[Resolved] ERT Abuse - Garnascus

[alexpkeaton]

BYOND Key: Alexpkeaton (Played that round as Jack Edwardson, QM)

Staff BYOND Key: Garnascus

Game ID: bQQ-aKBv

Reason for complaint: Garnascus spawned himself as a lone-member ERT near the end of a Rev round and acted like a death squad when people didn't follow an order he issued in an announcement under the name of the revhead HoP who had been making false announcements all shift to rile up the crew against NT. I feel the murdering of crew who didn't follow the confusing announcement could have been avoided by sending an announcement in his own name, or, better yet, having more players on the ERT that could screen crewmembers prior to shuttle docking and not needing to resort to violence at all. I also feel that he abused his authority by not communicating to my ahelp post round by claiming through a moderator that he couldn't handle that complaint, while apparently, at the same time, providing info to the moderator about what to say regarding the incident. If he cannot handle the complaint, he shouldn't be providing the moderator with what to say either. It just smacked of "I don't want to deal with you."

Evidence/logs/etc:

Garnascus bussed himself into the round as L/tpr Baer. He was the only ERT that round.

He sent this message upon arrival:

this is lead trooper baer. anyone armed is hereby ordered to disarm and collect yourself to the bar or medical if you are injured. command are ordered to disarm as well and wait in the bridge meeting room. failure to comply with any of these directives will have you labeled a danger to the company

-L/tpr Baer (Emergency Response Team)

I do not know if Baer went to the bar or medical to clear individuals that gathered there. I would make my way to the bar (though admittedly it took me some time to get there, partly because I was hungry and partly because I had half of an armory on my back and was figuring out what to do with it). When I arrived at the bar there were only two other characters there, one of whom was severely injured and I treated with a medkit I brought and decided to take them to cargo to see if I had some stabilizing medicine in the warehouse.

The following message was then sent a short time after he came on station:

Priority Announcement

we are initating evacuation procedures. If you have not been PERSONALLY named by me to evacuate you will REMAIN ON STATION in YOUR DEPARTMENT. failure to comply with this will have your mode of transportation destroyed in transit. a full regiment shall be dispatched to investigate

-Rrazujun Rrhazkal-Jawdat (Head of Personnel)

That message was signed by the rev HoP, who had sent out untruthful messages during the round to try to sow distrust in the standard Chain of Command.

-----

For example:

Nathan Corvo gave a pistol to a crewmember and told them to open fire on me and the CSI agent. He has been arrested and demoted to janitor as an act of parole. STOP TTRYING TO KILL EVERYONE.

-Rrazujun Rrhazkal-Jawdat (Captain)

(not true, though brilliant on the part of the Acting Cap. I was involved in that incident and the Captain had not even reached his office to equip when those events happened)

-----

I immediately called BS on this in common comms, and the only direct response came from the rev HoS, who I knew was turned because of a prior interaction with the HoP and HoS together.

[Common] Jack Edwardson says, "Screw you, HoP"

[Common] Jack Edwardson says, "You are not legitimately in command here"

[Common]Poslan Kur'yer-Isra exclaims, "THAT IS THE ERT, NOT JAWDAT!" <--- Rev HoS

Here are the full text of my ahelps post-round:

PM to-Staff : I kind of have an issue with how that ERT was managed. I was telling people that the comms traffic of saying the ERT was murdering people was wrong. I went to the bar, three people were there, one was severely hurt so I took them to cargo to treat them. We then went to escape where an ERT opened it to space with 10+ people inside. Since the HoP was saying that the ERT was murdering people I thought it was a lie. Also, the Announcement message about not boarding had the HoP's signature, so I figured that too was a lie.

PM to-Staff: If you are going to give an order as ERT commander, have it have your signature, not the signature of the head of a revolution.

PM to-Staff: Do you have a response to this?

Your adminhelp will be tended by TheDocOct. Please allow the staff member a minute or two to write up a response.

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: uhhhhhhhh

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: Not really sure how to, no.

