Metagaming - Why don't I understand it?

[Blade2000Br]

I'm fine with that, becuase there is a precedent for xenomorphs to attack isolated and vulnerable targets.

What I don't find kosher is when an Almayer ayy immediately melts their way into SD and fucks up the APC before beginning their rampage.

I have seen an ancient spitter melt all 8 weapon vendors from both alpha and Bravo and mods stomped thr guy so hard it was sad. I think he even got 3 day ban.

So if you see a xeno melting himself through the blast doors from Tcomms just to break the tcomms APC, ahelp that shit and the xeno will get banned faster than saying banana.

Anything that seems metagamey "Aka. A drone melting his way through tcomms and SD or Meltung weapon vendors before DS crach" can result in a ban. Just ahelp that behaviour.
"Xenos can't meta" is a meme, not a true statement.

[Crab_Spider]

Yet destroing tcomms and slashing ONLY sd apc is fine..

It's fine. Keep it as is. Not meta.

[Shuffl3]

Lol, theres no consistent definition of Xenos metagaming that anybody can agree on and its not like theres a list of meta you can just look up. Just dont be a dick if you get pinged for something and explain yourself honestly. As far as I know, these things are decided on a case by case basis. So plead ignorance, acknowledge the murky grey area, and dont do it again after staff has told you to knock it off. If it seems like whatever action has become acceptable, ahelp to confirm before you try a repeat performance.

Ive never had any issues with this approach.

[Miranda]

I have seen an ancient spitter melt all 8 weapon vendors from both alpha and Bravo and mods stomped thr guy so hard it was sad. I think he even got 3 day ban.

So if you see a xeno melting himself through the blast doors from Tcomms just to break the tcomms APC, ahelp that shit and the xeno will get banned faster than saying banana.

Anything that seems metagamey "Aka. A drone melting his way through tcomms and SD or Meltung weapon vendors before DS crach" can result in a ban. Just ahelp that behaviour.
"Xenos can't meta" is a meme, not a true statement.

Ahelped things like this many times. Tcoms slashers and sd slashers. Almost no reaction.
Once i ahelped the alien who melt everything in emergency armory of our old ship(if im not wrong we had m56, GL, tactical shotguns and insediary slugs there). Admins said he just wanted to make a nest.

[Blade2000Br]

Ahelped things like this many times. Tcoms slashers and sd slashers. Almost no reaction.
Once i ahelped the alien who melt everything in emergency armory of our old ship(if im not wrong we had m56, GL, tactical shotguns and insediary slugs there). Admins said he just wanted to make a nest.

It depends of the approach. If the drone is literally destroying every APC then goes to Tcomms/SD, is fine. If he goes straight to the said APC, without looking the others, it's meta.

Now that emergency armory issue seems rather iffy, and I would need more context for that. But dunno.

[Shuffl3]

It depends of the approach. If the drone is literally destroying every APC then goes to Tcomms/SD, is fine. If he goes straight to the said APC, without looking the others, it's meta.

Im not normally one to self-incriminate but Ive pretty much done this exact thing anytime I'm a shipside drone and on maps where its possible to get a stealth tcoms takedown like Prison I will always attempt to leverage that advantage. I mainly pick up things from the game via context and it seems generally understood in both hivechat and dchat that xenomorphs not only understand what tcoms is but recognize the equipment and understand the causality of destroying the APC. Besides...

Disabling T-Coms is a element/mechanic of CM, if we didn't want T-Coms touched or disabled we'd move it off of Sulaco. It's there to add more to the game, so stop complaining about it.. it's such a ridiculous thing and I'm sick of it. We use to be on the same page with this, but a few Mods/Admins decided to enforce this issue differently which I think has confused the playerbase.. If you're a mod reading this now, understand what I just wrote.
-Feweh
viewtopic.php?f=86&t=6278&p=66522&hilit ... oms#p66846

[Rio]

I have seen an ancient spitter melt all 8 weapon vendors from both alpha and Bravo and mods stomped thr guy so hard it was sad. I think he even got 3 day ban.

So if you see a xeno melting himself through the blast doors from Tcomms just to break the tcomms APC, ahelp that shit and the xeno will get banned faster than saying banana.

Anything that seems metagamey "Aka. A drone melting his way through tcomms and SD or Meltung weapon vendors before DS crach" can result in a ban. Just ahelp that behaviour.
"Xenos can't meta" is a meme, not a true statement.

I have.

Either a get a canned response along the lines of "meh", or get told that the xeno has a "reason" for melting their way into SD and slashing up the APC never to return to the room again.

From the few months of my playing and observing, "Xenos can't meta" is a meme only because moderators choose not to act on blatant xeno powergaming.

