Survey results, new Server Rules draft, and next General Rules Only day

[Rahlzel]

Here are the survey results from 153 responses: https://i.imgur.com/mvjxdcF.jpg

A few notable points I've pulled out of the open-ended feedback questions (paraphrasing some):

• Any technical problems found with being allowed to take other player's ID cards?
  • Taking IDs is necessary in certain situations
  • Mistook a mutineer having CO's ID as the CO, released them from their cuffs. A bit confusing! (I consider this a good thing - it adds flavor to make the round potentially more interesting. -Rahl)
  • Sentry gun Identify Friend or Foe (IFF) is keyed to ID cards which could cause problems
• Any feedback regarding the Roleplay Guidelines?
  • They can be condensed
  • it needs to be updated in order to consist with removing some rules.
  • 'Act like a Xenomorph' NEEDS to be added
  • despacito

And overall feedback was largely in favor of General Rules Only day with some worry about it becoming LowRP with aliens.

I've taken feedback into account and made some significant changes to a first draft of the new Server Rules.

• 34 rules have been reduced to 19. Fun fact, the number of total characters used to write the rules has been reduced from 21,759 to ~7,500, give or take changes that I may do at any time after getting more feedback.
• Roleplay Guidelines have been completely removed, but the more important parts have been moved to the Server Rules draft. I'm in favor of having a single document that has all relevant information instead of spreading it over multiple documents.
• Most rules have been rewritten to make them as short and simple as I think is possible. Some tweaking may be needed for clarity or examples. For example, the "English Only" rule really doesn't need a paragraph explaining it.
• For MPs, most of our staff and many players are in favor of them all using Marine Law as an extension of the rules. An argument could be made for only the Chief MP to be bound to Marine Law, but that will likely cause too much chaos in an already chaotic round. It's good to have a small group of people firmly trustworthy with over a hundred running around causing shenanigans.
• Also for MPs, it is likely that at least one more job slot will be added to make the total 6. This would allow for a buddy system and make traversing the ship a bit safer.
• The Lethal Force rule is back to prevent too much insanity with fisticuffs turning into a gun fight unrealistically.
• Alien Rules and Predator Rules can mostly be combined into a single "Act like your given role" rule that covers everything.
• Mutiny is rewritten to be simpler and favor a whitelisted Commander's end-of-mutiny decision. I have very few reservations with giving whitelisted roles more freedom when their place on the whitelist is in jeopardy at all times.

Server Rules Draft (what's up with Google's list formatting in published documents?)

The next General Rules Only day is being renamed "Server Rules Draft" day, and is scheduled for next Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday

3 days of testing instead of just one. It's more accurate to call them "Server Rules Draft" days because I'm putting this draft to the ultimate test. It is highly recommended that you check this draft prior to joining next week in case anything has changed because it likely will. I'm also open to the idea of completely and immediately changing the server rules to the new draft if results are good for those 3 days. I want this done.

Also in the works is Marine Law which will certainly need an update to coincide with the new rules. As usual, the goal is to make Marine Law as efficient as possible to cut down on the wall of text. Nicer to read means nicer to follow.

[Sleepy Retard]

despacito

[James5734]

Breaking news: Rahlzel reveals Despacito 2. More at 11

[Lumdor]

Very good rahl, I like where this is going.

[TheMusician321]

Maybe add in xenos melting entire parts of the colony that they oocly know marines will be at but ICly don't into the metagame thing, like the time one beno melted all the window frames in hydro and only the window frames.

Oh and this is mainly a log thing but maybe adding in a Xeno melted Thing at (x,y,z) in the attack logs too?

Everything else looks pretty good.

[Rahlzel]

Maybe add in xenos melting entire parts of the colony that they oocly know marines will be at but ICly don't into the metagame thing, like the time one beno melted all the window frames in hydro and only the window frames.

Within Rule 1: Aliens - You don’t know where hosts might show up or go to defend.

[Aceluke123]

So long as things go smoothly I’m all for the changes! Good luck players and staff alike.

[WinterClould]

Personally I don't think IDs should be stolen from people who can still be revived. If you get your ID jacked then revived you can be totally fucked because we don't have a HOP and our ID's are all weird. But if you're braindead it becomes a who gives a fuck he's dead as fuck scenario.

One more MP could be added but smh fuck the MPs still.

[FearTheBlackout]

Getting shot to death as an MP only makes me stronger!

