Rampages

[Boon Yoon]

I was going to post this in Nerdy's ban thread, as I think the ban was completely unjustified, but I didn't want to shit it up. I think a discussion on rampages is necessary, because I have seen lots of conflict regarding it, especially in dead chat. Victims of rampages often say "rampagers are boring" or even worse, "you should be banned from antag role". They cite the culture of goon, and this is where I begin to question things. Is the culture of goon anti-rampage, and is that a good thing?

I ask because the other day I was openly murdered on the shuttle, and more than 7 people stood by and watched. Ever wonder why rampagers are so successful? You have only yourselves to blame. People are too afraid to kill, too afraid to take action. They think "if I leave the antag alone, he will let me live", and I think this sums up the current culture more than anything. 

As such, I think more people should rampage. Rampage until people wake up and start picking up fire extinguishers. Maybe they'll start listening to the radio as well! To sum it up, embrace rampagers by fucking killing them. This should be the culture.

Furthermore, between an incompetent traitor, a friendly wizard, or an evil rampager, I will take the rampager every time. They are actually fun if you try to fight back. Perhaps some of you could give it a shot! 

I apologize if I come across as a bit catty in this post, but holy shit guys, banning people for rampaging is terrible, and the current passive culture we are harboring is terrible, too.

[Noah Buttes]

Typically, only the most brazen rampages are fun. Brazen rampages are also, by their very nature, exceptionally difficult to pull off without dying. No one likes to die as a traitor, so if someone DOES rampage, they'll typically do so in as safe a manner as possible.

Most of these relatively safe methods are inherently dull and/or boring: stunning + spacing people, jammer + saber, jammer + butcher knife, and just about anything with a revolver or shotgun. Since they're so comparatively safe, these are the most common forms of rampage.

So not only are they dull and boring, they're overplayed to boot!

But absolutely none of that matters because a traitor should be able to commit evil however the heck he wants.

It'd be nice if more rampages were of the drugged out, staple gun shooting kind, but we should never force people to do that.

That having been said, I don't think we should make peanut gallery threads about nerdy's ban.

[Erik]

Rampages are fine as-is within the current ruleset, sure they are indeed boring, lame and overdone, and i think that we need to encourage players into doing fun and interesting traitor gimmicks.

[Mageziya]

I do at times miss the contest to be crowned "most robust" that old goon had. People were jumpy as hell and always looking for a justification to kill other players. While this seems brutal and unfun, it actually meant that the crew fought back against antagonists. Antagonists had reasons to hide themselves from the crew, as the crew would hunt them down at first acknowledgement of their crimes. Rampages are a hold-over from the time where it was difficult to actually rampage, where clearing the station's population was actually an achievement.

There was a short period of time where I rampaged, but I stopped. I didn't stop because rampages are shit things to do, I stopped because it was boring as hell for me to do. You either succeeded at it or didn't. That's it. The crew never fought back outside of the individual victims or security who just happened to be in the right place at the right time. There was no crew dynamic.

Rampages can still be fun for the normal crew. I remember one recent-ish round where I was a captain and mobilized most of the station to try and search for an elusive mad bomber who was blowing up the station and fucking off into space. It was insanely chaotic and fun, partly because the crew engaged in mass hysteria as no one was sure if the bomber was real or not, yet the station kept exploding.

The solution to rampages is to not punish the rampagers, as this goes against the ideal of letting traitors have free-reign over their actions. The solution is to instead find away to convince the crew to organize and fight back. To convince the crew to act instead of ignoring something that's not affecting them, or just waiting until next round for another chance at whatever they're doing.

[Noah Buttes]

To add, the current passive culture is the result of an overreaction to a former hyper-aggressive culture.

We didn't let anyone get away with anything at all, even gimmicks. We're far more lenient now. While that, in and of itself, is not necessarily a bad thing, I believe we've gone too far in the opposite direction. The only thing that really generates a coordinated crew response anymore is a blob. Wizards, shambling abominations, and even syndicates are ignored or tolerated far more frequently than they should be.

[Musketman12]

Rampages are fine as-is within the current ruleset, sure they are indeed boring, lame and overdone, and i think that we need to encourage players into doing fun and interesting traitor gimmicks.

