Ghost role policy suggestion

[Slignerd]

Bottom post of the previous page:

The current ghost role policy seems somewhat vague, so I would like to suggest a following addition to the ghost role policy.

• Regardless of IC conflicts with the crew, unless they're a neutral role threatened with complete annihilation or an antagonist role, ghost roles may not cause any major, round-ending damage to the station.

I believe it would clear up a certain grey area in hostilities between station crew and ghost roles that I didn't know was a rule issue until told so by an admin.

[Rustledjimm]

I remember a recent incident where the golems set up an A.I.

This AI proceeded to antagonise the crew, specifically security, by closing and bolting doors, shocking them etc. etc. So much so that security ended up raiding the free golems who then, in self-defence to what they saw as a raid unknowing it was because of their AI, set off a singulo bomb on their own ship in their final defence as security overran them. Promptly killing much of the security force too.

Now in this situation you can see the escalation, it upset a lot of folk however. Personally I said that the Golem A.I. was to blame and I merely warned them to not randomly fuck with the crew in this situation in the future. They were even quite remorseful (they themselves had been eaten by the singulo), for some reason not realising that security would come for the Golems as a whole. A lot of misconception and miscommunication which is what happens in this game, it's meant to happen. However I still warned the Golem AI player to not antagonise the crew without prior reason beforehand.


This happens rarely enough I don't think we need stringent policy on it. It can be done fairly easily case by case.

[BeeSting12]

That sounds like one of those interesting situations created by conflict and player interaction. The AI was likely "at fault" for terrorizing the humans, but if it was within or encouraged by its laws then I'd call everything that happens there valid just because it was cool/funny.

It's a huge leap from guy took my two easily replaceable objects, let me BoH bomb the station.

[Wyzack]

>not being explicitly told that dropping a singulo on the station over minor confrontations is bad is a ban trap

Have a fucking brain. If people are literally too fucking stupid to figure this out on their own do we really want them playing here? How can they type and breathe at the same time with that level of processing power?

[feem]

I don't know why I've had to say three times that I don't want a stringent policy, I want a simple clarification in the rules that we do not expect roundstart and lavaland ghost roles to be major actors within the round.

The lavaland policy which currently exists does not effectively communicate this:

Follow the flavour text you receive upon spawning to the best of your abilities. Unlike the rest of the rules, these roles are very much defined and guided by roleplay rather than a system of "valid" or "not valid."

Your life is cheap though, and escalation rules are greatly relaxed both for you and any crewmembers interacting with you.

This is something that's been upheld multiple times by multiple admins and headmins, but Slig is right -- in this very narrow instance, in this thread -- that the rules don't address this effectively.

The way the rules are currently written, while, yet again, BoH bombing or antagonistic AIs are out of scope for lavaland roles, the way these rules are currently written explicitly states that escalation rules are relaxed bidirectionally, which could lead someone to believe, in concert with flavor text, that assaults on the station at large are in-scope. This is, to us, obviously incorrect, but the rules as they are written leave unnecessary ambiguity.

[Pascal125]

I mean,
I personally think it was pretty clear that Golems are neutral and should not be seeking conflict,
Ashwalkers and Escaped Convicts can seek conflict.
Veterenarians, Their pets, and Lifebringers are peaceful and should avoid conflict.

They're ghost roles, they shouldn't be trying to fuck with the main crew. They are ghosts or observers. It's a privilege, it shouldn't be used as an excuse to act like a side-antag. Especially not BoHing or commiting grand sabotage on them for retaliating when you've literally made an AI that fucks with the crew. But that's been established already.

This is literally just common sense. That's all there really is to say about it. It's a sad state when it has to be clarified.

[Rustledjimm]

That sounds like one of those interesting situations created by conflict and player interaction. The AI was likely "at fault" for terrorizing the humans, but if it was within or encouraged by its laws then I'd call everything that happens there valid just because it was cool/funny.

It's a huge leap from guy took my two easily replaceable objects, let me BoH bomb the station.

Oh yeah I was just giving a different situation. I did find it all quite amusing and was fine with all the escalation etc. however though I cannot remember off the top of my head I do not believe the AI was encouraged by laws to mess with the crew. Which is why I just gave them a verbal warning to try and not cause unneeded conflict between the two.

[BeeSting12]

The current rules are follow your flavor text @feem. Basic reading comprehension should've been learned in high school, if they can't infer that ash walkers are hostile, vets are not, and golems are essentially crew members with more relaxxed escalation they might not've passed high school. I'd be okay adding a chart to the rules though.

