Threaten, fleshed out

[da mitey warrior]

I think Dauntless was the first person to think of this idea.

The idea is to let people RP out conflict scenes before the fighting breaks out.  People can point their weapons at their targets and demand money, trade insults etc.  The victim has incentive to stay, because either way he'd have to face a couple rounds of combat if he ran and he has a chance to talk himself out of the situation (or wait for the cavilry to arrive).  The aggressor has incentive to not start attacking because he can make demands or get money from the victim, or wait for more friends to show up.  Plus he knows that if the victim tries to flee he'll get a round or two of combat just like if he'd used the kill command.

To start threatening someone, the attacker types "threaten (victim)".

You cannot threaten people while in combat or while the victim is in combat.
You can threaten while hidden, but doing so makes you visable.
I'm not sure where to put the delay.
You cannot threaten more than one person at a time, but multiple aggressors can all threaten the same victim.
Threatening makes you wanted in cities.
Threatening would make aggro npcs attack you, and fleeing ones run away.

What the victim sees:

The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak points his sword at you!
You are now being thretened by the thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak

Third parties see:

The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak points his sword at the tall elf!
The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak starts threatening the tall elf.

The aggressors ldesc changes to:

The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak is here, pointing his sword at the tall elf

If the victim tries to use movement commands (n, s, e, w, u, d, leave, enter) he gets:

You cannot leave while being threatened.  Use "flee self" if you want to run for it.

If the victim does any of the following actions combat starts: flee, wield, draw, mount, cast, plus all the usual combat commands.  Combat would start instantly, so the aggressor would get a round in before the victim's action.

The tall elf moves and so the thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak attacks!
The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak slashes at the tall elf, but misses
The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak slashes the tall elf on the body, connecting hard
The tall elf draws a bone longknife

The victim would be able to remove, get and drop.  They could also follow the aggressor.  

Any sort of attack on the aggressor by a third part would break his concentration and let the victim escape.
The aggressor can stop threatening someone by using "threaten me"

This type of command would be a HUGE improvement on the "thick hooded figure arrives from the north, the thick hooded figure bludgeons you on the head, flee, flee, flee" type RP that is so common now.

[Rindan]

The only thing I would change would be to have it so that if a person who is doing the threatening is attacked, they attack the person they are threatening.  This would allow one to place a knife to someone and declare that that person is going to die if anyone tries to help.

[da mitey warrior]

Imagine a traveller on the north road.  Suddenly you see...

Someone points a crossbow at you!
You are now being threatened by a tall figure in a dark, hooded cloak.

Someone points a spear at you!
You are now being threatened by a figure in a dark, hooded cloak.

A thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak arrives from the north
A huge and obese figure in a dark, hooded cloak arrives from the north

A thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak points his battleaxe at you!
You are now being thretened by a thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak.

A huge and obese figure in a dark, hooded cloak points a greatsword at you!
You are now being threatened by a huge and obese figure in a dark, hooded cloak.

Snarling, the figure in a dark, hooded cloak says, in sirihish:
  "Don't move or you die!"

Snarling, the figure in a dark, hooded cloak says, in sirihish:
  "Don't try to be hero now.  hand over all yer sid and no one gets hurt."

Holding up your hands, you say, in sirihish:
  "I don't want no trouble."

Poking you with his spear, the figure in a dark, hooded cloak says, in sirihish:
  "Hand over your kank and your sids, NOW!"

You dismount from a yellow kank

You stop leading a yellow kank

You get a pile of obsidian coins from a leather backpack

You drop 2927 obsidian coins

The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak gets a pile of obsidian coins

The figure in a dark, hooded cloak says, in sirihish:
   "Let's go, boys, before his friends show up"

The figure in a dark hooded cloak starts leading a yellow kank

The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak stops threatening you
The thick figure in a dark, hooded cloak runs north.
The figure in a dark, hooded cloak stops threatening you
The figure in a dark, hooded cloak runs north
A yellow kank runs north
The tall figure in a dark, hooded cloak stops threatening you
The tall figure in a dark, hooded cloak runs north
The huge and obese figure in a dark, hooded cloak stops threatening you
The huge and obese figure in a dark, hooded cloak runs north

You think:
"I hate raiders"

(ok it's shakespear, but you get the idea)

[Delirium]

You've made me into a fan of the idea.

[Bestatte]

I like the idea too! I'd also like to see the threaten toggle automatically turn off if a person doing the threatening moves to another room.

