Response to slaving thread thus far...

[Naiona]

Linendel,

While the wagon script thing may or may not happen, it will never turn into an automated quest.  Multiple PCs RP'ng will have to take part in any hunt, and the pay at the end would not come from the NPC at the cage, but from PC superiors.  The cage would be no more a tool then the Nenyuk is, just a way to avoid having to have an IMM present to account for and dispose of beasts brought in (which is how we have actually been doing slaving hunts of non-pcs for a while now).

[Seeker]

Merchant tokens for non-city dwellers should work as a get-out-of-jail free card (if they're not... um... accidently misplaced by the slavers during capture)  because the powers that be want goods and services too still flow in from the outlands.

And the more I think about this, the more dead slavers with a surprised look on their faces I keep imagining.

Seeker

[Halaster]

It would not be limited to animals. Those would just be the easiest and most often attempted targets.

I'm diggin it. Are there plans to create a more alive desert as targets for slaving pcs? NPC travelers and such?

About the live desert, I think there was a project currently that invovled implementing the simdesert. Is that still going on? Can we as players send in ideas about that?

Sorta.  It's done in one area (somewhere in the tablelands is all I'll say).  Someone then adapted it to a couple of limited areas in the southlands.  Someone then adapted parts of it to various locations in the middle of the world and the northlands.   So it's not everywhere, but it's made some headway.  It's one of those projects that's pretty complicated, so slow moving.  People add it to their areas as they have the time and inclination.

But, in general, it is still happening and moving forward - slowly but surely.

If you have ideas related to SimDesert, feel free to send them to me.  If they involve other peoples' areas, I'll forward it.

[Akaramu]

I havent read most of those two threads, so I dont know if this has been brought up before. If it has, apologies.

I see a possible problem even with the rules mentioned: It would likely be impossible for most players to tell whether or not they will enjoy this new slave role at the time they are being captured. They dont know how busy the new master will keep them, how much interaction they will be getting, if their playing times will match those of others etc.

If my PC was about to be enslaved, but I enjoyed my current role, I'd probably try to bribe my way out of it simply out of fear that I am trading something enjoyable for something that will bore me. It could be a blast, but I'd rather not take the risk not knowing how much interaction / activity awaits me as a slave.

[skeetdaddle]

Three thoughts:

1: Would NPC slavers be involved in these "captures"? If so, I think my only problem with the slaving idea would be that I would hate to be picking berries, have a slaving group walk into the room, and ten pages of spam later, realize "Oh fuck....guess that was a bunch of slavers that just walked into the room." I say this, because I've seen something similar happen to a friend's character who was trying to shoot somebody while just outside of the gates, and the soldiers walked into the room and killed the character, before he could say "shpedoinkle." He would have gladly been hauled off to jail, but had no chance to even drop his bow.

2: Are there going to be limits to the amount of effort a slaving group will put into chasing someone down? Is Mary-Jane-nobody-elf really worth running through gith country to go get? Is Rich-bitch-noble's little aid worth tracking across the desert? I think it simply makes sense, that if some Joe-Shmoe is proving difficult to catch, that the slavers would quickly give up and just try to find someone else. I also think, however, that if X noble from the north has a vendetta against Y noble in the south, that maybe something akin to a Byn contract could be made for the slavers to hunt down Y's aide.

3: I agree with previous concerns that accepting a slavery role might get dull. I think that as long as there are PC slavers around good at keeping the role interesting, it's a wonderful idea. Perhaps to ensure that PC slaves are not bored out of their skulls playing a PC slaver should require some karma? And maybe every slaving group has to include a certain amount of PCs? Just a thought.

My personal thoughts overall is that I like the idea, but I think it needs a trial period to see how well it works.

[Halaster]

I say this, because I've seen something similar happen to a friend's character who was trying to shoot somebody while just outside of the gates, and the soldiers walked into the room and killed the character, before he could say "shpedoinkle." He would have gladly been hauled off to jail, but had no chance to even drop his bow.

