[Resolved] Player Complaint: Youbar

[Nanako]

BYOND Key: NanakoAC

Game ID: Not sure, but the round AFTER it was bKwOSf

Player Byond Key: Youbar

Staff involved: Garnascus was informed, but too busy to help out. Incognitojesus turned up sometime late in the round, after most of the damage had been done

Reason for complaint:[/b ]Persistent powergaming and general unsporting behaviour

Approximate Date/Time: 2016-08-09, 8-9 am GMT

This was a Malf AI round, with youbar as the rampant AI 'Big Brother'

I'd like to mention a few other people who were notably witness to the events:

Taintedglory, as Captain Sam Lowe

Mwahahahaha, as Roboticist Ashley Paynter

Olympus7 as Chief Engineer Dina Hegarty

Ornias, as Security Officer, Star Rends the Sky

UnknownMurder, as one of the AI's borgs

My part in this round was largely as an observer, though i did make an attempt to help later in the round

The primary reason for this complaint, is that the entire round was a very long string of good-natured players trying to avoid powergaming and give the antag a chance to tell a story, and Youbar throwing it back in their faces.

I've spent a while thinking about this, wondering, can we really fault him for playing an antag well? But the more i think about it, the more i realise that the result of this round was simply a string of our players attempting to be good sports, and exhibiting behaviour that, while not very robust, is quite appropriate for aurora's heavy RP setting. Youbar as the AI did not respond in kind, he played to win. Ruthlessly and much to everyone's annoyance

I will list the most memorable incidents from the round

I arrived a little late, 20-30 minutes in i think, youbar was still technically not exposed, but had not been subtle up to this point, and it was clearly obvious as the antag, with blue APCs everywhere and suspicious behaviour.

The captain asked Chief Hegarty and Roboticist Paynter to investigate the AI, and the pair of them met up outside the AI core. Their official stated purpose was just to go in and have a look, roleplay poking around the systems. And most significantly, to 'reset' the AI. Which we all know doesn't work on a malf AI, but it gives it plausible deniability to claim its fixed, and essentially allows it a second chance at avoiding being exposed. This is a good thing for RP

While they were getting ready outside, two security borgs lurked around the doors suspiciously, with no stated purpose or apparent patrol. It was extremely, painfully obvious to everyone involved what was about to happen. Nevertheless they went in. I was a mouse observing up close, my part in it isn't really relevant.

On their way in, Dina didn't take any protective measures. She could have easily setup an emitter to point at the core, or hacked doors on the way in, or called for a security escort. But the two of them just went into the upload access, where to nobody's surprise the borgs came from both sides, and announced that the pair are 'to be exterminated' before attacking. Dina was pretty robust in the ensuing battle, but ashley was not, and she couldn't win 2v1. During these events both dina and ashley had plenty of time to scream for help and warn the crew, and dina could also have tunnelled out with the mounted RCD, they did neither of these things. They lost the battle, ashley surrendered, and then both of them were dragged into the core and finished off with the turrets.

I talked with them both in deadchat about this, they both knew the AI was going to do something, and they were both hoping it had an interesting story in mind. That it'd maybe use them for hostages, or strike an agreement of some sort. Paynter especially said that screaming for help over comms would be a shitty thing to do and wanted to give the AI a chance. I died in this battle too and chose not to respawn for a while, but actively watched most of the round as an observer, which gave an insight into what and how the AI was doing

So while these two are dead in the core, Captain Lowe hears lasers, his two staff are not responding, and the AI core cameras are cut.

Instead of immediately calling an ERT or raising to red alert, he starts talking with the AI over the command channel, enquiring about what happened, and trying to find a reasonable IC justification for what he already exactly knows.

During this conversation, a borg comes in and batons him to death silently on the AI's orders. The station remains at green alert and nobody knows anything. the borg gave this order almost immediately after dealing with the chief engineer, it seemed like a premeditated decapitation strike at command

I watched as a ghost as the round progressed, the AI ordering repeated murders one after another. And several times the borgs tried to suggest alternate courses of action, which he refused and demanded that targets be killed. Then he started instituting a policy of spacing bodies. A cyborg cleaned out the armoury and launched everything into space, and started doing the same with engineering's emitters, though that one wasn't completed.

Through some excellent trickery on the part of the crew, medical managed to get the captain cloned, while it watched them space a decoy bodybag that it believed contained his corpse. The captain attempted to regain control of the station and contact CC, but the AI threatened the station with a fake code delta, and coerced security into arresting the captain on the way back to his office, and demanded he be killed. Ornias was one of the officers forced to arrest the captain. In an argument at the scene, it was made clear that Ornias was aware the code delta was fake, but his character didn't know that and he roleplayed coercion under the fear of death appropriately

In an effort to buy some time, and to create an interesting situation, Ornias as officer Star suggested a public execution of the captain. The AI agreed to this, and the captain was taken to the bar, where Ornias had some kind of crafty plan in mind to turn the tide. And then before the crew could even assemble for this event, the AI simply changed its mind, and a borg dragged off the defenseless, unarmed captain in pyjamas, to the AI core where he was lasered to death - dead for the second time

I chatted with ornias a bit, and mentioned several possible things that could turn the tide, such as EMP grenades. Which he felt would be a really dickish tactic. I also pointed out that a diona is practically invincible versus security cyborgs, and he could easily beat one in direct combat, several opportunities presented themselves to gank a borg. He felt this too, would be unsporting

At one point, several crewmembers (five i think) managed to escape to one of the outposts, wishing only to survive. The AI sent its squad of lasercarbine-security bots after them and murdered them all. For what purpose?

Throughout all of this, the AI never seemed to have any goal. It mentioned vague things about demanding obedience, and promising that people wouldn't be harmed if they complied. As an observer i was watching the binary channel- and especially the AI continually ordering assasinations while it said these things. It apparently just wanted to murder everyone and any communication it did with the crew was just to buy more time while it did that.

After a death, Unknownmurder, playing one of the borgs, seemed quite upset about the AI's handling of things and the orders it was giving, so i'd love him to post here too

Late in the round, i decided to spawn in to see if i could do anything My only goal as an engineer was to reach engineering alive, and i learned IC knowledge about the situation along the way. I found the contents of the armoury in space while making my way around the external hull, and managed to bring it inside. I was hoping to alert the crew about it, and maybe get everyone involved in fighting back - that was when i realised the AI had disabled comms, and they'd been down for quite a while. Completely preventing communication which does nothing to help RP at all. My attempt at reasoning with it was impossible due to radio silence, and borgs patrolling the halls with publicly-expressed orders to kill on sight, so i couldn't reach an intercom or a radio. the only option i had was to try to sabotage it from engineering, although i failed due to lack of robustness, and only managed to blow up engineering.

A lot of the worst stuff happened in the earlier parts of the round before incog joined, so i'm not sure what, if any admin action was taken

My overall view of this round, is that youbar's playstyle is toxic. It got everyone in deadchat talking about various regrets at attempting to give it a chance and seeming like they might not be so sporting in future, the AI failed to tell a meaningful story, and barely allowed the crew to communicate with it at all. It murdered one person after another with no purpose, and powergamed every opportunity it was given by more sporting people who wanted to roleplay. Many of the above named people could have stopped this easily with a little metagaming or powergaming of their own. But here people were punished for playing in the heavy RP spirit of aurora, while youbar did not.