So if I threaten Delirium with my vile evil magick steel broadsword of deth and destrukshun, and she gives me all her loot, I can just go "east" and the threaten would shut off by itself. Well, I'd thank her politely for her cooperation first and maybe smile or something.

[Carnage]

I'm not in favor of it because it gives MORE of a code-wise advantage against, well, the one being threatened. Outdoor room:

A large, enormous barren portion of barren plains [NESW]
The Krathi arrives from the east.

The magicker-slayer arrives from the west.

Magicker-slayer threatens Krathi, despite the distance between them, then proceeds to talk/do whatever.

The Krathi is left completely defenseless. The second he tries to get off a spell, the game kicks in and gives the PC the same advantage a NPC has: lightning-fast reflexes. Once again magickers are screwed in PVP combat.

'Threaten' isn't going to solve twinkish behavior. If anything it's going to increase it. PKer arrives from the west and then just as quickly threatens you without a single emote or taking into consideration room size. Frankly, I'm happy with the system the way it is. You want to play a raider/mugger? Take into consideration the risks.

[Anonymous]

'Threaten' isn't going to solve twinkish behavior. If anything it's going to increase it. PKer arrives from the west and then just as quickly threatens you without a single emote or taking into consideration room size.

I wouldn't like that either, but the same thing happens with the kill command as things stand now.  At least this threaten command would allow for some dialogue.

There is a problem of perspective that no command  will fix.  Outdoor rooms are huge and people who don't treat them like that annoy me because as the target of a raid, you'd probably notice that dark kank-mounted figure three leagues off some point before he got within kicking distance of you.

Frankly, I'm happy with the system the way it is. You want to play a raider/mugger? Take into consideration the risks.

I don't see how threaten mitigates any risks for the attacker.  I have't heard anyone suggest that you'd get a bonus in combat one way or the other.

This thread has turned me into a threaten fan.  It gives you a chance to talk your way out of a problem or to at least walk away free.  It could also be used for more situations than just a raid.  Interrogations, stuff like that.

[da mitey warrior]

How does using the threaten command better than using the kill command for the magicker slayer?  Combat would start the same either way.  And once it did the magicker could flee like normal.  He could even flee while being threatend, he'd just get attacked a couple times.

It actually gives a slight advantage to the victim since the attacker loses the element of surprise.

Magicker killer arives from the north

Magicker killer blugeons you on the head
Magicker killer stabs at you, but misses

flee
You run away!

Or

Magiker killer arrives from the north

Magiker killer points his warclub at you!
Magiker killer starts threatening you.

...RP maybe? ...

flee self
As you move, magiker killer attacks!
Magiker killer blugeons you on the head
Magiker killer stabs at you, but misses
You run away!

....


Same difference.  He'd probably just use the kill command, since he'd probably get 2 or 3 rounds in before the magiker could react.

[Ueda]

I'm not saying this is an advantage or not, but you would be able to contact people while being threatened. You could also look at the Raiders, while there doing this. Think of the possiblities, you try to stall as much as possible, giving all the information of what -Raider- looks like while your stalling him. Hence bringing more RP into the whole world.

[Rindan]

Carnage, how is what you describe any different from everyone walking in and typing kill?  Threaten isn't going to fix the problem you describe, but it sure as hell won't make it worse.  It will solve one problem and leave another problem untouched.  That sounds like a fair deal to me.  If anything, as a victim I would rather a person threaten me then kill me then simply kill.  If a person walks in and types kill I will be surprised OOCly and probably fumble to escape.  If I know an attack is likely to come I will probably be hovering my finger over the flee command.  Threaten is only going to make the life of a victim easier and the life of a raider less twinkish and open to more possibilities other then killing everyone you meet or giving them a near 100% chance of escape if they decide to run.

[ashjpd]

Could it even be a skill though?
If you have a higher flee skill then the threat wouldn't work maybe?
*shrug*

Or if you have a higher threaten skill then the other person would have a harder time trying to get away. Something of that sort...

You enter a room, then everyone threatens you and they all get attacks if you try to move away. At least with kill some may lag or somerthing or be slow on the kill switch. Its as if they automatically get to surround you, if they don't rp surrounding you then its just as bad as kill except now they attack you no matter what.

Why not just have approach code. You can't attack someone until you approach them. If you are sneaky, they won't get the so and so approaches you message. Or maybe have it so they have to approach you before they can threaten you. You can't threaten me from way over there. Psh. Sure you can wave your sword at me from across the tavern but that in no way means that you could hit me with it before I made it to the entrance as you fought through a throng of ppl etc. Make it have a delay and such. Make moving to another room have a before delay too .
So depending on speed, you may or may not get there in time to threaten kill the victim. If you get there before his prelag runs out, you start attacking him or you get close enough to threaten and attack him if he moves. SO being a stinking elf or riding an uber fast mount you'd catch em. Probably make it too easy to kill people or too easy to get away etc.
Anyway just an idea i like.

