HULK

Ban in question: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=5843

I was banned for five days, globally, for placing a point bounty on a player. I believe this punishment falls under cruel and unusual. I was banned without any warning. There are multiple reasons that I believe this ban was overkill. These reasons are listed out chronologially here:

-Earlier in the day urisk2 said that anyone who kills a specified player would get paid for the t-round that they might have lost. He did this for two different players, on two seperate rounds. (Snak and Chii were both on the server)

-A few games later Toyotama-hime said that he would pay someone 2,500 points if they killed Chii with a harpoon headshot, to which I followed up on.

-Toyotama did not pay the points promised, to which i reacted by setting a bounty on him for 2,500 points for 3 rounds. He was rdmed twice by two different people, both of which were rightfuly paid the points I promised them.

-After a few rounds Krys joins the server, as a request by Toyotama for him losing a t-round. After Krys loaded in, he talked to another mod that was on the server and laughed at how I was using my points to get Toyotama killed, and one of the 3 mods on said that I wasn't breaking any rules. This lead me to believe that what I was doing was fine.

I understand that what I did was in fact harrasment, but I feel that the ban was a little extreme. If Toyotama or any of the 4+ mods that witnessed the events would have warned me, I would have stopped.

TL;DR: The ban was overkill, while a shorter ban would have been understandable. The mods behavior during and before the events lead me to believe that what I was doing was fine.

 

Do you have any evidence of the mods putting the bounty on each other? This would be considered unacceptable and present a bad impression of the staff to the community.

 

I didn't take any screenshots because I didn't think I would need to collect evidence for something the mods were doing, but I'm sure if asked they wouldn't lie about it. Urisk2 placed the bounty, and snak got the kill/points. Chii was in the lobby while it happened.

 

The bounties placed by the staff were for traitors only, according to what you're saying. It's completely acceptable to put a bounty on someone as long as you specify it can't be RDM.

In your case, you placed a bounty on someone and allowed them to get RDM'd for 9 rounds. The way I see it, each round is an offense. At 4+ offense that's a 5 day ban for both RDM or harassment. Some may even say the ban was lenient.

Your ban won't be lifted by me, so at this point it's up to Lead Admin or Highwon feels like it was excessive.

 

The bounties were placed before the round started.

 

I feel, Toyotama-hime has to tell his part of the story on this. Just an FYI because he knows the whole conflict. So, before anyone gets say I recommend he posts on this.

 

I agree completely.

 

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=5843

he already did >_>

 

Lol, my apologies. I'm quite tired at the moment.

 

When us mods put bounties on each other, we don't exactly say "500 points to anyone who rdms this person" or even "500 points to anyone who kills this player". What I've always seen mods (and some regulars) do is say "500 points to whichever T jihad's Chii" or "200 points to any T that kills Sprinkles" etc. In this case, we are simply putting out a contracted hit for Traitors to fulfill, but any kill made would be perfectly allowable by the game rules.

In your case, you are encouraging ANYONE, including innocents, to kill the player, which means you were actively encouraging RDM.

However, if you have any evidence of the mod/staff on at the time saying that what you did was not against the rules, or whichever mod said it would be responsible enough to step forward and post here, then I believe your ban should be lifted/shortened. I don't think you should be punished for something a staff member said you were allowed to do.

 

This player should not have been banned for the following reasons:

1. Every player is responsible for actions. We just had to reiterate this just the other day when an innocent player said that he planted C4 for ten minutes and, when some innocent came to defuse it cutting the wrong wire, killed 4 other players with it. That innocent was the player held responsible; which they should be. Nowhere in our server rules does it state that you are allowed to kill someone who has a bounty on their head. Innocent and detective players are not allowed to kill someone unless they have a KOS on them or they have done/are doing something traitorous. So, in this case, the players that should be held responsible for the repeated kills should be the players who fulfilled the bounties. Which, because this is true, this player should only be punished for harassment, which brings me to my next point.

2. This server is a "monkey see, monkey do" server. This means that if a player sees a staff member doing something, they will assume that it is not against the rules. After all, why not? Our staff members should know the rules better than any other players; they should know the specificities and the unwritten. If our staff members are seen placing a bounty on someone's head, then every common player would see that as completely fine, regardless of the phrasing. If you place a bounty on a players head, it can be seen as harassment by server rules; it is directed at a specific person and it can be viewed as unwanted. The reason I say it can be viewed as unwanted is because placing a bounty on a players head, even for traitors only to carry out, means making the entire traitor team possibly target one player specifically whom they would not have collectively targeted without a bounty. However, in this case of harassment, this player was simply doing what he had seen the staff do and he was punished for it.

