Malf AI's and crowbarring hacked APCs

[DaydreamIQ]

In a recent round a Malf AI (Not myself) was told not to use "Play to win" tactics to accomplish their objective. However the tactic in question was literally just opening the cover of the APC with a crowbar which is both easily repairable and nowhere near as exploitative as just dissembling the APC entirely.

Should opening the cover be considered powergaming as a Malf AI is basically the question. Posting this because there was a lot of back and forth over it after the round, hopefully things can get cleared up this way.

[humanoid]

The malf AI in question here,

I think the problem lies in how obscure it is. almost no AI I have seen does the trick. If all the AI does it every malf round it really be a problem anymore because people would know how to react and know what the AI is gonna do and act accordingly.
Which is why I think it's not really play-to-win. If enough AI do it more frequently you can expect sec and engi mains to pick up on it relatively quickly. it also encourages better tactic and strategies also good communications with your borg.

[BrianBackslide]

It's pretty blatantly obvious. Random APC in maint flipped up? Hmmmmm...
Just crowbar it back and look at the funny blue screen.

Aren't malfies supposed to accomplish their directives "at all costs"? Sounds like they're lawed to do it.

[spookuni]

I was the admin who made the call to request (No note was applied) that the malf AI player in question not repeat their tactic of crowbarring open hacked APCs to hide their hacked status from onlookers and people who might stumble onto them. I made that decision after consultation with adminbus and the head-admins elect that the interaction of crowbarring hacked APCs to hide their status as one of the primary tells of malf AI seemed to be unintended, and that the behaviour of using the increased security provided by that interaction to more easily attempt an N2O borg machine setup (which failed due to unrelated reasons) and then delta and kill everyone remaining on station to be out of line with the desired sportsmanship of play on Manuel.

There has been further discussion after the fact in admin channels about whether or not this was reasonable, and while I still think it is for an MRP admin to make that call in response to player behaviour in round, especially with greater context as to what was going on during that round, I have been wrong before and will be wrong in future, so discussion is always a good thing.

(In case it was not obvious, and before there is a massive influx of "what the fuck admins" this ruling was given on Manuel and would only apply to servers following the MRP ruleset, I have no comment on what Malf AIs want to do on LRP, crowbar away)

[Tegun]

Not only is this not a policy issue nor a code issue, this is a spriting issue.

[mrmelbert]

As per the policy set by viewtopic.php?p=618969#p618969:

Powergaming produces an arms race that significantly degrades the quality of the round. MRP players are expected to prioritize the story of the shift over tactical advantages.

I believe that going out of your way to conceal a major mechanic of your antagonist though a semi-obscure mechanic is an example of someone opting for a tactical advantage over the story of the shift.
Instead of someone stumbling across your APC and making a harrowing discovery that you may be malfunctioning, or security and command needing figure out if the apc's from a traitor, malf ai, or ninja - which are interesting
story beats for the shift - all the APCs are instead concealed with a gamey mechanic that no one would consider.

I cannot imagine very many people would see an APC in maintenance with its cover open and think "ai's malf" first thing.

(Tegun's correct, though. It should show on sprite regardless if it's crow-barred or not.)

[Farquaar]

I believe that going out of your way to conceal a major mechanic of your antagonist though a semi-obscure mechanic is an example of someone opting for a tactical advantage over the story of the shift.
Instead of someone stumbling across your APC and making a harrowing discovery that you may be malfunctioning, or security and command needing figure out if the apc's from a traitor, malf ai, or ninja - which are interesting
story beats for the shift - all the APCs are instead concealed with a gamey mechanic that no one would consider.

I cannot imagine very many people would see an APC in maintenance with its cover open and think "ai's malf" first thing.

(Tegun's correct, though. It should show on sprite regardless if it's crow-barred or not.)

If you're walking around maintenance and you find out that all of the APCs have had their screens pried off, wouldn't that indicate some sort of sabotage? How is that level of deviousness not within the bounds of MRP?

