Player Complaint: Delta and Cobracoco007, Rev Round

[SierraKomodo]

BYOND Key: SierraKomodo

Player Byond Key: OneOneThreeEight (Vira Taryk), Cobracoco007 (Gary Hughy)

Staff involved: N/A

Reason for complaint: In a recent RP-Revolution round, both persons, as loyalty implanted personnel (Head of Security and Captain, respectively) revolted against a central command directive (This was a 'custom' rev round, hosted by Jackboot. See my other complaint thread for details on that). They stated the directives were immoral, refused to follow them, quit, and the captain demanded to have his loyalty implant removed.

This resulted in the round losing half of its heads of staff in a round type that pretty much requires heads of staff to function (Serenity Neferet, played by DeathlySoul, also quit, I think, but she wasn't implanted at the time so I don't think I can include her in this complaint).

Approximate Date/Time: ~7 PM Pacific Standard, September 27, 2015

[Garnascus]

So this one is a bit harder and unfortunately its not as black and white as "going against their loyalty implant". We have had the issue of heads in the past seemingly violating their implant and the problem is is not exactly concrete what it does and does not let you do.

The general consensus from my understanding of being in mod chat during some of these instances is their decisions MUST be for the greater good of nanotrasen. Im assuming from here on out that the directive you are referring to is the "kill two people" one as well as some similar ones. Now its not a stretch to think that these orders are in direct opposition to the greater good of nanotrasen, it could also be argued that it is.

I recall jackboot proposing some loyalty implant directives here

aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=3262&hilit=LOYALty+implant+directives

Personally I think the nature of this complaint revolves around what the implant actually does and the Grey area and lack of context on WHAT it actually does. I really eon not think its a good idea to have them be " you cannot ever ever disobey an NT order no matter what" as I find that toxic to RP.

[SierraKomodo]

A large part of this complaint is also in regards to the round type - Revolution - Which requires heads of staff to really be a viable round type. Antags can't revolt against the heads if all the heads quit because they didn't like the directives.

[Garnascus]

A large part of this complaint is also in regards to the round type - Revolution - Which requires heads of staff to really be a viable round type. Antags can't revolt against the heads if all the heads quit because they didn't like the directives.

 

This is a fair point but almost all of the regulars who play heads of staff are very invested in their IC actions. So they won't break character regardless of the round type or orders. Should we punish players for sticking to their charavters?

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I have to say it was extremely lame to have half of the command staff, including all the loyalty implanted ones, to just up and resign after being told to discover and borgify traitors or find they, themselves fired. The one, overriding law in loyalty implants is that you do not question CC orders. If they told you to kill yourself, you'd have to do it. That's the entire point of loyalty implants. They're scary mind control chips. You can't just resign, then just come back later and whine about how immoral NT is while refusing to do anything to enforce directives sent forth.

[cobracoco007]

Yeah I messed up on this one I just didn't know where to go with my rp and I didn't fully understand loyalty implants. I read the wiki once more and can assure this won't happen again no hard feelings I hope.

[Guest]

Reason for complaint: In a recent RP-Revolution round, both persons, as loyalty implanted personnel (Head of Security and Captain, respectively) revolted against a central command directive (This was a 'custom' rev round, hosted by Jackboot. See my other complaint thread for details on that). They stated the directives were immoral, refused to follow them, quit, and the captain demanded to have his loyalty implant removed.

 

Nope, that was not my reasoning for stepping down. I stepped down as I was not able to control my security team, for one, was unable to deal with issues without your special military AI constantly locking down everyone in the proximity of a piece of paper and demanding they be loyalty implanted, and overall Vira was completely unable to be diplomatic with anybody, especially since 'Mister CentComm' was perhaps powertripping a bit too much to be believable in any sense of the word.

I gave up my job because I was unable to follow through with it, but this was only after your AI 'shut down', because it was at that point I knew nothing else could get done and command was completely fucked. Your timeline could use a little clarification, is all.

OOCly, yes. I quit because the DO 'handling' this event was drinking a little too much from the fount of PowerTripAde and not realizing how limited their power actually is.

