A Discussion on Metatrust

[Emimiyu]

Thread may have not been replied long.

Though, I have concerning issue with metatrust in regards of whitelister only interacting with other whitelisters. In a case, I have seen HoS prioritizing officers or security assistant who are also whitelisted, while ignoring other active officers. I have also seen when a whitelisted player, who were not playing sec at the time, ask something that can be done by other officers on board, yet treat other officers who were attending to them as no one and demand for whitelisted players they know to attend them instead. Not in, "I only want to speak to your HoS or NTSC", but directly calling that they only want to interact and act with "Name" and "Name"

It is rare. But, I feel like whitelisted heing treated as the "cool kidz club only". I wonder if this is a kind of metatrust? I do wish this is just a very rare occurance, because I do not like the idea of metaclique based on whitelist and people who they wish to be "whitelisted".

[Vulwin_Gilran]

if anyone is acting like that, especially people on whitelist who are EXPECTED to not do stuff like that, you should really ahelp that imo.

[BioFrequency]

I probably have some kind of unconscious bias on this subject.

On an ACTIVE level. I like to think I don't have much meta-trust in other players.

Let's take.... Genetics for an example.

Going to genetics for a gene scan is something I try to do often. It gives another player something yo do - and you might walk away with some cool mutations as a result.

I am 100% confident that the question of "if" I will ask for a geneticist scan is NOT effected by who is working Genetics that day.

Once I'm IN the gene tube is when I start to get a feel for the geneticist skill level.

Newer players are easy to spot.

When I do encounter a newer player- I usually try to let them do their thing. But, I will abort a scan and leave early if its taking too long and I have other things to do.

My tolerance is around 3 to 5 minutes. Any scan taking longer than that and I politely ask to leave.

[Shiiba]

Thread may have not been replied long.

Though, I have concerning issue with metatrust in regards of whitelister only interacting with other whitelisters. In a case, I have seen HoS prioritizing officers or security assistant who are also whitelisted, while ignoring other active officers. I have also seen when a whitelisted player, who were not playing sec at the time, ask something that can be done by other officers on board, yet treat other officers who were attending to them as no one and demand for whitelisted players they know to attend them instead. Not in, "I only want to speak to your HoS or NTSC", but directly calling that they only want to interact and act with "Name" and "Name"

It is rare. But, I feel like whitelisted heing treated as the "cool kidz club only". I wonder if this is a kind of metatrust? I do wish this is just a very rare occurance, because I do not like the idea of metaclique based on whitelist and people who they wish to be "whitelisted".

If you notice this as a pattern it should be ahelped.

[Zhail]

Thought that it might be pertinent to bring this conversation up again and give some thoughts on it, specifically about metacliquing through ingame relationships, because it's been bugging me for a while. There is also this thread (mentioned earlier) that goes more into detail on metacliquing, but given that the last post was from over 2 years ago I didn't think necroing it would be wise.

I've been noticing a few new players coming to our ranks recently, and with that I've also noticed that, sometimes, they've been excluded from an interaction and put off because people wanted to focus on their established friendship's RP. This phenomenon is especially prevalent when it comes to deeply connected characters, to the point where two characters' lores are interconnected.

Obviously, these are allowed. But I saw these types of things as a way to show these friendships, lore drops, and ingame romances off, and then move on. Looking further into this and noticing that it's not just newer players being excluded, I think it's turned into a crutch, to a point where even when one player is an antagonist, they'll go out of their way to include their deep connections, or interact solely with the people they have relationships with. It's frustrating to play a round and be treated a wildly different way than someone just because I don't have an ingame marriage with them, or be excluded from an RP because it involves "Hey guys, remember this funny thing that happened to us?" 

People will always interact with each other differently based on how long they've known each other; it's human nature to do so. But I think the key difference between not knowing someone, therefore talking to them differently and fully excluding someone because your friend just got out of cryo and you want to go talk to them is how many times it happens across multiple rounds. One round, could be coincidence. Two rounds, maybe not. Three rounds, definitely not. Unfortunately that means that it's hard to pick up before the affected person has already decided that the rest of the server might be like this, and goes somewhere else instead. This means the people participating in it have to moderate themselves, which then creates another problem of not having the kind of game you want because you're not talking with the people you feel comfortable expressing yourself with. It's a vicious, frustrating circle for all involved.

I think jan's put it best: "Play the round." Roll with the punches that come, not the crew you know.

[Kotlol]

 I think it's turned into a crutch, to a point where even when one player is an antagonist, they'll go out of their way to include their deep connections, or interact solely with the people they have relationships with. It's frustrating to play a round and be treated a wildly different way than someone just because I don't have an ingame marriage with them, or be excluded from an RP because it involves "Hey guys, remember this funny thing that happened to us?" 

I'd like to add to this part really.. but in a different way. (This was long ago!)
I once was a security officer in a shift and suddenly I get a beep of a hostage situation in the chapel. Naturally a traitor took a crewmate hostage... I of course 1st had to get rid of any person trying to vigilante 1st. Aka clear the room... Cause hostage situations are fun interactions with the antagonist but it mostly goes sour since Staffy McStafferson runs to suplex them in their demands. (I like my personal rule of "Do not attack the antagonist until the antagonist starts combat or security.")

When that was done. We started doing the negioations.. and it went well till a staffy ran in and suplexed the dang antagonist, saving the hostage. (Well darn)
Guess we gotta arrest them now.... cuffed em and checked on the hostage to only have the hostage pull the antagonist away from security and saving them.
Okay.. so the hostage is mindhacked. Makes sense... SMART move traitor to have a backup plan.
So we naturally arrest the hostage and.. no mindhack? Odd.. okay maybe they are another traitor and have no traitor gear?
But they kept saying how they loved eachother and are married and did this so they could retire to the Space Bahama's. The hostage situation was to drum up a fortune.
Fun story.. and if they were both antags. BRILLIANT! Shame a staffy suplexed it and ruined their round.

Then... end of round came in. I checked on the antag list and... Wait... the hostage... wasn't an antag at all? No mindhacked OR antag ever?! They were just a normal staffy who in META was married to the antagonist from rounds ago and always roleplayed together in a METATRUST WAY!?
Yea I wasn't pleased.... Ahelped it and moved on.

This is why I wanted to add to it. Since this kinda meta trust makes interresting stories but also "breaks" the rules of "pretend like you want to keep your job if you ain't an antagonist." Just cause your two charaters have history from previous rounds... and you like roleplaying a loveydovey couple that's married. You can't just be an antagonist cause the other one is.

I also learn of their previous loveydovey stuff and continuoued ones on later rounds. And I'll be honest... after that round whenever one of the two was an antagonist, I was ready to jump the other one just in case... Luckily that offense didn't get repeated. But it shows that metatrust like that can lead to very bad situations.