You see, I noticed that drones (atleast most of the time) Rush the common locations of survivor loot (Booze vendors, LV-624 cargo, solaris mining, etc etc.) And thats not metagaming apparently.
So when is something metagaming and when isn’t it metagaming?
When you play as Survivor, you play as people who SURVIVED on the Colony.
In the case of FORECON, Scout and SG should know where exactly their gear was displaced because they fucking arrived with them and lost them to begin with. FORECON also know where they crashed, what inventory they had when they crashed.
In the case of boozemats, the Survivors should know where they used to drink alcoholic beverages before xenomorphs appeared and started killing everyone.
Survivor gear location is not metaknowledge. But I suppose we could make it metaknowledge for xenos to know that you can make booze from alcohol. You’re a space lizard with acidic blood. Why would you just decide to rush to destroy the booze dispenser? Doesn’t make much sense to me, bro. Which is why I believe sabotaging machines before survs take them SHOULD be metagaming unless a surv or marine is dragging them.
Xenos melting every colony wall in a specific location to remove a building/defensive point.
We have a ruling on the rules page about how destroying walls to make a hold not possible constitutes metagaming. So rushing common hold spots and destroying surv gear that isn’t weaponry or materials, such as Vendors should be metagaming, I think.
Everything else should be fair game. Xenomorphs were capping survivors and killing them on the colony earlier and their hive mind allows for rapid propagation of colony layout and gear location among other things. Barricades are already found prebuilt on colonies, so xenos know survs use metal to build them.
Xenos ripped off the cloak from scout, as it would not be lost under different circumstances and found in reactor. So rushing it as xenomorph would be fair game, it’s on scout for not going after it first thing.
Edit: Edited to be less offensive and to clarify my opinion on the Xenomorph side of the issue.
everything you see on the wiki map is useable knowledge. Whats not usable knowledge is spawning in as a lesser drone and rushing to die at the flank marines made without being seen by any xeno, alerting the hive that a lesser drone died in North east caves. AKA, don’t use any information you saw as a ghost.
Metagaming is when you act ig taking into account information such as loot location or that in the early game the hive only has larvae and the queen is immature, that RP wise your character shouldn’t know. The reason they are banned is because acting into account of such information more often than not makes the game unfun for most. Now in terms of loot location it is reasonable for survs to know where loot is. It’s their colony and all. Xenos on the other hand, I don’t think they should know where loot is or how can it be used against them so yeah, in that regard rushing loot spots is the same to rushing hive. It’s meta.
Xenos already attacked the colony though so they have a general layout of the colony and I don’t see why they shouldn’t be able to know the common loot spots & hold spots since a lot of those allow survs to turn it into a “afk until 00:20” match
metagaming
examples of not metagaming
Xenos destroying colony assets prior to Marine landing, such as APCs, lights, vendors, etc.
Xenomorphs are not stupid and neither are the people playing it. I am doubtful they are going to believe that a survivor is dragging a alcohol dispenser machine just to vend 500 beers to get drunk on.
Metagaming is making use of information your character should not have any knowledge of.
The Xenomorphs have already partially overrun the colony and are acutely aware of the presence of survivors and the tools they use.
If a Xenomorph can recognise a mine is a explosive device that triggers when they walk next to it, despite the xenomorphs never having seen one, then they would recognise things such as “meta” loot. Xenomorphs are attached to a hivemind that shares information from across different hives and time.
In my opinion.
Excuse my language, but that is just shit lore.
If they got so much info and processing power then why they just don’t pick a gun and start shooting marines?
Why they don’t develop tools, not stone hammers and shit like that, but facehugger launchers and such?
“Aliens” portrayal seems the best, individual xeno is a bit smarter than a dog, something like elephant, or dolphin, Queen is human level, or above, but she lacks knowledge, but if she sees something, she can figure it out (elevator).
Xenos under hivemind actually get dumber depending on a Queen, if she tells them to rush a smartgun, they will no questions asked, if she tells them to not attack Ripley, they will not, if she tells them to cut power, they will cut power.
