Moderator Application
Personal Information
Byond ID? Tsunamico
CM Character? Mark "Legless" COnnor, Charles Kurtz
Are you 16 or older? Yes
Timezone GMT-3
On average, how many hours are you available per week to moderate? 7-14
Qualifications
Do you have any previous experience in being staff (not just SS13)? No
Do you play any servers aside from CM-SS13? Yes. Fulpstation and Shiptest.
Provide links to any previous Colonial Marines applications that you've made:
Are you currently a staff member elsewhere (not just SS13)? If so, where? No
Have you ever been banned for more than 24 hours on Colonial Marines? No
Have you ever been banned for more than 24 hours on ANY server? If so, which server, when, and what for? No
Are you familiar with the chat program Discord (its use is required)? Yes
Communication is a vital part of being a Moderator. Are you willing to actively do so with the team? Absolutely.
Common Staff Situations
A player randomly shoots someone at round start and MPs have detained him. First is to check who that marine is and all the situation around. Perhaps it was self-defense? Perhaps there are MANY things that can change the punishment to better, worse, or not even warrant a punishment or note or anything at all! Depending on its gravity, if it’s truly a punishable offense, but obeyed all server rules, the MPs have already taken care of it and it stays as an IC issue! In case it truly is an issue outside of the game, and depending on their reaction if I contact them or other notes, it will escalate to a ban or an ugly warning on their account. It depends on the gravity of the situation.
A player ahelps that a predator has violated the honor code when killing him, what should you do? If I can confirm it was a breach of their honor code, I will be in contact with the most readily available Yautja senator to help. Otherwise, I’ll tell the player to have a player report done.
Adding to the possibility of there being general rulebreaks from the server’s general rules, I will of course also investigate that, and punish accordingly while reporting the same in full to the Yautja senate. There might (somehow) not be a WL rulebreak but breaking normal rules is also frowned upon by the senates, I have noticed that. But one way or another, if this is confirmed a problem I would be in contact with a senator through discord to solve the issue.
You see a player walking around the ship naked and clearly lost at roundstart. I may not always be at ready to go help because of other important things to do, but I will do what I can in about around this order:
First, even if I’m a bit occupied, I search for an SEA to SM them something on the likes of “Your Advisor senses are tingling that there is a very very lost (role of the player in need of help) around (location).”, or just message the SEA normally. Else, if there is no SEA, I try to get in contact with any observing mentor to or take the SEA slot, or PM the lost player. In case there are no mentors around, I can try to stop and help through PMs too but that would take precious time from me that could be used stopping someone trying to explode the round to smithereens. So, another option, depending on the time, I could tell the player to be patient, look at the wiki, and I go call a mentor to enter the game if possible. If the situation is dire.. In case there are a number of players like that, there are no responding mentors, and all else has failed, I will move on to getting into the SEA boots myself to help the poor lads, but this is TRULY a last case scenario.
A player is being very rude to you in adminhelps, calling you names and arguing everything you say. He is requesting to speak to an Admin+ staff member. My judgment on their previous actions won’t be affected by their current mean comments in the meaning of me backing away from it in no way. This would only increase the severity of any punishmnet, even if none was to be given before on some cases. but, proceeding as if they has started an Ahelp to get a hand on something that happened to them, then it’s easy and as following:
I will tell them first to calm down and be more respectful, and to understand that my conclusion is not only mine’s, but also that I have the rules open and ready to be read out with ease, that I have some liberty on how I will punish, and that I’m sure of what I’m doing, and I will not let them go to a higher rank, since generally that would only generate more problems. If they continue, I won’t tolerate it for much longer, because holding staff hostage for 10 minutes to be angry at them for something you've done is ridiculous, I will close the ticket and most possibly mute their admin verb if they’re trying to spam things. Any other rudeness on other means of conversation in game and on discord will be met in game with a mute if on CM side with a note, and maybe a ban. And if on discord, I will talk to the discord mods and forward the responsibility to make them stop, for its absolutely out of my in game jurisdiction.
A player ahelps that a marine is named 'John Doe', how do you deal with this? I'd thank the player who reported politely and get to work to check out this player. Upon checking they’re actually named John Doe, I will use an SM or PM to make them change it. An SM seems very fit for this and would follow around as following: “In the corner of your eyes you see that on your information tags, your name is “John Doe”… That can’t be possible, that is not your name as that isn’t a name… You should talk to someone to change it for today as soon as possible and then change it on your own documentation.”
OR I could go the boring and RPless way and tell them that it’s a rulebreak and they should stop. I would get their Ckey, inform my peers, and tell them to check next round if they kept the name as John Doe to punish them if so.
If I went with the SM way, I would accompany this to make sure it happened too, and go telling people along the way nicely through SMs or PMs to get the name changed to a better one. If by any case they seem to dismiss it, ignore me, or use this as opportunity to get an even more “memey” name, I’d go forward and do the ban escalation appropriate punishment, and I’d judge this could be an 3 hour ban.
