Escalation Policy Rewrite

[GPeckman]

In a recent peanut thread, an admin mentioned that current escalation policy is flawed and the headmins were considering a rewrite. Now I'm curious, is a rewrite actually planned or in progress?

[sinfulbliss]

Strong disagree with an overhaul, current escalation policy has gone through years and years of refinement, being chiseled out through several headmin terms, the last one adding to it I believe being Spook or Mothblocks’ term.

We have had multiple threads sketching out exactly what it means and how it applies. There is really no more excuse to be confused at this point:

Timber and Hulk both explaining current escalation policy in general and how/when conflict ends:
viewtopic.php?p=647278#p647278

Hulk explaining instigating conflicts and how/when it can be done:
viewtopic.php?p=633497#p633497

It is disappointing to see the recent trend of escalation policy being thrown out and talked about in a derogatory way as “escalation baiting” or “checking off escalation boxes.” Escalation rules exist to be followed — the boxes were quite literally placed there in order to be checked off. That’s how you know you’re following them!

This new mentality has led to admins banning players for merely instigating conflicts, despite this being allowed with no reason required so long as it doesn’t excessively interfere with the defender’s ability to do their job (see the Hulk thread), and also a trend of admins enforcing damage/theft after death as over-escalation despite this being a specific clause accounted for in escalation policy itself.

Overhauling the current rules with more vague, hand-waving policies that can’t be actively utilized by players reading them would not only be unhelpful, but would allow admins to enforce escalation however they personally see fit to.

[Vekter]

We're discussing a possible rewrite but I can't share any details at this time.

[Hulkamania]

Strong disagree with an overhaul, current escalation policy has gone through years and years of refinement, being chiseled out through several headmin terms, the last one adding to it I believe being Spook or Mothblocks’ term.

Hi, not really!

Our old escalation policy, once implemented by kor, was essentially unchanged throughout its entire history. People complained about it a lot, repeatedly, but nothing was ever done. I personally took it upon myself to ask people what was good and what was bad about it and provided the bulk of the current rewrite. It was tweaked very slightly upon implementation, and then once after.

You could argue that yes, it took "years" to get to this point, but it was more like a few motivated individuals putting changes into place all at once, rather than rewording things here or tweaking things there.

Overall I think the current one has had as few as three changes, if you count the change that was put into place upon implementation of my old writeup which is debatable.

As far as an "overhaul" it was designed to be a living document more or less. Not necessarily a complete overhaul but the needs evolve with the player base. I have some level of personal love for the amount of effort I put into the one that I made but it's out of my hands if the headmins think for the good of the game (as is there station to determine) that it does need changes, or a complete rework.

[sinfulbliss]

We're discussing a possible rewrite but I can't share any details at this time.

Why is it private information? Isn’t this the point of the policy forum.

You could argue that yes, it took "years" to get to this point, but it was more like a few motivated individuals putting changes into place all at once, rather than rewording things here or tweaking things there.

Overall I think the current one has had as few as three changes, if you count the change that was put into place upon implementation of my old writeup which is debatable.

Whether or not you want to take credit for it: you can clearly see the evolution of escalation policy over the years. I remember escalation policy from late 2020 early 2021 and the one we have now.You can clearly see elements of the earlier versions in the current one — it went through a long evolution.

This is what I mean by that it was “refined,” it wasn’t just one person that sat down and made up something that sounded good, then someone else came along and made up their own version that sounded good — and so on and so forth. Those three edits you mentioned were only made after many months of ban appeals and issues kept cropping up and confusing people. Little changes like that take a long time to hammer out in policy.

As far as an "overhaul" it was designed to be a living document more or less. Not necessarily a complete overhaul but the needs evolve with the player base. I have some level of personal love for the amount of effort I put into the one that I made but it's out of my hands if the headmins think for the good of the game (as is there station to determine) that it does need changes, or a complete rework.

I like it too and that’s why I would hate to see it get scrapped a month into a new term.

[Vekter]

We're discussing a possible rewrite but I can't share any details at this time.

Why is it private information? Isn’t this the point of the policy forum.

There's no details to reveal; admins are discussing how they want to re-work the policy. When we have something to share, it'll be posted in here for folks to go over.

[Jacquerel]

also i dont think its the point of the policy forum, headmins can and do just change policy whenever they want without community input
the part where the community get to decide is "when they elect the headmin"

[TheBibleMelts]

i like to share, so here's where our draft is right now. (it was still being hammered out when vekter posted above, thus not being able to share it) overall goals here are to enable players to use their judgement based on IC reasons for escalation, as opposed to following an OOC flowchart of 'X means I get to do Y'. too many choices were being decided based off of a strict interpretation of said flowchart, as opposed to needing to be able to justify it IC'ly through the lens of each situation as a unique interaction.

additionally, we wanted it to feel more natural to people who may not have the rules memorized - you shouldn't need to dig through every clause in the rules tab to determine the minutiae on how you're allowed to get back at that dude who pissed you off. you should simply be able to justify it IC'y, if needed, in a way that isn't "my character is insane".

i wanted to maintain the spirit of the old escalation policy, but loosen the shackles a little on both player agency to escalate, and administrations ability to call someone out for acting on/initiating an escalation without plausible reasoning.

Escalation Policy

We allow and encourage players to solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner, as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1.

It does not strictly apply when the other player is an antagonist, instead see Rule 4.

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning, using judgement based on how threatened they are/how bothersome somebody is being to determine the severity of their actions/reactions where it would make sense from an IC perspective.

The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it.

If one player kills another, the conflict should be at a stage to necessitate the killing - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the 'victor' if able.

If you are incapacitated in a fight and the other player makes an effort to get you treated, or the conflict is otherwise ended by the station authorities, you are expected to require a valid IC reason to initiate it once again. Verbal de-escalation should also be respected within reason.

[Pandarsenic]

Might be worth adding a bit about conduct when security gets involved

[sinfulbliss]

Looks neat, a few questions:

We allow and encourage players to solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner, as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1.

what do you mean by “an exception to rule 1”?

