Masks/Facewraps

[Kismetic]

Just be careful assuming, if you do.  A Templar character can be annoyed, but the player may appreciate your roleplay.

I don't think anyone is going to shame you for roleplaying the right way.  And as I said, I see this a great deal more often than the head to asscrack to toe descriptions that are being alluded, here.  Frankly, this is either a problem in a specific locale, or vastly blown up because a handful of PCs over the last year or so got a raw deal.

[Rahmi]

The thing that bothers me about this is that there ARE mdesc covering masks in the game.

citation needed

They got changed ages ago.

Personally saw it on a Kuraci(pretty sure) member about 3-4 months ago. Don't have logs though. It didn't make the mdesc go away so much as it replaced it with a description of the mask. The mask had the Kuraci(definitely some clan) insignia on it so it was clearly a clan item.

I have definitely seen this too.

Okay, I'll bite.  Please put in a request with the sdesc of the offending item.  I'll track it down.

You are correct, there was a Kuraci mask that had slipped through the cracks, but this was spotted earlier in the year
and fixed.

[Creslin]

I think they should hide the mdesc but all the articles of armor or clothing should still be visible. I don't know if people have suggested it completely masking you or what. But I find hiding the mdesc to be acceptable and realistic.

I had an idea for a compromised solution, not sure if anyone has suggested this before so sorry if I'm repeating an already suggested idea... 

My optimal solution would be for characters to have both regular mdescs and their concealed mdescs. The regular mdesc would be replaced by the concealed mdesc when the character wore a mask/facewrap + a cloak with a raised hood, and would only describe physical characteristics visible in that garb.

I think straight up mdesc removal is too unrealistic and abusable.

I agree which is why I have an idea that is somewhat similar to what you suggested that's in the middle ground.

Split the MDESC up into two MSDESC. 1 for Face and/or Head. 1 for Everything Else (Rest of Body)

Wearing a mask conceals Face/Head MDESC but nothing else.

However, considering how major of a change this would be for something this insignificant, I highly doubt it will ever be implemented.

[Lizzie]

I think they should hide the mdesc but all the articles of armor or clothing should still be visible. I don't know if people have suggested it completely masking you or what. But I find hiding the mdesc to be acceptable and realistic.

I had an idea for a compromised solution, not sure if anyone has suggested this before so sorry if I'm repeating an already suggested idea... 

My optimal solution would be for characters to have both regular mdescs and their concealed mdescs. The regular mdesc would be replaced by the concealed mdesc when the character wore a mask/facewrap + a cloak with a raised hood, and would only describe physical characteristics visible in that garb.

I think straight up mdesc removal is too unrealistic and abusable.

I agree which is why I have an idea that is somewhat similar to what you suggested that's in the middle ground.

Split the MDESC up into two MSDESC. 1 for Face and/or Head. 1 for Everything Else (Rest of Body)

Wearing a mask conceals Face/Head MDESC but nothing else.

However, considering how major of a change this would be for something this insignificant, I highly doubt it will ever be implemented.

That wouild be pretty limiting to the flow of text. You wouldn't ever see "brown hair covers his body, from head to toe..." or "he is completely hairless" because that is -inclusive- and you're asking for exclusivity.

The only "solution" that doesn't do that, would be to have two distinctly different descriptions: one for facial coverings, and one for unobscured faces.
Unfortunately, the staff can't even keep up with the number of typos, grammatical errors, and "wrong word" errors in the existing format of a single mdesc; I'd rather not see them have to wade through two for each character.

[valeria]

Or tag-based descriptions, like allowing people to tag what in their description is their face or head.  Though that wouldn't solve the approval-checking problem.

[Lizzie]

Or tag-based descriptions, like allowing people to tag what in their description is their face or head.  Though that wouldn't solve the approval-checking problem.

That still doesn't eliminate or address the problem of free-flowing text. It just disconnects players from their characters even further. Yes, it's an "immersion" issue. A clunky off-the-top-of-my-head example that I'm making up here:

the willowy, red-furred elf

This male has narrow, lanky features from pointed ears to long gangly legs. His face, regularly exposed to the burning rays of Suk-Krath, has been baked to a near-black hue while the rest of his body is a deep bronze. Most remarkable are the patches of short, wooly red hair that covers his skin, only slightly longer at the top of his scalp.

With your suggestion, it'd read like this:

This male has narrow, lanky features from [redacted] to long gangly legs. His [redacted], regularly exposed to the burning rays of Suk-Krath, has been baked to a near-black hue while the rest of his body is a deep bronze. Most remarkable are the patches of short, wooly red hair that covers his skin, only slightly longer at the top of [redacted.]

