Senpai Jackboot's Unban Appeal

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

You have been banned by lordraven001.

Reason: EoR Grief, Assaulted the cockpit of the shuttle, Appeal on our forums or contest the punishment there..

This is a temporary ban, it will be removed in 4320 minutes.

BYOND Key: Jackboot

Total Ban Length: 4320 minutes

Banning staff member's Key: LordRaven002

Reason of Ban: You have been banned by lordraven001.

Reason: EoR Grief, Assaulted the cockpit of the shuttle, Appeal on our forums or contest the punishment there..

This is a temporary ban, it will be removed in 4320 minutes.

Reason for Appeal:

I was a cultist that had been growing increasingly frustrated at security officer's indifference to having a literal ghost (shade) summoned before their eyes. Literally said "Im busy, let's do this later?" and walked away. I chased one down and he goes "i'm an athiest i don't care." Like, what?

The skrell cadet, bless his heart, followed me later as a crew transfer was called and I was whispering with my shade about assassinating the self-proclaimed athiest. I convert the Skrell rather quickly and willingly in botany after making vague promises about him gaining the ability to summon ghosts.

Anyway I and the new cadet chase down the athiest officer all the way to departures a few minutes before the shuttle arrives and we assassinate him, decapitating him, and the skrell gobbles up his soul, I think.

Eventually the cult boards the shuttle and security arrives. They go "WTF" and start opening fire. I had hoped to keep them out by bolting the doors but I had spent too much time being dramatic and setting the scene. I grab one and sacrifice them with a throat slitting and we all dramatically rise up. The HoS and the detective, Buchannan(?) and Leo Wyatt retreat to the shuttle cockpit firing guns and I join the assault on the cockpit, before I am winded and banned.

We didn't bomb the shuttle or rush for greentext, I hit my target and had planned to lock us in the shuttle so we could escape while I blather about the glory of capturing souls like pokemon. This plan failed when security reinforcements arrived too soon and we had a fight because of the delay. The conflict did spill onto the shuttle, but it wasn't a spontaneous uprising.

It's not GRIEFING to have a conflict escalate, or to have a firefight that happens to spill into the shuttle. The OOC protection thrown around the shuttle is not fair and is a severe hampering to actually playing the game as a role-playing environment. It is completely unreasonable to demand that we completely put a full stop to a murder-in-progress to sit around and hold hands to avoid attack logs.

The rule being improperly enforced along with this being (within my knowledge) my first offense of EoR grief a whole 3 day ban is excessive.

[hivefleetchicken]

Do you know if you were the only one who was punished?

[Skull132]

He wasn't. All cultists involved were.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

The others were banned. 3 others, I think.

The conflict was hatched and unfolded before the shuttle call. I had killed an engineer to entice or murder sec a few minutes(?) before the shuttle had been called. Not using his shade for my goal would have been very unfair to the player involved. He was a good sport though, I forget his name but he was very chill with being lured into maintenance with grumbles of cut wires only to have his major arteries cut instead.

Regardless the hand was already played when I met sec at the EVA storage and they rebuffed the shade, and the athiest officer repeatedly made snarky remarks to this frustrated and angry cultist (me).

If we succumbed to EOR no conflict we would have stood up midmurder and quietly walked onto the shuttle like nothing happened while sec, exempt from the rule when detaining based on dozens of cases I directly witness, detains us all. I felt this would be more bizarre and unnatural than allowing the conflict to escalate.

Speaking to Skull the shuttle is protected to save against collateral damage. I only targeted security officers. Except for the original engineer who was a target of convienence the only people I murdered were officers who either a threat or originally targeted. I cannot speak for the other cultists who were banned, but I do not remember seeing civilians being slaughtered. Pretty much everyone on the shuttle was a cultist by that point. I may be wrong, since I was focused on (dramatically ) eliminating the officers and stealing their souls.

The lack of collateral damage, the intentions, the conflict only being a resumption, and this being my first offense again, make me feel this ban is unjust.

[Guest]

He wasn't. All cultists involved were.

 

And not the security forces, who were shooting guns on the shuttle?

