Captured PCs - What should be done?

[DeathRose52]

My personal feelings is that.... Yes it would suck hard if you got perma kill. All that time you put into a character and so on but it is a risk in the game to start with. People that get captured who has say "Murder" someone, well they should get smacked with some kind of hard punishment. Now i know you dont want to Perma because time put in but perhaps....
You could strip them of their gear and money? You dont destory their characters at all but it does hurt because some that gear isn't easy to get, it would take time to earn it all back, specaily with the prices of the higher end gear. Or maybe a EXP slap depending on the crime at hand.
Really i dont know what to suggest, it a hard call. If Perma-Death is called for, so be it.

[Jai_V]

I actually agree with TBS on the whole no players capturing players without DM presence, and I think that's the best way to handle this whole hot mess.

Maybe that seems a little unfair to the people that want to be in the Legion, rolling around and slapping the shiney convict bracelets on doers of lawless deeds, but think about it this way: In reality, when you arrest someone, you can't hold them indefinitely. There's a whole legal process. And since we don't have mundane PCs that play full-time judges, barristers (though we do seem to have a part-time gnome barrister), etc, then that process is aborted. And I realize this is a medieval fantasy setting, and you could argue that the wheels of justice are greased with the blood of the allegedly guilty, but my analogy had more to do with the process being overseen by someone with a higher authority rather than just being player-enacted and player-controlled.

Also, things to consider: An evil character might snitch out another evil character to worm his way out of confinement, he/she may plan a daring escape, or simply "pay a fine" (re: bribe) some official when appropriate.

Either way, capturing should be the purview of the DMs. Period. Just my $0.02

[cdnspr]

On capture / imprisonment by another character:

I think pcs should be able to capture / imrison other pc's without dm supervision. I'd like to think we can all engage in mutually-satisfying rp without mommy and daddy holding our hands, but unfortunately, this isn't always the case. While I don't think the dm should have to be around during the actual arrest, they should really give it their attention as soon as possible. If they can't, then the pc should be free after a few days.

I have the above opinion because of a little incident I was involved in on another server. My character got arrested on suspicion of extortion and assault by a guard-type pc who was pretty much free to do whatever he wants because the player had been around since the server's start and i guess some dms liked him. No charges were ever formally laid, no court date was ever set, and I was indefinitely held prisoner by this player because the legal system was this player's little sandbox. After a couple weeks RL, a dm (who incidentally felt the alleged crimes were BS) asked me about how the process was going, and was shocked to find out i was still in prison with zero progress: "What? You're still in there?".

Incidents like that are, in my opinion, why dms need to be involved in the immediate aftermath of arrests.

[Urithrand]

I feel that I need to delve deeper into something here so I can understand peoples' logic. You guys who are dead set against Perma - What are you hoping to get out of your character?

Do you hope to play your character forever and ever until you get bored of him/her and stop playing them on your own terms?

Do you intend to one day have them perma'd on your own terms?

Do you intend to have them one day retire in wondrous glory and settle down to have lots of sex and babies?

What is it that drives you, if not the desire to have an exciting and climactic end?

I would also pose you another question - do you find it upsetting when you complete a single player game? Playing BioShock, or Dragon Age or Baldur's Gate, what did you do when you finished the game? Did you throw your mouse against the wall furiously because of the amount of time you'd spent playing, all gone to waste now because the game is over? All those hours spent levelling and grinding for nothing - or at least nothing in as much as your Sundren-formed logic goes.

Just satisfy my curiosity

[grant]

I don't know, I may just be blowing smoke, but if people saw more NPC's facing the noose/chopping block or trials by combat, would it soften the occasional escape/slap on the wrist a PC gets?

[DeathRose52]

I'll answer them questions granted im for Perma-death... yet i still wouldn't be happy in some terms.

When playing a character, It basicly the time and effort put in to try change things or put on a damn good story with other people. If say, Varn was to die in a Vampire war at their estate, I'd like to go out in flying colors or at lest something that the character would be remembered by others for. Just not being able make a impact somewhere, even in death, well just sucks to be honest. If varn was die out in the woods, no one to know... or him disappear into the night.. well frenkly everyone be at a lost to what happen. Not a way i like to go.
Problem is, i think alot people are that way. I put time in, i want go out with a bang in the end, i've earned it. Games like, say DA:O, sure after im done their nothing left to do but damn it was a good story from the start of being a Dwarf that got outcasted (which i played) to the very saving of the world even though it cost me my life. But what a story. Wasn't like i got killed mid way in the woods by a gnoll, god that would suck. ha.
Other thing is, Those's games vs this one... this one eats up alot of time. Sure ME2 suck 30 hours out you, but this one as we seen with *Cough* Cirion *Cough* can take a hell alot longer.

