The Police Department & You

[Exploits]

58 minutes ago, arandomgamer said:

Quite frankly I think people should be asked when arrested/ticketed if they will contest it OOC, and if they don;t, the report should be kept very short and sweet. If they don't contest the report all the paperwork you write just sits there uselessly.

This is where it gets difficult. I'm going to preface by saying I've got a decade of LEO-related role-play under my belt at this point over several different games and role-play mediums. I'm not saying this to claim I'm an absolute authority or anything, only that my experiences are varied and I've been on all sides of damn near all issues at one time or another as either a cop, or a criminal, or civilian; pro-paperwork, anti-paperwork; results-orientated, role-play-orientated -- you name it.

 

Paperwork is always useless until it isn't. You buy a new cellphone, you get a receipt. That receipt don't do jack for you ... unless your phone suddenly breaks due to a defect and needs to be returned. Suddenly it's the most important thing that came with your purchase, and if you didn't get it, didn't keep it, or anything else, then you're stuck with your broken phone. "Sucks to suck", I guess.

 

On a previous server we used to do literally no paperwork. Like, at all. And it became very quickly evident that this was problematic, especially once the idea of a court system started to gain popular traction and moved from theory to implementation. I'm talking people who get arrested for 'attempted murder' when the crime is factually a battery; female characters being arrested for 'prostitution' (which is, literally, not a charge) because they wore 'skimpy skins' while standing near a street corner; getting charged for illegal firearm possession even though you have/had a firearms license and were being accosted for a non-firearm related crime or incident. It was garbage. And since officers had no expectation to even provide a semblance of evidence, the court system would be 'he said, she said' and go nowhere. This was equally true if the situation became OoC and involved admins. Something had to change.

 

So on the subject of arrests, I think the paperwork is the least an officer can do. If you're going to prison somebody for X hours or days, I think it entirely fair that you should take perhaps an hour out of your day to present your justification for it not only as a courtesy, but to ensure that said player has recourse to contest it as a character or as a player. Even the idea of asking players OoCly if they will contest their charge(s) is moot, because they are allowed to change their mind, or perhaps they misunderstand their rights, or the components of their charge(s), or learn new information that suggests rule-breaking on the part of the officers or the evidence gathered.

 

Incident reports ... that's also tricky. On another server we would discover most of our officer down incidents not through the faction, but through gang screenshot threads. Cops would get killed or kill doing dumb shit and just not report it to save face and avoid punitive action. That's super no bueno. And since, again, there was no expectation of reporting these incidents anyway, their fellow officers would also prefer to sweep it under the rug than type on it and see a buddy 'punished', and we'd have nothing to act on other than 'he said, she said' and hoping affected players make an in-character report through IA, or a player report to admins. Which is kind of fucked, since you put the onus on policing the police organization on the players the police antagonize the most. It's not a balanced relationship.

 

I'm sure there's a line that can be drawn which is considered reasonable, but at the time, mandating those reports meant we had a better idea of which officers were problematic. If you have ten reports in a week, and eight of them involved one officer always shooting somebody over a similar set of facts, then we could start asking questions. Furthermore, if they didn't write a report and we discovered an incident through other means (e.g. the gang screenshot threads, a player report, whatever), it was now actionable. I don't believe PD nor SD on this server is in a position right now where all incidents need to be reported, since in my experience here, the majority of questionable incidents in-game have been handled reasonably well by supervisors in-game and beyond. Making all incidents mandatory to report on is more of a nuclear option, in my opinion. These reports really should, ideally, be reserved for incidents where questions remain or higher-order oversight is needed (e.g. four cops and one Sergeant is on, there's a shooting, the legitimacy is a toss up: paperwork here would be good to have so that the event isn't buried OoCly, accidentally or otherwise).

 

When I fizzled out, here's what my patrol generally looked like in regards to paperwork. Keep in mind this is just the paperwork. I am not accounting the actual time role-playing.

• Five minutes on my traffic report.
• Roughly two minutes per traffic incident.
• 30m to an hour per arrest or more. <- I got no problem with this one.
• 10-15 minutes on my Field Training report (if a trainee was taken). <- Nor with this one, in theory, but any reduction is good.
• 15-30 minutes on a patrol report.

