Complaint - 'Greasers'

[Susan]

BYOND Key: SueTheCake

Player Byond Key: Festus_Crane, Jenalele, Sanguine416, CraftingCK

Reason for complaint:

Get ready for a long read.

For awhile now, the server has sometimes been graced by a metabuddy group of 'Greasers' that seek to emulate actual Greasers from the 1950s, going so far as to wear pompadours, blast original rock over the comms, and establish a 'Church of Rock' with Elvis Presley as the lord and savor or something equally asinine. This is the reason for my complaint; I view this behavior to be reprehensible and destructive in its nature. While at first it may have gotten a few chuckles and was a little bit funny, they have continued to extend the joke and beat the proverbial dead horse with an unrelenting desire to completely and utterly overturn suspension of disbelief and in-character immersion. While this may be tolerated on some other servers, I was under the impression Aurora Station is heavy roleplay and I feel that administration has failed to provide a legitimate reason for inaction over behavior that, quite frankly, I'd expect from /tg/station.

To create an environment conducive to roleplay, things are policed by administration - things like character actions. Characters with unbelievable or snowflakey backgrounds are contacted by administration (usually), unrealistic actions are questioned and adminhelped, and joke characters are mostly swiftly dealt with. In light of this, I would like to bring attention to this group of players as as far as I am concerned they fall into this group here. I feel that these repeated rounds spent with 3 assistants flocking around a chaplain preaching about the 'Church of Rock' add nothing to the round but blatant stupidity and degrade in-character immersion. Given that Aurora is touted as a heavy roleplay server, I would appreciate if this issue was handled in a more official capacity. I do not see a justification for allowing this behavior to continue short of 'but its funny', and even that stands on such shakey ground.

Why would NanoTrasen allow a 'Church of Rock' onto their station? What would possess people in the far flung future to worship Elvis Presley and a ten year period in human history? In our current day and age, we do not have people that worship Benjamin Franklin or what have you, so I fail to see how this 'Church of Rock' can even be considered a realistic institution that would even be recognized by the Alliance as a legitimate religion. Further, since Greasers are traditionally gangs of perturbed youth, and that NanoTrasen would have access to and would certainly perform background checks on individuals - Police in our current day and age keep tabs on individuals suspected of participating in gang activity and these notes would be on their criminal record. Assuming this is a gang (as they have repeatedly attempted to mug people, while non-antags before), I fail to see why the company would bother employing gang members at all, no less assigning members of a gang to the same station thereby increasing the chances of them performing gang-related actions.

It is my firm-held belief that the individuals presented here have failed to grasp the intent of this server and seem to have confused it with /tg/station or some such. They add nothing to the round but some bad Fonz impressions, emotes about 50s music over the radio, and other outdated references that are not funny and achieve nothing beyond the destruction of immersion and the fourth wall by being blatantly awful. I do not believe 'it is fun' or 'its funny' or even 'don't ban fun then we'll be hitler' are anywhere close to actual justifications for allowing this sort of behavior to propagate, because that is the same bad, slippery slope logic used by Baystation which has literally turned into /tg/station 2.0 because of the obscene amounts of stupid shenanigans they allow over there. I would like action to be taken, mostly to put a stop to this whole thing more than anything, so that we may return to a bearable IC atmosphere without an OOC metacommunication team cracking jokes about 'malt shops' over the radio.

 

 

isnt this funny gais rofl xd

[hivefleetchicken]

I should add on to Sue's complaint, which I strongly agree with; the one time that I have seen these guys as antags, they attempted to gank me without any words while I was in the middle greeting one of them in the so called 'church of rock'.

They're annoying, offer nothing to the round but chuckle-fuckery, and are blatantly meta-communicating. And I frankly must admit that I don't find it funny in the slightest anymore.

[Susan]

I would also like to bring the sheer arrogance of these keys to attention after administration stepped in once they beat someone to near death.

Responding to a staff member's justification for "putting a stop to the gang things", the 'leader' linked in OOC a google doc with a beautiful header that consisted of:

 

 

They then began to attempt to justify their behavior and displayed a clear lack of understanding as to the real issue at hand.