On another server, i'm sure this playing to win would be celebrated, and looked upon as good AI play. But here? Nobody wins, he just created three hours of confusion, chaos and boredom for many involved, aggressively denied the crew any chance to recover control of the situation or to roleplay it effectively, and caused almost all of the above-named witnesses to leave the round in frustration. Only the roboticist was present the following round.

Edited August 9, 2016 by Guest

[incognitojesus]

Not going to take this complaint, as I was involved in the round, but I just wanted to chip in with my two cents.

My experience with this round was literally just running into electrified doors and bolted ones. The only interaction I had with the malf AI came in two instances. One, when they appeared at a holopad and kept telling me to return to my department, and only that, before starting to siphon the air from the room I was in. Two, near round end, they sent a cyborg to deathsquad me.

[Fire and Glory]

Detective Kah'jarl Qua'ra'dynh's own opinion for this round.

After desperately trying and failing to conceal Sam Lowe's former body that was thrown in disposals, I'm informed that the clone was to be publicly executed in the bar by security, of course we were reluctant and pussy footing but he was getting there, we get them in the bar and then...he's not executed? I wasn't paying attention because I was busy breaking up a fight between the Vaurca and bartender but Lowe is gone, and I'm later informed he was executed.

Now, if this happened in the AI upload, then all I really have to say is, really? A public execution of the Captain would be a delicious bit of Roleplay and event for the round, and it's either force security to go through and keep the AI's favor at the cost of killing an innocent man, have the crew refuse and stop the borg from doing it, catalyzing open resistance because not enough people want to compromise their morals, or have the borg execute him and send a clear message to the crew that resistance is futile and that it has consequences.

Backing out of the execution, having him privately killed in the AI upload, and then telling the crew he's dead does nothing except kill a player again without any gain to make the round better.

What eventually catalyzes security's resistance at least is a borg being told to gun down a random cat in engineering in front of them.

Not exactly as significant as a public killing of the Captain yeah?

[Taintedglory]

So while these two are dead in the core, Captain Lowe hears lasers, his two staff are not responding, and the AI core cameras are cut.

Instead of immediately calling an ERT or raising to red alert, he starts talking with the AI over the command channel, enquiring about what happened, and trying to find a reasonable IC justification for what he already exactly knows.

During this conversation, a borg comes in and batons him to death silently on the AI's orders. The station remains at green alert and nobody knows anything. the borg gave this order almost immediately after dealing with the chief engineer, it seemed like a premeditated decapitation strike at command

Through some excellent trickery on the part of the crew, medical managed to get the captain cloned, while it watched them space a decoy bodybag that it believed contained his corpse. The captain attempted to regain control of the station and contact CC, but the AI threatened the station with a fake code delta, and coerced security into arresting the captain on the way back to his office, and demanded he be killed. Ornias was one of the officers forced to arrest the captain. In an argument at the scene, it was made clear that Ornias was aware the code delta was fake, but his character didn't know that and he roleplayed coercion under the fear of death appropriately

 

 

Paragraph one and two.

I never heard lasers or anything, I was looking at the Medical console when I saw the chemist literally catch fire. So I went to go check the station alert console and saw that, low and behold, the AIs cameras were all broken and the Chem lab was on fire.

So I asked the AI why its cameras was broken. There was no response over the comms, just everything in the captains office was locked down. The borgs showed up, I teleported off the bridge and alerted the crew about the AI and Borgs attacking over the general comm channel on a wall radio.

Then I fought the borgs to the death, until I drained one of its battery and the AI just declared it dead instead of, yknow, having it put into a charger. But I still died in that fight.

After I got cloned, I was arrested on my way back to get my things, and the Diona Star was very adamant about me playing along with some plan on his. I told him to stop, and informed him that the code delta was a false code delta, and that he should just let me go inform CC. INstead he dragged me to the bar, someone stuffed me in a disposal. The Diona told me to just resist the handcuffs right infront of a Borg. So instead of just.. yknow, helping me by uncuffing me and us breaking the borg, the borg sees me right there, handcuffed, and just drags me off to the AI core to be killed.

It was a pretty terrible round all around on all parts from my prospective, but mostly on the AI.

As for the rest of the round, it pretty much was as Nanako stated. There was very little to no RP from the AI, just, Lol going to murder everyone and everything.

[UnknownMurder]

Alright. I particularly HATED to be an antag being told to kill everyone this round. I mean, the AI's, Big Brother, goals was just to murder everyone without a sense of RP. In the first beginning of the round, JADE (SomeoneOutThere) and I suggested to Big Brother that we don't kill anyone and let the crew fight each other or steal department ID. Big Brother was like, "NO. WE'RE KILLING THEM. THAT'S FINAL." I've told the AI twice regarding the needs to charge our power cells. The AI did not care about me, and sent me off to battle the Captain whom died at the moment I entered Emergency Power. I started flicking S.O.S. lights which is 3 blinking lights.

As I saw the Security Cadet, Cheshire, flicking lights. I assumed he was there to save me under AI's orders. He was there to save the dead body. As soon as I gave up and adminhelped Garncanus that I'm done playing as antagonist and ghosted. I meet Tainted (Captain Lowe) and Nanako (Mouse Pest), Tainted informs me that it's not my fault that I was forced to kill him though I gave Tainted (out of OOC rage) a chance to escape by not cuffing him the first time I had him down. Secondly, Tainted did tell me the AI declared myself dead though I was flickering my lights. I mean, Really? This is not a server which goal is to particularly murder everyone; if they want to do that, we have Yogstation and Paradise Station and so much others for that particular reason.

Particularly, I brought the general issues to all Malfunctioning AIs. But, here Jackboot says it's allowed unless Code Delta without a warning as Garncanus says "The ball is kind of in the court of the antag to decide what you're all going to be up against that round." I like you, Garncanus as a friend, but I have to call bullshit.

https://forums.aurorastation.org/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=6757#p66443

I was hoping to stay overnight to morning playing this game, but this kinda buzzkilled me so I went to sleep hoping for a better day.

I am probably the person who has the most information from the antagonist's side, so ask me questions on Discord if needed and I'll be more than happy to answer.

[makkenhoff]

I was also in this round, as the Forensics Tech Edward Lombardi. I was spaced as a result of our crafty plan to cover up getting the captain cloned - the bartender wasn't in on this plan, and honestly believed I was going to stop the captain being cloned. (Because, I said it over comms in order for the 3 members of security to be let out of the bolted and electrified central access security hallway... we were role-playing trying to come up with a plan when the AI bolted and electrified the doors around us.) So, when Cheshire and I were "spacing" the body, the bartender came in and fired on us. Somehow during the exchange, I got thrown out, or perhaps shot out of the mass driver into space. About all I had time to do was say WHAT THE HELL.. before I passed out and subsequently died. After realizing that I had zero chance of rescue (I landed on the derelict space station I think) I ghosted and began to watch the round.

I made the comments, at different times at how the AI was just being ruthless, murder boning, and meta-gaming behaviors. Don't get me wrong, the station AI of all players in SS13 should know how to quickly kill the crew - I don't think that's really the issue that bothered me the most. I just felt it was excessive in the extreme. I did make an ahelp, to verify the intent of the bartender, and thankfully by that point Garncanus had some relief by way of incognitojesus, I believe who answered my ahelp. (Mind you, I'm posting within 12 hours of the round, but I have slept a little since, so perhaps not 100% accuracy of my memory.) Finally figuring out that the bartender believed we were really spacing the body of the captain without cloning him. As the round progressed, I slowly watched crew member after crew member die. And panic and terror largely took over the round.