PM to TheDocOct: Garn said he was in charge of the ERT, and I believe that ERT was improperly led.

PM to TheDocOct: Did you receive my other two messages?

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: Yes.

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: He was also the -only- ERT. Publishing an announcement himself would have required him to abandon the e-shuttle, allowing potentially hostile forces to board the Odin, and go to the nearest C&C computer (a Head's office) in order to do so.

PM to TheDocOct: Well, if he wants it taken seriously, he shouldn't sign it as a criminal.

PM to TheDocOct: I didn't believe that we would die because a rev head made the announcement and he had lied all shift to try to scare people away from legit leadership.

PM to TheDocOct: He went as a lone gun and killed a bunch of people for no reason.

PM to TheDocOct: I mean, Garn is seeing all this. Why isn't he responding?

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: The issue regarding the e-shuttle being off-limits was announced over both general and security radios multiple times by him, in addition to the, admittedly improperly signed, announcements.

---

I dispute that he gave ample warning. While I would suggest in the PM exchange that I must have missed it, it turns out that I wasn't mistaken. There was not ample warning provided via general comms by Baer. I saved the entire log and searched for the ERT leader's name. It came up only once in an announcement (the above announcement directing crew to the bar/medical) and only three times in common radio (I blacked out on the emergency shuttle prior to departing). This was only immediately prior to opening fire on escape, and then venting escape to vacuum. I would estimate that there was maybe 60 seconds between Baer making his first warning over common comms (not counting the announcement signed by the HoP) and firing a shot (there was about 10 or so people in escape at this time), and deconstructing the bulkhead to space about 30 seconds after that.

---

PM to TheDocOct: It was too confusing, and I don't remember the comms traffic. A lot was happening, I was dealing with a wounded crew member, looking for two others, talking to the AI via PDA. I didn't pay attention to some of it

PM to TheDocOct: Also, did he ever even get to the bar to check people?

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: It's against policy to argue about actions via adminhelp. If you'd like to address him directly, you can post a complaint, or talk to Aboshehab regarding the incident.

PM to TheDocOct: what was the game ID of last round

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: bQQ-aKBv

PM to TheDocOct: I want confirmation for my staff complaint. Is he talking with you but refusing to talk with me?

I would appreciate if a staff member could review the internal back-and-forth.

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: Yes, because he is required to.

I want to point out here that just because he wasn't communicating with me doesn't mean he wasn't communicating to me. He was providing information to the moderator and therefore responding to the adminhelp. The fact that he didn't personally message me is just a technicality and just came off as rude.

PM to TheDocOct: Uh huh

PM to TheDocOct: He received the first two ahelps and could have chosen to respond

PM to TheDocOct: Okay, thank you

Trial Moderator PM TheDocOct: Again. It's against policy to respond to complaints via adminhelp. That's not what ahelping is for.

PM to TheDocOct: I wanted to know why he did what he did. It takes a lot of effort to litigate it and honestly I don't want to, but I will.

PM to TheDocOct: Also, by the by, staff actions aren't arguable, but player actions are. And because the ERT was one person and a staff member, I am unable to have my complaint addressed. That's a conflict of interest that shouldn't happen.

Trial Moderator PMTheDocOct: You can have it addressed. You can post a complaint, or PM Abo.

Post-round, Garnascus noted that he killed people during the round as an ERT for not following his orders.

OOC:Garnascus:i killed anyone who ignored my orders

I tried to clarify whether the ERT was a death squad, and I wasn't the only one. (Selected OOC's)

OOC:AlexPKeaton: I don't understand, was that a death squad at the end?

OOC:Mogelix: was that a deathsquad at the end?

OOC:AlexPKeaton: if it wasn't a deathsquad, what the hell was it doing?

OOC:Garnascus:i killed anyone who ignored my orders

This was the first time I discovered that a staff member was involved with the ERT. I wouldn't know until the PM exchange that Garn was the -only- member of the ERT

OOC:AlexPKeaton: so that *was* a death squad

OOC:AlexPKeaton: but was it a death squad?