Kill newb>
He is too far away.
Threaten Newb>
You raise your sword at newb but he is awfully far away.
Approach newb>
You begin walking towards newb.
Newb begins running.
Newb runs north.

Got away cause you were walking and newb was running. Silly you.

[X-D]

Alright, I'm not sure this has been addressed, but I will be a fan if it is.

Once the attacker is threatening, he can turn it off by toggle or leaving, we know that, But, far as I can see, he still keeps his 'suprise' attack advantage, I do not think this should be.

In other words, once threatoning, if he decides to attack, he will still get his round or so advantage, same as if he would have done, L e/e/kill elf.

But at this point they should no longer get this full advantage, they should either have to break threaten then attack, or there should be an echo and a small delay, otherwise, you would be getting abuse, people who currently would flee the insta attackers would maybe hold off because of threaten, So and so threatens you with his sword, you start typing something out to save your life, So and so slashes you on the neck....

[ashjpd]

Once again what if it was a skill, but...
Only given to Templars or something like that. Then it would be used for good, but maybe a big abuse also.

[sacac]

thuggin' skill?

I'm all for it.. yes ..i am.

[Rindan]

But at this point they should no longer get this full advantage, they should either have to break threaten then attack, or there should be an echo and a small delay, otherwise, you would be getting abuse, people who currently would flee the insta attackers would maybe hold off because of threaten, So and so threatens you with his sword, you start typing something out to save your life, So and so slashes you on the neck....

I am afraid you have lost me.  Why would someone threaten, then kill?  Why not just type kill?  Code wise it would be the exact same thing, except that the guy who does threaten first then kill is going to give his victim to get a response (fleeing or drawing a weapon) ready.  If someone enters a room, types threaten, then types kill, it is no more twinkish then just typing kill.

As to other complaints, the thing people are missing out on is that threaten does nothing more then kill does.  If a dozen guys in a room could type threaten on one person without RPing surrounding that person, they could also all type kill or assist.  If a person could run up to another person and type threaten without explaining how they close the distance, then they could run up and type kill.  There is not a single instance where threaten offers any more of a coded advantage then kill.  On the contrary, threaten could be made to not always work and so be LESS effective then kill code wise, AND threaten is always less effective from the OOC stand point because a threatened person who is wise will have a response to any attack ready.

If someone types kill, they get a free round off, pure and simple.  Hell, they likely will get more if the victim is OOCly surprised.  If someone types threaten, then you get a chance to RP and potentially the attacker gets a free round off, but against a victim that is aware.  

The point people are missing I think is that threaten is NOT designed to keep people from running across the desert and attacking.  It doesn't fix that problem and it doesn't even try to.  Complaining that this is a problem is pointless.  It is a problem right now and threaten will have no effect upon this either for better or for worse.  That is a fundamental problem with combat and a much bigger fish to tackle.

Threaten solves a much more modest problem.  Threaten gives someone who is going to attack the ability to hold their blow just before hitting.  Instead of viciously slashing someone's neck, a person who is threatening can hold off the blow right before that point.  It is like leveling a pistol at someone's head and telling them if they move you are going to pull the trigger.  The only thing threaten is going to do is make it so that in the many situations where the attacker wants to code wise hold his blow from hitting so long as the defender does nothing aggressive, the code will now support this action.  It can only lead to more and better RP in my opinion.

[Krath]

Sacac Suckus..Im all for it too!

[Rindan]

You enter a room, then everyone threatens you and they all get attacks if you try to move away. At least with kill some may lag or somerthing or be slow on the kill switch. Its as if they automatically get to surround you, if they don't rp surrounding you then its just as bad as kill except now they attack you no matter what.

Let me address this one more directly.  Let's compare everyone in a room threatening to everyone in the room killing.  If everyone in the room kills, the first guy will attack, you then have the option of running or not running.  As others join the battle, you will always have the option of running or not running.  If you wait until everyone has joined the battle you will suffer each round of combat an entire round of combat attacks from each person.

If everyone in the room threatens, the first guy will threaten.  The longer you wait to run, the more people are going to threaten you.  If you were to run instantly the second the first guy was to threaten you, you would take one round of free attacks – just like in if someone was to type kill at you.  If you choose to not to flee, then you are letting yourself be surrounded.  That is not to say that this still can't be done in a twinkish way, but it is no more twinkish then using kill.  If you respond to threaten exactly the same way as you respond to kill, you will take exactly the same number of free attacks.  

