Bath Salts Addict

The Warden should be staying in the Brig at all times. The CSI should never be involved with actively pursuing criminals, ever. The HoS, as stated before, should try to avoid frontlining and delegate it to the officers. The two cadets should be trying to stay out of danger or stick with an officer, ideally shouldn't be given weapons, and lack the equipment to assist with an arrest the way an officer can. The detective should try and avoid standing shoulder-to-shoulder with sec officers unless there's a clear and present danger or an emergency. And even then it's hard to do so without people screeching "VALIDHUNTER" at you. So yeah, not 9-10 people fam. Try four, maybe five. And on an unrelated note, for the people saying paramedics should have their maint access removed just because security has, shame on you. There's no need to play that card. It's childish. There's plenty of compelling arguments to revert this awful PR already, we don't need to downgrade to the same arguments we made about our siblings as children.

I agree with Matt in that it's a good idea conceptually, but with the way players are and the way Aurora's map is, it's just not handled well. I'm also pretty sure the idea didn't come up in good faith but salting from a few specific players on a near-constant basis that snowballed into a full-blown implementation, as most impulse PRs are. Let's be honest. Aurora only has one level. Construction and surface are barely looked at by anyone unless it's to go to the shuttle. On that one level, maintenance might seem very big, but more often than not it's a claustrophobic maze with maybe only one or two paths that just lead to the same spots anyways. And even then, you can split it into four section. The map was just not designed with this PR in mind. Section one is cargo's pitifully small piece of maint that's only used to hack into the warehouse. Section two is Research and Engineering's shared maint that provides antags with plenty of space to hide and even get up to their gimmicks, plus access to telecomms and engineering sublevel. Probably the best section of maint by far. Section three is civilian maint, shared by medical and civilian and encompassing the eastern side of maintenance. While the largest maint from a bird's eye view, in reality it just a winding labrynthian path that's only notable for its crusher access and surface ladders. Section four is security maintenance, encompassing an area that is even worse than section three in terms of the fact that there is nothing of value aside from a back entrance into the teleporter room and a maint door next to the armory if you're a bad enough dude. Traitors, revs, cultists, lings and vamps are now pretty much confined to their departments and the surrounding maint area they do have access to. Keep in mind that every portion of maint is isolated from the other, so escaping into one means you need to exit out into the public view at some point, and all security really has to do in such a scenario is camp the exits. While a sound tactic in and of itself, camping maintenance is boring and no one can be bothered or competent enough to cover all the exits. Without an incentive to give chase directly into the dragon's lair, though, that is basically what security is forced to do. This gives the AI better control to lock down areas where the antagonist might be able to escape from, assuming they don't have tools. The argument that cultists, lings and vamps can just use their various abilities to get access comes at the expense of the crew and, depending on their gimmick, may not fly 100% of the time. You can't try to discourage antagonists from needless killing/poorly played out antagonism and then basically shoehorn them into finding half-baked reasons to stun-paper-onto-rune/sting-and-succ/mind control someone just so they can reliably have maint access. And a traitor shouldn't have to spend TCs that might otherwise go towards something crucial to their gimmick if they don't want to. How a traitor wants to play is 100% up to them, and shouldn't be relegated to "take this so you can be the very best" a la the mini-crossbow + e-sword combo. This change doesn't promote anything resembling "HRP" at all. It encourages half-baked murders and conversions that boil down to "we need your access", and that's not fun for the person on the receiving end. We shouldn't be encouraging antagonists or anyone for that matter to play to win. And as for security, the sole reason behind locking them out from this change is based on a few people complaining about their loot goblin-ing getting interrupted by security. It's such a dumb thing. The loot you find in maintenance is hardly important to anyone's round, be they crew, antagonist or otherwise, and a lot of the stuff that isn't contraband is useful for Security as well as anyone else. It's not like some servers where you can find teleporters and guns in piles of trash. At most you'll find a knife, or maybe some drugs, or a toolbelt and tools. Stuff you could acquire elsewhere without having to rely on RNG. To add the cherry on the cake, detective and CSI are included in this as well, shafting them even harder than they already are. The CSI and detective regularly have to poke through maint when something happens to look for evidence relating to their case. Most notably when evidence such as a murder weapon has likely been flushed down disposals, or stowed in an out-of-the-way spot. They need that access to do that job efficiently, and relying on the HoS or AI to open every single door or a HoP to give them access isn't going to cut it because there's too many situations where all three of those things just don't exist. Otherwise you'll start seeing detectives and CSIs with enough electrical engineering skills to hack open doors, and no one wants that despite how necessary it'll be. And that's not counting all the other ways regular crew are disadvantaged by being barred from maint, either. Honestly, the fact that this was implemented without letting this thread sit for long enough to garner feedback or opinions from the community before actually forcing the PR in and the fact that any problems arising from this PR clue me in to the fact that this was an impulse thing more than anything. It's implementation was poorly thought out and poorly designed. Discounting the fact that this PR shouldn't exist at all, you shouldn't release a PR like this in "stages" where we have to suffer through the brunt of this PR while you code away at "workarounds" that should have been there in the first place. Again, this change was made in good faith but brazenly done without long-term consideration of how it'll effect rounds. It was an impulsive "security are snatching up all the contraband that is just lying around anyways" decision that a few people decided they didn't like. And while all the proposed workarounds are nice on paper, if reason fails and this PR remains, at least allow detectives and the CSI to retain their original maint access. Unlike the rest of security, it really is essential to them doing their jobs.