 

 

When someone brought up the arrogance of the title:

 

[josh1133]

*Sits back in his seat, smoking a cig with his slick back hair and sunglasses over his eyes, a leather jacket being worn on his shoulders*

Why that ain't cool cat, you see, the greasers have appointed me their cool cat lawyer. Now, you make some pretty good points, just kidding.

Also, this Jacob Drengr though he was a real Class A joker, and changed the janitor's water in his bucket to some kind of messed up chemical to set fire to the janitor and half the hall way. My cool clients went to confront the man and he pulled a knife and stabbed one of them. Of course they defended themselves, but I guess they don't have that right since some people don't like them, sure if one of your characters did the same thing we wouldn't be having this discussion.

Basically, Kingmatt set a man on fire and when confronted stabbed one of them. Your reasons don't make much sense to me, and since Kingmatt is the one who started all the chaos posing as one of my cool clients, and they went to talk to him before one of their brothers was stabbed about all the crimes like the fire and the graffiti they went to confront him about, they acted naturally and attacked him.

But I guess we draw the line at greasers, instead of a church that worships turtles, kills clones and screams constantly about how we are all going to a stranger version of hell, since all of those religions have been allowed in no problem.

You see, its time to take your argument apart one by one sweet cheeks.

1) I feel that these repeated rounds spent with 3 assistants flocking around a chaplain preaching about the 'Church of Rock' add nothing to the round but blatant stupidity and degrade in-character immersion.

Your opinion is that its stupid, personally I find them greatly entertaining. You claim that they don't add anything, I see a force that is a group of vigalantes, a interesting factor when they are on the station daddy-o, enemies to both antags and security, and are a force to be reckoned with, if that ain't interesting RP, then I don't know whats cool baby.

2) Why would NanoTrasen allow a 'Church of Rock' onto their station? What would possess people in the far flung future to worship Elvis Presley and a ten year period in human history?

So this church of Rock can't be here, but multiple times characters of mine that have been cloned have been kidnapped and sacrificed by a cult of killers who don't like them there clones very much. This religion is allowed on the station, but we can't worship our dear lord and savior Elvis? That ain't cool kitty cat, especially with other religions that worship turtles, snowmen and other crazy things, but I guess Elvis is just a bit too cool for this school.

[Sanguine415]

Joy, an actual thread. Let's begin with your first paragraph.

While I'm wounded of your disbelief in the church of rock, and it's preached "rule of cool", I certainly respect your choice to dislike such a thing. That said, your presumption that such a thing is reprehensible or, cue the dramatic chorus here, destructive, is just silly. We've done nothing but abide, in every regard of our character niches, to each response in roleplay. A shame truly that we aren't pink haired snowflakes from Unicorn-16, but RP is not such a close minded concept, no?

Now, while my previous statement regarding respect for your opinion remains, our presence in RP has, in the past, raised a fair bit of reasonable RP, if perhaps not the sort that your personally "agree" with. Whether the dramatic story of Johnny Frank's horrible accident in the dreaded pool party pressurization, or the rev round where the church took it to the man with words and preach of NT's keeping the cool down with their removal of all the fun, our presence was not simply "stupidity". Our roleplay was nothing but heavy in regards to every response, action by action.

If you're implying NT's hiring history is of the highest quality, or that they'd be seeking the highest educated individuals for menial labor positions, specifically assistants, I note that you have a very narrow minded perception of background. The universe is a rather large place, and if there exists a cult in this vast place that worships the basic equivalent of Space Cthulu, is it truly unbelievable that a planet in this vast space has a different sort of worship? If one worships a man who was put up on a cross, and had a large following in the distant past, it is no far fetched belief that such a thing could occur in regards to another king, the coolest sort. There is no gang present, beyond several fellows in a religious organization who protect their own. Your assumption of criminal background is just, that, assumption, and deserves no other response.

I'd like to think our Fonz impressions are pretty solid, but that's personal perception. All of the actions you've listed are certainly true, some of the finer points that have evolved within the church of rock, and certainly provided an active religion if nothing else. We shouldn't be our own witnesses in regards to the quality of the RP present, but your perception of these things appears to be biased by a clear dislike of rock and roll. While such preferences are acceptable, yours is not the universal definition of "Heavy" RP.

