[Elwood Johnson's 32nd Marines Regiment flag]

BYOND Key: Ublicto

Discord Username: GalacticEmpireLover

Character Name: Elwood Johnson

Item Name: Solarian Marines 32nd Regiment Flag

 

Item Function(s): It's a flag of a Solarian military unit. It should have no difference mechanically from a normal flag.

Item Description: A flag representing the Solarian Marines 32nd Regiment. The text on the left of the flag is the motto of the unit, "Always ready, always loyal." On the right the year "2461" is written.

Why is your character bringing this item to work?: They were in the 32nd Regiment during their last years of military service, and the unit itself means a lot considering that it was made up in large part by 33rd marines which did not join the SRF and fought on the side of the Alliance government.

How did your character obtain this item?: They were part of the unit.

What value does this item have to your character, and what story does it tell?: It's a representation of a lot of their values and something they take a lot of pride in. Even though they're out of the military and nearing retirement the flag to them represents many of the principles they chose to live by as well as part of their personal history.

Sprites: attached to this post, there is only one. Folded there's no reason it shouldn't look like every other flag does.

Additional Comments: None

32nd_Regiment_flag.dmi

[Add sensors back to non-job clothing.]

2 minutes ago, Noble Row said:

Personally I believe this server has an unintended culture of OOCly punishing antags more than their IC nature. I know too many players who don't play antag, or don't want to try to play antag, because they're afraid of being bwoinked, or ridiculed. Hell, the term 'Antag main' is used in a derogatory sense half the time. And we antag ban so many people because we have strict quality rules for antag rp. OOCly is where the adjustments need to be made, and anything IC feels like shots in the dark or band-aids for the much much larger issue.

This is another excellent point. I frequently find that antag teams tend to be a mixed bag and the number of skilled people willing to play antag regularly is limited. I feel like a formalization of existing rules which aren't clear or a change to the rules regarding the way antag players are moderated would be positive here but that's something the staff team must discuss.

[Add sensors back to non-job clothing.]

I am solidly in support of this change. Nerfing sensors makes it much better to play antags such as ling and will decrease the reliance on certain less fun traitor tools. It opens up a lot for antagging and is a very positive change. First responder before this was one of the most oppressive roles for a ling and having two FRs was worse in many ways than having more sec. However, I do think adding sensors back to non-work uniforms would be a positive change and I dislike tying suit sensors to alert level because this incentivizes raising the alert level whenever any crew anywhere could be in danger. Instead I think the tracking level of suit sensors should be totally removed and the highest level should be vitals which can be available at all times. The other changes I have no criticisms of because to me they are very positive, especially taking sensors off PDAs and tablets.

[[ACCEPTED] Commendation Report 12/3/2023]

Reporting Personnel: Maximilian Burns

Job Title of Reporting Personnel: Captain

Game ID: cq6-dCq8

Commended Personnel:

Jamari Sauter - Chef

Gregory Digson - Bartender

Witnesses:

Maximilian Burns, Captain - Attended feast and saw large assortment of beverages and excellent food prepared.

Cordia Caladius, Executive Officer - Organized feast and spoke highly of the preparations Sauter and Digson made for it, as well as the end result.

Xuq Gir-Loveq, Research Director - Observed the feast and spoke highly of both Sauter and Digson's work.

 

Time of Commendable Act: 00:40

Real Time: 8:00 EST

Location of Act: Holodeck Alpha

Overview:

Chef Sauter in cooperation with Bartender Digson prepared a large feast for the Dominian Feast of Rewnewal. Despite neither of them being Dominian themselves they put above and beyond effort into it and prepared a wide variety of dishes and drinks. They spent two days before the feast preparing and provided an excellent experience for the entire crew. Seeing as how both went above and beyond to raise crew morale and encourage a spirit of cooperation among a culturally diverse crew it is my opinion, and the opinion of the other heads of staff present for the shift including the organizer of the feast Executive Officer Cordia Caladius that both Chef Jamari Sauter and Bartender Gregory Digson deserve a formal commendation and all associated benefits for their efforts.

Additional Notes:

None

[post screenshots that make you go hmm]

[Feedback for Command Remap (Not bridge).]

Two consulars is a great ideal. Opening up the command department to more people and making it less 'sectioned off' from the ship is excellent as well.

[Ublicto's Human Lore Deputy Application]

On 23/11/2023 at 00:44, TheBurninSherman said:

Hi, pardon the delay on these questions. I've had some personal events delay these for you and all other applicants. I will ask you three questions, the first I will ask to all applicants and the latter two will be tailored to your application specifically. Consider these questions as being from both myself and my deputy.

1. On balance, how do you see the Human Lore of the server being different with you than without you; what is something that only you bring to the table as a deputy?

2. We've received some criticisms from the community before about focusing too heavily on government or military lore, as some in the community feel that it is too detached from their characters. This is a compound question: how would you make the government lore of the various factions have a place on the ship and in the lives of player crew characters without making it intrusive, and similarly, what are aspects of human lore that you would want to write about/develop that are not related to the government lore?

3. A lot of the arcs you've proposed here seem rather confrontational. A complaint that arcs ran by the lore teams in general have received before are that arcs are too combat heavy and result in too many deaths. Do you have any ideas for future content which may address this concern or future arcs that might not involve conflict between the various factions in the setting?