I'm genuinely curious, though. Was any warning issued out beforehand, was there any admin announcement, full stop, proclaiming that any ongoing conflict occurring on the shuttle was to stop?

Because if such an OOC order was blatantly ignored, then the ban would've been justified. In fact, that is literally why the staff announces beforehand, so they can cover their own asses and actually be justified in removing people from the server for a few days. EOR bans have never been doled out without fair warning prior to the mass exodus (hue) in relation to banning offending players.

[Skull132]

Because if such an OOC order was blatantly ignored, then the ban would've been justified. In fact, that is literally why the staff announces beforehand, so they can cover their own asses and actually be justified in removing people from the server for a few days. EOR bans have never been doled out without fair warning prior to the mass exodus (hue) in relation to banning offending players.

 

I'll defer to Jenna, Serv, and Lordraven as to what was discussed and why.

But note that we have issued the 3-day bans without warnings. The warning announcements are issued when we have reason to believe that something may happen on the shuttle (for example: we have a shit tonne of accounts with 0 days of age on the server, or it's been a really violent round already). Whether or not such a warning is issued does not alter our capacity to enforce this rule, unless you can find a previous precedence wherein we have opted for a light/severe warning instead of a ban, due to no public warning being issued beforehand.

Yes, we issue warnings for this, we don't always issue bans. We also issue bans without any prior warnings for the same offence. The decision is generally based on circumstance (what happened, how it happened, etcetera), and on the player's prior history or lack there of.

As for sec. We do not punish the individuals who react to such shenanigans, as long as they don't do something hilariously dumb (like detonate a bomb, explosive grenade, whatever).

[Fire and Glory]

To put in my 2 cents, I was watching as a ghost with antag HUD and I believe there WERE no civvies on the shuttle to get caught in the crossfire, it was a flat cult-vs-security with no one caught in between at the end, I'm pretty sure the ACTUAL civilians decided that crew transfer was overrated and stayed on the station.

[Jennalele]

One. Buchanan didn't go "lol, I'm an atheist." He's an implanted Head of Security that was on the case of shit sort of kind of exploding violently at arrivals. That takes priority over "I'VE SHOWN YOU GHOSTS JOIN MY CULT NOW PLS". He didn't tell you to fuck off, he said he'd talk to you after he was done investigating the breach, because he was definitely intrigued by the situation, but there were more pressing internal security matters at the time that he'd already dedicated to, and he wasn't just going to bloody drop it as a LI'd command member to go "hey cool look, ghosts." Again. Potential Bomb Detonation > Possibly Paranormal Spooky Sensational Things.

But anyways. The end of the round is not the time to finally decide to go loud as the cult. From my perspective, here's what happened, ICly speaking.

Come to escape with Wyatt after processing some evidence. Hear Wyatt yell "He's armed! Commander, get in here!" Enter the shuttle, get bumrushed by cultists with various weapons like hatchets. There's a shade there too, and it starts sucking off our life. Defend ourselves minimally to be able to cut a path to hide in the Bridge because we have no goddamn clue what's going on, but we're both pursued by that shade that managed to come through the door, and the rest of the cult immediately bursts in from the other side. An EMP goes off, RIP Buchanan. Rest of the cultists rush Wyatt, RIP Wyatt.

Now on to the OOC.

I'm of a mind to leave this ban in place, because again. The very end of the round when the shuttle's here is NOT the time to suddenly start decapitating people and bumrushing the officers that got onto the shuttle because you failed to block them off. Especially when there was, from our perspective, zero escalation. It went from "Oh hey, cool, shuttle's here, lets get to escape" to "There's a hatchet in my face and I can't feel my legs, what the fuck."

TL;DR: If the cult has been quiet and peaceful the entire round, the escape lounge when we're transferring is NOT the time or place to go loud and start killing. You, especially should know this.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Jenna, were you playing Buch? :s I really hope not, because having the admin making the decision being a heavily involved character makes me uncomfortable.

