Punishing RP

[Clumsy Thief]

Suppose that in an effort to create some interesting RP, a thief emotes failing a steal attempt on a templar without ever using the steal command.

Now while it is completely IC for the templar to have him killed, do you think it's bad form OOCly to punish the player for attempting to spice up the game when he could have easily maimed, tortured, or enslaved the thief and enriched the RP of everyone involved.

Before anyone tells me to email the mud, I'd like to point out that this isn't a complaint and any templar in that position has every right to kill the offending thief.

I just want to know everyone's opinion on if you think he made the right OOC choice.

[Seeker]

I think that the clumsy thief in question, in trying to enliven the game, deserves a big thumbs-up.

But... if that thief wanted the entire scene to go to his own satisfaction, he would have been better served to fail the commandless steal on a vNPC or an NPC templar.  That way, he could have finished the scene as he originally envisioned it, and much hilarity might have ensued.

Asking the readers of the GDB to judge the role-play of any other player (primarily because he didn't play the script out that someone else had created for him in their own head), based on a vague, second-hand accounting is generally nonproductive.

Kudos for the ballsy-ness, though.

Seeker

[Ghost]

I am not sure if I got it.  But if you are emoting a failed steal attempt on a templar, you better get ready for some nasty stuff.  Because you have to get close to the templar in order to steal something.  Assuming your emote would indicate how close you come to the templar, and that you even touched him, I would expect the templar to remove your offending arm so that you would not repeat that mistake again.

Templars, are to be scared of.  Your character would know well to keep his distance from one.

[Rindan]

Honestly, I think most templars would just flat out kill you.  If they don't instantly kill you and put your head on public display, it is likely because they first wanted to torture your, THEN put your head on public display.

There are two ways to bend the game.  You can either bend it a little in terms of the OOC things you control, and how your character behaves ICly.  The OOC things you can control is things like emoting a failed steal, ordering your guards to grab someone and have them emote missing, or choosing to ignore things that you as a player see, but decide that your character missed.  You can also change how your character behaves IC, like having a templar decide to let a victim live that RPed well.

For me personally, I am more then happy to bend a little for someone who is going the extra step to play out a scene.  I might even emote out the scene and give some excellent opportunities for escape.  That is to say, I might happily manipulate OOC things such that my half-giant guard trips over a table while trying to grab you.  When it comes down to it though, I will have my character do what my character would do.  I am a lot less likely to bend the personality of my character ICly.  If I had a templar that would kill any thief foolish enough to touch my sacred persona, well RPed or not, my character is going to try and kill you.

When you decide to do something like what you described, you can't expect their character to bend much, if at all.  They might give you an extra chance to escape, but if they have you, they are not going to let you live.  As far as expecting a chance to escape... it might be more likely, but I wouldn't go betting your character on it.

In my personal opinion, while doing what you described does liven up the game a little for that brief moment, a long lived character livens it up more.  Throwing away or taking excess risk for the entertainment of others is a fine way to get rid of a boring character or spice up the life of a character that is boring you to tears.  If you like your character though, I would rather see it add to the game by living a life longer then your average Byner exploring the 'rinth.

[Cenghiz]

I don't know anything about northern style.. But normally if you approach a templar before he wants you to, you probably end up stiffened in a corner with broken ribs as a h-giant guard kicks you away.
Guards should be considered. Your steal attempt should get past the guarding folks first and believe me, those manbeasts have huge guarding skills.
After that, if you could have sneaked closer to a Lord Templar, I totally agree with Ghost. The touching arm should be removed.
Even with NPC templars, I would not be comfortable with that. Some things are taboo in this game. Deciding to do something against a templar is deadly, even if it's a NPC one.

[DesertT]

Yes, there could've been more rp built up from that.  I had a case where my merchant had been in Allanak all of an hour, and was killed by a templar because of his accent.  Templar walks up, says you are guilty of treason, I can tell because of your accent, kills me.  Though my character was there to do some trading, I had entertained the thought, oocly, that he could turn into a kind of spy.  How the templar read my ooc mind, is beyond me.    But yeah, it would've been nice to see more rp come from that, rather than me trying to type out a plea, but getting my head lopped off before I could finish typing.  And as for your thief, yeah, there was definitely more opportunity for rp, but perhaps as in my case, he was just too busy to even deal with you, so just decided that you weren't worth the effort.  I see the rp in that as well.