[Miranda]

It depends of the approach. If the drone is literally destroying every APC then goes to Tcomms/SD, is fine. If he goes straight to the said APC, without looking the others, it's meta.

I ahelped only >he goes straight to the said APC, without looking the others< cases.

Now that emergency armory issue seems rather iffy, and I would need more context for that. But dunno.

He was a larva that bursted in medbay. Escaped and after evolving he just went to armory and melt everything there. We found him only when aliens was flying to us with DS..

[Miranda]

it seems generally understood in both hivechat and dchat that xenomorphs not only understand what tcoms is but recognize the equipment and understand the causality of destroying the APC. Besides...

Also tell me why ayys don use our pulse rifles then? You just make smart animals into almost godly geniuses.

[Heckenshutze]

Xenos can meta/powergame, but it's a very -very- ....very....... thin line, so thin it almost depends solely of the moderator's criteria when dealing with the Ahelp, but there are some points most of the moderators agree that's againts the rules:

1) Dragging bodies under the LZ

2) This own case, grabbing stuff to put it in a crate,locker, container to melt it all at once.

3) Using lockers, containers, disposals chutes etc to hide stuff or bodies. You can drag bodies to the corner of the map but you're forbidden of hiding them in such containers.

4) Making strong fortificactions at the LZ or any vital area for the marines BEFORE first contact.

5) melting all the stuff in a room vital for the marines BEFORE first contact.

6) Ship-side: Going STRAIGHT to SD/Tcomms before other rooms to melt/slash stuff/APC.

7) Ship-side: Straight melting the armory.

That's the ones I can recall.

[Symbiosis]

Xenos can meta/powergame, but it's a very -very- ....very....... thin line, so thin it almost depends solely of the moderator's criteria when dealing with the Ahelp, but there are some points most of the moderators agree that's againts the rules:

1) Dragging bodies under the LZ

2) This own case, grabbing stuff to put it in a crate,locker, container to melt it all at once.

3) Using lockers, containers, disposals chutes etc to hide stuff or bodies. You can drag bodies to the corner of the map but you're forbidden of hiding them in such containers.

4) Making strong fortificactions at the LZ or any vital area for the marines BEFORE first contact.

5) melting all the stuff in a room vital for the marines BEFORE first contact.

6) Ship-side: Going STRAIGHT to SD/Tcomms before other rooms to melt/slash stuff/APC.

7) Ship-side: Straight melting the armory.

That's the ones I can recall.

Pretty much it. The only other thing I can remember is dragging old dead bodies over freshly dead bodies to hide the defib symbol from medics.

OR taking the dropship BACK DOWN to the planet to delay. (good old Jopper)

[Shuffl3]

Also tell me why ayys don use our pulse rifles then? You just make smart animals into almost godly geniuses.

Why would they?

In a very broad sense, tools are used to overcome ones limitations within an environment. Humans, being fairly young to the extrasolar game are extremely limited by their environments. Outside of a relatively narrow band of energy levels and chemical compositions the universe is just unsuitable for humanity. For a broad range of what could be seen as common interactions you might as well replace a human with a somewhat viscous and flammable water balloon and save yourself the math.

Humans need tools because they cant survive without them.

Xenomorphs come close to being the polar opposite of this. Whether it be naturally through some similar process of abiogenesis and evolution or unnaturally via some act of intelligent creation; Xenomorphs are well suited to life in the universe. Where the human needs a spacesuit, the xenomorph has a carapace. When the human needs to project force, the xenomorph has its own frightening speed and strength. If sticks and stones are the fundamental proto-tools of humanity, the lever and the kinetic, the xenomorph is gifted these from birth in spades.

Xenomorphs dont use tools because they dont need to.

Reducing them to mere 'smart animals' betrays your own hubris. We've countless observations of what we would consider higher order intelligence. Object permanence, self-recognition, concept formation, observation learning... Whatever line we draw in the sand that defines the border between their intelligence and our own keeps getting pushed back. Its coming so close to our feet its to the point where if we don't describe them as a sentient species we will have difficulty ascribing that same virtue to ourselves. Those fools at USCM High Command haven't the faintest idea what they've stumbled upon and we need to capitalize on their ignorance before we lose the chance.

-Dr. Steve Stevenson Ph.D
Weyland-Yutani Research

[Miranda]

Object permanence, self-recognition, concept formation, observation learning...

Thats basically what 'Smart animals' is. Even birds have this. Still doesn't mean birds can understand what radio is WHILE NOT HEARING IT AND NOT SEEING IT and how are they sopposed to link radio with Tcomms tower, hmm? How can they KNOW what SD is? There is a big difference between intelligent and omniscient.

