Knowledge of Someone's Tactics - Where Does It Become Meta?

[8bot]

There are plenty of people who have gimmicks and particular strengths, and often employ the same exact strategies round after round. Whether or not this makes them a one trick pony, I am not here to discuss. What I am wondering, however, is at what point does recognizing somebody's patterns and reacting appropriately turn into metagaming? There's always been a grey area between every shift being a fresh start IC and relationships persisting between the rounds, and in my experience, it's usually left to the rule of common sense - but, I am still curious.

For example, somebody whose strategies for getting away and surviving utilizes the hand tele. If you find yourself reasonably expecting conflict from them, whether due to them slighting you in the round already, or being your target as an antagonist, is making a beeline towards the hand tele specifically to remove their ability to use it metagaming?

Do note, this isn't something that you are doing 'just because'. It's due to you either expecting, or having already entered, conflict with them.

Another example that Bagil players might remember from back in the day: A geneticist main who always goes hulk. If you are assigned to kill them as an antagonist, is it metagaming to destroy the genetics console specifically to remove their expected advantage?

Both examples, of course, dictate that stealing the hand teles/destroying the genetics console would be metagrudging if done on the grounds of 'just because'. This is just in legitimate cases where they have already made themselves valid, or at least started escalation with you.

[sinfulbliss]

It’s easiest to just assume we’re talking about antagonists, since that avoids Rule 1 and escalation concerns (which is tangential to the thread).

The way I would consider it: Can you justify the decision IC at all?

Let’s take breaking the geneticist’s console so he can’t make hulk. I think that’s reasonable to do to a geneticist regardless of if you happen to know he gets hulk every round.

Let’s say there’s a robo that always makes a Gygax on lowpop. Is it metagaming to, as an antag, break the robo APC, or otherwise just fuck the robo over so you don’t get owned with a Gygax later on?

Using the test: Can you justify breaking the APC with IC reasoning? I think you can. You’re an antag and antags like to break shit and sabotage.

On the other hand, suppose you learn a certain assistant is an antag, and this assistant makes bombs or plasmafloods every round, so you pre-emptively reinforce atmos and toxins to prevent it.

Using the test: Can you justify reinforcing these departments with IC reasoning? Probably not. So that would probably qualify as metagaming.

[Nabski]

I had to go look at your profile because you said "people might remember" and had a join date of less than a month ago.

You seem to have phrased your examples mostly in "I'm an antag and need to go after this person" in that case the rule of antags can do whatever they want wins out.

The better way to worry about it is as security (or god forbid a valid hunter). My personal preference there is that space law is pretty wide and you can just wait until they do the thing they wanted before arresting them. I'm particularly thinking of an assistant who would every round tide into the armory.

A QM keeps going carGUNia. You don't break the shuttle/consoles before he orders something, because that's ruining his fun. You do bother to put on a bulletproof vest before you take him down because you like being still alive.

Sinfuls comment about reinforcing atmos is a good one, because you explicitly can't reinforce atmos just to fuck over AI's.

[8bot]

I had to go look at your profile because you said "people might remember" and had a join date of less than a month ago.

I've been playing for years, I just lost my old ckey. I was remanseptim AKA Zachary Chester AKA Cumbrain AKA permabanned for 2 years

[dendydoom]

similarly to what sinful brought up, in these investigations commonly we don't like seeing players rely on hypotheticals which have no grounding in IC reasoning for the current round - ie, making specific assumptions about what could be true and then acting on those alone. build up and conflict are important aspects of narratives: we like to see players investigating things, figuring things out, then acting specifically on that newly found IC knowledge to motivate further action. this is where "what was your IC reasoning?" comes into play.

i would consider it similar to the "prepping for antags" rule. sure, you have knowledge of how traitors, heretics, nukies etc all work, but you need evidence of them ICly in this specific round in order to challenge them. you can't just assume that they exist and then prepare for them without that IC reasoning. if you're looking at the manifest and going "oh, john robo is a roboticist, he always does X and Y, i'm going to prep for that," then i would find issue with this. you would need to see john (or at least see evidence of) doing X and Y before you could rely on your knowledge of what john usually does.

[LEDDDriver]

An atmos tech does this weird elaborate setup you saw 3 rounds ago where he was antag. He has his mixers set up precisely the same way and from your gas scans (while he wasn't there) you conclude this is going to be "just one of those rounds", or at least that's what your OOC brain tells you. Is it metagaming to fuck with him if you know a very specific combination of little things ends up in a big disaster when perfomed from this person?

The example of atmos is biased because i main it, and not so few times have i become the subject of " ok this person is going to do x because a b c d e f" and i felt this was not a IC justifiable line of thinking.

I find it easy to answer this question on genetics context, but i find it way harder to do so when examing an open ended job like engi atmos or even botany.