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning

Does this mean instigating conflicts for no reason, e.g. “what are you lookin at pinhead,” shoving someone walking by in the hall, etc., are off limits since they don’t have good IC reasoning?

Previous escalation rules would allow instigating conflicts without a valid reason, so long as it didn’t interfere with their ability to do their job, and it kept a lot of nonantag conflicts on the table that I’d worry would now be considered rulebreaking.

The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it

Could you clarify what this means? One could imagine minor events inciting conflicts that end up with a very extreme end result—like one party killed—if in the course of the fight things, well, escalate (for lack of a better word).

About the rest — what would “necessitate” a killing in your view? Killing is almost always technically unnecessary, even when deserved. And I notice there’s no policy about round removal. Are you expected to bring someone to medbay several times after multiple lethal encounters?

[conrad]

About the rest — what would “necessitate” a killing in your view? Killing is almost always technically unnecessary, even when deserved. And I notice there’s no policy about round removal. Are you expected to bring someone to medbay several times after multiple lethal encounters?

Killing and RR'ing is covered in rule 4. You're not supposed to kill someone unless they're acting like an antag.

A thing to bear in mind, that was a lot of the basis for this draft during elephant tusk edifice discussions is that escalation shouldn't replace other rules. It should be just a slimy tendril of rule 1.

Hulk, during those discussions, made the case that escalation should just be a level of clarification to allow for non-antag conflicts. IIRC, and Hulk can correct me here, the RR clause of escalation was always intended to be an extension of rule 4 (if they come back again, you can assume they're an antag, meaning you can RR them).

[conrad]

Doubleposting 'cos I don't wanna edit my post again:

The reasoning behind the draft is to shape the text to its original intention without necessitating knowing all the context behind the creation of the policy.

Newer players and newer admins, from what I understood of the those who wrote and implemented the policy, are interpreting it incorrectly as it is right now. My opinion is because there's missing context from the original draft, which was available only in admin channels on 2019, the implementation, which was in 2021, and the policy thread you linked, which is from 2022. Clarification is not on the actual rules page.

The spirit of the policy is to remain the same. The wording TBM is proposing is to clarify the original intent on a community that might not have looked into the original context (and let's be frank here, few people read the rules anyway, even fewer have a forum account. We should help them with the former, and not have them be punished for the latter).

[kieth4]

i like to share, so here's where our draft is right now. (it was still being hammered out when vekter posted above, thus not being able to share it) overall goals here are to enable players to use their judgement based on IC reasons for escalation, as opposed to following an OOC flowchart of 'X means I get to do Y'. too many choices were being decided based off of a strict interpretation of said flowchart, as opposed to needing to be able to justify it IC'ly through the lens of each situation as a unique interaction.

additionally, we wanted it to feel more natural to people who may not have the rules memorized - you shouldn't need to dig through every clause in the rules tab to determine the minutiae on how you're allowed to get back at that dude who pissed you off. you should simply be able to justify it IC'y, if needed, in a way that isn't "my character is insane".

i wanted to maintain the spirit of the old escalation policy, but loosen the shackles a little on both player agency to escalate, and administrations ability to call someone out for acting on/initiating an escalation without plausible reasoning.

Escalation Policy

We allow and encourage players to solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner, as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1.

It does not strictly apply when the other player is an antagonist, instead see Rule 4.

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning, using judgement based on how threatened they are/how bothersome somebody is being to determine the severity of their actions/reactions where it would make sense from an IC perspective.

The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it.

If one player kills another, the conflict should be at a stage to necessitate the killing - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the 'victor' if able.

If you are incapacitated in a fight and the other player makes an effort to get you treated, or the conflict is otherwise ended by the station authorities, you are expected to require a valid IC reason to initiate it once again. Verbal de-escalation should also be respected within reason.

Looks epic

[sinfulbliss]

RR clause of escalation was always intended to be an extension of rule 4 (if they come back again, you can assume they're an antag, meaning you can RR them).

This part is a little hard for me to understand. In most scenarios when someone comes back again after I kill or crit them, I know they aren’t an antag actually — they are upset at how the last conflict went down, or are getting revenge for a perceived wrong, or any number of things, none of which would necessarily lead me to believe they’re an antag.

Many admins have a fairly strict view of Rule 4 — no antag gear? Conflict escalated for a somewhat understandable reason? There’s no reason to expect them to be antag… But there’s definitely a reason to kill someone that you find yourself needing to crit multiple times throughout the round regardless of that.

[conrad]

RR clause of escalation was always intended to be an extension of rule 4 (if they come back again, you can assume they're an antag, meaning you can RR them).

This part is a little hard for me to understand. In most scenarios when someone comes back again after I kill or crit them, I know they aren’t an antag actually — they are upset at how the last conflict went down, or are getting revenge for a perceived wrong, or any number of things, none of which would necessarily lead me to believe they’re an antag.

Many admins have a fairly strict view of Rule 4 — no antag gear? Conflict escalated for a somewhat understandable reason? There’s no reason to expect them to be antag… But there’s definitely a reason to kill someone that you find yourself needing to crit multiple times throughout the round regardless of that.

Took Hulk and Timber explaining it to me like 5 times for me to understand it too, dw. fwiw, if someone keeps coming back after you critted them and left them on medbay, with or without the escalation policy, you could treat them like an antag. Does this make sense?

Escalation isn't supposed to replace or complement other rules. It's supposed to clarify rules 1 and 4 in a way that lets non-antags enter conflict. That's the dissonance that exists with the current interpretation from the community, which is IMO very much fixed with the Xemo's draft.

[sinfulbliss]

RR clause of escalation was always intended to be an extension of rule 4 (if they come back again, you can assume they're an antag, meaning you can RR them).

This part is a little hard for me to understand. In most scenarios when someone comes back again after I kill or crit them, I know they aren’t an antag actually — they are upset at how the last conflict went down, or are getting revenge for a perceived wrong, or any number of things, none of which would necessarily lead me to believe they’re an antag.

