Metagangs, Snubs, and Exclusion

[RaveRadbury]

I've heard players claim that they've been excluded or ignored by metagangs and crew, especially on Manuel. I'd like to understand this phenomenon better. Would anyone be willing to share anecdotes of their experience? No fingers have to be pointed (and it would probably be better if names weren't named), but stories of it happening might better establish what the issues are and how they can be addressed.

[Super Aggro Crag]

nobody likes me and everyone hates me

no one rps with crag

[Lacran]

For me its usually groups of 3 or more people that have continual interactions between rounds, they'll pick different departments and then meet somewhere private and ignore their jobs, or pick the same department (medical usually) and just stand there swapping backstory minutiae or asking about other character/friendship specific info. These chats can go on the entire round and these players seem to treat interacting with other players, antagonists or responsibilities regarding their job as some sort of inconvenience they're above.

I've seen a large number of people see the pattern certain players do and try to integrate themselves into the clique but are usually met with rudeness which can even escalate into outright violence. Manuel cliques are almost always very hostile towards newer and inexperienced players.

It can also become very obvious who are in cliques when certain players discover the whiteship, only specific people will be allowed on board and they'll leave pretty quickly together to sit in the ship in the middle of space for the rest of the shift.

I wont say there are any admin specific cliques, because I haven't found any, but I do know admins that 100% are in or on good terms with certain cliques that have exhibited pretty toxic behaviour.

[Striders13]

Once, when I played a character I've never played before I tried to hang out with the group of known statics in their maint pillow fort. When I arrived and said hi I was stunshoved and thrown away. These were the same people who are very friendly to me when I play my usual static.

[san7890]

I’ve heard it being “worse” on Manuel but people lose sight of how hard it is to be the odd-one-out or the new guy who doesn’t get all the lingo and vibes from the start. Every social situation ever has been like that. The absolute best thing you can do is see people walk into the same pitfalls you once did (I guarantee you fell into at least one) and try your damndest to teach them and try and make good with them.

Here’s a fast, tangentially related story from Sybil: I was once the HoS, and I was gritting my teeth over not having de-prioritzed that job. However, I heard a voice over common:

Common: Hey crew, PDA me if you want a psychological evaluation!

My heart immediately shattered into one million pieces. I didn’t just feel bad for them, I immediately felt an outgushing of emotion remembering the times that I would sometimes go Psychologist to try out the new job and try and have some kitsch roleplay fun. I remembered all the stories I’ve heard about modern psychologists: that they simply don’t get to do anything. I remembered how I would just give up on the role, swipe some gear, and become a discount doctor. I didn’t get anyone to give me a chance to truly flesh that job out. So, I PDA’d them.

I was the only one who did. No other appointments. I’m certain they would have gone SSD or slug around the entire shift wishing they went to another role (since I spoke to them after that), but I was able to catch them before they had such a slip. After a short appointment, hijinx ensued and snowballed into one of my most favorite shifts ever. It was mostly thanks to them.

You don’t have to give every new person a shot (it would be nice if you could), but if you see someone about to fall down a manhole… it would be best for all of us if you caught them before the big tumble. We’re all burnt out pieces of cold, molten steel here- so why not be a kinder person and ensure that those new, fireblooded individuals keep our legacy going. Everyone has that one player who helped them stay in the game and truly got them ingrained into and appreciative of the culture, now wouldn’t you like to be held in the same regards as those who came before you? Maybe even have your own name spoken about as fondly as you speak of your heroes? I know I do.

[Tegun]

just stand there swapping backstory minutiae or asking about other character/friendship specific info

Like it or not, this is what peak roleplaying looks like.

[CPTANT]

I sincerely don't get why these people don't play on a high RP server instead.

[technokek]

I sincerely don't get why these people don't play on a high RP server instead.