[sinfulbliss]

you conclude this is going to be "just one of those rounds", or at least that's what your OOC brain tells you

I don’t think that counts because you’re allowed to have knowledge of atmos round-to-round, and part of that knowledge could be knowing singlecap recipes that atmosians use and the setups required to make the gasses for them.

But you prolly still shouldn’t stop them because that’s a atmos gang faux pas.

if you're looking at the manifest and going "oh, john robo is a roboticist, he always does X and Y, i'm going to prep for that," then i would find issue with this.

If you know John does X and Y, and you’re antag, you can totally just fuck him over in particular, even roundstart, so that he doesn’t do X and Y to stop you. You’re allowed to metagrudge as antag so that would be kosher…

It gets harder when it’s a nonantag prepping for an antag, but powergaming is kosher on LRP so I think prepping for foreseeable but unrealized threats would be totally allowed, as long as it’s for your own personal use. Really depends what X and Y is though here.

[Googles_Hands]

Allow it all just to force players to be creative/switch up their playstyle.

[GPeckman]

Part of me wants to say "If someone is relying on one single strategy so much that other people can use it against them, then that's a skill issue tbh."

But that kind of is metagaming. I think Sinful and Dendydoom have the right idea.

[Higgin]

Part of me wants to say "If someone is relying on one single strategy so much that other people can use it against them, then that's a skill issue tbh."

But that kind of is metagaming. I think Sinful and Dendydoom have the right idea.

There's a degree to which metagaming is unavoidable as long as people are recognizable by their statics or can at least be placed in the round by their ckeys when somebody hits who.

I think you could get rid of the latter. I think it's a concession to the former that we do allow metagrudging (and a lot of more benign, subtle treatment that turns on people's metaknowledge of others attached to their statics - )

I think we consider it to broadly make the game more rewarding and personal for people to have identities that matter and can be remembered than if everyone was randomized and anonymized every round (even if that's what really purging "metagaming" would require.) Recognizing how people behave over time and successfully playing around that is part of the longer-term reward for playing, even if it makes the game less accessible and fair up front for people just joining. It's not without tradeoffs.


On this one: it should be considered entirely fair play if people prep and respond to you doing the thing you always do as long as they're otherwise in the bounds of the rules.

Gunning down Cuban Pete the Scientist as a tot made sense back in the day because whether or not he was one too (he often was) his presence and behavior every round threatened your run and the shuttle and every square inch of turf from arrivals to escape turning into a crater.

On MRP, you'd probably be better off applying the standard described above: wait until you see them start making bombs or doing something material within the round, take them out or otherwise disrupt them because they pose an actual demonstrable threat in-round, go on your merry way.

The choice to be recognizable is a meaningful choice and should be treated as one.

[SkeletalElite]

In the example given with the hand tele even if it's technically metagaming it's nearly impossible to prove and therefore is defacto okay. An antag stealing the hand tele is totally normal behavior. Even if you're doing it just so your target (who you know likes to use the hand tele) can't use it against you, that is something that will pretty much never be distinguishable from normal behavior.

Even stealing the hand tele as a non antag isn't going to land you in trouble for metagaming, if it's something you do very frequently you might get noted or banned for running afoul of other rules, but I don't see a world where metagaming is the ban reason following someone stealing a hand tele.

[Vekter]

It does count as metagaming if you take into account your previous interactions with someone to that degree. Your character can dislike someone if they've had a poor interaction with them in the past, that part is fine, but if you're taking anything more than just "general vibes" into account, there's an issue.

Remember that "metagaming" is one of the very few things antags cannot do on LRP per rule 4.

[BeeSting12]

Realistically, it's impossible to enforce this for antags as long as the player doesn't admit to their reasoning for doing so.

Example 1: Hand tele.

Traitor steals hand tele roundstart so their target can't use it. First of all, their target won't ahelp the hand tele being taken because they can't use their meme strategy. There's 60 players on the server, they don't have sole rights to it. Secondly, stealing the hand tele as a traitor is a good move because it opens up a lot of mobility for the traitor. Unless you openly admit you did it because you know Joe Schmoe likes running away with the hand tele, it's impossible to get caught.

Example 2: Geneticist

Destroying the genetics console roundstart is a good idea because your target is a geneticist and logically you don't want them getting powers which make them hard to kill. Also means they have to leave their department to get it fixed. Noone would ahelp a genetics console being broken, and if they do I can almost guarantee the admin will check antags and hit the IC issue button. Once again, unless you openly admit to doing it because Gene Ball is playing genetics, you can't get caught.

On the other hand nonantags would not have justifiable IC reason to steal the hand tele roundstart or destroy the genetics console roundstart, so I'd consider that to be metagaming. (So technically, the target in example 1 is breaking more rules than the antag). Either way though, this is impossible to enforce unless you're dumb enough to admit to it, much like the underage policy.

