Consistency of the Rule Regarding Quotation

[Lukewarm]

I am gonna head out of this conversation at this point, but my final opinion on my way out: I think that modkills are the only answer for breaking the rule, and I don't think that the rule should be loosened up.

The only change I could personally get behind would be to make it clear that paraphrasing - if done poorly - will be treated the same as quoting, so that everyone is clearly aware of the danger when they are paraphrasing, and will be careful when doing so to make sure that it really is in your own words.

This is not really a change, but I do think I could also get behind there being a listmod thread dedicated to the topic, similar to the one about mentioning on-going games, that provides examples of acceptable paraphrasing of your role pm vs unacceptable paraphrasing.

[chamber]

I think that the issue is more obvious, when you put mastina's claim right next to the way it is worded in her role PM

My non-SP ability is Charm Eye. I target a player and they are Charmed -- Charming counts as a form of marking.
----------------------
Charm Eye [Active] - Choose a target. That target will become Charmed. Charm is a form of marking.

My 1-SP ability is Chain Circle. I bind the target, negating all support done to them
---------------------
Chain Circle (1 SP) [Active] Choose a target. You will bind that target, negating all support done to them.

My 2-SP ability is Nerve Circle. I ensnare my target in a circle--anyone targeting that player takes 2 HP in damage
---------------------
Nerve Circle (2 SP) [Active] Choose a target. That player will be ensnared into a circle, and any user who targets that player for that stratum will take 2 damage.

My 3-SP ability is Curse Circle. I curse my target to be unable to be healed by utility abilities.
---------------------
Curse Circle (3 SP) [Active] Choose a target. You will enact a curse upon them, where they may no longer be healed by utility abilities.

My fourth ability, Dispel, 2-SP, is dispelling the curse circle. Doing so heals me for 2 HP.
--------------------
Dispel (2 SP) [Active, Self-Targeting] Choosing to dispel your Curse Circle will cause you to heal for 2 damage instead.

My passive, Enlightenment, makes me gain 1 SP every time I successfully mark someone.
-------------------
Enlightenment [Passive] - Each successful mark will grant you 1 additional SP.

Basically every ability uses the same wording. I also find is strange that she even put the ability names?? Like, what impact does that have on your claim, unless you are hoping that everyone will be more likely to believe that it is coming straight from your pm?

Like, looking at each line side by side, it does not look like paraphrasing to me

These abilities are all highly technical and non-standard, small changes in wording could change how they function. Properly communicating what you can do basically requires quoting segments. This contrasts against claiming say, cop. Having only seen this basically, it seems absurd to me to modkill over this. I think it's on the mod to provide some means of fake claiming in their voice in a game with roles this complicated (either by providing fake roles upon request, or by providing fake claims in the initial role pms).

[Micc]

If I were to write an (ex)listmod policy thread on this rule, I’d emphasize that the purpose of the rule is to prevent players from confirming themselves as speaking truthfully because of some consistency with other moderator communication (timestamp, sentence structure, formatting, grammar, punctuation, ect.). If the claim is more believable or is confirmed because its presentation resembles the moderator, that’s rule-breaking. The defining factor being whether the player gained creditability for their claim that they wouldn’t otherwise have.

This is admittedly still some pretty arbitrary criteria, but keep in mind that much like the ongoing game rule, enforcement is going to lean heavily in the direction of caution. It is too easy to ruin games that players have spent months playing for moderators to be lenient about this rule.

[TemporalLich]

If I were to write an (ex)listmod policy thread on this rule, I’d emphasize that the purpose of the rule is to prevent players from confirming themselves as speaking truthfully because of some consistency with other moderator communication (timestamp, sentence structure, formatting, grammar, punctuation, ect.). If the claim is more believable or is confirmed because its presentation resembles the moderator, that’s rule-breaking. The defining factor being whether the player gained creditability for their claim that they wouldn’t otherwise have.