Not to derail this thread, but what does he expect standing outside the gates shooting at them when they're next to the soldiers?  They probably weren't interested in "capture" at that point, considering arrows were flying at them.

[Tlaloc]

1: Would NPC slavers be involved in these "captures"?

No, this would be nearly 100% PC driven. Any NPCs involved would probably have something to do with administration at the noble level, or dealing with individual slaves.

I say this, because I've seen something similar happen to a friend's character who was trying to shoot somebody while just outside of the gates, and the soldiers walked into the room and killed the character, before he could say "shpedoinkle." He would have gladly been hauled off to jail, but had no chance to even drop his bow.

I'd have to echo Halaster here, heh. What was your friend thinking was going to happen, shooting arrows at an army?

2: Are there going to be limits to the amount of effort a slaving group will put into chasing someone down?

I imagine limits will be self-imposed, mostly due to IC circumstances. It would probably depend on the slavers, themselves, and how much effort they feel like putting into it.

3: I agree with previous concerns that accepting a slavery role might get dull. I think that as long as there are PC slavers around good at keeping the role interesting, it's a wonderful idea. Perhaps to ensure that PC slaves are not bored out of their skulls playing a PC slaver should require some karma? And maybe every slaving group has to include a certain amount of PCs? Just a thought.

Once again: its very unlikely that any PC slaves will actually come out of this. Honestly, my original plan was to simply force captured PCs to be stored/retired/killed after a certain alotted time was up, to give the PCs time to buy their own freedom, organize an escape or some other sort of rescue.

Most Players do not want to RP their PC as a slave, and honestly, I'd be too worried about PC slaves doing unrealistic things to automatically force players to play a slave, without a special app or some sort of OOC nod from the Player which states that they'll play within the IC restrictions required of a slave role. This would most likely mean realizing that you'd have do deal with some downtime, restrictions of movement, and not being able to just up and "escape" without staff approval.

Currently, there are discussions going on within the staff about ways to make PC slaves that come from this somewhat possible and playable...but really, I believe they're beyond the scope of this discussion, and add complications and extra staff overhead to what could really be a self-regulating, almost automatic player-driven system.

Players don't (usually) get worked up about getting eaten by Tembo, scrab, gith, meks, bahamet, or any number of other NPC creatures that can cause instant death among their numbers. In my personal opinion, I'd rather go out in an interesting manner, than simply seeing 'A gith walks in from the east'. At least being enslaved for the rest of your PCs natural life is an interesting way to go.

In the past couple of months, I've heard comments from the playerbase about how independents have it too easy, how many nobles have nothing 'to do', and about how players like player-driven, mundane, and harsh plotlines. I think this is a chance to take care of all three of those issues, and who knows how many more we may have missed.

My personal thoughts overall is that I like the idea, but I think it needs a trial period to see how well it works.

I think we do too. We'll see how it works.

[skeetdaddle]

Okay....allow me to clarify. The character mentioned in my previous posting was outside of the gates, shooting away from the gates at someone who was also outside of the gates. He wasn't shooting at, or even through the soldiers whatsoever. He didn't think this would get him crim-flagged, but apparently it did, and he was killed unbelievably quickly. My main point, though, was the massive spam that he got before he even realized what was going on. But since the slaving parties are going to be mostly PCs, it's really a moot point, I guess. I would be very disappointed if a bunch of PCs walked into the room and spammed like that without any emotes or anything.

[Cenghiz]

About crim-code: If soldiers see something, they react. Simple...
If NPCs and VNPC's see something, they react.. To tell the truth, I'm also uncomfortable with magickers casting in Barren Lands, since the room desc says virtual soldiers roam about virtual fenced areas to protect virtual slaves/workers. Of course they wouldn't dare even reacting if you wore a House's cloak behind you or if you were known as the pet of a well-known templar, I believe.