Apartment Security, Burglars, and Tresspassing

[Niamh]

The quality of a lock does contribute to the price of an apartment's rent, among other factors.

That being said, this is one of the perks of being a part of a clan.  You get room and board as a benefit, which means a place to store your things that is guaranteed to be safe from burglars.

[Saellyn]

The quality of a lock does contribute to the price of an apartment's rent, among other factors.

That being said, this is one of the perks of being a part of a clan.  You get room and board as a benefit, which means a place to store your things that is guaranteed to be safe from burglars.

Except for that filthy neck in the clan. Nothing is safe from him.

[Lizzie]

The quality of a lock does contribute to the price of an apartment's rent, among other factors.

That being said, this is one of the perks of being a part of a clan.  You get room and board as a benefit, which means a place to store your things that is guaranteed to be safe from burglars.

Actually, no, it isn't guaranteed to be safe from burglars. It's guaranteed to be safe from lockpicks, since there are no locks. But burglary doesn't necessarily require a lockpick. And it doesn't necessarily require magick either, for those who were assuming that's what I was thinking of. It requires - access. Sometimes it requires major serious uber twinkage (ignoring the game world and all those NPC and VNPCs standing in the room watching you steal from your clan-mate's locker, for instance). Sometimes, it requires only that someone was dumb enough to leave the clan compound's gate open, and the thief having good enough sneak skill to get past the guard. Again - this would involve twinkage since in order to actually take anything, he'd have to be somewhere that would likely have all those NPC and VNPCs standing around watching him load up his pack.

But - no..it's not guaranteed to be safe from burglars. Twinkage happens in clans as easily as it happens in apartments. Moreso, because of all those NPCs and VNPCs that aren't inside peoples' apartments.

[Agent_137]

I've had burglars pick my apartment's door while I was inside several times, also.

I walked in on a burglar once, as a very powerful magicker. Unfortunately, my character had a drink in his hand and just kinda stood there dumbfounded as the burglar picked the lock from the inside and left with a shouted taunt. I personally was so dumbfounded I didn't even get a good emote off.



Oh well. At least it was in character.

[Saellyn]

Shoulda blown him up man.

[Nahara]

Nah. Have the burglar slowly realize exactly what he stole from until the poor guy's having RL nightmares about being turned into a half-silt horror.

On stealing from a clan, might be reasonable if it involves sleight of hand and something left in the open.

[Saellyn]

A tall, wind-blown man says, in sirihish,
       "Do you have any idea who I am?"

A filthy, short elf says, in rinthi-accented sirihish,
         "Don' care."

A tall, wind-blown man says, in sirihish,
        "Better start..."

A tall, wind-blown man extends his arms, slowly, and a sudden blast of wind causes the door to shut.

A filthy, short elf's eyes widen with painful realization.

A tall, wind-blown man says, in sirihish,
        "Because you're about to die."

[Agent_137]

Nah. Have the burglar slowly realize exactly what he stole from until the poor guy's having RL nightmares about being turned into a half-silt horror.

On stealing from a clan, might be reasonable if it involves sleight of hand and something left in the open.

i think you actually have to use the steal command for that. sleight of hand skill and commands only work on your person, i believe.

[Nahara]

Nah. Have the burglar slowly realize exactly what he stole from until the poor guy's having RL nightmares about being turned into a half-silt horror.

On stealing from a clan, might be reasonable if it involves sleight of hand and something left in the open.

i think you actually have to use the steal command for that. sleight of hand skill and commands only work on your person, i believe.

Ah, steal then. Some manner of taking from a room without being noticed.

[Agent_137]

i think that and having clan cloak would pretty much be fair game.

[Synthesis]

Palm and slip work on:  containers in YOUR inventory or in the room.

Steal works on: containers worn or in inventory of OTHER people, and single items in the room.

Plant works on: other people's inventories and the room.

The distinction is moot, really, except for a rare few city-elves whose guilds don't grant the sleight-of-hand skill.

[Agent_137]

good to know Syn. But, um, steal/plant is considered an illegal command and palm/slip is not.

One gets you Wanted, the other doesn't. So it's actually a pretty big distinction when you're trying to plant a flower in your pet runner's hair.

[Synthesis]

good to know Syn. But, um, steal/plant is considered an illegal command and palm/slip is not.

One gets you Wanted, the other doesn't. So it's actually a pretty big distinction when you're trying to plant a flower in your pet runner's hair.

Palm and slip are illegal if you fail them in certain places, and you will become wanted.

Also, steal and plant are not illegal if you only do certain things with them.

Have fun figuring that out!

[Niamh]

To address the points of those who contradicted mine:

A lot of clans don't hire elves.  GMHs, noble Houses, militias all do not hire elves, and those are the most common clans for people to join.

Twinkery and stealing in clan barracks doesn't happen as often as you might think it does.  And if it does, the VNPCs and NPCs are more than likely to tell their superiors who was stealing your stuff, and the culprit will be punished.  The reality of the matter is that there is very little chance to have something of yours stolen from a clan barracks than anywhere else.  You can argue about that until you're blue in the face based on what you might have seen or heard in your limited point of view, but it won't change the actual statistics.

[Is Friday]

Without Gimf to verify these "statistics", I can't really side with the staff at this point in time.

[Saellyn]

Without Gimf to verify these "statistics", I can't really side with the staff at this point in time.

Concurrence.

[Vanth]

Also with the new "apartments are not warehouses" changes, I can't even set down 2 bottles on the floor, let alone any actual furniture or chests.

There's probably built in storage if that's the case.  Check the room description.

But regardless, you should still be able to set some things down.  If that's not the case, email me with the room name and I'll have a look.