You're taking the first set of quotes out of context. When the mercenaries first arrived, everyone was under the impression that they were an "official" team a la ERT, not mercenaries or even TCFL. That's why Noir pointed out there was an IPC among them. Every line before when it says "So you're a third party" was before it was informed the mercenaries were, in fact, a mercenary team hired by NT. And if the ERT is accepting IPCs now, I genuinely didn't know OOCly. And knowing that now I feel like it undermines TCFL's initial gimmick but what do I know? That's neither here nor there, anyhow. Everything after was Noir attempting to highlight just how hard the Security department was getting shafted by Central and was in no way trying to insinuate they were illegitimate. Nor am I also the guy who tried to claim the AI was subverted. I don't know if people keep trying to make a point with some random guy I don't even remember saying that or what, but I'm not him. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Noir said at any point that they weren't legitimately hired by NT. There were announcements, there was a fax, the RD and the AI were backing them and the CMO was remaining a begrudging neutral party. The only thing I can see wrong is that perhaps my noticable OOC distaste for "CC-approved" antag gimmicks, but that never colored Noir's behavior or the reason why the conflict escalated towards violence in the first place. CC-approved or not, Noir and Security opened fire because there was a credible threat to their lives. At no point did Noir initiate the conflict because "hmm I don't think these guys are legitimate", it did so solely because "holy fuck the RD wants to borg me and maybe even my colleagues, we gotta stop this from happening". And validhunting? Can you even validhunt with words? I fail to understand how that is possible. There are only seven lines of dialogue from Noir that could be misconstrued as it questioning the legitimacy of the mercenaries, and that was all within a few minutes during the initial confrontation with the mercenaries. This initial confrontation served to provide exposition to security as to what their purpose was for even being on the station. At no point did Noir ever encourage action against the mercenaries on the basis that they weren't real CC-approved mercenaries, because that was never in dispute. If anything, Noir didn't encourage action against them at all. At one point Noir suggested going on strike, but that suggestion was quickly shot down by the Warden. And even then? Punishing someone for seven lines of dialogue spanning a few minutes during a period of misinformation, poor communication, poor procedure/loyalist announcement mismanagement and a comms blackout in a round that lasted roughly an hour and thirty minutes seems entirely unfair and totalitarian to me. By that logic, you'll also need to comb through all the off-handed comments of crew who were saying stuff along the lines of "wow these guys are sketchy, are you sure they're from NT"? Because trust me, there's a lot. The fact that you acknowledge the reasoning for security initiating the firefight as valid proves the validhunting argument as illogical for the simple facts that: From the moment Noir stopped speaking with the mercenaries to the period spanning the firefight in the lobby, Noir did not move from said lobby. That goes back to my previous question. How can you validhunt with words? What validhunting took place when all that occurred was Noir discussing the on-going situation via the radio, PDA and in-person with the people also in the lobby? When at no point via radio or PDA did Noir try to form a battle plan or plan of action against the mercenaries in the first place. Much of security's initial questions about the mercenaries was born out of a misinterpretation of their initial contact with Command by the AI, a comms blackout, miscommunication, lack of forewarning, and poor usage of the loyalist announcement system to provide the necessary exposition. Once it became clear that they were sent by CC, no one acted against the mercenaries under the belief otherwise. The conflict and reason for escalation was brought to Security on a silver platter and was, in all honesty, forced upon us in a way. Again, we (or at least Noir, the Warden, a cadet and maybe two officers) did not leave the Brig and confront the mercenaries under the pretense of their legitimacy or even seek to stop them and the RD from doing their thing. Even the CSI's reported borging was met with a consensus of "wow wtf" and not much else. It's already been established by Alberyk's own validation that Noir and by extension the rest of Security were in the right for escalating the conflict under the belief that their lives were in danger. Considering again that they did not go out looking for a fight, how can it even be argued that I was trying to validhunt? I don't understand how that conclusion can be drawn. Maybe I'm overthinking things but in the interest of preventing a similar situation from occurring in the future, I'd like to explicitly request that this train of assumption gets painstakingly explained to me in the most juvenile manner. If the reason for conflict to escalate to violence is deemed valid, then is it really valid hunting? If anyone should be at fault here, it would be the AI. They intentionally mislead the RD to believe Security was planning a mutiny despite having every tool under the sun to monitor both their comms. PDA and even their conversations in the lobby. ICly and at the time OOCly we were lead to believe the RD was lying to the mercenaries to get a disgruntled Security out of the way. Maybe in a way she was, but mostly she was acting on misinformation from the AI. Said AI obviously just wanted to see security get stomped by the mercenaries, and bolted what they could to force the conflict to take place in as confined a space as possible. In no way should an AI be attempting to escalate conflict as a non-antag, especially where crew safety is concerned. And not to drag this out into a personal slight against Garn's overall behavior, but it's been proven time and time again that he's incredibly biased towards antagonists, to the point where it noticeably colors his behavior and administrative decisions. At one point he even tried to insinuate via OOC that a full 50+ server of people were bad at RPing because they didn't immediately accept a malf AI's demand to lynch the HoS under the threat of mutually assured destruction. This isn't just a claim by me, but looking at a great many of the complaints against him, accepted or otherwise, and speaking with a vast quantity of people who share the same views (but for some reason are too scared to make their own complaints regarding said issues). He regularly plays bald, black-eyed, thirty year old human janitors with randomly generated names who are, despite his cautionary advice to Naelynn in a complaint against them, for all intents and purposes "antag mains". I don't think he ever actually plays the game unless it's to try and roll for antag, or screw around as a janitor if he didn't manage to. While he and I share a love of in-game combat and the interesting narratives stemming from the conflict that arises, the difference is that he only wants to see the antagonists succeed and everything they do go smoothly and according to plan. The reason why I formatted my original post in "chapters" a la a story but then abruptly shifted to an OOC perspective and provided no IC conclusion? Because there was none. I did this to highlight the fact that Garnascus, rather than act in a headmin's intended function of keeping a round going smoothly as possible, did the complete opposite and put an end to anything that made the round interesting or fun. As soon as they realized what was happening, both Security and the antagonists stopped, more or less said "fuck this" in LOOC and stopped any and all narrative progression for the rest of the round. In rounds where antagonists are meant to have heavy involvement with the crew, conflict is what drives the round forward. I and many other people adore conflict in all its forms. It's not enough to just play a deathmatch against each other, but there needs to be an underlying motivation. Why is my character fighting? What happened to make this timeline come to fruition? What part of my character's personality will be revealed to other characters amidst an evolving crucible of desperation and violence? I desire it, thrive on it, feed off it, but never force it. Forced conflict is not fun. And a forced end to otherwise enjoyable conflict is like a sneeze that never happens, or being told that you're going to be taken to Chuck E. Cheese's after a visit to your grandma's house but instead your mother spends the entire night chatting away while you die of boredom in a flat that smells like old people and has toys from thirty years ago. Because despite my aforementioned distaste for CC-approved antagonists and revs in general, I was actually enjoying that round. It had all the makings of a round that would become truly memorable in my eyes thanks to being driven forward by a collaboration of unique, interesting characters like the RD, CMO, the mercs and Security,, but Garnascus instead opted to butcher, cleave, massacre and gut the round because one dead antagonist suddenly decided he wasn't having fun anymore, and if he wasn't having fun then no one else should be. There was no grand revolt in the face of a cold, corrupt corporate entity. Security and its impromptu militia didn't arm up and lay siege to the powermad queen and her army of elite baddies. The RD and her cronies never got the chance to see corporate power triumph over a station in open rebellion. The cargo techs didn't get the chance to put aside their typical differences with Security and band together in the name of truth, justice and the American way. London Werry never got the chance to (for a round at least) realize just how corrupt a corporate entity like NT can truly be and see the value in following a moral code rather than a pre-written one. Noir, a character I have lovingly created and cherished and continued to play on this server time and time again despite just how ridiculously petty and illogical some people can be, never got the chance to truly display how well the very foundations of its persona and year and some of steady character development could shine. But none of that happened, because we got cucked out of it. And THAT is what makes me so darn disgruntled. Miffed, ruffled, plucked, and floozled. I'm a writer by nature, and mediums like Aurora are an untapped goldmine of potential. When that potential gets wasted by crass decisions borne out of an intentional ignorance towards context, I get just a tad displeased. And boy, it sure is nice to be told that my ban is being changed to a warning LONG AFTER said ban already expired a long, long time ago, I'm gonna have to continue my objections. If Garn wasn't so noticeably biased towards antags - or in fact if any other staff member had handled the initial situation, this ban wouldn't have occurred. At all. This complaint would not exist, and if any other staff member had seen the misconstrued logs that somehow imply I was trying to validhunt, they'd shrug and go "meh" because, again, the round wasn't colored by said IC statements in any way. So how exactly is it fair that I have to continue to bear the weight of this cross well after that it's been proven that I've done very little wrong? Hell, if Garn had even been paying attention at all to the round this probably wouldn't have happened, but that ties in to him being biased towards antagonists.

Then it's a matter of arguing how being held at gunpoint and forced to surrender with the threat of cyborgification looming over you and your friends' heads is any different from being attacked with an e-sword. I, for one, am of the opinion it's not. If a security officer has a gun and is being advanced upon by someone with an e-sword and fires upon the antag, then it's valid. If mercenaries, CC-approved or otherwise, refuse to back down and have set a precedent with their violent actions force Security into a confrontation and hold them at gunpoint and force them to act accordingly to protect themselves, then I'll argue that it's valid as well.

This is untrue, at least where Noir is concerned. The only time it left the Brig to confront the mercenaries was with the rest of security asking them why they were shooting down the hallway. Afterwards, Noir and I'd say most of the team spent the remainder of that round in the lobby talking. We were following orders despite some grumbling here and there, but they were still accused of trying to kickstart a mutiny. I'm not sure if anyone was following them around, and if there was I never knew about that unless it was the CSI. Technically speaking, I guess so! But why, again, is that so bad if it's for a perfectly valid reason? Security had reason to believe they were in danger. Noir even moreso. Security isn't a hivemind. What they do for the majority of the round is their own business. But you simply can't sit there and insinuate that I was following them around most of the round because I simply wasn't. No one was out for valids like you believe they were. I took the round as it evolved around us, looked at the facts and the steady escalation and figured there was very real enough grounds for Noir and the team to figure that there was a credible danger to themselves, and that the RD would go back on her word if they disarmed. So Noir told Feuffer to start the engagement to neutralize the threat. Now you're just misconstruing my words. The CSI was charged with sedition, a medium level charge, and nearly got cyborgified for it. (I say nearly because she showed up later, sans her ID and apparently better, but the RD told us she getting cyborgified?) It stands to reason then that the punishment for mutiny is going to be much the same, if not somehow worse. This was what security was being accused of, so they acted within the interests of their self-preservation and by Lord I can't stress this enough. Self-preservation is infinitely more important, whether the person threatening it is from Central Command or not. You can't say the threat was exaggerated when you weren't even paying attention to the round or how it escalated. You're an otherwise upstanding member of the security team employed by a big megacorporation. During what seems like an ordinary day, NanoTrasen suddenly announces that your pay is cut by a huge margin and fail to explain why. There's no audit or anything, just a blanket cut across the entire station. To add insult to injury, while you're starting to consider looking for a new employer, a group of four armed, sketchy guys in red suits show up like they own the place without any fanfare or announcement beforehand regarding their arrival. These mercenaries tell you that they're a third-party hired by NT to enforce their "policies" that aside from the paycut you're unsure what there is to even enforce. To make matters worse, they're probably being paid better than you and you're told to practically just suck it up. You've been shafted, had your credibility called into question, betrayed, insulted, dishonored, and forced to have your job acquiesced to a gang of armed thugs who hold no real interest in keeping the peace save for a phat paycheck. You can't tell me any non-implanted crew, security or otherwise, is expected to stay all nice and loyal and compliant. Tack on the fact that they stripped a Diona of all its belongings and locked it in maint and open fired on some random CSI for throwing a can at them, it's very clear they're violent, no-good thugs, whether they're hired by Central Command or not. No one should be forced to acquiesce to strike breakers, especially when said strike breakers come to you spoiling for a fight. I find your pompousness absolutely laughable as you go on to claim Security was only going in it for the valids and how you were oh-so annoyed that the gimmick was "interfered with" when it was clear all you wanted to do that round was bolt and shock doors to soft-antag as the AI. Nowhere in the gimmick's many announcements did it declare that the acting Captain could start cyborgifying people on trumped up charges. The only announcements made were in regards to a paycut, and that's it. I also want to address this. What weird, double standard is it that antags can wordlessly open fire on Security without any provocation but when the tables are reversed, and there is mountains upon MOUNTAINS of steady escalation and provocation from both sides that Security can't open fire against a superior force to try and minimize their own losses? Why are they railroaded to comply with a gimmick that has done nothing but agitate and antagonize them out of blind loyalty and not 'mutinying' when the IC of each individual character that round dictates they shouldn't? There's just so many blatant inconsistencies in regards to how situations are handled that I'm not even sure if setting a precedent is going to work anymore. Every situation will just be handled regardless of how similar situations were. Some people will be punished for less at the staff member's discretion and people doing much worse will get off scot free. When nothing is clarified and nothing is for certain, how is it fair to expect that anyone gets punished for acting within the best interests of their character with plenty of escalation and reasoning to back it up?

