Mutiny - can it ever succeed if all rules are followed?

[ThePiachu]

So yesterday we had a pretty large mutiny going on, but it got me thinking about how do you actually succeed at a mutiny really?

So say, you have a Commander that did a big bad and 90% of Marines want to mutiny. They follow the rules - wiki/Rules - ahelp and all that. Then they start storming the Almayer. First of all, mutinies are illegal (wiki/Marine_Law#Mutinies_and_arresting_ ... ng_Officer), so MPs will be fighting for the CO. So they are shot and then mutiny goes to CIC. Things escalate into lethals pretty quickly. They shoot the Commander, broadcast that the mutiny was a success and think it's all over.

Now, a few problems:
- Everyone has to get medical treatment, meaning the MPs and the Commander will (most likely) be alive. Mutiny is still illegal, and MPs have to obey the Commander, so you can't just tell MPs to perma the CO and expect that to hold them down without a letter from the Provost. So counter-mutiny can always happen.
- Only the Commander can perform BE, and normal executions have to be authorised by aCO and CMP. Again, Mutiny is illegal, therefore CMP will never authorise an execution of anyone from the original command list on the request of the mutiny command.
- There is no formal definition of when the mutiny is over, so anyone can grab a gun and start gunning down the mutineers. You can never know whether a given person has joined the mutiny, surrendered, or are they just pretending.

So in this situation, why would you ever mutiny, unless you can ensure the Commander "just happens" to get husked? The only rational way to get the Commander deposed and punished for any wrongdoings or warcrimes would be to get the MPs to arrest them, or get a letter from the Provost, all the while not causing enough fuss to get BEd?

Should we have some sort of system in place to mark people as "pro mutiny", "anti mutiny", "surrendered" and "neutral party"? This way you could figure out when a mutiny is successful, when it really failed (one side or the other all "surrendered"), and prevent people from pretending to be surrendered while trying to sneak kill someone? This would be an abstraction to fit a complex issue into a timeframe of a spaceman game where you can't devote more than 20-30 minutes to the issue. Also, it would be useful for HvH games and letting people surrender.

[FGRSentinel]

You think that's bad? We had a round start with a mutiny where the mutineers' first act was to storm the bridge and take the CO hostage once he refused to listen to their demands. Mutiny lasted a whole 10 seconds in theory. In reality, neither the CO nor the MPs were willing to accept that and spent the next FORTY MINUTES fighting for control, with the CO going full-on tyrant, until he got decapitated by a shot meant for the chest in a shootout. By the time the Commander died, three (if not all four) of the SOs were mutineers and the XO was more or less in on the mutiny, spending almost the entire OP as de facto aCO while the MPs and CO basically became the mutineers. There's literally no way for the mutineers to "win" without the CO getting husked or decapitated in the firefight, neither of which can be done intentionally.

[Renomaki]

To be honest, the only way for a mutiny to succeed is IF the commander is willing to negotiate in a peaceful fashion, with MPs on the sidelines in the event things go haywire.

A violent mutiny never succeeds due to the sheer costs of said mutiny, with good men getting hurt or killed and command staff no doubt joining the bodies on the floor. Minor chaos would ensure afterwords as they attempt to fill the power gap with the death of the commander with whoever was willing to take charge, but as this server's history shows, a lot of people don't LIKE being in charge, so it becomes a fair bit difficult to find someone on your side who is willing to take over. Not all XOs, after all, are loyal to the revolters. And that isn't even involving the xenos, which more often than not come to the Almayer probably minutes after a mutiny has taken place, if not during.

The peaceful option is the best and most dignified option, but most commanders would rather fight tooth and nail for their position rather than step down (and in many cases, some are all too eager to start shooting up their own marines with their personal smartgun).

Not to toot my own horn, but I myself had been mutinied quite a few times back in the Sulico days (and I think once or twice during early Almayer days?), and every time, I chose to negotiate or simply step down with some shred of dignity, exiling myself to my bedroom or office. This has resulted in a number of interesting outcomes, more than once being re-instigated back into command when they had a change of heart.