[Bilanthri]

The quality of a lock does contribute to the price of an apartment's rent, among other factors.

That being said, this is one of the perks of being a part of a clan.  You get room and board as a benefit, which means a place to store your things that is guaranteed to be safe from burglars.

Except for that filthy neck in the clan. Nothing is safe from him.

An important point I feel a lot of people miss about elves is their sense of clannish loyalty. Sure, culturally, all elves love to steal (i.e. get something for less than it is worth or nothing at all), and they vehemently distrust all who are not perceived as tribe. But an elf who has identified themselves as a member of a group would not consider stealing from their tribe-mates, even if they spend all day trying to figure out how to steal from everyone else.

As much as elves see the people outside their tribe as an indeterminate collection of potential threats, they view their tribe as a direct extension of themselves. Stealing from the tribe is like cutting off your own fingers.

Now, that's not to say that an elf wouldn't lie and connive his way into a group so he could rob them blind...that's part of the fun of the elf: Is he loyal, or is he lying?

With the racial commentary out of the way, on to burglars:
I have, on multiple occasions, had my apartment broken into. It's part of the risk of settling. I'd like to say that it was about 50/50 between reasonable thefts and a complete clean-out, but that's not the case. It seems like there are those who play their thieves for the sole purpose of racking up coin, despite a serious lack of buying potential for an unclanned rogue with 1000's of coins in the bank. Rather than making stealthy acquisitions, they take everything that's not nailed down, some even having the audacity to leave a single near-worthless item with an altered ldesc so they know you will realize you've been cleaned out.

Now, if "cleaned out" means I lost a couple sets of clothes or a bag of feathers and shards, then that's reasonable. But when your freelance merchant comes home to find that your tool chest, material trunk, wardrobe, bench, etc. are all missing, with the only thing left being a waterskin (which has been poisoned), you begin to wonder if there's a group of half-giants rolling the neighborhood.

To those stealth specialists who have a sense of self control and realism, kudos! And to the rest, don't you think the doorman is curious where you're dragging that trunk full of swag?

[Ampere]

I've always thought it odd that assassins and burglars don't require karma.

[Delstro]

I find it odd that apartment managers would let apartments stay unlocked. You don't want people climbing through windows and squating.

[Jdr]

I'm pretty sure if an Authority asked a doorman who dragged a table out of the exit lately, he/she would probably be told. Maybe you just need to bribe the right Robe more?

[Potaje]

The quality of a lock does contribute to the price of an apartment's rent, among other factors.

That being said, this is one of the perks of being a part of a clan.  You get room and board as a benefit, which means a place to store your things that is guaranteed to be safe from burglars.

Except for that filthy neck in the clan. Nothing is safe from him.

An important point I feel a lot of people miss about elves is their sense of clannish loyalty. Sure, culturally, all elves love to steal (i.e. get something for less than it is worth or nothing at all), and they vehemently distrust all who are not perceived as tribe. But an elf who has identified themselves as a member of a group would not consider stealing from their tribe-mates, even if they spend all day trying to figure out how to steal from everyone else.

As much as elves see the people outside their tribe as an indeterminate collection of potential threats, they view their tribe as a direct extension of themselves. Stealing from the tribe is like cutting off your own fingers.

Now, that's not to say that an elf wouldn't lie and connive his way into a group so he could rob them blind...that's part of the fun of the elf: Is he loyal, or is he lying?

With the racial commentary out of the way, on to burglars:
I have, on multiple occasions, had my apartment broken into. It's part of the risk of settling. I'd like to say that it was about 50/50 between reasonable thefts and a complete clean-out, but that's not the case. It seems like there are those who play their thieves for the sole purpose of racking up coin, despite a serious lack of buying potential for an unclanned rogue with 1000's of coins in the bank. Rather than making stealthy acquisitions, they take everything that's not nailed down, some even having the audacity to leave a single near-worthless item with an altered ldesc so they know you will realize you've been cleaned out.

Now, if "cleaned out" means I lost a couple sets of clothes or a bag of feathers and shards, then that's reasonable. But when your freelance merchant comes home to find that your tool chest, material trunk, wardrobe, bench, etc. are all missing, with the only thing left being a waterskin (which has been poisoned), you begin to wonder if there's a group of half-giants rolling the neighborhood.

To those stealth specialists who have a sense of self control and realism, kudos! And to the rest, don't you think the doorman is curious where you're dragging that trunk full of swag?

Alright I see a good point here, and this has been discussed for many many years now . I believe the staff also frown on thieves just cleaning out a place, however, that said, as a freelance merchant and having you tool chest taken and then everything else perhaps it should give you pause to consider that you have garnered the attention of a competitor, or  have been seen as the competition by a Greater Merchant House employee and so are not only crippled but taxed for your intrusion into their market.

With out knowing who the thief is, was, one can only speculate.


Oh and Who is to say door men can not be bribed either way,... tandomly generated description man say to the door man " Heres three small, hold the door for me while I move my sister out of her ex-mates place, he hits her alot when he's drunk, so if'n ya can forget ya saw anything, its appreciated" ..doorman says " Aye, door is stoppered open, I gotta get some lunch and take a piss, be gonna couple of hours, man has needs."

[Bilanthri]

Valid points, Potaje.

In the case of a GMH taxing a freelance merchant, I'd like to see some actual effort and intent. Smash some furniture, toss the room, take all the stuff that directly infringes on your market and make a mess of the rest. Judicious use of salvage and arrange can provide all sorts of fun RP.

[MeTekillot]

I've always thought it odd that assassins and burglars don't require karma.

Because not everyone has karma and these classes aren't potentially game breaking.

[Romy]

Hi, how about just make it impossible to steal if you're carrying something too heavy?