Simplified PK Discussion

Delphinus

Iocun said:

What I'm wondering about is whether this change affects the whole village-playerorg alliance thing. Up to now, bashers of allied denizen villages could be attacked by members of organisations allied to that village. Does this change mean that it's considered OK to attack people who hunt denizens your character would logically seek to protect, regardless of official alliances? That could potentially be a huge grey area between "PK farming" and sensible RP (although I'd definitely always expect such PKers to not just attack out of the blue but give reasonable warning first, etc). On one hand, I really want that, since it kind of sucks that Iocun has to stand there next to a person hunting, say, random mhun in Mog and all he can do is frown, but on the other, I'm sure there's going to be a huge temptation for some PKers to turn their RP into that of a champion of tons of frequently hunted bashing spots. Those might be easy to weed out if they make it obvious that they're just seeking for excuses for lolpking, but some of them might actually roleplay that entire champion thing well and consistently enough that you couldn't really fault them.

I'm mostly picking out this example because it used to be one of the areas where the old PK system was the farthest from "common sense", meaning that this change might affect this more than other areas, where most forms of RP-justified PK were already allowed anyways.

I think it'll depend largely on the judgement and mindset of those involved -- specifically their willingness to issue warnings, be reasonable, and keep it small. Obvious attempts to farm it will get stamped down under scrutiny.

In Istarion, for example, I've taken advantage of the simplified PK to threaten people who kill the mobs in the Cabal of Life. As my character is a member of the Cabal of Life, I'm justified. I'll issue warnings when they walk in, and if they kill an NPC before they can read and respond, that doesn't necessarily give me carte blanche to attack. At the same time, I'm not going to try and protect all of Istarion.

Using your Moghedu example, it might be reasonable to protect small parts of that whole -- say, the Mhunna (a single denizen) or the miners (low-level NPCs) -- because you know what people really want are keepers and knights.

Jarrod

The difference between those examples and the current org-relations is that villages have to ally the city back to give the members defense ability.

As you cannot publicly align yourself with a city (even things like news posts would fade with time, and the village generally would not), it seems silly that players would be able to defend an org without the org recognizing the player.

Iocun

Yeah, I guess that's a sensible way to go about it. I think one distinction that also makes sense is whether you go out of your way to notice the hunting of the denizens in questions, or whether it just happens to take place before your eyes. I'd find checking WHO every few moments and highlighting anyone present in area X quite questionable, but if you're standing in a room and someone else comes by and hunts "your friends", or you just happen to pass them while hunting, it makes sense to intervene. In other words: I generally turn a blind eye whenever reasonably possible when it comes to such things (mostly because having a "stern talk" with fellow citizens who are only interested in bashing gets boring after so many times - I'd much rather just let them continue and pretend Iocun didn't notice). But once it's obvious that Iocun just had to notice, then he's involved and will react accordingly.

Tanris

I'm sure you'd be fine, providing you were sensible about it (as Delphinus said).

Vasool

agreed with @Jarrod

Defending village denizens should happen through org relations. I'm fairly certain a person doing that once might get away with it, more than that and they'd likely be shrubbed.

ETA: I say this because that type of RP is a thinly veiled reason to PK people for no real reason.  Not saying people like @Delphinus aren't exceptions to that.

@Iocun if someone comes and kills denizens in the very room you're standing in, after a warning, that's a different story.  If you're purposely moving to their room just so you can stand in it... that's being a jerk.

Aithon

Delphinus said

I think it'll depend largely on the judgement and mindset of those involved -- specifically their willingness to issue warnings, be reasonable, and keep it small. Obvious attempts to farm it will get stamped down under scrutiny.

That example is actually another very good reason why I don't like the change at all. Once you open that door, that someone may protect denizens other than those that are obviously loyal to either someone or an organization, you will soon end up with a world where you're threatened with (announced or unannounced) PK at every corner. I'm not an optimist when it comes to trusting people's judgement.

Jarrod

Iocun said:

Yeah, I guess that's a sensible way to go about it. I think one distinction that also makes sense is whether you go out of your way to notice the hunting of the denizens in questions, or whether it just happens to take place before your eyes. I'd find checking WHO every few moments and highlighting anyone present in area X quite questionable, but if you're standing in a room and someone else comes by and hunts "your friends", or you just happen to pass them while hunting, it makes sense to intervene. In other words: I generally turn a blind eye whenever reasonably possible when it comes to such things (mostly because having a "stern talk" with fellow citizens who are only interested in bashing gets boring after so many times - I'd much rather just let them continue and pretend Iocun didn't notice). But once it's obvious that Iocun just had to notice, then he's involved and will react accordingly.