[conrad]

What bee said, tbh. "I've seen this player do it on another shift 'cos they do it all the time so I'm gonna interfere" is not IC reasoning, it's metagaming, since you're relying on knowledge of the fact that this is a game composed of rounds (no, calling them "shifts" doesn't justify it).

It's like if you say "I'm gonna get a Bag of Holding this campaign 'cos this player always plays a Rogue with a Portable Hole for stealing the party's look and I'm sick of their shit". It's not IC, it's relying on the fact the character has an IRL player piloting it, and knowledge of how they behave.

Just do what you would normally do in this situation keeping in mind that past shift knowledge works like not knowing who there heretic that sacced you is (you know but you don't "know" know) and you're golden.

[Hoolny]

Metagaming isn't an actual tangible concrete idea is more of a concept where people draw the line under whatever they do.

If you give leeway for antagonists to game the system as much as they want you have to let the protagonist do so if you don't you cause a power imbalance in the station which leads to actual issues in this system.

I believe player freedom is nearly more important than any other thing and I find the reason the word metagaming is used is simply by people either copying do to loss or from a general unfairness due to code unbalanced such as unfair mechanics, overpowered weapons, and bugs, not an Issue that will be able to be fixed with policy because it is simply another issue that people try to morph into this one.



Sinful brought up the good concept that if there is no IC justification for it then it is metagaming. For example, they used someone reinforcing toxins every shift so the assistants wouldn't make TTVs and blow up the station, for one I see the IC justification as toxins being an extremely dangerous job that will cause round-ending consequences upon the wrong hands with little knowledge and a few minutes.

I see the actual issue with this being Toxin itself and explosions from it being utterly broken and unfair within the code that brought up these actions, blame the game, not the player, and TTVs are very much not fair.

Under a game with balanced mechanics metagaming cannot exist for it is a downward spiral of players feeling as if they are not playing within a fair system which is the actual issue.

And there are also players losing and being angry and spouting whatever to cope which is just a normal human thing to do that shouldn't be discussed in policy.



In the other side the point of the game is having fun just let people do what they want giving people the upmost freedom to play the game in a way they like to play it such as being massively OP is fine we have actual rules that prevent this not being fine (rule 12 sucks)

[sinfulbliss]

Sinful brought up the good concept that if there is no IC justification for it then it is metagaming. For example, they used someone reinforcing toxins every shift so the assistants wouldn't make TTVs and blow up the station, for one I see the IC justification as toxins being an extremely dangerous job that will cause round-ending consequences upon the wrong hands with little knowledge and a few minutes.

Sure that’s a fair reason, but if the admin bwoinks you and you say “this assistant makes bombs when he’s antag and I don’t want to risk it,” that would probably be metagaming, whereas if you said “toxins is a dangerous area and I want to protect it,” that sounds more excusable… In particular I was imagining someone adding plasteel to the airlock panel.

In general I think the reason has to make sense from an IC perspective, i.e. from the round itself, instead of purely OOC reasons.

The reason antags would be allowed to “metagame” but not nonantags is because antags are allowed to do pretty much anything, so metagaming as an antag is indistinguishable from just being an antag itself (see breaking robo APC example). Same reason antags are allowed to metagrudge, because it’s indistinguishable from the antag griefing some random person just because.

To be honest it’s hard to think of situations where this would apply because if you’re antag, your antag status overrides. If you’re nonantag, rule 4 would override in how you treat antag players.

So for LRP at least, I’d say it only matters for nonantags doing something preemptively against an unconfirmed antag, for a reason that they can’t explain IC.

[Isratosh]

This generally comes down to what you can verifiably tell the admin that is asking you. Have some sort of evidence from the current round that you can point to and you will never run afoul of the metagaming rule. I will comment on the various scenarios proposed here to hopefully give some insight. I will throw in some comments about MRP restricted antagonists as well.

What I am wondering, however, is at what point does recognizing somebody's patterns and reacting appropriately turn into metagaming?

This is essentially the definition of metagaming. You cannot use information from previous rounds to give yourself an advantage. You can react to actions taken in the current round.

For example, somebody whose strategies for getting away and surviving utilizes the hand tele. If you find yourself reasonably expecting conflict from them, whether due to them slighting you in the round already, or being your target as an antagonist, is making a beeline towards the hand tele specifically to remove their ability to use it metagaming?

Yes, this motivation is explicitly metagaming. If you're an antagonist this will never be brought up in an admin PM, but if it does just pick a different reason for taking it. If you're not an antagonist, and they haven't given any indication in this current round that the hand tele is going to be stolen or used for nefarious purposes, then taking it just to spite them is metagaming. There are plenty of other legitimate reasons I can imagine for a non-antagonist to take the hand tele, just pick one of those if applicable.