Actually, if you want to get technical, if you respond to threaten the same way you respond to kill, and it takes you a couple of seconds to register the threat and respond, then kill will actually end up in MORE attacks landing while you are unprepared.  

Let's say it takes four seconds four seconds for you to respond to a threaten or kill.  Let's also say that each second a new person threatens or kills at you, and every two seconds there is a combat round.  In the case of threaten, after four seconds you will take attacks from four people.  In the case of kill, you will take six attacks; two from the first two people to attack and one from the last two people to attack.  It seems pretty clear to me that threaten is far more merciful then kill is.  Threaten also has the added bonus of giving you a chance to talk your way out of the mess you are in, kill does not.

[Carnage]

It gives the attacker a bonus because the attacker doesn't need that second or two to type kill soandso. They just get an insta-attack in. That's how you mitigate away danger from the attacker. When that warrior draws out his swords you get a free attack beforehand. Drawing out your weapons can be a lightning-quick thing. The Japanese had it refined into a series of techniques on its own. Iai or Iaido was it called? Drawing your blade and attacking/killing your opponent with one hard slash.

When you're in the middle of a sentence while talking to someone, as it is in game, and then you suddenly want to attack them, you have two options: Add -- to the end to show being cut off or delete all the text, then typing kill soandso. This second is easily an accurate representation of the time it takes to attack and kill. Threaten takes this away and brings Joe Schmoe Warrior one step closer to being insta-action gith NPC. Whether you want to admit it or not, threaten has the effect of paralyzing someone and letting you attack them at your discretion.

How can you bring dialogue into these things? Well, most muggers/bandits work in groups. Have one of your men grab and subdue the people and hold them in place. If they try and get away or do then go right ahead and try to kill them.

[Bestatte]

Carnage wrote: Whether you want to admit it or not, threaten has the effect of paralyzing someone and letting you attack them at your discretion.

I say:

[kill PC] already lets you attack someone at your discretion. Hell, you don't even need discretion for that. What threaten does, is give the roleplayed conflict the opportunity to pause, and end without violence of any kind. It's a slim chance, granted, but it is an opportunity that currently doesn't exist code-wise.

If I'm a raider and I got my hood up and my target hasn't looked at me yet to see my main description, I would want to give him a chance to give me his stuff and run away. A chance. Not a guarantee. But if I'm a raider and just say "Give me your loot!" The victim (if he has ANY brains in his head) is gonna high-tail it the hell out of there, game over, I lose.

With threaten, I just put him in a position where he can't just walk away without risk - but he -can- roleplay AND use the code to make the decision on whether or not he wants to give me the loot without my clubbing him over the head, or attempting to flee and risk getting clubbed anyway.

Currently you have no choice but to either use the code, OR rely strictly on trusting the other guy to RP with you. You currently can't do both at the same time. Threaten allows you to do both at the same time, because it forces both parties to pause before weapons start swinging.

[Callisto]

I don't like it.

I don't like the idea that someone could code-wise use it as a quick route to some easy damage right off the bat. Someone walks in from the south, you click off threaten <jerk> before the movement lag wears off and one way or the other the threatening party is given an almost 100% chance of scoring some huge damage.

You could just walk into a tavern and threaten a Templar, so as soon as someone tries to assist him, you go into combat against him. Seems like a good way for an above average warrior to work around those NPC subdue machines Templars keep around in case abuse levels drop a little too low.

What happens when a pack of raiders decide to all threaten random people passing on the road? Nine of ten people enter the next movement command before the last move delay wears off after a quick scan of the room, pausing every few rooms to drop an emote or look in directions. Right there... I just found your first exploit and the code isn't even in place yet, you get your first attacks in before their entered command comes through, if the victim complains, you could just back it up with "Well if you didn't spam walk, you wouldn't have died!" and it now you have to waste an Imms time to get it resolved.

The old subdue code was ideal for hostage taking and raiding because you could place a weapon to said person throat and the second said person resisted, you could nail them for some heavy damage. However, the code was changed due to long-running abuse... I'd imagine this would end up much the same way.

We don't need new code to force people to role-play, because coded measures based on that intent will never fail to end up being more easily abused then the problem they were created to solve.

We have the subdue command, we have the kill command, we have the emote command. Use them.

[Anonymous]

It gives the attacker a bonus because the attacker doesn't need that second or two to type kill soandso.