I'd take almost the exact opposite stance on which would be more acceptable. If you're just passing through the area and you see someone hunting them (if you're not actively defending why are you even in the area?) and you take that as your chance to defend, you're not a good defender of the area, and you're just going to fight someone who had no idea.

Otherwise, if you were actually checking WHO often and actively seeking out anyone in the area, you'd be an -actual- defender of the area, instead of an opportunity seeker. You'd build up a history of defending that area, instead of just randomly being in the area and defending.

Edit: Not that I think either should be acceptable. Just saying someone who actively defends has an incredibly stronger RP base to attack hunters than someone who just happened to be walking by and calls themself a defender.

Iocun

Jarrod said:

The difference between those examples and the current org-relations is that villages have to ally the city back to give the members defense ability.

As you cannot publicly align yourself with a city (even things like news posts would fade with time, and the village generally would not), it seems silly that players would be able to defend an org without the org recognizing the player.

What about villages that actually do recognize an adventurer as a friend/ally? That happens through quests in several places. Delphinus named one, and there are quite a few others that work in a similar manner. In some cases that actually is public (such as the Caer Witrin honours line clearly designating someone as a "champion"), but even if it wasn't made quite as public, why would that make it illegitimate? The RP justification exists just the same.

And even without being officially recognized by the denizens in question there might be a good justification. A righteous paladin would have good reason to protect innocent orphan children, even though the orphans obviously don't have any organisation that might recognize said paladin as their "ally".

I do however agree that whenever possible, formal alliances between orgs and villages should be sought, as that provides for much more consistent RP than special-snowflake "I'm the champion of manticores, ghasts, and Bitterfork!".

Aithon said:

Delphinus said

I think it'll depend largely on the judgement and mindset of those involved -- specifically their willingness to issue warnings, be reasonable, and keep it small. Obvious attempts to farm it will get stamped down under scrutiny.

That example is actually another very good reason why I don't like the change at all. Once you open that door, that someone may protect denizens other than those that are obviously loyal to either someone or an organization, you will soon end up with a world where you're threatened with (announced or unannounced) PK at every corner. I'm not an optimist when it comes to trusting people's judgement.

Yes, it opens the door to certain forms of abuse, nobody denies that. However, I don't think the prospect of being threatened with death at every corner is such a terrible one, as long as it doesn't actually lead to death at every corner.

I actually like the idea of an atmosphere like "this is a very dangerous world and lots of people might kill you if you don't watch your step, but if you're inconspicuous/charismatic/cunning/friendly/diplomatic/wise/elusive enough you can quite certainly avoid death".

Veldrin

Jarrod said:

Iocun said:

Tanris said:

Really like the direction this is going.

 

Could we get Nirvana/Inferno/Chaos plane added to the trecharous planes list incidentally? Could make dealing with undesirable elements of the respective classes easier when they do show up, although in those situations there'd likely be rp justification regardless.

I think it's a given that there's enough RP justification for non-members of the respective classes to attack trespassers, so making them akin to the UW/Annwyn would in fact only encourage the trespassers to attack the respective class members. Unless that's actually what you're asking for (i.e. the possibility to raid those places and attack the "legitimate" visitors) I don't believe what you're suggesting is necessary.

Hypothetical situation:

Non-Occultist Housed Occie takes their friend into the Chaos Plane. Tanris goes to Chaos Plane because he needs more OP pits and has to talk to Golgotha. In Tanris' mind, it's perfectly RP justified to attack the friend (and possibly the non-House Occie, based on RP reasons), but the non-Housed Occie clearly has the ability to enter the Chaos Plane, and can take their friend there, so to him/them there's no RP justification, he's not subject to the Occultist House rules.

What if Cyrene/Shallam stop being buddy/buddy, and Cyrene went under Ashtani protection. Tanris becomes friends with a Priest and that Priest willingly takes him to Nirvana. What then?

It's not possible to get any non-Priest/Apostate up there. You can't follow through refuge and there's no way for you to travel to the Priest since he's 'off plane'

Cahin

Also, Tanris should know better than to take care of the mentally challenged if that was the situation.

And I would expect Shallam to start excomming if Ashtan ever formed an alliance with Cyrene, but that's just the optimist in me.

Erasariel

My two cents on taking people on "exclusive" planes like Nirvana: they are your responsibility, and you will be held accountable for bringing them there. End of story.

If anything, that should be outright forbidden except in the most extraordinary of cases.

Achilles

Cahin said:

And I would expect Shallam to start excomming if Ashtan ever formed an alliance with Cyrene, but that's just the optimist in me.