[Crab_Spider]

Thats basically what 'Smart animals' is. Even birds have this. Still doesn't mean birds can understand what radio is WHILE NOT HEARING IT AND NOT SEEING IT and how are they sopposed to link radio with Tcomms tower, hmm? How can they KNOW what SD is? There is a big difference between intelligent and omniscient.

By that genius logic, humans are just "smart animals". no fucking shit

[misto]

xenos are allowed to break apcs and shit because thats all part of what they do as movie badguys, breaking the power and stowing away and being nasty. also, they have a magic xeno goddess in the sky named the queen mother who chimes in with periodic lifeform scans like ares does, and thus any supposed gaps in knowledge the xeno team "should" have can easily be handwaved away by them being psychically filled in by this ancient superintelligent xeno queen who telepathically scans the planet and almayer across interstellar distances

[Shuffl3]

Thats basically what 'Smart animals' is. Even birds have this. Still doesn't mean birds can understand what radio is WHILE NOT HEARING IT AND NOT SEEING IT and how are they sopposed to link radio with Tcomms tower, hmm? How can they KNOW what SD is? There is a big difference between intelligent and omniscient.

Yeah, mistos got the right idea. I mean, we're all just peeps that play the game. To get a super serious lore based answer youre gonna have to pester somebody official. Maybe that penguin person that runs the wiki? But its not that tricky to think up one yourself.

Real low effort explaination involves the intragalactic hivemind. If you check out the timeline youll see that this is not the first time xenos have encountered humans or marines. So the xenos know all this because as a species, this enemy is not new to them. CAS lasers, OBs, defibs, theyve seen it all before and that knowledge has been embedded in their genetic memeory(leaving that typo). Much like their knowledge of the predators, its something theyre born with or they just get an update from the near omniscient Queen Mother.

A slighty more specific take on it that could appeal to your viewpoints better is that Xenomorphs have much greater senses than humans. Sure, theyre just smart animals but the range of the electromagnetic spectrum they can detect is much greater, broader, maybe even contiguous. Unlike humans that can only detect three narrow bandwidths of electromagnetic radiation, Xenomorphs could see and understand whole swaths of it. Radio is just a different bandwidth of light, so perhaps the headsets and communication towers glow like bright pulsing beacons to them. Power units would stand out and seemingly flicker as the currents of electricity change inside. It wouldnt be too much of a stretch for them to associate the same pulsing patterns of the marine headset units with the very same pulses of the telecommunication equipment.

Ultimately the burden of justification falls to you though. Its not anybody's responsibity to force the game to make sense for you. The xenos just represent the hostile other, the true alien. Thematically they're the embodiment of some of the worst human experiences: rape, mutilation, forced pregnancy. Closer to a supernatural entity or a force of nature, any attempt to logically define or understand them serves to undermine that and reduces the impact they can have. So like, dont feel the need to do that. They're scary space bugs, let em do scary things. The more off balance and upsetting they can get you the better. Its what they were made for.

[Miranda]

Real low effort explaination involves the intragalactic hivemind. If you check out the timeline youll see that this is not the first time xenos have encountered humans or marines. So the xenos know all this because as a species, this enemy is not new to them. CAS lasers, OBs, defibs, theyve seen it all before and that knowledge has been embedded in their genetic memeory(leaving that typo). Much like their knowledge of the predators, its something theyre born with or they just get an update from the near omniscient Queen Mother.

Still nothing to do with what radio is and how it links to radio tower. And SD..
And >intragalactic hivemind< comes from fanfiction and Alien 3 worst of them all until Cameron come back.

My point is that devs could just make our power sourse on planet the target for this! Want to remove radio? Then disable power plant same as in "aliens". And not specifically lonely APC in far corner of a map that is WALLED and UNGUARDED even. Same with SD. They just need to run into engineering and mess something there and not a damn APC in a closed room. OR TAGET ALL APCs. We were talking about cases when lonely runners came into SD room or spitters melting walls surrounding Tcoms tower for no damn reason and without any orders from queen that is sopposed to be "the smart one" actually.

[Miranda]

By that genius logic, humans are just "smart animals". no fucking shit

And we are.

[Shuffl3]

[Obstinance]

Eh, Im not sure if anybody here could explain things to you.
This video might be able to help you out though.

https://youtu.be/cytyAgu9-bA

[Heckenshutze]

Enough. You're all doing a silly debate over something isn't related to the topic. The creator asked about metagame and he got answered already, if you lot ain't going to share something else regarding xeno metagame but just argue about how smart a xeno is this is gonna get closed, and a proper topic would be made.

Now, to end this once for all I must say: CM has it's own lore, where xenos are so smart that know how tcomms work and humans so dumb they can't outsmart a child lock on pill bottles.

