You're trying to make the argument that because a player's behavior is aimed at another player rather than their character that it's OOC behavior, but I don't think it is. You really can't base OOC/IC classifications off of player motives, and have to rely only on the behavior itself. PKing, stealing, looting, and general in-game harassment are all IC behavior, regardless of what reasons a person has for doing them or who they do them to. Spamming, breaking rules, and non-game-related verbal abuse are all OOC.



Semantics…



Those are completely different concepts than role-playing.



Legitimately meaning IC, and not OOC.



Well, I don't see how you can be "abusive" by repeatedly PKing someone (which is what your original claim was that began this conversation).



I don't think it's merely a difference in where we draw the line. It seems that we differ in opinion pretty fundamentally if you're sticking to your claim that it's even possible to be abusive via in-game means such as PKing. I'm not saying either one of us is right and the other is wrong, and as syn pointed out a few posts ago, different people like different standards of game-play.



It doesn't necessarily matter when you remove the character (depending on the size of your game), but the fact that they do need to be removed is pretty indisputable. The number of linkless characters in an average game would be tremendous if you never removed them, and would eventually start bogging the game down or worse.

Isn't the whole discussion about semantics? I was under the impression that semantics are a fairly key point here, given that we're trying to tease apart abuse directed at a character and abuse directed at the person behind the character… (Actually, I've never liked dismissals of points based on "semantics" (making it sound like a dirty word!) because that's like saying "your point is meaningless because you are using words in a particular way that although valid doesn't jive with me".)


Maybe we have completely different definitions of role-playing. You aren't in-story if you're not role-playing, because if you're not role-playing, you are acting like an IRL person, and if you are doing that, you can't possibly be in the game's fictional world.


This seems like such a no-brainer I'm not sure how to answer your question. Killing somebody over and over again for the sheer fun of making them miserable and suffer is sick and abusive behavior, pretty much by definition. It's sociopathic behavior.

I could understand not agreeing on when behavior reaches this line, but I am very surprised at you saying that it is utterly impossible for game-mechanic behavior to ever be construed as abusive.

Are you familiar with the article "A Rape in Cyberspace" by Julian Dibbell? If not, you should. You should see how "game mechanics" were turned from something innocuous into something sick and abusive.

You talk about "breaking rules", but then you say that everything is fair if you use game mechanics. But then there are no rules other than game mechanics. By even talking about "rules", you have established that there are game mechanics that are not acceptable to use in certain ways. Therefore, you have established that even some game-mechanic behavior is unacceptable. Therefore, it doesn't make sense to claim that everything is fair if it's game-mechanics, and yet to claim that there exist rules governing these game mechanics outside the game mechanics themselves.

Different people like different styles doesn't change this point, it merely moves the line. That's fine. But even on a game where you tolerate killing, it is perfectly possible for the behavior to, eventually, stop being "fun and games" and move into territory that is much murkier.


Yes, but suddenly, you see, we are no longer talking about the necessity of removing characters when their players log out, but the necessity of not endlessly accumulating characters. All of a sudden, it is no longer at all necessary to immediately remove players upon quitting. You can leave them there, and have roving bandits find and attack link-dead characters. The world will clean itself up.

The point is that is has become clear that it is not, in fact, utterly necessary to remove characters as soon as their player quits. It is "absurd" in the game world to do so (vanishing characters? huh?), and yet the causal link "player quit –> character vanishes" is so entrenched in our minds that you argued it was completely necessary to do so, and it would be impossible to do anything else. The thing is that other, equally "absurd" notions get resistance; but why is this?

You're assuming that the motive for killing is "making them miserable and suffer". Can't it just be for the challenge and excitement of taking on and beating a human opponent (as opposed to a dumb mob, or a "cheating" AI with inhuman reflexes)? There are plenty of games which revolve around killing human opponents, whether they be FPS (Counterstrike, Unreal, Quake, etc), RTS (Age of Mythology, Command & Conquer, etc) or even board games (chess, risk, etc). I don't think it's fair to call people sociopathic just because they enjoy competing against other players.

That's such a preposterous statement that I have to wonder if you're simply trolling. Aiming behaviour at a player rather than a character is definitively out of character. Acting out of character means acting in ways determined by the knowledge and motivations of the player in such a way as to conflict with the established knowledge and motivations of the character.

Think of an RP MUD as an ongoing improvised drama. Suppose that, in the middle of one such drama, one character who (it has already been established) is the truest and most loyal friend of another, always has been, and always will be, suddenly shoots his friend in cold blood. "What the hell did you do that for?!" ask the other actors, "that makes no sense!". "Because he insulted me in the dressing room," is the reply. That's what "out of character" means - acting in ways that only make sense to the actorand not to the character. If you think that one character shooting another purely as means for the actor to inconvenience another actor is not "out of character", how on Earth would you define the term?

