[Closed] Martial PvP

Hi!  I don't play a martial character so I don't really know if I have much say in this but I did want to note that death -is- permanent.  It has been since I've started playing at least. I believe they changed it over when the game switched because there is no more magic/whatever that old religion was. Unless you mean when people get knocked out like when hunting and stuff?  But most of the time they are only out 1-3 days.

-Death- is permanent.  I do believe as of right now though it has to be consented to by both players and approved by staff.  Once it happens though, PVP or through plot.

Thank you so much for posting this, Heinrich! I agree that while there are some potential issues to work around, PvP deaths without players having to consent would add a lot to the game. It might even help fix some issues that the game is currently experiencing. I am really looking forward to having a respectful and productive discussion, and to seeing what everybody else thinks! =)

Thanks for the first feedback.

My understanding is the knocked out / coma status is the default regardless of injuries or intent and you come back in however many days.  So unless I plan it out there is no permanent death in the game.  There is no real fear of death or reprecussions for my actions either with the environment nor with other players.  There is no surprise or perhaps improvisation.

I think it makes sense that just because someone is "knocked out" means there is a chance they could die. It's nice knowing that death is "consensual" (no one really wants to lose a character. Especially against their will), however that's not realistic either. If someone is going to play a villain, there should be a way to make the character (not player) pay for their crime if another character wants to take the law in their own hand and kill them off. On the other hand, whats the point of having an assassin class if you can only kill those who are willing to die?

There was a MUDD I played WAY back in the day were if you were killed in "RP mode", you'd lose a point in the characters constitution and when you ran out of points, you permi died. That to me made sense because when you came back from the dead, you were "weaker" than before do to your constitution stat. However resurrection would not work in this game either. There could be "luck points" where a npc doctor is lucky and saves your life. I would like to see some more balance with martial and fighting/stealth classes. I've heard from other players who have assassin or fighting characters saying "There isn't much I can do with my class". 

Those are just my two cents.

As someone who has been playing these games a while I think I have some wiggle room to throw out my opinions.

I've had multiple martial characters in this game and others. So I'll first say that I agree that death should be permanent (which it is now), because it adds layers to the story. It is sad to lose a character, but sometimes it makes their story better. Sometimes you just have to say goodbye to them.

With that being said, it should always be consensual. I say this because having it any other way opens up a door for cheating, drama, and whole lot of messy business. I've seen a lot of ooc play at work in games and this could easily become a he say/she say thing. Staff needing to go through logs to find out what happened, if it was done correctly and so on. It just sounds super messy.

Making it consensual doesn't mean it can't be a surprise. You can oocly ask a character if they're okay with it and then play out the scene at another date when they least expect it. Furthermore, consenting to death doesn't mean you'll win. You could ask someone to consent and then it could be your character that ends up dying. That would surely surprise you.

I don't think having non-consensual death will make people change how they rp. Since you mentioned history, we have a long history of people speaking up about their beliefs even knowing it might get them killed. We shouldn't try to control how people rp their characters or make up new rules to get them to play how we want or think they should be played.

However, I do have an idea though on what could be put in place. We could have something like @victim that works like @chat, therefore people who want to participate in death scenes could type @death or something and they would show on un the @death who. That way you know ahead of time who consents to having their character die at any moment of the game. Just a thought!

I have to say I, personally, would not like to be completely PVP.  I might allow my character to die ooc given the right circumstance but I don't want to be just standing in the plaza, having someone come up - stab her and run away.  Perhaps if there was a area that was 'unsafe' where it was allowed, that would be something.  I know a lot of people get turned off by the PVP especially because of losing all their time/money/stuff but a secluded, or a few secluded areas might be okay?  But I would prefer it be 100% something I consent too.  I know that there is also the other side of the issue of people who would never consent even if it made sense ic but it would all be a really hard thing to police and could get super ooc. 

