Denise C

After the new year for me. One more week won't kill.

+1

I agree with this as well. The only thing I would recommend adding is the punishment range (e.g. “metagaming will result in punishment ranging from a warning to a permanent ban” or whatever staff decides the punishments should be). But even without that it is still a +1 for me. Thank you very much for hearing us out on this topic. I’d love to know what other community members think of Osvaldon’s suggestion too.

Great work you guys, very excited to see where this goes!

First, thanks a lot for responding to this discussion. I'm very glad it reached you/caught your eye. x Moving on, all rules are intended to ensure a better roleplay environment and a fair gaming experience. That's the purpose of roleplay rules in the first place, from our rules on combat logging to our rules on deathmatching to everything else we have in our rules document. The issue is now because the current metagaming rule is so flimsy and so hard to enforce, we're seeing administrators such as Ballin making selective exceptions to the rules (e.g. PD use of Discord, Streamers, etc.) and other administrators such as Serthon enforcing the rule strictly for no reason (e.g. giving someone with no prior record of rule-break, not even a verbal warning, an official warning for saying, "I'm responding to a robbery"). Obviously requesting help on an OOC platform from your allies is metagaming. There's no denying that. Your second example, however, isn't really in relation to the metagaming rule. People get in Discord calls while they're on the server and they'll be caught up in conversation (usually conversation that is completely irrelevant to roleplaying) and they won't roleplay. This happens in every roleplay platform everywhere and it's unavoidable, but just because people are in a Discord call does not mean they're exempt from roleplaying. I'm of the opinion that if you log on the server you're logging on with the intentions of roleplaying, and if you don't have those intentions a player should log off. Like I said, metagaming has always been a difficult thing to police, and I applaud the attempt at trying to make it less difficult, but, as a result, staff members are punishing good players for doing very innocent things. The things that the current metagaming rule seeks to prevent don't actually bring down the roleplay environment nor do they contribute to a negative roleplay experience. The only way someone could achieve either of those things is if they actually metagame, if they actually use OOC information IC, not if they're merely discussing things that happened or are happening in character via out of character means. I'm of the opinion that we should be allowed to speak of things that have happened in character, as well as things that are ongoing. If people abuse that and metagame then the punishment should be severe for it. I feel as though the solution is to increase the punishment for real metagaming and scrap the "you can't talk about things that happen/are happening IC" part. At the same time, even making it so we can at least discuss concluded situations would be a step in the right direction. Obviously it's not what I personally want to achieve from this topic and, in my opinion, it's still unfair to rule-abiding and fair players, but it's a whole lot better than this rule as we have it right now.

Because if a player acts on it and an administrator is suspicious of how the player acquired the information, they are to do their due diligence and investigate the situation and have the player provide some form of proof of how they got hold of said information. Metagaming enforcement has always been an incredibly tricky thing to tackle in every server and every roleplay group, but adding more constricting and unfair rules isn't the way to combat it. All that does is lead good roleplayers or people who genuinely care for the server to get punished because staff members automatically assume that we're incapable of differentiating IC from OOC. The easiest solution is to punish metagaming when it happens. There are many, many instances of people making player reports and you can hear them speaking in Discord and actively metagaming (e.g. "Come here I'm getting robbed," "Watch out there's another shooter," etc.). Those are examples of metagaming. Me telling you via TeamSpeak that I just crashed my car into a bridge should not be considered metagaming. However, if I tell you that and you come pick me up and an administrator shows up and asks us for proof of how you knew I crashed (which we wouldn't be able to provide), it would and should be a punishable offense.