Another example that Bagil players might remember from back in the day: A geneticist main who always goes hulk. If you are assigned to kill them as an antagonist, is it metagaming to destroy the genetics console specifically to remove their expected advantage?

No, this could be true for any geneticist and that is enough IC reason to do it. While the motivation "geneticist main who always goes hulk" IS metagaming, it will be indistinguishable from normal IC antagonist behaviour unless you tell the admin otherwise.

Let’s say there’s a robo that always makes a Gygax on lowpop. Is it metagaming to, as an antag, break the robo APC, or otherwise just fuck the robo over so you don’t get owned with a Gygax later on?

Using the test: Can you justify breaking the APC with IC reasoning? I think you can. You’re an antag and antags like to break shit and sabotage.

The sabotage is of course fine as an antagonist. As an MRP restricted antagonist specifically, this hypothetical would not be an acceptable reason to murder the roboticist unless there is IC evidence that they are constructing mechs to be used against you.

On the other hand, suppose you learn a certain assistant is an antag, and this assistant makes bombs or plasmafloods every round, so you pre-emptively reinforce atmos and toxins to prevent it.

Using the test: Can you justify reinforcing these departments with IC reasoning? Probably not. So that would probably qualify as metagaming.

This is correct and is indeed metagaming. Wait until they make an attempt or show intent to use those departments for nefarious reasons before acting against it.

An atmos tech does this weird elaborate setup you saw 3 rounds ago where he was antag. He has his mixers set up precisely the same way and from your gas scans (while he wasn't there) you conclude this is going to be "just one of those rounds", or at least that's what your OOC brain tells you. Is it metagaming to fuck with him if you know a very specific combination of little things ends up in a big disaster when perfomed from this person?

Atmospherics is too open-ended and has enough non-mass-sabotage reasons for making almost any gas mix that I would consider this motivation metagaming, especially if targeted towards a specific player. You can't kill an atmos tech or scientist just for making bombs, but if they are being dangerous or careless or showing intent to use them on the station or you then that is enough IC evidence to act against it.

if you're looking at the manifest and going "oh, john robo is a roboticist, he always does X and Y, i'm going to prep for that," then i would find issue with this.

If you know John does X and Y, and you’re antag, you can totally just fuck him over in particular, even roundstart, so that he doesn’t do X and Y to stop you. You’re allowed to metagrudge as antag so that would be kosher…

It gets harder when it’s a nonantag prepping for an antag, but powergaming is kosher on LRP so I think prepping for foreseeable but unrealized threats would be totally allowed, as long as it’s for your own personal use. Really depends what X and Y is though here.

This is true for the LRP rules because it is normal IC antagonist behaviour. The specific motivation of "john robo is a roboticist, he always does X and Y" IS metagaming, and would not pass as an acceptable reason to murder poor john robo if you're a restricted antagonist on MRP.

Sinful brought up the good concept that if there is no IC justification for it then it is metagaming. For example, they used someone reinforcing toxins every shift so the assistants wouldn't make TTVs and blow up the station, for one I see the IC justification as toxins being an extremely dangerous job that will cause round-ending consequences upon the wrong hands with little knowledge and a few minutes.

Sure that’s a fair reason, but if the admin bwoinks you and you say “this assistant makes bombs when he’s antag and I don’t want to risk it,” that would probably be metagaming, whereas if you said “toxins is a dangerous area and I want to protect it,” that sounds more excusable… In particular I was imagining someone adding plasteel to the airlock panel.

Reinforcing toxins because you think it's a dangerous job that can cause round-ending consequences is metagaming on par with reinforcing the armoury or making atmospherics plasma-flood-proof. You need tangible evidence from the current round that any of these places are going to be used nefariously or broken into to justify protecting it.

[sinfulbliss]

Yes, this motivation is explicitly metagaming. If you're an antagonist this will never be brought up in an admin PM, but if it does just pick a different reason for taking it.

Not sure I agree with this, for antags at least. Suppose you have to go after an assistant who you know often uses bottle stuns. Would grabbing a sec helmet beforehand, based on that OOC knowledge, be disallowed? I think there is a separation between metagaming, i.e., using knowledge that you are not supposed to know in-round (Discord VC comms being the classic example), and using information based on people’s static personalities and antics that become part of what is reasonable to know about their character.

Reinforcing toxins because you think it's a dangerous job that can cause round-ending consequences is metagaming on par with reinforcing the armoury or making atmospherics plasma-flood-proof. You need tangible evidence from the current round that any of these places are going to be used nefariously or broken into to justify protecting it.