[Cenghiz]

It's the way of play, DesertT.. I ended up in nearly same situation and ended up losing a finely carved chest. Just a chest. My OOC advice will be imagining templars similar to police states of some poor countries when it comes to bribes. If they say you're guilty, you _are_ and best way to get away is bribing.

[Clumsy Thief]

Seeker-

I'm not asking anyone to judge the templar's RP. There was nothing wrong with his RP and his IC actions were justified. I'm asking people to comment on what they would have done based only on the scenario I've given. Assume it's hypothetical and that there was no script in mind. But killing the thief doesn't do anybody any good.


Ghost-

Of course something bad should have happened and losing an arm would not have been excessive. And ICly, losing a life isn't either.

To all-

The point of this isn't to judge the templar.

It's to open a discussion about whether people think that OOC factors (like creating and maintaining good RP scenes) should affect decisions when more than one choice is ICly plausible.

And do templars in general have a responsibility to attempt to administer non-lethal but possibly permanent punishments when it is IC to do so?

[Seeker]

And do templars in general have a responsibility to attempt to administer non-lethal but possibly permanent punishments

No.

when it is IC to do so?

This DOES ask for a judgement from others on what is IC for another player's character.  Entirely out of our league.


Seeker

[Anonymous]

Seeker-

I'm not asking you to judge anybody's RP. By saying "when it is IC to do so" I'm saying that let's assume it -is- IC to do so and then let's discuss from there.

You don't need to know anything about the templar to know if killing someone is IC for him because killing someone is -always- IC for him.

This isn't about "what's IC" at all, it's about OOC courtesy in general and has nothing to do with any specific person.

[Jherlen]

I'd say... look at it from your character's perspective, not yours.

Your pc is attempting to steal from a templar. Even if you decide he'll fail, he's probably hoping he'll succeed. He probably also knows the risks that he's taking - the templar may kill him if he fails, but he's attempting to do so anyway. Well, he failed... and died. This shouldn't come as a surprise to you the player.

I agree with Seeker, we can't judge anyone else's RP or their decisions here. IMO templars should be as brutal as they feel like - suppose other people saw the templar being lenient to a thief who attempted to steal from him. Suddenly the templar gets a reputation for being soft on thieves. He probably doesn't want that. Much easier to make an example when given the opportunity.

[Ghost]

Hmm.. Now the question looks better.

Well, if I were playing the templar in the question, by the same token that a commoner approaching me that much even to touch me, there is nearly nothing that would stop me from punishing the commoner severely.  
I would be thinking like "This is not a simple crime, this is a crime and disrespect put against ME, the templar, the law enforcer.  People should be scared of me, and respect me, and some commoner ignores the fact?  I should just put an example on how to behave when the subject is me."


And a very well placed bribe could make me remove an arm or a leg publically and painfully from the thief, instead of killing.

I don't know if I will ever play a templar, but if I was playing one, in such a situation, I would respond like this.

EDIT:  The characters IG should and would know this.  Both parties.  The thief would know he is going to die if he gets caught.  The templar would know, the guards would know, the spectators would know... Things like this can be played out, if they are REALISTIC enough.  If you have enough reason why your character would mess up with a templar (maybe he is crazy.. maybe someone offered him 20000 coins if he stole templar's gloves..etc) scenes like these would be playable.  But if it is just asking to make a fingerwork on a templar, just for fun, it is too dangerous for funstuff like that.
I would more like expecting the fear of templar to be played out.

[wizturbo]

I would view this situation from a realistic standpoint.

Let us view the stereotypical Allanaki Templar.  

1.  They are mystic servants of an all-seeing, all-power god-king that we so affectionately refer to as the Highlord.  A large portion of the populace might believe that attempting to pickpocket one would be utterly impossible, as they're mystical terrifying abilities would prevent it.

2.  These fearful servants also generally have an armed escort, eager to chop of the limbs of anyone who gets too close to their charge.

3.  Citizens of Allanak would, quite likely, be quite excited at the prospect of turning in anyone they notice trying to steal from a Templar.  Many people want to be in good-favor with these powerful men and women.

With those three conditions recognized...put yourself in your character's shoes.