And of course - since he has his hood up and his face covered, we know to replace [redacted] with head, face, and scalp, respectively.

At worse - it'd look more like this:

This male has narrow, lanky features...legs. His...rest of his body is a deep bronze. Most remarkable ... covers his skin.

Which, as you can see, is not especially readable, nor enjoyable to read. If you were to add any details at all, it'd give away what his face/head/scalp looked like. And so you wouldn't be able to write that description -at all- or you'd have to accept that it'd look really really stupid when you tagged the key facial features when you put up your hood/covered your face to make sure no one could see it.

[Yam]

I wouldn't want anything that compromised the literary freedom of the mdesc.

[Cerelum]

At the end of the day nothing is impossible.  All you need is a coder who wants to do it and a way to satisfy both sides of the playing field.

The people who want to be able to have absolute anonymity.
AND
The people who want to keep it the way it is.

This is a text based game, so anything short of making use of my graphics card, they could do with enough desire to do it.

I don't understand why some people are saying, you can't do it because of the mdesc and how it's covering up technically your whole description for a thing that covers your face/head.

You can, you could do any of the things people have suggested, give it a description of it's own.  Have characters write two descriptions of their characters, one like this:

Normal:
My Character is a big hairy ape who has muscles ontop of muscles.
Masked:
%masked's face is obscured but from looking at the rest of his body you would see he's very muscular, also he is extremely hairy.

And yes, this is a gross over simplification, and people would have to do a little bit of work to morph their description to a masked variable, but no more then how some of you emote two lines of text in a few moments.

[Maso]

Not even absolute anonymity, just the potential for successful anonymity in a vaguely realistic fashion.

[Kismetic]

Unless you're talking about a customizable description, similar to tdesc, then you're wasting coder time.  What it boils down to is that people will learn your "secondary desc" and 'contact mask.goudra,' and dun dun dun -- you're busted.

Have a little faith in other players.  In lieu of that ...  File player complaints.

[Jingo]

The hide and sneak skills do the trick imho.

[jhunter]

The hide and sneak skills do the trick imho.

They do. The problem is then you have to act out of character in a way and only focus on npcs until you have everything else maxxed to prevent other players from abusing the fact that they get too much information unrealistically. Then everyone bitches because when they start getting hit, it's from fully mastered thieves, etc and they can't do -anything- about them except get property raped.

[Eurynomos]

At the end of the day nothing is impossible.  All you need is a coder who wants to do it and a way to satisfy both sides of the playing field.

The people who want to be able to have absolute anonymity.
AND
The people who want to keep it the way it is.

This is a text based game, so anything short of making use of my graphics card, they could do with enough desire to do it.

I don't understand why some people are saying, you can't do it because of the mdesc and how it's covering up technically your whole description for a thing that covers your face/head.

You can, you could do any of the things people have suggested, give it a description of it's own.  Have characters write two descriptions of their characters, one like this:

Normal:
My Character is a big hairy ape who has muscles ontop of muscles.
Masked:
%masked's face is obscured but from looking at the rest of his body you would see he's very muscular, also he is extremely hairy.

And yes, this is a gross over simplification, and people would have to do a little bit of work to morph their description to a masked variable, but no more then how some of you emote two lines of text in a few moments.

Pretty sure the people coding for Armageddon have bigger things to tackle. No, it is not a perfect system. Yes, our Playerbase seems to get along fine all considering. The simplest solution is -- If you think someone has unrealistically identified your character, using discreet portions of your mdesc that are hidden by your equipment list, file a player complaint. We'll at least look things over, and determine if your full description was worthy of noting entirely. But it honestly turns into nitpicking at that point, and a general waste of time for volunteer Staff, don't you think? As a player, I never had problems playing these sorts of things off. I trust you guys as mature equals, and believe you can determine what or what not is noticed when looking at a masked, hooded figure, without needing hard code to determine it for you.

[Maso]

I would say that the player base is 'fine' because they simply avoid doing anything which would require real anonymity for their success or survival, because they know it isn't possible.

That's a real shame, as anonymity opens up a plethora of opportunities and potential storylines. Think about the number of famous characters that rely entirely on dual identities (pretty much all superheroes and villains for a start!).

Yes, you could do it anyway and hope that other players will respect the mask...but if they don't, and your whole plot hinges off it, then by the time a player complaint is filed and looked at (by volunteer staff who have better things to do) - it's way too late. Things will have gone too far down an IC route for them ever to be changed.

But the offending player will know for next time.

But next time it will be a different offending player.

It's just a darn shame.

[Synthesis]

I would say that the player base is 'fine' because they simply avoid doing anything which would require real anonymity for their success or survival, because they know it isn't possible.