BYOND Key: Bath Salts Addict Staff BYOND Key: Garnascus Game ID: b30-aKft Reason for complaint: I was banned for pursuing a course of action that resulted in conflict with a group of antagonists when my character and his co-workers all had valid reasons to believe their very lives were on the line. Evidence/logs/etc: To preface this complaint, I have nothing in particular against Garnascus or how he administrates. However, I feel as if his decision in this particular instance was unreasonable and, judging by my conversation with him via ahelps, he didn't have the context necessary as he didn't even know what the antagonist gimmick even was in the first place to have made the decision that he did. Now, to explain the incident that took place I'll have to explain the round from my point of view. Act I: "They're cutting our pay, empty the bank accounts!" A normal round starts. I'm the lovable, somewhat-controversial IPC detective Noir, who finds fulfillment in stomping crime, squashing injustice, saving damsels in distress and looking stylish while doing it. There is one security officer, Brett Feufer (another one, Ziithrik Kuth'rex, later latejoins a bit later), a cadet, Mali Soun (another, Sloan something-or-another one later joins too), the warden London Werry, and a CSI, Amanda Ivanou. Unbeknownst to all of us, though, the CSI is a dreaded revhead. Things progress, and as Noir is talking to Sterben in the medbay, an announcement goes through that NanoTrasen is reducing pay by a whopping one hundred percent. Wowzers! Being an IPC, Noir isn't all that disturbed. Money, while a useful resource, isn't wholly necessary to their continued existence. Noir runs a P.I business on the side as a hobby more than anything, but if the going gets tough he can always take on a second (third?) job or start looking for a new employer. Despite NT not being able to really do anything about bank accounts, though, Noir follows Sterben's example and empties his bank account from the nearest ATM. Five hundred and fifty dollars, whoopee. People are miffed and disgruntled, but otherwise fine. Act II: There One was Some Mercs from NanoTrasen, Who Shot at Crew for No Raisin A bit while later, while everyone is still grumbling about the admittedly hefty paycut, Noir finds itself in the Brig lobby trying to convince a borg and a Diona why the color red is a much better paintjob for the Brig than blue and that having a red Brig is not at all fascist, no sirree. Just as those words escape its ash-encrusted speakers, a heavily armed group of four intimidating individuals in red suits march past the Brig, only stopping to regard the lobby's occupants with a wordless stare before moving on. The AI freaks out, security freaks out. The Warden calls everyone to the armory and they rush inside. Lucky for Security, RNGesus himself descended from the heavens and bestowed upon the cargo warehouse an ERT ammo vendor full of delicious automatic .45s, buckshot and... Of course, slugs. Noir regards this act of divine providence with its usual bemusement, and considers the options. An ion storm took out comms but the announcement was missed by the whole of Sec, leading to concerns that the redsuits took out comms somehow. There are four group of potentially no-good red suits. There are two officers, a Warden who should be staying in the Brig as much as possible, and two cadets with minimal training at most. Concerned and wanting to even the odds, Noir gains the officers' blessing to assist as the chainsoking robotic hero the station needs and grabs a shotgun, loading it up with much-coveted slugs. While still in the armory, Security gets informed by the AI that these random redsuited individuals just so happen to be a Policy Enforcement Team sent by NanoTrasen and that the previously 100% paycut is now merely a 50% cut and that Security should stand down. Security is skeptical and, while in the armory, hear small arms fire coming from outside the Brig. The entire Security team rushes out of the Brig and forms a horse-shoe shape in front of a pair of mercenaries, who they saw firing energy carbines on stun down the hallway towards medical. They're hesitant to tell Security what they were shooting at, but eventually do. While everyone was arming up, the CSI threw a can at them. This seemed like a remarkably petty thing to stun someone over, so Security requested they stop. At that moment the RD pushes her way past the throngs of armed Security to stand between them and the equally-armed band of "Policy Enforcers". She has a conversation with them and tells Security to stand down, an order which is begrudgingly accepted. Guns are put away. At this point no one is sure what policies they're enforcing or why contracted employees need to be overseen by armed guards while the real policy handling comes from NT's off-station accountants and managers handling who gets paid what. Noir points this out along with the simple fact that the mercenaries can't be hired by NT. For starters, one of them is an IPC, which aren't even allowed in the ERT. The mercenaries then proceed to explain they're a third party group hired by Central Command to enforce the policy changes. (Still not clear what policies, but alright). Security is, as always, skeptical but shuffles off back to the Brig debating what to do. As a whole, they feel betrayed and dishonored. Despite being otherwise upstanding employees, Security has had their pay cut along with the rest of the station and is expected to acquiesce the majority of their authority to a third-party gang of vicious, armed thugs who've already shot at someone for very little reason and are loyal only to their phat paychecks. After they depart, the CSI arrives and loudly proclaims to her unenthused colleagues that they would, to paraphrase, "rebel with me!" and fails to give very convincing arguments otherwise. And despite Noir's suggestion to not go around talking so loudly about open rebellion, she storms off in a huff, irritated that her colleagues won't join her cause. While Noir and others are skeptical and passively suggest a peaceful strike, the Warden remains firm in her belief that they should let things play out according to NT's wishes. As one member in security put it best, "I bet they cut our pay to pay these guys!" Act III: The Girl Who Cried "REBELLION!" While sitting in the Brig pondering on what to do, Noir and others state their affirmation that if NT is going to cut their pay by half, then they should only do half the work where gruntwork is involved. Of course, with these sketchy mercenaries roaming around, Security remains firm in its resolve to step in and protect the crew if things start going south and innocents are potentially harmed. The CSI then radios and informs them that she is being arrested for sedition.! What a shocker. It's at this point the Research Director, Cleo Ora, announces to the crew that she has assumed the position of acting Captain and that all "mutineers" are to stand down or be "forcefully brought to their knees". Noir expresses concern over her less-than-tactful wording, and it is then reported that the RD and the mercenaries plan to cyborgify the CSI! Wait, what? Noir takes a cursory glance into Corporate Regulations and discovers that sedition is a medium level violation, the maximum sentence of which is Holding until Transfer. Mutiny, on the other hand, a more violent form of sedition in which the CSI was most undoubtedly not, does. Noir points out this discrepancy and blatantly illegal act to the acting Captain when she finds herself in the Brig, to which she replies: Noir and others point out that she can't do that, but their arguments fall on deaf ears. Instead she, while standing in the doorway of the Brig with an adjacent door next to it, attempts to push Noir aside. Being a metal man weighing somewhere in the ballpark of two hundred to three hundred pounds, Noir fails to budge both out of physicality and on principle. The following exchange is had. The acting Captain makes clear her intentions to cyborgify Noir, even alluding to gaining sadistic curiosity from watching a free IPC be turned into a lawed stationbound. Not one to acquiesce to petty threats or injustice, Noir meets her hostility with a challenge. And out loud, at Noir's accusation, admits to the majority of Security sitting in the lobby that she has gone mad. As Noir informs the Warden of what was said between them, Cleo speaks with her off-screen mercenary goons outside the Brig: Wait, what? Act IV: Desperate Measures and a Showdown at High Noon If Noir was a being capable of feeling panic, this would be it. To face potential repercussions for their defiance was one thing, but the Research Director had blatantly gone and lied to her goons that Noir's defiance was, in fact, Security's as a whole and that they planned to mutiny. Keyword here being mutiny. If non-violent sedition was enough to attempt cyborgification on the CSI, who knows what sort of depraved tortures a sadistic, self-professed madwoman like Cleo Ora had in store for alleged mutineers? Not just Noir itself was on the line now, but it was starting to look like it may have just unintentionally condemned its undeserving colleagues to potential hellish slavery as well. Security remained rooted in the Brig lobby as they had that entire round, pondering their next course of action. And there they sat when the mercenaries, after likely having formed their own plan of action, showed up. Three of them stood near the entrance, guns in hand, to force Security to heel and relinquish their arms. They were faced off by Noir and three other members of Security, demanding the mercenaries do much the same. While they promised no one would be cyborgified if they laid down their arms, Security couldn't reasonably expect that a lying, clinically-insane sadist like their acting Captain could be expected to keep her word. She had already proven herself capable of lying to get her way and already attempting cyborgification on an otherwise harmless CSI. There was simply no way to tell if disarming would have resulted in their deaths. And while they generalized Security as a whole, Noir knew deep down that the acting Captain's ire was directed at them and them alone. Even if Security stood down, Noir would be cyborgified regardless for its defiance. Literal and metaphorical gears churning, Noir began formulating a plan of action to save both its own metal skin and the fleshy, squishy skin of its organic comrades. Three redsuits. Two were fairly standard redsuits with shields and submachine guns. The Unathi, however, was problematic. Unathi in a RIG with an assault rifle. That's bad. Unathi in a RIG with an assault and also an ion rifle slung across its suit. That's double bad for Noir, who is an IPC. It's at this time that it starts looking for Brett Feufer, who had the ion rifle. Right on queue, she appears and informs Noir that the fourth mercenary, the IPC Tin, is lurking around maintenance, most likely to flank. This is a threat assessment Noir agrees with, and informs Feufer to be ready to blast their ion on the Unathi once things escalate. You see, not if things escalate. Neither side was acquiescing, and their argument was circular. The tension was thicker than whip cream, and twice as delicious. Things were beginning to escalate, and with Tin in maintenance it was highly likely they were planning to strike first. This would not do. The Unathi, by virtue of wearing a RIG and carrying an ion rifle capable of crumpling Noir like a wet paper bag in two shots, made himself the primary target. Feufer was informed of this priority, and... As they refused to stand down for the umpteenth time, security began to get into position. As the de facto leader, Noir's word was heeded by the team. They began to shuffle, finding the best position to shoot from. Some members of the team got onto the front desk and closed the windoors, giving them the best vantage point to fire on the mercenaries with their laser weaponry and be shielded by their bullets. A few took positions on the front door to form a deadly firing line should the need arise, trusting in their trigger fingers to win the day when the shots began to fly. Noir hung back behind the safety of the Brig door and windows to protect itself from bullets and also the ions while also watching maintenance for the illusive flanking mercenary. The mercenaries, for the most part, didn't budge an inch. Either they didn't notice what Security was doing or they were confident. But as we all know, overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer. Once everyone was in position, Noir PDA'd Feuffer to begin the engagement. With a vicious battlecry of "Tata", Feufer opened with the ion rifle, emptying the entire thing downwind into the RIG-wearing Unathi's chest. Their ion rifle was disabled, and Security began to open fire. As Feuffer fell back, Noir took her place and opened up alongside their comrades, killing the Unathi in a hail of concentrated fire and forcing Cleo and the other two mercenaries to retreat. No one wanted to fight. When the fighting settled down and the onlookers gathered to assess the situation, the team gazed down upon the fallen Unathi with a mixture of regret, anger and sadness. One member resolved to not participate in the coming conflict, citing honor. Noir declared that Cleo Ora was to be arrested. The Warden and Feufer spoke with a potential cargo militia to form an alliance and bring the acting Captain and her cronies to justice. One mercenary returned, walking into the Brig. Security stared at them with rapt attention, wondering if another fight would occur. This lone mercenary once again began to demand security's surrender, although being just one man they were scoffed at. What could one man do against a team that took no casualties against a team of armed, armored thugs in an enclosed space? Then Brett Feufer fell over, seemingly SSD. Act V: The Bwoink Knight Rises It became abundantly clear that not everyone on the opposing side was perfectly okay with how things played out. Security had engaged first, and had to in order to have even a chance of winning. It just so happened that the lead mercenary, the Unathi who died, was typing at the time the attack started but his chat bubble was