And I was just an Officer III! I'm also presuming no extreme circumstances where I'm suddenly asked to fill in something like a use of force report, or make a statement for I.A., or whatever other uncommon event. I didn't run anything nor hold a supervisory position of any kind. Supervisors or unit/department heads, detectives, etc., have much more to contend with, and this relationship is exponential. The more role-play you put into a day, the more paperwork you would have to do, and the more of both that you do, the more paperwork the faction wants you to do. Yeah, this is all voluntary, but it's not especially rewarding. And the dual irony is that if you're somebody like myself who, getting rather sick of it all, took the time to find solutions during my interactions to avoid paperwork, then ... well there's literally no proof that I did any work at all that day, even though I ostensibly may have resolved a dozen situations on a single patrol. So I was put into this frustratingly untenable (for me) position where doing my best to role-play would not reward me due to the faction's existing structure, and if I wanted to ensure I was rewarded, I would have to role-play less due to cutting my available time to be in-game for that paperwork. I just stopped caring and gave up.

 

I want to reiterate too that anybody in really any faction is there voluntarily. We are all expected to role-play. Nobody is providing a 'service' in the PD in the same way that nobody in any gang is providing a 'service' by role-playing in their respective groups. So I tire of the notion that legal faction members are somehow deserving of respect or leniency in what they do on the pretense that they 'do it for us'. You're there for you. If you're not there for you, then don't play the victim card. Children are victims. Adults are volunteers.

 

THAT SAID, there is still a debate to be had regarding what the expectations are in these factions and what their consequent results are. Ultimately I did not want to volunteer my time to the faction anymore and I left. That's all there is to it. But I also know that if the faction were to change in certain respects (some specific, some more abstract), I'd be more than willing to return. There are numerous people who I know personally from this server and beyond who are less than enthused about the preponderance of paperwork over actual in-game participation, but what is your recourse if your interest is primarily or exclusively LEO role-play? Start your own law enforcement faction? That's really not an option. If the current leadership legitimately believes that paperwork = realism = good role-play, then that's really the end of it. Either they need to be convinced otherwise, or an exterior force needs to impress those changes regardless of the leadership's opinion.

 

And I really want to stress on that last sentence. I have always found it strange that, being a server-supported official faction in a way that no other is, we allow so much leeway and breadth to whomever is currently running these factions. I've seen immense changes undergone in some police factions to the detriment of the faction itself and the greater server as a whole. Officers have a level of lateral authority that no gang faction could ever possess, and it's strange to me that these changes can occur even overnight, if so desired, with little internal or external recourse. I know LFM exists, and I know they handle reports, but anecdotally, the majority of these reports which question the institutional structure whether in part or as a whole are usually canned and hand-waved as simply being 'the Chief's decision for 'his' faction'.

 

Is it really 'their faction', though?

Edited October 30, 2020 by Exploits

[arandomgamer]

1 hour ago, Exploits said:

Even the idea of asking players OoCly if they will contest their charge(s) is moot, because they are allowed to change their mind

Are they? Don't they waive away their right to appeal when they submit 'Guilty' OOC ?

[Exploits]

2 minutes ago, arandomgamer said:

Are they? Don't they waive away their right to appeal when they submit 'Guilty' OOC ?

The plea itself is meant to be IC, we just do it through /do and 'OoCly' in the vague sense because the real process involves an arraignment before a judge, which would be a logistical nightmare to implement. But yes, if you plead guilty, then it's over. Nonetheless I think a report should be made since, again, I feel it's simply proper courtesy if you're going to be putting somebody away, and it's certainly necessary if OoC contentions crop up later. What if the testimony that got you arrested comes from meta- or powergamed information? It doesn't have to be the cops breaking rules here, it can very much be somebody else.

[Ronnie two poles]

On 10/25/2020 at 9:07 PM, Ronnie two poles said:

Hello, a current new member of the faction speaking.  To be honest, it's lackluster, frustrating - and just outright boring. So I thought I'd give some transparency to the community about how I think the faction could be improved. Before I go into detail about everything, I know there will be people that will ask me:

 

Ronnie, why did you not bring this up to so and so, or go private on the LSPD forums and try to bring awareness or change or some sort of constructive criticism that could be discussed among leaders to take the best appropriate action deemed necessary to fix your regard? 