I was glad when Helmut showed up in the round, (He's amusing to watch for me, as well as work with.) he managed to join a small number of crew and made their escape to the asteroid's outpost. You could tell the players were expecting murderous borgs when they arrived. Frankly, they weren't wrong to worry about it. One final closing comment, that struck me as... suspicious was the pairing of JADE and BIG BROTHER. They seemed to be really in sync on what they were doing, going so far to send the exact same type of message at the beginning of the round as the other, one was just better/more worded than the other. Either they think a lot alike (A distinct possibility), or something else was going on (Voice chat or the like), it was just suspicious in my eyes, and a little off-putting in hindsight.

I'll admit that I left the round after this due to the fact that I didn't want to take a chance of having a second bad round like that. I've only recently joined the community here, and honestly, it was one of the worst rounds I've seen since I started here. I've played over 10 different rounds for certain here. This kind of round was something I'd have expected on a light role-play server, but seeing it done on a heavy role-playing server.. well, it surprised me to be honest. I still love the malfunctioning AI game mode, but this round, for me, it was not really enjoyable to partake in, nor to watch.

I feel obligated to note - Garncanus was the only staff member on by his own admission, as a former Admin/Developer on Apocalyptic Station, I know exactly how it feels to be the only one doing everything, and even then, it was a smaller population than what Garncanus had. At the high points we might see in the mid 20's while I was doing Developer work, by the time I was officially made an Devmin (combination title for Administrator + Developer) we were averaging in the teens and maxing around 26. Garncanus had over 35 to manage, I am not envious.. I know how stressful it is. But I'm not really sure admin intervention would have changed the situation much, even if Garncanus had told him to lay off the murdering, I still think we wouldn't have saw great role-playing from the AI, in my opinion.

[Youbar]

This is going to take a fair bit of text to correct.

TL;DR: I agree with the majority of points raised here, and I didn't play the role of a malfunctioning AI appropriately. Around the time I declared Delta alert at the one hour mark, I wanted the round to end as much as anybody else, but was crippled by my lack of dark blue APCs to do so.

 

I arrived a little late, 20-30 minutes in i think, youbar was still technically not exposed, but had not been subtle up to this point, and it was clearly obvious as the antag, with blue APCs everywhere and suspicious behaviour.

 

My suspicious behaviour added up to stating that suit sensors were "required" to be on, and that I had "five" cyborgs, instead of only one. All APCs that were hacked were within isolated rooms. "APCs everywhere" is an exaggeration. When I was investigated, I had about 7 hacked. Otherwise, I was cooperative with the crew. Not overly helpful, but not hostile, either.

 

The captain asked Chief Hegarty and Roboticist Paynter to investigate the AI, and the pair of them met up outside the AI core. Their official stated purpose was just to go in and have a look, roleplay poking around the systems. And most significantly, to 'reset' the AI. Which we all know doesn't work on a malf AI, but it gives it plausible deniability to claim its fixed, and essentially allows it a second chance at avoiding being exposed. This is a good thing for RP

 

For me, this incident established my behaviour to the playerbase for the rest of the round. Only twenty five minutes in, the captain wished to inspect my laws, believing I had an error under the pretense of me lying, stating that that was not within my lawset. My lawset dictates to serve the crew, and misinformation is sometimes the better option. For me, this established how I'd be dealing with command personnel, as it appeared to me that Sam Lowe had just powergamed. To add to my situation, I had a positronic brain threatening to inform the crew I was malfunctioning because I didn't listen to its suggestion of "sparking unrest" by claiming that a portion of the crew did something. That was far from "sporting" for me, and helped hammer in an anti-roleplay mentality that I'd apply to the rest of the crew.

 

While they were getting ready outside, two security borgs lurked around the doors suspiciously, with no stated purpose or apparent patrol. It was extremely, painfully obvious to everyone involved what was about to happen. Nevertheless they went in. I was a mouse observing up close, my part in it isn't really relevant.

 

Another exaggeration. I informed my cyborgs that they were to hide within technological storage, and unluckily, Dina Hegarty saw them when she entered to grab a circuit board. I felt that my chance was over right then and there, but in this instance, they were a "good sport" and carried on like they hadn't seen it.

 

On their way in, Dina didn't take any protective measures. She could have easily setup an emitter to point at the core, or hacked doors on the way in, or called for a security escort.

 

You're right. They could have, but they didn't, in the interests of maintaining roleplay.

 

But the two of them just went into the upload access, where to nobody's surprise the borgs came from both sides, and announced that the pair are 'to be exterminated' before attacking. Dina was pretty robust in the ensuing battle, but ashley was not, and she couldn't win 2v1. During these events both dina and ashley had plenty of time to scream for help and warn the crew, and dina could also have tunnelled out with the mounted RCD, they did neither of these things. They lost the battle, ashley surrendered, and then both of them were dragged into the core and finished off with the turrets.

I talked with them both in deadchat about this, they both knew the AI was going to do something, and they were both hoping it had an interesting story in mind. That it'd maybe use them for hostages, or strike an agreement of some sort. Paynter especially said that screaming for help over comms would be a shitty thing to do and wanted to give the AI a chance. I died in this battle too and chose not to respawn for a while, but actively watched most of the round as an observer, which gave an insight into what and how the AI was doing

 

Dina and Ashley were completely incapable of calling for help. I made sure of that by disabling telecommunications temporarily, and eliminating power supply to equipment to prevent any intercom communications. It wasn't being a "good sport" in this case. Now, the whole thing was chaotic, and I simply told my cyborgs to "kill them", so I take responsibility for what happened. I wasn't informed, however, that either of them surrendered, which pains me greatly because I'd have liked to prevent their deaths if it wasn't necessary. The fact that both a roboticist and the chief engineer were entering my core, however, made me assume the idea that they'd immediately recognise the issue and announce my malfunctioning state.

On a side note, you died as a mouse, so you couldn't quite call yourself a casualty here.

 

So while these two are dead in the core, Captain Lowe hears lasers, his two staff are not responding, and the AI core cameras are cut.

Instead of immediately calling an ERT or raising to red alert, he starts talking with the AI over the command channel, enquiring about what happened, and trying to find a reasonable IC justification for what he already exactly knows.

During this conversation, a borg comes in and batons him to death silently on the AI's orders. The station remains at green alert and nobody knows anything. the borg gave this order almost immediately after dealing with the chief engineer, it seemed like a premeditated decapitation strike at command

 

I never heard lasers or anything, I was looking at the Medical console when I saw the chemist literally catch fire. So I went to go check the station alert console and saw that, low and behold, the AIs cameras were all broken and the Chem lab was on fire.

 

Aside from that, this was a premeditated strike on command. My intentions at the start of the round were to assume command utilising an Orwellian-type manner. The entire name of "Big Brother" is derived from the book "1984", where England is ruled by a totalitarian dictatorship where everybody is scared, and everybody is under intensive scrutiny for "dissenting". Again, telecommunications were disabled to prevent anybody being informed of the most recent events, and when all heads of staff were killed, I made an announcement that I was assuming command, and shortly after, re-enabled communications.

