/tg/Station 13

So in the just over a year that I've been gone from tg a new meta has come about, for many of you this will be standard and normal though, but I'd like to be able to talk about it because I believe it has a lot of connected issues.

Escalation.

Escalation always sort of existed, though never to the extent that it is now and certainly not as common place. The issue with the current guidelines/usage is people get to basically kill anyone with a fairly low amount of provocation.

That dude that slipped you? Give em a punch to let them know you mean business. Oh they're hitting you back with a toolbox? Stab em in the eyes with a screwdriver! Oh now they're stabbing you with a kitchen knife? Pull out that gun you found and shoot them dead. Leave their body in escape so It might be found in 30 mins or so depending on traffic. This isn't an uncommon set of events. Quiet often Im getting people ahelping this and more often than not there's some back and forth between people in the logs so I have to drop it.

This is genuinely surprisingly common, like at least 5+ times a day I will see an ahelp regarding this.

The main issue around all of this is that ANYONE essentially can kill, Im not sure if this is because cloning has become so quick and easy that dying doesnt really mean much or if its something else. The issue is it removes a lot of people from the round and ultimate upsets a lot of people. Obviously people have to expect to die in this game, but it USED to be that the threat came from antags, or the captain or the HoS if you REALLY pissed them off for long enough. Now its basically anyone.

I think actual murder needs consequences for non antags.

NOT THIS THREAD AGAIN

Couldn't see a thread active so made a new one, because its still obviously an issue

Escalation only really becomes an issue when you have an understaffed or incompetent security department. At that point, you're well within your rights to robust someone that keeps punching you in the head. Act like an antag, get treated like one.

If anyone is to get punished in an ahelp regarding escalation, it should always be the person who initiated it. Apparently kill-baiting is a bannable offense, so maybe start enforcing that more?

If you instigate a conflict of any form with somebody (such as slipping them) and they decide to punch you for it and you decide to fight back then you are a faggot that started and took part in escalating a conflict and are more than welcome to the 30+ minute timeout your victim is dealing you.

If you slip someone and they kill you without you fighting back that's another matter but maybe if you don't want people to kick you in the face you shouldn't have slipped them in the first place.

if you escalate and lose and ahelp to try and get an admin to dunk the guy you're a retard and a sore loser
those kind of people are what the rule was made for, I feel
maybe don't get into fights so often if you don't like losing

deedubya wrote:Escalation only really becomes an issue when you have an understaffed or incompetent security department. At that point, you're well within your rights to robust someone that keeps punching you in the head. Act like an antag, get treated like one.

Except escalation also applies to security... then what do you do? Im talking about OOC rules here, not game mechanics.

deedubya wrote:If anyone is to get punished in an ahelp regarding escalation, it should always be the person who initiated it. Apparently kill-baiting is a bannable offense, so maybe start enforcing that more?

Except its never easily clear who started a fight, sure its obvious who pushed/hit first, but if someone was following you around constantly and take everything from you without touching you and you push them over, now it looks like you started it, not them.

The hardest thing as well is if an antag starts a fight you'll obviously fight back, however it could just be someone who doesnt like you trying to kill you. So now you havent got a clear way to decide whos an antag and whos just an aggressive player?

teepeepee wrote:if you escalate and lose and ahelp to try and get an admin to dunk the guy you're a retard and a sore loser
those kind of people are what the rule was made for, I feel
maybe don't get into fights so often if you don't like losing

A lot of people get pushed into fights and loose, under the current rules if they fight back its "fair" escalation. There are a lot of people starting fights they know they can win and its REALLY hard to properly proove that they were ban baiting or self antag as it can be called. There isn't a clear line. So mostly most deaths are ""acceptable"" under the current rules.

peoplearestrange wrote:A lot of people get pushed into fights and loose, under the current rules if they fight back its "fair" escalation. There are a lot of people starting fights they know they can win and its REALLY hard to properly proove that they were ban baiting or self antag as it can be called. There isn't a clear line. So mostly most deaths are ""acceptable"" under the current rules.

an excerpt from escalation policy:

Escalation Policy wrote:If you are concerned about being "kill baited" then consider calling security, using non lethal means to subdue your opponent, fleeing, or otherwise working things out (talking them down, getting your stolen items replaced, etc)

if you're too much of a pushover and worry about losing fights all the time just let the admins deal with it, if it was an antag you'll know you should have resisted, if it's not, you just got a griefer noted/banned
rule 10 is relevant here too, I believe

Rule 10 wrote:Losing is part of the game.
Your character will frequently die, sometimes without even a possibility of avoiding it. Events will often be out of your control. No matter how good or prepared you are, sometimes you just lose.

if you died because you didn't fight back against an antag and lost, that's okay, it's part of the game
if you died fighting back and lost, that's okay too, no need to have admins win the fight you just lost because you're a sore loser
being paranoid about whether someone's a tider or a traitor is part of the paranoid atmosphere of the game
this is why I believe escalation policy is perfect as is

Murdering someone as a non-antag used to net you a dayban. This lead to a situation where security could actually tell who the fucking criminals are because everyone on the crew wasnt a homicidal maniac who uses murder to solve all their problems.

