Begging for mercy

I understand and agree with you dey. Feeling better?

Plenty.

Dey

The thing is Dey' date=' desire to suit up and fear of fighting syndi are not necessarily OOC. They can be well within the bounds of a person's RP. [/quote']

Of course they can. What I meant was, is this:

Deykari is playing an Duergar Warrior. Deykari is BADASS, he is RPed as a hardcore **** that takes no crap from anyone. He's a hothead. We'll assume he's decent at PK, which is the reason behind him having this sort of RP behind him (wow, first time I've ever seen "Deykari" and "good PK" in the same paragraph ).

Imagine then, that Johnny Syndi comes along and slaughters him, then full loots him. Syndi then sends a tell to Deykari, saying "Hey dude, sorry about that, but business is business. Come on, join me in Gear."

What would Deykari do here? You'd expect him to be angry and ready for revenge, declining the offer and sending threats. MAYBE he'd play the deceitful hand, and use the Syndi to get suited up, then kill Johnny Syndi afterwards. But what does Deykari do here? He takes the cowardly OOC route, going against his RP, by 'befriending' the Syndi again, going to suit up, and not bothering him again, because OOCly it suits me as a player - I'm getting EQ out of it and I'm not going to be bothered by Johnny Syndi because we can help each other.

Of course the desire for EQ/fear of Syndi is a perfectly valid RP reason. I'm not saying it's not. What I think Behrens is talking about, is stuff similar to the scenario I just described. I think.

Dey

If that were the case, then hell yes he is going against his RP and I agree with you there.

Though let's add to your hypothetical situation:

What if Johnny Syndicate is your good friend and ol' huntin' buddy? You, as a character, understand that Syndi are headhunters. You, as a character, know that Johnny Syndicate is in Syndi. In my opinion, your "Cowardly" option becomes very valid in a situation like this and wouldn't be OOC. Additionally, Roleplay is more than just what a person will do in a single gaming session. Let's also say somewhere down the road your Duergar warrior will get Johnny back, even though in this session it looks like your character "shrugged off" the death. The fact is no one has access to your characters thoughts.

Basically, all I'm saying is that noone can judge someone elses RP because we don't know that character as well as the player him/herself.

Additionally, Roleplay is more than just what a person will do in a single gaming session. Let's also say somewhere down the road your Duergar warrior will get Johnny back, even though in this session it looks like your character "shrugged off" the death. The fact is no one has access to your characters thoughts.

Basically, all I'm saying is that noone can judge someone elses RP because we don't know that character as well as the player him/herself.

I completely agree. That's not what I'm talking about however. I'm not talking about people who are out for revenge against Johnny Syndi, even if it takes 20 play-sessions to initiate an attack for revenge, I'm talking about people who would sooner go against their RP and what their character would do in a certain situation because it benefits them OOCly. And you're right also, that no player can turn around and say, "Man, you suck. You totally just went against your RP." because the only player that really knows their char's RP is the player themself. But say that people going against what their intentional RP is doesn't exist, as it's just so easy to shape up a reason and change their RP slightly to make it fit, to benefit them OOCly.

What if Johnny Syndicate is your good friend and ol' huntin' buddy? You, as a character, understand that Syndi are headhunters. You, as a character, know that Johnny Syndicate is in Syndi. In my opinion, your "Cowardly" option becomes very valid in a situation like this and wouldn't be OOC.

Again, that's down to individual RP. In the case of Johnny Badass Duergar Warrior Deykari, he wouldn't tolerate that, friend or no friend. But then the only person who would know that, is Deykari himself, so it would be easily for him to play the cowardice card in an "OOC" sense and pretend that that's his char's RP because it benefits him there. It could also be his genuine RP to play the 'cowardice' card and remain friends with the Syndi.

Either way, there's nothing really bad about doing it, beacuse often it's too hard to judge if someone's decisions are IC or OOC. You can't expect everyone, to constantly stick within their RP, all of the time, especially as FL is such a harsh PK environment and some sort of OOC interference in that respect may be needed to retain enjoyment for the player, but those that do consistently stick to their RP, even when it lands them in dire trouble, deserve a lot of respect.

I hope that makes sense.

Dey

If your previous hunting buddy is now a synd, takes my bounty, I'm not going to let him get away with the "It's just business". Maybe I'll act as if I befriend him again, but deep down, I'll always look for his back turned to me.

Ya, I think we've been agreeing the whole time, I just haven't been representing it properly .

@Questioner: Absolutely. Though keep in mind to an outsider that may not be readily apparant. That brings me to my point: To what extent can somebody else tell you that you are roleplaying your character the wrong way? My opinion is that they can't, just like it's difficult to know whether that silent PKer had a reason to kill you or not.