[mrmelbert]

If you're walking around maintenance and you find out that all of the APCs have had their screens pried off, wouldn't that indicate some sort of sabotage? How is that level of deviousness not within the bounds of MRP?

This is actually a pretty interesting point to consider. I wouldn't personally think it's sabotage while playing, just some dingus forgetting to close their APCs. But someone could probably see it as much.

[NecromancerAnne]

I cannot imagine very many people would see an APC in maintenance with its cover open and think "ai's malf" first thing.

(Tegun's correct, though. It should show on sprite regardless if it's crow-barred or not.)

And yet a flipped open APC is already a red flag that something has happened to the APC. Which would maybe incline someone to investigate it further. Even if so much as flipping the cover back down so nobody steals the cell.

Concealing your status as an antagonist should be within bounds of what is permitted as an antagonist. I definitely do not like the precedent this sets, as any obscure method that might crop up to accomplish hiding your activities will be given this same scrutiny.

I do not believe antags should be held against them for covering their tracks with something that doesn't immediately throw misinformation that can't be interacted with to uncover. Since you can do that with this trick, what is the problem other than the AI can't be called out as immediately from sighting the APC alone?

[CMDR_Gungnir]

With the mention of it being a Sprite Issue That Is Intended To Still Show Up, I assume the reason for the bwoink is the same thing as the Changeling MMI Test. You're not SUPPOSED to be able to do it, so you're not allowed to.

[Yulice]

reducing things down to "you are a veteran gamer so you should purposefully handicap yourself so that you don't own the newbie players" even though this is a very clever and sneaky way of using game mechanics to further their goals without just outright murdering people. This is an awful precedent and honestly the definition of "powergame" seems to broaden every fucking day. I do not want to reach the point where any antag that isn't a wizard or a nukie has to ahelp like they're raising their hand in class to make sure they can do fucking ANYTHING antagonistic

[thgvr]

Covering your tracks as an antagonist is not powergaming.

[BrianBackslide]

Emergent gameplay should not be against the rules.
Being clever and hiding your tracks should not be against the rules.

Any chum(p) with a crowbar can flip down that APC, and many would. Not out of wanting to validhunt, but just curiosity.

What about emagging the APC for whatever ne'er-do-well reason and flipping it up to slow down investigators? Would you bwoink them for "play to win"? What if they simply forgot to flip the APC back down?

Would ninjas wanting to hide their tracks also be subject to this? Kinda goes counter to the point of being a NINJA.

[Timberpoes]

If a player is using their freedoms to pull off something genuinely interesting or different, or to facilitate roleplay, it tends to indicate any creative use of game mechanics were done in good faith to the betterment of the shift. There is no problem with their use of the sandbox aspect of the game and this is awesome to see and part of what makes SS13 amazing.

If that player is using it to maximise progressing towards their win condition, it tends to indicate an approach that works against the above. Where appropriate, it may be discouraged if an admin wants to exercise their discretion as such.

I want admins to feel empowered to step in when they, in good faith, believe something is in either the interests of that shift or the longer-term interests of the server(s) as a whole.

This is universal across both LRP and MRP. We specifically recruit a broad team of admins across all server with different ideas and views. Our admins are all allowed (and occasionally encouraged) to act as dungeon masters, their different approaches make every shift something unique.

They are allowed to and encouraged to make decisions like this to nudge shifts towards memorable and interesting stories that players remember for the right reasons. Admins have stepped in to offer advice to players before, discourage certain things and suggest they approach things differently. And admins will do it again.

Since this didn't even end in a formal note, it's a giant nothing-burger. Not everything has to be a grand, sweeping ruling.

[Pandarsenic]

idk why this thread is even a thing

Covering your tracks as an antagonist is not powergaming.

[spookuni]

Covering your tracks as an antagonist is not powergaming.

While I agree in principle, my primary issue with this (coupled with what it was being used to accomplish) is and was that it it appears to be an unintended interaction being used to benefit the antagonist player at the expense of everyone else - actions that I have seen in the past to be deleterious to the health of Manuel as a server.