They would be banned for metagaming shrimple as

[sinfulbliss]

I went to Manuel a long time ago when my RP wasn't very good or developed and had a much harder time integrating with the place than I did on Sybil. People were curt and didn't seem friendly, which was surprising since I went in thinking people were overly nice there. I hadn't played Terry much either yet found it significantly easier to get involved in things and (ironically) RP there than on Manuel because of the lax culture.

As counterintuitive as it sounds, the same culture that allows people to get in random battles to the death in the halls while yelling like chimps in broken English also provides new players that know nothing about the game with a very accepting and low bar to enter themselves into things. Call me crazy but a shove-fight is a much more approachable interaction to involve yourself in than a Manuel pillowfort like Striders described.

Everything becomes a function of time though. I remember when I met a player on Sybil we'd just *wave to each other and then continue our separate rounds, now we're friends and have had a lot of funny and entertaining interactions with each other. Over time we just began to recognize each other and this makes interactions much smoother than if you're randomnaming.

It's more about promoting an environment where you won't get negative interactions, so at the very least new players can play the game and have little micro-interactions with people, and over time develop those, than to get bogged down in how to create positive ones (although those are incredibly valuable).

-snip-

phenomenal post good job

[stewydeadmike]

I’ve heard it being “worse” on Manuel but people lose sight of how hard it is to be the odd-one-out or the new guy who doesn’t get all the lingo and vibes from the start. Every social situation ever has been like that. The absolute best thing you can do is see people walk into the same pitfalls you once did (I guarantee you fell into at least one) and try your damndest to teach them and try and make good with them.

I think this is important to keep in mind with this conversation since a lot of it implies that LRP servers are less prone to toxic social attitudes when it's more so that they just take on different forms. Like yeah you're probably not gonna get told to get bent by the four people vibing in their maint cafe for 2 hours on LRP but back when I was a new player with 2017 era bagil being my first server I got yelled at a lot for not playing well with like sub 20 hours total. I even remember one round where I rolled geneticist and the other guy saw me and said something like "I'm stuck with YOU? welp. that's it." and then suicided.

I doubt that kind of culture is still around on most of the LRP servers but I just think it's important to not focus solely on manuel. LRP is still a social space like any other.

That said though I haven't really had any experience with being excluded personally by manuel cliques as of late so I can't really comment on that. One thing I've noticed a lot though is that people commonly don't really bother to interact with each other outside of their job/pragmatism or friend group. Like I don't really see people grouping up with their friends and excluding other people all that much as opposed to people who just don't really consider anyone outside of their circle to be in their "possibility space" of interaction if that makes sense.

[kieth4]

I’ve heard it being “worse” on Manuel but people lose sight of how hard it is to be the odd-one-out or the new guy who doesn’t get all the lingo and vibes from the start. Every social situation ever has been like that. The absolute best thing you can do is see people walk into the same pitfalls you once did (I guarantee you fell into at least one) and try your damndest to teach them and try and make good with them.

Here’s a fast, tangentially related story from Sybil: I was once the HoS, and I was gritting my teeth over not having de-prioritzed that job. However, I heard a voice over common:


Common: Hey crew, PDA me if you want a psychological evaluation!

This is incredible, considering this is how I made one of my best friends on /tg/ right now. There was a moth psychologist shouting over coms, of course, no one came but then I decided to and it all went uphill from there.

For every tale of a new person wanting to learn and interact well there are tales of many many many new people who are just horrible shitters. I think trying to teach 'new' players sec is a good indicator, sometimes they're genuinely new lovely people but other times they'll be from some downstream and feel that they're epic gamers and try to boss you around with no actual knowledge of the game.

As for the actual exclusion part I think it happens everywhere even IRL, there's now way to avoid it but people feel lrp is a bit more relaxed because metagroups bond over lesser things. e.g mrp might have people bonding over conversations whereas lrp it'll be shit like a huge fight club.

[Timberpoes]

It'll be more obvious on Manuel because of the Manuelcord being what it is, and being as big as it is.