bugged. But as Feufer laid into him with an ion rifle for a full five seconds before the rest of Security began shooting, he never moved an inch. Even as he was getting killed even with his superior armor, he didn't think to close his chat box, click into the game and run into cover. And as he died, he ahelped. And what's worse: Security started the engagement! A grand sin! Unbeknownst to the rest of us, Garnascus answered the ahelp and rounded on the first person to shoot: Feufer. I'm not entirely sure what was said between them, but I imagine they never told him that Noir told them to do it, but once Garn started talking in LOOC we realized. Not one to quietly twiddle my thumbs while someone else took my fall, I told Garn and we took the discussion to bwoinks. He made it fairly clear early on that he was going to ban me despite my attempts to argue otherwise and his supposed 'empathy'. Now I'm sure he or someone else are more than capable of pasting the full, raw logs of the ahelps and I am willing to argue whatever points get brought up later but first there is something I want to address. Somewhere around Act 3 in our little story, I ahelped asking if I could be made a replacement revhead, as our current one (the CSI) proved herself to be a bit of an unsubtle nincompoop, was getting herself cyborgified, and the round was about to stagnate because while the loyalists had put in oodles of effort to make an interesting gimmick, all she did was run around, throw junk at the mercs, scream "REBEL WITH ME" out loud, disarm spam them and get arrested, all without using the mechanical conversion function. Even before that I had expressed an interest in assisting her, but she never used that feature. They were obviously a new player who checked all the antag roles they possibly could without considering the amount of effort they'd need to put in to creating a fun round. I was fully willing to bear that burden to jumpstart the round early on, I told Garn of this, as well as Noir's IC reasoning that security was being shafted by NT, someone was being illegally cyborgified on a trumped up charge, and that the RD was blatantly abusing her power. His response was thus: So with this in mind, I began operating under the assumption that the RD, as acting Captain, was liable for breaking regulations. Of course, to do that, Security needed to get through her goon squad to get to her first. However, upon discussing the matter with Garn he says the following: This answer is two-fold. Firstly, it reveals that Garnascus was barely paying even a modicum of attention to the round. He likely just tabbed in when he heard the noise, saw a bloodbath and resolved to get the bare minimum story. He had not been watching the round or the steady escalation of conflict between Security and the Loyalist-aligned mercenaries as they tried to make each other see reason. When I ahelped, he was under the assumption that the RD hadn't declared herself acting Captain and was commanding both the AI and a squad of mercenaries to make any attempt at pursuing legal proceedings against her impossible without doing something about the mercenaries. He was also under the assumption that these were just run-of-the-mill mercenaries, without at the time stopping to consider the fact why there were mercenaries running around and security was focusing on arresting some RD being screwy with regulations. This segues into the secondary implication that if Garn or another admin had been paying attention, he'd have granted my request. And if he had granted my request, then perhaps I wouldn't have been banned and this entire situation could have been avoided. When I point this out to him, it goes a little something like this: ...As a headmin? I have no idea how Aurora staff works, but I'm under the assumption that admins - and by extension headmins - are given the leeway to make reasonable decisions in favor of keeping the round's narrative going. After all, aren't headmins the highest administrative rank below Skull himself? Sadly the round was coming to a close, and Garn didn't want to drag the argument on long enough to cause a delay, so he laid out the ban shortly after some more circular discussion. Luckily, the player of Brett Feufer was promptly unbanned after Garn had deemed himself too harsh. In Summary: For those of you uninterested in the finer details, I was banned for my character and its colleagues defending themselves from the threat of cyborgification. Because the team posing the threat was 'CC-approved', Security should have been expected to throw all caution to the wind, lay down their arms and potentially risk detainment and cyborgification because their supposed would-be dedication to the corporation that axed their paychecks in half should trump all instincts of self-preservation and a desire not to be made into a mindless slave. To Summarize Garn's Arguments as I Interpret Them: Security, neither being loyalists nor revolutionaries, should have complied with the sketchy-as-all-hell Central Command-authorized team of violent thugs in all aspects despite the blatant breach of both regulations and federal law. Security, when accused of being mutineers and held at gunpoint by the acting Captain and her mercenaries, should have acquiesced to the lying lunatic who attempted cyborgification upon a much less defiant offender because... Hey, CC-approved! Any instincts of self-preservation or self-defense that Security and Noir may have had because they didn't trust a proven liar are "irrelevant" because, by Garn's logic, an antagonist waving around an unproven fax that no one but the RD herself actually saw claiming to be from Central Command should be listened to in spite of the entire team being betrayed, treated like dirt, accused of being mutineers and held at gunpoint under the threat of cyborgification even while doing nothing but sitting around the lobby all round should be listened to without question. Even at the near-certain risk of Security's own life. Security, despite contending with, yet again, a proven liar, sadist and madwoman and held at gunpoint by her own cronies, "over-exaggerated" the threat to their lives. I really shouldn't need to deconstruct those arguments further because I've already picked them apart with my not-so-passive summary, but here we go. My Counter-Arguments: Security, with the exception of the Head of Security of which none existed that round, were not loyalty implanted. While Noir and the rest of the team may not have been loyalists or revolutionaries, they acted on the perogative of their own character's ICs. They did not go seeking conflict, the antagonists of that round brought the conflict TO them and forced them into a potentially dangerous situation in which they needed to act, and preferably act pre-emptively to neutralize the threat to them. We did not openly accuse the mercenaries of being phonies, we only questioned their validity until the point where the AI and RD began spamming the announcements that they were legitimate. When the fighting was over, we did not chase them down to finish the job. Some decided to continue with their course of action to see Ora brought to justice while others opted to stay out of any future fighting and prioritize themselves and the uninvolved crew. This is entirely fine. Security should not be expected to be so loyal that they would potentially risk their lives when the only lives at stake are their own. The RD lied to get them accused of mutineers by the mercenaries, and it wasn't a stretch of the imagination to assume she would lie again to get them on the operating table ready for cyborgification, or turn around and order the cyborgification anyways. As above, Security are not loyalty implanted. They can not in any way shape or form be expected to willingly give up their guns and risk cyborgification by a corporation that just cut their paycheck in half... By armed thugs hired by that very same corporation. Noir is an IPC, and those are supposed to value self-preservation above all else, as IPCs are arbitrarily expected to despite being a goddamn robot. Security was comprised of humans (and one honor-bound Unathi who in the end opted to stay out of the fighting) who were also fearing for their lives and acted accordingly in defense of themselves and their friends. In real life, cops are trained to prioritize the safety of themselves and their fellow officers first and foremost, especially when compared to a life-threatening suspect. You cannot expect Officer Joe Blow to not defend himself even if it was the President of the United States holding a gun to his face. Security are trained much in the same way. They're human, and most of them were contractors anyways. They had no love or comraderie for the faceless redsuits pointing guns at them. They were a threat, and they were a threat that was neutralized in the name of officer safety. The RD, in her capacity as acting Captain, blatantly disregarded regulations in a self-professed non-emergency, violated federal law, attempted to cyborgify someone for a medium-level crime, openly claimed to be insane, told Noir in private that she was going to cyborgify it and lied repeatedly to the CC-sent mercenaries to get the rest of Security painted as violent mutineers for doing next to nothing. The mercenaries, for their part, weren't loyal to anything but their paycheck and were following Cleo's orders without question, holding Security at gunpoint demanding their surrender while a fourth mercenary skulked around in maintenance, most likely preparing to flank and initiate an engagement if security continued to refuse. It's highly likely that my three day ban will expire long before this complaint gets resolved, but for the possibility of getting both my note expunged and preventing a dangerous precedent that is inevitably going to lead to more pointless bans while hopefully setting my own and fleshing out the ins and outs of security play, I will keep this one going. And on the topic of precedents... If This Ban Sets a Precedent: I roll traitor. I get my revolver and some ammo and one of those announcement maker thingies. The announcement is from a Central Command department on the Odin with a fancy name that says the following: "Tater McTot has been sent to the NSS Aurora to handle labor disputes. Security is to comply with their requests by any means necessary and allow them to perform their work unscathed." I swear up and down in AOOC that my character is a LEGITIMATE agent sent by Central Command to do his assigned task. Because I'M the only one that can provide oversight to my gimmick, goddamnit! So I grab my gun and I patrol around the station, earning skeptical glances from Security who have no actual clue ICly or OOCly what to do as I force them to comply with my dumb ass gimmick being forced upon them like a sweaty old man at Hooters, probably resulting in more than a few cryos from people who just don't want to deal with the piping hot plate of bullshit I'm offering. And then I find him. The bartender. I do some courtesy RP with him, spout some edgy nonsense and find a contrived reason as to why he's a filthy SLACKER and NanoTrasen has no place for SLACKERS like him on his glorious station. Without further ado I whip out my revolver and gat the dumb drink-jockey down amidst the screams of the common channel and the AI freaking out. For good measure, I shoot that goddamn monkey, too. As I busy myself by hacking apart Pun Pun with a shard of glass, Security bursts in and demands my surrender. I spout some edgy nonsense about how I'm from Central Command itself. As they try to subdue me, I open fire upon them as well for obstructing CORPORATE JUSTICE. In the ensuing gunfight, I am killed and I smash that F1 button faster than my step-dad slams down rye-and-cokes. I explain my gimmick and that I am a LEGITIMATE CENTRAL AGENT and that I wasted my TC on a COMPLETELY LEGITIMATE ANNOUNCEMENT and the admin agrees, bans the dirty nasty no-good seccies who dared defy the will of NanoTrasen, rejuvenate me, give me a cookie and a glass of milk and send me on my merry way. Does that seem far-fetched? You bet. But it's not a far cry from what happened here. What the loyalists and mercs were doing that round was a GOOD gimmick. But if arbitrary announcements trump reasonable IC response, then you will no doubt begin to see gimmicks that get progressively worse and worse. If This Appeal Goes Through and Sets a Precedent: If this appeal succeeds and sets a precedent, then Security and the players that comprise it can rest easy in that their individuality as fleshed out, lovingly crafted characters (2D pixels as they may be) with their own aspirations, relationships, goals, likes, dislikes, development, personalities and the IC decisions that occur as a result don't play second-fiddle to an arbitrary ideal of loyalty forced upon them without care or regard to how the round itself plays out. IC perogative and decisions drive a round forward, and so do conflict and how it escalates or de-escalates. A round should progress in as fluid a manner as possible without administration attempting to stifle player creativity and what makes Aurora a server with unique characters that are lovingly crafted to interact with the world around them. Additional remarks: Part of me enjoys writing these complaints, because they give me the opportunity to potentially change the way Aurora is run for the better. It's far from perfect, but I enjoy it for what it is in spite of all the ups and downs. An appeal like this lets me address those issues in the way that I see them, and hopefully bring it to light to the multitude of other players who have in some way shape or form encountered the same issues I have. Pressure being applied on players who put the time and effort to create unique and interesting characters in an attempt to artificially make them bland and uninteresting to mould someone else's view of how the server should play, the constant mashing of F1 anytime anyone dies as they desperately grasp at straws to get some measure of vindication, policies that are supposed to be IC being enforced as an OOC extension of the rules in non-canon situations. I love Aurora, but there are just so many things that need to change to make it even better.

