Eliot Clef

Oliver Roadman has been a staple character of Aurora station ever since I started playing here. You're pretty laid-back, you don't cause problems, and in general I have nothing but positive things to say about you. You are the kind of person who should be a Head of Staff. +1

My admittedly limited exposure to Hypatia over my last few days on Aurora has been dominantly positive. I haven't really seen any lunacy out of her, and her behavior in the rounds where we've been in security together (which coincide with these complaints) has been plenty reasonable. There's been way more aggressive people than her in there on the regular during my time here, and I don't think any of them have eaten a ban.

Hello! I was the borg who released the N2O, and consulted staff afterwards on my actions. I didn't release that gas "just to win", and I didn't like that it took so long to get you sorted out. You guys had taken the HoS captive, and while I hung back and tried to figure out what was going on my fellow borg (I forget his name) rolled in and tried to help the HoS. As far as I could tell, he did so non-violently, attempting to uncuff. I saw said borg get flashed and start getting beaten. Given that revolution was your goal and you'd executed it successfully at that point, this wasn't really unreasonable. But I realized that if I tried to interfere that would doubtlessly happen to me and that every single one of you was armed with a flash, and at that point it was verified that you guys were very hostile and that there wasn't much I could do under normal circumstances. I released the prison system N2O as the only action I thought I could take that might conceivably allow me to free the Head of Security. I felt kind of bad and thought I might have gone too far, but when I consulted staff on whether or not I screwed up, I was told by Garn: Seems to me like you just out-maneuvered them. So while I understand angry and disappointed reactions, between my possible actions of: 1) Release N2O and probably succeed, 2) Attempt a rescue I knew was VERY doomed, 3) Retreat from the scenario and admit defeat, I don't think what I did was any more play-to-win than the ambush of the HoS itself.

The percentage value for activating a Power is almost completely irrelevant, because block injectors always give you the activated trait.

Honestly, how many times have you been killed by a hulk, though? If you go back six months to a year, this was a semi-common problem. Non-regulars from low RP servers would show up messing about, get Hulk, and go on a rampage that required them to be put down by lethals. I eventually learned that while they can't get stunned normally, they can be blinded by flash to put them off their murder-game, which makes apprehending them feasible. I don't know how often people were killed, but it was pretty common to get knocked around pretty decently at the time. These days, random people don't show up as often causing problems as Geneticists. Key word, "As often." We recently had a round where a Geneticist hulked himself and a bunch of Assistants out with predictable results. I don't know if anybody got killed then, but I know those Hulks did hurt a few people during their short-lived rampage. On a more funny note, we had a xeno round where the Geneticist hulked himself out and punched an alien queen across a room. That was pretty great.

I think we should just acknowledge that I'm thick as a castle wall when it comes to picking up sarcasm over the internet.

If you want my opinion, it's that open OOC hatred towards any class of players isn't okay, and can be quite taxing on said players when they're constantly exposed to it. It's very tiring to be constantly closely scrutinized and abused by people if you play Security. I've gotten bwoinked half a dozen times from some screaming asshole complaining about getting arrested, and only once has it been something the Admins suggested was iffy. And even then, only when I went out of my way to ask the Admin their thoughts on my behavior, they didn't actually go out of their way to tell me or get me to stop.

+1 I can only second Killerhurtz. Sophia's a good Warden, she'll make a good HoS.

This is because I am an idiot and somehow didn't realize what the Report button was, but admittedly, I probably would have thought that it bears discussing anyway. Last time I tried to draw Mod attention to something I ended up just PMing the Mod group.

Quartermaster is not a Head, though it has responsibility over Cargo. It's not whitelisted/restricted.

Frances, if you say they're both 100% joking, then I believe you. And I'm going to have to admit that I'm feeling... I don't know, particularly guarded lately? People have been a bit unreasonable recently, and I guess it's put me on edge. To be perfectly honest, I enjoy black humor, and if I knew Storyteller (and I guess spacevoidagent) then I might not have thought this looked like it was just being nasty. Legitimate extremism in action and parody can be difficult to separate, and I suppose I'm not assuming the best of people at the moment.

