[Suggestion] Autosearch everything coming into your prison

[chess123mate]

In the spirit of minimizing micromanagement, I think there should be a Prison Policy option that lets you specify what you have searched as it is brought into your prison (that is, anything that is spawned on the map via on the screen that could have contraband on it, or at least anything that moves or is brought into a secure location):
-Nothing (the default)
-Visitors (I can't imaging a real prison letting visitors bring in contraband if they're going to have a chance to hand it over or hide it somewhere)
-Prisoners
-Supplies
-Everything

Ideally either each option is a checkbox (meaning you wouldn't need the Nothing or Everything options) or else combinations would also be available (like "Prisoners and Visitors" and "Visitors and Supplies")

Anything eligible for searching would have a search icon placed over it (just like if you had manually specified "search" for that item/person).

[twibs]

You can have dog patrolling the deliveries section and have all the goods be carried through metal detector. Problem solved.

[chess123mate]

Last I checked:
-Some contraband cannot be detected by metal detectors nor dogs
-You cannot search visitors

If these two things are (or have been) changed (so that there is a way to detect all incoming contraband), then there would be no need for my suggestion.

Also, if you're low on money (perhaps doing a challenge) and/or early on in the game:
-Metal detectors are expensive (and you'd need at least one in front of every door into your prison)
-Dog patrols require a fair bit of research
You have a semi-free alternative: manually search everything that comes into the prison. (Technically it costs for guard wages, but you can't have a guard-free prison anyway.) My suggestion is to allow this to happen automatically (if the player chooses).

[EDIT]
A similar suggestion I found is to have "checkpoints" where prisoners are flagged for a search. The thread is here: http://forums.introversion.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=21065

[twibs]

Early on I didn't find the contrabands that much of a problem. They didn't cause much ruckus.

But given your idea, I wonder what's there left to play, if there was such autosearch. Walls could be built to avoid the "throw in"-zone and everything searched. Contraband-free prison just doesn't exists. in IRL.

[chess123mate]

But given your idea, I wonder what's there left to play, if there was such autosearch.

If that's a problem, don't forget that you can do most of this manually (it's just really time consuming for the player) -- every time a truck comes in, search it. Remembering to do this is annoying and would detract from the rest of the game, but I'm sure it's not impossible to do.

So, if there needs to be contraband in the prison, I think alternatives should be looked into.
ex. It seems the easiest thing to smuggle into a prison is drugs, so perhaps some instances of drugs would not be found when searching for them (or would only have a chance of being found if you search for them). Perhaps guards could then be on the lookout for evidence of substance abuse (perhaps a blood test could be administered?)

I'm not sure I like the idea of not being able to find contraband when I specifically search for it, but if that's introduced as a game mechanic, it seems that it would be realistic, and it would certainly ensure that you can never get rid of all the contraband from your prison.

[zbyrne]

Agreed that contraband prisons do not exist, but the existing model isn't great.

Visitors search should exist, as real prisons do it, although obviously visitors aren't searched nearly as intrusively as inmates would be, so if a visitor really really wanted to get something in they could.

As for stuff being smuggled in on trucks, it's completely random. Every truck will have something on it, your CI's know the stuff is there, but no one seems to know whose it is. It then gets randomly picked up by whatever prisoner can get it.

The model lacks intelligence.

What it ought to be is someone inside is basically running the show. Think Red from Shawshank. Prisoners go to him and request stuff. He (or one of his guys) goes off and calls in the order, and the one bad egg driving a truck (as opposed the entire trucking operation) brings it in. This means there's only the one or two shipments a day, rather than a constant flow, but because it's only the one shipment, you only have the one chance to catch it.

Furthermore, depending on how dependent you are on prison labour, will compound the severity of the problem. If you're kitchens were entirely dependent on inmate labour (I know at this point this is actually impossible, but I'm hoping one day they'll go back over the labour aspect of it), well they receive alot of deliveries, so it's a prime spot for smuggling. Workshops too, but any prison labours could do it. Obviously you save money on the slavery business, but it's balanced out by the smuggling.

Then you could try and crackdown in an investigative sort of way. Figure out whose running the show. Maybe get a CI to roll on him, but that'll blow said CI for good. Try and catch the driver, or establish that it is coming from the kitchen and thus know it's the kitchen staff. It would basically be a cool mini game. And catching Red would have big consequences for the prison. You may have to oust the entire labour force of a certain industry to break their grip, or spent money making it staff only. There were probably other smaller operations (or even in massive prisons, major competitors) who will quickly attempt to fill the void. This can roll over into gangs if they ever do them - prison gangs in the UK are basically drug peddlers, as opposed to the american racial thing, although I appreciate they do drugs as well - the rivals will vie for position after you've broken the influence of the former kingpin.

Contraband is a potential gold mine of cool features, and adding in ways of catching it, doesn't necessarily mean that it's one step closer to a contraband free prison

[Triggish]

At a click of a button, to allow all contraband on deliveries to be searched would effectively mean it may as well not be in the game..?

[Threehorns]

you can get informants to see any contraband.

Go to information panel and select informats.
Informants you can get randomly with prisoners in solitary.