Many admins have a fairly strict view of Rule 4 — no antag gear? Conflict escalated for a somewhat understandable reason? There’s no reason to expect them to be antag… But there’s definitely a reason to kill someone that you find yourself needing to crit multiple times throughout the round regardless of that.

Took Hulk and Timber explaining it to me like 5 times for me to understand it too, dw. fwiw, if someone keeps coming back after you critted them and left them on medbay, with or without the escalation policy, you could treat them like an antag. Does this make sense?

It does make sense. I’m just not sure I see the explicit connection between rule 4 and escalation rules. Rule 4 to me was an exception to escalation policy — if they’re an antag, escalation rules go out the window. They don’t have to follow escalation against you as an antag and nor do you to them.

Escalation isn't supposed to replace or complement other rules. It's supposed to clarify rules 1 and 4 in a way that lets non-antags enter conflict. That's the dissonance that exists with the current interpretation from the community, which is IMO very much fixed with the Xemo's draft.

Right, I suppose I’m not sure I understand how it exactly clarifies Rule 1. Escalating a conflict can involve two players, neither of whom are objectively “being a dick,” ending up trying to kill each other because of the slow ramping up of a natural in-game conflict. I’m interested how exactly Rule 1 comes into that though.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

Escalation Policy

We allow and encourage players to solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner, as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1.

It does not strictly apply when the other player is an antagonist, instead see Rule 4.

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning, using judgement based on how threatened they are/how bothersome somebody is being to determine the severity of their actions/reactions where it would make sense from an IC perspective.

The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it.

If one player kills another, the conflict should be at a stage to necessitate the killing - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the 'victor' if able.

If you are incapacitated in a fight and the other player makes an effort to get you treated, or the conflict is otherwise ended by the station authorities, you are expected to require a valid IC reason to initiate it once again. Verbal de-escalation should also be respected within reason.

I got some pretty instant questions just from a brief glance

1) What does "solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1" actually mean? Rule 1 covers disrupting/ruining peoples rounds without a reason / being a shithead to people OOC. Rule 1 wouldn't prevent a good faith resolving of legitimate disagreements/conflict in the first place, so I dont understand this line. What am I missing?

2) "The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it." this is a weird thing to put in escalation policy, literally the policy that covers how fights are allowed to intensify and get worse. It probbably isnt the intent but it looks a lot like its saying that if a fight 'escalates too far' that people would be judged based on whatever started the fight and whether how the fight ended is a proportionate response to that. Which it never is in any case where people are consulting the "admin he punched me can i break his legs flowchart" policy?

3) Always hated the rule that defenders have to put down what theyre doing to take attackers to medbay but its clear and consistent with current policy i guess.

4) Cant help but notice that this policy seemingly makes it no longer allowed to round remove someone who keeps coming back for more, and they wont get in trouble as long as they still have an IC grievance.


I'm also not sure how good a review of policy "It only took two of the most charismatic senior members of the community multiple attempts to explain in person to me how the new concepts actually work" is.

[TheBibleMelts]

Escalation Policy

We allow and encourage players to solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner, as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1.

It does not strictly apply when the other player is an antagonist, instead see Rule 4.

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning, using judgement based on how threatened they are/how bothersome somebody is being to determine the severity of their actions/reactions where it would make sense from an IC perspective.

The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it.

If one player kills another, the conflict should be at a stage to necessitate the killing - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the 'victor' if able.

If you are incapacitated in a fight and the other player makes an effort to get you treated, or the conflict is otherwise ended by the station authorities, you are expected to require a valid IC reason to initiate it once again. Verbal de-escalation should also be respected within reason.

I got some pretty instant questions just from a brief glance

1) What does "solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1" actually mean? Rule 1 covers disrupting/ruining peoples rounds without a reason / being a shithead to people OOC. Rule 1 wouldn't prevent a good faith resolving of legitimate disagreements/conflict in the first place, so I dont understand this line. What am I missing?

2) "The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it." this is a weird thing to put in escalation policy, literally the policy that covers how fights are allowed to intensify and get worse. It probbably isnt the intent but it looks a lot like its saying that if a fight 'escalates too far' that people would be judged based on whatever started the fight and whether how the fight ended is a proportionate response to that. Which it never is in any case where people are consulting the "admin he punched me can i break his legs flowchart" policy?

3) Always hated the rule that defenders have to put down what theyre doing to take attackers to medbay but its clear and consistent with current policy i guess.

4) Cant help but notice that this policy seemingly makes it no longer allowed to round remove someone who keeps coming back for more, and they wont get in trouble as long as they still have an IC grievance.


I'm also not sure how good a review of policy "It only took two of the most charismatic senior members of the community multiple attempts to explain in person to me how the new concepts actually work" is.

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1) What does "solve in-character conflicts in a good-faith and rules-compliant manner as a properly roleplayed exception to Rule 1" actually mean? Rule 1 covers disrupting/ruining peoples rounds without a reason / being a shithead to people OOC. Rule 1 wouldn't prevent a good faith resolving of legitimate disagreements/conflict in the first place, so I dont understand this line. What am I missing?

that wording has stuck around since the very first version of the draft, i do agree it might be re-iteration of the obvious, but recognize the necessity of that sometimes too so it's stuck around. i wouldn't be opposed to trimming a little bit off of there, though.

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2) "The end-result of an escalated conflict should have an understandable IC resolution based on what incited it." this is a weird thing to put in escalation policy, literally the policy that covers how fights are allowed to intensify and get worse. It probbably isnt the intent but it looks a lot like its saying that if a fight 'escalates too far' that people would be judged based on whatever started the fight and whether how the fight ended is a proportionate response to [i]that[/i]. Which it never is in any case where people are consulting the "admin he punched me can i break his legs flowchart" policy?

this asks, more or less, that whatever starts a conflict be worth how it ends up progressing - it's expected that if you're starting a conflict with somebody over something petty, that you take care to watch the line in how far you're taking it. i'll see if this can be worded in a more natural way.