Attaching threats of termination and IC arrest for not getting an order done is a very piss poor method in dealing with things as an authority, especially when you have no reason to even threaten anybody. When you're supposedly a corrupt corporation, you're supposed to still pretend you're the good guy, you know this, Jackboot, right? Hearts and minds.

 

So this one is a bit harder and unfortunately its not as black and white as "going against their loyalty implant". We have had the issue of heads in the past seemingly violating their implant and the problem is is not exactly concrete what it does and does not let you do.

The general consensus from my understanding of being in mod chat during some of these instances is their decisions MUST be for the greater good of nanotrasen. Im assuming from here on out that the directive you are referring to is the "kill two people" one as well as some similar ones. Now its not a stretch to think that these orders are in direct opposition to the greater good of nanotrasen, it could also be argued that it is.

I recall jackboot proposing some loyalty implant directives here

aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=3262&hilit=LOYALty+implant+directives

Personally I think the nature of this complaint revolves around what the implant actually does and the Grey area and lack of context on WHAT it actually does. I really eon not think its a good idea to have them be " you cannot ever ever disobey an NT order no matter what" as I find that toxic to RP.

 

Mm-hmm.

That's exactly what I've been told over and over again by the administration. In this case, the best thing I could do for the sake of the company's reputation is to do nothing. My character's logic at the time was 'The only winning move is to not play at all', because associating herself with Uncle CentCom's drunken rage-induced fits would damage the company's image more than it would help it. Perhaps nobody else was paying attention at the time, but I was busy deflecting fault from myself and from CentComm by refusing to comment and saying it's a miscommunication from the higher-ups.

Funnily enough, I'm better at PR in IC than I am in OOC.

Let's review these guidelines, shall we!

1) Central Command, the station Captain, and Corporate Regulations are to be adhered to in that order of importance. You cannot disobey one without the allowance of the above.

Logical enough. What if Central Command tells us to murder people, though?--

 

 

oh heeeeeey look at the caveat isn't it pretty and

2) Corporate regulations may only be violated in an extreme emergency if the goal is in the greater interest of Nanotrasen or with a majority command vote. During standard operation, they are to be adhered to completely.

I don't know about you, but the POSSIBILITY for Biesellian/Sol Alliance spies aren't exactly to give up corporate regulations over. Nor does the law of the land permit capital punishment given our vicinity to Biesel.

3 and 4 are not so relevant here. Considering, um. 4 is really obvious, and I haven't broken that at all. In fact, what I was combating that round was NanoTrasen deciding to force command stuff to buckle down and take several paddlings to the ass or kiss their contract goodbye. I picked the latter that round, and not just for the sake of my pride. I don't know about you, but 'in character' for me as a Head of Security means playing the good guy 24/7. There are no other alternatives, because I don't consider failure to be an option for me.

5) The greater good of Nanotrasen includes: Making a hefty profit ; improved publicity, public relations, or power.

If I might add as a jab, sometimes I think the Duty Officers suck at more than half of these. It's very difficult to have respect for them when they walk around flaunting their presence and threatening termination/pay cuts.

No, really. NanoTrasen doesn't employ you to be an asshole. NanoTrasen employs you specifically for your investigative abilities to deal with internal affairs issues at the highest level. You are not a representative of corporate interests, you are an overglorified suit with a fancier title and a few more in-game verbs to deal with things. Recognize where you have the power and use it to fit your own professional ends, yes?

Be polite. Be respectful. Be expeditious and straight to the point. Pursue the truth, maintain doubt when conflicting accounts are gathered. Always be willing to change your own personal views on the matter. Communicate with the proper people. If you're sending a message that is MEANT for a specific person, then DON'T MAKE IT PUBLICLY OBVIOUS. You have fax machines at CentComm to send faxes directly to the captain. Use it in conjunction with your Spawn Duty Officer verb.

 

A large part of this complaint is also in regards to the round type - Revolution - Which requires heads of staff to really be a viable round type. Antags can't revolt against the heads if all the heads quit because they didn't like the directives.

