How do prisoners obtain contraband?

[C4Warr10r]

This isn't entirely the stupid question it sounds like. I know the intel screen and where it says prisoners get contraban. But what if prisoners have never been to those areas? What if they haven't been outside their cells in ages?

In my prison, every single one of those sorry sots is in solitary. 2000+ hours for any offense. Prison was their second chance and they blew it. New arrivals never make it through the day with the detectors and dogs, and they are searched right there, taken straight to solitary.

So why is it every time I shake down the prison I find 900 contraban items on guys who haven't gone anywhere? I mean, I could understand maybe some utensils, (not that i'd allow them any) perhaps the guard who fed them wasn't paying attention somehow, but where would they get a friggin' power drill?

Kinda seems like the game just gives them those items based on something I can't control. That's fine, I suppose, but then it's not really allowing me to build my prison is it? Kinda seems like maybe the game wants me to play it a certain way.

Unless I'm missing something. Am I? I have to say, I have no idea what kind of future plans there are for this game beyond very nebulous assertions on the internet, but since it's been released (even as alpha) for so long it does appear that maybe there aren't going to be any major changes. Is there also going to be a staff search system? Or a loyalty mechanic? Maybe they should have named this "Correctional Facility Architect" or "Rehabilitation Workshop."

I don't know, but where are these toys coming from?

[Mansen]

There are a ton of methods to obtain contraband.

You have your obvious sources, like taking a spoon or a power tool with you from the canteen or workshop. And then you have less obvious ones, like breaking into a cleaning cupboard or infirmary for various poisons (or scalpels)

And then you have the ones you might not think about - Contraband can be thrown in from the outside if your fences aren't far out not enough to isolate the inmates. And they can have it smuggled in through kitchen supplies and such. Or pickpocket workers or gardeners.

There's a map overlay where you can see sources of contraband.

[C4Warr10r]

Originally posted by Mansen:

There are a ton of methods to obtain contraband.

You have your obvious sources, like taking a spoon or a power tool with you from the canteen or workshop. And then you have less obvious ones, like breaking into a cleaning cupboard or infirmary for various poisons (or scalpels)

And then you have the ones you might not think about - Contraband can be thrown in from the outside if your fences aren't far out not enough to isolate the inmates. And they can have it smuggled in through kitchen supplies and such. Or pickpocket workers or gardeners.

There's a map overlay where you can see sources of contraband.

I already mentioned those. My prisoners never go to those places. They are in solitary. Nobody ever sees them, so unless they're pickpocketing power drills off my guards.........thank you but it's not what I was looking for.

[Mansen]

You still have to feed inmates in solitary - They may have someone help them with smuggling in things.

[C4Warr10r]

Originally posted by Mansen:

You still have to feed inmates in solitary - They may have someone help them with smuggling in things.

Which would be fine if there was a mechanic for that. But I don't think there is. I think the game just creates items for them.

[Mansen]

Could be - I couldn't tell without access to debugging tools.

[C4Warr10r]

Originally posted by Mansen:

Could be - I couldn't tell without access to debugging tools.

My thanks, anyway. Perhaps someone will happen along who knows for sure.

[Qwar]

I think an important question is: Do you have a workshop at all, from where power drills at least could be supplied? Same for other items that don't come directly from the outside.

[C4Warr10r]

Originally posted by Qwar:

I think an important question is: Do you have a workshop at all, from where power drills at least could be supplied? Same for other items that don't come directly from the outside.

Hell no. They go straight to solitary. As I said, prison was their second chance. Couplke that with the game mechanic to make them lousy workers when supressed and I figured there was no point.

They do have a visitor center, not that any of them have ever been there. Again, first day in they always violate something and go to solitary. Even if the ones who just got here went and smuggled something they are searched right away, and it doesn't explain how guys who have been in solitary for weeks or months keep getting this stuff.

[zaabi1995]

Cant you check the Investigation screen to see the source of the items found?

[C4Warr10r]

Originally posted by zaabi1995:

Cant you check the Investigation screen to see the source of the items found?

Yes. Offices, the visitor center, the kitchens. But nobody ever gets to go to those places. I don't even give them laundry or cleaning closets, yet somehow they end up with poison.

Again, these guys are searched repeatedly, too. Once they're in solitary, they're in for good. They never go anywhere. Yet every time I do a shakedown, which is often nightly, I've got a ton of contrban coming from the cells. Not other places, either, I see where the markers flash up. Knives in kitchens and crap, sure, but then something like a power drill or a bunch of drugs turn up in the solitary cells.

The one thing they haven't shown up with is guns. Odd, since I have an armory, but no armed guards. I don't need them, I just built that junk for the Maxsec grant. They also keep showing up with dog collars, though I've never lost a K-9 unit.

Honestly, I am baffled by how this comes to pass, though I appreciate all the attempts to help.

[Qwar]

Hmm you could try this: Shakedown and cancel all food. Keep them like that for as long as you can, then shakedown again. See if they got things anyway.

[DigitalImpostor]

Detectors and dogs aren't guaranteed to find items on a prisoner, and prisoners can trade contraband with each other.

[C4Warr10r]

Originally posted by Qwar:

Hmm you could try this: Shakedown and cancel all food. Keep them like that for as long as you can, then shakedown again. See if they got things anyway.

Good suggestion, I've already tried it, after a fashion. At any given time roughly twelve of my prisoners are in need of medical attention. They collapsed from starvation, since the guards simply will not feed them properly, despite an abundance of meals and guards, not to mention allowing three hours each for two meals a day. Some prisoners, they just ignore. Not sure why, maybe a bug.

They do drag those prisoners to the infirmary, otr the doctors take care of it and yet those same jack-holes will occassionally turn up with something they had no way of obtaining. Power drills being the big one. It's actually what finally set me off to make this post.

The only thing I can think of at this point is that maybe the game just spawns random drops of weapons like it does for escape mode. Or at least what I assume is random. I'd have to test much more. Still very new here, kind of hoping to avoid that. If it isn't that, then the game is spawning weapons, which sabotages its own mechanic.

I'll give mass starvation a try and see how that works out. Not fond of the idea, but I guess I asked to make the omlette.

[Mansen]

Originally posted by DigitalImpostor:

Detectors and dogs aren't guaranteed to find items on a prisoner, and prisoners can trade contraband with each other.

That's true - It is theoretically possible that he's been able to hit it in his... uh... openings for all of this time. Now I wonder if he also bothered to bring along an extension coord, or at least a big battery.

[veryinky]

Originally posted by C4Warr10r:

Yes. Offices, the visitor center, the kitchens. But nobody ever gets to go to those places. I don't even give them laundry or cleaning closets, yet somehow they end up with poison.

The items are smuggled in to the items brought into the prison, prisoner clothing, food, even furniture. I have several dogs and 10 guards in my delivery room and they don't find half the stuff my confidential informants show. Tracking on the intelligence screen I saw a power drill being smuggled in by cargo truck on a crate of prisoner clothing, which got taken to the laundry which got delivered to a prisoner in my protected custody wing (which is a sealed environment). A screwdriver got smuggled in a crate of potatoes to the kitchens, which somehow ended up in the general population even though none of my prisoners have kitchen access. I'm guessing it put into one of the meals and was delivered.

When you click on an item's icon in the 24h or 7day tracking in the intelligence screen, it shows you the chain of trades, all the way to how it got into the prison in the first place.

Wish there was a way to grow food in the prison, it'd plug up one of main contraband sources for my prison.