No denying the arrogance bit, nor defending it. Simply nature.

[Sanguine415]

And as a noted to the tunnel snakes rule bit, it wasn't us. If you'd noted the flow of the comms, it was us specifically that complained about the graffiti before our fellow was set on fire.

[Frances]

Be nice. This is an OOC complaint, so I'm expecting it to be handled OOCly, in a polite and mature way. Drop the greaser act in this thread, or I'll step in.

 

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Now, to put out a few things for all.

On chucklefucking: chucklefucking is actually allowed, within reason, given that it does not break any rules. This means no blatantly insane characters, actions must still be justified, proper backstory when applicable, etc. Above all, and the reason why we have all these rules: your characters must be fun for others.

Now, it's impossible to please everybody, I get that. But there's still two major rules chucklefucks need to abide by, should they with to avoid getting their characters removed: the character should not be completely immersion-breaking, and they should not piss everybody off, in an OOC way.

Examples for both: for the former, this doesn't mean ridiculous characters shouldn't be allowed. We are still playing SS13; ridiculous things happen fairly often. But there is enough shit going on during a normal round that we don't need greasers or space-clowns becoming a perma-feature. A balance of humor and drama is what makes the server enjoyable: being able to alternate between serious and funny rounds. But it frankly becomes a problem when your chucklefuck character is on every round, trying to do the same thing over and over. Another example would be a character engaging in absolutely ridiculous acts (blowing themselves up out of incompetency every round), yet getting repeatedly hired (or at least not ever fired) by NanoTrasen.

For the latter, this means don't design characters who are incredibly overbearing, and avoid going overboard. Pissing off people ICly is fine, in fact it's something that happens even with serious characters and is just a daily part of life. But if you create a wholly incompetent character, who needs constant babysitting, keeps preventing other people from doing their jobs, needs 24/7 brigging, and keeps coming back every round despite being demoted to assistant, well, that's not fun for anybody to deal with.

So, these two things. How do they apply here? Frankly, I think that's up for you all to discuss. But one thing I will mention is frequency: the greaser act is, imo, 100% fine in its essence, given that we have pretty silly shit happen constantly on the station, including some staff-organized events. But if you keep getting complaints, it might be a hint to tone down both the frequency and intensity of these adventures, before we're forced to ask you to stop. Because we shouldn't forget that even chucklefucks are permitted to stay so they contribute to others' enjoyment, and not just their own.

[Sanguine415]

Acceptable, though the frequency of the greaser presence is vastly overestimated. In total, we've done four, maybe five rounds of it over a five week period. Usually roll as Rudolph or CL3AN.

[Frances]

Acceptable, though the frequency of the greaser presence is vastly overestimated. In total, we've done four, maybe five rounds of it over a five week period. Usually roll as Rudolph or CL3AN.

Again, just stating the rules and the general idea on this kind of incident. Don't take this as a statement on your particular case; that's for you, and everyone else involved, to determine.

[Covert0ddity]

My major issue with things like 'chucklefuck characters' is their probability of being hired on the station. While it seems to be a running joke, and has offered a lot of laughs before, that NanoTrasen doesn't give any forethought or shits on who they hire. I don't think this should be the way it is. Any corporation, it doesn't matter how big, will have their bad eggs, of course. But said eggs will be squashed.

I find that everyone has to take a psychological test, a written test to make sure they are capable of doing what they are hired to do, and a small interview with a resource manager. Okay, that'll sort out the rabble right then and there.

I wouldn't go ahead and say "Blaaagh all funny characters are bad." Rather, limit the act to once in a blue moon.

[Sanguine415]

My major issue with things like 'chucklefuck characters' is their probability of being hired on the station. While it seems to be a running joke, and has offered a lot of laughs before, that NanoTrasen doesn't give any forethought or shits on who they hire. I don't think this should be the way it is. Any corporation, it doesn't matter how big, will have their bad eggs, of course. But said eggs will be squashed.

I find that everyone has to take a psychological test, a written test to make sure they are capable of doing what they are hired to do, and a small interview with a resource manager. Okay, that'll sort out the rabble right then and there.