[Urithrand]

Needless to say, we don't factor in the amount of time someone has spent in the AFK room to our decisions as to whether someone is eligable for permadeath.

[gbbishop]

I have to say that i agree with prismatic to a point.

BUT i have a few quidproquos... or what ever they are...

Amicable permadeath between PCs can happen but only if there is communication. I also believe that having a DM present or at least conscious of events, goes a long way for smoothness as well.

There was a great quote that sometimes your part in the story is over before you would like it to be thus, and another that said I am not telling MY story but A story.. might have been the same post but I can't be arse to go back and look. I am already sick of reading this thread. But these are GREAT points.

This is supposed to be about having fun. It is not "fun" to get hoodwinked by a bunch of rival faction members while you are with out any back up because of log times etc...

I have said this before and I will probably have to say it again, communication is key! If you wanna "perma" some one start talking with them. Don't want to give up the element of surprise jump them, cap them, then talk with them. Explain where your character is coming from, find out where there's is coming from.

Together you can create a story that is far better than any you will make on your own this I promise you!

So to wrap up i don't think you can make a blanket rule that will make everyone all snuggly. Permadeath SHOULD happen!

It might sting a bit at first but if things are talked out and explained before hand I think everything tends to work out well.

With communication you will find two kinds players:

One those who really don't want their toons to die "just cuz they are attached" or have "yet to tell their story" will quickly be revealed and left to "tell their stories" ALONE because people will not want to play with them any more.

Two those that like to craft good stories will be revered by both enemies and friends. They will TELL good stories and develop good rivalries/comraderies and have fun while contributing to the "group narrative."

dammit! one additional thought why not offer a reward for "playing along?" some sort of legacy reward....

Say Bob the Unsinkable is nabbed by Umberleans and is tied up and indeed sunk to the depths of the abyss. Say bob's player has put in 4 RL days. Perhaps "willing" that time (or some of that time) to a new toon would help salve the hurt of "loosing" that time.

[GodBeastX]

Alright, I think this is an easy fix then.

Couple Proposals.

Players cannot take others into custody who would may be executed without consent unless a DM enacts the capture. (Notice I didn't say a DM oversees it because I don't think players should be begging to perm other players).

We'll just say they didn't come quietly and you had to put them down

If people are causing trouble in civil areas, stealing, fighting, etc. I still think they should have a cool off period. We may have to implement an automated system that locks them up and lets them go when their time is up for jails and such.

Another option is to amend murder rules to handle if someone is resurrected. Maybe, because life isn't fully lost, it can be treated as an attempted murder instead so that they get a lesser punishment. Maybe they have to "Pay" for the resurrection in some way. Maybe 3x the price of a res + jail time. If you can't afford it, added jail time. Since no player wants to perm themselves from being killed by other players, we'll likely only see murders against NPCs and attempted murders against PCs.


Just some ideas.

[cdnspr]

I think certain individuals are becoming too impassioned by this thread. This is an open discussion. Please, leave your attitudes at the door.

[Gurkak]

Permadeath & Impact

In the end the question is why is permanent death (ie: real death), or permanent imprisonment an issue? The answer boils down to one simple answer -- impact. When one's character does not have an impact (whatever that may be) on the server players don't like it.

This cuts to the heart of a major issue on PWs; that being the dumbing-down of what a D&D player character is -- a superhuman. Collectively we're not portraying Joe Schmoe; we're portraying persons of such ability and potency that they have to really try not to change the world around them or by their very actions they will. Be that an effective indifference, worsening, or betterment depends on what happens at the table so to speak.

Typing for myself, I can only say that I view permadeath as an important and superb tool. Without risk there can be no gain. Without the chance of failure there is no sweet nectar of victory; however, the punishment should have the potential to produce a similarly grand reward. If your character may be expunged from existence and pulled from the playing table of the server you should have the opportunity to have an impact on the server. The impact is the reward, what form it takes would depend on the situation but examples are: spurs the writing of a saga about the character, causes an uprising/civil war, has a deep impact on the character's companions causing them to greater acts of heroism, or etc.

In the same spirit a player character should not suffer the risk of removal from the table unless they are actually moving towards an impact on the environment around them. For example, Character X that generally just talks around the campfire then grinds who suddenly gets in a scuffle with Faction PC Y, and Faction PC Y decides they should come and kill them because of this(permanently) is not a good death. There's not real impact there, not in reality. Once more in the end it's risk versus reward and -- impact. In the end it's the impact of the situation, the risk versus reward that is the key factor that should be on Player's and Dungeon Master's minds.