I would bravely propose that many Manuel IC metacliques can be drawn back to people getting along IC, chatting on the Manuelcord, getting along OOC and that's it. They now have friends to play with every shift and that makes the game better and more fun for them.

If players could see the admin chatter channels, every so often they'd probably get the same vibes.

Speaking generally accross all our servers:

I'd say a starting point to look is the admin team. It has its own metacliques and these metacliques form the blueprints of play-by-example to the rest of the playerbase. We have our own version of the Manuelcord inside the admin channels, just with extra exclusivity and our own admin in-jokes. I'd say this take should be non-controversial as admins have been warned in the past for excessive participation in metacliques, but I'm sure it'll ruffle some feathers anyway that I have even suggested such a thing.


It's easy to look outwardly, but I think forming cliques is just a natural progression for some people as they go through their SS13 playtime.

I think what metacliques often do is kill emergent RP, as they are circles of trust. Most conflict is usually consensual or manufactured between them. Outsiders are usually shunned away unless they're incidentally friends of someone in the clique. You only let people into the clique you can trust to make things more fun or interesting for you. Exchanging job benefits to unlock more of the sandbox. And there's of course massive safety in numbers. It's an optimal way to extract fun out of SS13 when you've advanced beyond the broad wonderment of the game and its premise, designed to instill omnipresent paranoia and force isolated people to come together to try and survive each shift's events.

I think it's a community thing. At some point the SS13 formula gets stale depending on your role and what you're looking for in games. But SS13 gets stale on the level of hundreds of hours. With such a massive time investment, people have built up friends and when they're bored of the game they don't want to leave their friends. So they stay and play together. And their core reason for playing SS13 is to play with the friends they've made along the way, which makes it a bit of a metaclique. And I think that's how it develops from players playing SS13, to players playing an SS13 themed chatroom with their friends, enduring the occasional bouts of gameplay and interruptions from random strangers.

[Super Aggro Crag]

we must ban everyone who wont be friends with me in game

[Farquaar]

I figure since I rant plenty about metacliques and metafriendships on this forum, I might as well write a spiel.

The Rant

► Show Spoiler

Listen, I get it. Some people like to make their friends online. That's fine. It's cool to find people to play video games with, especially if you're too shy to make friends IRL who share your interests. I have zero problems with people meeting people on /tg/station and becoming friends. What I do have a problem with is these friendships being mixed with the practice of staticnaming.

SS13 isn't a team game. If I'm playing Team Fortress 2, and my friend is on RED team while I'm on BLU team, it's perfectly expected that we'd kill each other. That's the game. There's no hard feelings if one of us kills each other- if anything, we'd probably try to kill each other in the name of friendly competition. In SS13, however, conflicts are often complex and based on incomplete information and nuance. If you see two people fighting in the hallway, you don't know who's in the right or who's in the wrong. You don't know who started it, you don't know whether they were justified, and if they were to tell you what happened you'd need evidence or good judgment to decide which side to believe. Because of this, you'll often see security try to break fights up rather than join one side of the conflict without any obvious signs someone is an antag.

Metafriends throw a wrench in that dynamic. Many (probably not all) longtime players who play statics have an innate bias in favour of their friends and against new or randomname players. If Friend A sees Friend B fighting with Stranger C, Friend A will more often than not side with Friend B, regardless of whatever IC interactions had occurred between the parties up until that point in the round. This really sucks if you are Stranger C, as it doesn't matter that Friend B broke into your department and started to attack you unprovoked- Friend A will side with Friend B because "they're my fweeend T_T". The reasons for this are obvious: people might take offense if you don't side with them in a conflict. For the same reason you'd back up your mate IRL if you saw him in a scrap, people support their metafriends when they see them in a conflict IC even if the rules nominally prohibit metagaming.

This is even worse when security or medbay enters the mix, since they are often involved in resolving conflicts. Get involved in a perfectly normal conflict with the wrong staticname, and you're basically screwed unless you want to spend the rest of the round planning petty revenge, which isn't worth it if you prefer abiding by server rules.

