Garnascus

The following is a topic i have flipped my opinion on a number of times in my tenure as staff here. Every now and then a new discussion starts concerning their outright removal or at best a rework of them. A screenshot of a forum post made by me lambasting them is usually used as evidence. If the title of this thread is any indication not only do i no longer subscribe to the fact that loyalty implants are awful abominations i in fact am making the case that they are a benefit to our server. I hold such an opinion based on the following two points. 1. Loyalty implants embolden the dystopian and amoral mega-corporation setting we have cultivated. One only has to read a few sentences into our wiki page article for Nanotrasen to understand this. The company most of our characters work for has been involved in illegal human experiments, essentially buying entire governments, funding and being involved in various species wars to suit its own needs and of course installs a chip into the head of its captains that essentially amounts to mind control. I like this setting and i believe the conflict it generates provides the resources necessary to create a wide range of different types. Perhaps your character was specifically affected by one of these events and they have an opinion on it. It is far easier i think to have to consider these things when one of the examples are in almost every round. That captain or head of security barking orders at you might just be a corporate slave. 2. It provides a certain level of consistency in the chain of command If we examine rounds holistically it is empirically obvious that the captain and the head of security are the most powerful single individuals on the station. The captain himself can literally subvert and even override corporate regulations in extreme situations, which is essentially every round if we are being honest. The HoS is in charge of the department that becomes the focus for most rounds on account of the inherent nature of antagonists and the conflict they create. In my opinion the most intuitive way to think of the implant is that is locks you to a "Lawful" Alignment. Every captain can be reasonably expected to observe the proper procedures for this or that because they have a chip in their head reminding them. Every HoS likewise has a certain level of conduct that can be reasonably expected of them due to the spooky mind control chip in their head. I believe that given the enormous power and authority these positions have it is a benefit to have the playing field be leveled a certain way. I will now do my best to respond to a few common counter arguments that i see. My intention is not to strawman or act in bad faith here. If you believe i am not accurately representing or responding to a certain point please bring it up here. It is entirely possible i am ignorant of one or the other as this is not a comprehensive list. 1. The loyalty implant erodes my ability to create the character i want to create. I agree with this one because it is true. The loyalty implant essentially makes certain character types impossible or incredibly implausible. I would argue however that while the implant does provide a narrower spectrum from which to create your character you still have a large degree of choice within that spectrum. I will keep using DnD examples because it is the most intuitive i feel. If we work from the example that an implant restricts you to a "lawful" alignment it is still completely possible to be a "lawful neutral" character or another flavor. So it is possible to support nanotrasen and their practices because they are the ultimate form of justice or perhaps they are the ultimate way to acquire wealth and power or perhaps they are simply the best company to work for. Our wiki also states the following This provides your character an out to do some niche and outlandish things in extreme situations. So theoretically you could beat a crew member to death because he murdered your wife or something. 2. The level of expectations for the conduct of captains and HoS's exist only on paper. In reality they vary wildly in quality. This argument is almost certainly true on at least some level. I acknowledge fully that any value we set in the rules or the wiki is always going to be how we ought operate. It is a constant battle as the admin and mod team to ensure our server remains as close as possible. I like to think that we do a reasonably good job and that while outliers exist they are just that, outliers. 3. Your first argument is predicated on a lore setting we ought abandon This argument is rarer but i have seen a few people try to make it. Perhaps you believe that we should change our setting such that nanotrasen are "the good guys" and everybody ELSE is horrible and amoral. Maybe that explains the presence of antagonists on our station. Its a completely fair opinion to have and its not impossible i may end up agreeing with it. I acknowledge that if we changed our setting so radically that LI would become obsolete. So thats that. That is why i think the way i do about loyalty implants. If you've managed to read this far about my opinion its only fair you take the time to post here so that i can read a little bit about yours.

They are changing the specific wording of the ban message to better reflect your actions. They did not change it to a warning. Wrong You have over sixty notes that say otherwise.

Understandable. I could have handled this a bit better. I will take this into consideration for next time.

Good because i am now tired of looking at this. I banish it to the archive.

Please do not remove any more tools that antags have to actually be stealthy.

