Combat
As a crewmember, you can use many objects as Weapons including ranged weapons, melee weapons and even your own fists.
When to use Combat
Whilst combat is frowned on in most situations and murder of your fellow crew and animal pets should be a last resort, there are exceptions.
An Antagonist may have an objective to kill certain crewmembers and isn't punished if they need to slaughter someone who gets in the way of their objective. However, that does not give leeway for a Traitor to go on a killing spree.
A Security Officer may encounter resistance in Syndicate crewmembers and may need to use force to protect the station. Typically non-lethal force is suggested as a first attempt unless the crewmember is exposed as being a Syndicate.
A non-antag crewmember may face situations wherein hostiles threaten them. For example a Salvage Specialist may encounter aggressive space carp or an infestation of spiders/rats may occur in the station. Alternatively, perhaps a Chef is sick of mice eating all their food and kills the nuisance rodent. A Chef can also order crates of docile animals for slaughter purposes.
Combat Mode
A crewmember can enter Combat Mode via the Actions menu on the left-hand side. It is otherwise known as Harm Mode.
When in this mode, most normal interactions no longer work. For example if you try to pick up an object by left clicking on it, you will instead attack it. If you try to open a door by left clicking on it, you will instead attack the door. Right clicking will no longer open the item menu. What your clicks do depends on what you have in your hand.
When you left click somewhere, you will attack with the item you are holding in your active hand, if any. If this item is not a weapon (e.g. a piece of paper), you will not do anything. If you are holding nothing, you will attack with your fist. If the weapon requires ammo, you will not do anything if there is no available ammo and you may need to first load or cycle the weapon. Ammo can be ordered by a Cargo Technician.
When you right click someone with an empty hand, you will "shove" them, attempting to knock them down. If they are holding a weapon, you will attempt to disarm them. Both these things are good for when you need to get away from a dangerous person, or for when you're cornered.
If you right click while holding a melee weapon, you will do a non-targeted attack with it, in the direction of your cursor. The exact shape of a non-targeted attack varies from weapon to weapon - for example, a spear will thrust forward, hitting a narrow area that reaches a fair distance away from your body, and a baseball bat will unleash a wide swing to hit anything in about a 60 degree arc in front of you. Whatever your weapon collides with will be hit.
Tactically speaking, non-targeted attacks are good for fighting living creatures (especially other players) that might try to run around and dodge you, since you don't need to click directly on something to hurt it. wide, swinging attacks can also potentially damage multiple objects close together. However, if multiple things are stacked in the same space (like multiple people or a window and a grille) a non-targeted attack might not hit what you want to hit, while left-clicking with a melee weapon will always attack the specific object directly under your cursor.
Note that a Zombie starts in Combat Mode but can turn it off to right click on creatures to determine if they are already Zombified or not.
Weapons
A weapon can range from a glass shard, a screwdriver, a shotgun, a knife, a club or even your fists. Damage is dependent on the weapon which you can see if you click on the lightning bolt icon after examining it. Refer to Weapons for more details. Some weapons (usually melee weapons) can be wielded in both hands to increase their damage
Ranged Weapon Usage
There are several ranged weapons which can be acquired. Most require some sort of ammo either lethal or non-lethal. If ammo is required, you will first need to ensure the weapon is loaded and if not, load it with ammo. After loading the weapon, you can then put it in your active hand and left click at a target to fire a shot. Note that you cannot shoot diagonally past if a wall is adjacent to you (even if it is a mime wall). After firing, some weapons will cycle automatically, others won't. If your gun clicks, this means you need to cycle to the next round in the ammo clip. More ammo can be acquired from a Cargo Technician.
To summarise:
- Put an empty weapon in your active hand
- Cycle the weapon to prime it
- Load ammo into an empty weapon
- Left click a target to fire at it (refer to Server Rules)
- Cycle the weapon by pressing Z (if it's not automatic)
- Left click a target to fire at it
- Cycle the weapon again by pressing Z again (if necessary)
Troubleshooting:
- If you attempt to reload the weapon with a new ammo clip and there is unused ammo in the current clip, such will fall to the ground.
If you put ammo into an unprimed weapon and attempt to shoot, the ammo may fall onto the ground unused. Cycle an empty weapon before loading.