[misto]

i did share some good good thoughts regarding what is xeno metagaming and proposed a potential fix if admins dont want ppl melting everything at the start of the round, but my excellent, amazing, good great post was sadly at the bottom of the page and thus ignored forever when the new page hit

[Shuffl3]

Enough. You're all doing a silly debate over something isn't related to the topic. The creator asked about metagame and he got answered already, if you lot ain't going to share something else regarding xeno metagame but just argue about how smart a xeno is this is gonna get closed, and a proper topic would be made.

Lol, Heckenshutze. His question hasnt been answered ya goof. We've just pointed out things that are flagged as meta, strategies to avoid getting banned for it, and tips on how to recognize it. Nobody has touched 'Why he doesnt understand it.' As a group our responses are all over the place. Even you contradict yourself when you list '6) Ship-side: Going STRAIGHT to SD/Tcomms before other rooms to melt/slash stuff/APC.' and then say 'CM has it's own lore, where xenos are so smart that know how tcomms work'. The former of which is at odds with Fewehs stated position about t-coms slashing from a while back. Sorry if the debate was starting to get out of hand, but it is fundamentally an investigative tool. And I think its served its purpose because Ive got a pretty good idea of why its just hard to make sense of 'why'.

CM is in a post-meta era now.

The server has been run near-continuously round after round for years. The core playerbase has become so intimate and efficient with the game that the meta is just baked in. Its a fundamental part of the experience. Marines clear weeds from the get-go, shoot eggs on sight, and blast xenos at first contact. Crushers get charged with incinerators but players that use them on ravs and queens get admonished. Specs and officers get meta-targeted, lazes and OBs get run from, and strongpoints on the Almayer get rushed. If the metagaming rule was fully enforced most of the players would be out with bans. Metagaming is really more of a catchall for players perceived to be violating the spirit of the game.

So Stumpy Buckford probably doesn't understand it simply because that is a fluid, organic concept that he probably hasn't been around long enough to catch up to speed with.

[misto]

So Stumpy Buckford probably doesn't understand it simply because that is a fluid, organic concept that he probably hasn't been around long enough to catch up to speed with.

"fluid organic concept" very clever way of saying "ill-defined and inconsistently enforced due to the limitations of human policing and variations of opinion within the moderation team" comrade

if you admins/mods/devs/owners do not want the activities defined as "metagaming" to occur your first priority should be restricting it mechanically with mapping and coding changes rather than relying on admin watchdogs for months/years.

so, to return to the example OP was banned for, if you don't want xenos putting guns into crates, make it impossible for them to do that.

if you dont want them putting guns into crates and melting them, make it impossible for them to do that.

if you don't want xenos pushing indestructible objects as gunfire cover, make the pushable objects take damage and be destroyed by gunfire.

if you don't want them melting the shit out of everything in the fob area before a marine even sets foot, make it impossible to melt that shit before some kind of timer runs out(for example, the 25 minute from roundstart timer recently imposed on the dropships)

when you find a "metagaming" exploit the priority needs to be PATCHING it. anything less, such as relying on human moderators to act as police for months/years, is a half-hearted half-assed half-measure

[Shuffl3]

"fluid organic concept" very clever way of saying "ill-defined and inconsistently enforced due to the limitations of human policing and variations of opinion within the moderation team" comrade

if you admins/mods/devs/owners do not want the activities defined as "metagaming" to occur your first priority should be restricting it mechanically with mapping and coding changes rather than relying on admin watchdogs for months/years.

so, to return to the example OP was banned for, if you don't want xenos putting guns into crates, make it impossible for them to do that.

if you dont want them putting guns into crates and melting them, make it impossible for them to do that.

if you don't want xenos pushing indestructible objects as gunfire cover, make the pushable objects take damage and be destroyed by gunfire.

if you don't want them melting the shit out of everything in the fob area before a marine even sets foot, make it impossible to melt that shit before some kind of timer runs out(for example, the 25 minute from roundstart timer recently imposed on the dropships)

when you find a "metagaming" exploit the priority needs to be PATCHING it. anything less, such as relying on human moderators to act as police for months/years, is a half-hearted half-assed half-measure

Woah bud, that sounds kinda incendiary.

I dont know if youve seen it, but the CM team is pretty effin good about coding out problems of this nature. I want to say that Feweh came out and said its one of their development philosophies. For example, last week there was some back and forth about the legitimacy of xenos putting bodies in disposals. Different mods had different ideas but they were all pretty reasonable about asking you to adjust your behavior in PMs. When it became apparent that there were inconsistencies between the different staff it got kicked up for an official ruling and then very quickly they patched it out. This week, xenos cant put anything in disposals.

Give em some credit yo.

[misto]

i have seen, to certain extents, and said as much in one of my other posts. the fogwall, crude as it is, is an example we are all familiar with of putting in a solid mechanical fix rather than leaning on policing and bans.