[MUD-Dev] Crime

[Greg Underwood]

Ben writes:


>     First off I would have to describe crime.  Crime to me
> is any action commited by an entity against another entity
> that has a negative outcome AND that the entity against
> which is being commited disagrees with.   Basically this
> means that anything I do to you, that you didn't want me
> to do, and/or doesn't benefit you, is to me a crime.

I don't know that I agree with the basic definition you propose here.  On
one level it seems to be somewhat specific, but upon closer inspection, it
makes several assumptions and is rather vague.

Fer example:

What is an action?  If I cast an area affect spell and you walk in the room
as it goes boom, resulting in your death, is it a crime?

What if I meant to time it so that you died as you walked in?

What if I drag a powerful, agro mob into a newbie area and it lays waste? 
I didn't kill the newbies... the mob did.  Sure, I dragged it in there, but
the action I commited was against the mob, not the newbies.  Or is it?

What if I push a rock down a cliff, and it squashes you?  What if I pushed
that rock down whilst I was trying to climb the cliff, and didn't even know
there was anyone down there?

Where do you draw the line?

> negative outcome AND that the entity against
> which is being commited disagrees with

How do you define negative outcome?  If I steal 5000 gold from you, it
looks to me like a positive outcome.

I especially dislike the last part of the sentance, that it is only a crime
if the party on the receiving end doesn't like it.  Aye, It's not a crime
if I "steal" money from you with your consent... but that doesn't mean that
anything I do that you don't like is a crime.  You could argue that if I
change my character's description to something vile and walk in the room,
I've perpetrated an act upon you (showing you my vile description), and you
dislike it.  Therefore it's a crime.

-Greg



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