What if you don't run an RP Mud, its just a PK Mud with no RP. The point of this game is to repeatedly kill people, much like what KaVir pointed out. Its not really OOC at that point as there is no OOC or IC, the entire point is to kill. If you find someone is easier to kill, and thus do it repeatedly, no matter what, thats the game. Either they need to get better at running away, get better equipment/stats (whatever the game provisions for), or learn their character skills better. If you play Quake and die all the time, and one person seems to headshot you every 2 seconds its not really their fault that you suck at dodging or rocket jumping..

-Syn

Then OOC and IC are entirely meaningless concepts. There is no character to be in or out of.

Right, that was my point.

Now take someone familiar with that only and drop him in an RP game, which he may not fully understand. Perhaps his 'character' gets taunted in some way, he is the butt of some IC joke, or he simply doesnt understand the game and attacks someone because he knows nothing else. If this leads to him hunting people down and, namely, the same person, it does not mean it was to make their life miserable. There are a ton of factors that can contribute the least of which is not simply a sick and abusive mind.

I ran a game where a character would taunt individuals on AIM, and subsequently get hounded down no matter who he logged in as in the game. He would cry foul and say they were purposely targetting him and it had no bearing on RP they were just assholes. I personally knew some of the people being taunted, and was over a friends house watching the exchange one day. Who, then has the abusive mentality? Who is the sick one?

Assumptions are bad, worse is lumping everyone who does X into Y group, because they MUST be of A B and C demeanor, obviously. That is simply untrue.

-Syn

Then that's his own stupid fault for not bothering to read the help files, and he thoroughly deserves every punishment he gets. "I'm sorry, I thought was playing a completely different game" is very rarely a viable excuse. You can't go around randomly hitting people in the street and then say "oh, sorry, I thought the street was just like a boxing ring and it was okay to hit people". It's your responsibility to figure out that hitting people outside of a boxing ring is wrong, and that streets don't work like that.


Assuming the MUD was RP-based, the people doing the hunting were absolutely, 100% in the wrong. The behaviour of the "victim" on AIM was certainly also wrong, but it should have been dealt with within the confines of AIM. It should not have been allowed to spill onto the MUD.

If the guy was also guilty of abusive behaviour within the MUD, then and only then would it have been appropriate to punish him for it, with the punishment being OOC or IC depending on whether his offence was OOC or IC.

If you're asking me where I stand on the question of whether or not serial PK constitutes "griefer" behaviour (something I haven't yet commented on in this thread) I would say that in a deathmatch-like MUD it most likely doesn't; if the sole purpose of the game is to kill other players, one can hardly complain when it happens. However, if a few players manage to become exceptionally powerful and always kill but never die that might indicate a problem with game balance.

One of the features of online Quake deathmatches is that they tend not to last very long: the game environment and the capabilities of the "characters" are reset to default on a regular basis - perhaps as often as every few minutes. If your MUD world is persistent, with some players becoming steadily more powerful while others are prevented from ever being able to advance at all, that might indicate a problem with the way the game works. If I were running a pure-PK MUD, I think I would probably abolish character levels and have reboots several times a day, so that, after each reboot, all characters start with exactly equal power and equipment, and it is only player skill and knowledge of the MUD environment that gives any one player an edge over another.

PK within MUDs that are not primarily focused on PK always makes me a little uneasy. Most people I've known who enjoy PK in that sort of environment are the same kind of people who used to be bullies in grade school, and never grew out of it: they do it because they enjoy making other people miserable.

I think it is possible to combine PK and non-PK in the same game, but it has to be done with great care. One approach is to keep the two systems widely separated, so that it is impossible for a PK-er to attack anyone who has not voluntarily joined the PK system. (This obviously has to be done very carefully indeed to avoid any possibility of "indirect" kills, such as the previously mentioned example of leading a victim into a death-trap). Other helpful features can include high-powered NPC law enforcement that realistically treats PK-ers as IC murderers, or two or more rival in-game factions who can kill each other, but not kill within their own group, where the groups are sufficiently separated by MUD geography that the risk of encountering a member of a rival group in normally "safe" territory is minimal.

No, its not really 'his stupid fault'. If you don't teach someone the basics of your game in some way, and they dont fully understand it, thats your fault as a developer. If you put a system in to have PK that is possible to that extent in an RP game, also your fault. If you add something, and don't actually restrict it, and use some arbitrary helpfile to try and regulate something, your being a moron as a developer.



I disagree. That is where we differ, cest le vie. If you want to be an asshole, and try to paint yourself a victim in my game, tough shit. I come from heavy PK MUDs though, we have no sympathy for this. I also am a DM and long time world creator. If someone is going to taunt someone before a DnD session and the person explodes on em in the game, we are human, you provoked him, his character 'went insane' and killed you, bad, oops.