It's not that easy! People tend to say this and this will change and "we'll work on it, thanks for the feedback blah blah blah" but it never does anything. I had a situation a year ago I brought up to FM and was practically ghosted, I can't speak on FM now, but 1 year ago it didn't help. I want to provide insight to the community as someone who's new to the faction and not bias in any regard. 

 

But Ronnie, what kind of insight do you posses that makes you entitled to such a strong opinion? Ronnie, you're only a Police Officer I, don't you think you're in too soon to make a judgment? I know this server is not LSRP, nor does it try to portray itself as such but I'm not some random who is upset and flustered over major issues, I've held administrative levels on LSRP and helped with FM overall some years ago. I'm not clueless to the process of legal RP, OOC administrative back ends of factions or whatever else. I know it's not easy to run something like faction management, but I feel like something needs to be addressed. 

 

Anyways, after an entire year of dealing with LSPD's recruitment (which finally got a new change of direction recently and looks a lot better!) I made it into the faction somehow. I've been in for two weeks, tomorrow - and I'm disappointed. Not only am I just de-motivated to go in game to get denied an FTP that's necessary for my promotion - this faction is just too overwhelming and crosses the boundary of what a video game is versus realism and standards of emulation/simulation of a real life department. I do think being in the faction would be maybe okay after a POI gets promoted, you get 56 days total to do everything I'm going to list here in a second, but let me tell you why even with 56 days, something like this would make someone who wants an overall good introduction to the faction, completely demotivated not even two weeks after joining.

 

Within 56 days, you're going to go on a ride-along with Police Officer IIIs if you find them in your timezone, and during your scheme, you must complete a checklist of 100+ boxes of silly things, that could be covered in the RP'd police academy. Instead of getting your bearings for about 3 real-life weeks in the faction and getting promoted, you go on hourly long ride alongs which are RP'd like it's the marine corps + evaluation patrols to judge if you're deemed capable for the next scheme. During these patrols you pray to God himself the person who takes you is OOC decent enough to RP covering some of these hundred + tick-marks and knock them out for you. Also, on top of all of that - you must also go in-game at another time and take two additional hourly long courses, you must separately sign up for (which also could be covered in the police academy) and it's just excruciating and not fun. (Better pray both of those classes are in your timezone, or someone is generous enough to offer a private course.) I personally think these two needed classes for promotion could be covered with a simple manual for both and a "R&U."

 

 

Another thing I noticed, during peak times the majority of POI's stand around AFK in the departments, because they can't find willing FTOs or they have to beg someone higher command to assign/force them to a FTP, which could potentially deem for a poor patrol because your guided partner was forced to take you. That is if you are denied for the typical reasons such as, "I'm busy, logging off, it's late etc." Seems pretty unrealistic that departments are flooded with cadets doing nothing at all, and instead could be on LINCOLN (patrol alone) - but even the requirements to get to the phase of being a POI and LINCOLN perms are still very overwhelming and require a lot of filler work in one week.

 

Nobody, who potentially goes to school/work/has real-life, friends, family, etc would ever want to turn a video game into basically a part-time job. It's not fun, it's not because it wants to be realistic, honestly, nobody really seems to know why there's just so much to learn. In the said checklist, there are extensive things to go over such as the arresting process which is already fairly confusing as it is. 

 

But Ronnie, it's only 56 days and you can get it done faster. POII is great and the faction is dandy and fine after the POI scheme. I don't entirely disagree with that, but it kind of takes away from the fact that it doesn't really feel like you earn anything whenever an influential member of the faction, promotes his friends to higher, higher ranks and bluntly put, pisses off, a handful of members who feel it's not fair whom could have worked as hard, if not even harder for those ranks. But hey, what do I know. I'm only a POI who's been here for 2 weeks. Click here for source.

 

But I thought I'd give the community some transparency since we tend to just throw that word around so loosely in our faction. My perspective is described as someone who's new, and just disappointed. Where is the fun? 

 

Ronnie, this all sounds like something you should have brought up to HC in PD. 

 

This is very important to me, but I also think it's important for me to show people interested in joining the faction in the future too. I'm not trying to steer anyone away, but I do think reform of the entire division/introduction, POI scheme is needed. It's not fun, it's not real life, it's only a video game. This scheme is the introduction of the faction that will stick with new members their entire term while RPing with the LSPD. You're immediate overwhelmed with "homework" for a lot of useless, filler material that is not needed on a video game.  