Below are a couple events that stand out to me, though plenty more have happened that I could go into. I also have some rather dumb stories where several people ganged up on me on a dime with a *plausible* IC reason (i.e. being murdered because I ordered lizard wine while a bunch of xeno statics were bar RPing), but those are harder to defend as obvious examples of the negative impact of metacliques so I won't detail them here. I can assure you that in both of these situations below, I said nothing outrageous or mean, nor did I do anything prior in the round that would have fostered overescalation of the conflict.

Incident A

► Show Spoiler

One metaclique (metafriend?) experience that really soured my view of Manuel occurred when I got into an IC conflict with another player (staticname bartender) at the very start of a round. As a chef, I accidentally shoved Pun-pun into them (they were trying to push him into the kitchen) and they retaliated by shoving me down and clawing me. After I got back up, I tried to talk to them to de-escalate the situation, but they beanbag-stunned me, slashed me into crit, and repeatedly dunked my head into the fryer until a borg rescued me.

Now, there were multiple witnesses, including the borg and a security officer. Despite the crazy over-escalation (one of us had no damage, the other was nearly killed with their blood spread all over the kitchen), when I asked why security didn't arrest the bartender I was met with something along the lines of "that doesn't sound like them" or "they aren't the type to do something like that".

Even the security officer who witnessed my critting and the officer who dragged me to medbay wouldn't make an arrest. I tried to get a lawyer involved to bring a case, but neither the HoS, nor Captain cared. Meanwhile, the bartender said that they critted me because I was a racist to anyone who would listen (I wasn't, unless you consider calling someone barbaric for beating me into crit over an accidental shiftstart monkey shove is anti-lizard racism).

That would have been bad enough, but an admin actually bwoinked me for starting the "fight", despite the fact that I made every effort to de-escalate it and never struck them once.

Incident B

► Show Spoiler

Another event which I'm not as salty over (because an admin seemingly did something about it) happened when I was a lot newer of a player. I was a security guard on Sybil, and there was only me, another guard, and a detective. A tider kept breaking into security, and me being a newbie, kept stunning me and kicking the crap out of me. I asked my fellow seccies for help, and they refused or didn't respond. Eventually, I cornered the assistant in cargo, where he and my fellow seccie were chatting or working on some autism project or something. I stunned the assistant and began my arrest, but the seccie stunned me, cuffed me, and beat me to death with the assistant's help. As a relatively new player at the time, this event was incredibly demoralizing and made me consider dropping SS13 altogether (which didn't happen, ofc).

An admin said they talked to the seccie but that event left an incredibly sour taste in my mouth that turned me off playing security for many months. It already sucks enough to not being able to rely on your department- it sucks even more to be betrayed by your department because people don't want to side against their friend.

Misc Experiences

► Show Spoiler

My main gripe with staticnaming/metafriending is that it's often used to back up incredibly flimsy escalation, and this appears to not only be my experience. Hearing stories like what happened to Crag in this encounter stick with me because it matches up with what I've seen on Manuel and other servers. I'm sure if I remembered more details to type in the forum search bar, I could fish out more examples of metafriends ruining someone's round by supporting their OOC friend with little IC justification.

TL;DR People will use OOC relationships to ignore the wrongdoings of their metafriend or back their metafriend in unjustifiable fights that said metafriend started, regardless of how in the wrong they are. After all, why would I arrest them- we play Rust on the weekends together! My dream would be to make forced randomname as a station trait to help people get used to not playing as a part of a meta-circle but that'll probably result in a staticname revolt.

[Shellton(Mario)]

Fun fact: The paint club was started by painting with Gay Johnson at 3-4am est for like a week straight. I Think metafriends/cliques are fine as long as people are open to welcoming people into their group.