This isn’t necessarily the case. This headmin ruling allowed for reinforcing the brig roundstart with flashers. Certain forms of reinforcement are allowed — it’s when it becomes excessive that it’s disallowed under metagaming. Medical often sets up those “human scanners” in their doors without IC reason, heads of staff close the shudders on their offices without IC reason, etc — these aren’t disallowed under metagaming. I think an RD, wanting to keep toxins only available to scientists, could put a couple pieces of metal on the airlock panel without issue.

The reason these precedents are so specific — i.e. “atmos plasmaproofing,” “armory turret reinforcement,” is because the goal isn’t to disallow all types of reinforcement period, only very specific types that prove problematic for round health. It would be a mistake to take such a general reading of this rule IMO.

[Isratosh]

Yes, this motivation is explicitly metagaming. If you're an antagonist this will never be brought up in an admin PM, but if it does just pick a different reason for taking it.

Not sure I agree with this, for antags at least. Suppose you have to go after an assistant who you know often uses bottle stuns. Would grabbing a sec helmet beforehand, based on that OOC knowledge, be disallowed? I think there is a separation between metagaming, i.e., using knowledge that you are not supposed to know in-round (Discord VC comms being the classic example), and using information based on people’s static personalities and antics that become part of what is reasonable to know about their character.

It's "allowed" in the sense that this is so minor and explainable many others ways ("I was just protecting myself" is good enough) that I can see almost no reason for this to be brought to an admin's attention nor do I think I would care if it was brought to mine. But it is still metagaming because you are using knowledge from previous rounds to give yourself an advantage, and it is when this is taken to extremes that admins get involved. Most of the text of rule 2 focuses on disallowing IC friendships from giving an unfair advantage but I would consider these scenarios you are bringing up as giving yourself an unfair advantage based on OOC knowledge as well.

Reinforcing toxins because you think it's a dangerous job that can cause round-ending consequences is metagaming on par with reinforcing the armoury or making atmospherics plasma-flood-proof. You need tangible evidence from the current round that any of these places are going to be used nefariously or broken into to justify protecting it.

This isn’t necessarily the case. This headmin ruling allowed for reinforcing the brig roundstart with flashers. Certain forms of reinforcement are allowed — it’s when it becomes excessive that it’s disallowed under metagaming. Medical often sets up those “human scanners” in their doors without IC reason, heads of staff close the shudders on their offices without IC reason, etc — these aren’t disallowed under metagaming. I think an RD, wanting to keep toxins only available to scientists, could put a couple pieces of metal on the airlock panel without issue.

The reason these precedents are so specific — i.e. “atmos plasmaproofing,” “armory turret reinforcement,” is because the goal isn’t to disallow all types of reinforcement period, only very specific types that prove problematic for round health. It would be a mistake to take such a general reading of this rule IMO.

Yes I agree with you - this is in a similar sense allowed because it is so minor. I would never notice nor care that somebody reinforced the airlock to toxins. If they replace all the walls with reinforced, add security barriers, bolt/shock/depower the doors, add deployable shields, etc. without IC reasoning then it becomes more of an unfair advantage based on metagaming that I would be willing to do something about.

However, if any of the scenarios I commented on gets brought up in an admin PM and the given reason for these actions is "I am using information from previous rounds", you will be steered away from this way of thinking and towards using IC justification.

[Isratosh]

On re-reading the OP, I got a bit lost in the sauce and I suppose the main question here is exactly where does it go from "minor" to "metagaming that an admin will do something about". This is going to vary from admin to admin and situation to situation and is generally a judgement call made on the fly. I don't think there is any way we could or should codify more of these scenarios, as admins should be reasonable about it and appeals are possible. I don't think a ban would be placed for any of these scenarios unless they were repeated after a warning. Like I said, if you can point to any sort of IC evidence from the current round, you won't have to worry about this rule. I intended my quick list of comments to hopefully shed some light on how one admin approaches these things.

[Not-Dorsidarf]

Reinforcing toxins because you think it's a dangerous job that can cause round-ending consequences is metagaming on par with reinforcing the armoury or making atmospherics plasma-flood-proof. You need tangible evidence from the current round that any of these places are going to be used nefariously or broken into to justify protecting it.

I'd say that the equivalent to floodproofing atmos would be dismantling/walling-off/AI roundstart bolting ordnance, not mildly increasing the defensability. Reason we dont allow armory-in-my-closet or disconnecting the plasma pipes is because its pre-emptively turning off antags strategies by bypassing the normal state of the station, you know?

[warbluke]

I've had a couple tot rounds where people figured out I was a traitor just by noticing a specific pattern of break ins, none of which I could have been implicated in (Not without anyone using forensics at least, which they didn't in these cases)
To paraphrase somewhat: "Oh, CE locker AND HoS office have been broken into in the first ten minutes, [warbluke] is a traitor again"
As a matter of personal opinion, this is totally fine by me. If I'm going to keep using these strategies people are 100% allowed to call me out on it in my book.