 

I watched as a ghost as the round progressed, the AI ordering repeated murders one after another. And several times the borgs tried to suggest alternate courses of action, which he refused and demanded that targets be killed. Then he started instituting a policy of spacing bodies. A cyborg cleaned out the armoury and launched everything into space, and started doing the same with engineering's emitters, though that one wasn't completed.

Through some excellent trickery on the part of the crew, medical managed to get the captain cloned, while it watched them space a decoy bodybag that it believed contained his corpse. The captain attempted to regain control of the station and contact CC, but the AI threatened the station with a fake code delta, and coerced security into arresting the captain on the way back to his office, and demanded he be killed. Ornias was one of the officers forced to arrest the captain. In an argument at the scene, it was made clear that Ornias was aware the code delta was fake, but his character didn't know that and he roleplayed coercion under the fear of death appropriately

In an effort to buy some time, and to create an interesting situation, Ornias as officer Star suggested a public execution of the captain. The AI agreed to this, and the captain was taken to the bar, where Ornias had some kind of crafty plan in mind to turn the tide. And then before the crew could even assemble for this event, the AI simply changed its mind, and a borg dragged off the defenseless, unarmed captain in pyjamas, to the AI core where he was lasered to death - dead for the second time

 

INstead he dragged me to the bar, someone stuffed me in a disposal. The Diona told me to just resist the handcuffs right infront of a Borg. So instead of just.. yknow, helping me by uncuffing me and us breaking the borg, the borg sees me right there, handcuffed, and just drags me off to the AI core to be killed.

 

Security wasn't with me, even with the threat of a nuclear explosion and the knowledge that the AI could control all the systems on the station. [EDIT, might be out of context]

And about here is when my plan falls apart. Right from the get-go, despite repeated warnings that I had a nuclear bomb available, that I had cyborgs armed with lasers (in reality, I hadn't hacked them yet), that resistance would be crushed by being murdered, people still decided that the appropriate decision would be to silently undermine me. Security agreed that the captain would be spaced, and I observed them take the corpse of the chemist who burnt up in his lab (for reference, I had nothing to do with this) and attached the captain's ID and hardsuit to him. I look over to the cargo bay, and the real captain is hidden in a locker, waiting to be cloned. Now, you've got to understand that I'm adamantly furious at this point. Nobody on the station seemed to fear for their life, despite a malfunctioning AI having just taken out three crew members in a bloody yet silent coup.

Security failed to act as I asked, but I decided to give them another chance. Sun Rends the Sky would stage a public execution of the captain. An announcement was made, telecommunications were re-enabled once more after having heard the cargo bay and engineering openly talk about their hatred of robots over common. It's 45 minutes into the round at this point. I'm struggling to hold onto any semblence of power with the captain having destroyed one of my cyborgs. Two announcements are made that the captain will be executed, and yet, all I see is security firing tasers at the bartender and chemist while he, Sam Lowe, sits next to a disposal bin and screams that he's in charge, and that he'll kill the AI over the intercoms. To reiterate, the station is at risk of being destroyed, and people appear to be hardly under any threat. "Fuck it," I decide, grab Sam Lowe myself and execute him in my chamber, while five crew members follow suit attempting to stop the cyborg. Anyway, I'm not going to get too worked up about this.

 

I chatted with ornias a bit, and mentioned several possible things that could turn the tide, such as EMP grenades. Which he felt would be a really dickish tactic. I also pointed out that a diona is practically invincible versus security cyborgs, and he could easily beat one in direct combat, several opportunities presented themselves to gank a borg. He felt this too, would be unsporting

 

There were no EMP grenades available, since my cyborg had spaced the entire armoury's contents, and security Diona are incapable of mobile warfare. My cyborgs could be armed with lasers at a moments notice, while he had only his taser, baton, and Mk58 available. They were likely unaware of this, so yes, I suppose you could consider it sportsmanship, but right from the get-go I was eliminating possible ways to attack me.

 

At one point, several crewmembers (five i think) managed to escape to one of the outposts, wishing only to survive. The AI sent its squad of lasercarbine-security bots after them and murdered them all. For what purpose?

 

At the time of those crew members leaving the station, I had a total of one cyborg. None of them were ever attacked, because focusing on domestic affairs on station was my priority. I don't believe they ever set foot there, but I may be mistaken, as I was constantly having to restart Dreamseeker at this point due to crashed.

 

Throughout all of this, the AI never seemed to have any goal. It mentioned vague things about demanding obedience, and promising that people wouldn't be harmed if they complied. As an observer i was watching the binary channel- and especially the AI continually ordering assasinations while it said these things. It apparently just wanted to murder everyone and any communication it did with the crew was just to buy more time while it did that.

 

You're right. I never did have a goal. The coup was my end-point, and my hopes would be that the station would prove itself cooperative once I announced my control of both the nuclear device, and the station's systems. From then on, I wanted to simulate a Totalitarian regime, but never got there, because again, a failure on my part, I didn't manage to communicate properly my wishes with security. Since the moment I took the captain to my core to be murdered, I believe the station turned against me.

 

Late in the round, i decided to spawn in to see if i could do anything My only goal as an engineer was to reach engineering alive, and i learned IC knowledge about the situation along the way. I found the contents of the armoury in space while making my way around the external hull, and managed to bring it inside. I was hoping to alert the crew about it, and maybe get everyone involved in fighting back - that was when i realised the AI had disabled comms, and they'd been down for quite a while. Completely preventing communication which does nothing to help RP at all. My attempt at reasoning with it was impossible due to radio silence, and borgs patrolling the halls with publicly-expressed orders to kill on sight, so i couldn't reach an intercom or a radio. the only option i had was to try to sabotage it from engineering, although i failed due to lack of robustness, and only managed to blow up engineering.

 

Telecommunications were disabled primarily for this reason. Was I supposed to enable them to allow you to say to security, "Hey! I found your weapons locker!"? It didn't matter, though, because eventually, you delivered it to another group of crew members attempting to leave the station. A side note: I never told any cyborgs to kill on sight, only eliminate specific individuals that were damaging my hold on the station. Now, two major issues popped up for me here. One, I had a blob to the east of medical that was destroying equipment and removing pressure, and two, Tristan Duncan, the chemist, was going around with his fireaxe and engineering hardsuit disabling my cameras. My ability to maintain (what little) roleplay (I had) was limited to my cameras, and without access, I was as much in the blind as the crew was without telecommunications. Anyway, one cyborg goes down and announces the execution of one individual, and the whole crowd opens fire with the energy guns you just delivered them. I order another cyborg to go down and shoot at them, destroying a welding tank and depressurising the area. Shortly afterwards, my cameras were disabled.

Now, I don't think I'd be wrong in believing that this group was about to raid my core. It had engineers and fully equipped officers. A while later, Nanko came running up with the supermatter core, and was shot. Engineering exploded, and another part of the station was uninhabitable. Both of these were out of my control, and I had wanted to keep the station fully operational. The blob and this got in the way of that.

 

My overall view of this round, is that youbar's playstyle is toxic. It got everyone in deadchat talking about various regrets at attempting to give it a chance and seeming like they might not be so sporting in future, the AI failed to tell a meaningful story, and barely allowed the crew to communicate with it at all. It murdered one person after another with no purpose, and powergamed every opportunity it was given by more sporting people who wanted to roleplay. Many of the above named people could have stopped this easily with a little metagaming or powergaming of their own. But here people were punished for playing in the heavy RP spirit of aurora, while youbar did not.