[Kendrickorium]

I think people play on manuel so they dont get murderboned and have no interest in actual rp, there i said it

everyone i know on sybil is pretty friendly with the exception of A FEW UN NAMED PEOPLE THAT LIKE TO PLAY HEAD OF SECURITY

that was also a really good post San, its easy to forget that those psychs asking people if they want evaluations or janitors that want to come in to do some cleaning might be looking for actual interaction with players and arent just doing busy work

i don't know im really tired

[RaveRadbury]

words

Was hoping you'd post when I was making the thread, thank.

[san7890]

I don't like the concept of a random-name station. It's always funny to say that "HA HA YOU'RE SO ATTACHED TO YOUR CHARACTER YOU CAN'T GO ONE SHIFT WITHOUT PLAYING AS YOUR SNOWFLAKE" but it's honestly like... it's not fun. I feel no attachment to the puppet I inhabit from the start of a shift, I'd rather have hijinx happen with my character and then be put into a flesh puppet. I have this whole thought out backstory for my character and how they might interact with any average person, and it's very hard to improv. I like seeing my character, the one I explicitly designed, be in control. Otherwise, I feel very far removed from any potential points. I like being "me". I used to be the mocker I quoted at the start of this post, but then it was actually forced on me and I absolutely hated every second of it. It was so silly. The person who runs the event doesn't get just how bad it is, and to abstract it to a code trait is not good in my personal opinion.

[Farquaar]

words

Was hoping you'd post when I was making the thread, thank.

I aim to please

[chocolate_bickie]

My experience with metagangs is players that just hang out together all the time.

I find them most obnoxious when you get them as objectives, since you effectively have to deal with 2+ players. Whenever I see certain players as targets I wonder if I should even bother trying to kill them.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

I don't like the concept of a random-name station. It's always funny to say that "HA HA YOU'RE SO ATTACHED TO YOUR CHARACTER YOU CAN'T GO ONE SHIFT WITHOUT PLAYING AS YOUR SNOWFLAKE" but it's honestly like... it's not fun. I feel no attachment to the puppet I inhabit from the start of a shift, I'd rather have hijinx happen with my character and then be put into a flesh puppet. I have this whole thought out backstory for my character and how they might interact with any average person, and it's very hard to improv. I like seeing my character, the one I explicitly designed, be in control. Otherwise, I feel very far removed from any potential points. I like being "me". I used to be the mocker I quoted at the start of this post, but then it was actually forced on me and I absolutely hated every second of it. It was so silly. The person who runs the event doesn't get just how bad it is, and to abstract it to a code trait is not good in my personal opinion.

Gonna be real this is a completely alien attitude to the game to me. I literally can't understand it whatsoever. It doesn't make sense for me at any level. Do you just play the same single character doing the same things over and over for thousands, tens of thousands of hours? My main static characters from seven years of play are at most a third of my total number of rounds played because I'm always coming up with silly new ideas to play with or amusing clown names. How is one of your spacemans a "you"? to dissociate around when made to play a different-appearance character?

[sinfulbliss]

I don't like the concept of a random-name station. It's always funny to say that "HA HA YOU'RE SO ATTACHED TO YOUR CHARACTER YOU CAN'T GO ONE SHIFT WITHOUT PLAYING AS YOUR SNOWFLAKE" but it's honestly like... it's not fun. I feel no attachment to the puppet I inhabit from the start of a shift, I'd rather have hijinx happen with my character and then be put into a flesh puppet. I have this whole thought out backstory for my character and how they might interact with any average person, and it's very hard to improv. I like seeing my character, the one I explicitly designed, be in control. Otherwise, I feel very far removed from any potential points. I like being "me". I used to be the mocker I quoted at the start of this post, but then it was actually forced on me and I absolutely hated every second of it. It was so silly. The person who runs the event doesn't get just how bad it is, and to abstract it to a code trait is not good in my personal opinion.

Gonna be real this is a completely alien attitude to the game to me. I literally can't understand it whatsoever. It doesn't make sense for me at any level. Do you just play the same single character doing the same things over and over for thousands, tens of thousands of hours? My main static characters from seven years of play are at most a third of my total number of rounds played because I'm always coming up with silly new ideas to play with or amusing clown names. How is one of your spacemans a "you"? to dissociate around when made to play a different-appearance character?