[Misdoubtful]

Am I the only one sitting here focusing on the concept that if someone is that glued to a gimmick or strat that literally everyone can just expect it that they might need to mix things up a bit?

[NecromancerAnne]

Am I the only one sitting here focusing on the concept that if someone is that glued to a gimmick or strat that literally everyone can just expect it that they might need to mix things up a bit?

No, I also agree with that.

If you deviate not one iota from a given gimmick that you will do with near 100% certainty, I don't think the blame should be on anyone in particular if you are prime suspect number one. If you pigeon holing yourself so much that dealing with you becomes routine when you start to perform your gimmick. That is, to me, a problem that you create yourself, because you've created a meta around yourself rather than just having metaknowledge about you exploited. Become more imaginative in what you do, or risk either being asked not to do it, or alternatively someone cutting the legs out from under you because they know what you're doing because you've done it at least 20 times before with the same results, in a row.

Now, let me be very frank. There is a degree to which people like to allow exploitable information about themselves be known to others because it fosters roleplay when it comes up, even if it is a foil. Like 'give Grey McTide a bottle of whiskey, and he'll drink it in one go because he loves it'. You use that to poison him. That seems fine to me. That, to me, is part of the narrative building process, and actually with permission of the player in question to build that scenario.

In addition, knowing someone favours a particular weapon or piece of equipment over others as a preference is not really actionable, as it is largely deniable. An admin would be hardpressed to prove you are metagaming maliciously if you try and exploit this knowledge. Like, say, you know Johnny Quarterback, the security officer, usually likes to get tackle gloves. So you nab the riot suit to protect yourself from tackles. Particularly if it is common knowledge that it is useful against certain threats (like desworders). That's not really an issue because literally anyone could be using tackle gloves, and the armor itself is helpful for other reasons. IT just happens to protect you from Johnny.

If it happens to be something fairly potent or strong in a way that isn't easily avoided (see: repeat suicide bombers often fall into this category) and they lean on this to accomplish success often to the point that your potential victim may as well prepare for it because you will come ruin their day instantly if you don't because of how unanswerable the nature of this tool is (AKA you will use this to validhunt everyone regardless of role or how the round is panning out just to remove a threat from the round without challenge), I think that absolutely feeds back into the previous issue of being so predictable that you only have yourself to blame if someone prepares ahead of time for your unimaginative ass to pull the same move every single time with certainty. In fact, I would argue that if you are such a problem that people need to know you are going to make their day worse by being in the round, this behaviour may be becoming a bit of a Rule 1 issue.

[MooCow12]

I`m fine with people knowing I have bombs on me pretty often, I only take issue if someone starts taking note of the radio signals i use, or examine me as a ghost and sees the radio / ntnet codes that the circuits I use have. Thats yet to happen and I doubt anyone intelligent enough to do that wouldnt also know its kind of stinky to do that.

I actually do want people to counter my gimmicks because it allows me to try out new things and see what actually works, for example, people started using thermite to get into my maint bases so now I'm experimenting with building walls of self bolting airlocks to see how that turns out.

Another example is people running away when they think im about to blow up, now I started using bombs that pull people in like a vacuum towards me while also slipping them.

[Vekter]

I think if you're doing a gimmick often enough that people start going "Fucking here we go again, Stunlocker Weldspace with his axe murdering", it's probably time to find a new one.

[Misdoubtful]

Idk mang I just see this all as a two way street. There is a balance there somewhere and both sides can be wrong at the same time about this sort of thing.

[Higgin]

The only real place this is a problem is when the play you make to preclude Person A from doing their bullshit for the hundredth time crosses over to shut out Person B doing it for the first time or so much worse, leads you to preempt Person B who might not have actually been trying to do the unfun bullshit at all.

I'm not sure this matters as much on LRP and think it should be only enforced with a very light touch around the most obvious roundstart antag-proofing mentioned above. What people do can be both valid and condition the way others play to be more harshly competitive. You shouldn't ask folks to hit themselves over the head with a brick after each round, even if it'd let us finally achieve peak SS13.

I'm not sure how much use RPR10 actually gets on MRP, but it seems like it's pointed directly at this issue. I'm not sure where it exactly gives players a claim either - God knows I'm sick and fucking tired of nonantags tiding cargo every round by pushing in the ORM, but is that an R1 or an RPR10 thing if I feel like I have to drag the ORM in and put up an r-wall every round to reduce some of the conga line of wordless shitheads who will otherwise immediately beeline the lathe? Is it a stay-in-your-lane thing? Do I just have to start beating their asses or destroying the autolathe roundstart rather than making it public if I don't want anyone with a department access (and thus nineral storage access to the window) to just come running in freely, or do I concede that the lathe is just public property even when the actual public lathe (we used to have one in its own little room next to EVA on Box) was mapped out long, long ago?