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3) Always hated the rule that defenders have to put down what theyre doing to take attackers to medbay but its clear and consistent with current policy i guess.

i get that, but it's where the forced part of acting in good sportsmanship comes in play.

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4) Cant help but notice that this policy seemingly makes it no longer allowed to round remove someone who keeps coming back for more, and they wont get in trouble as long as they still have an IC grievance.

the idea here is that if something is getting to the point where one player feels that somebody else has acted in such a way to deserve being RR'd and rule 4 isn't taking over as the 'act like an antagonist, get treated like one' clause, something has gone horribly wrong with one of the affected parties conduct and we're in the territory where rule 1 is being broken, which should be addressed as a rule 1 issue.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

snip for mega length

Thanks for clearing all these questions up, the explanations for 2 and 4 in particular were very helpful.

[TheBibleMelts]

here's some cleaned up writing, with another crack at clarifying the line dorsidarf asked about.

You may have, and solve in-character conflicts in a properly roleplayed and good-faith exception to Rule 1.

It does not strictly apply when the other player is an antagonist, instead see Rule 4.

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning, with judgement based on how threatened they are, or how disruptive somebody is being to determine the severity of their actions/reactions where it would make explainable sense to do so IC'ly.

The result of a conflict should have a progression and resolution based on assumed sanity of both parties, good sportsmanship, and what initially incited it.

If one player kills another, the conflict should be at a stage to necessitate the killing - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the 'victor' if able.

If you are incapacitated in a fight and the other player makes an effort to get you treated, or the conflict is otherwise ended by the station authorities, you are expected to require a valid IC reason to initiate it once again. Verbal de-escalation should also be respected.

[Constellado]

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning, with judgement based on how threatened they are, or how disruptive somebody is being to determine the severity of their actions/reactions where it would make explainable sense to do so IC'ly.

This sentence is very long and needs to be chopped up a bit, I find it hard to read.

Why is rule 1 to be ignored when the policy applies here? Is this because fighting is normally against rule 1?

I like the way it is worded otherwise, and makes more sense to me compared to current escalation policy, and is closer to how I have been seeing admins enforce it recently.

[TheBibleMelts]

A non-antagonist may start conflict with another using good in-character reasoning, with judgement based on how threatened they are, or how disruptive somebody is being to determine the severity of their actions/reactions where it would make explainable sense to do so IC'ly.

This sentence is very long and needs to be chopped up a bit, I find it hard to read.

Why is rule 1 to be ignored when the policy applies here? Is this because fighting is normally against rule 1?

I like the way it is worded otherwise, and makes more sense to me compared to current escalation policy, and is closer to how I have been seeing admins enforce it recently.

sure, I'll take a look at that line later. for your other question - rule 1, taken at complete face value, would indeed make starting most any conflict a bonk worthy offense. but that wouldn't make for a proper mask for real antagonists, nor would it be very fun for players to be so tightly constrained as to never allow for any emergent gameplay over IC disputes to arise based on the story being played out.

[Boot]

this asks, more or less, that whatever starts a conflict be worth how it ends up progressing - it's expected that if you're starting a conflict with somebody over something petty, that you take care to watch the line in how far you're taking it. i'll see if this can be worded in a more natural way.

I'm really curious about how'd this go down if implemented. Let's run a scenario.

We got two assistants, one hacking into tech storage for those juicy insuls. One runs in and tries to grab them off the table only to get shoved down by the other so he can take them.
If this leads to death who are we saying ought to have the say in if it's worth it or not. If assistant 1 kills 2 over the gloves being taken is that the fault of 2 because he shoved first? Is it the admin who sees this who will be the arbiters of what is the worth of an assistants life?

[dendydoom]

RR clause of escalation was always intended to be an extension of rule 4 (if they come back again, you can assume they're an antag, meaning you can RR them).

This part is a little hard for me to understand. In most scenarios when someone comes back again after I kill or crit them, I know they aren’t an antag actually — they are upset at how the last conflict went down, or are getting revenge for a perceived wrong, or any number of things, none of which would necessarily lead me to believe they’re an antag.

Many admins have a fairly strict view of Rule 4 — no antag gear? Conflict escalated for a somewhat understandable reason? There’s no reason to expect them to be antag… But there’s definitely a reason to kill someone that you find yourself needing to crit multiple times throughout the round regardless of that.

i agree with this. a lot of the direction of the rewrite appears to be based on understanding someone's IC motivations for their actions, yet this wording of rule 4 relies on a mix of interpretations of mechanics, not IC motivation. i think perhaps it shouldn't rely on that.

i like the direction of the rewrite it seems very intuitive but as i said in adminbus i think it will take some discussions and some headmin rulings for some edge cases that will inevitably appear, but eventually it's gonna lead to a better gameplay mindset and better rulings.

[TheBibleMelts]

here's another take for review.

Non-antagonists are allowed to get into conflicts with other non-antagonists with good in-character reasoning or when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.

Use judgement based on how threatened you are, or how disruptive somebody is being, to determine if the severity of your actions/reactions makes explainable sense IC.

The decision to escalate to violence should have good reasoning based on how naturally the conflict has progressed towards it from a grounded, IC perspective. If a conflict escalates to violence, any meaningful break in that conflict ends that escalation.

A conflict should not become a murder between two regular crewmembers - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the standing party.

[sinfulbliss]

here's another take for review.

Non-antagonists are allowed to get into conflicts with other non-antagonists with good in-character reasoning or when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.

Use judgement based on how threatened you are, or how disruptive somebody is being, to determine if the severity of your actions/reactions makes explainable sense IC.

The decision to escalate to violence should have good reasoning based on how naturally the conflict has progressed towards it from a grounded, IC perspective. If a conflict escalates to violence, any meaningful break in that conflict ends that escalation.

A conflict should not become a murder between two regular crewmembers - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the standing party.