Let us assume, for just a moment, that your character for some reason decides they want to do it.  I think the best way to go about it, wouldn't be to sneak into the room and type "steal templar's shiny rock", but actually roleplay out the process.  Be it getting into that Templar's good graces until you get the opportunity to subtly make the steal, or take advantage of a great distraction, buying a "magick necklace" from a gemmed that will give you good luck and prevent getting caught, or any other number of realistic methods of penetrating such a dangerous set of defenses (whether they are codedly there or not).  Just walking in and hoping you get lucky with the code...seems pretty lame to me.

[Clumsy Thief]

wizturbo-

The code was not used at all. As I said, we're talking about a situation that was acted out purely in emotes...until the thief died.

[wizturbo]

wizturbo-

The code was not used at all. As I said, we're talking about a situation that was acted out purely in emotes...until the thief died.

Yeah, I think using emotes is a good idea.  And...to be honest...emoting out a failure is being realistic, as unless the pickpocket is insanely adept they're probably going to fail.

Don't be upset if you get killed for trying and deliberately failing though, as anyone should know that is the likely result of such an act.

[Gaare]

If I understand you correctly, here is my two sids. ARM is an RPI game and creating and being into good scenes is of course every players' wish. Also for a role like Templar, IMHO that's a bit of responsibility as well.

On the other hand, your question goes into a bit IC in sense because situation can differ for each Templar. There are not exact and strict laws in Zalanthas after all, and a templar's words are law until another one has another opinion on it. So, a templar could have a bit of maniac personality and enjoys showing elf heads in public, other one could like using taking body part as a punishment, one of them could even enjoy those attempts and prefers using those awkward thieves for her/his own plots.

As I see, there are a few usual chracteristics of templars, and bribe is maybe the most common.  On the other hand, even a PC templar could be so maniac and rudeless that s/he does not care a well amount of bribe in your example (Nevertless to say that would be an unpleasant suprise for the thief) and cut the head quickly without a word. Surely that would not be a good RP scene for the victim, templar and audiance but if that PC templar ICly likes getting into solution quick and bloody, then I believe there is nothing to say.

Edit: Smoothing and Grammar.

[Seeker]

This isn't about "what's IC" at all, it's about OOC courtesy in general and has nothing to do with any specific person.

If I understand the direction of your question, now, it is:

Should OOC courtesy (i.e. not killing a PC when other RP methods are legitimately available) be more important than a player running their character in an entirely IC manner, and making their decision strictly in an IC fashion.

That's a more interesting question for discussion, if I understand you correctly.

[Clumsy Thief]

Seeker-

That's exactly what I'm asking, thank you for phrasing it so well.

I don't really want to discuss any particular situation at all and nobody should be surprised or upset by what happened to the "Clumsy Thief" because it makes perfect IC sense.

The real question is what you said, Seeker, with an emphasis on -legitimately- available.

Should OOC courtesy (i.e. not killing a PC when other RP methods are legitimately available) be more important than a player running their character in an entirely IC manner, and making their decision strictly in an IC fashion.

[Cale_Knight]

Right - this is a question about player to player interaction, not character to character interaction. I think that when you're in a position of power, it can be easy to forget that there's a person behind every PC, and I also think that decisions should be made keeping that fact in mind.

I think Rindan's example is the best marriage between IC actions and respect for other players.

[Rhyden]

wizturbo-

The code was not used at all. As I said, we're talking about a situation that was acted out purely in emotes...until the thief died.

Emoted fail or code fail, I still think this certain situation would lead to the same concequence.

I think the problem here is knowing where to draw the line between an emoted action and a coded action. If you're emoting walking up to a templar and trying to snatch some coins from within his pocket, you'll most likely get the same reaction for codedly trying to steal something and failing. This works for this certain situation where emote and code are practically the same.

It's the same as walking up to a templar and emoting to kick him in the shin or using the actual skill kick. You'll most likely get the same reaction.

IMO, I'd say using emotes to back up your coded action would have been the best thing to do in your given templar-thief situation.

[Ender]

The thing that I will never agree with is the idea that Templars should not kill PCs because it ends RP.  That statement is utterly false if you ask me.  If it goes against the nature of the character to keep a person alive, then that is what kills RP.

Everytime a templar lets an arrogant "bows to no one" type off the hook because OOCly they don't want to kill a PC, that is where RP dies.  

Every time a templar goes easy on a thief who publically tries to even dare to touch him, it sets a precedent to other thieves.  If this decision was done because OOCly the thief RPed well, then the IC precedent is marred by an OOC decision.