[Solarmare]

Should be some restriction on using lethals on mutiny before command so people don't just use it as an excuse to shoot command whenever something remotely bad happens, that and the needing 5 being a thing that'll need up ending to be ahelped or something just to see how many marines were part of the mutiny.
Could be changed to removing the amount of people needed but the lethals restricted before commands uses lethals to make attempting one in small numbers just a bad idea.

[frozentsbgg]

Despacito 2 day!

[Imperator_Titan]

Oh and this is mainly a log thing but maybe adding in a Xeno melted Thing at (x,y,z) in the attack logs too?

Everything else looks pretty good.

Already a thing in the attack logs.

[TheMaskedMan2]

Well the first General Rules day worked pretty well, I didn't expect it too. I hope this next test works just as well. Overall I don't see any problem with the current rule draft coming up. I'm sure a few things might pop their ugly head up but that's what testing is for.
Here's to hoping it goes well, eh?

[Rahlzel]

Should be some restriction on using lethals on mutiny before command

Assuming I understood this correctly, "The Acting Commander must be given a chance to stand down peacefully."

[taketheshot56]

Now do BEs extend to the MPs and CMPs again? Or are we sticking with the defined BE rules set out within the marine law page.

Also describe the synths corporate interests. I was always told Synths are loyal to marines 100% barring marines turning on you or an event. Does Wey yu now outrank marines in that regard?

[Bronimin]

'No powergaming - Powergaming includes performing actions outside your assigned job or chosen character’s abilities. Your skills or RP background prior to the round do not matter - a standard marine with "a brother in Engineering" does not know how to hack an airlock.' - The skills system makes all of these examples used here irrelevant, remove them or replace them with something more relevant.

'No metagaming or metacommunication - Acting upon knowledge your character does not have or communicating information about the current round, including but not limited to private discussions, chat rooms, and/or voice chats during the game. If you want to talk to other CM players about CM or just in general, we have an official Discord, but keep the discussion about past rounds and never about the current one.' - I would class suicide under the RP guidelines and not metagaming. I would also remove the ramboing clause since I don't think that that has ever been enforced since I have started playing at least.

'No messing with atmosphere - Our Atmos system is horrible. We are working to improve it, but for now do not intentionally breach to space, release phoron (or other gasses), or mess with atmos at all. There are some gameplay exceptions such as the dropship landing partly in space or the Predator’s gauntlet exploding on the ship.' - Irrelevant, atmos can't be altered by players after a recent update.

'Battlefield Execution - Whitelisted Commanders are allowed to instantly kill any marine at any time if they feel the marine is a threat to the mission. A command announcement of the situation and reason must then be made. Excessive or poorly-reasoned battlefield executions may end with the Commander being removed from the whitelist.' - IDK why this is here, shouldn't it be in marine law?

'Act like your given role - We’ve all seen the movies or played the games. ' - Merge rule 14 with this one, MPs cannot break marine law. You could probably integrate Lethal Force, too

[Solarmare]

Assuming I understood this correctly, "The Acting Commander must be given a chance to stand down peacefully."

That basically, I'm just thinking things over so marines can attempt mutinies without them being an excuse to shoot command over basically. Getting the acting commander to peacefully stand down would be one of the more important bits.I'd probably prefer a more strict you can't fire until defending command does, though that's mostly just due to my opinion of lethal force should be a more restrictive measure to attempt in general. Firefights between marines have a whole lot of problems, among them encouraging other marines to shoot when they have no idea what's going on,

I don't think marines shouod have too many restrictions on mutiny, just strong ones so it isn't abused. The amount of people being replaced with you need to ahelp with a reason to mutiny and have it accepted by staff could work.

[spookydonut]

Atmos rule can be removed.

Naming rule should have the word unique added to avoid name theft or duplicates

[Rahlzel]

Now do BEs extend to the MPs and CMPs again? Or are we sticking with the defined BE rules set out within the marine law page.

Also describe the synths corporate interests. I was always told Synths are loyal to marines 100% barring marines turning on you or an event. Does Wey yu now outrank marines in that regard?

Good find. I wrote that thinking of the potentially bad synthetics in the movies and such. Fixed.

I figured I'd move BEs to the rules in order to lock down what a Commander should and shouldn't be doing.

'No powergaming - Powergaming includes performing actions outside your assigned job or chosen character’s abilities. Your skills or RP background prior to the round do not matter - a standard marine with "a brother in Engineering" does not know how to hack an airlock.' - The skills system makes all of these examples used here irrelevant, remove them or replace them with something more relevant.