This is admittedly still some pretty arbitrary criteria, but keep in mind that much like the ongoing game rule, enforcement is going to lean heavily in the direction of caution. It is too easy to ruin games that players have spent months playing for moderators to be lenient about this rule.

yeah, you put into words what I was thinking.

The intent is to avoid that unfair advantage. Based on that, this situation is really in a grey area and neither the game mod nor listmods deserve blame for a modkill that is controversial.

Based on that, you should paraphrase claims into your own wording style. Something like "I can charm a player for no SP. For 1 SP, I can nullify any support on someone. For 2 SP, I can make anyone targeting my target lose 2 HP. For 3 SP, I can deny someone utility ability healing. For 2 SP, I can undo the previous ability and gain 2 HP. I gain 1 SP for each charm."

3 SP was hard to do a high level paraphrase on. But yeah you can see why I was wrong initially. This was a no-win situation, we'd either be getting this thread or we'd be getting complaints the game was ruined. It's probably better we get this thread so at least we don't have this in the future and people can stay on the right side of the rule.

[yessiree]

Right now there is a very simple rule: don't lift any direct phrases from you role pm
You are arguing to make the rule worse by suggesting that you should be able to do this as long it doesn't effect the gamestate and here's a test to know if it affects the gamestate

Just don't lift direct phrases from your role pm. Cut and dry, there is no reason to make the rule and more complicated than that. It is not a high bar.

The reason to make the rule more complicated than that is that a modkill is a nuclear response that causes serious damage to a game, and should not be considered where there is no game damage.

How would you know for sure if there is no game damage?

If one player leaks specific elements of mod communications through poor paraphrasing or just misjudgements, (mistakes do happen) how can you ensure these elements can't be picked up by other players who can then use that information to their advantage?

[Jake The Wolfie]

The same way you'd find out if a player secretly PMed everyother player in the game their role PM in secret: You can't unless someone fesses up.

[Gamma Emerald]

also a player referencing that unexpected communication with the moderator occurred, such as a player asking a question and receiving a response, if not done publically should probably be frowned upon (which isn't to say i think this sort of communication should happen publically; i do not. i simply think players should not say 'i asked the mod and...' whether truthful or not)

I like this point, someone in a game I was modding once sent a PM to me that set me on red alert mainly because he wanted to get a realistic time of response for a question he wanted to pretend to ask
As such I have a vested interest in making sure moderator communications that are sent privately remain private. I believe I explicitly have a rule that says "if you try to use private moderator communication as a way to give yourself an edge in game, expect to be punished".
Now, I didn't punish the player in that specific scenario, and I probably still wouldn't now either, because the main idea was just to make sure they weren't caught in a lie. But if the explicit intent were to say "I just talked to the mod right now and he said this" that would effectively be using timestamps to further your position

If unwnd issues a warning and tells everyone to not quote their role pms without modkilling the slot in question, that's more or less moderator confirmation of the claim and that would be more damaging to the game state by keeping the slot alive AND also unfair to other players in the game.

this is why I have a rule in my ruleset about the dangers of taking moderator communication/action as some means of confirmation as something within the game. My approach is "buyer beware" where I'll do my best to have a fair and just hand in my actions I take, and if you decide to read into that it's not my problem. And the approach is valid because I have seen town lead itself off a cliff based on a mod action (not a game I modded but one that made headlines).
IMO the proper thing to do depends on how the player manages things, if they are explicitly utilizing things they shouldn't to get ahead it should be handled (what Micc said, essentially). But if other people are interpreting it as in some way confirming that's on them, not the player who claimed. A very good reference on this was in TENET, where shellyc seemed to quote parts of the role PM. The players of the game still didn't buy it, but the mod punished it anyway. So really, you should take a step back and say "from an UNINFORMED perspective, does this look like something that matches the Role PM beyond what should be stated to give an accurate summary of the contents?". It's very easy to think something looks bad when you know more than everyone else, it's a common reason why scum are advised to not try to push everything they see as scummy from their partners.
Idk if I made a cohesive point here but the gist of it is modkilling should be the LAST option, and that there is generally a way to equitably handle things that doesn't reveal something more then you would intend.