The only reason it came to my attention in the first place was because I was punished for it, yes. Until then, I thought the metagaming rule was the same as every other metagaming rule, which is the act of using OOCly-acquired information IC. Afterwards, I spoke with several other people about the issue and they also said they've been punished for similar and equally as unfair situations, which encouraged me to make a discussion about it. This isn't a conversation about PD using TeamSpeak or TeamSpeak being strictly IC though. We can always make a different topic to address that and I really don't want this conversation to end up derailing just because my example comes from a PD perspective. We're talking about the act of metagaming specifically and the rule and whether you agree with what's said in the rule right now or not. And yes, things you gain OOC do indeed stay in your mind, but I think it's a huge part of player respect and courtesy to not assume that everyone on the server is going to mix information. The easier solution would be to put the onus on players to prove that any information was not acquired through metagame (e.g. a player accused of metagame showing an administrator in game text messages which explain how they were informed about something) as opposed to a blanket rule that prohibits everyone from talking about IC things OOC, even if they just want to have a civil and fun discussion with their friends or talk about fun things that happen.

I agree that they are treated differently, but the issue comes with both of them being treated as rule break when one of them clearly is and one of them historically isn’t. Admin discretion is used, sure, but they still consider both of these a violation of the rules, and that means players are going to receive some form of punishment for doing something that really shouldn’t be a punishable offence in the first place. As a personal example, someone asked what I was responding to via TeamSpeak as I had my lights and sirens on in game, and I said that I was responding to a robbery call. The other person did not act on this at all and, to my knowledge, asked out of personal curiosity, but I was still given a metagaming warning for it. So, despite that information not being used and not being detrimental to the roleplay environment at all, there was still administrative punishment given. Others have been punished for similar things, such as saying, “Ah crap, my car was stolen,” or “I just put my house up for sale, I hope it sells.” Even just generally talking about things that happen IC becomes punishable.

I'd also love for anyone who believes it shouldn't be changed to post why they think that way. I hope to have a good discussion about this rule because there was obviously a reason why it was implemented in the first place, despite, in my opinion, it being unfair and unnecessarily restrictive. I also expect this discussion to be mature. No insulting, no belittling someone, no shutting down arguments or opinions in a cruel or aggressive manner, etc.

6.3 Metagaming 6.3.1 Metagaming (MG) is the act of relaying IC information through OOC methods or using OOC information in roleplay scenarios. OOC methods include third-party software, for example, Discord. 6.3.2 Mixing IC and OOC information without any benefit is a minor MG offense. For example, a player uses IC chat to talk about OOC content or calls someone by their nametag. The current metagaming rule is not the true definition of metagaming, which is the act of using out of character information in character. The current rules state that just talking about what happens in character on an out of character platform and not even using any of the information in character is metagaming. It is even metagaming in instances where it does nothing to the roleplay environment, does not cause other instances of rule-break, does not promote bad, poor, or fail roleplay, and does not harm anything or anyone in any way. As it stands, this rule acts as a pre-metagaming rule, a rule to combat the act of metagaming before it even happens. The term "metagaming" has been altered on Eclipse Roleplay as if it is believed that players are unable to differentiate in character from out of character and are unable to follow basic metagaming rules, which is not only incredibly pessimistic, but also implies that us as the player base are stupid and can't roleplay properly. This is very unfortunate and insulting in my opinion. I suggest that the rule be changed so that our metagaming rule follows the true definition of metagaming, not an oddly customized one that contradicts a number of other rules or protocols on the server (e.g. making it mandatory to post faction screenshots which would be relaying IC information on an OOC platform, PD using Discord to notify other members that they have received emails, etc.). Thank you all in advance for taking the time to read this and contributing to a conversation about this issue. x

+1

+1, I'd love to be able to give permanent keys out to people who I often loan my vehicle to. Also, as a member of PD, I've responded to a lot of calls where we had to tow vehicles due to the driver crashing and losing the key that their friend gave them.

+1, thanks for making this topic. I was pretty disappointed as a new-ish player to find that all three-car houses have dildos littered everywhere. Paid $488k for a lackluster interior! Please change it!

Thanks for the reply, Flucifial. I'll send them both the background as well as my information right away. I appreciate it!!

Hello, I have been having issues logging in. I was in England for a month (which is when I started playing Eclipse) and a half and I have recently came back to Canada which is where I live. Now, the game tells me I need to verify my location and to check my email, but I am not getting any emails whatsoever. I've checked my inbox and junk folder and I have verified that my email is the right email. Am I doing something wrong? Thanks a bunch in advance.