So are IDs ooRP or inRP?

[Tenshi]

I'm quite confused. On the server rules themselves, the linked post about metagaming & powergaming on it's own is out of date, as it lists that thrusters are something your character sees inRPly, when the staff has made an announcement that thrusters and engines are purely cosmetic. (That is at least the part I am focusing on atm, there might be more sections of it that are outdated)

So as far as the only official writeup I can find in the server rules goes, IDs are considered inRP. If that is truly so then why do commands such as /freelancer exist to spoof your IFF? Additionally, what are infected ships supposed to do when they have a Wild/Wild Equivalent ID installed? I remember a few years ago there used to be an exception in the rules about Wild factions being able to use different IDs because it fit their roleplay but even that is gone now.

It seems like there's people who fanatically believe that IDs are ooRP and call you out when you refer to their IDs as inRP, and then there's a different group of people who believe IDs are inRP and should be treated inRP.

How is such a thing not defined in the rules?

EDIT: Quickest edit of the wild west here, but can we also please address stuff like "Boorman Treaties" that are being thrown out as apparently existing things that we should just /know/ about either because it was briefly mentioned during flying to waypoint 4.3 of mission 6.7 of the campaign by some rando' (35 years ago, btw) or because it's hidden somewhere in some ingame news article or bar rumor? How is it considered valid and acceptable roleplay for someone to walk up and tell a Vice Admiral of the Navy that theyre uneducated for not knowing what the Boorman Treaty is purely because the player behind that character has <never> seen that thing mentioned before, as it literally does not exist anywhere?

Yes, I'm obviously referring to the on-going tensions between Liberty and Kusari, and I'm also obviously referring to the various people who have mentioned the term "Boorman Treaty" as something that apparently exists. How does a treaty exist when it's not in the Laws charter? Are we making up treaties now? What else will we start making up?

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"Honour. Courage. Commitment."
Task Force Akhetaten - Information

Tenshi

Discord: kagetenshi

Liberty Navy 46th Fleet

[Hemlocke]

As far as I understood, and was told, in addition to it being my own opinion on the matter. Undercover ships with a spoofed IFF are to be treated as the IFF that's spoofed. Rules wise apparently that only applies to Wild, but what then is even the point of spoofing your ID to begin with as an intelligence operative if someone can just go "lmao nice ID" (Note that I don't play undercover intel IDs), but treated all the undercover KOI/LSF/Order ships I came across as undercover vessels due to their freelancer IFF.

And I seem to recall that there was a staff-post about this issue somewhere, but I cannot seem to locate it and or it doesn't exist.

Unless I'm just absolutely blind, the rules only specify you can't go "lmao nice ID" to Wild vessels with spoofed IFF.

Whereas you could probably guess pretty easily you're dealing with an undercover intelligence operative or wild if they're using their ID's native tech, such as undercover avenger totally not being a lawful dude, or a wild sporting nomad guns.

So is there just no protection for intel IDs that use the IFF spoof?

[Kauket]

https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...tid=206713

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[Tenshi]

https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...tid=206713

Did you read the post?

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Information ≛ Recruitment ≛ After Action Reports ≛ Feedback

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"Honour. Courage. Commitment."
Task Force Akhetaten - Information

Tenshi

Discord: kagetenshi

Liberty Navy 46th Fleet

[Kauket]

https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthrea...tid=206713

Did you read the post?

did you read the comment above me that asks if intel ID's get the same protection?

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[jammi]

Staff have been discussing the next stage of IFF reform for the last few weeks to address this issue, so we may be able to provide a full update soon.

I'm also planning on writing up a Library post on intercolonial law, so the Boorman Treaty would be covered in that too.

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News article library, feedback and content requests.

[Petitioner]

Disclaimer: This post is my personal opinion and advice, and should not be read as some kind of staff ruling on the matter.

You should, as a matter of courtesy if nothing else, always assume that someone is (or at least is trying to present as) whatever their IFF says. Whether IDs are technically, rules-wise, considered inRP knowledge or not, if you look at someone's ID and treat them as such, when they're putting effort into inRP presenting as something else, when there's no other reasonable cause to suspect they are their "truly" a member of their ID's faction and not their IFF's (eg, KuWild flying full native Kusari tech with a KNF IFF, given away solely by their ID), I personally am going to call your roleplay low-effort and suspect you're mostly just hunting for blues, or trolling, or both.