I do however, think there are few roles for fighting/assassin characters to play in game.  It just takes a little more work if they don't want to be constable/militia.  They'd have to be willing to be a bad guy or put some work in so make guard/whatever work.  But they could inflect bad things to other characters even if they can't kill them.   I mean, the other character would have to consent again but they could perma-damage or disfigure/steal.  

I do like Leliana's idea of @death.  That's actually kind of really neat.

I wanted to share a description of a scene that I played on another where all of us gave consent to death.

My character and two others were on the team (LAW), the other three were on the team of (CRIMINALS). The Law group went down to hideout of the criminals, seeking to bring them to justice. What followed was a long and brutal fight where just about everyone was wounded and three people died. Even though they came back to life, it's an example on how consensual deaths can be surprising and very fun to rp. We didn't know who would get hurt or die, but we went into anyway. In that game, when you die you lose some skills and stuff. Things you have to learn again, and no one likes the process of learning things (ig). I should also note the criminals didn't know if they would be brought back to life, yet they still fought us instead of just being arrested. That was one of the best scenes I played and no one was upset oocly because we all gave consent.

I don't know if I described it well enough, but I'm just stating that giving consent doesn't make your scene boring or any less exciting. That is up to the players and characters. 

Not that my opinion carries much weight as someone who doesn't really play anymore, but I've always found games with player kill to be a more respectful environment. When you have the possibility of someone murdering your character for your character's actions players tend to consider diplomacy or attempts to get along more realistically as stonewalling is almost certainly going to lead to someone wanting to get the roadblock that is your main out of the way. 

I wouldn't personally want to PK someone without talking with them OOCly first as I think solid OOCly discussion can help ease tensions if both parties are willing to be productive in conversation about character differences and maturely move forward with RP that everyone can enjoy.

At the same point however, if their ICly actions bring that upon them they should have to accept the consequences for things to have weight and feel realistic. I don't see any of the players here hopping quickly into a "Kill so and so" mindset and doubt that would be an issue, murder hobos aren't really into playing MUDS.

I personally always play my characters in any game as if there is true character death anyways. If Ava would have been terribly wounded when Peace shot at her I would have opted in and let the character bleed out if help didn't get there quickly. 

TL;DR: I think it would be a good idea. 

Now, to break down the ramifications of PK in a game where you're spending real world money into character and investing a huge amount of time into their skills. I do think that in a PK situation, if it was implemented, players should get back some of their LP and their STP investment. Maybe 50% would be fair? I think there should be incentive to stay alive and it should be a hit if your character does get PK'd, you can't really say 100% because then you'll get people just getting themselves killed off to make a new higher level alt. 

I also don't think perma-death should EVER happen because of NPC's or animal attacks or any other in game thing besides a ICly player driven assassination. Just to clarify that. To perma-die from a bear attack out of nowhere would be realistic but it would also suck big time and not create much of a story.

PK also needs to be monitored to make sure there isn't retaliation after someone is killed. If that player who dies rerolls and goes after their killer or has their friends do it and tips them off, that's alt crossover and harassment, I've seen enough of that to know it could certainly be an issue. 

As someone who has been in and out of the game for about a decade, I can definitely say I have put a lot of thought into my own character's demise. And I will adamantly defend the belief I should have the final say in how my character dies.

Am I open to being assassinated? Yes. Am I open to getting killed by a bear? Sure. Taken out by influenza? Okay, why not. It's my story and I am going to write the ending (and maybe I will have some co-collaborators too because that is what cooperative storytelling is, right?) 

I'm not worried about money spent or storypoints spent because I was able to enjoy the benefit of those purchases while the character was alive. It doesn't make much sense to ask for a refund once the character's story ends. You don't ask for a refund on a bath robe after years of use because you've worn it out and are ready for a new one. You got your moneys worth and it served its purpose.

@margrat_maclean I'm curious what problems you think nonconsensual killing would solve? 