[Gamma Emerald]

in a complex large theme game where everyone has unique role pms with lots of moderator text, you absolutely do not want it even implied that it's ok to quote the moderator to get "cleared" as it would be a massive slippery slope that can lead to other people following the example if they get pressured.

the most fair way to deal with it is immediately modkilling the slot and warning everyone else.

Counterpoint: if your game has a lot of detailed components that rely on specific figures, don't freak out when someone has to post those figures to effectively communicate how their role works to others

[Gamma Emerald]

Basically every ability uses the same wording. I also find is strange that she even put the ability names?? Like, what impact does that have on your claim, unless you are hoping that everyone will be more likely to believe that it is coming straight from your pm?

I will agree that the ability names were definite not needed
however the SP values I think were an integral part of the role and as such should not have been a factor in the call of whether things were copied or not. Unless you want to leave things vague, you have to give explicit values. I don't know the inner details of the decision so I can't say for certain, but from seeing the discussion as it's played out it seems those did end up getting counted as parts that were "quoted"

[Gamma Emerald]

For contexxt, the example that has driven me to action here is this modkill, which did have listmod approval. I'm not particularly happy with the way that this "murky situation" is being addressed by the list mods when it arises, and would prefer a consistently defined approach to how that situation is resolved in a way that does not result in unnecessary game-damaging modkills

What I'm seeing here is "Look! Mastina fluffed up what she copied, and therefore hath

sinned

! She will promptly be executed for.. her good-faith attempt to claim!"

this is basically my understanding as well
lukewarm brought up good points but the whole thing seemed to be in good faith
now, unwnd did mention there was something about timestamps over discord, and if that were to be made more open maybe everyone could make a more informed decision on whether the call was fair or not

[lilith2013]

The Listmod team intends for modkills to only be used in cases where a slot has been compromised to the point that removing the slot does more to preserve game integrity than letting the slot live. As noted in the announcement post on modkills, we advise for game moderators to utilize force replacement where possible, and only resort to modkills if a force replacement still would not preserve the integrity of the game. We do not intend for modkills to be used as punishment or retribution against a particular player, but see it as a necessary action in order to allow the game to continue with as little damage as possible. If a player has broken site rules, they will likely face moderation action separate from any in-game action taken by the game moderator, and that is a decision that will be made independently from the modkill decision.

In this specific instance, based on the information available to us, this modkill was determined to be necessary given the content of mastina's claim. We consider this to be approximately equivalent to quoting a role PM based on factors such as similarity of wording, similarity of formatting (eg line-breaks and paragraphs), etc., which could allow another player to deduce the legitimacy of the claim if they had any abilities that were similarly worded or formatted. Lukewarm's comparison in 52 demonstrates how closely the claim matched the role PM. Taking the words from a role PM and slightly rearranging them is not the same as paraphrasing; nor is simply substituting one word for another here or there. Looking at a role PM and word by word or clause by clause rewriting it while keeping the majority of the wording the same is not paraphrasing either. Although I was not part of the initial decision, it looks like mastina also described formatting of the role PM itself, both in terms of bbcode and the arrangement of text, as well as described timestamps and private communications with the game mod. In combination with the claimed role PM, mastina may have been able to "prove" or make other players view her claims as true, thereby providing an in-game advantage, which does damage the integrity of the game. Based on this, the game moderator took the correct action in raising it to a Listmod to approve the modkill. The alternatives - force replacing mastina or announcing a ban, or any other public warning or action taken by the game moderator, while the slot stayed alive - would have confirmed that mastina was indeed quoting her role PM/private communications with the moderator, and thus affected the game's integrity. There was also the possibility that, although players' thoughts/reads may not have been immediately impacted, they could be impacted in the future. It's impossible to know how the game would have gone, but in this case the aim of the modkill was to limit the potential future harm to the game if mastina's claim was seen as true due to the factors listed above.