 

That's hypocritical, since you left at the critical part of the round as the AI (around 40-50 minutes) and didn't come back, especially considering how much you took initiative at the very beginning. You were also the first to duck out to go play Skyrim.

 

This is a fair point but almost all of the regulars who play heads of staff are very invested in their IC actions. So they won't break character regardless of the round type or orders. Should we punish players for sticking to their charavters?

 

Heck no. Last I checked, to roleplay was to pretend you're someone else and to play a role, and make decisions based on your pretend character's values and thought processes. I find it kinda funny, considering Jackboot and Co were among the first to say that making those who were loyalty implanted complete mindslaves was inhibiting to roleplay, and suddenly now that they are on the end of having orders doled out and they aren't being followed because everyone politely disagrees with how stupid they are, they're calling the captain and I out for quitting.

As far as I know, I put a great deal of thought into my decision of stepping down. I immediately had a backup HoS who was just as willing to kick the asses of the active revs (or self-antags, as I've heard), so I had them promoted and let them go ham.

And that was the end of that, I chilled in an office for awhile and then hopped aboard an escape pod and kekked from how god awfully planned and organized CentComm was.

 

I have to say it was extremely lame to have half of the command staff, including all the loyalty implanted ones, to just up and resign after being told to discover and borgify traitors or find they, themselves fired. The one, overriding law in loyalty implants is that you do not question CC orders. If they told you to kill yourself, you'd have to do it. That's the entire point of loyalty implants. They're scary mind control chips. You can't just resign, then just come back later and whine about how immoral NT is while refusing to do anything to enforce directives sent forth.

 

We all up and resigned after you gave us a retarded (nondescript, illegal, incredibly illogical and unhelpful, absolutely no clue on who to start with, etc) order attached with a threat that command staff would be terminated and IMPRISONED just for not following a stupid order.

I would have to say it was extremely lame for someone who was involved in-round to start pressing buttons rampantly to force security into combating the revolutionaries with violence and nothing else. I play rev for the off chance that the 'revolutionaries' are actually just pro-unionites and try to be peaceful about their protests to get shit repealed. You know. To roleplay?

I don't know about you, but I don't think that getting orders to violate an unspecified suspect's anus with a stunbaton and rip their brain out and put them in a borg constitutes as meaningful interaction.

I would also ask that the captain of this round reconsider their stance for a second and take into account what awfully constructed, nonsensical scenarios were thrown at us.

[cobracoco007]

Well I will say it was really shitty that I had no direction I was trying to turn it into the crew vs cent com but that dailed. And before that I tried to be a malevolent dictator but based on ic actools of others I thought I was runing the round for others. This all left in a spot where I just didn't know what to do so I do agree with your points delta and I just want this resolved quickly with no hard feelings with Sierra and Jack because I like you guys

[SierraKomodo]

I stepped down as I was not able to control my security team, for one, was unable to deal with issues without your special military AI constantly locking down everyone in the proximity of a piece of paper and demanding they be loyalty implanted

 

I was doing as I was told by Central Command, which was all personnel that have seen/read the faxxes are to be implanted. Kunai is an AI that will do things exactly as told, with little interpretation beyond 'Does this violate laws'.

 

That's hypocritical, since you left at the critical part of the round as the AI (around 40-50 minutes) and didn't come back, especially considering how much you took initiative at the very beginning. You were also the first to duck out to go play Skyrim.

 

I left after the heads of staff had already quit, and my attempts to retcon things so we could move forward was met with silence and/or OOC backlash. I don't appreciate people bitching at me for doing what I was ordered to do as an AI.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

2) the game mode was rp-rev. The vanilla orders from cc make no sense. Were trying to justify a revolution in under 2 hours.

3) the game mode was not secret. You had every chance to decide you weren't going to participate in the round.

12) again. Its rp-rev. DOs hardly act as standard during rounds that literally are made to piss people off ic.

6) Central Command is the highest NT authority in Tau Ceti. The only ones that can override it are the board of directors or ceo. And this isn't a wet dream of justice; even Biesel pauses to listen to CC. Unless you have ties to defectors in the government then not even your precious laws can save you from being imprisoned without justice.