Dont do this Let me be absolutely clear here. The issue here is not the efficiency with which they can get these things done. Its entirely possible and permitted to be good at the game. What is an issue is doing it just to do it. And then just winging it which naelynn has conceded she has done and i assume will no longer do because i am asking nicely @Naelynn

Ok scratch my last sentence its @Alberyk

Well correct me if i am wrong but in your original post you claimed that naelynn stole all of the contents of the armory and then crushed them in the crusher. Naelynn claims that she did not steal all of them. Just the ions and the shotguns and left the lasers. Considering she was an autakh and that shrapnel is a death sentence this seems like pretty reasonable antag play to me. What i meant to say when i made that comment is that antags GENERALLY need to follow this formula 1. they consider a gimmick and decide on one if they want to 2. They engage in some preparation time. Getting weapons, disabling machines, causing some distractions or engaging in sabotage against specific portions of the station. 3. They essentially "go loud". This can mean something like THE WIZARD ENACTS HIS GRAND PLAN TO STEAL THE SM or THE HEAD OF PERSONNEL ARRIVES AT THE BRIDGE WITH HIS MILITIA TO MUTINY AGAINST THE CAPTAIN. During this step is when the LARGE SCALE conflict is usually going to happen. Sec will get guns and move to pacify, command will raise alert and give orders and things of that nature. 4. The "conflict" continues with casualties and damage on both sides until a crew transfer, until one side "wins" or an emergency is called. This is not objective and its entirely possible for rounds to flip back and forth a little bit between phases. So from this i consider robbing portions of the armory or sneaking in to steal the captains spare ID to be reasonably obvious prep work for antags. I would not really be able to give a good answer to that question. I acknowledge that there can generally be some grains of truth in the reputation a player gets regarding their play. It is also possible to be knowledgeable of this game's mechanics and various nuances and be able to apply them such that you end up "winning" most conflict encounters. I recall our very own alberyk getting many many ahelps on his security play for exactly this reason. At the very LEAST though it is something worth investigating. That's fair to say though i think i would counter a bit that relying only on the manifest can be a little tricky at times. I mean i am sure we have all seen the situations of "oh wow suddenly three security guards showed up! how convenient!" This of course is acceptable to do but im empathetic on the part of the antag who now would have to think "oh shit now i have to go back and get rid of the ion because its an hour into the round and they have a good reason to shoot me with it ahasajskhdga" I think this can be a really good point. Let me give some vague examples as far as our administration goes. There have been certain players who in our server's time got REALLY good at doing a select number of things. The point where they could speedrun the armory, hack doors and steal a whole load of stuff in like 20 minutes. This is "kinda" fine but the problem we ran into is these players then..... kinda didnt really have a good idea on what to do after that. They would just kinda walk around and OF COURSE someone will try to stop them and then of course they have a reason to kill them. No real grand goal no real thought out directive. If it gets to the point where you're just checking things off like this is a quest in an RPG i do agree we have a problem. On this basis we have taken action against people. @geeves @Naelynn What are your guys thought's on all of the above? Naelynn specifically i would ask you honestly if when you engage in this "efficient prep" do you do it with some... goal in mind or some gimmick or a specific target? Or do you just kind of feel things out and "wing it"? I think the former can be fine and the latter is a problem. I am going to get another staff member to read this over and see what they think. Dunno who yet its 10 Am cut me some slack.

With naelynn's clarification this seems to have been fine. Well i mean that is really how antags generally need to operate. Any gimmick or thing you do is necessarily going to provoke conflict. That is why your role exists. So then that means security is going to try to stop you with force. If you overpower them or you harm their ability to do so you have a greater chance of getting done what you want to do. We have specific rules against murderboning and the like but i really do not feel like this is against the rules. I mean does naelynn intentionally start shit with people after shes disarmed just so she can kill half the station? I could understand an issue with that tbh.

I will look over this tonight

Spot filled once again. We have no openings at this time.

Ok sorry i am finallly over a cold so i can take a closer look at this. So, i feel like this is unfortunately an IC issue. I do not feel that the logs say that the chemist denied them based off of OOC mistrust. It might even be fair to say that asking for these drugs at round start would be a little powergamey. Realistically i think i would have preferred an ahelp but that is a minor issue.

Dont remember who the CMO was but i do recall @Azande was playing as the AI. Who probably saw even more than i did.

