[MUD-Dev] Guilds & Politics [was Affecting the World]

[Derrick Jones]

On Thu, 4 Dec 1997, Ling wrote:

> Here are some of my insights into society.  They're very crude, cynical,
> impassionate and probably misled.  But I've only lived a couple of
> decades.

They're also insightful and frightfully close to the mark.

> - A higher proportion of people in muds can and will be jerks publically
>   infront of strangers.
> - Why does the same not apply to life?

I tend to think that people act as jerks outside a mud Universe; the
difference being one of scale.

> - Because of comeback, because they're receive pain either physically o
>   mentally.  I do not go around clubbing someone I don't like for fear of
>   arrest.
> - But mudders get 'arrested' too!
> - Yes but it is a persona being arrested.  Anyway, there are plenty of
>   other muds to go piss on.

Here you have to observe motivation.  People are jerks for different
reasons:
1.  noteriety.  Sure, they'll be known as jerks, but they'll be _known_.
How do you make yourself stand out?  Affect major change in the mud you're
playing.  Most mud designs are geared in such a way that 'bad' change can
be achieved much better than 'good' change.  (quick definition: bad
meaning that is lessens the enjoyment for the other players)  Why is this?
Well, destructive acts (starting a forest fire, leveling a town, going on
a pk spree) are quick and there's no doubt as to the cause.  The only
suggestion here is to perhaps stress positive actions, and other such
mindgames with the mud populace.
2. 'revenge'  A player has been wronged in their eyes by the staff (the
design/code/admin isn't what they're looking for usually) and wants to
make life intolerable for them (If I can't play the way _I_ want to, then
no one else will either...).  Here, the admin's only hope is swift and
harsh justice, that is if mind-games with the player doesn't work.  You'll
piss off a few people, but save many more people long headaches.
3. 'venting'  Players vent their RL anger in an IC way.  very cathardic.
I've been known to do it myself.  There's no real defence short of knowing
your players personally.  These 'jerk-like' outbursts can come from even
the best players, and are usually isolated acts (how to admin/punish
these? dunno...any thoughts?)
4. 'immunity'  How much damage can an IMP actually _do_ to a jerk player?
Probably the worst is purge/ban.  Big deal.  Sure the player loses maybe
100 hours total on-line time(for the most established players), but how
does this compare to the time it takes to bring a mud from preliminary
design through production and administration?  Not to meantion all the
time the other players affected by the jerk have invested...Personally, I
think I'm going to include a hidden routine within the client that will
allow an IMP to reformat the drive on which the client is located.  I
wonder what the legal implications of this would be?  Then I'm probably
better off not knowing...
5. ignorance...A widespread problem today.  Players can't comprehend the
fact that they are jerks.  How many players have sworn up until the bitter
end that they did nothing wrong, even when it is obvious to others that
they did?  Short of a shotgun, there's no RL solution to ignorance.

I'm sure there's a few more, but those are the main ones I've seen...
Any suggestions on:
++identifying potential jerks before they do much damage
++how to get jerks to leave willingly?  (this causes much less resentment
from the rest of the playerbase).  I've noticed that even after a _real_
jerk gets banned, a number of otherwise complacent players are up in arms
about 'those nazi admins'...Seems they feel threatened by the IMP's use of
power, even when its clearly justified and done for their sake...
++How to market towards 'better' players, to reduce the ratio of jerks to
decent players.
++keeping incidents isolated(Usually there's one original jerk out there,
then when he gets going, others seem to follow him...)

> - So get muds to form an informal mud alliance where someone blacklisted
>   on one mud will find life difficult on other muds.
> - This might work, difficulty in implementing due to the way people can
>   change their id so easily.

Hrm...perhaps some Big Brother mailing list circulating the ID's of banned
players from various muds, combined with a routine to automatically forbid
players who have been banned from 2 MUDs (I'm feeling nice..give 'em a
second chance) from logging on.  Of course people could change their ID to
get around this, but it would weed out quite a few twinks who don't know
any better, and even the hard-core hackers would hopefully get the hint.

Gunther