1. When compared to a lot of the other applicants I think I would offer a different level of depth to human lore. While many of their ideas are good and deserve implementation, I feel as if my suggestions for expansions in the lore and story arcs would make the Aurora universe feel more lived-in and give new meaning to many of the identities and ideas characters on the Horizon have. Having the Horizon participate in a lore arc as a minor element or even only observing the effects of the arc through a series of events and mini-events that have low to moderate stakes would encourage character development influenced by ongoing lore while also creating a solid middle ground between the Horizon being the center of the universe and just another space ship. A lot of the broader world-changing lore changes I support would also make the values and cultures of the characters on the Horizon more diverse. Another applicant has raised the fact that a lot of the lore is "Americentric" because 21st century American culture is treated as the default and they are absolutely correct. Aurora is heavily influenced by the cyberpunk genre which in turn reflects the concerns of Americans from the 1980s both in terms of foreign economic dominance and machines taking over from humans (a concern today as well). The changes I have said I would make in my application would do the most to change that I think.

Among all applicants, I think the changes and new lore I would make would do the most to make Aurora's universe more unique and engaging for players.

 

2. Consulars are an excellent way to bring in geopolitics and for a while now I have thought we should have at least two slots for them. Besides that, I have said that I want to increase the cultural differences across the Aurora universe. I generally dislike how the baseline for culture in Aurora is 21st century American culture and am interested in taking different directions in different ways. While Biesel might be more "21st century" than the others, I think most of humanity should feel as different from us in our version of 500 years in the future as our ancestors were 500 years ago from now. In particular I think the implications of a lot of cultural practices are not explored. How would Eridani society sustain itself when societies that put career success above everything else right now suffer from demographic crisis? How would the genetic engineering of elite Dominians affect the population? Would it deprive them of whatever social mobility could exist for them in a society like Dominia? Maybe gene-boosted primaries have to be sectioned off from society because they're so resented by everyone else that excessive public exposure risks mob violence against them? How would the hyper-militarism of Gadpathur affect what jobs and communities its exiles organize. Maybe there are Gadpathurian exile mercenary companies because the only job skill many exiles might have is being a soldier.

 

3. I think my Elyra-Dominia arc could be as dangerous for the Horizon as the event organizers would like to make it. There could be away missions with little combat that focus mostly on engineering and medical, or there could be high intensity away missions where some faction mistakes the Horizon for their enemy or otherwise tries to force it or its away team away from something important.

 

If we want to avoid combat or confrontation between factions however it might be best to focus on a diplomatic arc. It would be interesting for the Horizon to carry a Solarian delegation to a diplomatic meeting in the Republic of Biesel or carry a Bieselite delegation into Solarian space. I'm sure many would like to visit Earth as part of a peaceful event. The Horizon could also participate in a cooperative mission with the Coalition, Elyrans, Dominians, or any other power to find something of mutual interest to both the SCC and that power. Regardless of what is done I would like to see the Horizon be part of a larger story rather than the subject of the entire story or a bystander. Players should feel as if their characters live in the setting rather than that they are the setting. Having the Horizon not be the most important thing in the universe and contributing to a larger concern can do more for player engagement than maximizing the stakes or violence like the ICV Wolf event (which i enjoyed) did.

[Unban Request - Ublicto]

Thank you RTNP, I'll never steal a captain slot from you again!

[Unban Request - Ublicto]

BYOND Key: Ublicto
Total Ban Length: Permanent
Banning staff member's Key: ReadThisNamePlz
Reason of Ban:
Reason for Appeal: not me

[post screenshots that make you go hmm]

[Ublicto - Command Application 2]

33 minutes ago, La Villa Strangiato said:

Played a brief round with you as my CMO. Innocuous, no bad behaviour.

The round after that, I played as my xenoarchaeologist, and what followed was kinda wacky. Not all of this is your fault or entirely placed on you, but I would like to summarise the events to attempt to elucidate why shit broke down so badly. Before I get too deeply into this, I would like to establish this is not a -1. It is an attempt to explain why the entire thing exploded as badly it did, and offer potential critique that you can take or leave.

As TL;DR as I can make it: Max Burns catches wind of the lone asteroid (the Solarian base away site) on sensors. Choosing to interpret the sensor readings as a potential distress signal, he assembles a team [Avengers theme] to "rescue" whoever is sealed on the base. This goes wrong for multiple reasons; the bridge crewman (Rajkumari Saha) gets thrown around from the Intrepid's movement and damages her organs, Saphy Lotami steps on a mine, then after the Intrepid gets back to the Horizon, the miner (Delan Girard) gets attacked by a reaver and an inopportune rescue mission gets launched, in which Hildebrand Metze kind of rushed out and got owned (sorry, Rookie, you got filtered).

Meanwhile, Max Burns sends the entire security team, most of the engineers, and the other first responder (Hal'zrrimya Yufalrii) back to the base. Another bridge crewman, Azari Marrkarr, and myself, Jiaxing Volvalaad, teleport down to the Spark to potentially assist in rescuing Delan, because as far as I knew at the time, nobody has showed up to the Spark for medical assistance. The kicker is that neither of us have access to the Spark airlock, and Azari requesting someone who has access to the airlock takes a very long time to complete.