7) loyalty implanted individuals are expected to trust that there is a rhyme or reason to cc orders. Otherwise we just invalidated cc's authority and the entire mutiny game mode too. In this case the sol alliance was funding and orchestrating revolutions all across nt space and the republic was simultaneously undermining nt. Cracking down during times of unrest are literally "baby's first step to tyranny". READ A BOOK

69) the order to loyalty implant people who read the orders was maybe a bit much. I had thought heads of staff would respect the "DO NOT READ IF NOT LOYALTY IMPLANTED". But on the other hand loyalty implanting all heads is a good way to make the crew distrust them, no?

Edited September 30, 2015 by Marlon Phoenix

[Guest]

1) delta didn't you quit? Welcome back again

2) the game mode was rp-rev. The vanilla orders from cc make no sense. Were trying to justify a revolution in under 2 hours.

3) the game mode was not secret. You had every chance to decide you weren't going to participate in the round.

12) again. Its rp-rev. DOs hardly act as standard during rounds that literally are made to piss people off ic.

6) Central Command is the highest NT authority in Tau Ceti. The only ones that can override it are the board of directors or ceo. And this isn't a wet dream of justice; even Biesel pauses to listen to CC. Unless you have ties to defectors in the government then not even your precious laws can save you from being imprisoned without justice.

7) loyalty implanted individuals are expected to trust that there is a rhyme or reason to cc orders. Otherwise we just invalidated cc's authority and the entire mutiny game mode too. In this case the sol alliance was funding and orchestrating revolutions all across nt space and the republic was simultaneously undermining nt. Cracking down during times of unrest are literally "baby's first step to tyranny". READ A BOOK

69) the order to loyalty implant people who read the orders was maybe a bit much. I had thought heads of staff would respect the "DO NOT READ IF NOT LOYALTY IMPLANTED". But on the other hand loyalty implanting all heads is a good way to make the crew distrust them, no?

 

2.) Congratulations, you made your version of revolution a much more exponential headache than if it were left vanilla. The premise of the gamemode is to suit light RP and instantaneously escalated antagonism. It is not suited for a heavy RP server and I don't understand why you lacked the forethought to understand that people will do what sounds right to them, and not what sounds right to you.

3.) I don't think anyone anticipated that 'Hey, time for the DOs to influence the round a bit to make this more fun' equated to 'Kill possible spies, probably, or get fired'. I don't think what you were doing was well-thought-out or planned, if at all.

12.) That did not sound like English to me, so I'm going to assume that you're saying this isn't an everyday thing and you're acting as Central Hitler to suit the round type. I personally don't believe this, because during my time as a DO, I never heard of you doing any DO work or using the DO recorder for investigations. Like, ever. The only thing I've seen from you as a DO was to send threatening faxes back and forth to command, especially when the situation didn't call for it.

6.) Said authority can be ignored if they're giving retarded orders that go against real precedents set by Central Command/The DO corps already. I seriously think you assume people aren't smart and don't pick up on those kinds of things, especially if they're command. Sorry, superspies on-board the station don't justify overriding corporate policy and breaking protocol.

7.) Mutiny by default doesn't give a half-assed, childish and outright illegal set of directives to be executed upon to begin with. The captain can very plausibly believe the conditions and background info put into the directive sheet spawned at 15 minutes because time and thought was actually put into drafting any of the four possible directives. Mutiny's framework is functional enough to create verbal conflict amongst the staff, including among the chain of command in which there's a conflict of interest. Revolution does not have this. It is very deadset on what it's about. It is revs versus heads of staff (+ whoever else), and the only win condition is to depose the other party and stop them from existing. By any means necessary, and the easiest way to go about that is to commit acts of unplanned and completely instinctual violence. Mutiny is very different, do you know why? Because while the framework of it CAN give a mutineer a good reason to mutinize in some way, they need to KNOW about the possible flaw in the chain of command and be convinced that the flaw needs to be done away with.