Deep down, I kinda enjoy mutinies, if only because I had a lot of decent, interesting experiences with them and rather enjoyed the RP of it all (and maybe disappointing a few marines who were really hoping to shoot their own CO).

[ThePiachu]

Yeah, having to have the option for peaceful stepping down is definitely a good thing in the mutiny rules. I'd honestly also like to see "house arrest" as a thing COs and CLs would be able to demand - they could still do their duty (talking on comms and sending faxes) while being "punished".

But yeah, if a CO decides to take the violent option, they only lose if they get accidentally husked or the xenos just murder them in the end...

I guess this suggestion might help with future mutinies:
https://gitlab.com/cmdevs/ColonialMarines/issues/4270

[Vampmare]

Mutinies often happen with the iron-fist COs or Dictators as some call them. These type of personalities would never surrender in a mutiny and that's why you will never see it. More issues arrive when people don't realize that Mutiny is a RP event and not your local COD game where you can blast some MPs and the CO. This is where you can get some confusion and who surrendered, who didn't.

Also If your goal for the mutiny is to win agaisnt xenos, then no. It will never succeed.

Mutiny from a OOC perspective will never help marines and it shouldn't do so, but it's a fun RP event. It also gives a way for the grunts to take vengeance on shitty command from time to time.

I much more prefer them than some who "accidentally" FF the CO in the back when he deploys.

[Brotemis]

I said this in another thread on mutinies. This is the only solution and this should be the OOC rule.

I would think a change would be needed to what can be done to the commander. If by any means, the commander does not surrender peacefully, I would wager that would open them up to being blown the fuck away, including decapitation.

Why? Because it is the SUREFIRE only way to ensure that a mutiny is recognized as successful. The commander was given a chance to peacefully stand down and refused. It can be safely assumed anyone involved with the mutiny would be executed and/or put into perma and permanently removed the round anyway.

[FGRSentinel]

Mutinies often happen with the iron-fist COs or Dictators as some call them. These type of personalities would never surrender in a mutiny and that's why you will never see it. More issues arrive when people don't realize that Mutiny is a RP event and not your local COD game where you can blast some MPs and the CO. This is where you can get some confusion and who surrendered, who didn't.

Also If your goal for the mutiny is to win agaisnt xenos, then no. It will never succeed.

Mutiny from a OOC perspective will never help marines and it shouldn't do so, but it's a fun RP event. It also gives a way for the grunts to take vengeance on shitty command from time to time.

I much more prefer them than some who "accidentally" FF the CO in the back when he deploys.

I have to disagree with you here. There was a player report up a while back regarding the mutiny I mentioned. The reason it happened was because the CO banned shotguns, delayed briefing because people were protesting the ban, and then ordered the POs not to launch under any circumstances until every single marine gave up their shotgun.

Let me restate that: a mutiny was required to get the Marines permitted to actually use whatever weapon they wanted and to actually let the round to properly start... And the MPs and CO still had the "mutiny" drag on for more than half an hour, preventing an entire squad from deploying, simply because they refused to accept defeat. There's actually times where the only way for Marines to have a chance is if the Commander's removed from command, but the tyrants and bad commanders that need to be removed are also the ones who are going to resist every step of the way, even beyond a practical "success" objective has been met (taking the CO prisoner, for instance... Or having the entire CIC staff against them)

[Dauntasa]

I mean functionally every mutineer these days just packs a shotgun and aims for the head in the hopes of scoring a lucky decap on the CO during the initial gunfight because that's the only legal way they can possibly win.

[Build_R_]

If all rules are followed, then yes I believe that the mutiny can succed. That is to say a good end result can be achieved, the issue being when to stop the mutiny. Since people rarely kill the CO and even when they're dead the fighting continues, it's very difficult knowing when to say stop.

However, when the mutiny has stopped and both sides cease fire a new better member of command staff can be aSL. Usually it only works if the marine side wins.