OOC:AlexPKeaton:but WAS IT A DEATHSQUAD?!

OOC:Garnascus: it was not a death squad

OOC:AlexPKeaton: that was bullshit then venting escape to space

OOC:Garnascus: no it wasnt

OOC:Garnascus: i gave orders to not board the emergency shuttle or you would be considered a threat

OOC:Garnascus: and people boarded anyway

OOC:AlexPKeaton: and plenty of people were screaming into comms that you were murdering people

This claim was made several times in common that the ERT was hostile toward the crew, prior to the incident at escape. I do not know if any of this was true, some of this was said into comms by the HoP who, again, was sowing discord. I told crew members prior to going to

escape that those reports must be wrong.

Additional remarks:

I have a several questions that I want to pose to Garnascus:

-What was the motivation for an ERT to get directly involved in the round? Were you called by command? CCIA? Fax? AI message? How long after being requested did the ERT arrive?

-Was there any discussion at a staff level about how the ERT would proceed, both before being dispatched and during?

-Why do you think you made a better ERT by yourself than by a) leading a team of players who had died during the round or b) allowing them to assemble their own ERT?

-More than once after the ERT arrived, people spoke into common comms stating that they heard the ERT was killing crew and that it was a death squad. Why didn't you try to counter these claims or clarify that innocents would be kept safe?

-Why didn't you personally clarify the announcement message you wrote but was signed by the rev head HoP that warned us that we would be killed if we tried to escape and were not personally handpicked to do so? Do you think it was reasonable that crew knowing the HoP was a revhead would dismiss that? Do you think it is reasonable that the announcement only added to the confusion of who was in charge?

-Why did you vent escape and the shuttle to space? The only warning I can tell in the logs that clearly comes from you happened within 60 seconds of you venting escape to space, and you were not visible to most of those crewmembers filing into escape.

-In a round filled with conflicting orders, conflicting leadership and unknown allegiances, do you feel that your approach as the ERT was the right one?

-Did you ever visit the bar or medical to clear non-command that assembled there? If you did, how much time did you provide between your announcement and visiting there? What arrangements, if any, did you provide people to safely escape?

-As a player, I should be able to adminhelp an action I feel to be rulebreaking by another player. Because staff complaints are apparently not to be ahelped, and because the ERT consisted solely of you, I was unable to do so, and was forced to bring my complaint here. Do you feel that conflicts of interest like this should be avoided if at all possible? Do you think enough was done to prevent this sort of conflict in this particular case?

-Do you feel that you were abusing your authority by discussing an ahelp with a moderator despite (apparently) not being permitted to participate in ahelps that involve your actions?

-I feel that, for better or for worse, players expect to leave the station by shuttle every round. Did you really expect crew to obey your order to remain stationside, especially how that order was delivered (in the revhead HoP's name)? You did not personally make a secondary announcement or comms message (that I received, at least) until about 60 seconds prior to the shuttle arriving, and only then immediately prior to engaging the crew and depressurizing escape (and immediately after, the shuttle).

tl;dr: Garnascus spawned as a lone-member ERT, depressurized escape and the shuttle following an announcement signed by a revhead saying those who attempted to escape would be killed (save those he "personally" cleared).

My complaints are:

Garnascus spawned as a lone-member ERT when he could have brought enough people to personally secure escape from weapons and allow crew to escape.In particular, as an admin he could have significantly added to the round by allowing dead players to return to the round as an ERT. I am confused why he didn't and elected to go in alone which I feel directly contributed to the murderbony actions at escape. He didn't personally clear up an authoritarian announcement signed by the revhead HoP saying those who attempted to escape would be killed unless cleared by him personally. He did not provide enough time from a personal warning over comms not to board the shuttle.He refused to communicate to my ahelps post round but discussed it internally with the trial mod who handled the complaint. I should be able to ahelp player behavior I believe to be rule-breaking, but because staff actions are not ahelpable, when a staff member makes potentially rule-breaking player behavior, that presents a conflict of interest. I don't feel that enough was done to prevent such a conflict from occurring here (e.g. having other players join the ERT, having another player lead the ERT, perhaps, with communication from CC).