Escalation made security's job fucking impossible.

Dr_bee wrote:Murdering someone as a non-antag used to net you a dayban. This lead to a situation where security could actually tell who the fucking criminals are because everyone on the crew wasnt a homicidal maniac who uses murder to solve all their problems.

Escalation made security's job fucking impossible.

security aren't obliged to let you go free if you kill someone but aren't an antag. They can still throw you in perma or even possibly execute you.

SkeletalElite wrote:

Dr_bee wrote:Murdering someone as a non-antag used to net you a dayban. This lead to a situation where security could actually tell who the fucking criminals are because everyone on the crew wasnt a homicidal maniac who uses murder to solve all their problems.

Escalation made security's job fucking impossible.

security aren't obliged to let you go free if you kill someone but aren't an antag. They can still throw you in perma or even possibly execute you.

They almost never do. Widespread allowed murder has changed the culture of the playerbase too much since those days.

the solution to bad escalation is to become good at the game so nobody tries a second time.

i permabrig/execute officers that beat people to death outside of emergencies/authorized executions when i play HOS. same with people that murder over something petty. when admins say "ic issue" you handle it ic and be the change you want to see.

tl;dr stop whining to admins

peoplearestrange wrote: That dude that slipped you? Give em a punch to let them know you mean business. Oh they're hitting you back with a toolbox? Stab em in the eyes with a screwdriver! Oh now they're stabbing you with a kitchen knife? Pull out that gun you found and shoot them dead. Leave their body in escape so It might be found in 30 mins or so depending on traffic. This isn't an uncommon set of events. Quiet often Im getting people ahelping this and more often than not there's some back and forth between people in the logs so I have to drop it.

Theres literally nothing wrong with this series of escalation and I’m not sure if you put it here to model good escalation vs what we have or something. If you do find fault with this I suggest stepping down from admin or reevaluating how you look at escalation, this is how its worked for way over a year.

Obviously its shit escalation if you kill FNR or for a shit reason (he slipped me time to die!) but that’s common sense.

Also your opinion that “not everyone should be able to kill” is fucking wack and would serve only to be a hugbox for retards and assholes.

> I started something then fought back when the obviously irritated individual hit me, now i'm dead and I want the admins to deal with this posthaste

thank god for ICissue

Dr_bee wrote:Murdering someone as a non-antag used to net you a dayban. This lead to a situation where security could actually tell who the fucking criminals are because everyone on the crew wasnt a homicidal maniac who uses murder to solve all their problems.

Escalation made security's job fucking impossible.

This is partly what I was trying to say, and also that in part of an admin role as well. It makes it really hard to know who was in the wrong as in most cases people don't like getting killed by a non antag.

Malkraz wrote:the solution to bad escalation is to become good at the game so nobody tries a second time.

This is litterally why escaltion doesn't work, its a series of one-uping

imsxz wrote:i permabrig/execute officers that beat people to death outside of emergencies/authorized executions when i play HOS. same with people that murder over something petty. when admins say "ic issue" you handle it ic and be the change you want to see.

tl;dr stop whining to admins

You are a rare exception to the rules/games I have seen thus far

wesoda25 wrote: Theres literally nothing wrong with this series of escalation and I’m not sure if you put it here to model good escalation vs what we have or something. If you do find fault with this I suggest stepping down from admin or reevaluating how you look at escalation, this is how its worked for way over a year.

Obviously its shit escalation if you kill FNR or for a shit reason (he slipped me time to die!) but that’s common sense.

Also your opinion that “not everyone should be able to kill” is fucking wack and would serve only to be a hugbox for retards and assholes.

That was exactly my point, it IS common place and I realise that it IS legitimate within the rules. HENCE why this is in policy discussion, a place to literally talk about what we think needs changing in the rules.

You also assign common sense to the players here, people simply don't play with common sense because its a game and not real life. There's no real punishment for killing someone or being killed other than getting angry, so it becomes the go to for solving any disagreements. From a physiological point its fascinating, but for game play is frustrating.

Your final point is just that tired old line of "hug box" that gets thrown around everytime someone suggests a non aggressive action, this game, lets be honest, has AWFUL combat (though its got better) and not eveything about the game need be aggressive, its much more than a robust simulator.