The biggest question I have is: what do you guys think is reasonable justification to kill someone IC without their consent? I would almost guarantee everyone has a different opinion on that. Hell, even situations I have witnessed where characters were simply shunned ended up leading to major OOC issues and hurt feelings because there were such conflicting opinions on whether or not the shunning was justified. In a game where players OOCly have a hard time accepting someone being mean to them ICly, I am skeptical that were would be such open acceptance of nonconsensual murder.

In Ironclaw, my character did permakill someone during a surprise attack. When it went down, we put the scene on pause and I politely asked the player for the kill. After quite a bit of back and forth, and explaining why I felt the kill was justified, he gave his consent. It was important to me as the person delivering the kill that the player felt comfortable with this course of action. In turn, I gave my consent to whatever form of retaliation followed as a result of my action. If you are going to take a life then you should automatically consent to permadeath yourself.

So to get back to the original post:

- Feel about the general concept

I am against letting characters kill each other without some level of consent. If someone wants to attempt to kill Samir, I am open to that discussion to see if it's something we both think would be rewarding to ourselves and the game.

- Ideas about how to mitigate some of the concerns above and others that may come up

Personally, I think this would ultimately lead to someone feeling cheated or OOC targeted/bullied. -Maybe- if there were a @pvp command that let you explicitly give consent to being killed under any circumstance by another PC. AND with the condition that a character can only kill someone if they too have @pvp enabled.

- How to support players that have had a permanent death

The death and story that follows should be its own reward.

Thanks for hearing me out.

Addition:

What happened to duels of honor? I know they are technically illegal but so is murder. If you have beef with someone, challenging them to a duel is a reasonable response and it creates some really fun and intense RP that doesn't result in someone losing a character.

You can also get the paperwork ic to petition someone to get demoted a rank.  Which would likely hurt more then a death given how much you need to work for rank now <.<  Not to mention a few other ic channels/punishments I can think of. Both legal and not legal.

Of course. Anything can lead to hurt feelings, especially with non-consensual RP, if it's shunning or killing or otherwise if it's not fun for one side it should be evaded and respected in a perfect world. That's why I believe it's important to a game to have better OOCly discussions and people should be more willing to help each other achieve the type of RP they're looking for. In my personal experience my lack of consent never seemed to matter however when it came to my character being cast out so I wouldn't consider this a game of consensual or cooperative RP, I asked for solutions to the problem OOCly because the situation wasn't fun and the more I tried to smooth things over ICly the less fun it got. 

Even now I doubt you would have brought that up if I hadn't said anything because the OOCly negativity towards me requesting to please move beyond that plot point OOCly will forever haunt me and is the reason I don't plan to return as I've felt quite a bit of OOCly negativity and backlash for asking to please move beyond whatever it is my character did to deserve her treatment so I could get some lighthearted RP...this was mostly due to a substantial amount of RL stress and wanting somewhere to get a positive escape which I desperately needed but could not get. We're all people behind this screen and you don't know what others are going through, under normal circumstances I wouldn't have cared nearly as much. 

My feelings were more hurt during that exchange because I expressed that I was unhappy and wished the characters to work thing out as we have a small game and I'd like to be able to RP with everyone positively on my Character and the other side didn't seem to want to for the most part. Many people on both sides got upset with how that situation was handled most of who only added fuel to the OOCly fire that should have never been burning to begin with. 

So I apologize for my hand in that. I honestly thought it wouldn't be a big deal to request that we squash a plot that wasn't fun on my end so we could return to positive RP, I didn't want to hurt anyone's immersion but I also didn't want to log and stare at a wall all day or only get negative RP throughout my standard log times...I also didn't want to have to make a new character just to be able to play the game I enjoyed casually having conversation and throwing tea parties in, I said this flat out from day 1 of that plot taking off, but in hindsight I should have deleted and made a new character because nothing ever got better despite my efforts and the OOCly negativity that I felt from both sides only grew. 

I wont bother you with all of my RL problems that lead me into begging for positive RP from those players, I will tell you that this has been the worst year of my entire life and I have more problems than I can even count right now with new ones springing up like weeds every few weeks to the point that it's flat out become comical.