-Syn

"Heavy PK MUDs" and "RP MUDs" are pretty much mutually exclusive; different rules apply. In a pure-PK, death-match-like enviroment, as already mentioned, there is no character to be in or out of, so ooc-motivated ic behaviour is not a valid concept, and hence not punishable. On an RP MUD, it is valid, and should be punishable. There are no exceptions to this.

In real life there are hardly ever moral absolutes, because real life situations are so complex and there are so many different possibilities. One can say that (say) killing people is usuallywrong; but the list of exceptions when it might not be wrong is actually very large: it might be okay if it's self-defence, it might be okay if you're preventing them from murdering someone else, it might be okay if they're terminally ill and they ask you to kill them, it might be okay if you're soldiers in opposing armies, etc. It is therefore rarely possible to make a blanket statement like "it is wrong to kill people" because the number of possible situations such a statement would have to cover is too great.

However, in MUD terms, there are moral absolutes, because the range of possible situations a moral statement has to cover is much more restricted. The statement "in an RP MUD it is wrong to engage in IC behaviour for OOC reasons" is a 100% moral absolute, and there are no possible exceptions. If you think you've come up with a situation in which that statement doesn't apply, you haven't: what you've actually come up with is a way of misconstruing the statement: you're talking about a situation which is actually not an RP MUD, or about behaviour that does not have IC consequences, or which does not have OOC motivations. In particular, if you're thinking about the type of game you personally are used to - PK heavy, as you call it - then you're not thinking about an RP MUD. Different situation.


It's perfectly possible for a character to go insane and commit murder, so long as the IC consequences for doing so are authentic. In a case like that, the character should expect to be arrested, put on trial for murder, and then detained in a psychiatric institution for many years, if not for the remainder of his natural life. If you allow his actions to escape logical IC consequences, then you're failing in your responsibility as DM. (Assuming, of course, that your game is actually supposed to be an RP environment; perhaps it isn't).

Exactly. So which part of killing someone in the game (repeatedly or not, and regardless of motive) is considered not part of the game's fictional world?



It's only a no-brainer to people who agree with your opinion of what makes a good standard of game-play. As KaVir pointed out, I don't think it's fair to consider it sociopathic behavior simply because you don't enjoy it. By that definition, I think role-playing is sociopathic behavior ;)



Perhaps we have differing definitions of in-/out-of-character. I define OOC behavior as anything not directly related to the game, and IC behavior as the opposite. Using this definition, it's quite possible to play a game and be IC the entire time without role-playing at all. Role-playing I define as what you're referring to in this post. It's a completely separate concept to me (and a lot of other people) than simply maintaining IC behavior.

Or perhaps he just kills those trying to arrest him. Your painting a very stolid view here. You try to make allot of assumptions about what should happen, these are all your views. The RP environment may have a warped sense of justice, perhaps murder is common place. Perhaps allot of things. Please dont make assumptions about punishment that may make no sense what so ever, or be moronic given a specific setting, campaign, or game.

The the part above this quote, I really dont see what you are trying to assert. I gave some clear cross beams from a person dumped from PK to RP, and I am used to playing PK Muds, running a couple, and running more RP muds then PK Muds. The situation is different to you. That does not make it actually different. My definition of IC is much like Drrck's as stated above. If it pertains to my game at all its IC, if you harass a player on AIM about the game, and get hunted down in the game (be RP) repeatedly, and theres even a modicum of a plausible reason good for you. If there was no harassment? A semblance of logic, and playing a chaotic evil character go a long way. If you dont want to be hounded, play a nice tea and biscuit RP Mud, shrug.

-Syn

In this case, yes, obviously, I said so, that was the whole point. I didn't say it was always such. Of course there are other motivations, which are perfectly fine.


Syn, I didn't say that *all* forms of hunting are bad. I didn't lump everybody into such and such group. I said that when something becomes abusive, it is wrong; I also said that many people who exhibit abusive behavior "in the name of RP" are typically using a bogus excuse, as shown by their tendency to cross IC lines to perpetuate their abuse.


That's a little silly. You can't just show up somewhere and behave however you like just because you couldn't be bothered to read help files. The MUD might try to show you, but people probably won't read the text it displays anyhow.

"I'm sorry Officer, I didn't know I couldn't turn right at red lights, I mean in my town I can, how was I supposed to know you can't here?"


See syn, that's the thing, you're talking about OOC interaction here and you're not enforcing IC behavior.

BTW it's "c'est la vie", not "cest le vie".


There are several things. The main problem is the very fact that people come back to life: it makes it hard to talk about "killing" because it's really more like "kicking somebody back to their temple".

Motive matters crucially and it's surprising to see you dismiss it. If the player is using a motive that the character doesn't have, and more strongly has no reason to have, then we are obviously outside of the game's fictional world.