We would definitely start ex-comming

Silas

Couple of points: Nirvana/Inferno/Chaos Plane are policed separately from this anyway. You can't bring somebody to Nivana/Inferno anymore, and any Occultist bringing non-Occultists to the Chaos Plane, when spotted/reported, are Occie excommed by Golgotha anyway (correct me if I'm wrong on the last one). For the Chaos Plane specifically, that says to me that the admins would be absolutely fine with Housed Occies attacking people doing anything of the sort.

Re: village champions, unless it's done on a very small scale - as in, repeated warnings, and then simply try to chase out rather than outright kill - I'd be against people being allowed to roleplay this without getting very public sponsorship from the village in question. For instance, anybody accoladed a champion of Caer Witrin (no idea what the quest is, but using it as an example because I know there's only a handful who've completed it) could reasonable defend Caer Witrin; if the Mhunna publicly posted to say that Moghedu is under the protection of Iocun, Iocun could reasonably kill anybody bashing there. Outside of that, encouraging it is not worth the headache of policing it.

Xenomorph

Awan said:

I am glad to see the PK rules changed to something closer to what both players and administrators have treated as the "real" rules for quite some time now.

One suggestion for the future: Under the old rules there seemed to be a whole bunch of additional, unwritten rules which administrators used to judge issues. I always thought that was bad; having unwritten rules you mention in issue rulings but which aren't in the PK rules puts players who are not actively enough involved in conflict to have learned what those unwritten rules are at a disadvantage which gets exploited by those who are. I hope we won't end up in that same position again. Even if it meant making the PK rule document a little longer, I'd rather have written rules that everyone has equal access to than unwritten ones which some players will know but most won't. That doesn't need to be a slippery slope into another 20-page document.

I also personally am really not looking forward to the fact that there's no longer such a thing as open PK status for forest enemies in the forest (or anyone in an enemy territory, but common sense is probably sufficient for cities). Nature conflict is already a major pain, and it is already completely one-sided and occurs only on the exterminator's terms; doing away with that rule will make it even more of a pain and even more absolutely one-sided. But the only reason we needed the protection of that open PK rule to begin with is because of how terribly broken and stupid the nature conflict mechanic is, and surely that will be fixed soon, I hope? In which case I guess that's fine.

You've always been a big advocate of dismantling forest combat, extermination, and all topics pertaining to it. Doing so will actually remove a big dynamic of Achaea, and a fun one at that.

Consider your RP form for a moment. You were born to fight on the side of Nature. To rally to the call of those that would hurt the trees or their feelings. It just strikes me as odd you'd want to completely dismantle forest combat and extermination. For one that has taken an oath to protect the forest, removing any chance of conflict would make your faction without a purpose or opposing force. You'd be raving in your barefoot, spear chucking forest bonefire snugglefests about protecting nature, all the while sleeping peacefully at night knowing that there isn't even an enemy to oppose you.

Removing extermination, and thus, OIA, you seem to think this would accomplish your goal. So after that is done who do you fight? You'd still pledge to protect nature. Except you'd have no enemy. You take an oath and protect the trees against...nothing. An invisible, non existing enemy. All so you don't have to participate in combat.

This is like Shallam praying away Ashtan to the divine. "Take away Ashtan! It's too much for us to deal with, can you just make it a bashing area with NCP's so we can play pretend!?"

Sorry. Forest combat, extermination, and OIA -give you a purpose in life-. Without an enemy, why would you even play this game, why even be here?

Look on the bright side. We give you purpose, and your org a job.

Antidas

I think that @Xenomorph does have a point when he says that doing away with forest conflict entirely would be detrimental to the game overall. However, I also want to point out that @Awan said nothing about removing it completely. She simply stated that it needs a change, to which I completely agree with.

Peak

Before we derail too hard onto that subject.. I'll go ahead and post for Awan and we'll stop right there.

Peak (representing Awan) says, "I do not wish to derail this thread. We have discussed this enough and I choose not to reiterate my opinions. Good day to you."

(does not necessarily reflect the opinions of Awan)

The end.

Back to simplified pk.. I think the biggest issue we'll see with this, is deciding the statute of limitations for things.

Veldrin

@Xenomorph

It's not up to you or any other player to give other players a purpose, you can give yourself and those who follow you a purpose and that's it. For others that's up to the administration that creates and runs this game. Without an enemy there's quite a few of us that'd still play the game just fine. The entire attitude you showed in that post is one of the biggest reasons to why simplified PK is absolutely idiotic. If anything there should be even stricter rules for those who starts up conflict and more lax rules for those who defends in that conflict.