As HoS, he manages the department but when he needs to, he's not afraid to flex and get his hands dirty. When he does, though, he isn't bloodthirsty and gives antags a chance to either talk their way out or put up a fight. He's got my approval.

Instead of removing it, why not add limitations and workarounds then? Give the staff and wand significant cooldowns so the wizard can't spam it on anyone they please, and upon choosing the staff/wand they get granted an ability to revert someone's polymorph. As for the crew side of things, add something that can revert the polymorph without it being too meta-y to try. Maybe something the Chaplain can do to counteract the "unholy" magics or give additional functionality to something like the lazarus injector that lets it work like a clean SE from genetics. I'm spitballing here since I'd rather not see something just outright removed, but I'm not sure how easy that would be to code. Being permanently polymorphed into a parrot does suck. A lot. Alternatively, give the victims some kind of ability that, after a significant amount of time, lets the polymorphed person automatically change themselves back. That way, if they wanted to remain as whatever they were they could, but the option to turn themselves back becomes presented to them after a certain amount of time has passed that the wizard has likely moved on already.

BYOND Key: Bath Salts Addict Game ID: the round prior to b2H-bb70 (or b2H-bb7O? BYOND font is fucky) Player Byond Key/Character name: Spider4062 (Jesse Armstrong) Staff involved: None. Reason for complaint: To summarize, the primary reason for this complaint is that throughout a rather hectic autotraitor round, Jesse Armstrong knowingly and purposefully kept his entire team in the dark in regards to a pair of malfunctioning AIs and only diverged information with a roboticist, in which he already had an established IC relationship of sorts with and a conflict of interest as he adamantly defended her when reasonable suspicion arose that she may have had a hand in the AI malfunctioning and the creation of an alternate rogue AI. His reasoning for doing so was that, as one security officer turned out to be a traitor and was subsequently eradicated by the rest of the security team, the rest of the team simply could not be trusted and despite the majority of the team including the acting Captain wanting to see the carded AI's laws the clear conflict of interest that arose, he ignored them. This isn't anything a reasonable head of staff would do in any situation. Even if one subordinate was rogue, suddenly turning around and depriving the rest of necessary information to perform their jobs to a suitable standard because they "can't be trusted" but some random roboticist that you've spent the majority of the round schmoozing in your office while the station went to hell is not. A HoS shouldn't and wouldn't deny the investigation team the opportunity to examine evidence and piece together what's going on, nor should he refuse to properly inform officers of what's going on and who the baddies are because he doesn't trust them. Not-so-summary summary out of the way, the details... It became apparent that someone in science had created a second AI that was bound via laws to the original AI that was also malfunctioning. The CSI and I actually managed to find out where the second AI's core was and went to go do something about it. We found a roboticist, Gwendolyn Miller, and informed her of the situation and where the AI was, and she opened/hacked the way to it. Attempts to properly question it were failed when Miller just up and carded it and we turned to leave. Out of curiosity at what the AI's laws stated, I asked to see the card but was ignored. Eventually my second request was danced around serreptitiously, which aroused my suspicion. The original suspect was a scientist, but this roboticist was refusing to let me see the AI's laws, which made me wonder if there was something she didn't want me to see. However, considering the fact that Miller had been nothing but helpful thus far and a rogue officer had just gone and gunned down the bartender in plain view of everyone, I left her to go deal with the more pressing matter. After dealing with that and working through a telecomms outage, I informed the rest of security that Miller was acting suspicious and had the carded AI. Arthur Sommer, Ezmerelda Coetzee and Vincent Gallardi (I butchered those names) agreed with my assessment and went to go get the intellicard from her - by force, if necessary. I confront her in the AI core and learn that she gave the intellicard, along with the original AI's intellicard, to Armstrong. Swell! Armstrong confirms and I ask to see the laws, to which he refuses. Strange... At this point I begin thinking that for whatever reason Armstrong is keeping Miller's secret if she had done something. This would make sense, as he spent the majority of the round schmoozing with her in his tinted office while he delayed speaking to crew that came to the lobby to speak to him about urgent matters. I pointed out the conflict of interest, to which he simply stated that his implant "forbade" him from letting me see the AI laws. From an OOC perspective, that is absolutely retarded. The loyalty implant isn't a brainwashing chip that makes you devoid of reason or logic. From an IC perspective, that is highly questionable, as a lot of things can be justified by an implanted person with enough mental gymnastics. Naturally, this just raised suspicions further. I informed the rest of security about the conflict of interest and they agreed. Even the acting Captain, Aez Goldhorn, agreed that refusing to let anyone see the AIs was plain dumb. What ensued was a lengthy argument in which Armstrong justified his actions by saying that Miller was the "only person he could trust" and three members of his own team and a fellow head of staff were telling him that he was being stupid went unheard. His side of the argument circled between "I don't TRUST anyone!", "Loyalty implant!" and "I am your boss!" while we tried to painstakingly inform of our thought process and why there was a clear conflict of interest. He only gave in when security had enough and informed him that they were willing to take the cards by force if they absolutely needed to, and showed the acting Captain (ONLY the acting Captain, he specified, and straight up told him that if he damaged the AIs that he would "break him"). Armstrong had it in his head that everyone aside from him and Miller were out to wipe the AIs for whatever reason. This lack of trust was apparently justified because one rogue officer who had nothing to do with the AIs went hostile, thus making the rest of Command and Security inherently untrustworthy. I really hope I don't need to outline how shitty this is from an OOC perspective and unreasonable behavior from a head of staff on an IC one. A head of staff should have the sense to delegate and let the rest of security do their jobs and keep them properly informed and in touch. One rogue subordinate should not effect that. Did you attempt to adminhelp the issue at the time? If so, what was the known action taken by administration/moderation? I made an adminhelp but no one took the ticket. Approximate Date/Time: 11:40 PM to 12:00 AM GMT -6

The issue is that they look terrible and don't fit with the overall aesthetic of the server, and I'm not sure how their PR even got merged in the first place. Now what do I mean by "overall aesthetic", you ask? It's simple. How do the sprites stack up compared alongside the other sprites? Now let's look at the white Amory-brand uniforms. They're gross, off-white, perfect for mindless corporate drones to wear that exemplifies the careless bureaucracy that is NT. Except they'd be better suited for actual 9-5 office workers and not a security team on a top research station. But I digress, that's not the point I'm trying to make. They're ugly, and that's not necessarily a bad thing, but they don't fit the server's overall aesthetic. Now let's look at the other uniforms, the other equipment security uses, and even the uniforms of the other departments and the character sprites themselves. What do they look like? Crisp, slightly cartoon-y, easily identifiable, limited but aesthetically pleasing color palettes. There's no cluttered pixel-y messes, they're not eyesores and if you saw the sprites side-by-side you'd know they come from the same game. The issue with the gross, off-white eyesore uniforms is that they don't fit that aesthetic and never will unless you want to painstakingly resprite all the other clothes and items in the game. Now, in what way does ugly work? Let's take Colonial Marines for example. It has it's own distinct style. Everything is ugly, looks dirty (sound familiar?) and has a complex spectrum of colors and it all works together like butter on a hotplate because the spriting team did put all those painstakingly long hours into respriting every. Single. Item in the game with a singular direction in regards to aesthetic in mind. Health analyzers, tools, medkits, computer consoles, even the character models themselves? Ugly, but they work because they're all designed with the same overarching look in mind reminiscent of that grungy retro-futuristic look the Alien series popularized. No one wants to look like a washed up office worker standing next to consoles with fancy schmancy holographic displays, laser rifles and floating cyborgs. In fact, I should propose a new motion. Return the classic blue uniforms to the ISD default and add Amory's uniforms to the loadout along with the old vests and old black uniforms.