To borrow your own comparison from the Manuel discord, I see this interaction as less similar to an antagonist buying soap to clean up the evidence of their crimes, and closer to an antagonist finding out that if they perform a specific set of actions with an esword prior to using it, it will leave no blood trail behind while still maintaining full lethality, and then making use of that interaction to more easily accrue a bodycount. Whether that is a fair comparison is perhaps debatable - Fair questions of the visibility of sabotage and whether this should be considered to be purely a sprite issue have already been raised, but I do not think it fair to cancel a question of intent, both playersided and gamesided, down to a single sentence quip that no one will disagree with.

[NecromancerAnne]

To borrow your own comparison from the Manuel discord, I see this interaction as less similar to an antagonist buying soap to clean up the evidence of their crimes, and closer to an antagonist finding out that if they perform a specific set of actions with an esword prior to using it, it will leave no blood trail behind while still maintaining full lethality, and then making use of that interaction to more easily accrue a bodycount.

This is a terribly unfair comparison given this both doesn't destroy evidence (which soap does) and leaves a breadcrumb trail to follow, while also being fixable by anyone with a crowbar. Following this logic makes it difficult to tell what would be permissive behaviour or ways to obscure your activities without it falling into this vague 'it's too victory-focused'.

Winning is not the only reason to do this, or other actions like walling off maint or sealing up areas. Continuing your round and not getting geeked immediately by sec before some other goal can begin is a very valid consideration, and shouldn't be held against players unless the expectation is for them to be caught and to fail. As much as people like to focus on success being a player priority could lead to detrimental behaviour, so too can the overfocus on not allowing antagonist action to ensure longevity, which can make rounds very uneventful except for a small burst of action to resolve a potential danger that probably won't put up much of a fight.

[Domitius]

How is this any different than people re-screwing the panel on a door after hacking through it? I feel it is a very fair comparison between this issue and fixing a door to hide tampering.

Apc's being crowbarred open is clear indication that it's been messed with which is an incredibly fair and ingenious use of IC equipment. If a spriter wants to tackle this nothing burger more power to em. Either way the cat is out of the bag now and if anybody tries to abuse this it's a safe bet somebody will now think to check out flipped apc's when the AI is being funny.

[cacogen]

In a recent round a Malf AI (Not myself) was told not to use "Play to win" tactics to accomplish their objective. However the tactic in question was literally just opening the cover of the APC with a crowbar which is both easily repairable and nowhere near as exploitative as just dissembling the APC entirely.

What has this game become if this is considered playing to win? It's already hard enough for malf AIs to hack enough APCs to go Delta without someone finding one without ruling out interesting emergent gameplay tactics that have cropped up through player ingenuity like this.

[spookuni]

To borrow your own comparison from the Manuel discord, I see this interaction as less similar to an antagonist buying soap to clean up the evidence of their crimes, and closer to an antagonist finding out that if they perform a specific set of actions with an esword prior to using it, it will leave no blood trail behind while still maintaining full lethality, and then making use of that interaction to more easily accrue a bodycount.

This is a terribly unfair comparison given this both doesn't destroy evidence (which soap does) and leaves a breadcrumb trail to follow, while also being fixable by anyone with a crowbar. Following this logic makes it difficult to tell what would be permissive behaviour or ways to obscure your activities without it falling into this vague 'it's too victory-focused'.

Winning is not the only reason to do this, or other actions like walling off maint or sealing up areas. Continuing your round and not getting geeked immediately by sec before some other goal can begin is a very valid consideration, and shouldn't be held against players unless the expectation is for them to be caught and to fail. As much as people like to focus on success being a player priority could lead to detrimental behaviour, so too can the overfocus on not allowing antagonist action to ensure longevity, which can make rounds very uneventful except for a small burst of action to resolve a potential danger that probably won't put up much of a fight.

I would like to mention again that I made my request not to repeat the round after observing that the malf AI in question had used it to more easily work their way to attempting an N2O borg machine and then setting off a delta (successfully) - Had the literal playing for victory that occurred not occurred, I would not have stepped in at all, perhaps I have communicated that badly.