Cobby wrote:> I started something then fought back when the obviously irritated individual hit me, now i'm dead and I want the admins to deal with this posthaste

thank god for ICissue

I literally have an admin complaint right now of someone who escalated and then complained that I did nothing about the other person when they got murdered. People simply don't like getting killed by non antags and can't handle it.

That escalation system would have been perfectly allowable under old rules too, PAS.
modern escalation is:
That dude that slipped you? Give em a punch to let them know you mean business. Oh they pulled out a sawnoff shotgun and blew off your head in two shots.

Nearly all the escalation threads come down to a prisoner's dilemma situation the defender is faced with

Let's say a person attacks you in some way. You have a choice - you can fight back, or you can just flee or else roll over and let them kill you. If you choose to fight back, however, this little clause kicks in:

If you choose to retaliate with violence, you in turn have opened yourself up to violence. If you choose this route, do not expect admins to help you out if you die, even if you were not the original instigator.

So basically, if you fight back, you don't get to ahelp about it. You also have no idea whether the person attacking you is an antag using their grief license, or some nonantag shitter.

If they're an antag, you fight back, and you win, then a winner is you, great.
If they're an antag, you fight back, and you lose, they wouldn't be punished even if you could ahelp, rule 10 applies, you lose fair and square but good on you for putting up a fight.
If they're an antag and you choose not to fight, get killed, then ahelp, it's valid, why didn't you defend yourself, should have fought harder next time scrub.

If they're a non-antag, you fight back, and you win, then a winner is you. Again.
If they're a non-antag, you fight back, and you lose, then tough shit you forfeited your right to ahelp when you fought back, you're not getting any help.
If they're a non-antag and you choose not to fight, then they're definitely getting a ban if they actually kill you, so they probably won't kill you.

So... if they're an antag then your best immediate course of action is to fight back, but if they're not an antag your best course of action is to not fight and ahelp instead.
Since you don't know what they are, that rule essentially becomes "don't expect us to help you out against nonantags if you don't also roll over for any antags that attack you"

And therein lies the issue. People don't take the risk and more often than not fight back. Sure the rules say they can't ahelp, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating or disheartening when you find out your killer wasn't an antag. People can accept a "valid" as they expect that as part of a game. Someone else killing them for small reasons just generates anger.
Basically what I'm saying is the current rules aren't exactly fun to play by.

Screemonster wrote: If they're a non-antag, you fight back, and you lose, then tough shit you forfeited your right to ahelp when you fought back, you're not getting any help.

this is bullshit and you know it, the rule literally says:

Escalation Policy wrote:If you are the instigator in a conflict and end up killing or severely impairing the round of the person you are fighting, you should make a reasonable effort to return them to life at least once or make amends, only seeking round removal if they continue to pursue you.

you will get cloned or the other guy will get banned if he instigated against you
and here's a little extra:

This protection doesn't apply to an instigator being killed.

so if someone instigates you and you win, space that bitch, you are allowed to
this is the perfect formula for self-policing and less hugbox administration

If something can be solved IC, it should be solved IC. Admins should not be there to babysit the players, just to stop extreme bullshit.

The escalation policy is not a mess. It's simply less hand hold-y - which is a good thing.

If anything, I would like the escalation policy made slightly looser.

The escalation issue is a direct result imo of the lack of actual gameplay present for people to entertain themselves properly. It's not entirely at fault but over time, and it has been a long time, it has contributed towards the attitude, 'ease' of which it is used, and just general acceptance.

To illustrate, if you were to ban conflict just as a test right now, what sorts of things would players Have to do to entertain themselves in their depts?
Some of these are very much alright as-is, relatively, and you can see them, but there's enough.... nothing, all over. Bored people entertain themselves and what can you do to police this when really that's all there is?

Gamarr wrote:The escalation issue is a direct result imo of the lack of actual gameplay present for people to entertain themselves properly. It's not entirely at fault but over time, and it has been a long time, it has contributed towards the attitude, 'ease' of which it is used, and just general acceptance.

To illustrate, if you were to ban conflict just as a test right now, what sorts of things would players Have to do to entertain themselves in their depts?
Some of these are very much alright as-is, relatively, and you can see them, but there's enough.... nothing, all over. Bored people entertain themselves and what can you do to police this when really that's all there is?

They could actually play the game and explore the many systems that exist already instead of being griefing shitlords that should have been banned a long time ago.

here's the dirty little secret: escalation is an extremely simple ruleset but the fact that people in this community are outright autistic and looking for loopholes to exploit it makes everything much harder for admins to deal with

if you suspect you got killed by a non-antag for no discernible reason, observe him and if he doesn't have the antag moodlet ahelp his ass whether you fought back or not. there are no or very few admins who will reject an ahelp because you defended yourself against a sudden attacker.

peoplearestrange wrote:Except escalation also applies to security... then what do you do? Im talking about OOC rules here, not game mechanics.