[Faris]

Alright, there seems to be a bit of confusion here, I guess we could do a better job explaining it.

First, an involved person is not allowed to deal with any ahelps involving themselves or that has them as an involved participant in an incident, in this case, Garn was not able to deal with the ahelp. In most cases you would be correct regarding ahelping rule breaking behavior but the issue, but the reason you were advised to make a complaint was due to the nature of staff present in this scenario. There was only a trial moderator being Doc and Garn himself present, everyone else was simply not around at the time and getting a person wouldn't been a lengthy process. So in essence, usually we'd have dealt with this thing during the round itself, but the circumstances didn't permit it.

Second, even us as staff are required to speak the staff responsible to an ahelp. If I get ahelped for say, lack of escalation before a murder, I am required to speak to the staff member that took the ahelp, but I am forbidden unless in extreme cases such as being the only member to actually communicate with the one that send the adminhelp, and that's usually to tell them I'm alone but I'm calling another member of staff to come online to deal with it. Again, circumstances of the end of round and possibly lengthy process to get someone online made this complaint the best course of action.

I'll also go ahead and say I'll be handling this case.

[Garnascus]

you're making a lot of assumptions. most of them are wrong. Ill just go point by point i guess.

Garnascus spawned as a lone-member ERT when he could have brought enough people to personally secure escape from weapons and allow crew to escape.

I was originally playing as a roboticist. Not a single person joined the ERT team and i asked in an ahelp if it would be ok for me to ghost and join ERT. At first doc said that would be kind of lame but after nobody joined they figured it would be in the rounds interest if at least one ERT joined. I spawned myself a human because i had missed the window due to me ahelping and needing to find a place to ghost to not be in the way.

In particular, as an admin he could have significantly added to the round by allowing dead players to return to the round as an ERT. I am confused why he didn't and elected to go in alone which I feel directly contributed to the murderbony actions at escape.

You're just straight up wrong. ERT was called with the admin verb meaning ANYONE could join ERT as long as they where observing. It was called with the admin verb because the station had faxed us evidence of the attempted coup and command potentially being compromised. CCIA at the time signed off on the ERT call.

He didn't personally clear up an authoritarian announcement signed by the revhead HoP saying those who attempted to escape would be killed unless cleared by him personally.

I dont really know what you mean by this but im going to assume you mean the announcement i made that had jawdats signature on it. I clicked on the command console to make an announcement but i forgot to make sure it was properly logged out and logged in with my ID. I never even noticed jawdats signature was on the announcement until you mentioned it in PMs to doc.

He did not provide enough time from a personal warning over comms not to board the shuttle.

I disagree. I was operating under the assumption my initial announcement came from me. I ordered security to disarm of weapons many times and i know i said it over the general radio more than once. I also did not start by spamming grenades. I knew jawdat was IC attempting a coup and i knew he was urging people to arm up against me. I came to escape and deconstructed a wall with my RCD to vent it. I vented it first because i know that you have enough time to run out of escape before the lack of air kills you.

To my surprise everyone remained seated. that is not my fault.they then boarded the shuttle DESPITE a vacuum and i noticed a miner carrying a locker. the locker opened and out poured a shit load of weapons with some crew scrambling for them. I busted in and threw frag grenades and the rest is history. I left once my frag grenades where done since someone started sniping me and i had seen jawdat fall down a hole.

He refused to communicate to my ahelps post round but discussed it internally with the trial mod who handled the complaint. I should be able to ahelp player behavior I believe to be rule-breaking, but because staff actions are not ahelpable, when a staff member makes potentially rule-breaking player behavior, that presents a conflict of interest. I don't feel that enough was done to prevent such a conflict from occurring here (e.g. having other players join the ERT, having another player lead the ERT, perhaps, with communication from CC).