[feem]

The current rules are follow your flavor text @feem. Basic reading comprehension should've been learned in high school, if they can't infer that ash walkers are hostile, vets are not, and golems are essentially crew members with more relaxxed escalation they might not've passed high school. I'd be okay adding a chart to the rules though.

I agree that this SHOULD be a clear issue. However, it is not. While, yet again, the instances of someone causing catastrophic damage to the station in such a role are few, there are many, many, many instances of someone needing to be talked to or given a note or ban for, either deliberately or accidentally, misinterpreting the intent behind ghost roles and treating them like regular characters.

By adding an extremely simple clarification that if you pick a roundstart ghost role that you are an NPC and not a regular crew member, and the aforementioned table, we can remove any ambiguity or defense for this behavior in the future without adding any 'new' rules.

Seriously, the Lavaland rules the way they're currently written don't accomplish what we're saying the common sense interpretation is, and explicitly saying that escalation rules are relaxed IN BOTH DIRECTIONS contradicts our position.

[BeeSting12]

Current Rules on Ghost Roles:

Lavaland Rules
Follow the flavour text you receive upon spawning to the best of your abilities. Unlike the rest of the rules, these roles are very much defined and guided by roleplay rather than a system of "valid" or "not valid."

Your life is cheap though, and escalation rules are greatly relaxed both for you and any crewmembers interacting with you.

In other words:


Suggested Rules

Ghost Roles
Follow the flavour text you receive upon spawning to the best of your abilities. This handy chart will help you understand your relationship with the station.

Ashwalkers: Hostile
Escaped Prisoners: Hostile
Free Golems: Neutral
Hermit (the dude in a pod crashed on lavaland): Neutral or friendly can't remember flavor text.
Veterinarians: Friendly
Ancient Station: Friendly

Hostile ghost roles are given limited antagonist status to accomplish their goals. Neutral ghost roles must follow escalation rules, but escalation is relaxed* on both sides. Use common sense here: If you have to think for more than five seconds about whether you should do it, you probably shouldn't do it. Friendly ghost roles should be attempting to avoid conflict, but escalation rules are again relaxed*.

*By greatly relaxed, I mean jumping to lethals faster than a normal conflict is allowed. Not using weapons of mass destruction against the other side.

Edit: Theres more than just these ghost roles. That's all I could think of. I added an asterisk down below to define relaxed escalation. I hate to make the rules longer for the stupid minority, but I think this covers it fairly well while still leaving wiggle room.

[EagleWiz]

Doesnt rule 1 already cover "someone stole my toolbox, I'm a non-antag ghost role, I'm going to end the entire round" ?

[feem]

Doesnt rule 1 already cover "someone stole my toolbox, I'm a non-antag ghost role, I'm going to end the entire round" ?

Bikeshedding. I'm not talking about what Slig did, I'm talking about what we can positively take away from this thread.

[BeeSting12]

Doesnt rule 1 already cover "someone stole my toolbox, I'm a non-antag ghost role, I'm going to end the entire round" ?

Yes, it does, but rule one also covers other things that should be obvious and we've had to point out.

My suggested changes should make the rules on ghost roles clearer to someone that can't comprehend rule one while saying essentially the same thing

[EagleWiz]

someone that can't comprehend rule one

isn't that what we have bans for?

[BeeSting12]

feem said he wanted something positive to come out of the thread so i gave him suggested changes to the rules but yes i agree with you

[Dax Dupont]

I got bwoinked and semi threatened by daturix for killing an ashlizard once even when I told him headmins agreed with me and I wanted to link him the thread

Anyways, you should know better than to ruin the round for 80 people just because someone stole something.
What happened to common sense?

[Slignerd]

I still maintain that adding the rule I suggested would improve on our ghost policy, and leave no room for confusion whatsoever.

[D&B]

Rules don't need to be added just because you're fucking stupid.

[Slignerd]

We also don't need to avoid improving on our rules just because there are some who wish to jump to personal insults when such proposals are made.

[Saegrimr]

and if it really truly is obvious someone will play stupid long enough to be believed on it. That's how our rules got to where they are in the first place.

[onleavedontatme]

If someone caves and adds this they need to add a "Why is our Rules Page so long?" link that leads to this thread

Also the 99.9% figure is probably pretty close to accurate considering free golems have been in the game for 2 years now and this is the first time anyone has found the rule "confusing" enough to make a big policy thread about it.

[feem]

I want to reiterate that my initial position on this was that adding a rule for this was stupid. I still think that way.