I will ask you to please not continue to make me feel attacked with what feel like backhanded comments directed towards me though. I've had quite a few of those already and I do not plan to return to your game where I'm constantly picked apart on an OOCly level as a player for wanting a chill ponies and rainbows RP space, I just wanted to offer my 2 cents from my experiences in other muds mostly for the people that do want to play political intrigue.

For the record I would 100% have rather lost my character to an assassination and been done with her than fought through that mess that caused me to no longer feel welcome in the game because I asked a few people to play nice since I enjoyed interacting with their characters and them as players.

I still <3 you guys, I'm sorry I was immature about accepting being cast out, I just wanted to have fun. 

Sorry again to derail but it's hard to continue to be attacked every time I voice any opinion at all. 

Yikes! I'm so sorry, Ava. I honestly wasn't speaking about you at all and I'm pretty much in the dark about whatever happened in the last few months because I have been dealing with some RL issues myself.

I was referring to a situation in Ironclaw where a noble was shunned for orchestrating a plot that resulted in mass casualties. There was quite a bit of debating at the time about whether or not it was fair and it left a very bitter taste in her mouth while on the flip side a lot of people thought she got off too easy.

I'm sorry about the issues you have had. Had I known I would have phrased my wording much differently!

Before I write this, I want to apologize in advance to staff and players. I know this is not the time or place and I should probably say nothing. Though for those who know me, I'm pretty sure you know how hard it is for me to just say nothing. I do hate to turn this post into something it was not meant to be. I also can't just sit by and read what Ava wrote and be quiet. So...sorry.

Ava, let me start by saying that no one has made you an outcast other than yourself. All of us tried including you in rp. At first, you had Ava claim that she couldn't hang out with us because the Germans told her so. In which we replied that Ava is her person and should be able to make her own decisions. Which somehow got translated to you should leave the consulate. That did come up later I admit, but only after you came crying to people ig and oocly about how you were unhappy with the consulate and characters. I feel like I tried to help you, we've had so many conversations. However, what ended my trying to help is when I spoke with you and staff oocly to try and fix what went wrong. Then you went behind our back to make ooc gossip claiming we were all trying to push you out of your consulate. Which another character then brought ig for drama. 

You continue to play the victim, yet you took anything we said to try and help and twisted it into a bunch of ooc stuff even though people were already bothered oocly. I had been over the plot. Everything was going back to normal, I think what bothered you was the fact that we chose not to forget what happened in ig. I'm sorry if that's what you wanted, but I'm not going to have Orla pretend she likes everyone just so people can be content. You can't just do things ig and then when it doesn't go your way you decide to wipe the slate clean. Just like Orla can't get away with the stuff she has said. I didn't mind the plot oocly because I expect a reaction to my actions ig. I only got bothered when people made it ooc drama. Can we just keep one thing ig without people talking crap oocly and making weird assumptions about why things happened? If you felt like people were being shady then you should have spoken to staff.

I even had Orla forgive Ava even though I was still upset oocly about you taking our help and twisting it to fit your narrative. I did that because I can take my feelings out of the mix and focus on the chars. Orla saw how upset Ava was and decided to forgive her, which is something she never does. So please don't try to make it seem like you were only trying to smooth things over when you were involved in the constant instigating. 

With that being said, I do miss you ig. Everything I just wrote is what I've been holding on to. I hate ooc drama so much that I decided it was best to just keep it to myself. Your comments are honestly what broke my silence, but this does not mean I dislike you. I did at one point because I was over the ooc mess, but I'm over that now. Even if Orla dislikes someone ig, it doesn't mean I dislike them. I want Ava to come back and do her weird fruit clothing, I'd honestly love to see how Miles and Percy do food clothing for Ava. I am sorry if you feel like you can't come back, but you can. People do want you here; I want you here. I want you to be able to enjoy the game and do all the mohawks. I just don't want you to try and control how people react to things ig and I will promise to do the same. That's all I had to say, bye and please know I do love you all.

Oh! And please don't kill Orla without my consent v.v lol