It wasn't the HoS i was targeting. I said "the athiest officer", not "the athiest head of security." He was rude, asinine, and enraged my cult character. Buchanan was fine and considered a possible conversion later, just like the skrell. I had ONE target, and I succeded in getting that target. All of this was before the shuttle was called, I believe, save for the murder itself, which was below the library. I don't remember if it was called before or after our meeting at EVA. I had already ordered my shade to target said officer, let's call him Notbutch because I forget his name.

I had already escalated before the shuttle was called when I killed the engineer to make a shade. I went loud again to kill the security officer below the library, having the skrell cultist steal his soul. We then boarded the shuttle and security boarded as well and the conflict exploded.

Just because you don't see the conflict from your perspective does not mean that it wasn't happening, that is why we have logs and spend time investigating. If you want to get specific, Wyatt shot me first when I was standing there in the shuttle, from the airlock, before bumrushing into the cockpit.

If anything your HoS(?) and the officers escalated the situation. Nobody was forcing you to storm the cockpit and make a fortress. If you had retreated back into the station I do not think anyone would have tailed you, and the cultists on board would have time to clean up and consolidate their souls as they fled.

Again I say that the situation did not just spontaneously explode and I did not do it for greentext. It probably wasn't your intention but you are coming off a bit patronizing; I'm not a child, I understand the rules we have in place.

[Serveris]

Jenna, were you playing Buch? :s I really hope not, because having the admin making the decision being a heavily involved character makes me uncomfortable.

Hence why Raven handled it, and not Jenna.

 

I had already escalated before the shuttle was called when I killed the engineer to make a shade. I went loud again to kill the security officer below the library, having the skrell cultist steal his soul. We then boarded the shuttle and security boarded as well and the conflict exploded.

Plenty of antagonists run around doing sneaky antics, and only at the end of the round realize that they haven't done much to engage the crew as a whole. Breaking bad as the shuttle is docked gets them banned as well.

 

If anything your HoS(?) and the officers escalated the situation. Nobody was forcing you to storm the cockpit and make a fortress. If you had retreated back into the station I do not think anyone would have tailed you, and the cultists on board would have time to clean up and consolidate their souls as they fled.

I stepped in departures right behind everyone else, and was greeted with the severed head of an officer lying in an airlock (of course I already knew he was killed post-docking; due to the moderator attack logs coming in). I step to the shuttle entrance, and quietly observe that most everyone in the room is covered in blood and holding switchblades, cultblades, hatchets; some variety of weapon. As I'm typing up a "WTF-esque" message, and notifying the head of security that everyone here was armed via security comms, one of your cultlings, I can't remember the exact name, but they were using a hatchet, walks up, and takes a swing at me. It misses. This is when I pulled my sidearm out, and Buch and I started shooting strictly non-lethal rounds at those standing between us and the portside entrance to the bridge. The two in our way scattered, and we ran in, exchanged a few words, and asked Raven if he was around in msay while we had a moment of respite before the cult chose to breakdown the bridge windows, and re-engage us, mid-shuttle transit.

This entire situation was entirely unnecessary, and being here as long as you have should have known better. Rather for reasoning being pursuing greentext or not, this is a violation of a posted server rule, as I know as a long-term community member, you are fully aware.

[Guest]

Hence why Raven handled it, and not Jenna.

 

I'm of a mind to leave this ban in place, because again. The very end of the round when the shuttle's here is NOT the time to suddenly start decapitating people and bumrushing the officers that got onto the shuttle because you failed to block them off. Especially when there was, from our perspective, zero escalation. It went from "Oh hey, cool, shuttle's here, lets get to escape" to "There's a hatchet in my face and I can't feel my legs, what the fuck."

TL;DR: If the cult has been quiet and peaceful the entire round, the escape lounge when we're transferring is NOT the time or place to go loud and start killing. You, especially should know this.

 

Which is it, Serv? Because it sounds like Jenna is attempting to handle a case they're directly involved in.

 

Come to escape with Wyatt after processing some evidence. Hear Wyatt yell "He's armed! Commander, get in here!" Enter the shuttle, get bumrushed by cultists with various weapons like hatchets. There's a shade there too, and it starts sucking off our life. Defend ourselves minimally to be able to cut a path to hide in the Bridge because we have no goddamn clue what's going on, but we're both pursued by that shade that managed to come through the door, and the rest of the cult immediately bursts in from the other side. An EMP goes off, RIP Buchanan. Rest of the cultists rush Wyatt, RIP Wyatt.