For the specific situation given, I doubt any templar would ever -ever- want to show to the public that he/she will tolerate a filthy thief putting his dirty commoner hands on him.  A thief trying to steal from a templar should be a death sentance, and a thief should know that will be the consequence if he/she is caught.  The reason is simple, stealing from a templar is a personal attack on the templar.  Not only is it an affront to the templar's authority, it shows weakness and vulnerability to be stolen from.

For the complaints that killing a PC ends interaction.  Yes, yes it does, for that moment atleast.  But this is a roleplaying MUD, not an interaction MUD.  Roleplaying should never be sacrificed so that interaction can continue.  

Remember, if the player is good he/she will accept their totally IC death and make a new character who will go on interacting.  

It shouldn't matter how well someone emoted or RPed, templars are in no way obligated to go lenient on a PC because they can emote well or played out a scene well.

[Larrath]

If I was playing the templar in this example, I would either execute the thief or throw him into the Arena agaisnt impossible odds.
I don't believe, as far as ordinary human commoners are concerned, that templars are being deadly enough.  Templars aren't Pez dispensers of lawful justice; they're heartless monsters!

I'd like to see more "You're ugly" taxes and punishments for annoying templars - like a couple of lashes if you stand tall and look the templar in the eye while twenty people around you are bowing.
Templars also need to kill people, and what the thief did certainly merits it.  It's perfectly fine with me.  I don't kill enough PCs myself, so someone has to.

[JohnGalt]

I agree with alot of things said here.  Whether the action is well roleplayed or not, shouldn't impact the consequence of said action.  You try and rob a Templar, you should expect a very painful death.  You cast a spell in the middle of Tuluk, regardless of how well you emote the bands of flame curling around your Krathi's fingertips, expect to get torn apart by a lynch mob.

Is it good roleplay to emote things out that will quite likely kill your character?  Yes, it is.  But it can just as easily be good roleplay NOT to do those suicidal acts...because they are in fact suicidal acts, and reasonable people don't do things like that without some incredible justification.

Supposing for a moment you do have that incredible justification...and *have* to do something outrageously dangerous, emoting it out and likely dying for it would in my opinion be the best course of action.  It might be a bit depressing, it might not be OOCly fun, but it's good roleplay and everyone involved will appreciate it.

[JohnGalt]

I don't believe, as far as ordinary human commoners are concerned, that templars are being deadly enough.  Templars aren't Pez dispensers of lawful justice; they're heartless monsters!

(I agree with you for the most part, but let me play devil's advocate because I'm in the mood)

Are all sorceror's evil beings bent on world domination?  Are all merchant's greedy?  Are all bards good at singing?  Is every gypsy a thief?

Stereotypes exist for a reason, and they're a good guide on how particular people act or don't act, but that is not to say *reasonable* exceptions do not exist.

One of the most delighful surprises I've had in my time playing this MUD, is that it is like real life, filled with the unexpected.  Now, completely diverting from the 'norms' of how a role is supposed to be played isn't something I think is good unless done by an amazingly talented player who can pull it off.  But having a character who is alive, and has their quirks and habits, their differences and their similarities to these norms is what I believe a 'good' character to be.  Being different than the 'norm', yet strikingly realistic in Zalanthas.

[marko]

Simply put - At no time should OOC considerations affect IC reactions and actions.  

Therefore, in this case, the templar should not be swayed by the fact the thief was "rping" out an attempt to steal from their person.  The reaction needs to be the same whether it was a code based steal or an emoted steal - there should be absolutely no difference in reaction.

I believe in interactions and playing with a situation - letting it go on for as long as it can (assuming it is fun) but I also do not believe in coddling stupid IC actions for any reason.  This particular thief was incredibly stupid to try and steal from a templar - therefore, the end result is likely to be death.  Templars, for the most part, don't reward stupidity.  

Now, if you had wanted to further the interaction and not died - the thief could have tried to steal from someone _else_ and then bribed the templar.  

Unfortunately, in this situation, there is no question in my mind that the templar acted entirely appropriately.  I am a very firm believer in always doing the roleplayed reaction properly no matter the situation (be it a friend who is on the receiving end, or maybe there were some amazing emotes done, or whatever).  Make no exceptions for OOC reasoning.  

The moment you do that you pollute your own roleplaying.