Nemutaur

Peak said:

Back to simplified pk.. I think the biggest issue we'll see with this, is deciding the statute of limitations for things.

That really depends on the person, I always found it odd that the PK Rules stated that you only had a day or so to retaliate to an insult. Some people might shrug that off in a minute and some might be hurt for a week or so.

Jarrod

Veldrin said:

@Xenomorph

It's not up to you or any other player to give other players a purpose, you can give yourself and those who follow you a purpose and that's it. For others that's up to the administration that creates and runs this game. Without an enemy there's quite a few of us that'd still play the game just fine. The entire attitude you showed in that post is one of the biggest reasons to why simplified PK is absolutely idiotic. If anything there should be even stricter rules for those who starts up conflict and more lax rules for those who defends in that conflict.

This type of belief is cancerous to Achaea. The only way to get a purpose is through your own actions or admin? Why not just play a single player game and remove the 'danger' of being forced to interact with people who might not agree with you? Every day people's RP and purpose is affected and changed by everyone around them. City to city conflict gives the city as a whole purpose, and your belief that it should not have one without admin ruling is ludicrous. The admin encourage interactions between the city, and simplified PK rules will directly encourage more people to be involved in conflict because they won't be worried about getting issued by a PK lawyer.

Example: I was raiding Eleusis and saw a monk who had just jumped one of our raiders with a gank group (perfectly ok) the prior week, sitting with the defense. This was N of Eleusis gatehouse. The skirmishing went on for about 20-25 minutes, during which there was some Monk attacks on our group. During this time the monk in question was moving with the group. We pushed them back to defendable and killed the monk who was with them. Monk issues me (I got the killing blow) for killing him without cause when he hadn't attacked. Common sense dictates standing and moving with the defense group indicates involvement with that group. Fortunately I won the issue with a warning to be more careful. People like this won't have a foot to stand on with the new rules.

Veldrin

You can find purpose in fighting others just fine for yourself, you just can't go and say that YOU, yourself are giving OTHERS purpose because of your actions. 

And I haven't said anything about admin ruling?

And the people who'll get involved in conflict under simplified would get involved in normal PK. You'll probably find people doing less outside cities because they don't want to risk getting killed for doing their own thing.

Whenever you push yourself onto others it's your responsibility to ensure that everyone involved is having fun. This is why there should be strict rules for those who start any form for conflict.

If all thieves was like Tenebrus you wouldn't have the new theft system, he did his very best to ensure everyone had fun with it. Unfortunately there was people who weren't like him and you ended up with what we got now

These kind of systems shouldn't be made with 'best case scenario's' in mind but should be made to directly prevent the worst case ones.

And I don't see a problem with what that monk did, it's your responsibility as a raider to ensure that those you attack in raids are actually involved, if they haven't done anything to assist the defenders or attack you, they aren't involved (The exception being if you actually had cause or they were mark/infamous).

If you just want to PK for the sake of PKing find people who wants to PK too and play with those, don't force your fun onto others. Don't see me forcing people to bash right?

Xer

Eh? In this particular situation with the monk, if he moved with the group during the fighting for an extended period of time as Jarrod said, then he should be aware that fighting is occurring in the immediate area. In that case, if he stays with them, he's opening himself up to the possibility of being hurt. You don't casually chat with defenders and not expect to be attacked when they try to whittle down the numbers. You get away from the conflict if you don't want to be attacked. If there is a room with a multitude of clear defenders, then everyone in that room is suspect, unless they clear out quickly. If you don't enjoy combat, then why would you even be in the same room where fighting is occurring, or about to occur?

Not commenting on the entire situation since my experiences are fairly limited in that regard.

Sohl

Veldrin said:

And I don't see a problem with what that monk did, it's your responsibility as a raider to ensure that those you attack in raids are actually involved, if they haven't done anything to assist the defenders or attack you, they aren't involved (The exception being if you actually had cause or they were mark/infamous).

That's like saying people should be able to stand in the middle of a highway and sue when they get hit by a car. It's the drivers' responsibility to swerve and avoid them, isn't it?

Veldrin

Far as I see it, he's either involved or not involved, as long as he's on his own org property he can pretty much sit wherever the heck he wants (yes even in the room with the raiders). If he's actively doing something to push the odds for his side up (that being attacking or assisting defenders,  a monk can easily sapience him to know that) he's involved, else he isn't. 

I have absolutely no sympathy for raiders, they deserve everything that gets thrown at them. If they don't like it they can stop raiding in my opinion.

Antidas

Veldrin making me laugh harder than I have in a long time. Much appreciated!