It’s impossible to know whether the other person is a “regular crewmember” from an IC perspective, so putting this in the rules governing how to behave IC doesn’t make much sense. I understand the goal — we don’t want nonantags murdering other nonantags over petty conflicts — but this creates a very strong layer of protection for antags, who are now protected by the rules from being killed by nonantags unless they’re obviously valid and thus fall under rule 4.

My point is basically just that only allowing murder for nonantags under rule 4, but no where in actual escalation, puts limits not only on how nonantags can treat other nonantags, but how they can engage with everyone, including an actual antag that just lacks a “valid” sticker.

Additionally, there are plenty of IC conflicts leading to murder that “make explainable sense IC” AND “are appropriately roleplayed,” so blanket banning any form of nonantag escalation leading to murder seems very extreme.

If a conflict escalates to violence, any meaningful break in that conflict ends that escalation.

This also seems too constricting on natural IC conflicts. If someone steals something from you, but then runs off and you don’t see him for 10 minutes, this clause suggests you wouldn’t be able to continue such a conflict because there was a “meaningful break.” Lapses in time don’t right the wrongs that happen to your character, so I’m not sure why they’d need to force-end conflicts.

Overall though a lot cleaner than the first iteration, starting to look good.

[Striders13]

Thank fuck it's getting shorter.

A conflict should not become a murder between two regular crewmembers - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the standing party.

Don't like this at all.
Murder makes IC sense in a ton of situations. Making it so you can only murder antags (or suspected antags) is really silly.
Next, if a dude breaks into my department and is being annoying, I don't want to haul his ass all the way to medbay when I throw him out. Maybe change it to "must be treated or taken to med (where reasonable)"

[Boot]

Non-antagonists are allowed to get into conflicts with other non-antagonists with good in-character reasoning or when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.

Use judgement based on how threatened you are, or how disruptive somebody is being, to determine if the severity of your actions/reactions makes explainable sense IC.

The decision to escalate to violence should have good reasoning based on how naturally the conflict has progressed towards it from a grounded, IC perspective. If a conflict escalates to violence, any meaningful break in that conflict ends that escalation.

A conflict should not become a murder between two regular crewmembers - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the standing party.

Alright I've been thinking about this for alittle bit and I really can't shake this feeling that this is just coming from a place of trying to nix LRP all together. I think I can put this feeling into better words here so lets give it a shot.

What you are doing here is not getting rid of the flowchart, you are obscuring it. Instead of mapping out something that all players can look at for a way manage escalation policy you are saying that escalation is fine so long as you don't failrp. A big issue that we're gonna run into here is that we're gonna see cases where different admins are going to have different ideas of what constitutes "appropriately roleplay". I feel like this really only ends in one of two ways. Either players gotta worry that the stick-up-their-butt admins are gonna come on and bwoink them for shoving someone in the halls or the policy discussion will be filled up with threads figuring out what failrp even is. However if the latter happens then we're back on the issue you set out to get rid of here where now you'll have people just studying the new escalation flowchart.

If I understand your idea correctly with wanting a more vibes based system where "does this feel right?" is the bigger question then I can admire the goal but I don't think it leads to a good outcome.

[BrianBackslide]

Newer players and newer admins, from what I understood of the those who wrote and implemented the policy, are interpreting it incorrectly as it is right now. My opinion is because there's missing context from the original draft, which was available only in admin channels on 2019, the implementation, which was in 2021, and the policy thread you linked, which is from 2022. Clarification is not on the actual rules page.

If the escalation policy changes from a hard checklist to what the admin deems as 'appropriate roleplay', wouldn't that result in MORE admins interpreting escalation policy incorrectly? How would players defend themselves in ban appeals in that case?

A conflict should not become a murder between two regular crewmembers - accidents do still happen, however. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the standing party.

Dangerous waters there. Per rule 4, on MRP or LRP, an antag can absolutely kill me for opening up escalation. With this, I know I am absolutely safe despite the level of shittery I do to another crewmember so long as they aren't an antag. In fact if they do kill me, I know it's either ahelpable OR it's a valid tell.

Further, I've had plenty enough instances of players who just don't know when to quit and have to be dragged to medbay four, five plus times. If I can't kill, then to what degree can I get creative in my punishments?

[TypicalRig]

I'm not sure on the wording, but I think something to consider with the rewrite is something should be added to specifically include roles with higher metaprotections that people can't escalate regularly against (heads of staff, silicons, and security). I've seen so many situations where people with these roles make extremely petty conflicts with players, the players successfully retaliate against them, but because they're a highly targetted role people without the full context side with them on the basis of them "being trustworthy due to their role" and it leads to a weird situation where the player who was wronged is the only one punished, while admins seeing it as an IC issue despite agreeing that the player had the right to retaliate against said higher value role.

Maybe a higher bar for starting conflict if you belong to one of these groups? I think it's fair to say that if you're benefitting from higher access and higher power, you shouldn't be fucking with randoms.

[sinfulbliss]

A big issue that we're gonna run into here is that we're gonna see cases where different admins are going to have different ideas of what constitutes "appropriately roleplay".

So, from how I read it, this is an OR statement: “with good in-character reasoning OR when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.” So if you have good IC reasoning, like the dude is wordlessly trying to stun you, you don’t have to roleplay like an idiot while getting owned, because you have good IC reasoning to escalate.

The issue would come with instigating conflicts. E.g. wouldn’t shoe theft be disallowed under this rule? If it’s not roleplayed, and your character had no good IC reason to steal someone’s shoes — wouldn’t that be against escalation? And random shovefights too — which we have already seen some admins (like Dendy) are supportive of, whereas others (like Vekter) are very much against. That’s a fairly massive margin for differential enforcement.

This concern is handled in current escalation rules with its own OR clause: “you may begin a conflict . . . with valid reason OR if it does not excessively interfere with their ability to do their job.” This ingenious little sentence protected minor conflicts like shoe theft and shovefights while simultaneously requiring valid reasoning for larger conflicts.