If your previous hunting buddy is now a synd' date=' takes my bounty, I'm not going to let him get away with the "It's just business". Maybe I'll act as if I befriend him again, but deep down, I'll always look for his back turned to me.[/quote']

That's dependant on character RP though. What if your character's personality was that he was a timid, fearful, easily influenced little fellow who gets convinved after death, half out of fear, half out of the Syndicate being silver-tongued, that they should become friends? That seems fine, in an RP sense, to me. There are sort of two sides to it - nothing wrong with being friends with people after they've killed you or anything similar to that if it's your character's RP to do so, but there is something wrong if it's not your character's RP to do so - but then, who is anybody else to say that it's NOT said character's RP to do so other than the player in question? I think that's what Wages is getting at.

@Questioner: Absolutely. Though keep in mind to an outsider that may not be readily apparant. That brings me to my point: To what extent can somebody else tell you that you are roleplaying your character the wrong way?

Agreed. To very little extent. No matter how you RP your character, you could do some drastic change to your character's personality and simply claim you were that way all along and that everything else was just a front, or otherwise.

Dey

It is hard to enforce rp and proper roleplay. This is because who really knows that that vampire will turn against all vampires and undeads? Or maybe that the syndicate that kills anyone who is a hopeful is really in alliason with knight in truth? I find it shameful that people whine that someone is not adhering to the coded rules and won't let someone rp there char they way they chose to be.

When all is said and done, this will never really apply to me, as I'm never actually going to be able to ever PK anyone to the point of me making them make OOC decisions to befriend me.

Dey

I agree with Behrens. Why? Because I think players do things assbackwards at times.

Doing something. Come up with a roleplay reason. As opposed to: Having a roleplay reason that forces you to do something.

Trust me. Our position in dealing with players has afforded us the opportunity to deal with a lot of situations where it is obvious that someone is justifying OOC ambitions using RP reasons. Usually these reasons are weak.

I always knew Johnny Syndi was a trash PKer. He likes to break up those healer tea parties.

A couple of you have compared my comments about Syndicate to silent PK. As Malch said, it is a case of taking something backwards.

Death is to be avoided. Your character doesn't know if he's ever coming back from another death. Knowing that is completely OOC.

A silent PKer has an RP reason (perhaps not a good one, and we as IMMs can take care of that) to not talk to someone who he killed. This doesn't mean he doesn't have an RP reason to kill them. Since death is to be avoided, and the first time a Syndicate kills you, you know that they are willing to put money above your death, and probably to kill without provocation or forewarning. Why would you be their friend ever again?

We are talking about death here. As a player you know you've got 61. As a character, it is a miracle that you have been granted a new life by your deity (or the forces of whatever if you're atheist/agnostic). Any RP (outside of undead/vamp who are kind of special cases) that accepts death without flinching is BAD.

I COMPLETELY agree that MOST of my characters would want to kick the living (&$#@#$###&^ out of any Syndi that took my bounty.

But sometimes.....revenge is a dish best served cold.... Like, "Yeah, I'll go with you...." and a halfway through Winter.....BAM! Or maybe when we're done...or maybe, just maybe, I might have to wait a few days because I was spanked so hard I'm not sure if I'm ready to face the mofo....

EDIT: Yes, I just read the rest of the thread. I realize I said a condensed version of something Deykari already said.....I'm tired....and I said something Deykari said.....oh, sweet mother Eshaine, help me!

A couple of you have compared my comments about Syndicate to silent PK. As Malch said, it is a case of taking something backwards.

Death is to be avoided. Your character doesn't know if he's ever coming back from another death. Knowing that is completely OOC.

A silent PKer has an RP reason (perhaps not a good one, and we as IMMs can take care of that) to not talk to someone who he killed. This doesn't mean he doesn't have an RP reason to kill them. Since death is to be avoided, and the first time a Syndicate kills you, you know that they are willing to put money above your death, and probably to kill without provocation or forewarning. Why would you be their friend ever again?

We are talking about death here. As a player you know you've got 61. As a character, it is a miracle that you have been granted a new life by your deity (or the forces of whatever if you're atheist/agnostic). Any RP (outside of undead/vamp who are kind of special cases) that accepts death without flinching is BAD.

Ok i will bite, with characters past i have rp'ed with Messalantha...now when a bounty is on my head she comes, i prepare and we fight to the death. Once or twice i have won, other times i have lost, and many times we have come to a draw on different characters of mine over the past year or so. Even if i lose though i continue to rp with her, and in some rp cases have made myself worth more alive than the bounty placed on me. Is this bad rp then? Because on some toons i might have hated her guts with every fiber, others saw the bounties as a neccesary inconvienence effecting the interactions between our characters.

And what of tribunal/justice...i played Syiara, a Justice elder elf. Now i took it as a sad, but neccesary task when a friend was wanted for a crime or commited a crime, my rp was i was doing them a favor. Even though i brought them down and had them torn to pieces on the wheel in the center of town, in my characters eyes this was a neccsary consequence to evils unjustly commited. Is it bad rp that after being jailed and or executed they do not turn on me all the time?