BYOND Key: Aedan Player Byond Key: spacevoidagent, The Storyteller (presumed, forum name) Staff involved: N/A, this complaint is forum-centric, although the effects of it do extend into the game itself, the complaint will not cover anything there as I have no recent logs. Reason for complaint: As you are doubtless aware, there is currently a bit of controversy on the subject of Tajarans. Many people are upset with the behavior of Tajarans in-game, for a variety of reasons. Some of them think they've exceeded the bounds of lore, and some Tajarans have. Some others dislike "Furries" categorically, and that is their reason for voting against them. Others still are, for whatever reason, very hostile to non-humans OOCly as well as ICly. And therein lies the rub. People have begun to express extremely nasty, hateful sentiments to all Tajaran players. Not just along the lines of, "Obey your lore!", but going on insane hyperbolic rants suggesting that they believe the Lore should not only be completely accurate concerning X inferiority, but that we're not going far enough with the measures that are being proposed. I have highlighted spacevoidagent and The Storyteller here, but I am absolutely certain they're not the only people expressing this sentiment, publicly or privately. An example from spacevoidagent: An example from The Storyteller: It seems to me based on the contents of this thread, his actions in-game (samples of which can be seen here >> http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=3661&start=20 << , his statements in OOC (which most unfortunately I can't quote reliably), that spacevoidagent at least is not merely spewing joking hyperbole. I am less certain of The Storyteller's motivations, but the net outward result is the same. Comically vitriolic behavior is being aimed at Tajaran players, by people who do not appear to me as if they would ever give positive input on Tajarans, regardless of what has occurred. It may well be isolated to these two, but I don't know, and I think it bears looking at. The Storyteller in particular even admits that he hasn't been around recently, having last posted in July, and yet he sees fit to express an incredibly hateful opinion with regards to Tajarans. Not just that, but both newish (Zidaniyah) players and well-established players that I consider friends (Ryfer) tagged Storyteller's post positively, in effect cheering on this conduct. The purpose of this complaint is to ask the administration of Aurora Station: Is this truly acceptable behavior? Is this really something people should be doing and cheering on? Should we really be encouraging people to vocally fantasize about subjugation and the genocide of people's favored characters, not merely in these circumstances, but at all? I find these exchanges to be mildly disturbing, and I'm not even a Tajaran player. Approximate Date/Time: Variable, post times can be viewed throughout the complaint. Mostly this complaint has risen as a result of the Cats in Command thread here >> http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=73&t=3652 << which was posted on September 17th, 2015, at 7:19 P.M.

Because not all opinions and ideas are valid or worthy of consideration, and input this destructive to a sizable minority's play experience lies in that category.

Ok. I'm just going to disregard the fact that I dislike paperwork as well for a minute, especially Genetics paperwork. You all already know my fairly irrational opinion about this subject from this thread. You are seriously comparing "getting permission to do potentially dangerous stuff" to involuntary ERP, and painting anybody who does paperwork as a knob. I don't like paperwork. I don't like enforced racism, or restricting the freedom of players more than is absolutely necessary for the RP server to function as an RP server. But I abide by the rules and cultural norms that I disagree with, and this is where you're failing here. You came here, insulted what is arguably our target player base, and claimed you're not the one being a dick while openly refusing to abide by our social norms when you didn't get the response you wanted out of us. The lack of self-awareness is staggering.

I'm aware. You're not "formally" banned, but you'll get thumped/bwoinked for doing it if you don't go straight to cryo. I don't think there should be restrictions, and where restrictions exist they should be exceptions if people seek them out, is what I'm saying.

I don't agree with limiting races at all, even if that means we have to come up with a reason why Aurora is different from the rest of the setting. If races have to be limited, I think there should be exceptions to those restrictions as there have been in the past. Unfortunately (in my opinion), the movement to restrict nonhumans + nonskrell is too big to make arguing for complete freedom viable in a community that makes decisions like this democratically without regard to the validity of reasons behind popular opinion, so I am more inclined to argue for restrictions with exceptions. You are completely correct though, insofar as I am concerned. I don't actually care what the lore says about the various races, I think that denying people Head whitelists based on character race is a shame and a waste.

I'm in agreement with this. Genetics as it currently stands brings a lot of headaches to HRP management, and the possibilities it brings for legitimate roleplay just don't seem to be worth the attached cost. For the people who are afraid of losing their characters, it'd be easy for them to keep the same background (or a relatively similar one) and fill them under a medical job with cloning + organ printing access (biologists). I'm not sure what "serious" roleplaying of a geneticist entails but I'm pretty sure turning people into telekinetic superheroes or angry green men isn't a major part of it. Ugh. It pains me to come around to this, but I have to agree that with as contested as Genetics/Geneticist is, and as often as people just break into the cloning lab to clone people, it does make a lot of sense to just get rid of Genetics and leave behind a cloning bay.

I have heard stories of Ninjas being thwarted violently with remote viewing/x-ray and telekinesis.