This is sort of a personal bugbear lately, but I think it gets at a similar issue: people doing predictably obnoxious shit, how much of that is on me to deal with as a player, how much can I do about it in-round if it's a hill I have to die on for gameplay reasons, where does the claim to staff involvement start?

[Constellado]

The only real place this is a problem is when the play you make to preclude Person A from doing their bullshit for the hundredth time crosses over to shut out Person B doing it for the first time or so much worse, leads you to preempt Person B who might not have actually been trying to do the unfun bullshit at all.

I'm not sure this matters as much on LRP and think it should be only enforced with a very light touch around the most obvious roundstart antag-proofing mentioned above. What people do can be both valid and condition the way others play to be more harshly competitive. You shouldn't ask folks to hit themselves over the head with a brick after each round, even if it'd let us finally achieve peak SS13.

I'm not sure how much use RPR10 actually gets on MRP, but it seems like it's pointed directly at this issue. I'm not sure where it exactly gives players a claim either - God knows I'm sick and fucking tired of nonantags tiding cargo every round by pushing in the ORM, but is that an R1 or an RPR10 thing if I feel like I have to drag the ORM in and put up an r-wall every round to reduce some of the conga line of wordless shitheads who will otherwise immediately beeline the lathe? Is it a stay-in-your-lane thing? Do I just have to start beating their asses or destroying the autolathe roundstart rather than making it public if I don't want anyone with a department access (and thus nineral storage access to the window) to just come running in freely, or do I concede that the lathe is just public property even when the actual public lathe (we used to have one in its own little room next to EVA on Box) was mapped out long, long ago?

This is sort of a personal bugbear lately, but I think it gets at a similar issue: people doing predictably obnoxious shit, how much of that is on me to deal with as a player, how much can I do about it in-round if it's a hill I have to die on for gameplay reasons, where does the claim to staff involvement start?

In low pop it's rough for some players to ask for items (cargo doesn't seem to be around, etc) and they just go get it themselves.
Same thing with going to engi for items, but usually people go to cargo instead for some reason.

I tided into cargo yesterday as an "assistant" yesterday because comms was out, AI didn't see a cargo tech at the time and I had no PDA. "It's just for one item.. how can it hurt?" I thought. Queue a cargo tech walking in and me getting locked inside cargo... Feel embarrassment as I ask to be let out..
When you are an assistant with a project and nobody is around you end up tiding in places to get what you need.
People tiding in when there is a person currently at the desk though is horrid and I heard stories of that. I remember dealing with that a lot when I mained QM on LRP.

[Itseasytosee2me]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

[TypicalRig]

By definition acting based off OOCly knowing someone's playstyle is metagaming. The problem is that unless players are stupid enough to outright admit to it, the admins will in most scenarios find it next to impossible to enforce and not worth pursuing. I've had this happen to me. The only fix is for the person actively changing how they play the game by adapting and becoming more flexible.

A good example, where this has happened to me, is that I used to have a player that would roundstart go to EVA, usually for space gear or tools. This person picked up on the fact that when I went there and grabbed plasteel, it meant that it was always a cult round. He would never explicitly say "TypicalRig has grabbed plasteel he's definitely a cultist" but instead of yell over the radio "SHIFT PREDICTION: CULT" or some variation of this and move on his way. Which got annoying fast. But it was just vague enough to where an admin wouldn't really be able to do anything about this information regardless. What did I do?

I started rushing EVA every shift for plasteel regardless of cult status, go back to doing my job normally, and giggle to myself whenever he incorrectly announced that he bets there's a cult. This went on for a few rounds until he realized he was being bamboozled and gave up on it.

The point is if a player's playstyle is so repetitive that a person knows how to handle their shenanigans with ease, it's probably about time they either switch randomize appearance on, or mix things in their space simulation game up.

[Vekter]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

This isn't the solution; people will see the random name running around doing antag things and figure out who it is based on what they're doing.

[Itseasytosee2me]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

This isn't the solution; people will see the random name running around doing antag things and figure out who it is based on what they're doing.

I thought the problem was using information about someone's static to intuit what they would do in a situation, not using what they do in a situation to intuit who they might be.

[Higgin]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

This isn't the solution; people will see the random name running around doing antag things and figure out who it is based on what they're doing.

Making the judgment about that instead of "because x is always antag/always does this as y/hangs out with z" is exactly what you'd hope for with this change - it'd make the finite round social deduction game a lot "purer" even if I don't think we want that or consider it worth throwing out statics/persistence.