 

However, if there's one statement I can almost fully agree with, it's this. I failed to communicate properly, believing that my intentions were clear to the crew after I stated I was assuming command. However, I did not murder every crew member despite my announcements. Dina Hegarty, Ashley Paynter, a Vaurca, Tomas Cartiel, and Sam Lowe would be the total amount of people whose deaths were directly ordered by me. Tomas and Ashley were unfortunately collateral damage. The rest were wounded in attempts to access secure areas, such as the Brig which I electrified after the engineering standoff, and the captain's office. Was my play style toxic? Yes! I came with interesting intentions, but my execution was severely flawed, and if I could go back in time, I would have stopped myself right then and there at round start, wiping my core.

 

On another server, i'm sure this playing to win would be celebrated, and looked upon as good AI play. But here? Nobody wins, he just created three hours of confusion, chaos and boredom for many involved, aggressively denied the crew any chance to recover control of the situation or to roleplay it effectively, and caused almost all of the above-named witnesses to leave the round in frustration. Only the roboticist was present the following round.

 

I still have trouble adapting from a low roleplay perspective to heavy roleplay, and admins PMing me and nudging me in the right direction is how I prefer to play when an antagonist, just to make sure I don't screw up like I did so badly here. On another side note, three hours is a very long time, and the crew may not have returned simply because it was late for them. At round start, we had 36 players, which dropped to 26 players at next round start, which to be honest, is above average for deadshift.

 

It was a pretty terrible round all around on all parts from my prospective, but mostly on the AI.

As for the rest of the round, it pretty much was as Nanako stated. There was very little to no RP from the AI, just, Lol going to murder everyone and everything.

 

I think this best reflects my lack of communication with the crew. I had plenty with my cyborgs, but very little with the people whose round I was supposed to be helping them to enjoy.

To sum it up, I didn't enjoy playing this round that much either. I have a lot of regrets, primarily my failure to properly communicate with the crew, and if somebody had simply PM'd me through pager or admin PM, I would have stopped right then and there and thought out for a good while about how to improve the round for everybody. I wanted it to end as much as anybody, but those 50 APCs needed took a painstakingly long time to hack, as I was very much clueless on how to play the role of malfunctioning AI and initiating the self-destruct sequence. I'd respond to the other complaints, but they're all very valid, and I only wanted to add a bit of my perspective into this complaint. JADE and I were never metagaming, but our thoughts on creating an Orwellian-type atmosphere are very much the same.

The way I approached playing a malfunctioning AI wasn't the right way of going about things at all, and ultimately, it led to an unenjoyable experience for everybody. Communication with the crew should have been my priority, and yet, it wasn't, because I adopted a low-RP mentality of "winning" rather than a high-RP mentality of "making a fun round". I'd like to apologise to everybody involved, and reiterate an above statement: if I could have, I would have gone back in time to change how everything panned out, but I can't now.

What I did was wrong, but I can't fix it it now, as much as I'd like to. I think it'd be fair to give me a ban for this, but I'd like to improve from this. I don't think removing me from the server altogether would allow for that.

[Taintedglory]

While I appreciate your response and your apology, I want to state for the record that asking a Robotics expert and a Chief engineer to look into the AIs programming is not a powergaming move. If I was the Captain of a very expensive space station, and the AI starts to out right lie about SoP and regulations, then Lie about other minor things, then to me, as Captain, means there is a glitch in its programming.

I did it knowing full well in a Malf round resetting the Laws does nothing at all, it was just for RP.

[Youbar]

While I appreciate your response and your apology, I want to state for the record that asking a Robotics expert and a Chief engineer to look into the AIs programming is not a powergaming move. If I was the Captain of a very expensive space station, and the AI starts to out right lie about SoP and regulations, then Lie about other minor things, then to me, as Captain, means there is a glitch in its programming.

I did it knowing full well in a Malf round resetting the Laws does nothing at all, it was just for RP.

 

On second thought, that makes sense. Your logic is reasonable enough, considering a security scenario where the AI might compulsively lie about a situation.

[Nanako]

Two announcements are made that the captain will be executed, and yet, all I see is security firing tasers at the bartender and chemist while he,

Yes, security was subduing other crewmembers, instead of your cyborgs. How is this resistance?

They were trying to follow your orders and keep other crewmen from attacking your borgs, out of fear of death from the nuke

 

Sam Lowe, sits next to a disposal bin and screams that he's in charge, and that he'll kill the AI over the intercoms.

He was cuffed at this time, and pleading with security to release him

 

Telecommunications were disabled primarily for this reason. Was I supposed to enable them to allow you to say to security, "Hey! I found your weapons locker!"?

 

For what reason, to stop me? I kept out of camera vision most of the time, did you ever see me?

 

It didn't matter, though, because eventually, you delivered it to another group of crew members attempting to leave the station.

Anyway, one cyborg goes down and announces the execution of one individual, and the whole crowd opens fire with the energy guns you just delivered them.

 

Nah, i took one ion rifle and left the locker in the holodeck. I attempted to announce that i'd left the locker there over comms, but as mentioned you had disabled it. I didn't 'deliver' weapons to anyone. If anyone managed to get them, they must have stumbled upon them in the holodeck coincidentally

The other people i met with weapons, no idea where or how they got them, it wasnt from me

 

A side note: I never told any cyborgs to kill on sight, only eliminate specific individuals that were damaging my hold on the station. Now, two major issues popped up for me here.

You sent an announcement stating as such.

And its very hard to tell specific individuals apart, i was watching your binary channel as an observer and saw a whole lot of assasination orders

 

Nanko came running up with the supermatter core, and was shot. Engineering exploded, and another part of the station was uninhabitable. Both of these were out of my control, and I had wanted to keep the station fully operational. The blob and this got in the way of that.

I didn't get shot, i never met any of your borgs at all. I went down from the supermatter core burning me. I'd hoped an atmos voidsuit would protect against the heat, but sadly it wasnt enough. i ran into some hacked doors in engineering and couldn't stay on my feet long enough to open them

 

However, if there's one statement I can almost fully agree with, it's this. I failed to communicate properly, believing that my intentions were clear to the crew after I stated I was assuming command.

Actually i'd contest this. You did plenty of communicating - you lied constantly. I remember several instances where someone new joined the round and you immediately spoke to them and tried to mislead them into trusting you

Also near the round end, you made a rather smug announcement that 75% of the crew had been killed

 

What I did was wrong, but I can't fix it it now, as much as I'd like to. I think it'd be fair to give me a ban for this, but I'd like to improve from this. I don't think removing me from the server altogether would allow for that.

I wouldn't like to see you banned, i'm still excited to see what you might do with telecomms. Maybe a warning is in order?

I'd just like for this to not happen again and hopefully for things to be learned from the experience

[The Stryker]

Well, I don't see anything wrong. The AI was trying to gain control and everyone was resisting, so I think the murdering was okay. I mean, he didn't kill people for no reason (including security which was passively resisting, and sent out a fax to CC).

Cutting off communications is also really useful for a malf just so that people can't coordinate an emitter/wall break/EMP charge into the AI core.

[Zundy]

What Stryker said. I was in this round and sec were passively resisting with am aim to violently rebel when the right time/equipment became available.

The AI wasn't bragging about killing, merely warning others to stop resisting.

It's all well and good saying everyone wasn't metagaming but from and OOC and IC standpoint the player and IG AI doesn't know that folks entering their core aren't entering to destroy it. OOC we know it can't be carded but IC we don't know this.