Maybe if the current "white" uniforms weren't hot garbage and looked like someone puked all over them and then tried to wash it with water and hand soap to get that nice off-white pukey look, more people wouldn't use the black uniforms. "Dun like, pls remove"

I mean, is it really as much of an issue as people are convinced it is? Just have your characters call them rusty tin cans and such. Just don't be surprised if the IPC in question gives you backsass. And imagine how it's going to go when an IPC or a pro-synth rights witness complains to IA about someone hurting their robo-feelings. The reporter would get laughed at. What I'm taking away from this thread overall is "I want my character to be hateful and bigoted against robots but I don't want to face IC consequences and lose brownie points with other organic characters for playing a hateful bigot"

The admin who permitted me to use a bomb was also the admin that banned me previously for said reasons you stated above, and also the most senior staff member on at the time. How exactly am I in the wrong when I've been lead to believe by being permitted in the first place (by the guy responsible for the previous ban no less!) that I'd be okay by doing it. If I wasn't given that guarantee, I wouldn't have done it in the first place! You have to understand there's a certain level of dissonance here when Aurora has a policy of all in-game decisions made by staff being final, but then turn around and ban players when they receive permission to do something from an admin. I'm sorry, I just don't understand.

Not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but you might need to elucidate a little on the logic behind this decision here. Looking at the facts, it can be established that: 1. The bomb was on a timer. It was not remotely detonated via signaller. 2. If I had any attention to kill anyone, then why would I have planted the bomb when no mercs were around and set the timer so low? (1:10 to be exact, although apparently the server ticks timers down differently) 3. About five minutes had passed between being granted permission and the bomb going off, and if you can reliably figure that out should it also not stand to reason that you can determine within that time frame when the mercs first arrived at the docks and entered their ship? Now as much as I wish I could control the ebb and flow of time, I simply can't. Nor am I as omnipotent as I like to lead people to believe I am. If I had no idea at that moment in time, OOCly or ICly, that the bomb resulted in collateral, how do my IC actions indicate red flags? I do not presume to claim that there wasn't a significant lack of foresight on my part, but if there's one consistency through my alleged OOC actions that are apparently causing red flags and the points I've tried to make in this thread, is that I've called into question the Tajara metacrew's decisions to hang around and follow armed antagonists onto their ship. I was not privy to the IC discussion that lead to that decision, nor was I privy to how things exactly unfolded from the antagonist's side that round. It is simply ridiculous to imply that I somehow knew of all of this far ahead of time, possibly before even they knew what they were doing, prepared a bomb beforehand and managed to time it juuuust right to coincide with them getting into position and blowing up spectacularly. Furthermore to take this to an entirely next level it is doubly ridiculous to assume that because I had the absolute gall and daring to defend my actions in OOC when confronted by people angrily insulting me and attacking the nature of my character (OOC character, that is), that it automatically indicates that I had masterfully pulled all the strings necessary to set said events into motion. If I were truly that omnipotent, then wouldn't I have been able to just avoid this whole situation altogether?

I have a lot I want to say to this, but Juani asked to keep things relatively simple and not clog the thread with the discussions of people not involved. If you want, I can discuss your points via Discord. The secondary purpose of Toxins is to produce bombs for the mining team (as if they need it these days, though) is it not? I don't see how complex a timer attached to a pre-made bomb really needs to be. Feasibly, as far as I know, there are no other "settings" a timed bomb would really need when it's something that serves only one purpose, which is to blow up. Really, I don't see it any different from an egg timer. In fact, people make bombs with egg timers. If they can make bombs with egg timers, I don't see how a timed bomb is so incredibly complex to operate. Set timer, toss bomb in, run like hell.

As far as anyone was concerned (and as far as what I was told ICly) the mercs and the heisters were one in the same, basically. Or at the very least from what I gathered in snippets of conversation, one group had hired the other to provide extra security. But to say you were peaceful is a huge over-statement. Someone (no real distinction was made between mercs and heisters that round) attacked Harper, who claimed it was the merc borg and a recruited Hendricks that did it. Then, while the mercs were away from the bar, it was reported over security comms that the "red suits" were breaking into the Vault. Knowing that things were starting to escalate and that an ERT was called, I began arming up and plotting my moves when I noticed the bombs in the merc ship, and the rest is history. It's not a stretch to assume someone is anything but peaceful - violent, even - when they march into your workplace armed to the teeth with ballistic rifles and energy weapons, intimidate command and security to the point where one officer is so scared shitless that he disarms himself and hands his gear over to said invaders, hospitalize one relatively harmless colleague over a trivial reason and break into the vault to rob company secrets and assets and will likely do the same to other stations. If their intentions were truly peaceful, they would have complied with Security and not have hamfistedly inserted themselves onto the station ready for a fight at any given moment. It's also a broad assumption to make that I did this solely because I didn't get to fight a cult last round. Any cock-blocking I mentioned was because the roboticist that made a Durand never got to use it. I was not intentionally rude, and if I came across that way, then I apologize, but it's a fair shake to say that they are in fact at fault for following the bad guys onto their bad guy ship on the promise of money. I didn't want to blow them up, nor would I have if I had known, but their decision to board that shuttle is what killed them ultimately. They got mad about it in OOC and I pointed it out, perhaps a bit smugly. Their defence was that "their friends were doing it" so I light-heartedly pointed out the typical adage of "if your friends jumped off a bridge, would you do it?" I'm not aware of any bug with timers, but if there is one that would explain why the bomb took so long to detonate when I set it to only a minute and ten seconds. My inability to foresee them boarding the shuttle should have been my initial justification, indeed, but there were a variety of other factors being called in to question as well, and so I feel it might have been lost in translation, so to speak. I'm not omnipotent, so I can't foresee the fact that some crew would willingly leave a relatively peaceful station that pays decently well to even the lowliest of assistants and janitors in favor of following some armed men aboard their eyesore of a ship under the pretense of getting paid.