I wouldn't go ahead and say "Blaaagh all funny characters are bad." Rather, limit the act to once in a blue moon.

 

That's a good reasoning as any, I suspect such a thing could provide amusing results and RP.

[Skull132]

That's a good reasoning as any, I suspect such a thing could provide amusing results and RP.

 

Or irritation. Empathy is a relatively useful skill to have on this front: if you overstep certain lines then the "amusing results" will be seen as nothing more than just childish acts that people have to tend to as a matter of course, and not as the spark of comedy that, I'm sure, you seek to provide.

So, please do keep others in mind while conducting your business.

[Sanguine415]

That's a good reasoning as any, I suspect such a thing could provide amusing results and RP.

 

Or irritation. Empathy is a relatively useful skill to have on this front: if you overstep certain lines then the "amusing results" will be seen as nothing more than just childish acts that people have to tend to as a matter of course, and not as the spark of comedy that, I'm sure, you seek to provide.

So, please do keep others in mind while conducting your business.

 

As a given, wouldn't be much point in the act if there weren't others to receive it.

[Chaznoodles]

They're not really causing any harm. If you're against people playing as a particular fashion choice, or worshipping someone who would have possibly evolved to a god-like status as the King of Pop, then you're as well complaining about the HoS who worships Nar-Sie, or all the clicky little religions that pop up.

These people have fun playing as these characters, and they do a nice job of adding fun and atmosphere to the station. That's the point of games. Not to complain about people who aren't having the same kind of fun as you, but to share the fun.

[Susan]

I have literally not seen you on server since I first started playing here.

Perhaps this is too blunt, but I don't think you have the required experience to say exactly how these people are influencing the round when you've never actually been on to see them at all.

And yes, I do have a problem with all of those things. If you as a staff member are trying to justify the /religious worship/ of Elvis Presley because he has the moniker 'King of Rock', then perhaps the sour taste left in my mouth after this whole ordeal is wholly justified. The religion is outlandish and makes no sense and the concept of some social group from a ten year period of human history nearly three quarter of a thousand years ago becoming some sort of cult thing is equally hard to swallow. I would make the same argument about a Head of Security worshiping a /blood god/ and the rest of the stupid religions that pop up, which, as a matter of fact, is related to this complaint.

Festus_Crane has played a chaplain recently who began to preach a religion ripped straight from Warhammer 40k, something about some Imperial Cult. Screaming about 'the Emperor' over comms and denouncing all xenos. Given that Frances, irregardless of my disagreement with her lack of action on this, as well as Skull talked about toning things down, this leads me to believe that Festus hasn't actually listened or learned anything from the staff responses in this topic. He continues to make outlandish characters that make obscene amounts of pop-culture references and has treated this whole affair extremely arrogantly, which has been stated previously.

Whether or not people have fun playing these characters is irrelevant. These people are more than capable of going to another server with rules that are more lax like /tg/ station or Goonstation to perform the same atmosphere-destroying feat that they've done here. In fact, I'd expect someone to be screaming 'Praise the Emprah' over the radio on Goon because of the nature of the place. Seeing it done /here/, and seeing staff /attempt to justify it/ is extremely off-putting and leads me to question staff judgement. I was utterly speechless that, ignoring your inactivity as well as a presumed gross lack of information on this topic, you even dared to claim that they add 'atmosphere' to the station. I wouldn't think I'd need to remind a member of the staff team of the two small words that appear in the window of the game client; those being 'Heavy Roleplay'. I'm sure our Lore team has slaved for weeks of in depth backstory and fluff so that someone can ignore it all, shit all over it, and come on screaming about praising the Emperor and heresy, or lauding Elvis Presley as a god.

 

 

Perhaps in the wake of a power struggle and swapping of positions the staff team has forgotten what 'believability' is, or 'heavy roleplay'. This is the sort of chucklefuckery that I would not have expected from this server and even still I fail to understand why staff members are attempting to defend and justify this given that it violates probably not only the lore, but immersion and atmosphere as well. I fail to understand why you believe allowing behavior more conducive to a light RP environment is a good idea on a server that boasts itself to be all about the 'heavy' roleplay, and I fail to see how anyone can sit down and seriously look at 'a religion based around Elvis' as a legitimate or even reasonable thing.