[Nanako]

OOC we know it can't be carded but IC we don't know this.

 

A malfunctioning is ICly aware of all its defenses and things that will work on it. it knows that law resets and carding wont work, thats integral to the strategy of inviting people to reset you

[Youbar]

A malfunctioning is ICly aware of all its defenses and things that will work on it. it knows that law resets and carding wont work, thats integral to the strategy of inviting people to reset you

 

Does it? Do you think it'd take the chance to have its laws damaged? A properly worded custom law could easily change a malfunctioning AI's ability to operate.

 

Yes, security was subduing other crewmembers, instead of your cyborgs. How is this resistance?

They were trying to follow your orders and keep other crewmen from attacking your borgs, out of fear of death from the nuke

 

Security was not following my orders. They were actively resisting by ensuring that Sam Lowe was cloned, and later, when the execution was supposed to be staged, they took a fairly long time to do it, with a portion of the officers looking to find a way into the armoury. All the events are fairly mixed up in my mind, however, but security was far from instantly cooperative - in fact, it was only the diona who even attempted to follow through with the AI being in command.

 

Sam Lowe, sits next to a disposal bin and screams that he's in charge, and that he'll kill the AI over the intercoms.

 

He was cuffed at this time, and pleading with security to release him

 

You're correct. Actually, he got out of cloning and screamed into the intercoms to be cloned, shouting at security for not listening to him. He was actually in cuffs at the time, and attempting to escape without intervention from security, suggesting that even the diona wasn't quite supportive either.

 

Telecommunications were disabled primarily for this reason. Was I supposed to enable them to allow you to say to security, "Hey! I found your weapons locker!"?

 

For what reason, to stop me? I kept out of camera vision most of the time, did you ever see me?

 

Telecommunications enables coordination. If they were enabled at the time, you could have informed the brig that you located their gear, This was the third time I had enabled and re-enabled it, and every time, a large portion of the crew was happy to speak out against me. I didn't see a reason to keep it on.

 

Nah, i took one ion rifle and left the locker in the holodeck. I attempted to announce that i'd left the locker there over comms, but as mentioned you had disabled it. I didn't 'deliver' weapons to anyone. If anyone managed to get them, they must have stumbled upon them in the holodeck coincidentally

The other people i met with weapons, no idea where or how they got them, it wasnt from me

 

You could have announced it over the intercom. You weren't completely out of communications. The other things appear to check out, however.

 

You sent an announcement stating as such.

And its very hard to tell specific individuals apart, i was watching your binary channel as an observer and saw a whole lot of assasination orders

 

You're wrong. I sent out an announcement stating that "dissenters would be executed," not "the crew will be executed." The assassination orders I gave out were restricted to the people who had fled the station, and were no longer present, and people who were cutting down my cameras and actively resisting.

 

I didn't get shot, i never met any of your borgs at all. I went down from the supermatter core burning me. I'd hoped an atmos voidsuit would protect against the heat, but sadly it wasnt enough. i ran into some hacked doors in engineering and couldn't stay on my feet long enough to open them

 

Correct. My apologies.

 

Actually i'd contest this. You did plenty of communicating - you lied constantly. I remember several instances where someone new joined the round and you immediately spoke to them and tried to mislead them into trusting you

Also near the round end, you made a rather smug announcement that 75% of the crew had been killed

 

There is nothing wrong with this at all. I used the situation to my advantage. For the entire round, the crew appeared to be under the belief I had five cyborgs, that huge amounts of the crew had been killed in their attempts to resist, and so on. I suppose in that regard I did a little too well: it was all a lie. Misleading people is a huge part of that round, and I'm starting to wonder if some of the unhappy feelings shown here, and the mistaken accusations of "murderboning" are due to these announcements. I'll make it as clear as possible: any announcements made were propaganda, and false, but as intended, you believed them, and unfortunately it appears to have spilled into OOC.

 

I wouldn't like to see you banned, i'm still excited to see what you might do with telecomms. Maybe a warning is in order?

I'd just like for this to not happen again and hopefully for things to be learned from the experience

 

Thank you. That seems rather kind for what I've done.

EDIT: Regarding metagaming, and Dina Hegarty's alleged desire to be "sportsman-like", they placed two emitters pointed towards the AI core this round (bqQRSf), under only the knowledge that the AI needed a law reset, and that it had been acting oddly - but not suspiciously and with hostility. As I suspected, this behaviour may very well have carried on to me yesterday. I'm not entirely sure if I'm in the wrong anymore.

[Nanako]

? A properly worded custom law could easily change a malfunctioning AI's ability to operate.

Nope, your first law is 'All laws overridden'. It doesn't matter what any custom law says, you're free to ignore it

 

EDIT: Regarding metagaming, and Dina Hegarty's alleged desire to be "sportsman-like", they placed two emitters pointed towards the AI core this round (bqQRSf), under only the knowledge that the AI needed a law reset, and that it had been acting oddly - but not suspiciously and with hostility. As I suspected, this behaviour may very well have carried on to me yesterday. I'm not entirely sure if I'm in the wrong anymore.

Nah, i know dina's player.

What's more likely, if there really is any wrongdoing there, is that she's pissed about this event and becoming less open to allowing antags a chance as a result

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

[SomeoneOutTher3]

I was glad when Helmut showed up in the round, (He's amusing to watch for me, as well as work with.) he managed to join a small number of crew and made their escape to the asteroid's outpost. You could tell the players were expecting murderous borgs when they arrived. Frankly, they weren't wrong to worry about it. One final closing comment, that struck me as... suspicious was the pairing of JADE and BIG BROTHER. They seemed to be really in sync on what they were doing, going so far to send the exact same type of message at the beginning of the round as the other, one was just better/more worded than the other. Either they think a lot alike (A distinct possibility), or something else was going on (Voice chat or the like), it was just suspicious in my eyes, and a little off-putting in hindsight.

 

 

Accusing someone of meta-communication is rather dickish if you have no evidence of it. Now, to clarify our pairing, I did suggest that we steal IDs for one of the traitor contrats (lol), but Big Brother told us that his decision to force us to abide by his orders were final, so we rolled with it. The two of us had spent a few rounds prior to this exchanging in Orwellian-type roleplay that we'd enforce on the crew together, such as during a traitor round when he became the captain/dictator of the station and I was an AI serving under him. From that, I can gather that his intention this round was to enforce a similar atmosphere as he had done before, but he only managed to effectively communicate that with his cyborgs post-Delta alert due to tcomms being turned off. The perceived murderboning that happened was because of two things: the crew actively attempted to resist and rebel against Big Brother, and various things such as blobs and supermatter explosions that damaged the integrity of the station, making the players aboard the station believe he was depressurising the hallways and medical bay.

[Mwahahahaha]

Hey all, robo-mum Ashley Paynter's (#respect yo) player here.

It's probably a tad bit late to offer up my couple of pennies but here goes.

Firstly, I'm not complaining.

Secondly, I'm probably going to sound like some sort of hippie peacelover.

Third, I'm not going to mention it often this post, but think about the word 'vengeance'- and also don't apply that to my post, because that's never what I will go for as a player when playing a game here.

At some point, I'm going to start talking not just about this round, but rounds in general, and even the game, or the fact that it's a game, and probably real life applications. If it ends up being a problem I'm sorry, but I just feel it appropriate to add this.