So the bodies of Hildebrand and Delan get recovered, but meanwhile the Intrepid lifts off and goes back to the base. That's more or less the Big Events.

To speak on my personal feelings, I felt you ignored the science department. Jiaxing tried to discuss stuff with Burns over comms; I didn't really push it that hard, as by that point I had different IC concerns. If you want to assemble an expedition, that's fine, and it's fine if the RP reason that research isn't immediately consulted is because you consider it a matter of life and death, that's fine. At the midway point of the round, however, it's been obviously established that this is not a matter of life and death, and control was not handed over to the research department in the aftermath of it becoming an expedition. This was kind of frustrating.

Communication, as you brought up in maincord previously, broke down a lot. I didn't have access to command comms except through overhearing it, so I can't say what did and didn't happen; however, I do know that pretty much the entire round could have gone a bit smoother if you gave more clear, decisive orders. "Continue exploring, but offload the bridge crewman". "Send a security officer along with the first responder". Etc. etc. Sometimes, you also have to not volun-tell people, and keep away teams smaller depending on player interest.

We can't all have bangers every day we play, which is why a command trial exists. I wish you luck in your future rounds!

Part of this I feel is because there was no HoS and no CMO so I was essentially coordinating three different teams of people and had little bandwidth left over for anything else. It was extremely difficult to pay attention to everything at once.  The expedition was also going against turrets and mines so I decided to send a lot of sec down rather than research because I imagined they'd be fighting more than anything else. I would have given a lot of those short and decisive orders if I could have and in retrospect I probably should have made someone interm HoS and CMO so I didn't have to deal with all this. Live and learn. I apologize if some of my mistakes made the round worse for you, but all things considered I think it was an alright round and I did an alright job. Much of your critique has merit, some of it I do not agree with. Thank you for it regardless, I appreciate it.

[Change Science to an Expedition-focused department]

On 05/11/2023 at 01:11, rrrrrr said:

had to call up a friend of mine for his thoughts on this.

 

 

I think Dagoth makes a really good point here, RnD is very outdated compared to a lot of other systems and there isn't enough to do in most of the science department. However, it would be good to add ship-side stuff for science to do like assemble probes that can be used to study planets, make custom artillery shells with specific substances in them (for fighting enemies that only take a certain type of damage maybe), and there could be additional tools for antag interactions like studying captured changelings and curing (or inducing) vampirism.

[Gabopwn - Command Whitelist]

I enjoyed working with Sandra and they seem very competent as XO. They're sure to be a solid member of any command team.

+1

 

[Yellowrosefromtexas - IPC Whitelist]

I really like the "Johnny Five" aspect of your character and have no doubt you could play it well. Drood, despite his eccentricities and my initial reservations about him is a fun character to interact with. I have no doubt IHU-812 can make a good character with a story to tell. However, you might want to add more to this application. Look at some of the applications for IPC that were accepted and see what they did well - it's what I did when I was applying.

+1

[Ublicto - Command Application 2]

BYOND key: Ublicto

Discord Username: GalacticEmpireLover

Character names:

Elwood Johnson and Athena are my most played characters.

 

How long have you been playing on Aurora?
Close to four months

Have you received any administrative actions? And how serious were they?
I have received some notes and an antag ban. One note is for not understanding the role of Warden well enough, another is for too aggressive antag play which I also received the antag ban for. None of these interactions were caused by me acting in bad faith, and I have demonstrated a willingness to avoid past errors.

 

Please provide well articulated answers to the following questions in a paragraph each.

What do you think the OOC purpose of a Head of Staff is, ingame?

A head organizes their department to respond to the round and is a primary driver of the story. They direct their department's response to anything that could happen and also ensure that the proper materials are available to help their department do its job. In the case of new players, command staff should ensure that they have the resources to become used to their assignment and aren't pushed out by a lack of familiarity with the mechanics. A head of staff does not need to IC know how every part of their department works, but they should be familiar with their role and be able to organize other players. The primary skill of a head of staff is communication and organization.

What do you think the OOC responsibilities of Whitelisted players are to other players, and how would you strive to uphold them?

They must facilitate role play in a constructive way and do what benefits the people playing the round best. That means ensuring departments have clear objectives and in situations where there is a threat to the ship or its crew respond in reasonable ways that are conducive to telling a story. With regard to antagonists, command players should generally give them leeway and allow them to pursue creative gimmicks within IC reason. During extended rounds departments receiving objectives or otherwise being given goals that allow role play that is not just having twenty people in the bar all the time might also be good and make the round more fun, and allow more canon experiences for characters.

 

Explain how the recent events in the Spur changed your character and how they came to be employed on the SCCV Horizon.