 

In conclusion, nobody wants to change their lifestyle around a video game even for a month just to do something that could be substituted/included elsewhere. A lot of the POI scheme, manual etc are filler. The situations that stem out on a day to day typically conclude about the same. It's really not that much of a learning curve to be fluent in this faction, it's just unnecessary work made up for whatever reason, for no reason. This is a recent update from the beginning of this year. It used to not always be this extensive and uncalled for to get from PI to PII. Where is the fun? 

 

 

I asked some POIs who have been in the department anonymously why they do not have any patrols yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 2, 2020 by Ronnie two poles
Broken images fixed.

[Ronnie two poles]

  

On 10/25/2020 at 9:07 PM, Ronnie two poles said:

Hello, a current new member of the faction speaking.  To be honest, it's lackluster, frustrating - and just outright boring. So I thought I'd give some transparency to the community about how I think the faction could be improved. Before I go into detail about everything, I know there will be people that will ask me:

 

Ronnie, why did you not bring this up to so and so, or go private on the LSPD forums and try to bring awareness or change or some sort of constructive criticism that could be discussed among leaders to take the best appropriate action deemed necessary to fix your regard? 

It's not that easy! People tend to say this and this will change and "we'll work on it, thanks for the feedback blah blah blah" but it never does anything. I had a situation a year ago I brought up to FM and was practically ghosted, I can't speak on FM now, but 1 year ago it didn't help. I want to provide insight to the community as someone who's new to the faction and not bias in any regard. 

 

But Ronnie, what kind of insight do you posses that makes you entitled to such a strong opinion? Ronnie, you're only a Police Officer I, don't you think you're in too soon to make a judgment? I know this server is not LSRP, nor does it try to portray itself as such but I'm not some random who is upset and flustered over major issues, I've held administrative levels on LSRP and helped with FM overall some years ago. I'm not clueless to the process of legal RP, OOC administrative back ends of factions or whatever else. I know it's not easy to run something like faction management, but I feel like something needs to be addressed. 

 

Anyways, after an entire year of dealing with LSPD's recruitment (which finally got a new change of direction recently and looks a lot better!) I made it into the faction somehow. I've been in for two weeks, tomorrow - and I'm disappointed. Not only am I just de-motivated to go in game to get denied an FTP that's necessary for my promotion - this faction is just too overwhelming and crosses the boundary of what a video game is versus realism and standards of emulation/simulation of a real life department. I do think being in the faction would be maybe okay after a POI gets promoted, you get 56 days total to do everything I'm going to list here in a second, but let me tell you why even with 56 days, something like this would make someone who wants an overall good introduction to the faction, completely demotivated not even two weeks after joining.

 

Within 56 days, you're going to go on a ride-along with Police Officer IIIs if you find them in your timezone, and during your scheme, you must complete a checklist of 100+ boxes of silly things, that could be covered in the RP'd police academy. Instead of getting your bearings for about 3 real-life weeks in the faction and getting promoted, you go on hourly long ride alongs which are RP'd like it's the marine corps + evaluation patrols to judge if you're deemed capable for the next scheme. During these patrols you pray to God himself the person who takes you is OOC decent enough to RP covering some of these hundred + tick-marks and knock them out for you. Also, on top of all of that - you must also go in-game at another time and take two additional hourly long courses, you must separately sign up for (which also could be covered in the police academy) and it's just excruciating and not fun. (Better pray both of those classes are in your timezone, or someone is generous enough to offer a private course.) I personally think these two needed classes for promotion could be covered with a simple manual for both and a "R&U."

 

 

Another thing I noticed, during peak times the majority of POI's stand around AFK in the departments, because they can't find willing FTOs or they have to beg someone higher command to assign/force them to a FTP, which could potentially deem for a poor patrol because your guided partner was forced to take you. That is if you are denied for the typical reasons such as, "I'm busy, logging off, it's late etc." Seems pretty unrealistic that departments are flooded with cadets doing nothing at all, and instead could be on LINCOLN (patrol alone) - but even the requirements to get to the phase of being a POI and LINCOLN perms are still very overwhelming and require a lot of filler work in one week.

