[Resolved] Alberyk Metagame Ruling

[SodaPopBob]

BYOND Key: Sodapopbob

Staff BYOND Key: Alberyk

Game ID: bR0-cHh4 (game after)

Reason for complaint: A disagreement in a metagame ruling made by Alberyk, when i Ahelped

Evidence/logs/etc: https://pastebin.com/y2Rv9LAY

Additional remarks: Goes without saying, but i have no issue with Alb or the player in question, but i disagree with this ruling. The only outcome i wanted was a note/warning placed with the player for metagaming, so in the future if its an issue there would be an example of the previous behavior, as a deterrent to continued metagaming.

It was a cult round and i was playing RnD. I had kidnapped the bartender, and drug him in a locker through the halls and into science. In misc testing, the AI spotted me welding the locker shut, and told Sec to investigate. I drug the locker into the maintenance halls, and into my secret base. The secret base was set up in the old shooting range behind science, i had cut the bolt and bolt lights wires of the door so no one could tell at a glance that the doors were locked, and installed a secret door in the bottom right corner of the room, in the wall facing east. Inside, i began RP'ing my conversion of the janitor. As we were RP'ing the conversation, I noticed lights on the outside edges of the walls, indicating that someone was out there with a flashlight. I know i'm busted, but continue to RP the encounter. As we are playing it out, I see another light join the first, so i know i'm screwed. I think the bartender knew it too, because he began to stall. No matter, I continue to RP while watching the lights on the walls. they go back and forth around the exterior of the room, from one door to the next, trying them out. then i see one light, starting from the top right door, move slowly down the wall, pausing each step, until they get to my secret door, which opens. I'm caught. It looked like a case of metagame which ill explain my reasoning for later, but for now, this is my conversation with Alb when i Ahelped.

 

 

PM to-: so how did zahid know to find my secret door set in the wall. its almost as if he somehow knew it was an option to be there

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

-- Click the Primary Admin's name to reply --

: [Primary Admin PM]Alberyk Mesons, it seems

to : Alberyk mensons dont reveal secret doors

: [Primary Admin PM]Alberyk They do

to : Alberyk ive never seen it, they always just show a regular wall

to : Alberyk i was using mensons in the room, the door never showed up once as anything but a wall

to : Alberyk not to mention, i could see his light on the other side of the wall, testing all the walls for secret doors

 

 

 

Very short, seemingly dismissive conversation from Alb. Based on the way it went, it seemed to me that he dropped the subject at "mensons can see secret doors" and didn't do any further investigation into the issue. This was frustrating, because i MADE the door while wearing mensons, and know they don't see through the doors, so the next round, i made one, put on mensons, took a screen cap, and continued the conversation in DMs. this is the conversation we had.

 

https://imgur.com/a/bMSLl

 

This conversation was very confusing to me, because it seemed as though Alb didn't really know what had happened, despite having said he looked into it. He also said many contradictory things, first saying that he thought the borg had found the door, then saying the officer found it a minute later on accident, then saying that the officer actually looked for the door intentionally later. He stated "they called a borg" as a reason to how they found the door, which makes no sense. The conversation itself was very confusing, which is why I bring it to a Staff complaint, because the whole thing felt phoned in, and the reasoning behind Albs ruling made no sense.

There are ways to tell if a secret door exists. If you step in blood or oil, and then walk into a secret door, it leaves tracks that make it clear that there is a secret door there. If you walked up on a room that you know had two doors, and today it has NO doors, it would make sense to think a door is hidden somewhere. But to see that a door is not working, in a room that is no longer used no less, i don't see the logical jump that is necessary to believe a secret door must exist. To address the final statement Alb made in the DMs, yes, the doors were tampered with. But not in a way that makes a secret door believable. Maybe i just disabled the doors when i entered the room to discourage anyone that followed me (as a note, these officers weren't hot on my heels. there was time to set up my conversion before they showed up.) or maybe the doors in the unused room are just not working due to a mechanical/electrical error, maybe its an unrelated issue, someone tampered with them etc. To jump from "doors not working" to "secret door" is clearly metaknowledge. its also made clearer by the players response that he "accidentally found the secret door" in ooc. this isn't scooby doo, he did not slip and start a hilarious chain of reactions that resulted in him triggering the secret door. The player, knowing that secret doors is an option, systematically tried walls until he found the door, despite IC reasons that make more sense being present, with no IC indications that a door could be there.

[Alberyk]

There was clear signs that someone modified that area of maintenance, and since found that the airlocks would not open, I see no issues with them trying to look for other entrances. If the officer was running around the maintenance by touching all doors because something might have been there, that would be an issue. Now, I was wrong about the mesons, because, if I am not wrong, the tajaran offier had them at the time. Now, the AI reported you moving to that area. I did investigate further by talking to the player that found the place in question, I was pretty much alone at the time mod-wise, and since I work at home, I had to leave for a moment to deal with something.

As I said in dms, if you told me they said that in looc, I would probably look into it more at the time, which you only did far later, it is impossible to staff to see everything at once or take in consideration everything. Later the player told me that he was looking for other entrances, which I do believe that is a fine case in this situation where they could believe there was suspect in a place they can't reach, that they could clearly in regular conditions. Anyway, I doubt that fake walls, mostly to security, would be some sort of hidden knowledge, like some antags tools are, and it is fine for them to take such in consideration.