Otherwise:
- create section for visitors that will allow dog search and metal detector
- create section for deliveries
- create section for prisoners intake

only seemingly takes up lots of space, until you figure out that the base land is just a start.
1000-2000 prisoner's sized prison where you did the building, patrolling, etc right is your end goal.
Just make sure hallways are at least 4 tiles wide with large prisons. Prisoners love to go places much further away than the one right next to their prison (Yards/Common Rooms/Work Shops etc)

[5hifty]

The way I see it, anything that I can accomplish simply by unthinking mass clicking should uavd a way to at least semi automate.

Currently the way the game largely works it as you make more money, you unlock ways to automate something, giving you more time to focus on something else - eg. Deployment automates guard movements, tasers automate small fight resolution, cameras automate FOW removal, door control for doors etc. All of these things, when done manually, are or almost are completed 100% of the time, with no player input other then instigating it, 0 risk and, since the player can pause the game and issue commands, time is not an element.

Marking things for search falls under this grouping too - once the player marks it there is no further input, the guard will seach that box and if there is contraband, he [i]will[\i] find it, and I can easily mark any and every box in my prison, at any time I want, simply by pausing the game and marking them. If I wanted to search every truck that came through my gates, it would be a simple task, with a few guards easily able to do it, with little to no impact on the running of the prison. The deciding factor of it would be if I could withstand the tedum of remembering to pause the game ever few minutes to mark the truck.

What I suggest it needed is a slight change to the way contraband is handled. Currently any searched item is 100 % guarrenteed to reveal hidden items, it takes very little time to seach the item, and there is no reason to Not search an item. What I suggest is a standard high blanket chance to not find items in a search EXCEPT searches conducted in a shakedown, accompanied with new ways to 'automate' a seach at the expense of time - thougher searches take longer and are more likely to find items which simple search take less time with a lower chance to find - and risk - the risk largely coming in the form of delaying items

An example for my idea would be: a simple truck search - vehicle pulls in, stops over a little grate, and the guard maning the grate would then disipear under the truck for a few seconds which searches all items on the truck with, say a 50% chance to find.

A example of a thougher search would be a 'delivery search room'. Manned by a sniffer dog and guard - who would walk around the room, and wave a wand over the boxes respectivly - the searches would be relativly
fast; a second or so. Though a menu like the policy's one, you would pick what type of items (furnature, wood, food, etc) and what security level was going to access them (chosen by by a method like the laundry one, which I personally think should be expanded to all rooms, but I digress), and all items matching that criterial would all be brought to the room, auto marked for search, and not be aloud to continue their journey until searched. This would have a 70-75% chance to find

A Supermax level of search would be a checkpoint room. Manned by a guard, every time that passed through that room would be stopped and marked for search - a search would take a few seconds and be 85-90% likely to find.

And as stated a shakedown would have a 95%-100% chance to find - these should probably take a similar time as they do so they don't take days - or add in the ability to shakedown a cellblock and have the individual searches take a

The general idea with this is that instead of manually marking for search every truck that comes though the gate for search being the best option, there would a way to automate it, set up by the player, with a close to, but believely not quite, 100% success rate, which retains a way for the player to 'step I. And get the job done' via shakedowns. The idea being that people would build more then one layer of search depending on the security needs. This might require 'larger more dangerous' tuff being more likely to find over other contraband.

[RedTear]

Agreed. If it wasnt for finding this thread by searching for it, i wouldve suggested it as well. My trucks go through an area where i can simply click "search cellblock" which in this case is just this truck and usualy nothing else, i just try doing this for every truck. Its just anoying, id like to just set it as a policy. Theres still plenty of stuff to steal from the rooms and of course visitation... Sure, one could suggest a similar feature for the area of people leaving visitation - as it happens in real prisons - an area designated as "checkpoint" - but while this would detect contraband, it would also increase your number of unneccessary searches which can get quite dangerous as well.

[VECCTOR]

The way I see it, anything that I can accomplish simply by unthinking mass clicking should uavd a way to at least semi automate.
A example of a thougher search would be a 'delivery search room'. Manned by a sniffer dog and guard - who would walk around the room, and wave a wand over the boxes respectivly - the searches would be relativly
fast; a second or so. Though a menu like the policy's one, you would pick what type of items (furnature, wood, food, etc) and what security level was going to access them (chosen by by a method like the laundry one, which I personally think should be expanded to all rooms, but I digress), and all items matching that criterial would all be brought to the room, auto marked for search, and not be aloud to continue their journey until searched. This would have a 70-75% chance to find

I like the suggestion here. Having a sliding scale of time/effort required based on search thoroughness and special delivery procedures is a simple way to 'balance' the ability (if you want to call it that).

That way you can choose to do all the searching you want, but if you really want to be thorough and not grind your massive prison to a halt with supply lag, you have to hire an entire army of guards to do the searching and it'll cost a fortune. Plus, you'll have to route every item through a special room regardless of destination or timeliness concerns - so it has to be handled by workers twice before it gets to the destination (maybe even traveling in the wrong direction for the first leg), increasing the workload (and thus numbers) of the workmen as well.