[FGRSentinel]

From what I've seen Mutinies only really end one of six or so ways: the mutineers are all arrested; the xenos crash into the ship and the mutineers decide to put that shit on hold until "after everything's not going to hell" (ie, they just give up because there's more important shit going on) and the CO BEs them rather than focusing on the defense; the mutineers manage to kill the commander but the MPs refuse to admit defeat and keep it going until they're all wiped out, even if the aCO tries to get them to stand down; the CO is killed and a few MPs try to keep the fight going, dying in the process before the CMP decides to be a reasonable person and order the remaining MPs and mutineers to stand down; the xenos board and wipe everyone out; or the CO is quickly removed from power but isn't killed, causing him to rally the MPs into what someone called a "counter-mutiny" (which I feel should be just as illegal as the mutiny itself if there's no message sent to HC about the initial one that gets HC to authorize putting the CO back in power) until one of the previous ones comes to pass.

Note that, in all these situations except 1 and 5, the actual outcome of the mutiny is determined by just how stubborn the CO and MPs are. In the case of number 6, you'll see that a mutiny NEVER ends with the CO gracefully accepting defeat once removed from their position. The only possible way to circumvent this is if the mutineers first speak to the CL and get permission to fax HC to inform them of the situation, explain what the CO's done, and pray that HC gives their blessing to overthrow the CO. If this happens, the MPs legally cannot stop the mutineers (and would in fact be obligated to assist them) as HC has ordered the CO be removed from power. Any "Pro-CO" marines then, technically, end up in mutiny against HC and MPs can't be in mutiny.

In other words, the only way to stop the long, drawn out mutinies basically boils down to a bit of insane troll logic and hoping the staff supports this interpretation of the rules and the MPs follow it.

[coroneljones]

From what I've seen Mutinies only really end one of six or so ways: the mutineers are all arrested; the xenos crash into the ship and the mutineers decide to put that shit on hold until "after everything's not going to hell" (ie, they just give up because there's more important shit going on) and the CO BEs them rather than focusing on the defense; the mutineers manage to kill the commander but the MPs refuse to admit defeat and keep it going until they're all wiped out, even if the aCO tries to get them to stand down; the CO is killed and a few MPs try to keep the fight going, dying in the process before the CMP decides to be a reasonable person and order the remaining MPs and mutineers to stand down; the xenos board and wipe everyone out; or the CO is quickly removed from power but isn't killed, causing him to rally the MPs into what someone called a "counter-mutiny" (which I feel should be just as illegal as the mutiny itself if there's no message sent to HC about the initial one that gets HC to authorize putting the CO back in power) until one of the previous ones comes to pass.

Note that, in all these situations except 1 and 5, the actual outcome of the mutiny is determined by just how stubborn the CO and MPs are. In the case of number 6, you'll see that a mutiny NEVER ends with the CO gracefully accepting defeat once removed from their position. The only possible way to circumvent this is if the mutineers first speak to the CL and get permission to fax HC to inform them of the situation, explain what the CO's done, and pray that HC gives their blessing to overthrow the CO. If this happens, the MPs legally cannot stop the mutineers (and would in fact be obligated to assist them) as HC has ordered the CO be removed from power. Any "Pro-CO" marines then, technically, end up in mutiny against HC and MPs can't be in mutiny.

In other words, the only way to stop the long, drawn out mutinies basically boils down to a bit of insane troll logic and hoping the staff supports this interpretation of the rules and the MPs follow it.

Technically, if HC supports it and authorizes it, its not a mutiny.
And if anything MPs should be the ones handling it if so.

[FGRSentinel]

From experience, rounds where the CO does something that's worthy of a mutiny are also rounds where you have MPs that seem to love soft griefing the marines or just brigging everyone they can. There's always a chance that, to them, it's still a mutiny since they didn't report it to HC themselves (and they'll NEVER report a CO that does anything bad enough to legitimately require a mutiny) so there's always that chance they either ignore it or declare it fake.

[Chaznoodles]

Amateurs.

Mutinies can't succeed in current state. CO players believe it's their god given right and will kill anyone who tries, mutineers can't escalate unless he does. Mutineers can't permakill anyone so enjoy the CO dicking you up later. Not to forget some COs deliberately baiting mutinies through certain orders so they and the MPs can go wild.