Finally, if you believe that someone has broken a site rule such as quoting their role PM, you are always welcome to report that post to either the game moderator or Listmod team. We are unfortunately unable to read through every post of every game, so if you think a rule has been applied inconsistently, it is very possible that we were not aware of the other cases in which action was not taken.

[mastina]

it looks like mastina also described formatting of the role PM itself, both in terms of bbcode and the arrangement of text, as well as described timestamps and private communications with the game mod.

I beg your pardon?

The timestamps were not related to the role PM; they were related to a discrepancy between my confirmation method and the mod's stated confirmation method--the mod accepted my confirmation in spite of me using a method different than the stated method in the rules (the confirmation method to use in that game: adding the mod on discord; the confirmation method I used: the standard method used in 99.99% of games of PMing the mod responding to the role PM), and I explained the situation. I couldn't explain that situation without giving some form of chronology, which I deliberately kept from being precise. It had nothing to do with the later situation.

There was a discrepancy between my confirmation method and the mod's stated confirmation method which I explained.

Separately, at a later time, completely and entirely unrelated to that, on my own, with zero ties to that, being something completely different*, I paraphrased my role PM. The two were NOT connected in any way shape or form. There was zero correlation between my clarification of the confirmation method discrepancy and my later roleclaim. The two were completely separate and I never went into detail in the formatting/bbcode.

I pointed out that the,

(role PM here)

(role PM text here)

Please confirm by adding me on discord at (unwnd's discord redacted).

Confirmation method here was something that I missed, that was easy to overlook, because it

was

, and I didn't see it, because it was smaller text at the bottom of the role PM and I assumed all the important information was inside the role PM. But that was, again, not tied to the roleclaim, that was tied to me explaining the discrepancy between the mod's stated method of confirmation and the method of confirmation I ended up using which was accepted in spite of it not being the proper method.

In combination with the claimed role PM, mastina may have been able to "prove" or make other players view her claims as true, thereby providing an in-game advantage, which does damage the integrity of the game.

"may have" implies intention on my end to have done anything more than what I did--there was no intention to prove the claim as true. In fact, I was fully expecting to be disbelieved. I claimed because I figured that my odds were better if I claimed early* rather than not at all, later on, or lied, but the claim was something I fully expected to not be believed on. I literally said I expected to be disbelieved in the post I claimed, which shows that I wasn't trying to prove myself at all.

But, *shrug*, "mastina just admitted to not being town", "mastina isn't town", "mastina could be lying", "mastina might end the game in a solo win", "mastina could be scum fakeclaiming 3p", etc. Pick your choice in ways where I'm guaranteed to die before I win, likely by the town elimination.

Does this

sound

like someone who thinks that they are gaining an

advantage

in claiming? Does this

sound

like someone who thinks their claim will be

trusted

? Does this

sound

like someone who thinks they are gaining an

advantage

rather than a DISADVANTAGE from claiming?

I literally thought that claiming was going to be a huge hindrance, a huge disadvantage to me, and only claimed because I thought lying or claiming later (the alternative options) would be worse than being truthful early after prompting on the subject. I didn't gain an advantage from the claim. And I certainly wasn't trying to, as I was making a good-faith effort to paraphrase.

*There have been games where a third party was talked about on D1 and people would've trusted them then but didn't trust them when they claimed on later days thanks to the 3p talk on D1 and no claim then. So my claim was a direct result of Cabd discussing the 3p on D1, with me making the call that if I didn't claim 3p on D1 there, that it was highly likely that if I claimed 3p on a later day, they wouldn't believe me, and would point to Cabd's post on D1 and go "if you were telling the truth, you would have claimed in response to this". But that's a side-note so I digress.

[Lukewarm]

I get the feeling, both from Mastina, and a few other people, that they think that a modkill in this scenario would require intent. I disagree with this.

Modkilling is not supposed to be a punishment, it is supposed to protect game integrity. Even if it was completely accidental, if a modkill protects game integrity more then leaving you in, then a mod kill it the right call.


