Murder. Corruption. Betrayal.

More of a tagline than a motto but that's beside the point. Where has this ideal gotten us? A toxic playerbase, a terrible reputation amongst the greater RP community, unsustainable staff turnover, and a dying MUD.

When you make your world the worst kind of place, is it really any wonder that you're going to attract the worst kind of people to play in it? I don't think so.

To be clear, I don't mind someone creating a raider and going on to kill a bunch of people. What I do mind is someone accepting a sponsored role and going on to kill a bunch of people. Though my experience playing a templar has shown me that in that particular role you can't really avoid killing a bunch of people - there's always another fool that insists on throwing themselves on your blade even when you weren't initially planning to kill them.

I agree with the changes in PK guidelines, but I think we need to go farther and change our entire community from a murder culture to one that embraces alternate punishments.

If reviewing PK logs is too cumbersome then it is because staff lack the correct tools to accomplish such a task efficiently. From my experience on APC I believe this to be the case.

Quote from: Dresan on Today at 12:44:48 AMIf the murderer can give the victim a good scene; that's great, please send them kudos. However, it is unreasonable to always expect a well RPed scene or understand the reason why you died or even fully agree with that reason if you learned it. I do believe that if people are forced to justify themselves to staff then the reason for their death will be a bit more obvious and perhaps be even better RP to the victim whenever possible.

I feel like it's a little far-fetched to say that it's unreasonable to expect a decently RP'd scene in a scene where you're dying. Without even talking about how many hours you lose when you die, Armageddon is an RPI, which stands for either Roleplay Intensive or Roleplay Enforced, I've heard both uses of it. Roleplay to a high standard should always be expected. This isn't me saying that you should get up in-arms about bad RP, but to say it's unreasonable to expect good RP from an RPI is a little bewildering to me.

Quote from: Dresan on Today at 12:44:48 AMFor the record, someone disrespecting a templar is grounds for a gory death, and its the fault the game and the entire community if this is not perfectly clear upon character creation.

Is it justified? Yes. Is it the only option? No. Is it the first option? Debatable.
Honestly any Templar player who goes straight to death penalties to solve issues is just going to shoot themselves in the foot. Nobody is going to want to interact or be around a kill-happy templar. As Dumbstruck said; It should be expected that people avoid sociopathic, murderous characters, both from an ooc and ic perspective.

That aside, I think calling anything which is critiquing PKs and putting on a spotlight on it 'carebear-y' is degenerate in the sense that it does nothing for the conversation. It just feels like a completely unnecessary insult to people who don't feel the same as you. Yes the tagline of Armageddon is 'Murder, Corruption, Betrayal', but Murder is one of three words, if the only way to make a game harsh and unforgiving to you is to send people a mantis head, then I don't know what to tell you.

The motto for this game is still: Murder. Corruption. Betrayal.

Conflict should be encouraged, and murder should still be expected. And there are plenty of justifiable reasons to kill someone.

If the murderer can give the victim a good scene; that's great, please send them kudos. However, it is unreasonable to always expect a well RPed scene or understand the reason why you died or even fully agree with that reason if you learned it. I do believe that if people are forced to justify themselves to staff then the reason for their death will be a bit more obvious and perhaps be even better RP to the victim whenever possible. After all, there is a lame reason why assassinating nobles and templars is rare in this game, despite how easily justifiable those deaths could be.

This game  at times tends to overcompensate with some of its issues and that might be the case here but seeing the same vulnerable players continuously get targeted because they are easy marks rather than any good IC reason has  been so revolting that I don't care about the extreme swing as much with this issue.

That said, this isn't Carebear Mush, everyone who plays this game should still expect to die at some point but it feels a bit like some people are trying to purely limit 'PK', even if it makes no sense to spare someone.  Instead, the community should try to improve its storytelling skills and further encourage the types of glorious conflict that better promote justifiable murder between two individuals. 

For the record, someone disrespecting a templar is grounds for a gory death, and its the fault the game and the entire community if this is not perfectly clear upon character creation.

Quote from: Dresan on May 23, 2024, 10:32:55 PMNo amount of RPee makes this any better. Its not harsh or gritty to keep punching down with murder while playing powerful classes or roles, its lame from both RP and gameplay stand point.

Actually, that's absolutely harsh (gritty is an entirely other matter not really related to this subject imo).

Which is why I think that as a community we should try to find a better balance of harshness and the other end of the spectrum. Stories about hope, triumph, and community can indeed be more interesting than 'The land of grimness where everything is awful 24/7 and everyone dies all the time for stupid reasons.' I have said too much and will probably be called a carebear now. 

I don't fully disagree. While I am indifferent to the carebear comment, the thing about punching down when you instagank minions and noncombat types sucks and is punching down. It's real cool and all that Lord Fartypants has a mortal enemy in Lord Templar Medallionface. But if it basically consists of snipping at each other like petty frivolous fops and nuking each others minions, that's just a really good way for neither party to wind up with minions because people don't like being nuked. Unless they have some special mental or emotional stuff going on that makes them an exception, most people will avoid getting invested in that after seeing 2-3 rounds of that, but by that it'll be too late for the half a dozen people who's time was wasted to not even defeat but merely /inconvenience/ someone else that their character is too weak to target personally. Being fallout damage sucks, and it sucks worse when it's <normal screen> <your prompt> <mantis head> with nothing in between.

Let's have the people talk for themselves. They might as well make clear what they mean if we're gonna disagree with them.

Quote from: Kavrick on May 23, 2024, 10:41:53 PM

Quote from: Dresan on May 23, 2024, 10:32:55 PMWhile some people here maybe taking it too far into carebear land.

I do genuinely want to ask, what do you consider 'carebear land'?

Lately? Any change that isn't in line with someone's idea of how to be "harsh".

Non-killing is "carebear". For a time, Tuluk was considered "Carebear" because the people who played there weren't "dirt and sand Allanakis with blood on their face" they were "carebear pussies with facepaints and flowers".

Quote from: Dresan on May 23, 2024, 10:32:55 PMWhile some people here maybe taking it too far into carebear land.

I do genuinely want to ask, what do you consider 'carebear land'?

While some people here maybe taking it too far into carebear land. I have zero tolerance for the people that have been targetting non-combat and newbie characters over the years because they are easy kills with the pettiest of IC reasons.

No amount of RPee makes this any better. Its not harsh or gritty to keep punching down with murder while playing powerful classes or roles, its lame from both RP and gameplay stand point.

You want to murder someone even with little rp, go for it, the game still encourages instant murder but if asking for reasonable justification for your character's actions is too 'hard' then yes, you need re-evalate your character or just your damn self.

Pychopathic behavior was not supposed to be tolerated even when i started playing decades ago, its just that finally the entire community (yes we are all guilty) is coming around to finally enforcing it.