[MUD-Dev] Marian's Tailor vs. Psychopaths

[Hal Black]

  I'd like to offer some discussion as to how to deal with part of the Marian's
Tailor problem: how does a tailor enjoy tailoring life without having to deal
with a disproportionate number of psychopathic characters?
  For discussion puprposes, I'd like to define a psychopath as a person whose
actions are governed by the desire to achieve pleasure by causing other
players displeasure without an in-game justification.  I'm also assuming that
the game has some sort of universe model where characters can experience
contention over resources and have game-engine arbitrated conflicts.  I also
assume that psychopathic behavior is considered a "bad" and roleplaying
and character development is a "good".
  Due in large part to the anonymity of the internet, and arguably the
demographic of its denizens, there are a lot of people who enjoy making other
people's lives miserable.  It's been my experience that with some localised
exceptions on roads near the U.S east coast and in government offices
everywhere, the concentration of such is higher on online games than in real
life.  Whatver you do, it's a good bet that one of these players will show up
in your game at some point.  Then the question becomes, how can your protect
the good players and the interesting gameflow from these players?
  Unfortunately, I believe that you cannot.  The problem would be trivial if
it was possible to identify the troublemakers a priori, but short of having
a full-time psychic on your staff, this certainly cannot be done.  So given
that psychopathic annoyances cannot wholely be stopped, what are some possible
ways to curb this behavior to a small enough scale so that the administration
can address it?

1. Allow the psychopaths to be psychopaths.  Let the player play an ork or a
goblin chieftain.  This certainly helps with the identification problem.
Also, it helps the game a lot in that law-abiding citizens can have more
intelligent evil enemies to fight (heh, maybe more intelligent... Let's just
say more variety in enemies... 8').

2. Mostly Safe cities.  As has been mentioned before, safe cities are a
pretty good idea.  Certainly there will be creative means for killing, but it
is possible (yet nontrivial) to code an engine that can trace the flow back
to the perpetrator for many cases.  In a safe city, any odd actions by players
should attract the automated city guard, "Why hello there, goodman.  I
couldn't help but notice you digging a rather deep hole here in the middle of
the street.  The cemetery is down the street, I'm sure I could help you on
your way." More overt action such as burning down buildings, exploding
powder-kegs and so forth will certainly have you hanging from the gallows.
Some safer cities might also have guards and dogs at the entrances and exits
so that no contraband can be brought into a city.  Also, presumably beasts and
demons won't be wandering around in a city, so the tailor is safe from the
folks from part 1.

3. Detailed Social Constructs.  This has been mentioned some and goes
hand-in-hand with safe cities.  What if the tailor wants to be a tailor but
not worry about security, leasing a lot, repairs for the building, kickbacks
to the local politician, or what have you?  In real life, my cousin is a
designer, and she doesn't worry about any of this stuff, she just deals with
clients and does designs.  How does she manage this Herculean feat?  Well,
she is not self-employed, she works at someone's shop.  Why shouldn't muds
have the same opportunities in place?  This makes things more fun for the
good roleplayer, and can isolate the tailor from some the nastier details
of both business and unsavory characters.  This one goes beyond the pschopath
issue, protecting the tailor from more typical (and perhaps legit,
in-character) trouble-makers so that the tailor can have fun tailoring.

Some Caveats:

1. Not all the fish will bite at this opportunity.  The more clever psychos
will play humans to cause havoc.  But hopefully it will divert some borderline
psychos to constructive violent behavior.  !!!!  8')

2. There is a great problem in totally safe cities as opposed to mostly safe
cities.  What happens when someone really does deserve a bruising?  In a safe
city, it will be very difficult to work them over, though there might be a good
reason.  A typical example is a newbie character mouthing off to the crime
boss of a town, which I have seen often on the muds I play.  Obviously, this
is either extremely stupid, or extremely out of character.  Typically, some
stalking ensues, until the dumb newbie makes a mistaken turn down a dark
street and gets his throat slit.  In a totally safe area, this wouldn't be
possible.  Either some "mysterious force" or insta-popup invincible guards
would show up, either way it would be undesirable in a world where you want
player to be responsible for their actions.
  Some players will also inevitably slip through the cracks in the game,
coming up with ever-more-ingenious ways to kill other players.  You have to
understand that this is an extremely fun thing for players to do.  And just
like real life police are always cracking down on new methods of thievery,
so must the city guard adjust to this in the same way.
  This is obviously an area of subtlely that will take a lot of attention,
playtesting, and ajustment.  The trick is to create an environment that
prevents uninteresting psychopathic behavior, but allows intrigue and lots
of interaction between characters.

  By placing substantial obstacles in front of players to commit psychopathic
behavior, you will be able to limit the number of psychopaths who can do real
damage to a small number of learned and skilled veteran players.  These
players can in turn be monitored by the admins and asked to leave if need be.

 Of course, I haven't had a chance to implement any of this so it's all
conjecture at this point.  8')  Hopefully it can inspire some ideas if nothing
else.

  Hal