I agree with the abuse concern which is why I specified it in the OP - As for the counterplay argument, I want some examples of situations where it'd be hard to generate counterplay against it, because I can't particularly think of any situations where this would be too strong, primarily because of the weapon switch delay. Maybe I'm missing something there.

Regardless, your points about inappropriateness, I feel are inappropriate themselves. They are neither as noble nor virtuous as you seem to believe them to be - They come across as an attempt to guilt-trip and use real-world issues as an excuse to discourage feature development in a video game. You want to talk about things like psychological triggers and respect? How about we start by trying to use 'think of the children' rhetoric on a Brit after the 25th of July, 2025. Disgusting behaviour IMO.

I’m going to be straight with you — brushing my points off as “pearl-clutching” or “guilt-tripping” isn’t an argument, it’s just you being dismissive. You can try to dress it up all you want, but the fact is suicide doesn’t belong in RP on this server, period. And no, comparing it to SCP’s existing themes doesn’t hold up. Horror, monsters, war, padded rooms in Medbay — those are fictional tropes. Nobody here is walking away from the server having to deal with an actual monster breaking into their house or being part of a war. Suicide, on the other hand, is painfully real. People in this community have dealt with it, lost friends, lost family, and struggled themselves. Acting like it’s the same category as “sci-fi horror” is just wrong.

You said my argument about kids and mental health doesn’t matter because of the server’s existing dark themes. But here’s the difference: kids or vulnerable players might see combat, might see monsters, and they know it’s fiction. Suicide roleplay, though? That’s not just “dark fiction.” That’s something they might already be thinking about in their own lives. That’s where the harm is. It normalizes something that shouldn’t ever be normalized, and it risks pushing people who are already struggling further down a dangerous path. You can’t hand-wave that away with “well SCP is dark anyway.”

And the idea that I’m just using “real-world issues” as some excuse to block features is honestly insulting. I’m not standing on a soapbox to look noble, I’m speaking from lived experience. I’ve lost a friend. I’ve seen family members fight through mental health struggles. I don’t need to justify why I take this topic seriously — I already know what it feels like to deal with the aftermath. You can call it whatever you want, but I’m not going to sit here and pretend suicide is just another edgy storyline to add for flavor.

Also, calling my stance “disgusting behavior”? That’s crossing a line. I’m not attacking anyone personally, I’m saying suicide RP is harmful and shouldn’t be allowed. Meanwhile, you’re dismissing people who’ve actually lived through this stuff as if we’re just making things up to score points. If you can’t see why that’s a problem, then maybe you should stop for a second and think about who exactly you’re talking down to.

Look, I’m not asking for SCP to become a PG-13 safe zone. I get what the universe is — horror, experimentation, violence, all of that. I’m fine with those things being part of the game. What I’m saying is suicide is different. It’s real. It’s close to home. And for a lot of people, it’s a wound that doesn’t heal. Roleplaying it doesn’t add anything except shock value at someone else’s expense. If you want to push boundaries in roleplay, there are a hundred other ways to do it that don’t risk reopening those wounds for people in this community.

So yeah, I’m standing by what I said: Suicide RP is not only inappropriate, it’s dangerous. You can try to frame my stance as pearl-clutching or guilt-tripping all day long, but at the end of the day, you’re just dodging the fact that some things don’t belong in a roleplay server. This is one of them.

 

[Solus_16]

Me when i shoot myself in the skull when a d-class insults me

+support

 

[yurtinskurtin]

+/-
I'm torn on this one. I see the potential for abuse yet I also see potential for great RP.
There would need to be rules implemented to prevent suicide at any minor inconvenience.