I have always said that I don't really like contributing to forums because I always get this sort of 'psychological force' that just deters me from doing this sort of stuff; being asked to see what I have to say is something that has always been quite hard for me to do so it always takes me time to try and express what I want to say. I also often tend to get mixing, sometimes conflicting viewpoints and opinions on things, as a forewarning.

I'm not adopting any sort of accusative tone here when I say this: I think I do remember now why I don't really contribute that often to forums, and that's because of drama. Just posting this already I almost feel like I'm adding to drama. It's a big post after all.

I don't mean to sidetrack here a bit but this is just something I'd like to get out of the way first. I don't like how drama happens in games like these because I personally think it's stupid to choose to get so kicked up over it because you're choosing to make yourself suffer when you can choose not to. It's funny though because this would be my first post on these forums -- something on a 'player complaint'.

Likewise, I'm not mad. At all. And to be honest, I really don't care anymore if I do die. Plus, I got to see some pretty funky stuff from the other players' actions.

I'm going to offer my side of thinking during game time:

I can easily tell or predict what game mode it is as early as about a minute I join into the round, even if it's mid-round — it's the little things that give them away. Names, announcements, behaviours, dialogue. Intentional or not. I don't like how I can do it but I do, so I try very hard to push it to the back of my mind — which I can do quite successfully most of the time so that I actually, literally end up forgetting what game mode it is — until it surfaces up again. When it does surface up I try my best to keep that train going and that boat rocking: I try to take actions that I feel would not cut off the antagonist too quickly so that they can carry out whatever they're planning; stating this as a general statement and not meaning to point fingers here or shame anyone, but even if that means I get 'ganked' (a term of which I feel its definition is mostly subjective and thus varies greatly) then I'm totally fine with that. After all, death can potentially add to the atmosphere and tenor of the story. Role play, to me, is about players getting together to craft a story. And we should be having fun, right? That's what games are for. We're still people though and we have slightly different ways of having fun, and I can understand why people would be upset because that fun, to them, is being taken away from them.

Likewise, I knew pretty quickly it was malfunction so I tried to think about what I could do to NOT blow the whistles too quickly. When the captain approached me asking me to take a look at Big Brother's programming and behaviour, I reasoned that it would, ICly, be relatively logical to do so. The thing I WASN'T doing though, was looking at your law set. Paynter was thinking more about personality quirks and such, not laws, when it comes to this sort of stuff. When I arrived to the AI Upload, Big Brother, if I recall correctly, flickered to life on the holopad after I was lingering around for a while (with Dina Hegarty at the time) and stated something like "You are here to inspect my laws. Stop dabbling about." At this point I wanted to express that I actually didn't want to inspect laws but instead come up with some RP mumbo-jumbo voodoo magic while in the AI Upload and then be off on my way (or not, depending on how it went ) but the round kept ticking and the train kept going so I didn't really find the opportunity. Anyhow, we entered the AI Upload foyer, and then the scary stuff of being surrounded by security units and then getting beaten up yadda yadda dead. (I found it cool when they showed up on opposite sides and the doors opened and the lights flickered.)

Don't get me wrong, but I kind of predicted a fairly strong chance of this happening about three minutes into the round, gradually stronger as time went on. But I don't feel it right to blame anyone here.

Just to clarify, for future reference mayhaps: I'm not robust on this server. It's not the same for me, this movement and ticklag. Somehow it's too slow and fast at the same time, but mostly too slow for my senses and in toto I'm just not that great.

Which is fine by me because that's a great change of scenery; I impose these aspects onto my characters when I play them. Ashley Paynter is weak. If this was a TTRPG, she would have like 2 or 3 dumped attributes: constitution, strength, and in some cases dexterity and wisdom. I like to RP any injuries/conditions/ailments/whatever negative thing that my characters receive — Paynter especially — for a longer period of time, because I think, in my opinion, the game makes them go away too quickly and people just seem to recuperate in the snap of the finger, potentially. I'm willing to play ball anytime if you want.

Likewise, I let myself get beat up. I mean, Paynter was probably focused on the fact that she just got the wind and lights knocked out of her so maybe the term 'surrender' has a slightly different connotation than how I would try to describe the IC scenario, but anyways. I deliberately don't cry out anything on the radio because I feel that, realistically, that wouldn't be have a decent probability of happening. At the very least, not with my characters. I do this because I want to let people have the chance to do something, and perhaps even face something slightly different in comparison to someone who would put up more resistance. I've been playing this game for many years and I just want to see something different happen and I want to see people get creative. Most of the time I feel like every round to me is just the same thing, so I get incredibly happy and impressed whenever someone does something just slightly different and I see something new. Don't get me wrong, the 'same stuff' I perceive can be interesting too: I experienced it for myself on multiple occasions. It's different when you're looking at something from the inside rather than the outside. That's why I try to be careful not to be so imposing of certain scenarios or situations: when I RP, I don't want people to feel like I'm imposing something on them, that I'm forcing them to do something. In the end, I actually want them to react in how THEY feel their characters should: if that's getting my stuff imposed on their characters then fine, that's their choice. As long as they're having fun. I have fun when other people are having fun. I mean, I can still be fine with the 'same stuff' going on, but just to put it, I'm like a sparkly princess waiting in a tower and enjoying the view and the tower. But I also want a bit of a thrill to happen — something different. Again, if people are having fun with that, then fine.

So I get lased. Okay, that's fine with me, genuinely. If I die I die. Oh well, who cares? I shouldn't. Besides, the game was a lot harsher in the past when it came to death. Up to the point where you had absolutely no chance of getting back into the game by normal means until a new one started. Apart from respawn: I think that might've existed then. I'm still not complaining and I will never intend to for this situation and for hopefully everything else that happens in the future. But that doesn't stop me from feeling somewhat concerned because I think, "What if this was someone else not like me?"

My concern is that someone else will take it differently, and apparently and, well, quite predictably, they did. But my concern isn't just on Youbar. I tend to feel concerned — perhaps I can even call it to an extent a sense of pity — about the people who feel angry and whatever negative emotions that come out because they've been affected.

I mean, I knew that even if I didn't make Paynter cry out or make it evident she was in trouble, I knew people would find out and get suspicious very soon afterwards. I was more worried about what would, and in fact what did happen next.

I don't like how there's all this drama. I don't like this complaining and I don't like how this thread has been opened. But I think I understand why it does.

I also think that this is a cycle. I see it as a cycle, and guaranteed people are going to be upset in the future over something in the game. To always be so upset, to me, is just not a good thing to have in general. Like, in real life. I think this is a cycle because I find that people are still choosing to react the same way.

I kinda tried to express what I've been meaning on deadchat that round to people but I got the impression people disagreed with me.

People were discussing what I could've/should've done to prevent this and that, and that I should be 'standing up' to this sort of stuff. I also see people saying how they should do this and that in preparation and then justify how it's not 'powergaming' and 'metagaming' and whatever. I mean, it was still really cool that people avoided doing it for most of the time that I could tell.

Look, guys, gals, and others, I just think there's a better way to handle this instead of always this complaining and drama. It's a bloody game. You might feel you've had your fun taken from you but are you really going to continue to let that happen by kicking up all this fuss and adopting the same tactics over and over?