As I explained, security and command were effectively rendered null by the combined forces of the raiders and mercs along with their fresh-faced recruits. Even with ERT (of which I think only one or two actually arrived) they severely outnumbered and outgunned the station. As much as I would have liked a good old fashioned firefight with them, it would have been a very one-sided firefight and would have likely taken place with a lot more possible collateral than a bomb confined to the antag's own ship. Is it really that far-fetched to not follow obvious bad guys onto their ship when they're giving you a choice whether you want to or not? If you'll shelve the passive-aggression for a moment, you'll realize that I'm not the sole deciding factor of anything that happens. I know you're just grasping at straws as an excuse to pad out your post, but I'll rebuff your points all the same. I was not the sole deciding factor that got slugs and shells removed for what the devs cited as balance reasons, so stop lying and saying it is and stop bringing it up every chance you get. I will even go out on a limb and say the substantial effect that you're talking about is a net positive overall for security and antagonists. I've noticed antags are more free to pursue their gimmicks without having to resort to violence to defend themselves, and that security is more prone to parley with antagonists and attempt non-lethal capture without jumping the gun and resorting to lethals off the hop. It also incentivizes Security to wean off immediately validing antagonists and make sure their primary duty of protecting the crew is fulfilled, as cargo, science and engineering can provide them with the precious ammo they desire. This also allows players of those departments to self-regulate and deny security ammo if they come a-knocking if they feel as if things are being taken too far. What do you think makes more sense? Robot A refraining from performing a certain action because it might make Human B sad, and the last thing they want is Human B to be sad because their relationship with Human B and how Human B perceives them is more important than fulfilling their duty and doing what they feel should be done. Or... Robot A performing a certain action even if they know it might make Human B sad because they feel as if it is the best possible course of action, and do not place as much value on what organics think of them because they are a robot and will continue to function normally regardless of whether Human B is going to be sad or mad at them or not. Again, I did not intend for even antags to die and had planted the bomb before I even saw hide nor hair of the antags on the surface level, but as I watched them pile on the ship then I figuredif they just so happened to get caught in the explosion, then so be it. The additional collateral was beyond my control, and ICly the decision was made by them without any coercion from the antags. It is within Noir's character to not be reduced to a pile of tears anytime someone dies, but it is also within Noir's character to do anything it can to keep innocents, even the ones that were complacent with the antags crimes, from dying. Had it known - which it did not - that there would have been collateral, it would have warned them and tried to disable the bomb, even at risk to itself. But with that decision also comes the grey area in which therein exists the possibility that the mercs would have attempted retaliation by starting a shootout in departures, and then you have to weigh whether it is worth risking uninvolved innocents over involved not-so-innocents who willingly joined a band of vicious thugs and screwed over their coworkers for selfish reasons. Players should have relative freedom to make those decisions in a round with all the IC consequences involved unless it becomes excessive and repetitive. No one should be banned for a reasonable-albeit-poor decision with unintended effects, just like how a complete accident involving black k'ois when it's PR was first merged got a long-standing member of the community permanently banned and stripped of their staff rank. There was no malice involved, just like how there is no malice involved with me. Why is that so hard to see? I'm not the malicious, valid-hunting boogieman that you're trying to paint me as, and I don't hop on the server cackling, rubbing my hands and going "teehee time to ruin someone's day!" I will agree with you that maybe bragging about it once on the Discord was not the smartest idea, but at the time I did not realize the gravity of the situation that I was in. And damnit, how many people can say they bombed a bunch of mercs on their own ship? Or at least think they did. Considering the person I know who sent the ahelp in the first place's track record, it is not a far stretch to say they have some sort of personal vendetta considering how quick they are to rant on and on about how awful of a person I am anytime I get mentioned even in passing, although that's not what I'm trying to say here, and as usual you are purposely misconstruing statements to be passive-aggressive as you are want to do. It's not exactly a scandalous secret that people are too quick to press the ahelp button everytime they die, and unfortunately I'm just as guilty of that. Do you not agree that it's a fairer shake to step back and analyze the situation, than to impulsively bombard staff with ahelps and force them to delay the round for 20-30 minutes at the last second and then angrily take to discord if you don't feel vindicated? Because I can guarantee that if staff don't make the decisions that they get pressured to make, then they're going to get subtly bitched out in Discord. "Maybe I died because I followed the very obvious bad guys onto their very obvious bad guy ship while dressed as one of them without really telling anyone?" "No, it's the other person that is wrong for killing me. I will send an ahelp because how dare I die with five minutes left in the round." They are free to say what they want to say in any complaint, just as they are free to make an ahelp for any reason. I will not try and deprive them of that, but is it not fair to wish decisions could be made on thought-out discussion rather than someone else's impulse? I feel as if my side and my motivations and reasons weren't properly taken into account or listened to, and I'm just as guilty of that as anyone else. On the contrary, however, I try to shy away from that on principle because I know the other person behind the screen is a fallible human being just as much as me. Now, I'm sorry that some people take exception to my very existence and I'm sorry for my actions that resulted in your grief, whether for reasons past or reasons that happened in this particular incident, but to hold onto grudges and allow those to fuel your impulses is decidedly petty, and just makes me wonder how any one individual can have so much energy to devote to such negativity. To decide you hate someone with such a seething passion because they killed you in a video game is in the same vein of doing something as shallow as gossiping about Becky at school because she wore the same dress on the same day as you but it made her look fat. That is something I want the community to consider and shy away from, as we brutally murder each other in a spessman game. The person being brutally murdered is a human too, and so is the person doing the brutal murder. No one is out to get anyone, but I feel as if we decidedly hate each other all the same that we've long since crossed the line into being inconsiderate, and only want to seek out short-lived satisfaction for ourselves. Because if I don't get unbanned, it won't be "wow, I can't believe BSA is still allowed on the server" it'll just be "wow, I can't believe they allowed BSA to stay on the server as long as she did" or much later, "wow I can't believe Person X is still allowed on the server". You know, for someone who is so against soapboxing (if the staff complaint against you in October of last year is any indication) you sure love to do it yourself on situations you have no bearings on at the slightest provocation.

I had planted the bomb before I saw any mercs or even their recruits on the surface level. Even though I set it to a minute and ten seconds to give me time to get to a relative safe distance, I felt like it detonated far longer than a minute and ten seconds. I wasn't even intending to hurt the mercs, but let it tick down when they boarded. It was only until the end of the round did I realize that the merc's recruits were also caught in the explosion. At most it was three minutes (a minute of which was with the bomb already ticking down) rather than the twenty previously claimed as I was being extra-cautious and didn't want a merc to see me if there were any on the shuttle. I couldn't have warned the crew either, as we had established that the antags had access to all comms, and didn't want to risk them retaliating by starting a shootout in departures. I feel like it's a bit unfair to ban someone for extrinsic actions neither they nor staff could have predicted. To my knowledge, notes are made whenever staff contact a player for any reason, whether said player has done something wrong or not. Again, to my knowledge, from looking at the WI my most recent warning was eight months ago, even older than the ban you're referring to, which itself is also months ago. I feel as if it's unfair to claim there's repetitious behavior here when I've never been given any indication of the sort, as well as to claim that I'm not learning from past mistakes when your only interaction with me was a decidedly negative one months ago. Before my previous ban I wouldn't have ahelped and just went ahead with the bombing on pure instinct, and maybe even have timed it to make sure the mercs were onboard.

What did I miss in the conversation that I didn't include in the OP? I probably might've missed something as I had to scroll through a lot of text to get proper screencaps, as I prefer that over straight copypasting, since it allows me to dissect things much easier. If you tell me that, I'll slip it into the OP accordingly. And as for the 'bragging', I was quite proud of myself on how slick I was, even if it did unfortunately result in quite a few accidental deaths. Noir is a character that models itself on cliche detective movies, and as such is themselves extremely cliche, so a one-liner when they ICly didn't know about the collateral is not out there, and even if it did know, robots don't exactly have much feelings in regards to the sanctity of the dead that organics do. I take no particular pleasure in the people that died, however, but felt as if the situation was definitely worth remembering.

Maybe give antagonists the ability to 'rate' how impactful they feel their overall gimmick or presence is being that can help the director make it's decisions, although that comes with the possibility of them artificially deflating or inflating the level of chaos that goes on in a round. Maybe allow them to give new ratings every thirty minutes, starting at the 00:30 mark of a round.