I think this is one of the biggest causes of rampages, thinking of traitor gimmicks is hard and eventually a lot of people just say fuck it and go on a rampage.

[SuperbDingaling]

I agree with the whole mindset of antagonists being able to do whatever the hell they want, barring exploits and obviously bad stuff like camping arrivals.

On the reverse side, I also think that antagonists should be subject to whatever the hell people throw at them.

I recently got grumped at for setting a wizard on fire who was going around and killing dudes. Policing antag interactions is going to turn into Baystation-tier "Wow you didn't give that guy a chance to fight back" stuff, and I don't think anyone wants that.

[Boa Jacque]

After getting in a bit of trouble for accidentally posting in the restricted area, it seems topic has bubbled over into what i hope is an acceptable place to discuss this.

IMO, No player should ever have restrictions placed upon what they do with their traitor rounds. (except the bigotry and other 'blanket' ettiquite rules)

If you try and say "This person" or "this style" of rampage is too rampant, then you open a can of worms. Moderating the level of rampage or what constitutes a rampage to begin with is a sliding scale and nobody would agree 100% with anyone elses standpoint on the matter, so its either Rampages Ok? Yes/No.

Goon has always had rampages. In fact, that whole "You may be bombed/burned/robusted etc" line you get when you log in is the whole reason half of us play goon I think, those servers that say "If you kill anyone other than your targets you're shit get out" are shitty servers.

I agree 100% that rampaging players are easy to counter. MURDER THE FUCKER, half of us are looking for excuses to enter combat or pull a prank on a dude and here you go, we have some jerk with a revolver or a shotgun and a body count....looks like you can do whatever to this dude and its ok, go get em!

I have fun killing folks that rampage, or borging them.

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I agree with the whole mindset of antagonists being able to do whatever the hell they want, barring exploits and obviously bad stuff like camping arrivals.

On the reverse side, I also think that antagonists should be subject to whatever the hell people throw at them.

I recently got grumped at for setting a wizard on fire who was going around and killing dudes. Policing antag interactions is going to turn into Baystation-tier "Wow you didn't give that guy a chance to fight back" stuff, and I don't think anyone wants that.

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Personally I think this is terrible. A wizard is a confirmed antag, and you mention the wiz had killed. The fact you got chewed out for setting him on fire is terrible, and I'd have complained about the admin that chewed you out for overstepping their bounds in regards to attempting to control legitimate play. Wizards on a killing spree should be ignited any chance you get, so long as you dont burn down the station in the process....

[Houka]

People know for a fact that I rampage frequently when I get a traitor role. The thing is, though, after I had done what some posters here have called "boring rampages" for long enough, I became inured to the idea of concealing my actions. It felt good for a second but largely the station went on as if nothing had happened. There was no chaos, very little indication that I had truly been an antagonist to anyone.

So I just stopped giving a shit about subtlety. I think I've had more fun this way in every single traitor round. No radio jammers, no quiet murder, just loud and bloody and fiery and chaotic messes everywhere I go.

And that meant people SAW it and they are more likely to do something about it. I leave a lot of witnesses, I leave a lot of evidence, I am distressingly easy to track and deal with. Even as a changeling, I often eat people in the middle of the hallway and scream "YOU SEE NOTHING" if someone stumbles across me.

Rampages aren't bad by their nature, but if you are gonna do it, I feel you should either go BIG or find small impulsive ways to antagonize people and let it build up to murder from there.

I don't think it's a good idea to go 'NO RAMPAGES ARE HITLER, BAN RAMPAGERS' I think it's a good idea to go 'hey, maybe give the people a calling card or do something more flashy next time' so that it feeds more into the game's chaos engine appeal and removes the problem of silent stealth rampagers stealthily dismantling all fun they find.

[Mageziya]

I've tried "crimeman" rampage gimmicks, where I'm as sloppy as possible with crime and only really injure people instead of outright killing. The goal is to cause a wild-goose chase of sorts, and then find people who I'd be justified in killing. (as they'd be trying to kill me.)

