Bad people Vs Bad players

[Selaina]

So while I'm sitting analysing a billion flow tubes and reading through the forums, I would like to ask people one question.

At what point does a character's actions make the player who controls them a bad person?

For example, recently veriya's trained warhorse was killed after she purposely left it out of the way in the forest when she went to hunt insects. I haven't seen her log in since.

To me, the player of the character who did such a action is a horrible person. Killing a warhorse which is a significant investment of time and gold, especially when purposely left out of harms way is an exceedingly antisocial way of acting in the game. Yes you can say that's just the way your character is roleplayed and there are horse thieves everywhere.

But geas is a game intended to bring enjoyment to those who play it and no one as a player, should be feeling anything but ashamed or guilty at causing another player's grief.

Our characters are a way we can relax, enjoy and wind down in the day. It shouldn't be a source of stress and a reminder that for another players 5 minute of enjoyment while they killed a poor innocent warhorse and stole all your items is equivilent to many hours of your time thrown down the drain.

We should be playing this game to bring happiness to ourselves and happiness to others. Not to take joy in causing the grief of other people. Because at the end of the day, since Geas is a game and not a life, if all people can get from logging in is stress and upsetness at having their character repeatedly killed, or stolen from or having no one but NPCs for company.. then they are going to stop playing.

That is not to say that no one should player evil characters, because there can be quite enjoyable enteractions with evil players in capture scenes and whatnot even if you are the one being captured. But killing a warhorse and then just disappearing is TERRIBLE behaviour. As opposed to knocking the warhorse out and tieing it up and waiting for it's owner to appear with a dagger held to the horse's throat or something that would actually inspire RP.

[Zehren]

Longpost

I keep IC and OOC entirely seperate, and often get so entranced while roleplaying I simply temporarily adopt the character's mindset.

I figure Geas to be a river, though, not a ladder: The more time spent, the further you drift, not the higher you get.

I agree on the point of keeping things more interesting than using pure code when doing something nasty, though.

Everyone knows I'm masochistic, though. >.>

[ganandorf]

Was it a douchebag move? Yes.
Is the player a douchebag? No.

You're allowed to have characters that are douchebags.

"But geas is a game intended to bring enjoyment to those who play it and no one as a player, should be feeling anything but ashamed or guilty at causing another player's grief. "

This sentence is wrong. Sure geas is a game meant for enjoyment, but some people enjoy it differently. I for one probably would've captured the horse if it was easy to do so, and ransomed it back. But I could also see myself killing it just to screw over the other CHARACTER. Because thats what you're doing, not causing another player's grief, you're causing another CHARACTERS grief.

Like Zehren said OOC is not IC.

[Devi]

I for one probably would've captured the horse if it was easy to do so, and ransomed it back. But I could also see myself killing it just to screw over the other CHARACTER. Because thats what you're doing, not causing another player's grief, you're causing another CHARACTERS grief.

You may not *mean* to, but you're causing grief for both the character and the player. It's not necessarily terrible and it should not be forbidden, but I think players need to recognise that their actions WILL have effects on players, and players WILL stop playing (at least for a time) if they lose everything they've worked hard for. I've seen it happen a dozen times. There are plenty of counterexamples too, of course. Is this reaction too much? It doesn't matter. People have it - and you can't stop them from leaving when they decide Geas is a giant sinkhole of fun. I think the whole "it shouldn't matter! it's IC!" argument doesn't work, because it DOES matter for many people.

On the grief of losing custom items: Some time ago, I logged back onto Devi to discover all of her custom items missing. I figured I died and rage-quit or something like that, and completely forgot about it. Devi has lots of items, and I've spent a long time collecting them - probably about 10-15 on her person at any time. The first thing I thought was "this will take 20 OOC weeks to replace" and I played for an hour and logged out. You don't need fancy custom items, sure, but losing something that you've worked so hard for and knowing it will take half a year to replace them (just waiting for the custom shop!) was really disheartening. This time around, everything went better when I logged back on!