Maximilian Burns is a career explorer and merchant who is 37 years of age. His mother Andrea passed away early in his life, and his father Herbert who was the owner of the small trading firm "Burns Trading Company" would raise him on his home moon of Callisto, although Maximilian would attend higher education on Earth. The influence of his father would permeate Maximilian's life and grow his interest in the adventure and profit of interstellar trade, which his Father would cultivate even more so by ensuring his son would be employed in his business and eventually command one of the family's five trading ships. With megacorporate competition forcing the Burns company's profit margins down and the stagnant Alliance economy further limiting their avenues for growth the company would resort to riskier and riskier enterprises to make ends meet. When Herbert Burns died and the company passed to Maximilian it had virtually no liquid resources and was barely able to pay interest on its debts. Maximilian would do everything he could to save it, and quickly find that he would have to resort to riskier and riskier expeditions to Interstellar war era ruins, alien wrecks, and high value transport to keep the Burns Trading Company alive. He would even have to cross ethical and legal boundaries at times. Regardless of his efforts it was inevitable that he would fail. The collapse of organized authority in much of the Middle and Outer rings of the Sol Alliance would doom the Burns Trading Company's future prospects. With the writing on the wall, Maximilian broke up the Burns Shipping Company in 2562 and auctioned off its assets to pay back debts and save what he could of the small family fortune.

He would find a way to do that through employment with the SCC. Being an experienced businessman and trader in difficult situations already he would find employment first as an operations manager aboard a space station before becoming the executive officer of the survey ship SCCV Advance that would be attacked on a mission to a deserted star system by Southern Solarian Military District raiders in 2564. The death of the SCCV Advance's Captain forced him to take command of the ship which he successfully guided to safety and prevented the capture of. This secured a chance for his promotion, which he took at the earliest possible time. He would be assigned to the SCCV Horizon, a much more advanced ship with a similar mission profile to his last posting.

What roles do you plan on playing after the application is accepted?
Captain

Have you familiarized yourself with the wiki pages for the command roles?
Yes

Characters you intend to use for command or have created for command. Include the job they will be taking:
Maximilian Burns - Captain

Do you understand your whitelist is not permanent, and may be stripped following continuous administrative action?
Yes, I expect to me stripped of the whitelist if I mess up in a major way or make a pattern of bad decision making.

Have you linked your BYOND account to the Forums?
Yes

Extra notes:

[Ublicto's Human Lore Deputy Application]

9 minutes ago, canon35 said:

1. What is your current thoughts on parts of the setting where human and non-human lore cross over? Do you think there should be more? Less? What are the strenghs and weaknesses, in your eyes, of these crossovers?

2. What are your plans to advance the setting for the nations besides Sol? It obviously has gotten the most attention with active lore developments like with the article arc for San Colette, I am curious to know what you think other nations should be doing.

3. What is your thoughts on Off-worlders? Do you think they should be expanded, cut down, or removed?

1. I think in general crossover shouldn't put the aliens as part of a human story or the humans as part of an alien story. I think the tajara in particular have a lot of interesting stories to tell on their own and a larger power intervening on one side or the other too much can suppress that. What works best I think are stories that use humanity as a plot device to advance something related to the aliens. Maybe the tajara lore people want to restart their three way civil war again and use human weapons and aid to intensify it. Maybe the Skrell writers want to have traverse rebels hire human mercenaries or something to escalate the conflict and destroy what chance at peace exists.

The way aliens interact with humans or other aliens should be much the same. I don't think humans or aliens should be imposing things on the other unless there's a good story reason to do so, all of their interactions should help advance their own story and use the other party as a plot device. I would be against something like the SCC taking over the Hegemony with a coup for a story where the SCC is the focus. If that happened it would have to contribute something positive to the Unathi's world.

 

2. The Coalition I think should be expanded and there should be some exploration into what its citizens view it as. Is it basically a military and economic alliance sort of like a combination between the EU and NATO, or is it a real state? I imagine there would be voices for centralization and voices against. Xanu and Gadpathur might like centralization as a domestic policy for different reasons even though they normally oppose each other on foreign policy for example. The Coalition's response to the Alliance's reunification can create a lot of interesting tension and should have a lot of news articles written about it especially when the Alliance starts reorganizing itself and becoming stronger as an institution so it can support looking outward.

Dominia and Elyra have a lot to write about as well. Elyra is a state with a lot of religious influence in a very materialistic world and I think it would benefit to take Elyra in a direction which keeps it a secular state but extends the role of religion in a cultural way. In Dominia religion is politics and cannot be separated from the state. There i think it would be good to introduce some instability. Dominia has a social system which would generate a lot of dissatisfaction among large groups of people and give them little legal outlet to deal with their problems.  Dominia deserves a story about struggling to reform or to resist reform and the consequences of that to their religious system. Maybe even as great as a short-lived (or permanent) schism of their church.

In general though I think Elyra needs more religious influence and Dominia needs less stability.

 

3. I like the idea of scarabs but I dislike the fact that they're part of the Coalition and one mostly unified fleet. There is so much space and there should be a category of off-worlder who belong to no nation and are much more spread out. There would be countless isolated asteroid colonies, generation ships, or whatever else outside the boundaries of any state. It can be the case that the farthest humans from Earth are on generation ships that launched long before the Interstellar war. A new category of scarab or entirely different offworlder that represents more isolated ships or asteroid colonies/space stations could be a solid addition. They could also contribute to events for the Horizon in ways that scarabs could not. They could be an enemy more interesting than random pirates or be the crew of some of the stations that populate the space the Horizon is passing through. There are plenty of ideas for new ghost roles or antag gimmicks involving them as well.