Our staff members are not above the rules, in this community, and they are held to a higher standard. I firmly believe that our staff acted incorrectly in this matter. Punishing a player for something that was done by a staff member portrays double standards and should never happen.

 

HULK I support them banning you 100% for this reason, whenever I'm on your trolling/rdming.


What some other mod's were doing was not what you were doing. They were doing legit bountie's that did not cause RDM, you specifically said in the chat that the person who RDM's toyoto gets points.



Now, thats just this one situation, all day though you've been doing stupid stuff that's been causing issues, you were throwing discobombs on terrortrain to RDM, you harpoon'd your T buddy Chii because you thought it would be funny. Yes there was a bounty on her head but they speicifcally said if it wasen't RDM, what you did was RDM so duh.. We were only laughing and having a good time when no rules were being broken, but of course you had to turn something that was going fine into something bad because you are a troll and that's what you do, like earlier you revenge'd RDM your t buddy because you thought he had "RDM'd" you last round. Then when I slayed you, you started calling me a fag in admin chat. So really, this appeal isen't going to get you far because on the slight chance it does get appealed, I will personally hop on the second you are unbanned and reban you for the previous offenses I let you just barley slip by on.


And as for warning you, type !motd, thats your warning. You were RDMing and that is againist the rules, the rules are your warning and you decided to go againist them.

 

Regardless of previous offenses, this player should be punished for rule breaking and in this case, he didn't break any rules. Even putting a bounty on someone's head for a layer to RDM them isn't anything other than harassment; although our staff will do it to each other. All of you may say that yours was okay because it was in good fun and you specified that it was a traitor only bounty, but it's still harassment.

Players that fulfilled his bounties are the ones that should be held responsible for RDMing the player. It's in our rules that you should t RDM, so even if a player says, "I'll pay you so much money to do it," it's still on the bounty hunters who actually do the killing. Yes, paying to have someone killed in the real world is basically the same as murder, but here, it is harassment; especially if it's continued.

All in all, punish this player for rules he has broken. Don't punish him for doing something staff were doing and dumb players that apparently do anything they're told.

 

Staff wasen't doing what he was doing, he was doing an alternate version that was causing RDM. I wasen't on for the part when he was placing bounties on toyato every round, but I know HULK Is a extreme troll so take anything he says take with a boulder of salt.

 

Calling out a bounty on a player is all that he was doing; staff were doing the same exact thing. He shouldn't be held responsible for the unintelligent innocents that decided to carry put the kill and fulfill the bounty.

I have spoken with one of the lead admins about this and placing bounties on a person, regardless of saying it is a traitor only bounty, can cause RDM.

Who do we hold responsible if someone is told, by a detective, to plant C4 as an innocent and the player does so? Obviously the player that wasn't using common sense and planted the C4.

The players that were using common sense and filling the bounties are the ones that RDM'd.

 

So, he should be held responsible for the unintelligent people, if infact placing a bounty even if it is a traitor only bounty is RDM, then what he was doing was causing mass RDM.

 

No, by those players playing on the server, they acknowledge that they understand the server rules. You are not allowed to RDM per Server Rules, so the players that RDM'd should be held responsible.

Yes, he would be held responsible if he called false KOS's on players, but simply saying the player who kills this person will get this many points is not a KOS; regardless of saying it's a traitor only bounty or not. The forms of telling someone to kill someone on sight are by saying they are a traitor, calling a KOS on them, and stating that they did something traitorous in accordance with our server rules.

 

If you guys want another scenario, say a staff member puts a tripe only bounty on another staff member, because you guys are friends and it's no biggie, but the bountied staff member becomes a traitor and is still killed by a traitor. Who is the responsible individual? The stupid traitor that killed a fellow traitor or the staff member that did nothing against the Server Rules? The server rules state not to kill traitor buddies, so why would the staff member need the slay as the rules clearly state that you can't kill traitor buddies.

 

Look at the screenshots in Toyota-hime's report.

Here are a few excerpts:

Those are sentences he was copy + pasting occasionally at the time. Not only was placing a bounty on someone's head, he was making RDM and a requirement, plus paying more if you RDM'd him as your t-buddy. None of the staff online endorsed the actions, though they didn't do much about it because they couldn't classify what it'd fall under.

 

It's because doing so could only be classified as harassment. I'm not sure if you guys are aware, but RDMing is not allowed in the server rules, so any player that does RDM, regardless motivation, is held responsible.

You guys even said in the report that it would be classified as a possible different form of harassment and if our staff members are placing a bounty regardless of saying a traitor only can kill them, it's still a different form of harassment. The staff represented the server poorly and now I'm calling them out on it. It shows a lack of professionalism and it can be perceived that we have double standards.