In all my time, I've only ever seen one CO pass command on peacefully. After the round, they were promptly told by a few CO whitelisted to just shoot anyone who tries and not give up the position. Attitude is a huge problem to a conductive round.

[FGRSentinel]

You mean like the "shotguns are banned" incident, Chaz? That's actually the one I was referencing for why mutinies are doomed to fail. And yeah, I know there's probably only one CO that's reasonable when it comes to mutinies, the others either go full psycho once a mutiny's started (even if the full scope of the "mutiny" is the marines demanding they step down, Alamo crashing, and the mutineers scattering to help defend the ship before any shots can be fired or it can escalate) or go so far as trying to instigate a Mutiny since they know once one starts they can BE anyone involved that they want and nobody can kill them for it, which makes me think either the mutiny rules need to be updated or some mutiny standards need to be enforced on whitelisted COs and MPs, who actually don't even bother following the mutiny rules 30% of the time anyways from what I've seen.

That's another part of the issue with why Mutinies never succeed: MPs can and often will soft grief their way to rule violations and claim they're upholding Marine Law if given the chance, such as arresting mutineer medics who are still in the combat area assisting wounded, which medics are required to do under the mutiny rules, to stop them from getting medical treatment or simply ignoring paincritted mutineers to let them die (I remember a few pro-CO marines and MPs ignoring me laying on the floor after the mentioned mutiny before another mutineer grabbed me and got me to medbay. I was injured trying to break up a skirmish that started after the mutiny was declared "over" as well, so...). I honestly feel like the only chance mutineers have of "winning" a mutiny is to take the CO captive in the CIC first thing if he refuses to step down, remove his headset, and declare that he's been removed via an announcement.

There's one issue with this though: If the mutineers survive the first firefight with the CO still in their custody, the MPs will most likely just release him, at which point the CO and MPs WILL continue causing problems and breaking mutiny rules. Realistically if everyone ahelped rulebreaks as they should, the staff would suddenly be flooded by ahelps from the mutineers about the CO and MPs violating various mutiny rules, especially if they decide to arrest the medics helping wounded, leave people to die, or just start other firefights or disrupt the OP in other ways.

And this all comes back to the linchpin in the whole "the mutiny rules aren't good enough" argument from the mutineers' side: the mutineers cannot win because there's no established "win" condition for the mutineers that ends the mutiny without the CO dying, which is against the rules if done intentionally, so the CO and MPs can just keep saying "nah, that firefight didn't count except for the dudes the CO BE'd and the MPs brigged" until all the mutineers are either dead or in perma... But the MPs and CO don't always follow the mutiny rules themselves, which often forces the mutineers to start breaking them to have a chance.

Literally the only way to make them work is for the CL to have a reason to assist and sending a fax to HC explaining why the CO needs to be removed from power, which if approved by HC means the MPs have to assist in removing the CO from command or they break the "MPs can't mutiny" part of their rules. This means that, in order for a mutiny to be successful under the current rules, it requires far more than the five people needed for it to be "legal" for the rules: it requires five pissed marines to ahelp it in case things don't work out, an SO or XO who's been angered by the CO enough to let people in, a CL that's either sympathetic or feels the company gains more from removing the CO (perhaps they refused to play ball with WY) than they do refusing the request, and MPs willing to accept HC's verdict if they approve the CO's removal from power. Even then, this isn't even a mutiny anymore, so the only way for the mutineers to win is to make it not a mutiny in the first place.

[Blade2000Br]

I will chime in on this thread of mutiny:

1. Mutinners can "win" (which is not a victory, Command staff have been half killed, along side 2/3rds of the company) but they need to be smart and not that kill hungry. Once you acquire the CO captive, be either alive or being treated on medbay, you have to send a fax to HC with all the reasoning behind the mutiny, what CO did and request removal.

If you simply take the CO captive and announce "He's released from Command" tou are just doing sedition. The CO is still in fact in Command, all you did was be a seditionner that deserves execution by Marine law.

