How-to-Ham
A Beginner’s Guide on Hamlet Survival
Written by: Eats-The-Vermin (Hammy Enjoyer)
Survival Basics
Your main goal as Hamlet is to identify the following:
• Shitters
• Semi-Shitters
• Jokers
• Sympathizers
• Allies
• Safe Departments
Shitters
Shitters are crew who will IMMEDIATELY attempt to kill you without prior escalation or will kill you for no reason or for a miniscule reason. Usually, their methods of killing are by microwaving or blending so you cannot be revived. When caught by a Shitter, your best bet is biting (may aggro shitter even more) or by spamming screams. These two methods will catch the attention of Sympathizers and Allies. Shitters are usually graytiders (passengers) or trainees such as medical interns, research assistants etc. and are usually found in hallways. If the shitter succeeds in killing you, Ahelp their ass. As killing station pets for no reason is against the rules.
Method of survival: Avoid at all costs.
Semi-Shitters
Semi-Shitters will despise you but not outright chase you around the station like shitters do. They will not follow proper escalation and will immediately kill you over a small nuisance. An example of this is a botanist who will kill hamlet on sight as soon as they enter botany without prior warning citing the fact that Hamlet may eat their harvests (even if that didn’t happen before during this round).
The difference between Semi-Shitters and Shitters is that Semi-Shitters will operate within their department and will look for any reason to kill you, while the Shitters will chase you down and kill you without reason and outside of their departments.
Reminder: if you were warned SEVERAL times before not to enter kitchen. And you get hurt/killed while getting into kitchen, you deserve it.
Method of survival: Do not enter their departments. Do not be a shitter yourself.
Jokers
Jokers will not directly harm you but will do things that are incredibly annoying such as throwing you in the trash or picking you up and throwing you around. This sometimes becomes very daunting when done repeatedly. This behavior is usually done by clowns and mimes.
Method of survival: Play along with their jokes and they will stop. If not, call for help. However, due to the damaged brains of mime and clown players, they may switch to being Shitters in a moment’s notice. You may find yourself being thrown in a blender rather than a trashcan. Evaluate severity of behavior. If you suspect shittery, avoid at all costs.
Sympathizers
Sympathizers are crew who will help you if you are in severe trouble but will not bother if it’s too much work. For example, they will not chase down Shitters who grab you and run away. They will help you when you are within reach but will not go out of their way to chase the Shitter that is trying to blend you across the station.
A herd of Sympathizers may turn into Allies. And sometimes Sympathizers may be emboldened by Allies and they themselves will turn into Allies.
Method of survival: Recognize Sympathizers’ place of gathering. Run there when in danger.
Allies
Allies will go out of their way to help you. They will chase down Shitters and kill them even if you are dead. Allies are very hard to find. Allies are usually formed by the relationship you build during the round. If you stay in a department for a long enough time, the crew in that department may turn into Allies.
Method of survival: Stay Close to Allies. Build rapport with crew.
If you feel bored staying close to allies and sympathizers and want to run around the station, you may do so but you must be careful and watchful of your surroundings. Preferably at that point you have recognized the shitters and can avoid them.
Safe Departments
Safe departments are departments with a high number of Allies and Sympathizers and no shitters such as: Brig, Bridge, Cargo. The rest of the departments you must evaluate yourself.
Strategies
Before you do anything, you have to ask an Ally or a Sympathizer to get you a mask and oxygen tank. Everything else concerning basic survival is the same as when playing as normal crew. Except you have to be extra careful because Hamlet has low health.
When it comes to eating you will not starve to death as Hamlet does not need to eat. If you need to eat just eat in small amounts when you need to move somewhere far, or if you feel like there’s something dangerous about to happen and you might need that movement boost from eating.
Service Department Strategy
It may seem counterintuitive, but befriending the botanists, bartenders, and especially the chefs is the best way to survive as Hamlet. You can do this if you show that you won’t steal their food and act cute either by dancing, squeaking, or dragging things around like you’re using them (such as dragging the chef’s knife using ctrl click and moving it over a dough using ctrl right click). If you succeed in befriending the service crew, you will get powerful Allies. I personally befriended chefs several times and whenever a Shitter attempts to kill me or succeeds in doing so, the chefs chase them down and butcher them. Similar things happened when befriending bartenders and botanists.
Command Strategy
Following a Command member such as Captain or CMO is good way to be protected since Command is more likely to protect station pets. This is especially true for HOP as they are already used to protecting Ian.
Forged Alliance Strategy
As mentioned before, staying within a department will help ingratiate you with the crew of that department and turn them into Allies. This is not advised to be done in medbay as people can come and go for treatment and may snatch you before you build rapport with the med staff.
This guide has been written as a response to the countless amount of times I’ve been put in a blender or the microwave as Hamlet for no fucking reason by shitters. Thankfully Ahelping the admin team has been putting the Shitters in their place. So if you ever get killed for no reason as Hamlet, please Ahelp it.