On a more optimistic note, I've been really, really impressed by the people who've roleplayed with me. Devi has been tortured, beaten up, stolen from, ambushed, betrayed, etc., but I've only been killed by a player once (and she deserved it!), and I've never lost any custom items. In my experience, players generally recognize that it's better to torture/ransom than murder/destroy. After all - destroying something does *nothing* that ransoming doesn't - except make people very, very unhappy.

I think the most important thing is to make this system worthwhile for the bad guys. If you're tortured, please, please let your character cry/squirm/beg for mercy. If you're playing the most badass character ever, they can clench their teeth through the pain and scowl through the tears, but laughing or feeling no pain kind of ruins it for everyone. There are times when killing is appropriate, but it just seems to work out better (more roleplay, more fun) when people work for it a bit more.

[Skragna]

Only once was Skragna ever captured and tortured. I played the Crusader commandments to the hilt, even trying to the point of trying to kill one of my captors through RP'ed bludgeoning with my tail.

[luminier]

Zehren's post is actually a really nice analogy. Nice one Zehren!

I also agree with both Zehren and Ganon. Sure it's pretty shitty to lose something big like a warhorse or custom item, and it's not nice of the other persons Character to do so, but, it's not like it's against the rules or non-fair play.

I feel if players violate "unwritten" rules that people (Selaina for example) tend to get a bit up in arms about it.

As you float down the river you might lose some things, but, I lost plenty and still continued with the game and never did I complain once about it. I know plenty of others who have had the very same happen to them. Sure it's a shame but life goes on.... right?

[Blizt]

I think I will attribute something to this post, since I had about 8 unicorns killed by various people over the years.

It sucks loosing a mount like that, but when that character uses it as a weapon then it is fair game. Especially if the killer has a grudge against the other character.

I am sure Veriya was not using it for a weapon, but perhaps some other character had a reason for it?

[Delmon]

I thought the horse corpse was never found, no blood tracks anywhere, and so forth. I was thinking glitch/lost mount/something weird the moment I heard about it. Kudos to whoever pulled off the one hit-kill magically disappearing corpse leave no blood trick. Am I wrong about the situation?

[luminier]

I think I will attribute something to this post, since I had about 8 unicorns killed by various people over the years.

Only 8? =D

[Selaina]

But see the thing is, people can hide behind the 'oh it's just a game' thing but say for example someone ransacked your house. Sure life goes on. But that doesn't mean you don't feel terrible that someone came into your house and stole all your things and trashed the place. Or if a girl you're in love with completely stomps and breaks your heart for fun. Sure life goes on. But you *feel* terrible. The whole of point of playing geas is to get enjoyment and feel happy. If you're wrecking other people's enjoyment in the game.... you not your character are doing something to the player.

[ganandorf]

I think thats a terrible argument and something like getting your heart broken or your house ransacked in real life cant be equivocated to this kind of stuff happening in the game.

Of course sometimes people will feel like shit and stop playing for a while, it happens to everyone, and I think its almost impossible to stop occurences like that from happening, no matter how hard you try. Some people get into a few PVP fights, lose many in a row, and stop playing for a while. I guess we should just prevent PVP fighting too right? Because we don't want a single person feeling upset.

If the majority of the playerbase wants to turn this into a game where no one ever gets upset, thats fine. But if even a few players want to cause grief from others, maybe thats how they get their enjoyment, similar to powergaming but just in another direction. They can be the bullies of the game, and you know what, thats allowed.

Now if you want to add something in the rules saying that your character has to nice and respectful and always have positive interactions with every other character in the game.... well I have nothing to say about that except it sounds rediculous.

[Selaina]

But if even a few players want to cause grief from others, maybe thats how they get their enjoyment, similar to powergaming but just in another direction. They can be the bullies of the game, and you know what, thats allowed.