On the subject of "just crowbar it lul" the one major concern I do have is that I do not think it good for the state of Manuel to have it be the defacto expected behaviour of the crew to break in to places to flip closed APCs because they see them open, sure anyone can do it if it's in a primary hallway, but the combination of restricted / out of the way areas with the requirement to physically interact with an APC to determine if it has been hacked feels like it may result in defacto metaprotections under RPR 10. Or people will just start metaing open APCs = AI malf kill they, I dunno, I'm not prescient.

Either way, I don't really have any intention of dying on this hill, it really is a sprite issue at it's root, so if the consensus is let malf AIs gamer out their borg machines faster, C'est la vie.

[BlueMemesauce]

This may be somewhat of a strawman but your argument is literally the same as someone arguing against traitors hiding bodies in lockers.

Hiding bodies in lockers is powergaming because it makes it harder for people to find evidence against then and makes it easier for them to accomplish their goals without being stopped.

It's a just a sprite issue, lockers are actually supposed to have windows on them so you could see bodies through them but the spriters haven't done it yet.

Lockers are a minor mechanic, its boring to see bodies be concealed in them compared to walking in maint and suddenly seeing a body.

People now are going to have to go out of there way to check every locker they see to make sure there's not a body in there.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

Gotta agree with panda & co here, the idea that damaging APCs to hide the telltale signs is somehow bannable powergaming that needs to be stamped on is ridiculous overstep, and is very much comparable to hiding the body in a welded locker as a traitor.

Crew who are actually enaging in the roleplay of a space station job rather than frantically hunting for their pre-memorised guaranteed antag tells might do something like saying "Anyone noticed that a bunch of APCs are damaged?" or trying to fix it themself to tidy up the station.

It's a clever emergent gameplay - hiding your hard antag tell behind what appears to be random damage to casual inspection.

On the subject of "just crowbar it lul" the one major concern I do have is that I do not think it good for the state of Manuel to have it be the defacto expected behaviour of the crew to break in to places to flip closed APCs because they see them open, sure anyone can do it if it's in a primary hallway, but the combination of restricted / out of the way areas with the requirement to physically interact with an APC to determine if it has been hacked feels like it may result in defacto metaprotections under RPR 10. Or people will just start metaing open APCs = AI malf kill they, I dunno, I'm not prescient.

This kinda seems like a silly argument. If you're seeing a lot of crowbarred open APCs, or borgs cowbarring them open in someone else's workplace, you're well within your rights to, say, tell one of the people working there to check it out.
Saying something is bad because Johnny McNobody with his No Access clearly has no options but to break rules and smash up the station to investigate possible sabotage is dumb, and it's weird that you think that the defacto expected behaviour for "huh somethings broken" is gonna be a horde of needy killbots breaking down the door to valid time. There aren't THAT many rooms in the station that nobody has access to and can't be seen from the outside and arent trafficked but ARENT weird for the borgs to be hanging around in. And if the AIsat apcs are all cover opened, that's a good time for the heads of staff to start wondering whats wrong with the AI

[Drag]

I agree with spookuni and Melbert, especially taking what the Malf ai did into account. I do not believe in any capacity this strategy could be used in good faith and I see innocent players being killed over metas forming around the strategy. Typically you don't think of sabotage when an apc is flipped down, you think some engi just forgot to put it back up. Unless headmins rule otherwise I am going to consider this an exploit and a violation of MRPs powergaming rules.

[Boot]

if I tell a borg to wall around blue apcs inorder to get them out of direct line of sight from people walking through the area am I now "playing to win"?

[Timberpoes]

What matters the most to me is the ultimate outcome from how things are leveraged by the players.

If the AI played it off to frame other departments, or used it to hide while they set up or ran an interesting gimmick then that's way cooler than just "Guys, we discovered the new optimal meta to hide hacked APCs in plain sight so we can plasma flood/borg machine/go delta much easier than ever before!"