I actually agree with the consensus that Tajarans should be at least a little more restricted, buuuut I think I disagree with you that this isn't significantly supported by blind or heavily emotionally charged negative bias. Tajarans are "furries" and are regarded negatively by the broader population involved in games like this (including myself before I got to know the people who played them) which will probably include newer players in general. Some of our players have expressed a belief that the in-character prejudices should not merely be in place, they should be completely true/accurate! Sue thinks this about IPCs/Robots, or did the last time we discussed this (I think, apologies if I'm misremembering this), and spacevoidagent seems to think the racism towards Tajarans should be justified. (I can't tell how much he's actually like this and how much he's just being deliberately hyperbolic, he says some pretty inflammatory things in-game.) So, I can't actually agree for certain that a lot of these opinions are actually reasonably founded. Some people seem to just want humans/organics/etc. to be truly special/elevated instead of merely at an advantage due to present circumstances.

Your motivation for this suggestion is an important part of how much the suggestion should be weighed, at least in my opinion. You've made it clear that this suggestion is a direct consequence of the current discussion on Tajarans, and also that you disapprove of that discussion and regard it as wildly unfair. You frame your suggestion as fair, but let's really take a look at what you're trying to do. The thread in which the relevant debate is ongoing is here >> http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=73&t=3652 << Incidentally, this debate is not yet resolved, even if the most "favorable" outcome for Tajarans is effectively impossible at this point. The end result will, unquestionably, be either Tajarans having their jobs rendered more restricted re: Head roles, or possibly being stripped of Head eligibility at all. The two winning options are: * Tajarans require extra screening/applications to become Heads. This denies them casual entry, but allows exceptional Tajarans to still serve. * Tajarans are stripped of Head eligibility altogether. The effect this has is that Tajarans are denied six very specific roles, and are not locked out of any departments. Your suggestions are as follows: Unathi: Stripped of Head, Security, and Research roles. This means a loss of: Warden, Detective, Forensics, Officer, IAA, Security Cadet, Scientist, Xenobiologist, Roboticist, arguably Geneticist, Head of Security, CMO, HoP, RD, CE. Total loss: 15 jobs. IPCs: Stripped of Security, Medical, and IAA, as well as essentially all Head roles because all Heads have access to sensitive information/records. This means loss of: Warden, Detective, Forensics, Officer, IAA, Security Cadet, Scientist, Xenobiologist, Roboticist, Doctor, EMT, Chemist, Geneticist, Psychiatrist, Research Director, CMO. Total loss: 16 jobs. Because Tajarans may or may not be removed from six whitelisted roles (and no departments at all), you're arguing that it would only be fair for IPCs and Unathi to be divested of not merely the roles they're most effective (and arguably, desirable) at, but half to over half of the roles in the game? What you're proposing is hypocritical on a personal level, wildly more crippling than the decision that has not yet been made regarding Tajaran whitelist eligibility, and spiteful to boot.

It's worse because you actively disagree with doing this, and are making this suggestion in direct response to an issue you have a clear personal stake in. "Counter-attacking" out of what I can only guess is spite is... distasteful.

In defense of his protest, a lot of people thinking something doesn't make that something right. That's a pretty big problem democratic processes have: As long as a bunch of people believe a stupid thing, it can become "law" no matter how lacking in merit it actually is. As I said, I don't play a Tajaran, and I don't really have a personal stake in this. But I can see where he's coming from.

Let's set aside the idea for a moment and look back on the thread you've been protesting in. Don't you think it's a little hypocritical to feel persecuted based on mob mentality and, therefore, make an emotional plea for everyone else to be persecuted worse?

You should listen to Loow, because what he told you is exactly what the admins are likely to pick apart as implausible. EDIT: Furthermore, if you were playing this background and people actually noticed it, you'd probably end up arrested and demoted pretty fast.

I actually agree that these polls aren't the best way to be deciding these sort of things*, but what I personally would prefer is wholesale allowing everyone to be anything, and if there MUST be restrictions to allow exceptions to those restrictions. This community, however, has (or so I was told) been founded on community consensus-based decisions, which means that "mob mentality" which can include all sorts of incredibly stupid opinions that shouldn't be validated by influencing major decisions, can count towards sweeping changes like this. The will of the community, whether they state their reasons or no, whether those reasons or valid by reasonable measurements or no, is heavily on the side of curtailing Tajarans in some way. That is how this community works, and I don't think it's unfair at all insofar as the system is working as intended. But I do think that the "Tyranny of the Majority" is in effect here in a bad way, and I think a significant number of people are most likely voting for emotionally charged reasons related to a strong antipathy against furries. In conclusion: I will say in fairness that I don't play a Tajaran, but my favored race (IPC) has been shafted a bit in an inconvenient and impractical way, so I can sympathize with feeling maligned concerning community decisions that have a negative impact on the player experience. * Most of the roleplaying communities I've been involved with are essentially benevolent dictatorships. Determining things like this by vote is unthinkable in the communities I've been in, even if input is sought from the community to some measure.