You're right that it's a little unfair to expect everyone to remember everything from the campaign, but Digital Anvil was never going go into huge depth about the contents of various treaties (such as the Boorman) anywhere in vanilla because the very genre of the game as it was released makes it almost irrelevant, and the UI format would make it almost impossible to present in a comfortable way. However, in our RP-mandatory environment, such things have become relevant to us by our own choices. Just because the contents of the treaties aren't elaborated upon in detail does not mean we can't make reference to them in our RP. The game's canonical lore (both in vanilla and in Disco) also barely talks about life on planets at all but headcanoning stuff about that is important to have RP that isn't laughably shallow. For players like you and @"Kai Siegfried" who have never played the campaign, obviously you're going to miss out on a lot of stuff.

Finding a way to comfortably present the general contents of RP and worldbuilding fluff that had absolutely no serious relevance to the original campaign requires a very different set of skills from those that the dev team historically took as required for story developers, and while various players tried to take initiative and do it on their own without story backing over the years, the products they produced were very flawed in many ways -- writing up treaties is, in and of itself, a complicated endeavour and a unique skillset.

To specifically address the Boorman Treaty, my understanding is this:
- It was signed and ratified by all four (Sirian) Great Houses at least 150 years before the campaign started.
- It specifically prohibits war between the Great Houses.
- It prohibits House military installations in the Border Worlds, as that would impinge upon their designated function as buffer zones which are either neutral or over which sovereignty is shared.
- Niemann's Rheinland flagrantly violated these critical provisions of the Boorman Treaty (due to Nomad subversion), and the chaotic effect this had upon Sirian politics is still being felt to this day (835 AS).

Any specifics beyond the above are not, as far as I am aware, present in vanilla in any capacity at all whether express or implied (though we can always extrapolate from what vanilla gave us to come up with more specifics as they relate to our RP, within reason of course).

I hope Jammi gets out the aforementioned library post soon, because I absolutely love worldbuilding fluff and lore that deals with civilian life within Freelancer's universe -- and because it would probably go a long way to preventing the ingame incident that I believed spurred this thread.

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Recruitment | Task Force Prometheus | ICN FIRESTORM

[Haste]

Rules as written:

This Alien ID is used by Kusari Wild infectees

2.3- All IDs can:

Attack Alien IDs, except while flying Cruisers, Battlecruiser, or Battleships.

I think it is entirely unreasonable for players to be expected to read anything but the server rules, to be able to abide by the server rules. There is no mention of IFFs here at all. The staff cannot sanction a player for /l1 /l2'ing a Wild ID ship. In my personal opinion, if the rules allow you to just blatantly engage a Wild ID, KOI IFF, pure Kusari tech Wyvern, then it stands to reason that you have some way of "knowing" that ship is compromised. How else are you making that decision in roleplay?

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With that out of the way, however: players doing the above and completely disregarding a player's efforts to play a covert Wild are, obviously, being dicks. We're all playing a game here, and we're all trying to have fun. If a Wild player is putting effort into coming across as a perfectly normal human bean then, maybe, just maybe, play along and let them have their fun.

Some random notes:

• On average, I think players do a very good job playing along already. In fact, back when spoofed IFFs weren't a thing, my average interaction on any of my Wild ships was oddly peaceful. A little bit too peaceful, if you consider that one of those characters is an Outcast, and should probably be getting shot by local law enforcement for that reason alone.
  
• Wild IDs have extremely generous engagement lines. The "SRP" Wild ID in particular can literally just attack virtually anything, anywhere. That extreme level of "power" is counterbalanced by the fact that anyone can also engage you back. I think any changes we make to how Wild IDs work, if they end up giving Wild IDs actual protection from being engaged, should also restrict their ability to engage. Otherwise, you create some highly unfair asymmetry.
  
• If you're going to try and enforce roleplay consequences on a Wild ID'd ship or faction, I do think you need more than just a scan of their ID. "Unusual" aggression, ship choices or -- obviously -- hybrid tech can give you grounds to further investigate or put a ship/faction on your KOS list. "Hurr durr Wild ID screenshot" does not.
  

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TL;DR: People who spoof their IFF while flying Wild IDs are basically broadcasting to all other players near them that they are trying to roleplay a covert Wild ship. This helps other players know how the Wild ID player wants to be treated. Playing along is the polite thing to do, but is not enforced by server rules. But don't forget life's unwritten rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" (I may have gotten it wrong).