I did mention "incompetent" in there as well. As I recall from my understanding of the rules, rules of acceptable escalation are also supposed to be tightened up for security/cap players for this very purpose.

The hardest thing as well is if an antag starts a fight you'll obviously fight back, however it could just be someone who doesnt like you trying to kill you. So now you havent got a clear way to decide whos an antag and whos just an aggressive player?

Are you telling me admins have no way to find out if someone was being a knob-end (read: disruptive trespassing, breaking stuff, stealing shit, disarm spam, etc) prior to the beginning of conflict? I've never had a situation where an admin was unable to source the instigator of a conflict so long as I did it within the same round. On top of that, most of the instigators are surprisingly honest, considering they don't want to eat a ban for lying to an admin and instigating conflict as a non-antag.



As an aside, if they instigate conflict, kill you, and then don't immediately take you to cloning? That's completely bannable, last I checked.

angelstarri wrote:here's the dirty little secret: escalation is an extremely simple ruleset but the fact that people in this community are outright autistic and looking for loopholes to exploit it makes everything much harder for admins to deal with

if you suspect you got killed by a non-antag for no discernible reason, observe him and if he doesn't have the antag moodlet ahelp his ass whether you fought back or not. there are no or very few admins who will reject an ahelp because you defended yourself against a sudden attacker.

There exists a rule 0 for a reason, and if an attack and escalation was deemed excessive or outright unwarranted and the guy seems to be doing it to deliberately bait you into escalating, it's still worth a look. Honestly, some people really do just look to find any means to ruin the fun for others. This isn't hugboxing, it's slapping cunts down that should know better and acting in extremely bad faith by abusing loopholes in our rules to try and wiggle out of it.

Escalation is how you can ensure proper, organic conflict even from non-antags. Between players, most of the time it works. But if someone goes from, say, being slipped and then buckshotting someone to death, well that's just them being a cunt. And yes, not making an effort to bring them back into the round violates this rule.

This doesn't usually apply to department breakins but only extreme arseholes enforce department turf rules honestly unless the person is being an obviously destructive individual. Like stealing lathes.

Ok all the points worth mentioning have been mentioned now the thread is going to devolve into the same arguments but worse. Proof being the 80 other escalation threads that went nowhere. Just lock it now losers

NecromancerAnne wrote:

angelstarri wrote: Escalation is how you can ensure proper, organic conflict even from non-antags. Between players, most of the time it works. But if someone goes from, say, being slipped and then buckshotting someone to death, well that's just them being a cunt. And yes, not making an effort to bring them back into the round violates this rule.

This is where you lose me, there is nothing organic about fights going to straight up murder. Escalation to deadly force was just a way for the people who wrote it to move the trouble of dealing with griefing asshole players from the administration team to the playerbase, and it fucked over RP in the process.

Remove deadly force, beating someone into crit used be a big deal because it is almost murder, and the OOC threat of a dayban was enough to make players actually behave like life had meaning.

Dr_bee wrote:

NecromancerAnne wrote:

angelstarri wrote: Escalation is how you can ensure proper, organic conflict even from non-antags. Between players, most of the time it works. But if someone goes from, say, being slipped and then buckshotting someone to death, well that's just them being a cunt. And yes, not making an effort to bring them back into the round violates this rule.

This is where you lose me, there is nothing organic about fights going to straight up murder. Escalation to deadly force was just a way for the people who wrote it to move the trouble of dealing with griefing asshole players from the administration team to the playerbase, and it fucked over RP in the process.

Remove deadly force, beating someone into crit used be a big deal because it is almost murder, and the OOC threat of a dayban was enough to make players actually behave like life had meaning.

That basically means you can't defend yourself from crime at all. For most people on the station besides calling sec there is nothing you can do to stop someone without critting them.

Dr_bee wrote:

NecromancerAnne wrote:

angelstarri wrote: Escalation is how you can ensure proper, organic conflict even from non-antags. Between players, most of the time it works. But if someone goes from, say, being slipped and then buckshotting someone to death, well that's just them being a cunt. And yes, not making an effort to bring them back into the round violates this rule.

This is where you lose me, there is nothing organic about fights going to straight up murder. Escalation to deadly force was just a way for the people who wrote it to move the trouble of dealing with griefing asshole players from the administration team to the playerbase, and it fucked over RP in the process.

Remove deadly force, beating someone into crit used be a big deal because it is almost murder, and the OOC threat of a dayban was enough to make players actually behave like life had meaning.

some people will drive you to the point where you gotta kill them or suffer whatever cancer they're giving you. The cancer isn't necessarily bannable especially if it's something dumb like following you around spam disarming and nothing else. if they didn't stop, you'd probably eventually kill them or lock them somewhere that they'll never get out of. admins aren't gonna ban someone for spam disarming you because it's so innocent while still being something you can't just ignore, if you were to adminhelp gettnig disarm spammed the best you'd get is the admin telling you to kill the person.