I believe that you as well misunderstood. I didn't say that all repetitive killing is wrong; I said that doing so for a very specific motive is wrong. If you well and truly think that it's perfectly ok for somebody to kill somebody over and over again for the sheer pleasure of making them miserable I am seriously concerned about your moral viewpoint. That is the definition of sociopathic behavior. :sad:

Obviously this does not include death-match games where the whole point of the game is to kill people over and over again. Why does it not include those games? Not because the point of the game is killing. Because the people doing so are not doing it for the pleasure of making people miserable. It's really that simple…

I disagree. You seem to be under the impression that a character must have a reason to kill in order to be part of the game's fictional world, but there are rather limitless examples of bad guys who do just this without rhyme or reason. It's, in fact, a lot of what makes them bad guys.

That said, sometimes players have OOC motives for some of their IC behavior (such as killing player X because he stole your girlfriend in real life, or something stupid like that), but this is not abuse. You can't regulate motive, and any attempt at doing so is naive, futile, and a waste of time.



Being the game's "pain in the ass" is entertaining for a lot of people out there. I've yet to meet anyone who plays a game for any other reason other than to entertain themselves in some form or another, so it's fair to assume that any behavior connected to playing that game can be lumped into the same category. Whether or not you, personally, find that behavior acceptable/entertaining/whatever is only your opinion (whether it's shared by others or not). Questioning their morality over their in-game behavior is rather ridiculous - especially considering you probably just got done slaying 7 little village girls for their pearl earrings and gold coins a few moments ago ;)

OK. So the character is just crazy and kills without reason. It's not that the character has no motives: I said that we were talking about motives the player has that the character does not. The point is that as soon as killing is done with a motive from the player, and not the character, then that is what brings us outside of the game's fiction.

If the player brings up "crazy character" as an excuse for the killing, but then does not otherwise act in such a manner, then it is again made clear that the killing was OOC-motivated (by definition).


Something has gone terribly wrong in this discussion if you think that I am saying that any OOC-motivated negative action is to be considered abuse…


I didn't say you could regulate motive. I said that motive matters crucially in trying to figure out if something is to be considered abuse or not.


I realize this was said in jest, but unfortunately it misses the point entirely: I am not talking about morality of character actions upon other game entities. I am talking about the morality of person to person interaction.

If you haven't read the article I posted, I vigorously encourage you to do so.

This has nothing at all to do with morality inside the game. It has everything to do with whether or not the behavior is acceptable outside of the game. If you start abusing someone OOC-racially in the game, using IC channels, this is not a game issue: it's an OOC issue. It should not be tolerated.

I will observe that if your standard for something being ok is that people find it entertaining, then I have serious concerns about your moral viewpoint. :sad: Obviously people play a game to be entertained. That doesn't mean that any action in the name of entertainment is acceptable!

Thanks, I never took french. /shrug

-Syn

NP – I try to correct French when I see it, seeing as how the language is fairly close to my heart… :wink: (I grew up in Paris)

Another favorite is "please RSVP" which means "please reply please". :smile:

When a character can act without its controlling person, you will have a very valid point. As of right now, though, characters do not have morality, personalities, etc. Their actions are what you, as the player, make them. Think of it as reverse role-playing. Instead of a you trying to fulfill your character's role, it is your character who is being made to fulfill the role of you. And if you so happen to be a person who enjoys harassing people, this is reflected in-game through your character.



That's a rather ridiculous concept, since a huge portion of what is considered "acceptable behavior" within practically any game, is not dually considered acceptable outside of it.



I didn't say that at all. I merely pointed out that you can't seriously question someone's morality based on their motives behind some arbitrary in-game behavior. People who find it entertaining to "grief" other players are not sociopaths simply because you dislike being "griefed".

In an RP situation, a character does have its own moral sense. Of course, the player is who controls what the character actually does, but the whole point of role-playing is to separate your character from your self. Obviously, one cannot judge this all in total isolation because it is precisely the player who controls all this – but that is the whole point…


I fail to understand how you are replying to my comment. We're not talking about killing people outside of a game here, even though it's acceptable in-game. Your logic isn't sound anyhow: just because there isn't a duality doesn't establish that things can't flow in one direction. It simply establishes that things don't flow in both directions.


I didn't say that people were sociopaths because they did things that I dislike. I said that people are sociopaths if they exhibit sociopathic behavior: see the definition of sociopath. Somebody who actively seeks and enjoys the misery and suffering of others is quite obviously a sociopath. I keep repeating myself on this point but you seem to keep ignoring the case I am talking of, and return to simple pkillers.

You are acting as if just because all of this happens in a game, all actions are completely devoid of any moral aspect, positive or negative.

I will ask you a very simple yes/no question, one that I asked earlier but it seems to have gotten lost in all of this.

Do you, or do you not, think that it is possible for some in-game behavior to be abusive of a player?