[Nodoka Hanamura]

To append on Gabi's statement, there are times where factions may be heavily affiliated with, but not be part of a proper ID. These can tend be part of more 'open' IDs - things like the Pirate ID, Zoner Militant ID, Freelancer ID, things like that - but can really be applied to any ID if the RP tracks enough.

Going based off of ID and ID alone isn't what I'd consider being good practice - even the IFF can be decieving. Ouroboros time and time again got mistaken for Zoners, when yes, we used the militant ID - because it provided the most flexibility for the stage in the RP we were in at the time. I don't expect everyone to know every factag, especially given that... embarassingly Ouroboros has yet to have a modernized faction page (I'm working on this.). We're moving to a BD ID to prepare for formally going open, but that's besides the point.

Someone playing to an ID is at least expected to be vaguely close to the ID's purpose and roles. There is no reason an unlawful faction would be using a DSE ID. A DSE-funded logistics startup, yes. A Zoner logistics firm out of Gran Can using a Zoner ID, is also valid.

I do have to concur that an ID isn't really good practice for inRP use. Faction Tags to my knowledge, are also inRP and demarcate a 'IFF subcode' that supercedes or appends to the code provided on an IFF response. When you Tenshi, as Maria Uhmen at the helm of the Akhetaten, are observing your FCO's station and see two TFP ships roll up, your immediate thought, given you know by now what TFP *is* - is to respond "Great, more Prometheans", and not "Great, more Technocrats." She's seen them before - she knows that they're not exactly part of the Auxesian paramilitary.

With that out of the way, however: players doing the above and completely disregarding a player's efforts to play a covert Wild are, obviously, being dicks.

I have always historically treated those playing Wild ID as it says on their IFF - their IFF response code is either malformed, expired or invalid. Something isn't exactly right with this ship, be it Raspelbock and two brainwashed Freelancers rolling up on Barrier Gate in RhGunboat, another gunboat and a fighter, or Cipriano Adimari out in the Taus. It also comes down to how your character *personally* would react.

Mieko, in the former situation, knew right away that the Raspelbock was an infectee. This was after years of time out in Omicron Delta, where dealing with nomad thralls is sadly not an uncommon experience - especially as part of Wild/Nomad raiding groups. The signs were very clear, and she knew it wasn't human - especially when it started blasting psionic suggestions at people.

Cipriano was much more.. subversive - nothing explicitly gave him away during a TFP encounter with him in the Taus, though Mieko was more occupied with seeing a KOI operator getting smeared across time and space for personal reasons.

Blasting a Wild ID'd ship just because it comes back malformed alone, isn't enough justification in my eyes. They either need to be rocking nomad tech, be acting in a way that can be deemed as flagrant infectee behavior, or otherwise know that the ship is piloted by an infectee.

Now with the advent of IFF spoofing for Wild IDs, it will allow for more covert activity by the Wild, something I feel is long overdue and will help with their naturally subversive goals.

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[kotyafffsky]

But it would be nice having that lines in rules about IFF being inRP and ID being ooRP respectively. I mean, not leaving it to the human factor, butchering this concept as one sees fit in their subjective logic of things. I will elaborate why.

The thing is, not everyone are such thoughtful as we all may think. For my time being here, I've encountered several times when people were called out as Wilds just because their ID is stating said thing. Or, if not directly announced as the enemies of mankind, then instantly being suspected of having a squid inside them / being brainwashed. That's another sitation when a "covert" individual is behaving strange enough in specific context, but sadly, some people ignore it and I won't point fingers. Of course, a lot of folks are able to play along, some even not interpretating "Unknown" ship as something infectee-related when it comes in sight.

Not mentioning an occurance on our little "undercover gameplay" experiment, when a couple of players were writing in /s things like "What's your purpose here, Order vessel?". The question of "if the tag is inRP or not" is also an interesting one, but we are talking IFFs and IDs now. And in that regard - people thought that IFF was just ooRP bugged, and not showing what it's supposed to show and I can understand their confusion, even though covert ship was not related to Order neither by the shipline or mounted tech.

To conclude all said here, rules of Disco are sometimes seem so incomplete or, better said, lacking details, so it breeds confusion and misunderstanding. We need some clarification of IFF and ID existance and meaning inRP. Maybe, in a form of a rule clarification post and then linking it in "2. ID and Combat Rules", like it was done in regard of PvP-Baiting.
Mentioning that IDs do not exist inRP and that people should play along with IFFs and with RP of "covert" player would help a lot, bringing some quality of life to the both sides of the scene.