Veldrin

Sohl said:

Veldrin said:

And I don't see a problem with what that monk did, it's your responsibility as a raider to ensure that those you attack in raids are actually involved, if they haven't done anything to assist the defenders or attack you, they aren't involved (The exception being if you actually had cause or they were mark/infamous).

That's like saying people should be able to stand in the middle of a highway and sue when they get hit by a car. It's the drivers' responsibility to swerve and avoid them, isn't it?

Well I do swerve and avoid them if they are standing in the middle of the road and I'm driving... if you want to run em over be my guest, just don't come to me and complain about the possible manslaughter charges/removal of license yadda yadda.

edit: that isn't to say the dude isn't wrong, but him being in the wrong place at the wrong time still doesn't make it all right to just run him over. You still have the responsibility to uphold the laws/rules regardless of the idiocy of the people around you.

Orklanishkal

Going out on a limb here. Manslaughter charges don't result from unintentional killings of people standing in the middle of the highway, and that seems to be the common sense sought by the new simplified PK rules.

Edit: i.e. willful ignorance not excusable

Aithon

I absolutely agree with Veldrin here. It should be up to an adventurer to deceide if they want to be involved into pk or not. The willingness to do so certainly does not define a characters purpose and I fear those simplified rules push exactly into that direction. The previous rules might not have been perfect, but at least they offered some protection for somone who simply didn't like to get involved into combat much. If anything, those rules should have been made stricter and not replaced by some vague guidelines that effectively suggest that killing somone once is ok, even for a shady reason. Also, the very idea of defending non loyal denizens for roleplay reasons makes me cringe, sooner or later we'd end up with a world where those who are good at combat tell you what denizens you may bash or not.

Veldrin

Orklanishkal said:

Going out on a limb here. Manslaughter charges don't result from unintentional killings of people standing in the middle of the highway, and that seems to be the common sense sought by the new simplified PK rules.

Edit: i.e. willful ignorance not excusable

Far as I know unintended 'killing' as in from running someone over is ruled by courts as 'manslaughter' or something to that effect with intentional stuff being outright murder. We have had cases here at least where people gets hit with it and lose their license for unintentionally causing the death of another being while being the driver of a vehicle. The only times it's ruled otherwise is if the person is jumping out in front of the vehicle just as it's passing  by to do suicide leaving the driver with no time to react (Or rather there was absolutely nothing he could do to prevent it).

Orklanishkal

okay sure - my point was that your own negligence/ignorance shouldn't be used to penalize other players, and while I think it's totally cool if you don't want to pk (I don't get involved either), I'm not sure why you're entitled to sit in a room with defenders/raiders and not expect consequences. 

Nadiel

Veldrin said:

@Xenomorph

It's not up to you or any other player to give other players a purpose, you can give yourself and those who follow you a purpose and that's it. For others that's up to the administration that creates and runs this game. Without an enemy there's quite a few of us that'd still play the game just fine. The entire attitude you showed in that post is one of the biggest reasons to why simplified PK is absolutely idiotic. If anything there should be even stricter rules for those who starts up conflict and more lax rules for those who defends in that conflict.

I think, ultimately, @Xenomorph's point was that a faction that declares itself an advocate for or defender of some thing (being, force) has no point if that thing is not threatened. If Nature is perfectly safe and autonomous, it has no need of advocates or defenders. The faction claiming to advocate for or defend Nature would then be superfluous. With the current system of forestal conflict and exterminations, Nature is, indeed, not autonomous, making the faction purposeful, even necessary. Of course, you are correct that that does not mean that it is @Xenomorph's (or anyone's) responsibility to give that faction purpose, but it would be silly to argue that Nature required defending if the ability to threaten it was removed. As long as it exists, it's plausible for an opposing factions roleplay to dictate the threatening of Nature.

Basically, not using the mechanics in place to threaten Nature out of a sense of fairplay and making the game fun would remove the threat as effectively as removing the mechanics entirely would. Again, making the faction superfluous. Ergo, using them IS what gives the Nature faction purpose, whether people like that or not.

The city of Good, Light and Creation wouldn't have purpose without opposing factions of Evil, Darkness, and Creation. Shallam could still exist, but it certainly wouldn't have claim to be advocates for things that aren't threatened or opposed. The Shallamese would have to find some other purpose for themselves, and I'm sure they could. But you can't defend something that isn't threatened.


ON TOPIC: As a relative non-Com, I'm still all for this change to the rules. It's a dangerous world in which our character's exist. It should be. And people wouldn't be able to dangle the old PK rules as a shield from the common sense consequences of their actions, even if an issue would rule in the favour of the person exacting the consequences.