[SodaPopBob]

you keep saying clear signs of modification, but the only signs were doors being tampered with, which could of been done that second, its not a huge modification. Its not like i rebuilt the room structure, and there was reason to believe that walls could of been tampered with in that fashion. I snipped the door bolt and light wires, that's it. with the mensons, you could see i laid out tile and set up tables, but beyond that, i just don't see how that's enough to expect a secret door. Maybe if i had torn down a bunch of walls, sure, i could see how that could be the case. or torn down the doors and replaced them with walls, absolutely, i could see that. but snipping two wires in two doors, that just doesn't make sense. that can be done in less than a minute, it doesn't really give an indication that there was a big time construction project going on.

there was no point in telling you that he said what he said in ooc, because immediately after you said"yes they do" (mensons seeing through walls), you just flat out ignored everything else i said. i had to rebuild my scenario and screen cap it to you before you would consider responding back.

it's not that it's hidden knowledge, it's that it's the most unlikely of scenarios in this situation. there were no real big indications of a construction project to justify really looking for one. the doors were busted. there's way better IC explanations for that, like i snipped them when i came in, or the room is just old and unused, or a power issue. jumping to "secret doors" just makes no sense to me. Especially when they were already fixing the doors when the officer found my secret one. Everyone else assumed the most logical thing, that i just altered the doors, he was the only one that jumped to "secret door"

[Jakers457]

Fake walls tend to be common knowledge amongst the crew and I believe Security were told to hunt for a suspect in that area of the tunnels. So in my mind, if they were in the knowledge that someone was doing some shady stuff in that area and found a room which was tampered with, they would have the motive for checking that room's perimeter for an entrance extensively. From how you described the scene, they were walking up and down the perimeter, checking the doors and such. If they knew you had someone, if they already experienced other hostiles that round and if they knew they were running out of time to save that bartender after what they experienced. They would have exhausted every immediate option, which involves checking the secret door.

Given the situation, why they were there and what happened during the round prior to this incident as well being able move a wall panel for access being known by the crew, whether they know how to construct one themselves or not. I don't see any meta happening, perhaps if they had no information to work from and immediately b-lined for the secret door, then perhaps it would be. But from what I can see, it was a major slip up on the antag's part that only tightened the noose around their neck.

That's my two cents on whether the situation was classed as a metagame infraction

[LanceLynxx]

I don't think fake walls are common knowledge to anyone but maybe say engineering at most. It's a very specific construction type wall that barely exists anywhere on station. I certainly wouldnt go around checking fake walls if I saw a tampered door, I'd try to untamper and use the same door. If I find a locked door, I dont automatically assume there is another way in, I try to unlock the said door. I think its power-meta-gamey.

[alexpkeaton]

Not involved but noticed this: speaking of powergamey behavior: doesn't mesons+tajara=full night vision? Why is a security officer even wearing mesons anyway?

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

A tajara wearing mesons isn't powergaming, it's a buff of the race, unless this policy was changed. A small update was made where mesons glow in the dark when worn specifically to balance this.

[keinto]

I don't think fake walls are common knowledge to anyone but maybe say engineering at most. It's a very specific construction type wall that barely exists anywhere on station. I certainly wouldnt go around checking fake walls if I saw a tampered door, I'd try to untamper and use the same door. If I find a locked door, I dont automatically assume there is another way in, I try to unlock the said door. I think its power-meta-gamey.

 

Basically this. I cannot recall a single public area where a hidden wall leads to a room that everyone knows about. If the only way in was locked, Security should have contacted Engineering for help instead of spamming clicks on walls they had no knowledge of being tampered with.

[Garnascus]

you keep saying clear signs of modification, but the only signs were doors being tampered with, which could of been done that second, its not a huge modification. Its not like i rebuilt the room structure, and there was reason to believe that walls could of been tampered with in that fashion. I snipped the door bolt and light wires, that's it. with the mensons, you could see i laid out tile and set up tables, but beyond that, i just don't see how that's enough to expect a secret door. Maybe if i had torn down a bunch of walls, sure, i could see how that could be the case. or torn down the doors and replaced them with walls, absolutely

 

if this is all that the situation was i really think it was meta to check for a wall =\ . Does anyone else have any conflicting information? If not this looks like alb should have bwoinked the individual for metagaming.

[Alberyk]

As I said, I am pretty sure that the person that found the room was using mesons, and did notice the titles being added as you said, which is an indication that someone was inside the room before and coupled with the airlocks being locked down, and since it was one of the room in the maintenance, I did not see any issue with the case. However, if other admin find my reasoning faulty, I will speak to the individual in question about this behavior.

[Garnascus]

TLDR i mentioned alberyk on the staff discord. If all you did was bolt a door and mess with some tiles then i do not feel that was sufficient evidence to start looking for hidden doors. Should have called an engineer or a borg to try and open the bolted door. The player should have been bwoinked but i suppose its water under the bridge now.