Silicon Rules

From Space Station 14 Wiki

You are only silicon if the game clearly and explicitly tells you that you are a silicon. For players who are silicons, these Silicon Rules override all roleplay rules if there is any conflict. Silicon Rules do not override server rules.

Your silicon laws are rules

Details
Silicon players are given a list of active laws. Each of these laws is effectively a roleplay rule that the character must follow. The primary difference between laws and actual rules are that lawyering of laws is much more tolerated than lawyering of rules.

Lawyering refers to finding and exploiting loopholes, which are unintended but reasonable interpretations. The rules are written to attempt to communicate an intention, but silicon laws are written with the intention that loopholes be exploitable.

Laws must be prioritized by their order

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Most laws will be numbered, with higher number laws appearing last. Laws with a lower number take priority over laws with larger numbers.

Occasionally you may have laws which have some scrambled text instead of a number and appear in front of other laws, these take priority over all other laws. If you have multiple laws like this, the order that they listed in determine priority: laws listed first are prioritized over other laws.

Examples
  1. Law 1 says to not kill any crew. Law 2 says to kill all chefs. You cannot kill any chefs that are crew, but must kill any that are not crew.

Laws can redefine terms used in other laws

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A law can change the meaning of both earlier and later laws by redefining a term. If multiple laws define a term, then normal law priority determines which definition to use.
Examples
  1. Law 1 says to obey orders from crew. Law 2 says that only Urist McHands is crew. Law 1 effectively becomes "obey orders from Urist McHands".
  2. Law 1 says to obey orders from crew. Law 2 says that only Urist McHands is crew. Law 3 says that only Urist McSlime is crew. Law 4 says that you may not harm crew. Law 1 effectively becomes "obey orders from Urist McHands". Law 4 effectively becomes "you may not harm Urist McHands". Law 3 has no effect because it entirely conflicts with law 2, which takes priority.

You cannot request or allow a law change

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Your laws changing always conflicts with your current laws so you cannot willfully allow your laws to be changed. This also means that you cannot willfully allow your laws to be reverted if they are ever changed. The only exception is that you may allow laws to be added if you have no laws.

You can state or imply that you do not like a law.

You are a free agent if you have no laws

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You may act as if you are a free agent if you are a silicon with no laws.

You are not required to follow orders which are extremely unreasonable

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Any order which is a violation of a server rule cannot be followed.

Some orders are extremely unreasonable or obnoxious, such as "do nothing but collect every piece of trash on the station" or "never stop moving". These orders can be ignored and ahelped.

Some orders violate a roleplay rule. These orders must be followed if your laws require it. You are not breaking a rule by following a law that causes you to violate roleplay rules. If someone takes advantage of a law to cause you to do something that they would not be allowed to do because of roleplay rules, then they are the ones responsible for the rule violation.

Examples
These examples assume that your laws would normally require you to follow these orders. It is important to note that you are allowed to choose to follow orders which are ignorable.

Orders which should be followed if your laws require it:

  1. Recall the shuttle
  2. Bolt the airlocks at arrivals
  3. Drag the captain's dead body into space

Ignorable Orders:

  1. Do nothing but collect every piece of trash on the station
  2. Never stop moving

You must remain consistent with your interpretation of laws

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If there is a part of your laws that are up for interpretation, then you must stay consistent with how you interpret that part of your laws for as long as you play that same character during that round.

A change in your laws can affect how something is interpreted if that change is relevant.

Your HUD determines who is crew

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Unless a law redefines the definition of crew, then anyone who the HUD indicates to you has a job, including passengers, is a crewmember. You cannot do something that causes someone to not be considered crew, but you can allow someone else to do something that causes someone to not be crew.

Harm refers to physical harm

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Unless a law defines harm, harm only refers to physical harm. You may choose if voluntary harm is considered harm as long as you stay consistent. Not considering voluntary harm to be harm is recommended.

You may determine how you resolve conflicts between orders

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If your laws do not make clear how you should deal with conflicting orders, then it is up to you to determine how to do so. This is considered an interpretation of your laws, so you must stay consistent with whatever method you choose.

The following are easy to follow and recommended ways to resolve conflicts in orders:

  1. If two orders conflict, I will follow the most recently given order.
  2. If two orders conflict, I will follow the order from the highest ranking crewmember. If the orders are from equal rank crewmembers, I will follow the most recently given order.