[Vekter]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

This isn't the solution; people will see the random name running around doing antag things and figure out who it is based on what they're doing.

Making the judgment about that instead of "because x is always antag/always does this as y/hangs out with z" is exactly what you'd hope for with this change - it'd make the finite round social deduction game a lot "purer" even if I don't think we want that or consider it worth throwing out statics/persistence.

SS13 is not a social deduction game, it's a role-playing game. If we start directly changing every rule with the idea that it'll make the social deduction aspects more "pure", I'm leaving.

[NecromancerAnne]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

What if I told you that this doesn't solve anything at all, and that there was a period of people using the randomized name/body feature to try and make it less obvious that it was them before they used their repeat gimmicks more reliably only to discover that instead, people still picked them out because it was their behaviour that distinguished them.

I believe this is why lepi's randomized-when-antag feature was a failure, but it isn't the only example.

[Higgin]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

This isn't the solution; people will see the random name running around doing antag things and figure out who it is based on what they're doing.

Making the judgment about that instead of "because x is always antag/always does this as y/hangs out with z" is exactly what you'd hope for with this change - it'd make the finite round social deduction game a lot "purer" even if I don't think we want that or consider it worth throwing out statics/persistence.

SS13 is not a social deduction game, it's a role-playing game. If we start directly changing every rule with the idea that it'll make the social deduction aspects more "pure", I'm leaving.

To be entirely pedantic, while I think you're right, social deduction games are also role-playing games. You've got the werewolves, mafia, vampires, witches, impostors or what have you; you've got the sheriff/hunter/innocents; you've got everyone who might be in between; and you've got the Fool, my favorite role in EpicMafia, who wins if they get people to kill them without actually being one of the mafiosi (so you'd get people accusing clown-shoes mafia of being Fools and not killing them, or mafia deliberately acting loud to try to get mistaken for Fools - great fun.)

I think you'd lose out on a lot of the other games people are playing if you tried to prioritize the social deduction game. We put a lot of emphasis in rules and design on the funny antag TTT game (which has diverged more over the years from the social deduction game by making tells more obvious, antagonists more ubiquitous, and relying on guaranteed innocents in security and the captain.) MRP tries to make more room for the cooperative non-mechanical games. It's a fair shout all around to say that all the games people are playing in any given round do not always play nice with each other, and we're making compromises between them as a matter of choice.

I'd personally be right there with you in choosing to go elsewhere without them, but there is also a 'metagaming' aspect to statics and everything that comes with them.

[Farquaar]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

Based take

[Itseasytosee2me]

I hate statics we should be forced to randomize every shift.

What if I told you that this doesn't solve anything at all, and that there was a period of people using the randomized name/body feature to try and make it less obvious that it was them before they used their repeat gimmicks more reliably only to discover that instead, people still picked them out because it was their behaviour that distinguished them.

I believe this is why lepi's randomized-when-antag feature was a failure, but it isn't the only example.

Once again, I thought the issue was intuiting playstyle by person, and not person by playstyle.

[NecromancerAnne]

And I'm saying there is nothing solved by making people amorphous blobs of non-identities with regards to this issue. Even under anonymity, someones own meta will become apparent and intuited. People recognize patterns far too easily. Put two and two together.

[Itseasytosee2me]

That statement isn’t relevant to the question posited in the titular issue posted. Which is using knowledge about a particular person’s playstyle to intuit that they are an an antagonist when something specific anatagonist action happens that they are known to do and then working with that information. Alternatively, learning that they are an antagonist and thus are likely about to preform some specific action.

[kinnebian]

There are plenty of people who have gimmicks and particular strengths, and often employ the same exact strategies round after round. Whether or not this makes them a one trick pony, I am not here to discuss. What I am wondering, however, is at what point does recognizing somebody's patterns and reacting appropriately turn into metagaming? There's always been a grey area between every shift being a fresh start IC and relationships persisting between the rounds, and in my experience, it's usually left to the rule of common sense - but, I am still curious.

If people are taking advantage of someone being incredibly predictable or doing the same gimmick, its on the antagonist to change their playstyle or come up with new strategies. If someones "meta" is intuited, thats their fault for overly using it.

HOWEVER

this should only be reactive
ie: you know they are bad, or they are doing said action
if you are preemptively fucking someone over, thats definite metagaming

[Cheshify]

While this is a roleplay game, we are humans who are capable of recognizing patterns. Don't go out of your way every round to stop someone's typical strategy, but you can respond or react to it if you see the starting signs of it start to show. If you're doing the same thing round after round and people start to complain about it, maybe it's time to change things up. Admins can possibly ask people to try different tactics if it's getting boring.

Cheshify - Ye
Fikou - Is Good
TheBibleMelts - is good