[dendydoom]

I'm not sure on the wording, but I think something to consider with the rewrite is something should be added to specifically include roles with higher metaprotections that people can't escalate regularly against (heads of staff, silicons, and security). I've seen so many situations where people with these roles make extremely petty conflicts with players, the players successfully retaliate against them, but because they're a highly targetted role people without the full context side with them on the basis of them "being trustworthy due to their role" and it leads to a weird situation where the player who was wronged is the only one punished, while admins seeing it as an IC issue despite agreeing that the player had the right to retaliate against said higher value role.

Maybe a higher bar for starting conflict if you belong to one of these groups? I think it's fair to say that if you're benefitting from higher access and higher power, you shouldn't be fucking with randoms.

i'll interject this quickly because i'm scared of derailing a very good and productive discussion:

this is how i've tried to approach it on mrp to mixed results. there is already a headmin ruling (from timber) asking admins to consider the real, tangible options available to a player who is being targeted by non-antag command/sec conflict, and it posits a lot of good points and asks a lot of good questions for admins to use when they're considering a situation.

really, though, at the end of the day when it's an IC situation, picking a fight with someone who is in a position of privilege and authority is probably going to end badly for you - it's unfair, yes, it's cruel, yes, but it's also quite realistic all things considered... this is why they're held to a higher standard, at least on mrp. if they're going to try to portray that shitheel member of command who's a real hardass on their department, then they're expected to do so in order to create a story out of it, rather than messing with people wordlessly or starting obscenely over the top conflicts for reasons that aren't apparent ICly. this is the evidence i look for when i'm considering these situations: the more of a bread crumb trail there is of IC actions that support why an outcome occurred, then the more i'm going to lean toward "this is valid ICly because it makes sense in an IC context"

if you're making an effort to play your character believably and respond to external stimuli consistently, and the evidence of that is apparent in the game (a combination of things you say and things you do) then that breadcrumb trail becomes more apparent and the more i'll want to support what you're trying to do ICly. this is how, in my book, you get away with playing an asshole character that starts fights with people all the time. beating someone up can be a story or it can be clicking on a sprite in a clunky video game. the more effort you put in to turn it from the latter into the former the more i'll vouch for you.

[conrad]

If the escalation policy changes from a hard checklist to what the admin deems as 'appropriate roleplay', wouldn't that result in MORE admins interpreting escalation policy incorrectly? How would players defend themselves in ban appeals in that case?

Here's where I'm gonna blow your mind. Escalation was never meant to be interpreted as a hard checklist or as a flowchart as I've been it being called before. It was always meant to be a pulse check, an extension to rules 1 and 4, and not a rule on its own.

I'm not making this up. When I said "'cos right now it's a checklist" the words from the writer of the policy were "No, it's not".

There's also a lot of talk about the issue of decodifying something that isn't supposed to be so hard codified, so I'll just reply to this:

It’s impossible to know whether the other person is a “regular crewmember” from an IC perspective

Untrue, crewmembers are both allowed to know about antags and have to game knowledge. If you a tell of a person doing antag stuff you can assume they are an antag just as much as now.

Just like it is now.

so putting this in the rules governing how to behave IC doesn’t make much sense.

What I really urge you guys to do is to go from "This rule bad" to "Why this rule here"

It's not there to govern your RP, it's there to remind you you're not supposed to kick someone seventeen times after they've gone to crit 'cos they broke into your department and stole some insuls.

[dendydoom]

A big issue that we're gonna run into here is that we're gonna see cases where different admins are going to have different ideas of what constitutes "appropriately roleplay".

So, from how I read it, this is an OR statement: “with good in-character reasoning OR when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.” So if you have good IC reasoning, like the dude is wordlessly trying to stun you, you don’t have to roleplay like an idiot while getting owned, because you have good IC reasoning to escalate.

The issue would come with instigating conflicts. E.g. wouldn’t shoe theft be disallowed under this rule? If it’s not roleplayed, and your character had no good IC reason to steal someone’s shoes — wouldn’t that be against escalation? And random shovefights too — which we have already seen some admins (like Dendy) are supportive of, whereas others (like Vekter) are very much against. That’s a fairly massive margin for differential enforcement.

This concern is handled in current escalation rules with its own OR clause: “you may begin a conflict . . . with valid reason OR if it does not excessively interfere with their ability to do their job.” This ingenious little sentence protected minor conflicts like shoe theft and shovefights while simultaneously requiring valid reasoning for larger conflicts.

in all honesty i don't think there will ever be a situation where we have total coherence across all rulings, the game is too complicated and admins have independence and autonomy in their reasoning and interpretations to make rulings. trying to assess the absolutely dizzying amount of information that comprises even simple situations in this game and making a clear and concise ruling that matches up perfectly to a rigid ruleset is, in my opinion, simply not feasible. i don't think i've ever made a ruling where there is not some level of compromise or leeway shown because the context and details of a situation don't match up to rules as written and it would be unfair to the player to apply them so rigidly.

the rules are more for players than they are for admins because they're a generalized set of expectations that they can use to determine what the likeliest outcome will be from when an admin looks at a situation. admins already know the score: we're just trying to curate a roleplaying game so that good faith and enjoyable rounds can be had by a very large number of people playing with each other at the same time. if the rules help to achieve that, then we enforce them. if the rules get in the way of that, then we throw them in the trash and disregard them.

this is why i sincerely believe we'll have a few months after a big new policy change like this where we'll see edge cases crop up and shonky rulings made that will need to be deliberated on by the community and headmins will need to make rulings on it. obviously the wording should be as clear and concise as possible, but ultimately it will take time for the "spirit" of what the rule is trying to accomplish to come out and be understood by the wider community, rather than regarding it in a rigidly codified way.

[iwishforducks]

im late because i really hate this thread and there’s too many words for me to care to read it all, but I really do think escalation policy as it currently stands is in its best place. It’s pretty simple all things considered, and has clear cut steps to follow. (fights escalating to violence is severe, and the victor of the fight must see to it that the loser gets medical treatment.) which is something i think is missing in all of these proposed rewrites. “escalation must have IC reasoning” just really muddies the waters. while, yes, this is a roleplaying game, and yes, people should be following IC reasoning, escalation policy being so simple to follow made it really easy to already follow it with IC reasoning. if someone bad-faiths escalation, they still have to see to it that the loser gets medical treatment. i think that you guys are blowing the problem out of proportion.