People who primarily play one character do so because their character takes on a personality and various traits based on how you talk, play, interact, and what sort of things you do. And if you've played one static for a long time it's probably just your natural way of roleplaying.

Some Super Advanced Roleplayers can create a dozen statics all with their own unique personalities, jobs, backstories, and ways of interacting. But that's certainly not a majority of people, much less on LRP. If that's your jam though more power to you.

No one is completely emotionally detached from the game as they play it. Healthy detachment is good so you don't freak out and get OOCly mad and upset over little misfortunes that befall your character, but I think no one is totally detached or you wouldn't even be having fun. So when you character is happy you are also somewhat happy, when your character is pissed at something someone did maybe you are somewhat pissed at this as well. Over time and after enough experiences you identify with them and have built memories as that character, which become part of that character. To randomname is to delete all that and play the game as some shell you have no attachment to.

[Stickymayhem]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

[san7890]

-snip-
Do you just play the same single character doing the same things over and over for thousands, tens of thousands of hours?

I don’t do the same things, and I think that really unfairly paints the situation. As I learn different things about the game or other people, my character changes in response to that. They aren’t truly static to the point they’re locked in time, they’re just the canal I’ve already dug out such that the water can much more easily flow. I’ve spent a while on the canal and using the canal that I don’t switch easily- I have to work a bit on getting used to it.

I don’t play the same job and do the same gimmick every shift, I switch it up as often as anyone else might. I just “behave” the same way depending on what I want to accomplish that day. It’s not like I’m so attached to it that I’m mournful to see it die, it’s just easier for me to enjoy this Sandbox Roleplaying game that way. I’m comfortable assuming the “skin” of my character, and I don’t want that to be peeled back as I’m shoved into another canal-less character (which happens to look like the ugliest bastard with a shitheaded name). I’m highly resistant to anyone who does not respect my wishes in this matter, as it sorely ruins my personal enjoyment of the game. I would rather not play this game for one month (when I’m not burned out) than to play a singular round where some admin pushes a button because they think it’s “funny”.
I’m perfectly okay with losing the character with normal round progression stuff, I just don’t want to be sliced from the jump.

This is a weird attitude that you probably will not agree with, which is fine. All I ask is that people stay in their own lane regarding this issue. I’ll check my blindspots for your new statics and the random-naming security officer, so please be kind as to not smash into the same 2001 Toyota Corolla I’ve had for a solid while.

Sinful got it right in his reply to you otherwise.

[Rohen_Tahir]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

Your estimate is way off.

[Stickymayhem]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

Your estimate is way off.

it's not an estimate it's an observation

[Rohen_Tahir]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

Your estimate is way off.

it's not an estimate it's an observation

I mean the dozen (12).

[Stickymayhem]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

Your estimate is way off.

it's not an estimate it's an observation

I mean the dozen (12).

I would say there are 6 cores and 6 that get swapped in and out less frequently

[kieth4]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

Your estimate is way off.

it's not an estimate it's an observation

I mean the dozen (12).

I would say there are 6 cores and 6 that get swapped in and out less frequently

I'd love for you to say the names tbh. I've not seen a murderbone of four people for a very very very long time. I've also not really seen anyone give people preferable sec treatment as more often than not you'll kill your metafriends as you know they won't ahelp.

[iamgoofball]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

why didn't you slap them for obvious metagaming?

[Stickymayhem]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

Your estimate is way off.

it's not an estimate it's an observation

I mean the dozen (12).