At that point, you'd have basically no other options but to put up with the shit or kill them.

imsxz wrote:

Dr_bee wrote:

NecromancerAnne wrote:

angelstarri wrote: Escalation is how you can ensure proper, organic conflict even from non-antags. Between players, most of the time it works. But if someone goes from, say, being slipped and then buckshotting someone to death, well that's just them being a cunt. And yes, not making an effort to bring them back into the round violates this rule.

This is where you lose me, there is nothing organic about fights going to straight up murder. Escalation to deadly force was just a way for the people who wrote it to move the trouble of dealing with griefing asshole players from the administration team to the playerbase, and it fucked over RP in the process.

Remove deadly force, beating someone into crit used be a big deal because it is almost murder, and the OOC threat of a dayban was enough to make players actually behave like life had meaning.

some people will drive you to the point where you gotta kill them or suffer whatever cancer they're giving you. The cancer isn't necessarily bannable especially if it's something dumb like following you around spam disarming and nothing else. if they didn't stop, you'd probably eventually kill them or lock them somewhere that they'll never get out of. admins aren't gonna ban someone for spam disarming you because it's so innocent while still being something you can't just ignore, if you were to adminhelp gettnig disarm spammed the best you'd get is the admin telling you to kill the person.

At that point, you'd have basically no other options but to put up with the shit or kill them.

Or make being a dick 4noraisen and toeing the line bannable. oh wait it already is if done enough.

If a simple "knock it off" message from an admin isnt enough to stop someone from being a dick then they deserve a ban for it. An admin saying "loljustkillthem" mean that admin is shitty. Escalation should not be an excuse for admins to pass the buck of dealing with griefers to the victims of the grief, which is the REAL shitty thing about this policy.

Dr_bee wrote:

imsxz wrote:

Dr_bee wrote:

NecromancerAnne wrote:

angelstarri wrote: Escalation is how you can ensure proper, organic conflict even from non-antags. Between players, most of the time it works. But if someone goes from, say, being slipped and then buckshotting someone to death, well that's just them being a cunt. And yes, not making an effort to bring them back into the round violates this rule.

This is where you lose me, there is nothing organic about fights going to straight up murder. Escalation to deadly force was just a way for the people who wrote it to move the trouble of dealing with griefing asshole players from the administration team to the playerbase, and it fucked over RP in the process.

Remove deadly force, beating someone into crit used be a big deal because it is almost murder, and the OOC threat of a dayban was enough to make players actually behave like life had meaning.

some people will drive you to the point where you gotta kill them or suffer whatever cancer they're giving you. The cancer isn't necessarily bannable especially if it's something dumb like following you around spam disarming and nothing else. if they didn't stop, you'd probably eventually kill them or lock them somewhere that they'll never get out of. admins aren't gonna ban someone for spam disarming you because it's so innocent while still being something you can't just ignore, if you were to adminhelp gettnig disarm spammed the best you'd get is the admin telling you to kill the person.

At that point, you'd have basically no other options but to put up with the shit or kill them.

Or make being a dick 4noraisen and toeing the line bannable. oh wait it already is if done enough.

If a simple "knock it off" message from an admin isnt enough to stop someone from being a dick then they deserve a ban for it. An admin saying "loljustkillthem" mean that admin is shitty. Escalation should not be an excuse for admins to pass the buck of dealing with griefers to the victims of the grief, which is the REAL shitty thing about this policy.

banning someone for disarm spamming is dumb

SkeletalElite wrote:

Dr_bee wrote:
If a simple "knock it off" message from an admin isnt enough to stop someone from being a dick then they deserve a ban for it. An admin saying "loljustkillthem" mean that admin is shitty. Escalation should not be an excuse for admins to pass the buck of dealing with griefers to the victims of the grief, which is the REAL shitty thing about this policy.

banning someone for disarm spamming is dumb

Disarm spamming someone over and over again for no reason after being told to stop by the victim and then an admin is going beyond just disarm spamming.

it would reasonably stop at the admin saying "hey can you not do that" but if they go beyond that the issue is no longer disarm spam.

wesoda25 wrote:Ok all the points worth mentioning have been mentioned now the thread is going to devolve into the same arguments but worse. Proof being the 80 other escalation threads that went nowhere. Just lock it now losers

I don't know, might be better to let it play out so people can get it off their chests for this iteration. Escalation is still a hot topic from the Headmin elections and clearly something players and admins alike are concerned about. Even if it doesn't go anywhere I'm pretty sure Headmins will at least read most of this hot mess.