That's a real shame, as anonymity opens up a plethora of opportunities and potential storylines. Think about the number of famous characters that rely entirely on dual identities (pretty much all superheroes and villains for a start!).

Yes, you could do it anyway and hope that other players will respect the mask...but if they don't, and your whole plot hinges off it, then by the time a player complaint is filed and looked at (by volunteer staff who have better things to do) - it's way too late. Things will have gone too far down an IC route for them ever to be changed.

But the offending player will know for next time.

But next time it will be a different offending player.

It's just a darn shame.

Not possible without magick, anyway.  But seriously, be careful what you wish for with the whole anonymity thing.  There might be some potential for awesome, but there's also a vast sea of untapped griefing.

[Cerelum]

I would say that the player base is 'fine' because they simply avoid doing anything which would require real anonymity for their success or survival, because they know it isn't possible.

That's a real shame, as anonymity opens up a plethora of opportunities and potential storylines. Think about the number of famous characters that rely entirely on dual identities (pretty much all superheroes and villains for a start!).

Yes, you could do it anyway and hope that other players will respect the mask...but if they don't, and your whole plot hinges off it, then by the time a player complaint is filed and looked at (by volunteer staff who have better things to do) - it's way too late. Things will have gone too far down an IC route for them ever to be changed.

But the offending player will know for next time.

But next time it will be a different offending player.

It's just a darn shame.

Agreed, they aren't going to bring you back to life after the Templar has roleplayed your death for half an hour and codedly killed you because Twink A decided to ignore the fact they couldn't see your facial features and reported you, causing you to get caught.

So the player gets a slap on the wrist and you get to start over on another player.

[Yam]

Anonymity is really hard in real life. Superheroes aren't a good comparison. Mdesc erasing masks aren't (and proved to not be) a good idea.

[Case]

I'm against it because it seems like they're only used to protect a PC while they do something that others don't want them to do, so they don't have to cry or lose their PC when people stop them from doing said things.

Get better at doing it or get better friends.

[valeria]

Or tag-based descriptions, like allowing people to tag what in their description is their face or head.  Though that wouldn't solve the approval-checking problem.

That still doesn't eliminate or address the problem of free-flowing text. It just disconnects players from their characters even further. Yes, it's an "immersion" issue. A clunky off-the-top-of-my-head example that I'm making up here: ...

Sorry it took me a while to respond, I was out of town.

Anyway, to clarify, your example isn't how it works on muds with tags.  It works more like this (actual description of past character):

This swarthy young woman has skin of such a deep chocolate brown that it almost looks black, especially in low light.  Because of this, the pale lines of the scars on her skin stand out sharply<arms>, and it's obvious she has a good share of them on the backs of her arms</arms>.  She is tall and rangy, and has a lithely-muscled athletic cast to her build rather than a bulky one.  <head>Her bouncy black ringlets have been cut short back from her face, but trail a little down the back of her neck, almost but not quite long enough to brush against her shoulders.  </head><eyes>Predictably, her eyes are also dark, so that her deep brown irises barely stand out from the pupils.  They are large and deeply set under her broad brow.  </eyes><face>She also has a strong jaw and chin, and full lips, giving a masculine cast to her face.</face>

You'd only have to get rid of 'predictably' to make it work on any reading.  You tag sentences rather than words.  Just looking through my past files, most people keep their sentences organized to a singe topic, like build, face, hair, etc, already.  However, because it would require additions to some really basic coding infrastructure, it probably wouldn't be very easy to add.

Under a tags system, you can have the sentences about someone's height, build, skin tone, etc stay in while removing specifics about head, face, and hair, and without really restricting how a person can set up their character.  You provide a list of available tags people can fill in, if they want, when appropriate.  If people don't have eye descriptions, they just don't use that tag.  If a person didn't want to use tags, the whole description would just display all the time.

[Lizzie]

Again though, that would -only- work if you restrict and limit character features. You wouldn't be able to have a character with hair longer than neck-length because then - is the hair part of the shoulders tag, or the head tag? Or the back tag..if it's not part of the back tag, then clearly their hair -cannot- grow down to their waist; that would violate the function of the head tag. They can't compare one part of their body to the other part, because -that- would violate the function of the individual tags. You can't tell anyone that your hands and forearms are significantly darker than your face, in the same sentence, because "face" is not "arms." You basically prohibit comparatives entirely.

You are, again, limiting text rather than encouraging it. You're telling everyone they -must- write in a certain way, and that they -cannot- write any other way. You're sticking them with a template. Templates are limited and awkward and difficult for many people to adhere to.