Alternatively off-worlders could remain almost entirely as is and only be tweaked slightly so that scarab is a more expansive term which encompasses people who aren't part of the main scarab fleet and crew those isolated ships and stations. Over a long time the scarabs could have split and the present scarab fleet is simply the largest group of them around. Whatever is done I think off-worlders in general need a way to be independent of any state or the larger scarab fleet without being a scarab sadar.

[Ublicto's Human Lore Deputy Application]

Example arc idea has been edited.

[Ublicto's Human Lore Deputy Application]

Ckey/BYOND Username: Ublicto
Position Being Applied For: (Wiki Maintainer, Lore Developer, Deputy Lore developer): Human Lore Deputy
Have you read the Lore Team Rules and Regulations wiki page?

Yes
Past Experiences/Knowledge: None, but I like to think I can write well.
Examples of Past Work: None, but I can write a sample news article or something if you need it.

Time on server: Probably close to four months

Why are you applying for this position and why do you believe you would make a good Human Lore Deputy?

I have a strong interest in Aurora's lore and enjoy world building. Aurora has a strong universe already established and I think it could benefit from filling in many details especially when it comes to being able to create more unique characters for the role playing game Aurora's lore revolves around. I am most interested in expanding Aurora's depth rather than its breadth and elaborating on the implications of various parts of the lore I don't think are explored. For example, how would the average citizen of the ASSN react to their country losing very close to half its territory? How would the average Bieselite who believes in the Republic respond to the Nanotrasen dominance over their government? Both of these questions among others create a good basis for stories to expand the Aurora universe.

 

What is your favourite part of Human Lore and why? What is your least favourite? (Note: If you submitted something that was canonised and is now part of human lore, you may not select your own canonised submission as your favourite or least favourite part of the lore.)

I am a fan of the Solarian Alliance's warlord period, and dislike the Nanotrasen stranglehold on Biesel. The warlords of the Alliance create a lot of interesting circumstances for Alliance origin characters and serve as an excellent way to force the ASSN to reform and push forward the story of that state in particular. The story of military usurpers and regional military commands losing direct contact with the central government reminds me vaguely of the late Roman Empire to a degree and there is a lot of room for lore expansion coming from that angle. The ASSN as this slowly dying state that refuses to go peacefully into history or as an empire given new life by a close brush with death both give some really good ways to tell a story.

However, Biesel is at the other end of the spectrum as far as states go. It is too stable and too predictable. For a Republic that must justify itself to its people with republican principles it delivers on little of its promises. The Nanotrasen control of the state and lack of real internal problems or opposition creates a stagnant and less interesting environment for story telling I think. Biesel needs a certain degree of stability to be the basis of the Horizon and to make sense as the home of Aurora's story, but it also needs real challenges and real internal problems to make it a more interesting state to create characters from and a good place to tell stories around or in.

What are three projects (medium to large sized additions, reworks, or arcs) you would like to do or help organize if made Human Lore deputy? (NEW PLANETS OR FACTIONS ARE PROHIBITED FROM ADDITION AT THIS PRESENT TIME. DO NOT INCLUDE THEM IN YOUR ANSWER TO THIS QUESTION.)

I would add or change details about the structure of human governments and make sure these reflect different values. I would like to see the ASSN reworked into a more unitary government or at least the way planetary leadership interacts with the central government elaborated on to reflect the authoritarianism that permeates its political system. I would also like to create more significant differences in the values each state beyond what exists now. Biesel and the Alliance should have different cultures and I am a fan of the work that was put in to make the Empire of Dominia culturally and organizationally unique. The Coalition of Colonies and Elyra could also greatly benefit from going into more details about the structure of their government and how that reflects their values or histories. . For example, in such a decentralized state the capital could move every time a new leader is chosen to the leader's planet. One year Galatea might have the capitol and the next year Xanu. This could also be a great way to add details to less explored parts of the Coalition where maybe some power sharing agreement results in the capitol being moved to a

With regards to arcs I think one about the internal politics of the Republic of Biesel would be great. Biesel in general can take interest from the politics of historical Republics where elite interests and popular interests were constantly interacting with each other and running into conflicts. A good arc can be a constitutional crisis caused by a powerful and popular populist senator being killed by the SCC after demanding economic or poltical reform. It would create a lot of tension between what Biesel is supposed to be and what it actually is and can be reflected in game with new antag gimmicks or events that divide the crew and change characters even if they don't involve very much shooting. An arc about Biesel's politics would also create more lore depth for the faction in general.

A second idea is the Sol Alliance rebuilding its international standing. The Horizon could host diplomatic missions or ferry an ambassador from Sol to Biesel with the possibility of attempts being made on their life or other interference that the crew would have to respond to. Depending on the crew's response and methods of dealing with the crisis - or failure to deal with the crisis - relations between two of the largest interstellar states in the game would be affected.

A third idea is The Dominians and Elyrans stirring up chaos. There could be some sort of incident between the two states and the Horizon is called in to protect the SCC's interests. This could be reflected in game by Elyran and Dominian ghost roles being available at the same time or the Horizon having canon away missions where it has to potentially skirmish with Dominian or Elyran forces or simply retrieve some bit of technology that the locals may not want to give up. There are plenty of interesting things to do with this and a lot of them don't need to be world shaking.

