[MUD-Dev] Character Restraint & Capture.

[Matt Mihaly]

On Mon, 1 Mar 2004, Paul Schwanz wrote:
> Matt Mihaly wrote:

>> And then how does this have any effect? If you can just stay out
>> of these other cities at minimal inconvenience to yourself, where
>> is the justice?  How does this help control PKers who are
>> offending other players' out-of-game sense of justice?

>> It doesn't. It provides for some potentially interesting
>> mechanics, but it does not address the issue the original poster
>> was concerned with at all, which is fulfilling an out-of-game
>> sense of justice (ie you shouldn't be able to kill me over and
>> over just because I'm a dwarf. I am, after all, paying to play
>> your game.)

> There's certainly a sense of justice for the people in the city
> whose laws were violated and who enacted the ban.

*boggle* We have these systems in place in all our games. Using
these city powers isn't about 'justice' for most players. It's about
manipulating them to cause the maximum amount of pain to your
enemies. For instance, cities have been known to lure (using various
methods from coded methods to just just convincing them to) others
into their city and then declare them persona non grata after that
person is in the middle of the city, then call the city guards to
kill the 'intruder.'

> Even if the PKer isn't particularly inconvenienced by having a
> single city declare him persona non grata, at least that city no
> longer has to worry about him causing further grief in their
> territory.  If the city has a treaty with other communities
> whereby bans are enforced throughout, then justice gets even more
> teeth.

I don't get what this idea of 'justice' you have is. What you are
doing is giving players a weapon and then apparently trusting that
they will use that weapon in accordance with an out-of-game sense of
justice. The only places I have seen this work are places with a
high level of admin oversight (an RPI mud, for instance).

> In the end, the system functions as a form of access control as
> much as a form of justice.  Access control is a concept central to
> any security system, yet is curiously lacking at the community
> level in many MUDs, which may explain why community members don't
> experience any sense of security.

Yes, exactly. It's a weapon and you're trusting players to use it
responsibly. Good luck with that. ;)

--matt
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