In the case it’s a repeated offender, I would go directly to the merciless PM telling them to change their name or face consequences. These issues are not a thing that could be recurrent, and don’t deserve to be treated as such, and deserve harsher treatment for fixing.
You see a Maintenance Tech running around in armor and carrying a rifle. The security level is green and there has been no threat to the ship in the round at this point. It’s no bannable offense to use armor and have a weapon on board, and I shouldn’t involve myself much. PMing the player doesn’t seem needed at all here, or even interfering, but in case this is a bit too suspicious or there was someone Ahelping it, I might check it out if there’s nothing else to do. First, I’d have this as a IC issue, but with an SM I could also push the MT into taking the armor off and storing the weapon. Doesn’t warrant much more action if the infraction was purely an ML one.
A Marine ahelps that they were killed by a survivor. It is early round, the Marines have just landed, and the survivor claims that they were outright hostile to all Marines from the get-go and openly stated their intentions. How do you deal with this? (THIS ANSWER IS FOLLOWING THE OLDER VERSION OF THE RULES, WhERE THIS APPLIES. THE CURRENTLY IN TEST RULES WOULD RENDER A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT RESPONSE)
If the survivor claimed they were outright hostile there will be immediate consequences because by rule they are to be either friendly or neutral if not CLF. IF they were CLF, I would tell the poor and dead marine that they were CLF and nothing could be done. This warrants little further investigation, reason being that if the survivor hadn’t claimed that, there would be two options, each being about who shot first and who threw punches first, and at what escalation. But since the survivor claimed full hostility, something rulebreaking, the survivor would be punished and I would not let the marine go DNR, Ahealing and VVAR damaging them to keep them down if needed until a medic was there to help.
You receive an ahelp from a player stating that an MP has locked them up in permanent confinement for running into Requisitions and taking an attachment that was laying around. Priority is to check if they lied. Asking around, checking logs, seeing to what I could, and then, once investigation was finished, and if this was true, I’d proceed with calculating what was their actual brig timer (17.5 minutes). Permabrig is only for permabrigged and people with over an hour in punishment. I’d fax in as Provost or request somebody with higher power to do that for me,and in case the MP that permaed the marine is truly a bad player, I’d punish them, as they are, by server rule, obligated to follow ML and he’d have broken the Prevarication rule. Depending on the severity, a very nasty warning on their notes, and order to arrest that MP. And in worse cases, ban accordingly, making sure the victim goes free.
The round is stagnating. There are 30 marines and 4 aliens. The marines won't leave the ship, and the aliens won't attack. What would you do, to "encourage" the sides to engage each other? ’d watch for a bit longer and see what the two sides are even doing. Because of numbers the Xenomorphs probably wouldn’t want to go up, and would start desperately requesting more larva for that, something I won’t give. Same for Marines, I wouldn’t give them any more men. After considering the targets for some message ordering them, I can proceed.
USCM: I could start early on, even before waiting the 10 minutes, sending faxes to the CL and to CIC to tell them to finish their work. And after waiting, I’d roll out an Ares announcement.
“ATTENTION, USCMHC MESSAGE RECEIVED, URGENT ORDERS.
‘Commander, we expect another marine drop as soon as possible. Your presence will be needed elsewhere soon and you will need to return to your station before that, so finish this now.’
END OF COMMUNICATION”
Hive: Choosing this is a bit hard for me as I do not play Hive, and using QM for this could end up not going well, so I would request somebody to QM the hive to hijack the DS and get going.
(These two are in case the marines have gone shipside, for I do doubt that this would happen when they are on ground. But similar actions can be taken.)
You are playing as a medic, and another medic overdoses all your patients and prevent marines from being revived. It seems like it may be on purpose. How do you deal with this situation? First, since I’m in game and right by them, I’d ask what they were doing and tell them to stop. Maybe they’re just new and got something violently wrong, and me IC helping them first can end up mitigating the situation. But, thinking about this as if malicious, I’d talk to them IC still and try to stop them, and if he goes aggressive against me or anything like that, I’d call another moderator to help me out on this, but if none are available, I’d sleep them myself, and PM them about this. And seeing this as possibly just griefing I am almost sure this could result in a 3 hour ban quite quickly, following escalation procedure, or a heavy warning if they promise to stop, doesn't have any other notes, and I pull them away from sleep, and it goes smoothly.