 

What do you believe are the current strengths and weaknesses of human lore? Why? What would you do to improve upon the weaknesses?

A big strength is the diversity of peoples, states, and cultures. This gives a lot of room for story telling and a great diversity of characters to encounter in game. A weakness I think is the general homogeneity in social values between any culture which doesn't have a gimmick of sorts. I know that introducing some prejudices or values that are debated in the real world can make some people uncomfortable but if done right I think it could make the world much more engaging and give a lot of new ways for characters to relate or not to relate to each other in game.

From a story telling perspective the SCC also seems much too powerful. Even though it has detailed lore and history it seems to win all the time and I think giant corporations openly defying state authority despite the fact that they lack armed force in most cases to back that defiance up is a little unrealistic. Especially considering that Hephaestus Industries just bought the Hegemony's economy. I always thought it would be nice if the SCC had real threats and there were times where the megacorporations that define so much of the story tended to blend with states and it wans't clear where the interests of the corporation ended and the state's interest began. Something like this exists in the Cyberpunk series where the mega corporation Militech has been nationalized by the United States government but still functions on its own and has its CEOs become American presidents. The line between Militech and the government in cyberpunk is very blurry and although we are getting some of that with Nanotrasen and Biesel I think a similar relationship could and should be extended to other states and other corporations to different degrees.

What are your thoughts on the past arcs that have been organised by the human lore team?

I was not here for many of those but I am a fan of the direction Mictlan is going. I like the potrayal of counter-insurgency and the realities of the Republic of Biesel's war effort on the planet. It feels realistic, its polarizing, and I can easily imagine a government in real life resorting to such brutal tactics because they do it all the time.

Apart from that reading the wiki I really like the story of Admiral Frost. Obviously he's an incompetent fascist dictator but his rise and destruction of the Alliance's government is a good story and also feels believable in a number of ways. His fall is also similarly good and I like how despite his incompetence he died in power and made those who outlived him pay for his actions. He's a figure in the Aurora universe that casts a very long and dark shadow over it and tells a realistic and I think important story.

What is an idea for a future arc that you would like to have a part in writing and organising in the future? (Note: If you provided an arc or arcs as part of your answer for question 3, you may expand on the ideas for that arc or arcs here, or you may provide another idea.)

The Elyra-Dominia skirmish arc would feature a few away missions and some space missions as well as giving ghost roles work during extended or potentially regular rounds. Having the Horizon transit a region where little central authority exists going from one spot to another retrieving technology or otherwise checking up on SCC outposts could create a more "Star Trek" feeling that I think the HRP space ship based nature of the server can be really good at making interesting. Outposts could be afflicted by Elyran or Dominian saboteurs, tajara or unathi groups trying to take advantage of the chaos (although that would involve the other lore teams), or involved in a multitude of other problems or projects. An arc like this would not be aimed at giving the Horizon participation in some world changing battle or series of events but instead creating interesting missions for the Horizon crew and canon events in a more episodic way.

Have you ever been subject to any strikes or bans of any kind from Aurora's moderators or admins? If so, how long ago were these actions and what were they for?

Yes I have received a week long antag ban and some notes for extremely aggressive antag play.  This was nearly two months ago by now and I haven't got any notes since then.

[Antagonists and Aurora: A discussion thread]

49 minutes ago, Fluffy said:

Our antagonists suffer, in my opinion, from a list of issues that needs multi-faceted approaches to tackle, which I will try to condense (this could take literally pages upon pages of expansions and subtopics) only two of the points as follows:

 

1) They are under an insane, undue and unfair scrutiny

Since they have the spotlight and they do unordinary things, they are bound to be the big victims of any John Doe that decides to ahelp or player complain them over trivialities

This is not helped, at all, by the fact that you have to reconstruct the significance and interpretations of the rules based on what happens to others, instead of reading it and have a pretty solid understanding of what you can and cannot do

That there are unstated expectations people can be punished for should not be a thing in general, but this disadvantages and unfairly punish antagonists in particular, due to their position

The aforementioned is compounded by the fact that a punitive approach is employed instead of a corrective one, making any mistake someone could make a permanent mark in their record that can be used literally years down the line to justify punishing more harshly the next mistake; it seems to me there is a cultural problem where people are very unwilling to forgive mistakes, this is particularly visible in the famous phrase often employed in appeals/complains of "intentions doesn't matter", a reductionist view that only seems to account for effects (which are of questionable relevancy in the big scheme of things themselves)

 

A sizable number of people wants them to deliver an amazing, interesting, engaging story, while at the same time not doing nearly everything that would make it possible: Does not want to be converted, assassinated, thralled, held as hostage, killed, sent in medical for a long time, inconvenienced by an atmospheric sabotage, or an SM sabotage, made into a cultist, attacked when they're not 100% ready to beat them, and so on

Some also expects extremely sophisticated, non-repeated stories on the regular, that are essentially impossible to archieve (there's only so many things you can narrate about), and even less so the more things you bar them from playing into

 