'No metagaming or metacommunication - Acting upon knowledge your character does not have or communicating information about the current round, including but not limited to private discussions, chat rooms, and/or voice chats during the game. If you want to talk to other CM players about CM or just in general, we have an official Discord, but keep the discussion about past rounds and never about the current one.' - I would class suicide under the RP guidelines and not metagaming. I would also remove the ramboing clause since I don't think that that has ever been enforced since I have started playing at least.

'No messing with atmosphere - Our Atmos system is horrible. We are working to improve it, but for now do not intentionally breach to space, release phoron (or other gasses), or mess with atmos at all. There are some gameplay exceptions such as the dropship landing partly in space or the Predator’s gauntlet exploding on the ship.' - Irrelevant, atmos can't be altered by players after a recent update.

'Battlefield Execution - Whitelisted Commanders are allowed to instantly kill any marine at any time if they feel the marine is a threat to the mission. A command announcement of the situation and reason must then be made. Excessive or poorly-reasoned battlefield executions may end with the Commander being removed from the whitelist.' - IDK why this is here, shouldn't it be in marine law?

'Act like your given role - We’ve all seen the movies or played the games. ' - Merge rule 14 with this one, MPs cannot break marine law. You could probably integrate Lethal Force, too

I fixed a few of these, but I think I'm going to leave the rest as-is. The "given roles" are meant to encompass the different races and not individual jobs. I may change my mind on this and combine it with the MP rule but for now this is sufficient and makes the MP rule stand out more.

Atmos rule can be removed.

Naming rule should have the word unique added to avoid name theft or duplicates

Fixed.

[NoahKirchner]

Aliens slashing powered devices such as APCc, cameras, and lights. ---> Aliens slashing powered devices such as APCs, cameras, and lights. (APCc should become APCs in rule 5 example b1)

Rule 7 could use a very short description for new players imo




I really really really like these new rules, they preserve the quality of RP and are a bit less of a nightmare to read through.

[Rahlzel]

Aliens slashing powered devices such as APCc, cameras, and lights. ---> Aliens slashing powered devices such as APCs, cameras, and lights. (APCc should become APCs in rule 5 example b1)

Rule 7 could use a very short description for new players imo




I really really really like these new rules, they preserve the quality of RP and are a bit less of a nightmare to read through.

Good to hear.

Thanks for noticing the typo. Fixed.

I'm kinda torn on rule #7. I feel like getting rid of it. I really don't care if people post byond:// links to other servers. If players want to go play elsewhere they'll just find it on the hub. Or if there's something crazy going down on another server... hell, I might want to join it to see what's happening, too. If there's a group of friends on CM and one of them posts a byond link in OOC at the end of the round to Bay or Paradise or something so that they can all meet up - cool. I couldn't care less.

Recruiting I'd probably move to the Don't Be a Dick rule, but even then I feel like it's stupidly obvious and encompasses that rule anyway.

[Solarmare]

Could probably add not to intentionally gib bodies as well, as thats usually uphelp as a rule and if that's going to continue as such.Maybe as an example in metagaming as there's no reason for a xeno to intentionally do so as they're the usual culprit.
Could add dragging away marine corpses as an example of not metagaming as well, since that can be a typical salty ahelp.

[NoahKirchner]

Good to hear.

Thanks for noticing the typo. Fixed.

I'm kinda torn on rule #7. I feel like getting rid of it. I really don't care if people post byond:// links to other servers. If players want to go play elsewhere they'll just find it on the hub. Or if there's something crazy going down on another server... hell, I might want to join it to see what's happening, too. If there's a group of friends on CM and one of them posts a byond link in OOC at the end of the round to Bay or Paradise or something so that they can all meet up - cool. I couldn't care less.

Recruiting I'd probably move to the Don't Be a Dick rule, but even then I feel like it's stupidly obvious and encompasses that rule anyway.

Will you marry me? Common sense rules like "don't be a dick" are useful because they open up the staff team to better deal with shitters and open up players to more possibilities ic and oocly, the more stuff that gets put into "don't be a dick" and becomes precedent instead of a proper rule the better as far as I am concerned. You can always re-add a rule if it become a serious issue too, and then it has a stronger justification, but the changes already made are truly a beauty.

[Aceluke123]

I don’t like advertising to be honest to be done on the server but that’s up to you rahl.

Also on BE rule, you might want to add that MPs are immune as it seems some players might get confused at that restriction on BEs.

[Rahlzel]

Well, I should be clear - I see a difference between advertising and just posting a link. Advertising I don't want to see. I hate ads. But if it's just someone asking for the Baystation server IP and another responding by linking it, or someone going, 'Some guy just made a bomb that blew a 100-tile hole in the station on their server [link to server]', that's fine. So maybe I should keep it but clarify that.