I did not refuse to communicate to your ahelps i CANNOT communicate to your ahelps. It is not appropriate for me to respond to an ahelp or an issue that i am directly involved in. Any dialogue we might or might not establish is going to be incredibly one sided. The proper course of action and the course of action i urged doc to tell you was to make a staff complaint and then it can be reviewed by abosh and the facts can be seperated from the fancy.

i knew their where revs.

I knew jawdat had attempted a coup

i knew he was urging people to ignore my order

i knew they where ignoring my orders

I was trying to force you guys to stay on the station and contained simply because i knew many of you where terrorists to the company and that jawdat and the acting HoS where leading it. I did not have the man power or the fire power to arrest ALL of them. i was trying to quarantine the station.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Hello, I was the Head of Personnel Head Rev turned Captain in question.

I wasn't aware there was an ERT call at first because I had thought I had managed to demote the ID's of the non-rev Command level ID's that would be needed to send faxes.

Garn being the only ERT was surprising, and I was suspicious that there were more running around.

However, I did not see much abuse or bloodthirsty behaviors on their part. If you can believe that they didn't realize they signed the announcement in my name, the rest of the consequence fall in line naturally. It played into my hands very well - I managed to convince a lot of people to disobey the ERT.

Garnascus did not strongly validhunt. I confronted him with a levy of revs multiple times but neither of us drew on one another. Given that he was alone and we outnumbered him 7 - 1, it would have been a phyrric victory on our end. However the crazy violence from loyalists and traitors made Jawdat IC'ly very wary of spending the lives of his revs in more violence when there were still crazy people bombing everything.

Garnascus showed the same restrained in the beginning. He stated his intent clearly and repeatedly, and he provided several warnings. The consequences of disobeying him were very plain.

Joining ERT is voluntary for observers. As it seems, literally nobody wanted to go ERT. That's weird since I killed a few people, and I don't know why ghosts weren't going ERT. If Garn hadn't gone ERT, you'd have gotten NO ERT whatsoever because there were NO other volunteers.

He provided plenty of time. I did not arrive at escape until seconds before the shuttle docked, before which we had heard at least 3 major common radio demands from him to not board the shuttle. The revs were intending to secure departures to allow non-revs to evacuate - I wanted revs to stay behind so I could announce the independent people's republic of aurora for the survivors.

His actions at escape fell in line with the consequences that he laid out. He TOLD you that the shuttle would be attacked if you boarded it, and it was. It's not murderboning if there is escalation and a clear avenue to escape the fate. If you did not want to die, you could have elected to not try to disobey ERT.

I cannot speak on behalf of him not responding to your ahelps. I can just say it would be a VERY BAD IDEA if admins could respond to their own ahelps. Imagine if Garn managed this complaint against him - an ahelp against an admin in-game is like an in-game staff complaint. Shadow would have to decide if his actions here were good.

His actions as an ERT were surprisingly restrained and he provided clear and plain consequences if you disobeyed very easy and understandable orders. He made an IC slip up which played into my head-rev narrative and lead to confrontation and conflict.

[Faris]

Seems to me the only real issue here was a mistake on his part not correcting the announcements, it's a common thing heads do at times as well. Considering the situation, I don't real see anything wrong with what he did. Situation called for strict measures where he gave clear and distinct orders to the crew. People refused, so he vented it to force people out of the shuttle. They still stuck around with some if not a majority went to arm up from said locker the miner brought, so he had to make a call.

So again, the only real issue was a mistake with the announcements, where he failed to notice the signature of the announcement and in that happening, didn't correct it. He still however gave orders verbally to the crew. So the only issue here was an honest mistake.

Considering this to be a none-issue, but a nudged will be directed to Garn to double check things in the future. I believe I did address everything here but do point out anything I haven't. I'll let this sit for at least 24 hours before I lock and archive.

[Faris]

Alright, deeming this resolved with no action that a nudge to be more careful with announcements.

Locking and archiving.