Think about the bigger picture for just one nanosecond. If clever emergent gameplay techniques are used in good faith towards fun or interesting or unique things, we have something that's worth protecting. But there's much more of a problem when they're used to progress towards win conditions.

When metas form and everyone is just running around leveraging all their OOC metaknowledge about all "clever emergent gameplay techniques" you end up with an arms race of OOC information dominating character interactions instead of roleplay.

It's to everyone's benefit when the admins oversee the use of clever emergent gameplay techniques. The alternative is often the coding team sometimes stepping in. And when the coding team steps in, all too often the only viable solution is to "fix" the clever emergent gameplay technique, either removing it or making it so difficult to do that it may as well have been removed.

The overarching intent is that players have freedoms to do whatever. The sandbox is designed around having admins to make sure players are utilising that freedom responsibly to create what a shared vision between what the admin team believes is peak SS13 and what the coding team believes is peak SS13. When these two things don't happen in unison, all it takes is one triggered player with the ability to change some words in a text file or two and one maintainer who agrees with that player to end with the freedoms and the sandbox restricted just another step further.

I fully support Spookuni's approach of talking to the player and guiding them away from gameplay loops, tropes and metas that Spookuni believes may be problematic. This is especially good when done without having to hand out notes and without the player necessarily having broken the rules at that stage.

[TheFinalPotato]

I'm not a huge fan of making changes to the code just to cover something dumb some dude did one time. Seems like a crummy pattern, IDK.

[chocolate_bickie]

Why does this thread even exist?!

It's an important piece of equipment that has been visually modified.

If I walked into my place of work and found black tape on the light switches I'd be asking what is going on.

The fact that MRP players don't feel they are allowed to speak of or fix APCs that have been modified should be a signal that enforcement needs to be less restrictive not more.

[massa]

Had the literal playing for victory that occurred not occurred, I would not have stepped in at all, perhaps I have communicated that badly.

It is so insane to me to ever hear this. An admin 'stepping in' because someone 'played for victory' as a team antagonist in a game where they were given a difficult goal to win and a lot of tools to make it happen.

At what point is this kind of rhetoric just coping and policing the behaviors of others because you're simply built the same, and not different? It's an APC. Crowbars are 100% mandatory or you're 100% dead on every station within 30 minutes and will be until current meme atmos gets resolved, air alarms actually do stuff, and firelock hell gets fixed. They should unironically start in our internals box. Seeing a shitload of flipped APCs all over the station is insanely suspicious and a glaring, immediate issue that doesn't lend to even a drop of stealth or subtlety, that will get the AI killed right away.

[iamgoofball]

guys, malf AI is hard enough as is, we should probably cut malf players some slack here

[spookuni]

On rereading my wording in the ticket and considering my defence of my call regarding this, I've decided that I communicated my actual problem with the original actions in round of the player I spoke to extremely poorly, and have been personally conflating my opinion regarding this ... oversight? With the reasoning I made the call to ask the player in question to not repeat their actions. For both of these failings I apologise.

To clarify my original position was and is that using an obscure spriting oversight to obfuscate identifying information about your antagonist type to more easily attempt an N2O - borg machine combo plan, falling back on a successful delta alert to kill most of the station after that failed for unrelated reasons (actions that I have previously seen identified as extremely boring gameplay and poor story material by LRP and MRP players alike), is at best leaning heavily on the ruling quoted by Melbert earlier, that antagonists should not be prioritising tactical benefit over making an interesting story of the round. Subsequent to observing this and in the pre-round following, I requested the player not repeat this tactic (no note was applied, it was a request made with the intent of maintaining server health, not a punitive action for rulebreaking) - I have re-examined that ticket, and with hindsight I completely failed to properly explain the issue I took - that being the use of obscure game mechanics / oversights for tactical benefit, purely in the pursuit of "victory" - and instead focused on the specific mechanic / oversight that had been used, which was not the main issue and has prompted this thread of people talking past each other as we argue about different things, or occasionally argue about the same thing with bad context (I've contributed to this as well, which is my fault). Ultimately I do stand by my decision to talk to the player about their tactics, and the reasoning behind that call, but that call is independent of the discussion here, about whether or not the use of this specific interaction should be inherently a rulebreak.