teepeepee wrote:

Screemonster wrote: If they're a non-antag, you fight back, and you lose, then tough shit you forfeited your right to ahelp when you fought back, you're not getting any help.

this is bullshit and you know it, the rule literally says:

Escalation Policy wrote:If you are the instigator in a conflict and end up killing or severely impairing the round of the person you are fighting, you should make a reasonable effort to return them to life at least once or make amends, only seeking round removal if they continue to pursue you.

you will get cloned or the other guy will get banned if he instigated against you
and here's a little extra:

This protection doesn't apply to an instigator being killed.

so if someone instigates you and you win, space that bitch, you are allowed to
this is the perfect formula for self-policing and less hugbox administration

That's as written but not how it's as enforced.

You'll get banned for permaremoval even if they're the instigator. Personally I think this is dumb since the rules literally permit this but *shrug*

Cobby wrote:That's as written but not how it's as enforced.

You'll get banned for permaremoval even if they're the instigator. Personally I think this is dumb since the rules literally permit this but *shrug*

Yeah, it's a known inconsistency with rules as written verses how it's enforced. The best explanation I can give that naturally can only represent my own position and not that of the team or headmins is that conflicts are messy affairs often where both sides are convinced the other technically started it. I don't like the idea of permanent round removal over a petty fight that both parties escalated into a full blown fight to the death. Where as some shit tool boxing you into red over the fact you got the gloves first or hell, because you're a lizard or some shit then I couldn't care what happened to that guy. For me it's about scale. You especially shouldn't space someone you started a fight with and you generally shouldn't space someone over a minor conflict that you both escalated into something more. At least, not until it becomes clear the guy you defeated the first time will not stop at anything short of your death. It's a tricky line that has been mentioned inside the team so it's kind of sad to say it can be inconsistent. There is enough room to say escalation has no protections for the instigator but being enough of a dick about keeping someone out of the round because of a dumb slap fight could be a breach of rule 1.

Maybe the headmins could get together on discussing that part of escalation specifically to address this inconsistency in the short term, long term I expect it would be better to look at escalation as a whole but it's not too much to ask for a clarification on perma-removal.

might as well post this here. Was in a round a few moments ago on Sybil. No one was in RD so all departments were going in and out to do research and print things for people. CMO let me into the department after I left it to get an inducer for a chemist. Anyway I get back in there and I'm going to message the chemist and let them know I left inducer outside the department. A scientist rolls in. Runs right up to me without saying a word. Grabs me aggressively and begins tabling me to the point I'm stunlocked. I can't react. I can't move. I can't react. The only thing I can do is respond. I ask them four times to stop. Leave me alone. They ignore me. They removed all of my gear. Everything. Then tossed me out and spaced all of my gear. With the exception of what was in my backpack and my toolbelt.

They removed me. I went back in to get my things. Which they had no business taking. Borg helped me back in. They proceeded to hit me with a fire extinguisher repeatedly. Stating I didn't belong in Science. While TWO fucking assistants who were just like me and didn't belong in science stood right there. It seemed as though they were singularly focused on me because I play a "ligger." They killed me. Dragged me to cloning. I attempted to ahelp but no admins online and the singular admin online ignored the ahelp. Wouldn't respond to it.

So what's confusing to me is I got a day ban for the same thing. I was informed stripping someone and taking their things and spacing them when they've not been hostile or done anything negative towards you is over escalation. You can remove someone but you absolutely have zero reason to remove their things? I'm confused.

Remember when Nervere said he was going to fix escalation policy almost a year ago?

Escalation is fine as it is, only the unrobust and autistics run into problems. If you want to play correctly then follow this simple 2-step process that banbots DON'T want you to know about:
1. if some dope is spam-disarming, thieving, or attacking and u tell him to fuck off/punch back and he throws another fist, end his life but don't perma-remove
2. if he comes back again threatening violence yeet him out the airlock
admins don't be retards and ban because some mongoloid baited
I fight cunts every time I log on and never had these issues

Snuffleupagus wrote:might as well post this here. Was in a round a few moments ago on Sybil. No one was in RD so all departments were going in and out to do research and print things for people. CMO let me into the department after I left it to get an inducer for a chemist. Anyway I get back in there and I'm going to message the chemist and let them know I left inducer outside the department. A scientist rolls in. Runs right up to me without saying a word. Grabs me aggressively and begins tabling me to the point I'm stunlocked. I can't react. I can't move. I can't react. The only thing I can do is respond. I ask them four times to stop. Leave me alone. They ignore me. They removed all of my gear. Everything. Then tossed me out and spaced all of my gear. With the exception of what was in my backpack and my toolbelt.