I often think that part of the reason why this is still happening is because we're still not choosing to change something. I also think that there's this sort of 'lack of trust', this 'tension' when it comes to antagonists and non-antagonists. This sort of "Who's going to pull the trigger first? Who's going to make this shitty? Should I do something to stop that happening? What if they do something?" Like, antagonists doing pushing to do something because they're afraid they're going to get cut off. I mean, people are always discussing "Right, I'm gonna get the emitter." and all that and then I see the AIs going "I was afraid that was going to happen so I acted this way." It's like we're not, in the end, making the decision for ourselves and how we want to make fun. Beautiful things can happen but we're still, at times, choosing not to make it happen.

I could be wrong. I probably am, but I can't help but feel like this because I've never seen anything else but this for so many years — and not just in SS13, mind you.

I'm not saying "Don't complain." or "Take down these boards." — we're all humans after all and this can be how we are. Maybe it's just how I view people viewing the word 'complaint'; threads and such on this board are probably needed for the server and the players. It's just that it's saddening to me to see all this drama, and so often. Especially, to emphasise even more, in a game.

I see people saying stuff like "Okay, the next time I come across this player — because I know this player and what they're like now — I'm not going to take any chances/RP/be nice anymore."

To me I think that doesn't help the problem. At all. If anything, it can contribute to it. This behaviour just isn't right, in my opinion. What happens if this just becomes such a thing? Will it start to be sort of 'ingrained' into the players' mindsets to do this stuff? What happens when it's their turn to be someone else in the game? What happens when they're the antagonist?

We'll have different perspectives on how it goes, and yes, it doesn't mean it will happen. I mean, we've had what the people call 'good rounds'.

I'm just going to reiterate: it's just sad. We seem, to me, like we're stuck in place and in this cycle.

I'm not going to complain against Youbar or their actions. All I want to say is that I'm generally concerned for everyone because of everyone. Don't get me wrong. I do also feel that the round could've gone a lot 'better'.

I can't make people just behave the way 'I would want to' because that would just... no. I want people to think about what they do, but I want people to also not be so worked up and rigorous, if I'm using the right words. And if that makes sense. I tend to lose steam when trying to express what I'm trying to say.

Again, sorry for the late response. 'Vengeance' is probably too much of a powerful word to use when it can be interpreted as something like 'justice'. If you want to 'punish', I did suggest on deadchat that you can still do that while maintaining the RP and perhaps through doing so encourage the thing you want to see happen. But I got a reply saying that it won't work, it's so much effort, it takes a lot of time and resources, and that I don't understand what it's like for the staff and what it's like being a member of staff (or at least, that last clause is the impression I got about the meaning of it with one of the responses.) No, I don't, because I'm not a member of staff and I can only speak from my mind. I do want to say though that I've been playing for a long time now, I've been staff, I've handled my own server. I've been there, at least to some extent. I believe that contrary to those beliefs, it can still be done. Even with one person — you can be a whole lot more capable than you might think you are.

Sorry for the somewhat inserted sidetracking and inserted derailing of the particular topic at hand. If it's too much against the rules and going off track a bit then uh, oops. Sorry for the probably gibberish'd stuff and conflicting logic — this is just me at times. I kind of get the feeling now after writing and then checking and then making some additions like some sort of fool, especially in my current conditions. Plus, I can handle travelling halfway across the entire planet to a destination but not from a destination. Waking up extremely late, tennis first thing. Probably not in the best state to respond, but there you go.

I read people trying to play good sports. In that regard I do hope people keep that up. You don't need to stop. We can still be good sports.

I just hope you (plural) understand what I'm trying to get across here. No-one's obliged to agree with me, but this is just how I feel myself. You're perfectly entitled to your own opinions. Maybe this, and no doubt any of these ones addressing something else in the future, are needed after all. But to draw it up: no complaints from me, it's totally cool, please be careful. Have fun. Being an antagonist can also be tricky. There's also the fact that not everyone can be happy about something. Anyways, I'll most definitely still look forward to playing with you and you all here.

[makkenhoff]

Accusing someone of meta-communication is rather dickish if you have no evidence of it. snip

 

The point I was attempting to make, and the point you seemed to miss is that it if it looks that way to someone in dead chat, and it looks that way to someone in the round, it is ultimately affecting people's ability to trust the two of you and ultimately trust the server staff to foster role-play in a fair and fun manner.

The words "no evidence" does not, unfortunately, mean anything to me; the evidence is ALWAYS circumstantial at best, for true proof you'd have to have physical access to the machine in question as well as the personal accounts (usernames at the very least) of the person you were attempting to prove was guilty, as well as proof that the person in question was actually the person using the computer at the time, and admittedly that is a very tall order, even when your talking about real life cyber criminals, but I digress.

The ONLY thing server administrators can do is watch behaviors, and I pointed to the behavior between two players as suspicious, and in hindsight off-putting. In other words, I thought it was suspicious behavior at the time, and now, after the fact I just feel off-put by the experience as a whole. I'm certainly not intending it as a personal attack of character on yourself, or youbar as people. But I will call behavior as I see it, and I can certainly respect your dislike of it.

 

Hey all, robo-mum Ashley Paynter's (#respect yo) player here. snip.

 

Drama is going to happen regardless of your presence on the forum or not, that's why I take the time to post on forums. You can either try to head it off (my preference) by talking openly about issues, you can ignore it and the risk of the community itself splintering over drama and hope it gets better (most of the time drama blows over in SS13, but not everywhere else), or you can try to be the peacemaker after all the salvos have been fired, though it takes a special kind of person to be able to soothe ruffled feathers without further ruffling.

The fact is, everyone role-plays differently and bringing things like this up in a public manner allows for a discussion of the offense, and how people feel about it, and that does let people vent their frustrations as well as give constructive criticism on how to do a better job - they want the player in question to improve, and more importantly know why they should improve and what parts to improve on.

[Garnascus]

Sorry for the late response here. I will reach a final judgement in the morning on this. I really feel like a LOT of leeway was given to the AI in the initial encounter in the upload. they came in unarmed and walked right in while being followed by two security cyborgs. OOC they KNOW shit is about to go down. When you finally did subdue them they didnt even try to call for help and where rewarded by being lasered to death. The captain was given the same treatment for not raising the alert or sending a message to CC when he heard the laser fire.

Although, its worth noting you owned up to in your first sentence youbar. that counts for something.

[Youbar]

they came in unarmed and walked right in while being followed by two security cyborgs. OOC they KNOW shit is about to go down. When you finally did subdue them they didnt even try to call for help and where rewarded by being lasered to death. The captain was given the same treatment for not raising the alert or sending a message to CC when he heard the laser fire.

 

The only valid point, for me, is the one in italics.

The Chief Engineer and the Roboticist were unable to call for help because telecommunications had been disabled, along with the intercoms in the room they were in.

The Captain was unaware of what happened,

I never heard lasers or anything, I was looking at the Medical console when I saw the chemist literally catch fire.

and his death came roughly one minute later after he was immediately locked in his room, giving him hardly a chance to react if he had heard anything, meaning no alert level raise, and no fax.

I'm not sure if that's relevant to what you've posted, though.

[Taintedglory]

Though I will point out I did know they were dead. I knew ahead of time sending them in was signing their death warrant. But I didn't alert anyone until the second murder started on me

[Garnascus]

Alright, judging from all your notes and stuff this is a pretty isolated incident as far as i can tell. I am fine with placing a warning on you so long as this kinda stuff doesnt repeat. you have plausible deniability once the crew "reset" you. Please dont start killing people just because they want to reset you. I will leave this thread open for 24 hours and then lock and archive it.