But I read the rules page and I think y'all should too, and while I can't see how someone would judge that this particular action was okay, I can see how someone would be confused about lavaland roles. The whole 'lavaland roles' section of the rules was added in relation to exactly this ambiguity and frankly it didn't do the job it set out to do: we should establish firmly that lavaland roles, while still having some basic rule protections (e.g. Rule 1), are not meant to have as much of an impact on the game as 'real' roles. The 'your life is cheap' and 'escalation rules are relaxed' statements don't say that.

I'd recommend making this very simple change:

From THIS:

Follow the flavour text you receive upon spawning to the best of your abilities. Unlike the rest of the rules, these roles are very much defined and guided by roleplay rather than a system of "valid" or "not valid."

Your life is cheap though, and escalation rules are greatly relaxed both for you and any crewmembers interacting with you.

In other words:

to THIS:

Lavaland roles are not meant to be replacements for or equal to station roles. People shouldn't kill you for no reason, but you're expected to follow the flavor text you receive upon spawning, and escalation rules are relaxed against you.

While some Lavaland roles (such as Syndicate comms officers and ash walkers) are 'light antagonists,' it should not be your goal or intent to significantly impact the round outside of Lavaland except through emergent gameplay. Don't nuke the station, but maybe help the nukies over the radio by watching their backs.

or something to that effect.

This addresses a few specific things:

1) The way the current text is worded, it suggests that you can retaliate for almost no reason in the same way that the players can retaliate for almost no reason. This should not be the case and is generally not how these policies are enforced.
2) It does not substantially increase the length or complexity of the rules, but does caution against over-engagement in a way which the original text does not.

I don't see this as "caving," I see this as clarifying what, frankly, is a poorly written policy already on the rules page.

Again, for veteran players of the game who have existed since before ghost roles existed, OR for people who have played roleplaying games before, it's pretty obvious that ghost roles are intended to be NPCs. Since y'all are going to bring up Slig again for some reason, yeah, he should have known better. But the way the rules are currently written, it IS possible for some newbie to come in and not understand that ghost roles shouldn't be used to just blatantly fuck with people, and since I have to handle an ahelp about someone doing that at least once or twice a month, I'm pretty sure it's worthwhile to make this change.

[onleavedontatme]

Obviously I only have around a couple weeks left here so my opinion is easily ignorable, but "try to avoid having a major impact on the round" is not a goal I had in mind with the rules.

The issue for me is not that they ended the round as a ghost role(an ash walker did the same thing two days ago and that was fine), the issue is they ended it for a stupid fucking reason that made zero IC sense and just as little OOC sense

[cedarbridge]

Obviously I only have around a couple weeks left here so my opinion is easily ignorable, but "try to avoid having a major impact on the round" is not a goal I had in mind with the rules.

The issue for me is not that they ended the round as a ghost role(an ash walker did the same thing two days ago and that was fine), the issue is they ended it for a stupid fucking reason that made zero IC sense and just as little OOC sense

Further to this "avoid having a major impact on the round" defeats the point with a lot of highly interactive space/lavaland ghost roles. Each role (though drones to a lesser degree and never directly) should play into the greater weave of storytelling in each round. They should just do it with a non-stupid reasoning. If pod people meet the station and start selling them gatfruit, you bet that's going to have a major impact on the round and that's OK. If ash lizards get on board the station you bet that's going to have an impact on the round and that's ok too. If the cargo crew decides to start genociding golems in some sort of retarded turf war and the golems get the upper hand and colonize cargo, that's fine too.

More players need to stop and think "Is what I'm doing right now REALLY stupid?" and then not do that thing if they are.

[feem]

"except through emergent gameplay" was a pretty important part of what I wrote. Since it didn't convey the intended meaning when you read it I think it could be revisited and edited for clarity. My point was that joining the game as a ghost role is a privilege which shouldn't necessarily confer as much impact by default as an average player role.

In no way am I saying that a story the players create can't or shouldn't happen. I'm suggesting that the existing "roleplay not valids" text also doesn't do enough to illustrate that ghost roles aren't just another way to get on the station and fuck around. Which happens a lot and often without any outcome other than lol I'm a ghostrole greytider escalate me.

I'm all about "don't be stupid," it's literally my platform. But I'm not talking about what Slig did and I've repeatedly said so, I'm talking about literal reading of the rules and how right now it says they're bidirectionally relaxed escalation grief machines for new players who want to get back into the round.