They removed me. I went back in to get my things. Which they had no business taking. Borg helped me back in. They proceeded to hit me with a fire extinguisher repeatedly. Stating I didn't belong in Science. While TWO fucking assistants who were just like me and didn't belong in science stood right there. It seemed as though they were singularly focused on me because I play a "ligger." They killed me. Dragged me to cloning. I attempted to ahelp but no admins online and the singular admin online ignored the ahelp. Wouldn't respond to it.

So what's confusing to me is I got a day ban for the same thing. I was informed stripping someone and taking their things and spacing them when they've not been hostile or done anything negative towards you is over escalation. You can remove someone but you absolutely have zero reason to remove their things? I'm confused.

Have you considered that the admin was AFK or just unable to get to your ahelp? Griff happens and sometimes shitters slip through the cracks, you shouldn't let that destroy your faith in the system we've got.

That being said, I find that verbally warning someone to cut their shit out before you dunk them will generally get you off the hook in ahelps provided you're actually justifiably defending yourself/your belongings/department, Malkraz is pretty spot on with his description of what to do.

Dr_bee wrote:it would reasonably stop at the admin saying "hey can you not do that" but if they go beyond that the issue is no longer disarm spam.

Server rule 1. Don't be a dick.
If someone is doing nothing but disarm spamming someone over and over (and ok, exceptions would be made for the clown), then you are adding nothing to the game, you're not taking part in the roleplay or the game elements, you are, without a doubt being a dick. And I think thats one of the few places Rule 1 needs to actually be used.

Snuffleupagus wrote:might as well post this here. Was in a round a few moments ago on Sybil.-snip-.

I understand its frustrating when your ahelps don't get answered, sometimes the botbus simply gets missed, or admins are AFK, or simply no admins are on at that time. It sucks when this happens but its by no means intentional.
All I'd say is don't take a no reaction from the admin team as a "its ok". If its ok we'll generally say, "that's IC" or "valid" or any number of things to let the situation be acknowledged.
Generally the only ahelps I personally let slide are mechanics/code questions I don't know the answer too and I can't find the answer in the code or wiki and no one's responding in adminbus.

peoplearestrange wrote:

Dr_bee wrote:it would reasonably stop at the admin saying "hey can you not do that" but if they go beyond that the issue is no longer disarm spam.

Server rule 1. Don't be a dick.
If someone is doing nothing but disarm spamming someone over and over (and ok, exceptions would be made for the clown), then you are adding nothing to the game, you're not taking part in the roleplay or the game elements, you are, without a doubt being a dick. And I think thats one of the few places Rule 1 needs to actually be used.

Snuffleupagus wrote:might as well post this here. Was in a round a few moments ago on Sybil.-snip-.

I understand its frustrating when your ahelps don't get answered, sometimes the botbus simply gets missed, or admins are AFK, or simply no admins are on at that time. It sucks when this happens but its by no means intentional.
All I'd say is don't take a no reaction from the admin team as a "its ok". If its ok we'll generally say, "that's IC" or "valid" or any number of things to let the situation be acknowledged.
Generally the only ahelps I personally let slide are mechanics/code questions I don't know the answer too and I can't find the answer in the code or wiki and no one's responding in adminbus.

I wasn't trying to come across as if I was mad at admins. If so I apologize. Was pretty heated when this happened and I wrote this. I'm just trying to see if what that guy did was shit tier or not? My understanding has always been you can throw people the fuck out of your department but if they're uttering shit like "Stop." "Please. I'll leave." you stop. Specifically if they're not fighting back. I also played under the assumption people weren't allowed to use macros. Literally the only way I can see someone being able to table stun someone else is with the use of a macro.

What really concerns me going forward is as the medical system changes getting the shit kicked out of you will actually matter. An assistant running around causing shit to get in fights will now actually be a serious problem as they are a drain on the limited amount of manpower and resources medbay has.

Most problems will not be solved as fast as the sleeper days, and being beaten into crit could mean 10 minutes of downtime.

It's unusual to see people caring about escalation policy any time other than the headmin elections. These two lines really need to be taken into consideration when complaining about escalation policy though:

If you are the instigator in a conflict and end up killing or severely impairing the round of the person you are fighting, you should make a reasonable effort to return them to life at least once or make amends, only seeking round removal if they continue to pursue you. This protection doesn't apply to an instigator being killed.

Fighting back against an instigator means you're still entitled to cloning/healing. If someone kills you after you retaliate and dumps your body/leaves it there, then they're in the wrong. The real argument is usually who instigated what.

It's not really feasible to prevent nonantags from killing each other with good reasoning (as outlined in escalation policy) because of the lack of a consistently good security response. Saying to call security is completely laughable because 90% of the time they have better things to do than arrest someone for disarm spamming or breaking into science or similar stupid shit. Players should be allowed to handle their own problems while the escalation policy protects them from ban baiting and kill baiting.