[valeria]

Again though, that would -only- work if you restrict and limit character features. You wouldn't be able to have a character with hair longer than neck-length because then - is the hair part of the shoulders tag, or the head tag? Or the back tag..if it's not part of the back tag, then clearly their hair -cannot- grow down to their waist; that would violate the function of the head tag. They can't compare one part of their body to the other part, because -that- would violate the function of the individual tags. You can't tell anyone that your hands and forearms are significantly darker than your face, in the same sentence, because "face" is not "arms." You basically prohibit comparatives entirely.

You are, again, limiting text rather than encouraging it. You're telling everyone they -must- write in a certain way, and that they -cannot- write any other way. You're sticking them with a template. Templates are limited and awkward and difficult for many people to adhere to.

Or using both tags, so that if it was head that was covered or hair that was covered, they would both be covered.  And add the back tag in when you're describing length.  Or just keep the length in a tdesc if you're really worried about it.  Or putting the length-appropriate tags at the end of the sentence, with the length in an independent clause, so it's only covered when waist/etc is covered (tag before comma, end tag before period).  It makes it read as a sentence.  Examples can be provided in a helpfile.

[Armaddict]

Again though, that would -only- work if you restrict and limit character features. You wouldn't be able to have a character with hair longer than neck-length because then - is the hair part of the shoulders tag, or the head tag? Or the back tag..if it's not part of the back tag, then clearly their hair -cannot- grow down to their waist; that would violate the function of the head tag. They can't compare one part of their body to the other part, because -that- would violate the function of the individual tags. You can't tell anyone that your hands and forearms are significantly darker than your face, in the same sentence, because "face" is not "arms." You basically prohibit comparatives entirely.

You are, again, limiting text rather than encouraging it. You're telling everyone they -must- write in a certain way, and that they -cannot- write any other way. You're sticking them with a template. Templates are limited and awkward and difficult for many people to adhere to.

I'd agree that this was a problem if it wasn't already completely neglected.  Hooded figures with full helms on still accurately described to the finest detail, making this nitpicking a moot point.

[Qzzrbl]

Anonymity is really hard in real life. Superheroes aren't a good comparison.

Tell that to all the to RL criminals that were on camera but managed to get away because they tied a shirt about their face.

[Booya]

Anonymity is really hard in real life. Superheroes aren't a good comparison.

Tell that to all the to RL criminals that were on camera but managed to get away because they tied a shirt about their face.

Mmmhmm

[catchall]

I'm against it because it seems like they're only used to protect a PC while they do something that others don't want them to do, so they don't have to cry or lose their PC when people stop them from doing said things.

Get better at doing it or get better friends.

The hidden assumption of your argument (and a hidden assumption that seems to linger beneath the surface of most discussions of PC crime) seems to be that players of criminal PCs are "up to no good" and should therefore be given minimal code support, because they're being bad (thus the focus on "something that others don't want them to do").  A criminal PC is not necessarily the same as a griefer.  It is a merely role in the game like any other.  I might as well say: 

The only reason people use shields is to protect a PC while fighting something/someone that should rightfully be hitting them, so they don't have to cry or lose their PC when that something/someone hits them.

Get better at your weapon skill or get better friends.

But since shields can't get their grubby fingers on PC's phat l00t, you never see this kind of dismissive snark directed toward that kind of feature.  Or hey, if you wouldn't be able to handle masked PCs causing you trouble, maybe you should get better friends.  In short, I find this sort of argument from snark very unconvincing.

A mask is a stupidly simple and accessible tool, simpler than a shield, and has been used by ne'er-do-wells to great effect for a very long time.  I'm not convinced the implementational problems discussed can be practically and easily surmounted, but that's not the same thing at all as saying identity concealment is a bad idea for the game.  Specially tagged mdescs would have to be optional.  There's no way around this.  Noobs have enough to worry about without having to learn a markup language just to write a desc.  It's also likely to be an approval nightmare.  I am a strong advocate of KISS and think that the "study" implementation mentioned earlier is probably the most elegant. 

Something that no one else has mentioned that i also think is important -- there should be serious combat, perception and stealth penalties for wearing concealing masks.  I'd even go a step further and suggest that people wearing concealment masks could be unprotected by crim code.  People won't be crimflagged for attacking them, since they're clearly up to no good.  (This would get complicated if, say, nobles started wearing masquerade ball outfits or whatever, but that's a pretty special case, and could be handled by making non-sneaky masks non-concealing.)  Of course concealing masks should not allow immunity from new or existing crimflags.

If you combine that with a simple, no-fail way to see through the ruse, like "study," and we'll have masks that are so nerfed into uselessness that abuse potential is virtually nil, but it will at least offer some more code support for a style of roleplay that is undersupported currently.  But hey, I'll take what I can get.  Hell, I'm happy that masks even cover *sdescs*, because even that is a form of code support for concealment roleplay.