[Shellton(Mario)]

Am happy as long as this makes it impossible for someone to murder me, drag my body around medical making it harder to rez me and to remove my ears and flush them down disposals after they let me into their department after they saw me tiding in and for the admin to mark it as ic issue.

PS: Am taking about one person taking up all these actions collectively against one person not someone doing one of these actions

[Jacquerel]

Am happy as long as this makes it impossible for someone to murder me, drag my body around medical making it harder to rez me and to remove my ears and flush them down disposals after they let me into their department after they saw me tiding in and for the admin to mark it as ic issue.

PS: Am taking about one person taking up all these actions collectively against one person not someone doing one of these actions

sadly no set of rules will prevent actions occasionally not being judged appropriately in the moment nor will they prevent players holding them as a grudge for the rest of time, or make it a useful thing to post

[sinfulbliss]

It’s impossible to know whether the other person is a “regular crewmember” from an IC perspective

Untrue, crewmembers are both allowed to know about antags and have to game knowledge. If you a tell of a person doing antag stuff you can assume they are an antag just as much as now.

In the vast majority of your interactions with people in the game, you will be unaware as to whether or not they’re an antag. My point is not that you “can’t know it,” it’s that you don’t know it from an IC perspective, so putting into the rules “regular crewmembers” presumes a level of IC knowledge you don’t, and can never, fully have.

Not everyone is going to be a bloodred hardsuit ultravalid with an esword out.

so putting this in the rules governing how to behave IC doesn’t make much sense.

What I really urge you guys to do is to go from "This rule bad" to "Why this rule here"

It's not there to govern your RP, it's there to remind you you're not supposed to kick someone seventeen times after they've gone to crit 'cos they broke into your department and stole some insuls.

Did you read my whole post? I never said “this rule bad,” I’ve offered reasons why I think it isn’t going to work very well in escalation rules. If you’d like to reply to the reasons I’ve offered that’s fine, but summarizing what I said as “rule bad” is disingenuous and doesn’t add anything to the conversation frankly.

[TheBibleMelts]

It’s impossible to know whether the other person is a “regular crewmember” from an IC perspective

Untrue, crewmembers are both allowed to know about antags and have to game knowledge. If you a tell of a person doing antag stuff you can assume they are an antag just as much as now.

In the vast majority of your interactions with people in the game, you will be unaware as to whether or not they’re an antag. My point is not that you “can’t know it,” it’s that you don’t know it from an IC perspective, so putting into the rules “regular crewmembers” presumes a level of IC knowledge you don’t, and can never, fully have.

Not everyone is going to be a bloodred hardsuit ultravalid with an esword out.

so putting this in the rules governing how to behave IC doesn’t make much sense.

What I really urge you guys to do is to go from "This rule bad" to "Why this rule here"

It's not there to govern your RP, it's there to remind you you're not supposed to kick someone seventeen times after they've gone to crit 'cos they broke into your department and stole some insuls.

Did you read my whole post? I never said “this rule bad,” I’ve offered reasons why I think it isn’t going to work very well in escalation rules. If you’d like to reply to the reasons I’ve offered that’s fine, but summarizing what I said as “rule bad” is disingenuous and doesn’t add anything to the conversation frankly.

this new policy is meant to compliment and fit in more neatly with rule 1 as a whole, with some of your concerns already carved out within its precedents.

Code: Select all

Random murders are not acceptable nor is the killing of other players for poor or little reasoning such as ‘My character is insane’. Each unjustified kill is normally met with one 24 hour ban.

Unprovoked grief (occasionally known as greytiding), repeated cases of minor unprovoked grief, and unprovoked grief targeted towards specific players or groups (i.e. metagrudging) fall under rule 1. Admins may follow up on grief with allowing the affected parties to ignore normal escalation policy or measures such as warnings or bans.

Players who attempt to break into the captain's office, head of personnel's office, or the bridge at or near roundstart for no legitimate reason put themselves at risk for being legitimately killed by the captain, heads of staff, or security.

You may defend your workplace from trespassers who damage or steal property within that space with significantly greater force than elsewhere. If someone is severely disruptive and returns after ejected, this opens them up to "fun" of the creative workplace death variety.

taking the contradictions out of escalation policy and letting rule 1 determine the validity of what happens seems like it would make for a less frustrating process for everybody.

[sinfulbliss]

taking the contradictions out of escalation policy and letting rule 1 determine the validity of what happens seems like it would make for a less frustrating process for everybody.

I agree, but if we’re using Rule 1 to determine the validity of what happens, can’t you just take out the last paragraph? It reads just as good if not better:

Non-antagonists are allowed to get into conflicts with other non-antagonists with good in-character reasoning or when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.

Use judgement based on how threatened you are, or how disruptive somebody is being, to determine if the severity of your actions/reactions makes explainable sense IC.

The decision to escalate to violence should have good reasoning based on how naturally the conflict has progressed towards it from a grounded, IC perspective. If a conflict escalates to violence, any meaningful break in that conflict ends that escalation.

Because if you let rule 1 determine the validity of the outcome, combined with the clause “use judgment . . . to determine if the severity of your actions/reactions makes explainable sense IC,” doesn’t that cover essentially everything you’d need to be worried about? Without explicitly forbidding murder and other concerns some people have mentioned.

[kieth4]

Can someone else speak in policy bus on discord I am so fucking alone guys

[TheBibleMelts]

Can someone else speak in policy bus on discord I am so fucking alone guys

a slightly more beefed up version in response to the policybus convos

Non-antagonists are allowed to get into conflicts with other non-antagonists with good in-character reasoning or when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.

Use judgement based on how threatened you are, or how disruptive somebody is being, to determine if the severity of your actions/reactions makes explainable sense IC.

