House Guards and the Law

[Cegar]

I've been reading through a few posts concerning noble house guards and their position (you can do a search if you like, there are relatively few), and came to remember a few things. In particular instances, there have been people in the cities who would insult a particular house or Noble in the presence of that House's guards, even going to far as to fight with the guards, throw trash, et cetera. Being Noble House guards, one would think that they'd be allowed to at least beat the shit out of that person, but the crim code treats them as any other Joe Commoner. This makes for a few very, VERY unrealistic and tricky situations and a lot of bad feelings for the house guards. Being a house guard should come with a bit of authority and power, but the code does not reflect that.

Therefore, I propose that house guards or personal at or above the rank of sergeant or its equivalent be given the ability to target a specific individual as having a limited crim code. That is, if Joebob Rinthi came up to a Borsail Sergeant and a few other Borsail guards and started calling Steven Borsail a fat tandu, then Sergeant Borsail could target Joebob Rinthi in some coded action and all member of house Borsail could commit limited crimes on him (i.e. anything short of ending the character's life). Specifically, they could carry that person off to a secluded place where they could continue conversing about Steven Borsail in private.

The pros in my mind are that:
1 - House Guards (higher ranks) would have some much needed authority
2 - It might attract some other to the house ranks who might otherwise stay independent or mercenary if offered the job (fairly unrealistic)
3 - No more commoners insulting the houses outright

Cons:
1 - Ability for abuse (though limited, since high ranked house guards should be watched closely and already have earned quite a bit of trust)
2 - Might conflict with the militia, though I would figure that the militia would turn a blind eye to house guards carting off some worthless commoner
3 - Might be impossible/hard to code in its current form

Any ideas? Comments? Flames?

If you are not in support,, would you please state why? Thanks.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

Hmmm. Nice idea, to an extent. Kick it around a bit longer. It could develop well.

[spawnloser]

How's this for a slight alteration to the idea?

I know that code exists already that makes some proof from crim-code, for example those members of the militia.  I don't know if it is possible to do this either, but possibly make it so that persons of certain rank or higher in noble house guards have similar immunity so that they can grab the offender and toss him/her out, beat him/her up or something like that?

[Cegar]

Ah, true. But is there a way to make it spread to his underlings for a limited amount of time?

Though if not, then having high ranked house members be immune to some of the crime code would work as well, since then their underlings could simply assist, and then not have any ramifications. That is how it works, I believe.

[Ayashah]

Ignore the code and defend your noble but make sure to have your
character set to not resist the npc militia. Those playing pcs that mouth
off openly to nobles, taunt high house guards, etc, really arent completely
playing realistic as they know the 'code' will affect the house guards if
they do anything about it. Both the 'aggressive' pc and the 'house' pc
need to forget the code and play IC.

The Militia IC will treat those working for Houses way different when they
end up in jail than they will the scum that lost their minds and acted like
they had nothing to worry about. Long ago when I played a real witch of a
militia pc a ranking system was explained to me like this:

slaves = the dirt
commoners = the pebbles on the dirt
house personal = mid-shin
militia recruits/house guards/merchants = knee
militia/merchant heads of houses = mid-thigh
minor nobles/militia captains = hip
nobles = waist
noble heads of houses/blue robes = shoulders
reds = head
blacks = the sky above

Hmmm, something like that. Its been a few, dang, about 5yrs maybe,
since I was told that. Anyways, so if Joe commoner and house guard Luke
ended up in jail, guess whom was believed? Sure as shit wasnt Joe
commoner.

Yes, this doesnt really address the code issue but stop to think, would the
militia REALLY give up its complete power over the city just because Joe
Commoner got hired up by a House and made a guard? No, because then
Joe House Guard could start more crap which might lead Joe Commoners
to think they could rise up against authority too. Who knows, maybe that
person dressed as a House Borsail guard stole the uniform!!! Do they
dare risk it?

At least that is my thought and opinions on why the code should remain
the same. The imms have made it possible to 'submit' to the npc militia if
you do something that might be out of line. The pc/imm run militia will
deal out punishment and/or release those that were protecting their
noble, etc.