I do not think this is correct. I watched you and most of the sec force follow them around for most of the round. Two faxes where sent and the AI and the CMO both verified them with station announcements. That is all you need to know IC to follow their orders. You where ordered to disarm many times. Refusing to do so was mutiny. I think this argument only works with the context that the redsuit guys are antags and you immediately know that OOC when you see them. Thus your reasoning becomes motivated. Which is exactly what i feel the security department was doing this round. If you had not followed the mercs around all through out the shift being extremely aggressive then i might buy that. One officer even tried to suggest the AI was subverted when it declared the merc team's legitimacy. Refusing to hand over weapons is mutiny. Mutiny is not a medium-level crime.

We currently have one spot open. Hit me up on discord if you are interested. PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU CAN COMMIT TO THE REQUIRED TIME AND OTHER REQUIREMENTS! We are currently deep into a campaign. Your character will start at level 5

Cool beans. This is accepted and the ban is lifted.

@Garuhn You will not take your anger to OOC, LOOC or ahelps in the future?

Hello i will be taking this. Domination between two lesser vampires is mechanically restricted. Domination from a fully powered vampire to a lesser vampire is not mechanically restricted. @Aboshedab has told me this is the relevant bit of code. I think it is fair of me to understand where you are coming from in your frustration over this. That of course does not excuse what i imagine where a few choice words on your part. Considering that the fault originally lies with us i am willing to lift this ban with your assurance that the next time a cooler head shall prevail on your part. Is that acceptable?

Hello I am sorry man but i feel like you're assuming we acted in bad faith here. I do not believe that is the case. You have simply just been given too many chances and we do not want to risk it again for our server. I know that sucks. I do not think drago made up a story. What it seems happened is drago originally wanted to unban you but alb overruled her. Which is of course his prerogative and given your history i am afraid i have to concur.

Combat in this game revolves around stuns. This is an undeniable fact. The damage you can deal and the tools you have at your disposable all serve to one single conclusion. I need to get my opponent horizontal. That means i win. Antagonists that rely on secrecy and subversion REQUIRE access to a stun in their kit or in the case of changeling a temporary stun immunity. That being said the cult stun talisman is objectively the strongest stun in the entire game. It has absolutely no counter. It goes through armor and it even mutes the victim. Its cost is negligible and due to cult zombies each spawning with a FULL talisman of charges it is very easy to farm an unlimited amount of them. Cult absolutely needs access to this stun in some way but the ease with which they can get it and the supreme power it has is probably not healthy.

I will look into this over the next few days. I do have one question though. Ok but WHY? Why did you have reason to believe that the AIs excuse of a "faulty monitor" was at all suspect? Why did you check the cameras of the other cyborg? Seems a little like motivated reasoning to me.

I can take a look at this sunday morning.

Cool beans. I will archive this in 24 hours. Ive done an everyone mentions on our admin channel so that they can all read this.

Hello So to start off i want to state some initial observations i have. 1. Its not against the rules to vote-sway 2. It is in theory reasonable to premise a second vote if the old one was predicated on wrong or incorrect information As an example lets say we have a vote on if we have apples or oranges for lunch. The vote passes 29-11 in favor of oranges. However after checking our stores we find out that we are all out of oranges and instead have only avocados. It is reasonable in this instance to start a second vote on having avocado's or apples for lunch. Given this line of logic I am afraid i do not find myself agreeing that this was a reasonable situation in which to call a second vote. We do not have this written down anywhere but here are the following vague rules as far as doing events goes. These rules are explicitly stated to every administrator upon their promotion. 1. Call a custom vote the round prior briefly describing the event. If it passes you're good to go. 2. You are STRONGLY ENCOURAGED to take into account the will of the people. Number 2 requires a little bit of explanation. Lets say i want to an insanely chaotic and combat oriented event. The event barely passes at something like 12-11. Let us also say that there are about 56 people online. We can gather two important pieces of information from this. One in that the vote was VERY CLOSE and that the majority of people did not vote. While it is not a hard line rule to not do the event most experienced administrators would say the wise thing to do would be to not do the event. I would agree. I feel that the presence of a second vote here did not reasonably fulfill the conditions required for a second vote and that they undermined the premise upon which we call votes to begin with. Going forward i am going to have to ask our administrators that they call one vote and only one vote. Am i missing anything or does this resolution address this complaint?

I dunno, i am skeptical but like i said i do not play medical. I would not mind seeing a test merge.