The decision to escalate to violence should have good reasoning based on how naturally the conflict has progressed towards it from a grounded, IC perspective. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the standing party.

If escalation to violence requires good reasoning, escalation to murder requires GREAT reasoning, such as rule 1 precedents, or rule 4. If you are incapacitated in a fight and the other player makes an effort to get you treated, or the conflict is otherwise ended by the station authorities, you are expected to require a valid IC reason beyond 'bruised ego' to re-initiate it.

[TheBibleMelts]

went live today as follows, i'd like to leave this thread open for people to share their experiences or any issues that might crop up with the new version for a bit.

Non-antagonists are allowed to get into conflicts with other non-antagonists with good in-character reasoning or when the conflict is appropriately roleplayed.

Use judgement based on how threatened you are, or how disruptive somebody is being, to determine if your reaction is proportionate.

The decision to escalate to violence should have reasoning based on how the conflict has progressed towards it from a grounded, IC perspective. Incapacitated players must be treated or taken to the medbay by the standing party where reasonable.

If escalation to violence requires good reasoning, escalation to murder requires GREAT reasoning, such as rule 1 precedents, or rule 4. If you are incapacitated in a fight and the other player makes an effort to get you treated, or the conflict is otherwise ended meaningfully, you are expected to require a valid IC reason beyond 'bruised ego' to re-initiate it.

[iwishforducks]

removing the clause for round removal for 2nd time escalations is no bueno i think

[TheBibleMelts]

removing the clause for round removal for 2nd time escalations is no bueno i think

it's the part i'm most curious to see the results of. i like to think that if folks are following rule 1, there should be no instance where a full round-removal is warranted from a properly escalated and played out conflict.

[Vekter]

removing the clause for round removal for 2nd time escalations is no bueno i think

The general idea seems to be that if people are consistently coming back to start fights over and over again they're violating rule 1 because they have no reason to do so besides being a dick. The conflict should resolve itself after someone has been crit or the fight ends; there's no reason someone should come back if they're a non-antag (save for very specific IC reasons).

I like this policy because I feel like the game is healthier when the rules push people towards organic, natural interactions instead of functioning as a checklist you need to tick off before you're allowed to make the person horizontal again.

[sinfulbliss]

removing the clause for round removal for 2nd time escalations is no bueno i think

The general idea seems to be that if people are consistently coming back to start fights over and over again they're violating rule 1 because they have no reason to do so besides being a dick. The conflict should resolve itself after someone has been crit or the fight ends; there's no reason someone should come back if they're a non-antag (save for very specific IC reasons).

“You are violating rule 1” does nothing for my character IC when he’s forced to repeatedly fight someone who refuses to let it go. Players should always have a sensible IC path to take that isn’t “hide in a locker and ahelp,” and that should exist in escalation policy IMO.

They might have a legitimate reason too, e.g. they think I have something that’s theirs, or they think I’m an antag based on misinformation. Both reasons where it’s not necessarily rule 1 breaking for them to constantly re-initiate the conflict.

[MooCow12]

Conflict does not just magically end just because one party stopped hitting the other and allowed them to get healed due to arbitrary meta restrictions, it may start to degrade but it never goes below (this person wronged me and I need to find a reasonable way to right it) *reasonable can literally be instant escalation under certain conditions like knowing that they have backup / sec on speed dial and has been abusing that fact whenever you try to nonlethally deal with it.

If someone has done something that fucks over my ability to play the game (steal id/credits (i need credits due to lathe tax), heirloom, broke power to my room, etc) im going to continue to escalate against them until i either get my gear back or i get the tools they used against me to undo what they wronged me, the other option is tiding their department but that involves possibly punishing an innocent 3rd party.

[iwishforducks]

removing the clause for round removal for 2nd time escalations is no bueno i think

The general idea seems to be that if people are consistently coming back to start fights over and over again they're violating rule 1 because they have no reason to do so besides being a dick. The conflict should resolve itself after someone has been crit or the fight ends; there's no reason someone should come back if they're a non-antag (save for very specific IC reasons).

I like this policy because I feel like the game is healthier when the rules push people towards organic, natural interactions instead of functioning as a checklist you need to tick off before you're allowed to make the person horizontal again.

the round removal clause was important because it was “if someone is being a dumb fuck stupid head and is coming back for seconds, then you can round remove them and stop them from coming back for thirds”

idk what the expectation is on how you should respond to this happening in-game, honestly. or at least in the current rules. are we just expected to Turn Them Over To Security or whatever? are we not allowed to round remove if someone escalates a second time?

[sinfulbliss]

removing the clause for round removal for 2nd time escalations is no bueno i think

The general idea seems to be that if people are consistently coming back to start fights over and over again they're violating rule 1 because they have no reason to do so besides being a dick. The conflict should resolve itself after someone has been crit or the fight ends; there's no reason someone should come back if they're a non-antag (save for very specific IC reasons).

I like this policy because I feel like the game is healthier when the rules push people towards organic, natural interactions instead of functioning as a checklist you need to tick off before you're allowed to make the person horizontal again.

the round removal clause was important because it was “if someone is being a dumb fuck stupid head and is coming back for seconds, then you can round remove them and stop them from coming back for thirds”

idk what the expectation is on how you should respond to this happening in-game, honestly. or at least in the current rules. are we just expected to Turn Them Over To Security or whatever? are we not allowed to round remove if someone escalates a second time?

This may be a stretch but I reckon this would qualify as the “GREAT reasoning” required to kill them, and now you can kill them. Also, because you only have to bring incapacitated targets to med “where reasonable,” I reckon this would trigger the “it is not reasonable to treat this guy” clause, so at best you can kill them and leave them where they are. PERHAPS you can justify cutting their head off if the admin would agree you had “good IC reasoning” behind it, but good luck with that. Maybe you can argue their behavior was acting like an antag and hence they were valid for RR. But all this requires a pretty specific reading of the new rules that I reckon some admins wouldn’t adopt.

Otherwise yeah you kinda just have to keep critting/killing them and getting them treated until an admin gets on to ban them I guess.