To be frank, I don't know where any remotely good quality enforcer guides exist and the enforcer mongrels I usually see running around the sub don't have any clue what they're doing. So I decided to make this guide just outlining the enforcer.

Enforcer Job Description

Enforcer job description can be summed up into 2 main areas

1. Internal threats.
2. External threats.

Most guides fail to mention external threats at all, and this has led to the 'shitcurity stereotype': enforcers raid and breach into areas, confiscate anything and refuse to deal with any external threats. Bad enforcers can be more damaging than some griefers in this regard because they halt the progress of innocent people and refuse to help in any productive manner. Let's start with dealing with outdoor situations.

Exterior situations

As an enforcer, too many people neglect the fact they are the ones who should be using guns. Next time you spawn in as security, look at the job description for security on your clipboard and it will say that you're the one responsible for manning the guns. Think of it like this. Other jobs with responsibilities are hard at work, medics are busy crafting and saving lives and engineers and mechs should always be ready to repair. A large portion of the time you are most useful staying on guns, so stay on them, or at least try to be close enough to them for when a creature attacks.

Thresher or similar sized creature in a blind spot? Use your baton! A great method of elimination is stunning them with a baton, followed up by spamming a diving knife. Larger creatures are significantly more dangerous and some will be resistant to stunning, don't try it with them.

Some submarines have shuttles that have guns on them and you should be the proud gunner of it. Get at least one person to come with to pilot (you can bring another person along as a signaller/loader) and gun threats down you wouldn't normally be able to hit with the main sub's guns. The Aegir has a well stocked shuttle, with batteries, oxygen tanks and explosive ammunition.

There is another primary exterior task in the form of ruins. Enforcers shouldn't be pussymen, they should be the pointmen, going in first and illuminating rooms to assess threat levels and take out any hostile life, then relaying back to your expedition crew the status of an area. Therefore, bring lighting objects and flares. Always be the first to volunteer for expeditions, learn from experience. Trust me, you'll be a better player. One last thing, don't try to stun the guardians. Seriously, don't.

Internal Threats

External threats are easier to predict, you know they will come and you have a good idea of where they are. Such is not the case with people. You will likely encounter a different internal threat every other game, none the same. Most often, it will just be people arguing. If you aren't the greatest speaker, just try tell them to play the objective. If someone is doing their job wrong, try help them.

The major internal threats will be griefers if traitors is off. I want to keep it basic so I'll just say find out who the griefer is through chat logs and interrogation. Proceed to detain them/kill them. Detaining is ideal but rarely possible if they managed to get a gun, which is often. What you cannot do is randomly arrest people with little evidence and proceed to murder them. You are enforcing the law, not breaking it like a vigilante. Be better than that or you are just as bad as a griefer a lot of the time.

If there are traitors follow the same line as with griefers. However to prevent them breaking NLR and to get a secret message at the end of the game detain them instead and put them in brig for the whole game if you can be sure they are a traitor.

What I've seen a lot of 'shitcurity' do is destroy assets that can be used for evil. This is correct to do for items such as eggs, but I think it is incorrect to do this for toolkits. Toolkit's use for good far outweighs their use for crafting traitorous weapons, and even if it is deconstructed people can still craft knives and spear guns in the assembler. So don't do that.

The odds are when you are dealing with internal threats people will get injured. You have the second highest medical skill in the game! Also you get to see first hand what injures people generally, which aids in diagnosis. If you can stop bleeding on people before a medic arrives, many lives will be saved. Also due to high medical you are proficient in CPR. 1 shot of corri and CPR on a non bleeding target can heal most wounds. For more info check out my medical guide: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=9696

Thanks for reading! Note: enforcer is probably my fifth or sixth most played role so I am not as proficient in it as engineer or medic. Therefore I probably have a lot of bad basic strategies here or there are ones I missed. I'm open to criticism someone can share. We're all here to learn!

Appreciate the thoughtful post my dude, I am actually going to disagree with you regarding external threats however. I play as security a decent bit (I'm sure some would call me shitcurity lol) and I think good Security should prioritize internal security/task completion, and only man guns as needed. Once the ship is up and running Engineers and Mechanics (except maybe 1 who is using the fabricator) don't have a ton to do so they should be manning guns.


I think a security player should spend the bulk of a round doing the following:
1)Patrolling the ship to make sure nobody is griefing/being traitor
2)Ask idle crew members you spot to man guns/fix issues they may not be aware of. This is a VERY common problem I see where 2 players are just standing in a stairwell talking about random shit. I just politely ask them if they can man guns which they can do while chatting anyway. I view it as directing traffic and 90% of the time they are nice back and are now contributing more to the round.
3)Be prepared to fight boarding enemies (fucking shrimp) as your baton + a welder/blowtorch is hands down the safest way to kill them
4) In instances of major damage/flooding security should man guns so Engineers and Mechanics can repair


I always have a welder if there are spares as while patrolling you may spot minor damage you can fix on the spot. A couple other common practices I have when dealing with badly behaved players (griefers, traitors, and often just idiots) that I see many shitcurity players not doing:
1) Use your radio to say WHO did WHAT as soon as possible and announce that "Player name is under arrest for XYZ". This is SO SIMPLE but often not done and creates 'who-dunnit' scenes where the whole crew is gathered in Medical asking "why is X cuffed/Is security abusing people/revolution when?!?!" as the ship crashes and plummets to the abyss. Sharing this info alerts crew of possible traitors and lowers the overall tension of the crew as they understand what is happening
2) In cases where the evidence is thin or the crime minor - detain people temporarily and tell them you're doing so. Cuff them, lock them up, and tell them you just need a minute to investigate what happened/interview them and other crew but if they comply they will be released in a moment. Again, this eases tensions but also locks a possible threat up - you can watch them closely later.
3) Do not kill anyone. They may just respawn so you are better off with them rotting in prison
4) Protocol when arresting someone: remove radio and clothes from the cuffed perp, the radio allows them to stir shit/foment rebellion even when locked in a cell while the uniform makes them more look more "safe" to fellow crew so I find removing it makes other crew less sympathetic to the perp.


Hopefully this conversation continues and helps inform how Barotrauma players play Security - as you said in OP Security is really lacking in quality enforcers!

I would value engineer going on guns over mechanic when they are idling, as mechanic can stop the breaches but engineer only comes in play when there is a breach, or a teleglitch.

1. When traitors are on and there's a griefing problem, I do agree with patrolling, especially if there is more than 1 security.
2. Yes, if someone is thoroughly useless but trusted enough to go on guns, absolutely command them to. Especially if griefing is a problem or traitors is on. Ultimately that gives an extra person a job to do, which is great especially for seamen.
3. I completely agree, baton+welder counters a ton of enemies. The only exception is husk crawlers , while you can baton them with good timing it is often a good call to use a firearm. Often it is not worth the risk of infection.
4. Totally agree, if there is major breaches damage often cannot be fixed quick enough, so the threat needs to be eliminated ASAP.

I would say where possible carry welders. There are spares for a reason. Another thing you can carry is a private radio so you can discuss situations to command personnel in discretion. I forgot to mention about handheld radios in the guide.

1. Absolutely I do this as well regardless of class. Calling out a suspect can really help prevent them from causing damage. Most of the time however, I play pseudosecurity as engineer and craft a baton so I can stop perps, then call them out.
2. This sounds like a really good idea to do. 2 birds with one stone, eh?
3. Detaining is always better than elimination in my eyes.
4. This is very useful because a lot of traitors will adamantly defend their position when caught out and play the blame game.

I think this is the best discussion people have had about security in a while. It's important for players to have a good outline of what to play and this is some really helpful stuff.