QED, they need to interact with a head of staff about this. They need to roleplay if they want to have any effect or involvement in the round. No ifs ands or butts.

And no, stop roleplaying Central Command as a fascist regime or whatever. That has been done over 1000x in the past year and it's getting very boring and inhibiting on gameplay. It is not 'the bad guy' but it is not 'the good guy' either. It is a corporation. It does not care about morality or any silly shit, but it does care about saving face so that it doesn't get completely rolled over by every single political force in the known galaxy for letting people get hurt and disobeying the law. It's not funny anymore and you need to really cut down on it, because you make the experience of not only command staff completely miserable at times, but also of regular crew members who have nothing to do with the nonsense you force upon other players.

Your actual responsibilities lie in communicating with command about controversies, giving advisement/orders in an emergency situation where it's needed, cracking down heavily on abusive and problematic characters, and ensuring SOP and Corp Regs are followed to the letter. HOWEVER, you are not a dictator. You are an unseen force, and that is where your biggest strength is. You work in the shadows and use subtlety to get the job done. From what I was told from Hartburry and Tishberg as advice right before I joined, it was to keep my head down as a Duty Officer and make calculated and calm decisions, and watch the older DOs at work. I stayed out of trouble and avoided giving dumb orders and game-changing directives because I would've been held responsible for any stupid shit that I let happen.

I don't think I expected you and Sierra constantly engaging in mind-numbingly stupid and toxic discussions (Oh, might I also add Sierra ragequitting repeatedly over and over again relating to DO business) over the DO skype group for hours on end about ridiculous, off-topic and unproductive shit. It's no wonder there was a backlog, there was no discipline or self-control at all.

69) Thank you for admitting that. However, I think most people would get easily pissed off as a head of staff if they were forced into being implanted over a directive that every single member should've been informed of to begin with. I'm sorry, but there's nothing more frustrating than being forced out of the loop by another character or IC force for no explainable reason.

I really hope you consider my feedback and try to plan out how you spy stuff interconnects with the rev GM a bit more in-depth. I would advise either making a separate event to advance it for the sake of the Aurora story canon, or at least avoid in identifying there is an anti-NT threat very early on so that the actual antagonists have a chance to conduct their business as deceivers.

[cobracoco007]

So should I just go or do you guys still need me

[SierraKomodo]

Anyways check the other thread for my response to all of this because apparently there are two complaints for the same thing.

 

This thread is about the heads of staff abandoning their jobs during a revolution round while implanted. The other thread is about the custom revolution directives

[hivefleetchicken]

Anyways check the other thread for my response to all of this because apparently there are two complaints for the same thing.

 

This thread is about the heads of staff abandoning their jobs during a revolution round while implanted. The other thread is about the custom revolution directives

 

Ah, I didn't understand, but I re-read it all and get it now. Thanks.

[Garnascus]

I have to say it was extremely lame to have half of the command staff, including all the loyalty implanted ones, to just up and resign after being told to discover and borgify traitors or find they, themselves fired. The one, overriding law in loyalty implants is that you do not question CC orders. If they told you to kill yourself, you'd have to do it. That's the entire point of loyalty implants. They're scary mind control chips. You can't just resign, then just come back later and whine about how immoral NT is while refusing to do anything to enforce directives sent forth.

 

Strongly disagree. I have not, nor have i ever seen a moderator enforce "you MUST obey any centcomm orders no matter what".

I also think its unreasonable to assume we arent humans. its entirely possible for people to get frustrated during a round and from what ive read in both these complaints it seems the round was frustrating for all involved. frankly i cant say i wouldnt blame anyone for logging on the spot but he at least roleplayed not following immoral orders (which i think is his right to do and not against the loyalty implant).

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Its better to cryo and log than to continue to participate and be salty or undermine the round. When I lose interest or get angry I get what I can in order to function when im gone then pop in a sleeper.