I hope this clarifies a bit what the actual problem that was discussed in bus was, and the reason for my deciding to talk to the player in question. I'd like to again apologise for my poor choice of words resulting in all this confusion and pointless (well technically this thread isn't pointless, but the context for its creation was off, my fault) argument.

With that said, after considering all the replies in this thread about its intended topic of discussion, while I still dislike the intentional usage of oversights in code for personal advantage, this thread has convinced me that the potential of this interaction is minor enough, and the potential story outcomes interesting enough, that while I maintain my concerns with regards to building player expectations of meta-understanding (oh look a broken APC in a room I don't have access to better prioritise checking to make sure it's not a malf AIs), making policy against those actions pre-emptively would be at best, extremely hasty.

(Tegun was entirely correct anyway, so if worse comes to worse I'm sure the spritetainers can stick a glowy blue light on open hacked APCs at some point.)

[CMDR_Gungnir]

Had the literal playing for victory that occurred not occurred, I would not have stepped in at all, perhaps I have communicated that badly.

It is so insane to me to ever hear this. An admin 'stepping in' because someone 'played for victory' as a team antagonist in a game where they were given a difficult goal to win and a lot of tools to make it happen.

At what point is this kind of rhetoric just coping and policing the behaviors of others because you're simply built the same, and not different? It's an APC. Crowbars are 100% mandatory or you're 100% dead on every station within 30 minutes and will be until current meme atmos gets resolved, air alarms actually do stuff, and firelock hell gets fixed. They should unironically start in our internals box. Seeing a shitload of flipped APCs all over the station is insanely suspicious and a glaring, immediate issue that doesn't lend to even a drop of stealth or subtlety, that will get the AI killed right away.

I'm not going to comment on most of this but I do want to say I've never grabbed a crowbar unless my job needed it BEFORE the atmos situation went to shit and I've never died to the atmos, so. /shrug

[massa]

Had the literal playing for victory that occurred not occurred, I would not have stepped in at all, perhaps I have communicated that badly.

It is so insane to me to ever hear this. An admin 'stepping in' because someone 'played for victory' as a team antagonist in a game where they were given a difficult goal to win and a lot of tools to make it happen.

At what point is this kind of rhetoric just coping and policing the behaviors of others because you're simply built the same, and not different? It's an APC. Crowbars are 100% mandatory or you're 100% dead on every station within 30 minutes and will be until current meme atmos gets resolved, air alarms actually do stuff, and firelock hell gets fixed. They should unironically start in our internals box. Seeing a shitload of flipped APCs all over the station is insanely suspicious and a glaring, immediate issue that doesn't lend to even a drop of stealth or subtlety, that will get the AI killed right away.

I'm not going to comment on most of this but I do want to say I've never grabbed a crowbar unless my job needed it BEFORE the atmos situation went to shit and I've never died to the atmos, so. /shrug

It might be different. Sybil's streets are savage. Lots of breaches.

[oranges]

Why does this thread even exist?!

It's an important piece of equipment that has been visually modified.

If I walked into my place of work and found black tape on the light switches I'd be asking what is going on.

The fact that MRP players don't feel they are allowed to speak of or fix APCs that have been modified should be a signal that enforcement needs to be less restrictive not more.

this would be the right answer, why is it expected that MRP players won't flip the APC back to check it? This isn't powergaming by any stretch of the imagination.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

Think about the bigger picture for just one nanosecond. If clever emergent gameplay techniques are used in good faith towards fun or interesting or unique things, we have something that's worth protecting. But there's much more of a problem when they're used to progress towards win conditions.

Well, what's the point in having all these laboriously designed, calculated, and balanced win conditions if progressing towards them in clever and interesting ways is bad? Why does the bigger picture REQUIRE you to gimp yourself and only follow the meta-expected strategies that everyone knows and is prepared for?