The problem though is that, even then, it's really hard to get the crew to give a shit and actually hunt you down. Sometimes, its successful and fun as heck, but most of the times that I've tried it have failed.

[hipBEE]

rampages are fine imo.
the real problems are people who don't get the shuttle called after they've killed enough people and that there is hardly ever a decent securit force to stop rampages.

[UrsulaMejor]

Rampaging is perfectly a-ok. Like campers in fps games they make a lot of people mad, but to punish them specifically for playing the game in a way you don't like is awful.

Lately I've been seeing a disturbing level of admin intervention (a glitch fest bombing jay wolff and the macho man smiting in the appeal) in how people choose to use their antagonist rounds. Admins shouldnt be in the business of policing styles of play that are allowed and encouraged under the rules.

Not everyone is a super creative wiz kid, guys. Let rampagers rampage.

[Superlagg]

I've found that the AI, oddly enough, is one of the best roles to unite the station into a bloodthirsty lynch mob. With a simple demand from the crew, the AI can counter two of a rampager's best weapons, stealth and confusion, simply by spamming the chat with the badguy's whereabouts and armaments. Course, this miiiight be breaking the law, since even if you don't bolt their escape, this invariably gets the badguy, the crew, and/or you murdered.

This also highlights something I've noticed about rampages and why the crew seems to drag their feet on stopping them: They don't want to get the wrong guy, and they don't want to die. I have a feeling that crew's apathy might have something to do with a combination of a lack of information and being unsure that they'd survive confronting the murderer. If they keep quiet, maybe Nerdy won't throw their sandcastle out the airlock.

That, and with a station as big as ours, just finding the guy without getting ambushed by him is almost harder than the actual throwdown!

[Ed Venture]

Rampages are fine. I do and still plan to do more in the future and some of those times I go completely loud like Oar so everyone knows they can kill me if they stop me. But just like Boon said no body tries to kill the antag. Now before you say "Well you got antag weapons why even bother" One, that's a terrible excuse to let yourself die without a fight and two I don't use antag weapons when I am a traitor. Almost all the time I have rampaged people just watch me kill a person do nothing to stop me and then complain when I come for them next. I remember back in the day on Mushroom when a unarmed scientist took down a fully armed Traitor with a wet floor and a locker to shield himself from the bullets. You say there is no creativity in rampages well hardly anyone tries to fight back or use creativity to stop the traitor. They Just let it happen and that's just as bad if you ask me.


Rampages happen for these reasons alone

1. Because they can.

Anyone who has be granted the role of antagonist can do whatever they want with the role. This is OK. One of the best things about Goon and the reason I choose to come to this server above all others was that I had the freedom in how I played and that freedom of choice should never change.

2. No security around most of the time to stop it.

Did you know what Admins would tell people back in the day if they complain about rampages? They said this "If you want to stop rampages from happening then be the person that stops them" IF there is no security and the crew won't make a attempt to save themselves then these rampages will keep happening and they will get more frequent.

3. No one will fight back (mostly from my experience)

For all the rampages I've done I've noticed that almost no one will try and stop me as I kill everyone around them. I'll then ask them in OOC or in deadchat if I do infact die and this was a response I got. "The combat system is too awful to learn to get good enough to protect myself so why bother" This comment baffled me. People say I'm robust sure I've been playing for years but it took no effort to "get good" at the combat in this game. All you have to do is run around in a fight and learn how to click really fast till you hit your opponent.

Rampages are not the issue. The players are the issue. From the people who do nothing to stop the antag and from the people who antag fish just to do this. I rampage pretty much anytime I roll a antag, But I play though my rounds all the way to the end most of the time.


Good thing that Popecrunch said that dude was banned for antag fishing and not for rampaging cause I've would have been up in arms.

[ISaidNo]

Buncha people been worried about catching a ban for taking people out, too. Worried that they'll get the wrong person, cause too much collateral, or cop a ban for meta gaming since they recognize the names of people who just rampage time and time again.

Skill gap and gear gap ain't the only reasons don't fight back. For us posturing so much about being the "best" admin team of any SS13 branch we apparently subjugate quite a number of regulars out of acting in their own best interests. Could just be me being fed up of seeing problems goddamn everywhere though.