Whether or not it's fun is irrelevant. You can be creative and make an interesting religion that achieves the same purpose without blatantly chucklefucking about, gang beating people and screaming about the 'EMPRAH' over the radio.

[Frances]

thing

We have wizard rounds. These are pretty silly.

The main thing I seem to understand from this is that you would like to get rid of silly roleplay altogether. Most of your arguments are based around the ridiculousness of the situation, rather than the quality of the roleplay (or lack thereof). Correct me if I'm wrong on that point.

I believe that argument introduces a core difference about the nature of our server. The majority of the staff has always favored silly happenings, as long as they do not go overboard and are not constant. There is a difference between "silly" and "horrible", but until you debate it properly (again, we have wizards), there is very little I can do to address this, as I don't think this kind of roleplay is going to leave as long as it is done in a reasonable matter and with some amount of skill.

[Susan]

I'm also wholly for the entire axing of wizard based on the sheer fact it's stupid.

You're correct in your understanding of my argument. You could be an RP god talking about Elvis Presley as your one an only savior with his brother the Space Pizza and whatever, and I'd still be against it. I don't believe the quality of roleplay should factor in; The Space Pizza has no place being discussed on a heavy roleplay server irregardless how well it is roleplayed out. As you said, there is a thin line between 'silly' and 'horrible'. However it seems that for me that line is a lot thinner than for you. I'm perfectly fine with silly things happening so long as they are within reason and don't require me to take my suspension of disbelief and behead it like Marie Antoinette. Jason Sanders being the Crimson Crow is an example of this; it's silly, but not too overly so. I can handle it, and deal with it ICly. The line between this and what I'd consider 'roleplay not becoming of a heavy RP server' would be crossing over into 'Praise the Emprah' Warhammer 40k religions.

I've seen silly stuff done on server. I've been okay with most of it. However, in this case, multiple factors are considered. The greasers in question have handled this in an arrogant fashion and disregarded staff suggestions to tone down their over-the-top characters, with Festus instead going ahead and making a Warhammer chaplain/taking part in that whole scenario. The silliness is okay once in awhile, which I believe is an argument you made, but it becomes repetitive when done often. This is true, and therein lies the problem; the greasers aren't the only perpetrators of 'outlandish/potentially offensive silliness'. I can think of many others, the first of which coming to mind are transgender characters with no concept of the source material they're pulling from.

Having to deal with some vigilante in a red suit once in awhile is fine. It's silly. I can suspend my disbelief enough to believe that. I can handle it ICly. Preaching about the Imperium, holding Elvis Presley as a god, worshipping music and social statuses six hundred years in the past, as well as antagonistic actions as non-antags, I can't. Extending the line too much is, I believe, counter-productive to the quality of this server as a whole.

[Frances]

You defend your point well on that aspect. I can't pronounce myself more on the situation as I haven't been present on the server much recently (actually on leave), but coming out of a heavy incident involving chucklefucking to play an equally ridiculous chucklefucking does not help Festus' case. Neither does the attitude the group brought in when handling this.

It would be nice to see another reply from Festus, though at worst I suppose it's bound to pop up as an on-server issue again sometime soon.

[Sanguine415]

And yes, I do have a problem with all of those things. If you as a staff member are trying to justify the /religious worship/ of Elvis Presley because he has the moniker 'King of Rock', then perhaps the sour taste left in my mouth after this whole ordeal is wholly justified. The religion is outlandish and makes no sense and the concept of some social group from a ten year period of human history nearly three quarter of a thousand years ago becoming some sort of cult thing is equally hard to swallow.

 

In this vast universe of space fish and plant people, apotheosis of an individual that greatly influenced a genre of music as prevalent as rock, while reasonably out there, certainly doesn't come to mind as particularly unlikely. The greaser presence, beyond the prospect that young people find the oddest things from both past and present to be the definition of "cool", states it as a base given that such a thing is not in the realm of impossible. That, and leather jackets are kinda a universal concept of cool, regardless of time and place.

 

Whether or not people have fun playing these characters is irrelevant. These people are more than capable of going to another server with rules that are more lax like /tg/ station or Goonstation to perform the same atmosphere-destroying feat that they've done here.