BYOND Key: Bath Salts Addict Staff BYOND Key: QueenofYugoslavia Game ID: Unsure. It was a crossfire round on the 2nd of December. (Or 3rd depending on your timezone) Reason for complaint: I was banned for rigging a bomb in the merc ship's hold to blow up, killing some of them along with a few crewmembers who had defected to the merc's side. Naturally, I contend the reasons justifying my ban, and the ban reason itself - unless it was changed since I pointed it out to Queen - provides erroneous information. Evidence/logs/etc: So. Let's begin. The round was a voted crossfire round. Surprisingly, instead of brutally murdering each other the mercs and the raiders teamed up. Even more surprisingly, instead of brutally murdering the station, they marched onboard and started a recruitment drive of sorts. Or at the very least, the recruitment drive was a diversion while they got up to mischief elsewhere. Security was all of three people, and later two as one of the officers ended up being so intimidated by them he gave them his gear and ran off to hide. Immediately from the get-go of getting onboard, the combined mercs and the raiders - heavily armed all - began waving their guns around and set up shop in the bar, deconstructing it and harassing the crew sitting around inside. They set up a recruitment booth and get to work manipulating whoever decides to walk up to them into joining them. To reiterate, the antags began recruiting crew to willingly join a band of murderous, intimidating thugs and a few even do (mostly the kind of characters that make you look at them, scratch your head and wonder how they even got hired in the first place) Having intimidated sec into being a laughable mess and having convinced multiple crew to violate their legal contracts with NT and join up with a band of violent thugs, they begin the next phase of their occupation of the station. In order to further win the loyalty of one of their fresh recruits, they proceed to hospitalize another crewmember by violently attacking them (the victim being Willow Harper I believe) for some mundane reason or another and leaving them hospitalized with a fractured skull. They then proceed to break into the vault and are able to loot it clean, without the two remaining members of Security able to interfere unless they wanted to get absolutely steamrolled. An ERT gets called, but too little too late, as the round is coming to a close and the mercs and raiders are preparing to leave. With the ERT called, I begin expecting things to come to a head and start arming up. A friendly raider that I met gives me a gun and also warns me that the mercs and raiders won't take kindly at all to the ERT being called, which further servers to exacerbate my fears. With ERT already on-station, the merc ship in the yellow dock and a crew transfer on the way with some crew already going to the dock to wait, I feel as if a shootout is going to become inevitable. As I wander into departures to investigate, I kill a carp that managed to break into the yellow dock and notice the hole it broke in through. Walking in, I trudge over to the merc ship to discover it pretty empty from what I could see inside. They forgot to close their shutters, of course. Also inside the hold, I spot the four bombs they left untouched. Wanting to try and disable the merc ship and leave them at the mercy of the ERT, I ahelp Alberyk and ask for permission to bomb the merc shuttle. He says yes, and so I shoot out the window leading to the bombs, set the timer on one to a minute and ten seconds, throw it in further to the wall connecting the bomb room to the entry airlock and walk casually back onto the station. Almost immediately upon entering through the hole I went out through I see a merc, and smoothtalk my way out of suspicion and watch him get on his ship. This is going to get juicy. As I walk out into the hallway, I casually stand by and strike up a conversation via comms with one of the raiders I had to force out of the kitchen earlier since they were harassing the chef. Meanwhile, a line of red-suits wordlessly march past me into their shuttle, and shortly after it explodes and I make a terrible cliche'd pun, a la terribly cliche'd detective, as said raider just so happened to have mentioned the word 'explosive' the moment it did. Except... Just one problem. Apparently the mercs found the time to stuff their fresh recruits in spare suits and the red suits I saw march past was a combination of those recruits and the actual mercs, and so while some mercs died, the majority of the ship's casualties (which undocked shortly before the bomb went off) were of the recruits that had willingly joined up with them. Well shit. Some of those recruits take exception to what happened and can't smash that ahelp button soon enough. Almost immediately I am bwoinked by Queen, and after a lengthy discussion I am banned. The full conversation between myself and them and a few other staff is below. (I wanted to separate these into title cards for different "chapters" a la Red Dead Redemption 2's transitions for the hell of it, but I don't have the time or creative mind to do something like that.) Here I ascend my prayer for salvation to the heavens, and the Lord of Robusting Antags himself answers my pleas. The wheel has been set in motion. Queen contacts me, and I immediately clarify that Alberyk had given me permission. This is where I found out that there innocents caught in the explosion. But that can't be right, I watched the dock and I only saw red suits pile in. Unless... Well shit. Still, it was the defected 'crew's' perogative to willingly join a band of murderous thugs, partake in their crimes and attempt to escape without repercussions. Although it was never my intention to kill them had I knew they were the red-suits marching past me beforehand, they willingly put themselves in that situation and unfortunately died as a result. The timer was already set when they walked aboard, and I could not have foreseen things playing out as they did. Here Queen reiterates her point and I reiterate mine, and to be fair I should have explained early on that I had set the bomb prior to knowing that the merc's recruits were piling onto the shuttle. However, this point is simply either erroneous or exaggerated. "Bombed departures indiscriminately" is an over-exaggeration, and implies I detonated all three docks with the bomb when in reality I made sure the radius was farthest away from even the yellow dock's entry, and at most it blew out the windows closest to the shuttle which was quickly repaired. Even then, if they weren't involved they wouldn't have helped the antags commit their crimes, violated their contracts and followed a band of violent goons onto their ship to do the same crimes elsewhere to some other station. It's not exactly black and white, here. Here I'm not sure if Queen was paying attention to the round or even knows how escalation works themselves. It's true that we didn't start shooting at the antags because with their numbers they would have absolutely demolished us. Killing anyone, even antags, was secondary to my intention of disabling the ship to leave them stranded. To my justice-oriented character, it is a better course of action than letting them run off into space to do exactly what they did to the Aurora on other stations or colonies. Even if I had known they were dressed up as mercs, there wouldn't have been much time to run in and disable the bomb, and it's likely the mercs would have saw me fiddling with a bunch of bombs and killed me immediately. That is not to say I wouldn't have tried if I did know, however, since it's against Noir's character to willingly be responsible - indirectly or directly - for the death of innocents - even if said innocents are not really that innocent at all. Because I was there, and one of only two active Sec around. The other was the Warden who was doing all he could to hold down the fort in the Brig or else we would've been really screwed. Why the antags didn't raid the armory is beyond me. No bombs were built or even modified. They were all sitting there in a row like a pretty bunch of coconuts. If Queen was paying attention at all to the round, they would have asked this the moment I ahelped for permission to blow up the merc ship if this was such a concern. Here I go into detail as to exactly what the antags had done to escalate the situation to that point. Here Yonnimer takes over very briefly as I guess Queen DC'd (maybe they didn't see my last points when they did) and asks me about the bombs themselves. Queen comes back and asks about my past history - which was quite a bit ago. All in all ever since my last ban, I've been a saint. They go even further and claim that it's validhunting and gank. I should have reiterated that I didn't exactly care whether or not the bomb killed any antags, and it doing so was just a happy little accident. Along with the not-so-happy little accident that was the collateral. Now here is where I feel there is a slight bias involved on Queen's part. Their last point is simply erroneous. The behavior had not been ongoing. I have been bwoinked before when staff felt like they needed me to do some explaining, and I always have and always got the okay. I've even taken to ahelping before I do anything that could be misconstrued, such as blowing up a merc ship or getting an autolathe hacked as Warden. The bias on Queen's part is likely stemming from an unfortunate encounter I had with them. During a lowpop traitor round, their RD character was a traitor and was manipulating events from behind the scenes. Security was attacked by an antag that I believe they armed up and told to have at 'em, and I had discovered Queen's involvement. I began to slowly confront them bit by bit, and when I outright accused the traitor-RD of being a low-down no good dirty traitor, they tried to brush me off and began walking away from me despite my numerous attempts to get them to stop, so I peppersprayed them. Queen ahelped, and the situation was handled by Yonnimer who saw no real fault in the situation. If @Yonnimer remembers that situation and all and wants to add in his side of things, I would plead that he does, as I feel as if Queen might have still been feeling sour from that whole fiasco because to my knowledge I never had even a small issue that could hint towards repetitious behavior. Here I make a last ditch effort to defend myself, and ask for another member of staff to step in - preferably one with seniority as I felt like the conditions Queen was putting in place in an attempt to keep me banned for as long as possible is beyond what a Moderator is and/or should be allowed to do. Eventually I just shrug and eat the ban, resolved to make this complaint. Here is the ban itself, which is erroneous as the reasoning says that I had waited twenty minutes after first being authorized by Alberyk to bomb the ship and implies that I had decided to bomb the ship expressly for the purpose to acquire valids. 'Large amount' is also dubious, as to my knowledge only two of the assistants part of that particular metabuddy group that joined up with the mercs died. Additional remarks: Now. Slightly unrelated rant time. Personally, I feel as if the community is too eager to smash the ahelp button anytime someone so much as looks at them funny, let alone kills them - antag or otherwise. This makes people who play antag and security overly-cautious and generally breeds an environment that is tense, unfriendly and outright toxic, knowing that at a moment doing the wrong thing inadvertently can make someone start seeing red in a blind seething rage. They don't ahelp out of concern for rules possibly being broken, they ahelp out of no desire other than petty vindictiveness. This is SS13. Unpredicted things happen, you're in a game where every role - up to and especially the robots - are filled out by a human. Said humans are not as infallible as some people like to believe they are, but I will go out on a limb and say that no one on this server is going out of their way to maliciously ruin as many rounds as they can. People need to stop acting like it's a personal attack on them anytime they get horizontal'd for any reason. As a whole, I think a lot of people just need to take a deep breath, step back, analyze the situation to see if anyone is truly at fault, realize it's a game, suck it up and either observe, play another game or rejoin the round as a new character until the next one. We're all guilty of this, of course, even myself, but at least make an effort to realize that no one is out to get you. Yes, even the person that blew your head off with a shotgun has reasons that seem sound to him for doing so. Stop wasting energy on being so goddamn angry and vindictive all the time, at least not without making an effort to figure out the justification someone might have. It's not healthy for you, as a person, and neither is it healthy for the community. SS13 might be a game about looking over your shoulder in suspicion at even your closest friends, but if we start acting that way OOCly I can assure you it isn't going to be good for anyone. It's not welcoming to new people, and it's dissuading to old-timers, and it's just exhausting having to constantly watch what you're doing, having to hear a bwoink every second and spend the next thirty minutes explaining themselves to avoid a ban just because someone got angry. I would rather sit out a round for two hours by getting killed even under dodgy terms than potentially make someone sit out the server for far longer than it took you to puff out your cheeks and smash your keyboard. Aurora is a great server, with great lore, coders, staff and mechanics, and has managed for years to keep a solid and sizeable playerbase without having to resort to gimmicks like allowing ERP to keep people playing. Don't spoil it all by letting your frustrations and anger turn the community toxic. I know even the worst bad apples in this community are better than that.

Also, I'm not sure how much more communication you need when someone whips out a .357 and guns down your buddy in front of you, and then proceeds to hunt you to hell and back.

I did make a few comments in AOOC when I got mid-round traitor, which I'm not sure if you missed or not. You must have known what my OOC handle was since I don't see anyone asking around the Discord about who plays Noir. At that point I think you and Carson were already openly hostile as well. I unfortunately had to AFK for a bit, and when I came back I was stripped and in cryo of all my gear and weaponry (I was a sec officer that round, not a detective) and all I had was the traitor .357 I bought from the uplink. The exact moment I come back, Carson is standing there with your character and the hostage, and aims the ice lance at me (for the sake of clarity I'll refer to our in character actions as 'you' and 'I') and tells me to get on the ground. Obviously not wanting to lose a very powerful traitor item and my only real remaining line of defense, I kept Carson talking until he made the decision to shoot me. I don't know what an icelance is, or what it's supposed to do ideally to an organic target, but naturally it did little to an IPC other than cause some burn damage. It was at this point I evaluated the situation. The Warden did, indeed, seem armed to the teeth but you with your hostage seemed to have nothing in the way of weaponry, and had nothing out. I play my cards right, and Carson starts shooting. I tank the shots and take him down, much to his chagrin in LOOC. I honestly had no real intentions of stopping Carson or you, and would have went cracking with my own devices. That was the plan at least, until the Warden made the fatal mistake of trying to take me hostage and shooting me. Unfortunately, as his accomplice, you were also guilty by association. Seeing as you had no weapons that I knew of, or at the least none that you were willing to whip out, I gave a close follow up until library maintenance, in which the hostage tried to warn me off. I was still deciding at this point whether traitor!Noir would care about the hostage's life or not, ultimately I decided the former since I tend to be a heartless renegade far too often. So I peel off, and with Carson dead and the rest of security reporting the departures wing clear, I figure the next logical move for you to make is to try to make for an escape pod (you did state your intentions to escape, if I recall correctly) so I went to the Bridge. You beat me, somehow, but I caught you coming out of the elevator on the top floor after the AI told me where you were. You were trapped in the elevator with your hostage, with the rest of Security - most of whom were also traitors strangely enough I think - squishing their greasy little faces against the doors ready to pummel the daylights out of you as soon as they opened on my word. Towards the end, yes, I did ask the AI to open the elevator doors to resolve the situation, but the server rebooted at that last moment. I was pretty confident that we could have rescued the hostage with minimal harm and have taken you down non-lethally. Why? Because you had yet to brandish a weapon. At all. To my knowledge your hands were empty except for the one holding the hostage. Now, I'm not entirely sure how police are supposed to operate in a hostage situation, but to me common sense dictates that when a hostage taker becomes unreasonable and refuses to realize that they're trapped and have no real way out, and there is a very present risk of said hostage taker trying to abscond with their hostage, both possibly never to be seen again, then that is the time for action and not words. At that point, all 3-4 of us could have rushed you and beat you down with no risk posed. And when said hostage taker fails to show them actually being able to make do on their threat, and is most likely unarmed? You better believe an ass whooping is in store.