[SierraKomodo]

I have to say it was extremely lame to have half of the command staff, including all the loyalty implanted ones, to just up and resign after being told to discover and borgify traitors or find they, themselves fired. The one, overriding law in loyalty implants is that you do not question CC orders. If they told you to kill yourself, you'd have to do it. That's the entire point of loyalty implants. They're scary mind control chips. You can't just resign, then just come back later and whine about how immoral NT is while refusing to do anything to enforce directives sent forth.

 

Strongly disagree. I have not, nor have i ever seen a moderator enforce "you MUST obey any centcomm orders no matter what".

I also think its unreasonable to assume we arent humans. its entirely possible for people to get frustrated during a round and from what ive read in both these complaints it seems the round was frustrating for all involved. frankly i cant say i wouldnt blame anyone for logging on the spot but he at least roleplayed not following immoral orders (which i think is his right to do and not against the loyalty implant).

 

I think exact clarification regarding loyalty implants and obeying Central Command directives is in order if we're going to find a resolution to this, one way or the other.

[Garnascus]

I agree sierra.

[Guest]

Glancing through Delta's rants, which I really don't have patience to go through, although atypical, he does seem to have had IC grounds to do what he did. Come to think of it, this is pretty much exactly for what I got a complaint once after a mutiny round.

I'll just say: What the loyalty implant allows you to do and what it does not just for the sake of penalizing people is pointless to argue, as it was never strictly defined with a rule.

But I guess it goes to say that quiting your job to avoid doing an order is betrayal, in a sense. The loyalty implant is actually the smallest problem here. As a head of staff player, you are somehow expected to act in the best interest of the round, to do that extra mile for other people's enjoyment, one, which I guess two of them already took that round and decided not to do again. If Delta's intent was to quit a round, as he could not do anything to advance it, I think it's okay.

[Guest]

Glancing through Delta's rants, which I really don't have patience to go through, although atypical, he does seem to have had IC grounds to do what he did. Come to think of it, this is pretty much exactly for what I got a complaint once after a mutiny round.

I'll just say: What the loyalty implant allows you to do and what it does not just for the sake of penalizing people is pointless to argue, as it was never strictly defined with a rule.

But I guess it goes to say that quiting your job to avoid doing an order is betrayal, in a sense. The loyalty implant is actually the smallest problem here. As a head of staff player, you are somehow expected to act in the best interest of the round, to do that extra mile for other people's enjoyment, one, which I guess two of them already took that round and decided not to do again. If Delta's intent was to quit a round, as he could not do anything to advance it, I think it's okay.

 

I had already arranged a replacement as well. I had Zubari promoted 5 minutes after I called it quits.

I was already very OOCly frustrated with the disorganization and forced retconning and I stepped down so that someone with a clearer head could take my place and deal with the matter.

[CakeIsOssim]

Revolution is meant to be crew vs. command staff, not station vs. central command (I'll cover this in the other thread, I guess). If central command intervenes too much, it becomes the latter because command staff will always defer blame to their own orders, and not their own actions, even if they're loyalty implanted. What was ordered by central command and how the command staff responded should have been some sort of custom event, not a revolution round. An event where, perhaps, the station does disobey central command on purpose. That's beside the point.

The point is, is it okay for *loyal command staff to completely disregard and disobey direct orders from central command? Even if said orders are entirely immoral, illegal, and nonsensical? I would say yes, as long as it furthers roleplay and does not act as a detriment. I should also say that, as far as I know, Duty Officers are not meant to intervene with antagonists beyond "Your situation has been noted. Proceed as planned, and we will expect all [antagonists] to be brought with you upon transfer/evacuation." Duty Officers playing as the antagonists during a revolution round (of which, I will also cover in the other thread, I guess)? Somewhat logical, but refer to the very first sentence in my reply.

I believe the command staff were not entirely in the right, but were not entirely wrong either. They got fed up, and quit.

*loyal = loyalty implanted.

[Garnascus]

I feel like this thread has been given sufficient explanation and its been inactive for quite some time. Loyalty implants are tricky but its a general consensus among staff that whatever implanted people are doing they MUST truly believe its for the greater good of nanotrasen.

In this case a captain quitting would be valid, I shall lock this and archive it in 24 hours.