Right, because typing 'threaten soandso' is so much faster and easier to type.

[Lazloth]

I can go either way here.  Don't see a real need for it but might be fun.

[X-D]

I really can't believe that Rindan cannot see all the possible abuse in threaten as stated so far.

Sure, one can walk in and just attack, but the victem may have already typed in flee self and could even beat the attacker to the punch.

With threaten, that becomes a sentence to at least a heavy wounding, unless the delay was before, Which might be alright, at least it would simulate distance some.

Over all, I think nothing would be solved and if anything more problems created, So, a minimal or even undesirable return for some probly heavy coding. I voted no on the poll and am gonna stick too it.

And come now CRW, Like you could not alias or macro threaten, hell, you could alias kill to threaten, the time it takes to type is nul and it is mildly silly to have even brought it up.

[Rindan]

It gives the attacker a bonus because the attacker doesn't need that second or two to type kill soandso. They just get an insta-attack in.

The point you are missing is that they could simply type kill.  That takes just as long to type as threaten.  Simply typing kill will result in an 'insta-attack' where the poor bastard does not get to draw weapon, run, or whatever it is they would normally do.  All the disadvantages that can be applied to threaten are also applied to kill.  Every argument used against the threaten command can be used against the kill command.  There is NO bonus other then the normal bonus you get when you attack someone who isn't ready.  Alls threaten is, is attacking like normal, but stopping at the point right before attacking, and making it clear that if the person tries to do anything you will simply carry through with the attack you have already started.  Hell, if you throw in a skill/stat check the victim might actually be able to draw a sword or flee in a situation where a simple kill would have given neither option until after combat had started and it was too late.

I don't like it.

I don't like the idea that someone could code-wise use it as a quick route to some easy damage right off the bat. Someone walks in from the south, you click off threaten <jerk> before the movement lag wears off and one way or the other the threatening party is given an almost 100% chance of scoring some huge damage.

How is this any different from typing kill at someone before the movement lag wears off?  That also gives you a 100% chance of landing the first few hits.  Neither instance gives a 100% chance of scoring damage though.  Threaten just causes the kill command to trigger before they do any hostile action.  This means that if you threaten a fully armed warrior with his weapons out, your threat is all but meaningless.  Great, you get the first attack as if you had typed kill.  So what?  He has his defenses fully prepared and will soundly beat them off and return his own assault.  Threatening an armed and prepared person would do nothing.  Threaten is no different from kill, except that the 'kill' command won't go through until you either force it through, or the person does something aggressive or tries to flee.

[You could just walk into a tavern and threaten a Templar, so as soon as someone tries to assist him, you go into combat against him. Seems like a good way for an above average warrior to work around those NPC subdue machines Templars keep around in case abuse levels drop a little too low.

You could walk into a tavern and threaten a Templar.  That would be stupid as his guards would simply guard threat like they would guard any attack.  If threat is treated just like a kill command for the purposes of guarding this problem is solved.  You could threaten a templar, but you will need to got through his guards and face the fact that they are going to beat the life out of you even if you do get through.  Again, it would work no different from the kill command, and when used against a guarded person would for all intensive purposes work exactly like the kill command because the guards would respond to it like it was a kill command.

What happens when a pack of raiders decide to all threaten random people passing on the road? Nine of ten people enter the next movement command before the last move delay wears off after a quick scan of the room, pausing every few rooms to drop an emote or look in directions. Right there... I just found your first exploit and the code isn't even in place yet, you get your first attacks in before their entered command comes through, if the victim complains, you could just back it up with "Well if you didn't spam walk, you wouldn't have died!" and it now you have to waste an Imms time to get it resolved.

Two points.  First, let's say it works exactly as you describe.  How would this be any different then typing kill at people as they arrive?  Threaten does not give any magical bonus to attacking, it acts EXACTLY like the kill command, except that instead of instantly killing, it is triggered.  The 'bonus' you would get to attacking this way would be exactly the same bonus as if you had used the kill command.

We don't need new code to force people to role-play, because coded measures based on that intent will never fail to end up being more easily abused then the problem they were created to solve.

We have the subdue command, we have the kill command, we have the emote command. Use them.

We have a kill command, we have a subdue command, and both of those commands will initiate combat and you can expect the RP from that point on to be whatever hastily typed emotes one can squeeze out, if any.  Threaten is simply a pause before combat.  It is the ability to basically declare that you are going to type kill if the person does anything hostile.  It does not and can not have any forms of abuse that kill does not already have because threaten IS the kill command, only delayed.