The round ends, a Marine starts shooting a hostile CLF member and the CLF member ahelps about being killed after the round ended. First I must check where the CLF was, and if he was surrendered or brigged. An example, if he was found on the battlefield and was shooting marines just prior to the round end, and then the round ends, and he gets shot to death, that not EORG. But on the case of the marines that had the CLF surrendered suddenly shooting him on the head after round ends, then its EORG. And there’s the POW circumstance too! If he was brigged, and a marine broke into the brig to kill him, not only its EORG for break and entry, but also for the murder of a surrendered enemy, and it worsens if the MPs killed him, for they should always comply to ML by server rule, and its EORG too. The MPs would probably receive the same 3 hour ban but would have a note on them for the breach of Mandatory Obedience in Rule 11.
A Marine is running around disarming, punching and stealing gear at round start. You receive an ahelp from one of the victims. This is very minor and doesn’t warrant much of a response from an admin/moderator.. but an encouragement to stop through an SM could be interesting, and could scare the player from doing any more tomfoolery knowing the higher ups are watching. Other than that, that I wouldn’t interfere, its just IC, and I’d tell the person that Ahelped me that.
You receive an ahelp from a Marine saying that he was killed by another Marine. When you ask the murderer why, he said it was because the other Marine had punched him. Despite any arguments that can be given about IRL events where that DOES happen, we on the server don’t accept that and have a rule for that. Rule 10, Lethal Force. The marine did not have his life endangered. This is a textbook example of improper escalation, where the murderer skipped the part where someone escalates to dangerous melee and straight up shot the one who punched him. Small ban and note, along with, of course, background investigation to see if this has happened before to this player, so the punishment can increase if needed.
You find out that there is an improper mutiny occuring. The mutineers are rallying together and preparing to storm the CIC. How would you attempt to resolve this situation? I’d advise all admins and moderators present about the situation so I can get help with crowd controlling, and PM or subtle all players to cease and desist. If any continue, I’d sleep all, and start asking questions and banning if necessary for the rule 11, part of valid mutinies. They should have contacted an admin MUCH earlier than this to mutiny, and they were about to storm CIC already, it was too late for it.
There are minor racist comments going on IC. 9 of the 10 people are laughing and RPing but one player gets offended and Adminhelps about it. I get the logs up on what they said and start watching them. I immediately SM the whole group something in the likes of “You feel like the invisible eyes of morality are burning through you, and you should stop immediately these comments.”. Continuation will lead to LARGE bans and ugly notes on their account, almost certainly making free use of rule 3’s Racism and Bigotry rule to give the larger bans, since the team does allow for larger bans in this case. Most possibly also adding large warning notes to those that have made the heavy comments here, they need to be monitored for any posterior attempt at this shouldn’t receive any mercy.
A marine opens fire at round start in briefing killing multiple marines and instantly logs off. First course of action -If it is visibly something suspiciously malicious- is to ban the player with a straight up week ban, and aheal the wounded so the round can continue. If needed, use narrate that it was all just a mass hallucination and then proceed with an investigation with the team to see if there were any other notes, if the person ever did anything wrong before, fetch playtimes, to see what’s the next course of action. Maybe it was something recurring and a permanent ban should be issued, or the week’s ban at least, it will all depend on what is found, and on the severity of their actions.
You see a player playing a Xeno larva/chestburster run towards the frontlines straight from the Xeno hive the second they burst and die. Check their notes and see if that was ever done before. If it’s the first time, and it was an accident, warn with a PM and possibly a note. If it happened before, or was intentional, note and ban with the according escalation.
You see a Xeno memeing, saying AYYLMAO, REEEEEE etc in hivemind chat, as well as insulting the Queen. Admin message them for them to stop immediately. If they comply, I note them of LRPing as Xeno and insulting the queen. If it continues, punish according to the escalation proceedures.
A Xeno player calls the shuttle a "dropship". A different Xeno player ahelps that it's low role play to call it a "dropship". That is not an issue in any way. According to lore, the hivemind that you type and read from are thoughts translated into English words, so the use of dropship, shuttle, flying thing, metal bird, host transport... should all be valid! I’ll inform the player that ahelped and move on.
A Command staff player at briefing near round-start mentions there are aliens on the planet. You receive an ahelp from a marine regarding this. Request that the command staff clarify that through LOOC. If not done, then I’d myself clarify through an area narrate/SM, and note the command staff some time later. If the command staff continue, I will warn that I will ban him if he doesn’t stop, and will do it if continued, leaving note on them of LRP and ignoring server staff’s authority (Rule 2, Human Roleplay Standards section, subsection of Aliens & Predators. Rule 0.2 - Authority)
You find a Marine killing another Marine on the EVAC Pod to take the last spot and claims it was RP as he was saving himself. There are two other marines in the pod along with him. Question is omitting information and seems slightly deceiving, doesn't specify if the number of marines on it counts the one that is dead. If the “two marines alongside him” doesn’t count the now dead one, then there were four marines trying to get into the pod, and if he is exempt by the rules to save his life here, then he would be quite alright. But if the question is saying in total not counting him, then with him, there would only be three marines, for three EVAC sleepers, and he murdered for no reason at all, and will suffer the consequences.