I think that it is fairly obvious that in this case, Masitina did not do anything with malicious or underhanded intent -- but that is irrelevant to the decision.


From my pov, I would expect someone accidentally breaking this rule to receive a modkill, and someone who intentionally breaks to to receive a modkill + some form of punishment, like a ban.

[mastina]

Modkilling is not supposed to be a punishment, it is supposed to protect game integrity. Even if it was completely accidental, if a modkill protects game integrity more then leaving you in, then a mod kill it the right call.

Sure! A modkill is meant to protect game integrity when there is no other option available, where every alternative causes more harm to the gamestate than a modkill. However, I would say that the modkill of me in that game did the

opposite

of protecting game integrity--the modkill was far more of a compromise of the game's integrity than leaving the post be. It completely removed an entire faction from the game, in a way that would not have occurred naturally, because the faction had a very real chance of being eliminated by the town.

Removing the 3p by the modkill actually made the game easier for the town, actually made the game harder for the scum, because it was removing a role that could, so to speak, distract the town.

So I would say that the modkill of my slot for a perceived advantage

that wasn't actually there

and there was tangible evidence

I wasn't actually getting

, shows that the modkill was erroneous. The modkill was justified as potentially giving me an unfair advantage, when the tangible evidence actually demonstrated that my roleclaim was not in fact giving me said advantage. I was not receiving the game-integrity-harming unfair advantage; modkilling me, thus, caused more harm to the game integrity than leaving it be would have.

[Dunnstral]

As someone who has an English degree, and both written and graded numerous papers - and also someone who has seen both the post and role pm - the post absolutely fails at its attempt to put the role pm in its own words. If you run the two through a plagiarism testing app, it flags it for plagiarism. So from an English major's perspective - regardless of whether there are quotation marks, or it being attributed to the mod, or even intent on behalf of the poster, the post quoted mod communication.

So from my PoV, it broke the rules as written. Maybe the rules should not be that way - I actually agree that the rule might need to get some refinement - but I understand why a mod would have turned to a listmod and why a listmod would rule for a modkill. Basically, I think it broke the rules, whether I agree with the rules or not.

This was exactly my argument in the game thread.

There are two arguments going on here, again.

Whether you think the rules should be like this are one thing. Whether you think the rules were followed correctly is a whole separate argument.

Whether the rules should be this way or what the policy should be can be up in the air, and can be discussed

What the rules actually are and whether they were followed are pretty cut and dry in that MariaR made the correct call in following rules as written.
Again, thinking that the rules shouldn't be this way is a different argument than thinking the rules weren't followed.

My thought is that the listmods being blamed for the modkill feels unfair to me

For one, anyone looking to assign blame is doing it wrong. And anyone assuming that the people trying to effect change are simply looking to assign blame is doing it VERY wrong.

But no, it's not unfair. The listmods told unwnd to modkill mastina, so they did it. If anyone wants this to change, then the listmods are where the source of the change needs to be.

To be clear:

The mod, backup mod, and listmod were all in agreement before this happened.

Anyway I made a snap judgment that the modkill was bad...

Because you're arguing for what the rule should be rather than what it is.

Looking at Mastina's claim, it looks normal. I wasn't in the game, but if I were I suspect that I wouldn't've thought "Oh, Mastina is copying what her role PM says." because I, as a player, would not have known what Mastina's role PM said.

If you were a player in a game and you had just seen this claim, could you determine if this is copying from their role, or paraphrasing their role?

Whether a player can determine something or not is not a guideline for whether a rule has been broken. If it were, that would be true inconsistency.

[Dunnstral]

This thread is confusing because people keep bringing hypothetical situations which aren't relevant and trying to compare it to what happened in the mastina situation.

You guys are asking "what should happen if xyz happens".

Right now what the list mods see is "did xyz happen".

And yes, xyz did happen.

But you can argue that the criteria for what xyz is should be loosened, but again, that's a different discussion and needs to be disassociated from the notion that this was a bad modkill or a failing of the system.