Right and what do you call a person that gains enjoyment from the grief of others? A bad person! The point of this discussion wasn't 'OMG EVERYONE SHOULD BE SUPER NICE' But a philosophical discussion of at what point does someone being super evil to others in the game, reflects on them as a person as opposed to just hiding behind the 'oh it's just a game, it's just how my character acts'.

[ganandorf]

They're not bad players, they just enjoy different parts of the game than you do.

[Eleassa]

I think everyone should remember that this is a game. I feel that if what happens in the game starts to affect you in real life (Like getting mad IRL when something is lost IG) then perhaps you shouldn't be playing right now. Nothing says you MUST play the game.

That being said, I do think it is possible for a 'bad guy' to go too far, in extreme circumstances. If you feel that someone broke the 'fair play' rules, then contact the admins.

[ganandorf]

Also my idea of a bad player isnt someone who makes the game more miserable for a few others characters.

Its someone is does something blatently against the rules (Aragog and OOC garbage she did)

People who do not roleplay.

People who abuse OOC information.

And any wizards who abuse their power (personally, the whole yoda and phelan thing I thought was bullshit, and other things)

[lanyara]

There was a similar discussion, almost exactly one year ago:

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=1441

To describe it briefly, books were lost.

[lanyara]

I'll try to summarize the various opinions in one sentence:

- Try to find (and maximize) ways to make the game enjoyable for every participant to the best of your abilities as a PLAYER, no matter the characters you play.

I emphasized the most important word in that sentence.

[Selaina]

^^^^^^^^

[Delia]

Loss should be accepted, nothing is given for granted nor is permanent in nature. One of the things that makes these kinds of games interesting is the flow of events in time. Usually, IMHO, one can make the most interesting decisions based on loss and defeat.

Of course, as it has been said and experienced countless times before, losing stuff isn't nice or fun in the long run. Especially if these things happen completely nonsensically, i.e. from player vs. player conflicts. Should this happen people ought to cool down and try to resolve whatever issues they have OOC(and perhaps take a break). But should there be an IC lowlife giving you hell...well...the scenario should be "you reap what you sow." With no crossroady chatty goodness on the side. Consequences!

[luminier]

Also my idea of a bad player isnt someone who makes the game more miserable for a few others characters.

Its someone is does something blatently against the rules (Aragog and OOC garbage she did)

People who do not roleplay.

People who abuse OOC information.

And any wizards who abuse their power (personally, the whole yoda and phelan thing I thought was bullshit, and other things)

It's annoying to me when brilliant posts like this get posted and then ignored by the Topic Creator... so I figure it should be reiterated.

I'll try to summarize the various opinions in one sentence:

- Try to find (and maximize) ways to make the game enjoyable for every participant to the best of your abilities as a PLAYER, no matter the characters you play.

I emphasized the most important word in that sentence.

Youll note that in that -whole- topic it was a lot of talking about how it was either right or wrong to do and justifications from both sides. You also should note that the only wizard to comment on the action was Genesis and he didn't have a problem with it.

Taken straight from the thread you linked Lanyara...

I think it is also "intentional harming of other peoples ability to play" to, for example:
- banish them
- outlaw them
- ban them from guilds
- expel them from guilds

And so on. I would add "and you don't see me complaining", but actually you might.

Doing something evil is evil, sure, but evil is a part of the world and of Geas. That's the "downside" of allowing free RP and having evil sides. Even if it is something that affects the gameplay of someone drastically, it is *legal*. (Except if done with OOC motives.)

As you can see this harkens back to what Ganon said. People are only "bad players" if they are breaking the rules or using OOC reasons to justify IC actions (which is part of breaking the rules anyways). Thats why what he said was simple and smart and it's annoying to see it ignored.

Going with what Delia said, I agree wholeheartedly. It was sad that that one bad thing happened, but, since then what like it has happened? Loss should be accepted and noted as a part of the game. I've lost important things, other players have lost important things, I know Delia has lost important things. I haven't seen threads created from anyone else complaining about IC actions done IC that leads them to want to quit or calling them to cease.