I would say there are 6 cores and 6 that get swapped in and out less frequently

I'd love for you to say the names tbh. I've not seen a murderbone of four people for a very very very long time. I've also not really seen anyone give people preferable sec treatment as more often than not you'll kill your metafriends as you know they won't ahelp.

hey if this all resolved itself magically while i was busy with my new job for the last few months thats good news

i literally have a conspiracy wall i was putting together with red string and everything i can probably dig up that had the core people on it

but you already know who im talking about you just disagree with the definition of metagaming im using because its ingratiated itself so heavily into the culture

[chocolate_bickie]

Given Keith4 is arguing with sticky I think I know the Terry metagang Sticky is speaking of.

If i remember correctly at least one would always roll security and then they would form a train/piggyback around the station.

This meant if you rolled any of them as objectives you had to deal with 2+ others at least one of which had a baton.

Yeah.

[kieth4]

Given Keith4 is arguing with sticky I think I know the Terry metagang Sticky is speaking of.

If i remember correctly at least one would always roll security and then they would form a train/piggyback around the station.

This meant if you rolled any of them as objectives you had to deal with 2+ others at least one of which had a baton.

Yeah.

I know what you're referring to but if you look at the content of trains they're 99% seccies and anyone else who joins.

Security making a valid train with security mains and valid hunter mains is I guess departmental metaganging? I dunno, I don't particularly view security hunting people as much of a metagang

As a security officer the worst thing you can do is go alone and people on Terry stuck together to counter this.

[kieth4]

Genuinely my worst experience with metagangs is on Terry

There is a group, every Terry player knows every member, who basically form a coalition round to round. A pool of about a dozen regulars who team up to do fun things like space or iceland exploration, and also team up whenever a critical mass of them roll compatible antags. The problem is interactions on Terry are so simplified and stripped back that these interactions are hard to distinguish from regular gameplay other than the general trend of bias towards members of the metagang. They give each other access, weaponry, favourable security treatment and roll together in groups of as many as four or five to murderbone the station.

Honestly I tried to gather evidence to disentangle it but it was so wide reaching and across so many rounds we just don't have a mechanism for dealing with it. It's a pattern of behaviour that's heavily biased but not perfectly consistent, and any indication of a potential crackdown (probably including this post) makes the cockroaches scatter for a week or two before the behaviours start to increase again.

Your estimate is way off.

it's not an estimate it's an observation

I mean the dozen (12).

I would say there are 6 cores and 6 that get swapped in and out less frequently

I'd love for you to say the names tbh. I've not seen a murderbone of four people for a very very very long time. I've also not really seen anyone give people preferable sec treatment as more often than not you'll kill your metafriends as you know they won't ahelp.

hey if this all resolved itself magically while i was busy with my new job for the last few months thats good news

i literally have a conspiracy wall i was putting together with red string and everything i can probably dig up that had the core people on it

but you already know who im talking about you just disagree with the definition of metagaming im using because its ingratiated itself so heavily into the culture

I honestly don't know what you're talking about, I'm not trying to pretend to be ignorant I'm just not sure I can think of players that fit into your definition. I remember gangs of validhunters and such but I don't know people who teamed up to explore Iceland and shit.

[san7890]

SNIP YOUR QUOTES!!!

[Rohen_Tahir]

SNIP YOUR QUOTES!!!

Don't do this it makes mustard gas

[Super Aggro Crag]

i want friend

[Shadowflame909]

SNIP YOUR QUOTES!!!

Don't do this it makes mustard gas

dont read this ip grabber

[toemas]

I know what you're referring to but if you look at the content of trains they're 99% seccies and anyone else who joins.

Security making a valid train with security mains and valid hunter mains is I guess departmental metaganging? I dunno, I don't particularly view security hunting people as much of a metagang

As a security officer the worst thing you can do is go alone and people on Terry stuck together to counter this.