When metas form and everyone is just running around leveraging all their OOC metaknowledge about all "clever emergent gameplay techniques" you end up with an arms race of OOC information dominating character interactions instead of roleplay.

As opposed to the complete lack of meta that exists right now, using no metaknowledge whatsoever and totally not incomprehensible to people lacking any OOC information. No golly sir, the current state of play is clearly a fresh and clean untainted experience where people only use knowledge they gain each shift to work out what's going on. Yes sirree, it's aaaallll emergent roleplay and not just regurgitating a decade's evolution of metastrats to fight antags with a thin RP justification.

It's to everyone's benefit when the admins oversee the use of clever emergent gameplay techniques. The alternative is often the coding team sometimes stepping in. And when the coding team steps in, all too often the only viable solution is to "fix" the clever emergent gameplay technique, either removing it or making it so difficult to do that it may as well have been removed.

The overarching intent is that players have freedoms to do whatever. The sandbox is designed around having admins to make sure players are utilising that freedom responsibly to create what a shared vision between what the admin team believes is peak SS13 and what the coding team believes is peak SS13. When these two things don't happen in unison, all it takes is one triggered player with the ability to change some words in a text file or two and one maintainer who agrees with that player to end with the freedoms and the sandbox restricted just another step further.

Freedom to do whatever except do anything to conceal their hardcoded meta-tells that let everyone know that the roleplaying should be suspended and everyone should drop what they're doing and TDM the silicon faction.
Luckily, these meta-tells are completely optional and only required for minor things like every fun and showy antagonistic tool that is available to the already most-scrutinised role on station.

I'm not really sure what the second argument being made here is, either. That the best way to stop ided players from griefing the codebase is to make sure that no maintainer will ever agree with an ided pr and speedmerge it? That's a weird statement for a maintainer in the first all-maintainer headminship for nearly a decade to make, can't the rest of the team just tell them to fuck off with that and un-merge it?

[JusticeGoat]

I personally believe this is a cleaver trick that should be allowed to be played out, players will catch on really quick with the apc's, if not then it seems more of a code issue than a policy one, updated sprites ect.

[Pandarsenic]

Why does this thread even exist?!

It's an important piece of equipment that has been visually modified.

If I walked into my place of work and found black tape on the light switches I'd be asking what is going on.

The fact that MRP players don't feel they are allowed to speak of or fix APCs that have been modified should be a signal that enforcement needs to be less restrictive not more.

this would be the right answer, why is it expected that MRP players won't flip the APC back to check it? This isn't powergaming by any stretch of the imagination.

I would also contend that if the Manuel players are allowed to recognize a hacked APC without being a relevant department (Engineering/Science), Manuel's AIs should be able to open the cover and leave the display facing the wall so that people can't see it, and if that bothers them they're free to

Just close the microwave

[Screemonster]

Why does this thread even exist?!

It's an important piece of equipment that has been visually modified.

If I walked into my place of work and found black tape on the light switches I'd be asking what is going on.

The fact that MRP players don't feel they are allowed to speak of or fix APCs that have been modified should be a signal that enforcement needs to be less restrictive not more.

this would be the right answer, why is it expected that MRP players won't flip the APC back to check it? This isn't powergaming by any stretch of the imagination.

I wouldn't even enforce this on HRP and I'd laugh at anyone that ahelped after losing because they didn't spot that every APC in every room had its fucking cover open for everyone to see

if enough AIs do it then an open APC will soon enough become just as big a clue that something's amiss as a blue one anyway so who cares

[RaveRadbury]

The specific interaction being discussed in this thread is a small part of the greater context under which the unnoted warning was made. The ends to which this interaction was applied to were considered to be unfun and not engaging. We do not feel that making a ruling on this interaction, whether it a feature or bug, brings any value to the ruleset or the initial policy it was based on.

We will be dismissing this thread.

Headmin Votes:
RaveRadbury: Agree
NamelessFairy: Agree
Dragomagol: Agree