[Larrath]

Immunity to crime code is a very dangerous thing.
I'd rather see these situations be handled with uncoded ways - either the House Guard can pummel the offender via brawl-code/emotes or you can wish up about it.

If the player refuses to play along with emotes or just ignores them, walk away and send a player complaint.

This said, nobles are exempt from many aspects of the Law, including murder of unimportant commoners.  If a noble (and only a noble) was able to allow his guards to beat someone up, that could make more IC sense and be less prone to abuse.  While a House Guard might be able to get away with some unjustified brawling, a noble would immediately suffer the consequences if he abused the privileges afforded to him, suffering a potential decrease in status in public or in their House.

[UnderSeven]

I like Larrath's points a lot.  Besides which, getting a noble guard position isn't that hard.  It's really easy and if it only took that to get crim code freedom it could be terribly abused.  A big problem I would see with that abuse is that people could lose their chars to such abuse easily and there would be no reimbursement.  

The flip side, with our current system maybe see's nobles and noble employees having to come up with more creative ways to handle stuff, but is that so bad?  I don't think so, I think it actually creates more interaction.

So let me add what I think some cons are to this:

Less interaction between nobles and templars and militia.  
Less interaction for the militia and templars (as nobles start taking care of their own problems and do not need their help as much)
Potiental for abuse is not limited by enormous.

Now, the way the game code currently works, the law is something requiring some room to sneak around for say a noble guard wanting to take the law into thier own hands and is there wiggle room here? Most certainly there is.  A well bribed templar can more or less give anyone they choose 'immunity' from the law by simply pardoning them.  Furthermore since there is often more than one pc templar around at any given time, not to mention the possibility of imm templars being played, that allows for a great deal of conflict and competition between templars and nobles. Ect.  Plus, with noble houses already having competition, personally I think when you take a look at the really big picture, it's much better if noble guards are not given some kind of immunity.

but that's just one player speaking.

[Cegar]

Well, my idea was to only have this apply to Sergeants and above. The PC's which have demonstrated trust and leadership to the immortals, and wouldn't abuse the crime code. And I would only suggest a limited immunity. That is, they wouldn't be able to kill anyone without retribution, but subdue them, rough them up, draw blood.

[Anonymous]

Rather than immunity, why not just have a severely decreased chance of "notice" for noble servants? Then it would be a crap-shoot, and the servant in question would seldom really suffer any consequences should he be caught, but have it reflect the willingness of militia and other forces to simply look the other way when noble house members make mischief?

This would simultaneously encourage noble house members to get into more trouble and enforce it so that it isn't totally abused.

Furthermore, if something like this were tied to an in-game used 'reputation' that would be extra bonus.  Right now there's little to let a noble know about the doings of his subordinates other than the citywide rumor mill, or often an observant clan imm. And it really doesn't affect him in any significant way on a daily basis.

Say, for example, that You're a member of the highest ranked noble house... you have a reputation of 20, which is the best you can get, really. Your house's rank is based on an average of the reputation of all the house members - to make it interesting, we'll say it's the average of PCs.

Then suppose you have a slave/guard who is apprehended by the law for doing something bad- or has been specifically accused of wrongdoing by a PC or NPC who matters to the templarate. That could drop your reputation, depending on the offense (length of imprisonment?) by a certain value.

Once that value is below a certain point, members of authority and members of nobility (including your own house) could use it to start discriminating against you. Let's say that the points are used by the clan imm to make relevant posts about you that would be generally known to the militia, templarate, or other nobles? "This noble can't seem to keep his slaves/subordinates under control, his own house is starting to view him with a jaundiced eye."

This would give the actual servants/slaves a small degree of power over their leaders and encourage more interaction between noble and player ranks. And it would provide a tangible bar for people to gauge at which point the House as an entity will become unwilling to let you drag them down with you.

Of course, I guess you could do the same thing with a "nobles" board, a "merchants" board, and a "militia board" if someone wanted to coordinate it manually. Either way, it's an interesting system.