Even when someone manages to create a unique and engaging story there's a tendency for people in dchat / looc / OOC / discord to go into full peanut gallery mode and pick apart every detail they didn't like or issue they had with it, it isn't even sufficient to mark everything and more, you can and will find people that can do it better, faultlessy, HRPerly, you name it, someone will be there to tell about how they would have done it better in one way or another on the regular; if in some miracle sense you manage to avoid that, you will find a John Doe eager to tell you how he didn't enjoy the gimmick because you interrupted the stream of sips x500 at the Bar while the chat was being used to write a novel that would have made Dostoevskij weep seeing its length, or whatever other reason. Even if the vast majority of people enjoyed it, you will still have to be subjected to the salt of those who didn't (either as a whole or in part), and you will always find someone that didn't like something about it, eager to tell you

 

2) They are toothless

We do not give them enough tools and liberty to engage in meaningful stories, which cheapens out the interaction with the ship, and thus the fun of it

There is no engagement in a story where you know who will win already, and it's practically written on the walls that The Horizon Always Wins™ (or at least, doesn't lose in any meaningful way); while this is a sad but excusable condition for canon things, it should not be towards/with antagonists

This comes from their toolkit, that is underpower to face an entire ship worth of people with entire backup departments, and from the player culture that shoehorn them in playing to lose (or risk more complains / administrative actions coming their way)

This also means that we rob half of the ship of fun: If Security is nearly always equipped enough to easily deal with them, people in other departments don't get to have the fun conflict with the antagonists; If we have an easily on tap Crew Armory fully equipped, Operations doesn't get to bring in shit and Science doesn't get to make things to fight back the antagonists with

If you have to instill fear of being bwonked to people because otherwise they would do something that a normal, sane person would do in said situation (see: Machinist making mechs if the Lii'dra were to reappear and is trying to take over your ship, or SRF marines are spotted), you are doing something terribly wrong with the balance

If there are essentially no stakes of dying/losing, it's boring for both sides, and if the antagonists are basically expected to lose from the get go in nearly every situation, it would suck even more for them

The aforementioned expectation also morphs the perception of the threat on an IC level, which usually railroad the gimmicks to go in the famous loop we're used to seeing

 

 

In regards to them, it is infeasible and a shot to our foot to remove them, the only server-specific data available (thanks to a pool that @La Villa Strangiato made and posted around) has currently the following statistics:

  Reveal hidden contents

Antagonists seems to be liked (at least as a concept, and over the alternative), there is a clear wish for them to remain (54.69% of the respondents to the pool have indicated that they would either play less or not play if they were not present, with a whooping 20.31% of them for the second case), it is also visible ingame when extended gets voted (or secret extended rolls) repeatedly that the popcount crashes; in the servers browser, there is a correlation between higher pop and the presence of antagonist (excluding NSFW servers, but I suppose people play in those for fundamentally different reasons)

Yes, I am aware that they are not HRP servers, there are other confounding factors and so on, if you have better data I am all ears for it

 

I would also like to point out that there are memorable and engaging antagonist experiences: the time the Horizon got sold to Dominia, the Solarian Clone Corps, when the Biesel emperor came visit in an alternate timeline scenario are three that comes right to my mind, all done by antagonists (without admin support as far as I am aware), and they all happened in the past few months

Lastly, I want to note that expecting antagonists to be memorable on the daily seems like an issue of unfair expectations, we should not expect antagonists to be consistently memorable just like we should not expect every character or character interaction to be, and we engage with way more characters than antagonists in general too, so they are far more likely to be in the selection of memorability (small trivia: this is formally known as base rate fallacy/bias)

A large contributor to this is that even if the antag can use their limited tools to their full effect, they are told not to and to prioritize telling a story (which usually means dont kill people and get brigged in practice). The crew meanwhile always plays to win, without exception.

[Antagonists and Aurora: A discussion thread]

2 hours ago, Susan said:

I completely disagree with any suggestion events cannot be a 'semi-regular thing' because if they were intended to eclipse antagonists, the systems that make them up should be overhauled and made easier and more accessible. There should be a staff role specifically as a pseudo-DM so admins do not need to be involved beyond greenlighting the narrative with lore staff. And it doesn't even need to be explosive. Corporate parties, inspections, hell, the Kobayashi Maru style event was fun and interesting. 

If we are going to replace antagonists it would necessitate a code pass-over to enable the kind of framework for what is basically a 'DM-lite' system, rather than just commenting them out and relying on what we have now. That's my take on it, and I would be glad to map or run events if that ever came to pass. But the culture shift and code requirements are too daunting, and we're too afraid of losing a few players, so we are stuck with the same stale set-ups, and that is a travesty.

Scheduling events will necessarily make non-event times less populated if all other rounds are extended. It will make it harder to gain new people and integrate them into the community which is a recipe for stagnation and a bleed of players. If you want more event-like antag rounds why not make a new WL category that gives some people certain powers (like spawning ships) when they roll antag to make the round more event-like? That seems like the best of both worlds, although I don't know how feasible it would be.

[Antagonists and Aurora: A discussion thread]

The easiest solution to this is to change server culture. Require people to "let the antag cook" among other things. Let it be known that during a round with antags, the course of the round and how fun it is generally depends on the antag. If antag was less of an OCC difficulty (including after the round where people shit on you) to play more people would probably do it.