 

Nobody, who potentially goes to school/work/has real-life, friends, family, etc would ever want to turn a video game into basically a part-time job. It's not fun, it's not because it wants to be realistic, honestly, nobody really seems to know why there's just so much to learn. In the said checklist, there are extensive things to go over such as the arresting process which is already fairly confusing as it is. 

 

But Ronnie, it's only 56 days and you can get it done faster. POII is great and the faction is dandy and fine after the POI scheme. I don't entirely disagree with that, but it kind of takes away from the fact that it doesn't really feel like you earn anything whenever an influential member of the faction, promotes his friends to higher, higher ranks and bluntly put, pisses off, a handful of members who feel it's not fair whom could have worked as hard, if not even harder for those ranks. But hey, what do I know. I'm only a POI who's been here for 2 weeks. Click here for source.

 

But I thought I'd give the community some transparency since we tend to just throw that word around so loosely in our faction. My perspective is described as someone who's new, and just disappointed. Where is the fun? 

 

Ronnie, this all sounds like something you should have brought up to HC in PD. 

 

This is very important to me, but I also think it's important for me to show people interested in joining the faction in the future too. I'm not trying to steer anyone away, but I do think reform of the entire division/introduction, POI scheme is needed. It's not fun, it's not real life, it's only a video game. This scheme is the introduction of the faction that will stick with new members their entire term while RPing with the LSPD. You're immediate overwhelmed with "homework" for a lot of useless, filler material that is not needed on a video game.  

 

In conclusion, nobody wants to change their lifestyle around a video game even for a month just to do something that could be substituted/included elsewhere. A lot of the POI scheme, manual etc are filler. The situations that stem out on a day to day typically conclude about the same. It's really not that much of a learning curve to be fluent in this faction, it's just unnecessary work made up for whatever reason, for no reason. This is a recent update from the beginning of this year. It used to not always be this extensive and uncalled for to get from PI to PII. Where is the fun? 

 

I resigned because they took too long to say yes or no about re-adjusting these phases. Lack luster faction, not worth the headache at the moment. 

Edited November 20, 2020 by Ronnie two poles

[Biscuit]

Hello! Reviving an old thread!

 

As a bit of a backstory, I am actively working as a Gruppe 6 PR Officer and have taken the task to attempt to repair relations between the LSPD and the LSSD. 

 

Recently, the LSPD (not to be confused with the LSSD) has made me literally hate my job and as a result I hate even going on my character as about 80% of the interactions I've had with LSPD Officers ended up with harassment towards me as a Gruppe 6 Member. And whilst people tell me all the time it is an "IC" issue, it simply is not.

 

Most of the rage towards Gruppe 6 is fueled by OOC information (an old video being reposted as a meme) and people simply metagame that into their own knowledge as-if they were there to recall the event and as a result, it only damages relations between Gruppe 6 and LSPD even further. It's gotten to a point where officers are plain and simple harassing us cause we respond to our client calling us onto their property which we are obligated by contract to do. And instead of the officers doing their job, they wasted 15 minutes harassing our security officers.

 

My question is simple; What do you want us to do?

 

Before you respond, here's some typical responses I get:

Stop acting like cops - Provide me with EVIDENCE of such an incident even occurring before even giving me this response, and before you accuse us, I heavily suggest actually doing a bit of research on what we do.

Disband your faction - Sure, but in return, I'd like to see an LSPD Division dedicated to providing club security, mounting security cameras, conducting Cash-in-Transit and checking properties for unlocked doors.

This is entirely an IC issue - No, no it isn't, as I quote from before: "Most of the rage towards Gruppe 6 is fueled by OOC information (an old video being reposted as a meme) and people simply metagame that into their own knowledge as-if they were there to recall the event and as a result".

Give the LSPD a nice gift :3 - Done, it ended up being thrown into a bush in front of the Police Department.

 

I'll actively be following the thread of this discussion, feel free to tag me with further questions or arguments.

[alma]

35 minutes ago, Biscuit said:

Hello! Reviving an old thread!

 

As a bit of a backstory, I am actively working as a Gruppe 6 PR Officer and have taken the task to attempt to repair relations between the LSPD and the LSSD. 