Generally, rule one would cover people who continue to instigate conflict with people who aren't engaging with them.

Basically this:

terranaut wrote:If you instigate a conflict of any form with somebody (such as slipping them) and they decide to punch you for it and you decide to fight back (especially with a fucking toolbox, this is textbook kill baiting) then you are a faggot that started and took part in escalating a conflict and are more than welcome to the 30+ minute timeout your victim is dealing you.

If you slip someone and they kill you without you fighting back that's another matter but maybe if you don't want people to kick you in the face you shouldn't have slipped them in the first place.

peoplearestrange wrote:

deedubya wrote:Escalation only really becomes an issue when you have an understaffed or incompetent security department. At that point, you're well within your rights to robust someone that keeps punching you in the head. Act like an antag, get treated like one.

Except escalation also applies to security... then what do you do? Im talking about OOC rules here, not game mechanics.

Please see the very last line of escalation policy: "Exceptions: Security is expected not to retaliate with random abuse or violence unless the person in question is otherwise eligible for execution. You can't kill or maim security for trying to arrest you for legitimate reasons."

The issue with that is that it isnt written anywhere in the rules about what is grounds for execution, there isn't an order, a set of criteria or even suggestions to what might be acceptable. You could quite reasonably execute anyone who you even slightly susspect, for anything. Obviously rule 1 puts sort of limits on this, but as this applies to any security, sec can be legitimately heavy handed if they want. Obviously all this does is piss people off and further aggressive acts towards sec, which they then use in justification of their heavy handedness. Its a wonderful loop of anger.

Most of that interaction is listed in Security Policy and Precedents, you can throw in a bit of the security escalation exceptions too if you like. So roughly speaking to 'qualify' for execution regarding security you need to have become valid to security. Typically this means acting like an antagonist or attacking security with lethal force. I usually advise players to reserve executions for serious offenders (murderers and antagonists) but basically it breaks down to anyone a officer can reasonably kill within the rules can probably be executed safely.

Basically if you can reasonably perma someone the chances are you can justify execution too. That said, security policy does ask that security hold itself to a higher standard when it comes to escalation and their actions due to their special status. Security is equipped with the tools to arrest and detain and where reasonable they should be using non-lethal force to keep the peace. As far as rules and policy goes there isn't a listed policy on who can authorize a execution; in theory a officer can catch someone who was trying to kill them and execute them on the spot. That should be rules legal providing the guy was valid to the officer but whether or not it's in-game legal to other security is another In-Character matter. Space law isn't the same as actual OOC policy, but it can guide the people who are in charge of security for that round. If the HoS says no executions and you execute against their orders then it's entirely reasonable for the HoS to demote or even arrest you.

tl;dr - don't execute people unless they made themselves very valid to you. Officers have a higher barrier of entry on valid however and are generally expected to enforce laws not kill some random shitter who punched them once.

peoplearestrange wrote:The issue with that is that it isnt written anywhere in the rules about what is grounds for execution, there isn't an order, a set of criteria or even suggestions to what might be acceptable. You could quite reasonably execute anyone who you even slightly susspect, for anything.

Security Policy and Precedents wrote:The 'act like an antag, get treated like one' part of Rule 4 of the main rules also apply to security. Stunning an officer repeatedly, using lethal or restricted weapons on them, disrupting the arrests or sentences of dangerous criminals, or damaging the brig, are examples of behaviour that may make you valid for security under Rule 4.

Ah right, I guess valid in this context means to kill, right I was misunderstanding that bit.

I wonder if each rule would benefit having a boxed example of a situation to make it clearer to all?

angelstarri wrote:here's the dirty little secret: escalation is an extremely simple ruleset but the fact that people in this community are outright autistic and looking for loopholes to exploit it makes everything much harder for admins to deal with

if you suspect you got killed by a non-antag for no discernible reason, observe him and if he doesn't have the antag moodlet ahelp his ass whether you fought back or not. there are no or very few admins who will reject an ahelp because you defended yourself against a sudden attacker.

you are so fucking based and now one of my favourite pl*yers

the community is so hardline autistic about needing STRICT RULES because people then want to rule lawyer literally everything with a pulse

escalation works fine and if you kill someone and cremate them for attacking you I'll always mark IC because the guy was being a huge cunt assuming they instigated it all

damnit PaS you opened up the cursed thread again

doublepost


okay so hear me out, if you want to change it, don't just say GIMMIE CHANGE

show us the change you want, actually give us a codified difference that you can imagine will realistically change things for the better

i'm sick of policy threads that don't state what they want the new change to be, so people can debate that. these always end up as players/admins going X thing bad because Y but never stating a formalized Z that could fix it in a concise manner