If you hang out with your friends you are a METAGAMER and need to be banned from the server ASAP

[toemas]

everyone i know on sybil is pretty friendly with the exception of A FEW UN NAMED PEOPLE THAT LIKE TO PLAY HEAD OF SECURITY

[Farquaar]

i want friend

Bruh message me and we’ll play some DBD later

[Kendrickorium]

everyone i know on sybil is pretty friendly with the exception of A FEW UN NAMED PEOPLE THAT LIKE TO PLAY HEAD OF SECURITY

sorry friendly was the wrong thing to say, everyone is pretty friendly, they just need to interact a bit more

[Kendrickorium]

pic only somewhat related

[Shellton(Mario)]

pic only somewhat related

I know every character in this photo

[san7890]

pic only somewhat related

From left to right:

Blacklisted, Discord Permabanned, Clinically Insane, Evaporated, Permabanned, Fulpstation Player, Admin

Truly, the finest Sybil has.

[Kendrickorium]

accurate

[blackdav123]

pic only somewhat related

god bless our troops

[Kendrickorium]

keeping bagil and sybil safe for years now

[Misdoubtful]

Having played on so many servers across the years, I can say I've run into metagangs, run into snobs, and run into those ignoring others and curating their experience so that they can maintain THEIR fun, on each and every one.

Is any of that a bad thing? No!

This is a social game with social interactions, that by its very nature invites social nuance, social circles, and even cliques.

That all existing is NO ONES fault, not players faults, not developers faults, not communities faults, and not admins faults.

Its also worth noting that for some people SS13 is more than just a drop in drop out experience at a whim. For them it is a recurring daily experience, a place to build some friendships, experience unique interactions, and be social outlet. That's great, that's admirable, I commend it being able to be that kind of space for many.

Its certainly understandable that some people would WANT to protect those spaces and what they have of course, is it not?

Its a shame when we run into negative social experiences but it would be disingenuous to expect we can provide a positive experience for everyone all the time. People don't HAVE to interact, to be nice, to be inviting, patient, or inclusive.

I can think of servers were I would play security poorly (intentionally) and not fit the mold, and wouldn't be trusted or accepted as a result. It was to be expected in an environment where almost always the same people were a part of the department at the time same set hours of the day.

That being said it isn't worth letting bad experiences with one group taint my overall experience. I'm not going to swear things off forever as I've had one bad meal at a restaurant. A restaurant where I may not have tried all the meals, the chef may be replaced, or even the management could be upended.

There is still space to look for the interactions you are seeking, adapt and change to get the sorts of interactions you would like, and so on. This is a social environment, and sometimes that means adaption, for others it may mean sticking it out with an attitude and 'character' and getting the experiences that come with it.

So lets not label this as being a problem to be solved with buzzwords like metagangs, metacliques, and whatever else. It isn't a problem to be solved, or even one that can be solved. What we can do is look at ourselves individually and the effort we are willing to put in to get the experiences that WE want, and provide the experiences we want to for others if we WANT to. Social nuance will NEVER be a problem.

That isn't to say that extreme behaviors can not be curtailed and rules not be enforced, but the groups and social interactions where some of these unique problems sprout up from are not fundamentally the cause of the problems themselves. Those behaviors to be corrected come from something else.

[sinfulbliss]

-snip-

It sort of sounds like you're just saying that players being excluded or snubbed need to just "adapt" (the RP equivalent of "git gud") until people want to talk to them. It seems to undercut the entire issue being brought up in the topic and chalking it up to inevitability. Is it inevitable for players to be rude to a newcomer because they have an inclination to protect their metacircle? I don't think so. I think you can have friends in the game who you hang out with regularly, while also being accepting to players outside that circle interacting with you.

Curating your experience to become insular so that you can "maintain your fun" goes against the point of the game and what makes it fun for other players. If you need to ignore everybody except a select few people you've decided are "beneficial for your enjoyment," and snub the rest so they don't dare invade your protected circle of enjoyment, I think you're doing something wrong.

It's true people like to hang out with their friends and nothing's wrong with that, but to be so obsessed with maximizing your own fun at the expense of others who just want you to reply to them, isn't a good thing. I also think negative experiences and having your "standard round-to-round meta-enjoyment" compromised is in the end a good part of the game, and adds depth not only to rounds but to your character development.