On the contrary, the presence upon Aurora is due to the reasonable quality of RP here. The things going on in such servers would be difficult to call "RP" in any definition.

 

I'm sure our Lore team has slaved for weeks of in depth backstory and fluff so that someone can ignore it all, shit all over it

 

Now that's just witch burning, there's little and less the greasers have done to, in your words, "shit" on the lore present, noting the vastness of the galaxy, and such suggestions are as unnecessary as they are amusing. No defense on the Warhammer shenanigans, I wasn't present for it.

If you're arguing that the content of our RP is irrational, that's fair, as folks have the right to their opinions in that regard. However, arguing that anything we've presented in regards to greasers has been "bad" RP is fairly insulting to our capacity as roleplayers, as I recall not a moment when the actions presented by us did not fit within the bounds of their relative characters. Not every son can be a city boy, nor every daughter a scientist.

[Festus_Crane]

Festus_Crane has played a chaplain recently who began to preach a religion ripped straight from Warhammer 40k, something about some Imperial Cult. Screaming about 'the Emperor' over comms and denouncing all xenos. Given that Frances, irregardless of my disagreement with her lack of action on this, as well as Skull talked about toning things down, this leads me to believe that Festus hasn't actually listened or learned anything from the staff responses in this topic. He continues to make outlandish characters that make obscene amounts of pop-culture references and has treated this whole affair extremely arrogantly, which has been stated previously.

Someone is talking about me. I guess it is time to make a forum account. Get your facts straight. I wasn't the chaplain. I was told someone I knew was going to be Chaplain, and I wanted to try out being a Chaplain's assistant. RP'ed with him for a bit and learned he was doing the Imperial Cult. Odd, but I knew 40k canon well enough. Nobody staff messaged me about the wrong doing of actions, nor anyone else. They may have messaged the man who was playing the Chaplain, but not me. Mmmk? Learned anything from staff responses on the topic, well, you haven't tried to correct me once, save for this thread I recently learned about. Nobody has been told me I have done wrong on the server, no, you save that for these forums, don't you? Alright, tell me about these outlandish characters. Second, I want to know how I have been arrogant, as I have not participated in this thread. Third, if you had a problem with me, why couldn't you have told me on the server? If I hadn't stumbled upon this, I would have never even known.

Hit me back with your response.

Edited September 23, 2014 by Guest

[Frances]

Second, I want to know how I have been arrogant, as I have not participated in this thread.

I can clear that one up - I was under the assumption the Sanguine415 account was yours - which I realize is quite silly, given Sanguine is another player named in the complaint (a fact which I overlooked. Somehow.) I believe Sue thought the same thing, though idk how exactly given she was the originator of the thread.

I retract what I've said about your attitude in this thread, because whoops. (Seriously, though, yeah, my bad v.v ) However, while I understand being upset about this, I'd still ask that you use a bit more moderation in your tone.

[Festus_Crane]

Sorry if I come off a bit testy. With all the harsh comments Susan has been throwing out about me, for a second I thought that was the norm.

[Frances]

Sorry if I come off a bit testy. With all the harsh comments Susan has been throwing out about me, for a second I thought that was the norm.

There's been a lot of hostility being thrown from both sides in this thread so far (I'm not just targeting you), and everyone was warned to use restraint in the way they commented on the issue. You're fine, I'm just trying to make sure things don't blow up.

This still goes for everyone else too. Be nice.

[DiggeryK]

I have also made an account for this thread.

Susan. Learn the difference between Heavy RP and Serious RP. Heavy RP is where you take the RP seriously, never deviating from your character. Serious RP is the same, but with characters designed around the theme and setting, where the players themselves take the setting seriously, along with the RP.

I was the Chaplain the round where I tried in vain to enforce the Imperial laws, from the character of a senile chaplain with a slightly more competent acolyte (Festus) While the character himself was wildly rude, a nuisance, senile, and petty in most regards, I took the playing him seriously. I was arrested several times, although I was the victim twice. At no point did I break character.

[Rusty Shackleford]

May not agree with hostility.

Agree with the need for more serious RP, less silly RP.

Also more science.