 

But you all fired shots in escape, did you not? Whether it was in defense or not does not matter, you fired shots back at the cultists and boarded the shuttle. You allowed the conflict to spill out onto the shuttle, which was escalated fairly reasonably on the cult's part, and you're all upset that they escalated after you fired back upon them?

 

End-round grief is punishable by an automatic 3-day ban.

The moment the shuttle docks with the station, all conflict is expected to end in and around the shuttle boarding area. (Escape and adjacent corridor). No conflict is allowed on Central Command, after shuttle arrival.

 

With this logic, though, the security officers that instigated and further exacerbated the conflict should've also been 3-day banned along with the cultists, for transparency's sake. That is, of course, unless Skull would rather rule that the handling moderator was incorrect in their ruling and would lift the ban on Jackboot so as to not to have to to ban a rulebreaking administrator and moderator from the server. The latter case is more likely.

 

As for sec. We do not punish the individuals who react to such shenanigans, as long as they don't do something hilariously dumb (like detonate a bomb, explosive grenade, whatever).

 

It doesn't sound like the security forces that were holed up in the cockpit of the shuttle were exactly innocent here. They fired shots at the cult while in escape, correct me if I am wrong here, and then flooded into the shuttle and locked themselves into the cockpit. The security team continued the fight until their eventual death by the cult.

It sounds like it's pretty much an issue with the sec team (primarily consisting of staff, wew transparency) being unable to cope with dying in a video game, honestly. So they pulled out the most relevant rule, waved it in the face of the cult and banned them all without that much of an investigation.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Are you serious? This is such a naked and open display of utter contempt towards me by a moderator and admin. You both were personally involved in this matter yet here you are making authoritative decisions and statements. Do you think that little of me that you don't consider allowing the small bit of respect in adding a little note somewhere in your posts that you were personally involved in this matter and maybe consider handing it off to someone else?

I refuse to believe that you allowed a trial moderator to unilaterally ban 4 people including a member of staff. He even mentioned it on Discord, because the incident interrupted a conversation we were having.

 

Lord Raven VII

Last Sunday at 2:16 AM

((I'm so sorry, I'm being told what to do and doing it))

 

If you both were part of the security team that assaulted the shuttle and got murdered you should have admitted that and asked another admin to take this appeal. I can understand if there were no other staff present at the time to guide LordRaven on what to do so you had to, but you could have at least admitted that. Transparency is extremely important in these situations and not being transparent with this makes it look like you have a personal vendetta.

 

[on Skype]

[11:09:45 AM] Jackboot: Is there a rule regarding admins being involved in admin decisions on things they got involved in IC

[11:09:48 AM] Jackboot: say I murder an admin character

[11:09:50 AM] Jackboot: and they ban the person

[11:10:55 AM] Shadow: Its frowned upon, if there's other staff online, they should handle it. You should only handle it if there's no other (not afk) staff online

 

I shouldn't have to ask you if this was the case, it would have been common courtesy to mention if there were any extenuating circumstances.

With that aside, all I can do is repeat what I said before.

You both, Jenna and Servers, launched the attack on the shuttle. The cultists in the shuttle had killed one person and remained in the shuttle. No civilians were killed. You opened fire inside the shuttle from the airlock, then continued to walk inside the shuttle filled with hostile cultists. What did you expect would happen? You fired the first shot and held up inside the cockpit. Unless I am mistaken the cockpit is considered part of the shuttle, so you not only launched an assault on the shuttle, but then remained inside the shuttle where you know full well you would be attacked.

The rule does not discern between attack logs of lethal or unlethal. You chose to open fire and launch and assault on the shuttle. Why are your attack logs and choosing to spark a conflict on the shuttle different from mine? Because yours was reactive? Because you're sec? Because you're admins and chose to interpret the rules to fit your personal interpretation of the event since you were so invested in it?