2. On that shotgun ban round, people misinterpreted what happened. I was never relified from Command. No HC fax came in telling me that. CIC just got stormed, Charlie protested and the XO unbanned the shotguns. Then they left.
I have not been overthrown, actually. I ordered the XO to handle the grounds OP as I dealt with the mutinners myself. They all commited sedition, so I ordered Charlie to brig for interrogation of who participated and was leading the mutiny.

In no point the "mutiny" extended it self. That 40 extra minutes was me dealing with people that commited sedition. There was no mutiny happening after Charlie left CIC.

3.If any side, Mutinners or Pro-Command, is doing permakilling/denying defibs you can ahelp it. Staff will handle any mutiny violations.

[FGRSentinel]

Part of the reason why you were never (properly) relieved from command is none of the mutineers were aware how exactly to do it in a way that made sense. It's one of the unspoken rules/expectations for how things work that honestly should be written down somewhere for the sake of preventing madness like that again.

[Blade2000Br]

Part of the reason why you were never (properly) relieved from command is none of the mutineers were aware how exactly to do it in a way that made sense. It's one of the unspoken rules/expectations for how things work that honestly should be written down somewhere for the sake of preventing madness like that again.

Its less of a rule and more like common sense. We will only OOC if the CO escape the pods and whatnot, but to solve the issue IC you should be faxing to HC.

[GoliathTheDespoiler]

Amateurs.

Mutinies can't succeed in current state. CO players believe it's their god given right and will kill anyone who tries, mutineers can't escalate unless he does. Mutineers can't permakill anyone so enjoy the CO dicking you up later. Not to forget some COs deliberately baiting mutinies through certain orders so they and the MPs can go wild.

In all my time, I've only ever seen one CO pass command on peacefully. After the round, they were promptly told by a few CO whitelisted to just shoot anyone who tries and not give up the position. Attitude is a huge problem to a conductive round.

I personally agree with this. I think one of the larger issues affecting mutinies is the attitude of no surrender most CO players have when they bait a mutiny. Because in all honesty, there will never be a mutiny the CO hasn't intentionally tried to cause. The fact that they are actively TRYING to cause incidents like these is also a major thing that bothers me, because if anything, it's the CO's job to MAINTAIN order and stability, not incite self-hating riots and trying to get yourself killed, just so you can notch a few more kills on a mateba.

Mutinies are, at the moment, just an excuse for COD and nothing else. One of my two attempts at non-violent 'mutiny' protests (where I'd just shut down whatever department I'm in and demand an audience) was been met with tanks, marines, grenades, and angry POs who don't even give a chance for a peaceful outcome. The other time was simply violent from the start, since there's really no other way for a mutineer to NOT get fucked over instantly by someone who listened to the radio and is armed.

At the moment there seriously need to be a mechanical improvement to how mutinies work, an identification system is absolutely critical or else the entire experience is going to be awful. But that's just a dotpoint on a list as long as a highway that needs to be done to improve mutinies to a state that isn't just awful, awful legal griefing.

[Accinator50]

I started a mutiny and it succeed. Then round was hardly over and the enemies only had 7 Xenos left. Then the XO ( we had no CO) gave the order to evacuate and said that we should recover our wounds. Nobody wanted rondo it but everybody done it. I stole a command headset and said in the whole comma that we are gonna kill the XO everybody joined even the CL. The only MP barricaded himself into the Brig and done nothing. Then the CL opened CIC knockdown because he said everything is fine. Then every soldier walked inside and I killed the XO and 3 from 4 SOs . Then the lizards came and we achieved into their location. They fully died and we won the round.
So this was a great mutiny.
I think for a food mutiny you only need a few things :
Friends with CIC access, only 1 MP / nearly no MP, Xenos which boarders your ship after the Command Stuff was executed so no one can think about killing the new aCO .
So it's nearly impossible to get a good mutiny...

[FGRSentinel]

Yeah, the thing is that most rounds where people do shit that warrants a mutiny against them they do it when there's almost a full MP force.

[Chaznoodles]

I killed the XO and 3 from 4 SOs

The XO can't shoot you first, because he's not allowed to BE, so yep.

[Gnorse]

If it's one of those so called "Tyrant" COs you better believe I'm going to "accidentally" husk/decap/disposal him because those types will NOT accept defeat.