I admit whole heartedly that "going to your death" or surrendering to a bounty because "they will giv eyou your bag" is crap rp..all for the reasons you stated above...but the social interactions FORCED onto us by the wanted and bounty systems can be worked around...i know of a character right now that has managed to passify several of the current bounty hunters with negogiated deals...why is this bad rp? even though they started off hunting each other...

I think there should be 3 commands available to you at stun.

Whimper- Char whimpers endlessly as his/her life drains away.

Gurgle- char Gurgles blood as his/her life drains away slowly.

and finally end- With their last bit of strength, char draws a dagger from his/her belt and falls on the blade.

Yeah.....Bit of a tune up for implemintation but I like it. No more whining about Syndicates.

Heh, I think the point of the thread has kind of been lost. So I will attempt to get this back on track.

So the general feeling is this is a bad Idea because it could potentially be used for some bad RP. Honestly, there is going to be some bad RP no matter what. The imms have already said they take care of most of it.

You are supposed to be stunned and incapable of rational though, so perhaps eliminate the emotes, and allow only says. You can further this by automatically changing the say to an emote coughs up a bit of blood and says "". On top of perhaps allow only one per tick that you are stunned.

I wasnt actually refering to the bounty stunning either, though it could make for some good RP, I think more **** will come from that than nessessary. However after a challenge or being mercied? No one knows what the other character is going to do, there could be some damn good RP in there.

Like I said there will always be some bad RP but we still have the emotes right? Are we truly afraid of bad RP this badly? It is my honest oppinion that this kind of RP would add a beneficial element to the mud and it doesnt have to be limited to begging for your life. After a challenge it could be a "Job well done" just before your character passes out from exhaustion. I recently wittnesed a situation where a character had reason to stun another and speak with them and attempt to get them to do something, that would have been greatly reinforced if the victim could have responded, even with just a simple say command. I am sure this happens more than I alone can see and would serve to make such situations much better.

If avoiding death is the name of the game, how is it going to help your character stay alive by threatening or ignoring or just generally making it known you despise someone. If they just killed you for a bounty, you are not in a position of power. If you act in certain ways they may decide to start killing you more often, like when there isnt a bounty on your head, or when they see you weak etc etc etc...I think it can be good rp to forgive, if not forget. You already died once, thats bad, now how can you act to help you stay alive in the future? I just dont think it's as clear cut as

1)Syndi takes your head

2)You now have a new nemesis.

also, I think I understand the difference between RP and OOC, but I have trouble understanding how a character can benefit OOC...OOC is you, your char is IC, if he gets a nice set of eq, thats not an OOC gain. If your character forms a kind of truce with someone who has killed you before, or even if you have the syndicate leaving you alone except for bounties, how is that an OOC benefit? Also, isnt each character entitled to a learning curve? We dont always know how other are going to act, different people do different things all the time, so sometimes it takes a few things to happen before your character may finally say ok so and so is not good for me, time to start returning the favours, or the opposite, so and so and I can really help each other, I am gonna make sure never to backstab so and so. Even not getting revenge out of fear or desire for eq, how is that OOC? You personally are not afraid to leave the house, but when you log and see someone who has proven they can beat you, that is not OOC fear, that is IC fear, wouldnt you do what it takes to avoid more death? Of course, if someone rolls a char whos rp is that they are better than everyone and that they are some kind of one man wrecking crew badass, then yes it would be bad rp to show fear to anyone. But not everyone plays like that.

Oh, as for rping when stunned. I agree with whoever said that is you can do something when stunned arguably you could quaf a recall, or eat a pill, or summon a death head etc...Leave it as is, you lost, now wait for the d-blow or the lecture or wtv.

Oh' date=' as for rping when stunned. I agree with whoever said that is you can do something when stunned arguably you could quaf a recall, or eat a pill, or summon a death head etc...Leave it as is, you lost, now wait for the d-blow or the lecture or wtv.[/quote']

There is a huge difference in not being able to move and not being able to talk. Just because you can mannage to get a few half garbled words in does not mean you can search through a backpack, pull out a recall/teleport and get it to your mouth. Nor does speaking indicate you can concentrate enough to gather mana and use it in a spell (when stunned you have no mana and it wont start regenerating till you can move anyway.) Just a few counterpoints that everyone seems to have missed.

If you have been stunned, that is a hint that you:

a) Suck horribly and deserve to die

Your character has been beaten so bad that he is on the verge of unconsciousness

c) Stop posting threads that make absolutely no sense whatsoever and have no real bases of argument.

If you want to beg for mercy' date=' beg during the fight.[/quote']

Thank you for seeing the utter brilliance of my logic.