Any of these options is bad. You banned a member of staff on their first offense over EoR grief when you intentionally escalated the situation yourselves. There is no rule forcing you onto the crew transfer shuttle, especially when it's filled with confirmed hostiles. You chose to open fire and enter the shuttle then act so offended and surprised when the people you shot at retaliated. You instigated the conflict then baited it so it escalates. I'd give you the benefit of the doubt if you had actually admitted your involvement immediately and explained the situation but you didn't and I have to find out so late into the unban appeal that I'm going to turn into a staff complaint if this isn't resolved. I can only really shrug and move on from this mess if this is just a series of genuine mistakes and judgement calls, which would at least show there's no intentional malice.

From my perspective now:

1) I murdered a single security officer, and the cult boarded the shuttle. There were no civilians. There was one other security officer who was dispatched in a very dramatic way and his soul absorbed(?). (EDIT: If I remember right I helped kill another security officer who had his gun out and was shooting iirc)

2) Staff security characters boarded and opened fire instead of retreating, generating attack logs when the conflict on the shuttle had ended.

3) The staff winded the cultists for retaliating to being fired at and banned those involved, including another member of staff.

4) The involved staff were personally involved and apparently coerced or pressured a trialmod to make the ban decision, throwing him out to the wolves by originally acting like he made the decision unilaterally

Edited May 3, 2016 by Marlon Phoenix

[Mofo1995]

From my perspective now:

1) I murdered a single security officer, and the cult boarded the shuttle. There were no civilians. There was one other security officer who was dispatched in a very dramatic way and his soul absorbed(?).

 

It's worth noting that the second security officer who was killed was held down in the shuttle and beheaded with a hatchet. I think it was by Yaktir, but I don't remember for sure. I don't remember if he attacked cultists following the beheading of the "atheist" in departures, or if he was aggressed some time after, but he did have his gun out when he died.

EDIT: atheist being in quotes to denote a titular title, rather than some sort of questioning if he's atheist.

[SierraKomodo]

I'm just going to jump in here for a moment and ask everyone to calm down and play nice. Staff are not exempt from the forum rules, and if I have to, I'll call Skull in.

If you do not have anything constructive to add to this ban request, please do not reply.

If you were directly involved in the incident and happen to also be staff, please try to make it clear your post is /not/ a staff decision on the request.

[Skull132]

Something to ponder upon: for antags, the restriction is generally that "If you see a chance of conflict being generated from you doing X in escape, don't.". Does this apply to sec as well?

At the moment, this is undefined by previous precedence, and the given validation is in them responding to action. Depending on how Wyatt conducted himself and how close he got, should he have just backed the fuck off and left it be?

[Skull132]

Alrighty.

I've talked to both Jenna and Serv on this. Have yet to catch Raven, but I've got enough to make my call.

As it stands, the chain of events that is objectively confirmed by ze logz:

- Cult does conversion shit in the garden, a sec officer or two notice it and a fight ensues there;

- All fighting is stopped by the time the cult reaches the shuttle;

- The cult boards an empty, unoccupied shuttle, without resistance or conflict;

- Serveris doesn't see the cultists early enough, gets wedged between them and fighting ensues from there with Jenna joining in later;

- Death and murder in the name of glorious Nar'sie happens.

- Fin.

Okay, so the question is whether or not the Cult should have been stopped from boarding the shuttle in the first place. The conflict that happened in escape happened pretty much organically, as both parties were in the clear to commence an attack. Because the situation is so odd, at the worst, I'd have added a note to see if anyone makes a habit out of seizing the shuttle like this in the future. (Similar to how CoolBc made a habit of doing the same antag spiel every time by "conquering" the station. It was eventually escalated to an OOC issue.)

------------

Regarding the management of the issue. It was dumb. As it stands, our staff SOP does not forbid members of staff managing the issues they are themselves involved in. We simply expect them to know how to manage an issue that they're involved in, or to defer complete judgement. What happened here was some odd level of in-between that is not acceptable. Either get your name on the ban, or don't get involved, should be the mentality. And I'll place a staff rule to effectively keep around as a reminder for the future. This won't happen again.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Yeah that's fine. I don't want anyone punished this time; we all learn from mistakes.

[Skull132]

Complaint resolved and archived.