Obviously we already ban for that but what the hell is the harm you're malfunctioning about in trying to reduce that repeat behavior problem with a better-worded policy?

edit: and please don't bring up the "bads gonna bad regardless of the rules" argument, because what I'm getting at -- and what I've seen frequently with ghost roles -- are people who aren't being disabused of the notion that they're meant to be a slightly separate meta by the existing rules.

[feem]

To summarize:

1) I am in no way suggesting that we should placate or defend a player who, as a lavaland neutral, boh bombs the station because someone took items from him that he had the resources to replicate. Whether the changes to the policy I'm suggesting are made or not, this policy will not affect that behavior because it's wholly out of line simply on escalation and rule 1 grounds.

2) I am in no way suggesting that we should add new rules to complicate an already complex system of rules and precedents.

3) I am in no way suggesting that players should be able to engage on this game without any consideration for their actions, simply because there does not exist a specific rule telling them not to do that specific thing.
To rephrase, players should definitely use their brains to determine whether or not what they're doing is in the spirit of the rules or has any purpose to begin with, and I contend that the majority of players already do this.

4) However, there is no reason for us to leave rules in place which allow for UNNECESSARY or UNREASONABLE ambiguity, or which could REASONABLY be construed as misrepresenting either the way we enforce the rule or our expectations of the players.

5) I therefore suggest that we make modifications to the lavaland policy as it stands to reiterate that the impact of these roles is expected to be via emergent gameplay rather than the much more 'free for all' play of your roundstart character, because I believe that there is ambiguity in the way that is currently stated. I've suggested a modification, and I think with minor changes to meet Kor's expectations of the roles it could serve this purpose well.

[Gamarr]

why do we need to add an extra paragraph to an already bloated ruleset reiterating that using your recreational nukes on a bunch of innocent people because someone stole your easily replaceable property is overkill?

Because nobody stops the coders from constantly adding in shit while ignoring all the other backed-up problems which existed previously. So presently there is a glut of content with no goals, too many players with all-access to one another, and bloated rules that is toed and confused over incessantly.

[Dax Dupont]

Maybe instead of adding it to the rules we should make the spawn text more obvious like GIANT RED TEXT

[oranges]

why do we need to add an extra paragraph to an already bloated ruleset reiterating that using your recreational nukes on a bunch of innocent people because someone stole your easily replaceable property is overkill?

Because nobody stops the coders from constantly adding in shit while ignoring all the other backed-up problems which existed previously. So presently there is a glut of content with no goals, too many players with all-access to one another, and bloated rules that is toed and confused over incessantly.

nowhere in this rambling sentence is there an answer to kor's question, and on top of that you call the rules bloated while simultaneously trying to argue for adding more to the ruleset.

[WarbossLincoln]

I have a radical solution: why don't we just slap a ban on dickheads who BOH the station for trivial shit?

If one golem kicked over someone's sand castle and dumped his books and he responded by BOH bombing the golem ship I imagine they would get bwoinked. Ghost role or no.

[Saegrimr]

I have a radical solution: why don't we just slap a ban on dickheads who BOH the station for trivial shit?

Because then you get threads like this.

[feem]

I feel like maybe I should just open a new thread for the actually reasonable suggestions because this thread is literally just a slig/bohbomb hate thread and no one is cooperating with my attempts to change that.

[WarbossLincoln]

But threads like this go nowhere, so there's no real harm. To an extent they're funny. I mostly only come to the forums for entertainment value while waiting for code to compile at work, it's like the jailhouse report for space autists.

We also don't need to avoid improving on our rules just because there are some who wish to jump to personal insults when such proposals are made.

Improving on our rules would be slimming them down and banning the minority of people who are too stupid/contrary/asshole to follow basic rules in a space-themed autism simulator. I feel like most of the people that require the sub rules and half or more of the rules precedents are not people we would miss anyway. Granted, I'm not an Admin so I don't see most of the shit that goes on. So maybe it really isn't a minority of people who are stupid as hell.

[feem]

I don

Granted, I'm not an Admin so I don't see most of the shit that goes on. So maybe it really isn't a minority of people who are stupid as hell.

The majority of ahelps don't result in notes or bans, and the majority of notes and bans don't result in appeals. So the visibility is pretty different from the admin perspective versus the player perspective. A lot of times, an ahelp is just about getting clarity over one thing or another. One of the reasons I've been vocal in this thread is that something I see a lot of people requiring a little guidance on is the role of ghost roles and how it differs from station players.

[Slignerd]

I feel like maybe I should just open a new thread for the actually reasonable suggestions because this thread is literally just a slig/bohbomb hate thread and no one is cooperating with my attempts to change that.

You've got my blessing on that.