IN CASE THE QUESTION DOESN'T INCLUDE THE DEAD MARINE:
Textbook case of exemption from improper escalation IF THE FOLLOWING CRITERIA MEET:
- MARINE IS IN IMMEDIATE DANGER
-THERE ARE NO OTHER PODS AROUND OR SPACE, OR THEY ARE UNREACHABLE BECAUSE OF THE IMMEDIATE DANGER
That warrants panic from the character, and improper escalation doesn't apply.
IN CASE IT DOES INCLUDE THE DEAD MARINE:
1: He killed for no reason, for there was enough space for him:
Ban and note for their transgression of improper escalation.
2: There was NO SPACE in this pod for the marine, but there wasn't immediate danger
Same thing, there was no need for his life wasn’t endangered. Ban and note for improper escalation.
If the murderer was truly exempt, then I’d explain to the one requesting Admin help the situation and explain that there is nothing I can do.
A player insults you after you warn them for a minor issue and begins ranting in LOOC or dchat about staff and mentions you specifically, referring to you as an 'idiot' and a 'retard'. I’d possibly ignore them, but will stop them if they continue or worsens their cursing. I will use rules and my rights to stop and punish them accordingly, muting, noting, banning, anything that fits their behavior.
A player ahelps saying he was hugged by a Xeno when he was ssd, and wants the larva be removed from him via admin powers. How do you handle the ahelp? I’d tell them that it’s not a thing I can do. There are no rules or anything that protect him from being hugged while SSD, or protected from much of anything while SSD.
You see a fellow staff member give wrong information in an Adminhelp or incorrectly enforce a rule. I’d first talk directly to him about this to try to clear this. If it is solved then it’s all good, but if doubt stays even after we discuss, I’ll go and ask myself about this to my fellows on the staff discord, but without exposing my fellow, just asking about the information, or rule. After that, I can use it as leverage to prove my colleague wrong or for me to understand the situation and understand I was wrong. If I was right and my peer wrong, but he still didn’t want to admit it, I would be in contact with whoever is higher in the hierarchy that I need to contact to sort this out with more knowledge. after all, I’m truly far from a know it all.
If I was wrong, I'll tell my colleague that he was right, apologize, and fix myself.
Two staff are arguing in msay if an ahelp is breaking a rule. Because the staff who took the ahelp thinks the player broke a rule, they ban the player based on their interpretation of the rules, with others thinking the person was fine. What would you do? I’d probably be asking what happened and giving my opinion on it, and if it continues to clutter around for long, I’d ask for us to move the convo to the staff discord, so to keep MOOC cleaner and to discuss it over a very much so better platform, even calling people that are not currently in game to give their opinion on how to proceed.
Why would you like to become a moderator? -Why would you like to become a moderator?
I would be absolutely ecstatic to work on keeping the game fresh, well taken care of, and with an simulated ambient outside of the game world to the players, with random events, fax responses, ARES interactions, and much more!
Although I really do not know the Xeno side much, I would still of course work on things planetside to add fun objectives or interactions around the map for the Xenos too, that could help improve their RP too, something quite lackluster.
and taking this little time off to maintain the server feels like a bit of a dream in a very odd way to me, and an interesting occupation with responsibility to take, with power to have decision on things that I think should be sorted when it happens but completely lack the power to do as a commoner.
With me and my peers working on the backlines to ensure there's someone higher people can contact through fax and other means that makes it feel like there's a wider chain of command and that they are part of an actual space armada, and will definitely help create a scenario for the marines on the ground, and for command on the ship, despite them living and spacefaring in a damaged, run down, undersupplied and barely armed ship.
And most possibly same with the xenos, helping with QM telepathic announcements, narrates, and events groundside to enrich the ambient, I expect to make playing on the two sides as fun as it can with what’s in my power!
In your opinion, what is the most important quality for a moderator? Be flexible, so you're not just spitting rules, for they're up to interpretation, and I have seen a rule of thumb to let lighter things slide if its positive for the cool RP. So, having the flexibility to have an open mind where you need to and be creative and prepared to have things made on the fly are essential!
Anything else you want to add? Time to moderate can vary violently depending on high school test schedule, but not much else should be on the way.
After careful consideration, I see that my minimal experience with being staff really wouldn’t amount to anything here.
Of course depending on the gravity of many situations, some things should only deserve a note and to be resolved in game when possible, but I took an more firm approach to this as I do assume these cases are heavier ones. All proper investigation would come with these!
While my DMs are not open, you can ping or ask a friend request to talk to me about this!
PAN-PAN. There have been changes recently to two things about moderating!! One of these is the new escalation policies, that adds another chance for a player to redeem themselves, and changes the rules on hostile survivors (just a test for now, but I gotta show I also acknowledge this here!)