 

Recently, the LSPD (not to be confused with the LSSD) has made me literally hate my job and as a result I hate even going on my character as about 80% of the interactions I've had with LSPD Officers ended up with harassment towards me as a Gruppe 6 Member. And whilst people tell me all the time it is an "IC" issue, it simply is not.

 

Most of the rage towards Gruppe 6 is fueled by OOC information (an old video being reposted as a meme) and people simply metagame that into their own knowledge as-if they were there to recall the event and as a result, it only damages relations between Gruppe 6 and LSPD even further. It's gotten to a point where officers are plain and simple harassing us cause we respond to our client calling us onto their property which we are obligated by contract to do. And instead of the officers doing their job, they wasted 15 minutes harassing our security officers.

 

My question is simple; What do you want us to do?

 

Before you respond, here's some typical responses I get:

Stop acting like cops - Provide me with EVIDENCE of such an incident even occurring before even giving me this response, and before you accuse us, I heavily suggest actually doing a bit of research on what we do.

Disband your faction - Sure, but in return, I'd like to see an LSPD Division dedicated to providing club security, mounting security cameras, conducting Cash-in-Transit and checking properties for unlocked doors.

This is entirely an IC issue - No, no it isn't, as I quote from before: "Most of the rage towards Gruppe 6 is fueled by OOC information (an old video being reposted as a meme) and people simply metagame that into their own knowledge as-if they were there to recall the event and as a result".

Give the LSPD a nice gift :3 - Done, it ended up being thrown into a bush in front of the Police Department.

 

I'll actively be following the thread of this discussion, feel free to tag me with further questions or arguments.

Not to be a asshole or something, but i am going to explain it in a pretty harsh way. the only reason G6 is failing and being made fun of is because 80% of G6 consists of females with bright colorful hair that are there for 1 reason, find a relationship with another female G6 member. And they all have experience in being a top A-grade master security guard and hand to hand combat specialist.

[Biscuit]

2 minutes ago, alma said:

Not to be a asshole or something, but i am going to explain it in a pretty harsh way. the only reason G6 is failing and being made fun of is because 80% of G6 consists of females with bright colorful hair that are there for 1 reason, find a relationship with another female G6 member. And they all have experience in being a top A-grade master security guard and hand to hand combat specialist.

Sorry but what the fuck did I just read?

 

Currently within Gruppe Six there is only one female with bright hair and that's me. Alongside that, within the last month, there had not been a hand-to-hand altercation with anyone.

 

Currently, on our roster, there is 21 males and 6 females.

 

Please, if you're gonna spell out lies, at least TRY.

[Mitch]

1 hour ago, Biscuit said:

I am actively working as a Gruppe 6 PR Officer

You should of known G6's reputation before signing up, otherwise you wouldn't of taken the job, G6's rep has been trashed repeatedly and no-one takes them seriously. We (LSNN) have had so many tips sent to us mainly around G6 pulling people over, trying to 'arrest' someone, stupid shit like that. It's a bit over the top. Look at the feedback you're given and start from there. 

[Biscuit]

1 minute ago, Mitch said:

You should of known G6's reputation before signing up, otherwise you wouldn't of taken the job, G6's rep has been trashed repeatedly and no-one takes them seriously. We (LSNN) have had so many tips sent to us mainly around G6 pulling people over, trying to 'arrest' someone, stupid shit like that. It's a bit over the top.

And I did.

 

The situation that happened, was dealt with on the spot. Faction Leaders should know that it's impossible to control every single one of their member and their actions to their strings.

 

The issue with that "traffic stop" is that it's entirely an OOC situation and ANY AND ALL IC knowledge of this situation is pretty much meta gamed or made up, so I'm sorry to say that the tips aren't as accurate as you think.

 

Here's the testimony of the faction leader who actually witnessed the event:

 

10 minutes ago, Mitch said:

trying to 'arrest' someone

Also, Gruppe Six, like any other Guard Card holder, are allowed to arrest people for felonies, under a citizen's arrest.

8 minutes ago, Mitch said:

Look at the feedback you're given and start from there. 

All the feedback I am given is the result of mass OOC meme hate which damages our faction's reputation as a result, this seems to not only be happening to us, but many other factions as well, considering the recent "Hoover school shooting" was completely made up.