Even in that AvP game where drone designated number “6” showed higher intelligence and then during the story it just so happen that “6” was destined to become a Queen. Sharing a hive-mind there meant that queen killed crippled xeno enough to fall to the floor barerly conciouss, instead of like in the meme “Queen dead? OH NO! Anyway…”
Making xenos big brain will just open a big can of worms. We already know xenos in-game get all the benefits of a hivemind with basically no drawbacks (queen might banish them if they disobey her over and over).
Xenos have also been on the colony tho, and its not unreasonable that they should know where loot is/which common tactics survs should use as for metagaming, practically it wouldnt work since xenos would just sit inside the hive then since nearly anything could consititute meta at that point.
IMO the best solution would just be to randomize surv gear, its already balanced for an old meta where runners would rush survs early and getting gear was very hard, if no one can know the location rushing it would be impossible.
Then we give survs an overall better gear progression with less super good specialization, remove things as thermals/tac shotty on Kutjevo.
The overall goal should be to either hide or defend yourself until help comes, and more defensive tools and gear would make that more likely without hopefully leading to survs being able to chase/roam for kills.
Xenos get something fun too do, survs have a tad of an easier time surviving and hopefully that leads to better and more RP shipside instead of just turning into PFC #56 as soon as marines arrive.
you are a giant lizard with acidic blood. How would you know what loot is and that survs will go for it.
When it kills me
you are a human, how are you making low alcohol content drinks into molotov cocktails?
The xenomorphs have already infested a decent chunk of the colony and have fought & been attacked by the colonists (as seen by the bodies, blood, weapons, xeno blood all over the place), we used to have RP rules and though they were quite dumb, new things like marines arriving with a tank or SADAR or something were sometimes roleplayed
I mean…to just put a paper into an alcoholic drink and then light it on fire…
One doesn’t need a masters engineering degree to figure this one out
that’s something you should take with the coders
If I understand correctly you are saying that since the xenos have fought the colonists already that they should know how they fight somewhat and by what means. That’s fair. Though I’d argue it’d take a bit for the to locate all the means and their location therefore it’d make more sense to not know rather than do, since the infestation is at it’s starting stage at round start. Therefore I’d argue camping surv loot is metagaming unless they have demonstrated its use. The whole point behind survs is to have a fighting chance after all.
it’s pointless to talk about whether ‘ic’ xenos or survivors would know where the loot is, because at the end of the day it’s a core gameplay mechanic of survivors. They can’t be allowed to get it without any challenge, or it would be nerfed into uselessness. you have an allotted amount of time where you only have to fight T1s to get to the loot, and that’s the time you get. I disagree fundamentally with larva rushing, but on some maps, like sorokyne, it’s basically impossible not to larva rush, since you already spawn next to the loot.
survs and xenos rushing to the loot to grab/deny it is fine honestly. it makes you prioritise certain locations and gives an attempt at coordination as two people going for the same thing can be poor.
the real issue here is xenos wiggling their way to import gear such as flamers or scout gear and then sitting on it until they can evolve to melt or camp it. to me that is where the meta starts and it should be punished severely.
eapecially considering that if the surv then shoots that larba and an ahelp gets out they’re likely to get spoken to or even noted due to killing a larba before drones.
I believe you can kill larvas, as long as you don’t go for the hive, if they’re being all willy nilly around the colony, then its on them for being killed
polish teenagers figured it out in ww2, it is not that complicated
Making an alcoholic drink that contains less than 50% pure alcohol into a molotov cocktail is indeed complicated in a way that it is impossible. I have found no metion of polish teenagers making them out of low alcohol content drinks.
https://web.archive.org/web/20230319005130/http://www.polishresistance-ak.org/25%20Article.htm
Molotov Cocktail being made out of alcohol drinks is just a videogame myth, it is almost never used unless you get something that is much stronger than 1-1 ratio with water. 1-1 ratio means it will burn, but it is a common trick to spill it on a dollar bill and light on fire, money won’t be damaged by the flames because it is barerly burning.
CM’s version even burns green, so I guess every alcohol drink in CM universe is like 90% pure ethanol mixed with copper.
Who could’ve thought that a videogame would have videogame myths? 
The guy who asked how the videogame character does that and the other guy claiming that there was events in real world history of such things.
It this supposed to be a “GOTCHA!” moment?