[Capital Punishment and You! - narrative suggestions for framing borging and marooning.]

17 hours ago, KingOfThePing said:

It is neither an OOC reason nor does it "not warrant borging" - the regulations are actually quite clear. I noticed during the discussion in the other thread that many people have not actually read them.

Also your solution to this topic is another antag draft? Because people who dont even want to play antag make better ones? I cant quite follow here.

"Insufferable pain in the ass" sounds like an OOC reason to me. My solution is that people who want quality antags should either be made to play antags or server culture must change and become more accommodating for antags, as I spoke about in the other thread. With regards to this thread, I think an announcement similar to the one that was made about command not sending confirmation messages for every antag fax would do a lot to fix some of the issues I and others have. What Lilahnovi wrote here with some changes about retaining valuable outside prisoners rather than borging them would do a lot of good if it was made official policy even if it is not everything I want.

[Remove Borging as a Punishment and change "execution" guidelines]

13 hours ago, Carver said:

I'd really like to address this, when people say "that's their job" it isn't some off-handed comment. You're signing up to perform, and trained for, this exact procedure when you willfully work for the SCC. If you have deep personal issues with the procedure then working as a megacorporate-employed Machinist within Biesel may simply not be the ideal profession for you.

If you personally know the individual in question (and care about them), then I can more see your point. But otherwise, you should be somewhat desensitized to the concept because you're hired to do precisely that task. It would otherwise be akin to playing a Security Officer who's a pacifist, or a haemophobic Physician - if you're unable to perform a core part of your duties due to personal belief (again, not in the context of pre-existing personal attachment to the soon-to-be cyborg, as that case is very understandable), then you shouldn't be in that position.

Realistically a machinist will almost never have to borg someone and is there to maintain robots, not preform executions. Your argument would take a lot of the roleplay out of a borging and has a number of other implications I am sure you wouldn't like. If everyone is so "used" to doing evil things for megacorporations than it makes the game more boring and means players are essentially not allowed to have principles that might make them critical of anything.

[Capital Punishment and You! - narrative suggestions for framing borging and marooning.]

25 minutes ago, KingOfThePing said:

Why do we need a third thread discussing this topic that re-heats the same points with different words? I really recommend actually suggesting an alternative to these two capital punishments, if they are really so bad. 

There are options to take (like brig, solitary, etc.) but usually antags who get borged are just an insufferable pain in the ass or not containable. Yes, you are right, differentiating between who the culprit is should play a factor and should be handled more gracefully but in the end this has all been said already. 

"usually antags who get borged are just an insufferable pain in the ass or not containable"

Half of this is an OOC reason and the other half does not warrant borging considering a prison break isn't a good reason to borg every antag. If you want less shitty antags why not discuss introducing an antag draft or finding other means to make more people play antag? That would make a good thread.

[Remove Borging as a Punishment and change "execution" guidelines]

To add to N-8's point, I feel as if server culture incentivizes antag play which is generally unfun and places unreasonable burdens on antags while permitting what in any other circumstance would be ganking on security's part. The antag is expected to put a lot of effort into a gimmick, to engage as many people as possible, and to also avoid killing those people for as long as possible. Security is downright valid hunting a lot of the time and frequently opens fire on antags with little escalation or in fact to de-escalate the situation which is what realistically they should try first.

An example of poor antag play caused by server culture is the reason why I received a note in a ninja round and a week long antag ban. When I was a ninja hunting people and aiming to take trophies I killed a janitor by essentially just running out from maints, bringing him down, and removing his hand for a trophy. This got me a bwoink because I prioritized game play over role play - however at the same time I thought doing something like that was necessary because all the janitor has to do to ruin my game is run away from me or yell out "SEC HELP" and I am through. The standard for me is much higher in this situation than the standard for them.

Similarly the reason I received an antag ban was because as a ninja leading a team of traitors we were detected breaking into the crew armory and security was arming up. In order to stop us from being rolled by sec I immediately led the antag team to stop sec. We encountered the warden on the third deck and tried to hold them up but they simply ran away. Then we went below decks and tried to hold up the warden and other officers in the armory again but the warden picked up the nearest gun and started shooting at the five or six antags arranged against them. They were only "spoken to" for this while I received a ban for doing the reasonable thing and ensuring the antag team was not totally obliterated less than halfway into the round. This type of culture makes it impossible for me as an antag to rely on other players for telling a story.

This is a cultural issue in general. I think some players are correct when they say borging is a symptom of a larger issue. The solution I suggest to this is an announcement similar to what solved a related cultural problem about command staff sending confirmation faxes too often. There could be an announcement that crew are expected to "let the antag cook" or otherwise engage in storytelling rather than simply valid hunting the antag which is what seems to happen a lot of the time. This way antags can point to something concrete when crew makes an unfair choice and the standard of behavior is changed. It has worked in the past, it will work again.

It is very difficult to engage with crew if a random assistant or barkeep will say "heavily armed boarder next to me" whenever I show up. This is why antags are so evasive and tend to avoid confrontation and make the round less fun for everyone - they simply can't count on people "letting them cook"!