I'm going to use one of my characters from another server as an example here. I had an extraordinarily powerful magus who had apprentices, followers, and connections whose presence could turn the tide of a conflict(literal as in PvP, or not so as in diplomatic) in the favor of whatever side he was on. I had put years of real life time into this character who went from TN to LG due to in-game events amongst many other things; I realized however that he was a stagnating force on the server. So, I decided to have him die. He choked on an oversized seed from his favorite snack, dates. Not very epic, but humorous and this end lead to assumptions of foul play by the current governmental regime(who wanted him dead), dancing around at his funeral by one particular arch-nemesis who went from a minor annoyance to a major thorn due to follower gains from the few who believed him. This was amongst many other changes and was a good death because it furthered the story of server and created change, and that's the spice of life. Routine should never be a large portion of our gaming experience. In my years of playing D&D I've come to the following conclusion as to why people play D&D -- to escape the routine! To play something fantastical, to leave behind the mundanity for a time.

For those of you who do not want your character to die for whatever reason, but most especially because the impact they have is not what you wanted should consider that this is a collaborative process with many other Players and Dungeon Masters beside yourself. It's not the story of my character it's the story of Sundren; of which your character happens to be a part. True, your character is a superhuman member of an extreme minority in the population but you're competing with other superhumans who may negate or turn the force of your intended goal to another angle. This unexpectedness is more or less the fun in itself, just roll with. See what happens, don't get tied up in some preset idea of what the character would/will do -- let them react to their environment, and most importantly change based on that interaction.

On the topic of impact it needn't always be obtuse. I'll use the TV series Supernatural here; therefore, we're all playing Sam and Dean Winchesters and whether or not the common man knows of our characters and their deeds does not change the fact they are(or at least should) be affected by them directly or indirectly. Their deeds are however known amongst the other "hunters" and their enemies..

Foremost on the mind of any interactee Player or Dungeon Master should always be those around you and the fun of others, not yourself. Do unto your fellows better than you'd have done unto yourself(OOCly of course ) and try to further the entire story not just your character's.

In closing, I'd say the above is the real issue in question and go further to say that the focus needs to be more on the PCs and less on the NPCs they happen to interact with as due to sheer numbers of sapien thought behind them PCs are far more dynamic and thus beneficial to the server.

/steps off the soap box.

[GodBeastX]

Not to be a jerk or anything, Gurkak, but you kind of contradict yourself in your post. Part of it you say there should be risk and you should be playing for other people's enjoyment, but then you say unless the player is making impact, they shouldn't suffer any risk or the enjoyment of others becomes second place.

This is where the headache that is being a DM comes into play. Essentially I'm getting a big feeling from alot of people "It doesn't matter what I do, when I die it should be on my terms." And that hurts me and a lot of people around the person.

I've said this in other posts, so I'll say it here. While I agree that P&P everyone is super human and impacts only affect a small group of people, we're in a world with hundreds of people coming in and playing and different rulesets. Where in P&P you've gone through plots and stories, directly making impacts every step of the way, in a PW you have grinding, chatting, and tons of things you never will see in P&P. So while P&P every character makes and impact, in PW every character won't.

So let me give you an example. A character comes into Aquor and starts nuking NPCs and burning buildings. Some players from the Sundren Military catch him and toss him into a cell. By your logic, unless he made an impact, we (that being anyone not the player) shouldn't be able to perm, execute, or otherwise impede his play until the impact is made.

Now your reply might be "Hey, if he does something dumb like that, he should have expected it." but what people find dumb is relative just like what people find epic or impacting. Everyone has their own views of what is awesome RP and what is crappy. So, like the real world, where do my rights end and yours begin?

Do players have the right to do whatever in the world until they're satisfied that they've made a sufficient impact and then everyone else can go to hell around them? What about the people who do tons of RP setting up allies, temples, changes to a city, and one player comes in and burns it all down. Are they to be untouchable because it's not enough for them? They just stomped all over someone else's play.

I do agree that play should be for other's benefit and that's why this whole situation is a big frustration for me, because whose benefit is more important? Attacker or Defender? Red or Blue? Yours, hers, or bob's?

And at what point does enjoyment of the DM also factor in? It's not fun to get pissed off players messaging me all the time when it's a no-win scenario for me. How great is it to have some bad guy crap all over something and have to say to someone like Peridan, "Sorry, you can't do anything about that character, because he's not done writing his epic story." or any other person on that side of the field. Or how about the other direction. A soldier puts someone to death and I go to the dead guy's allies, "Sorry, that soldier doesn't want to die yet, so you just have to sit there." At this point are we writing stories or just simply existing? And the backlash for all of this doesn't come to the player in jail, or the player escaping, or the people who stuck him in prison, it all comes on my shoulders as a DM.

In P&P DMs get a fun experience in running a plot for everyone because everyone is after the same goal. You cannot ever compare the input and output from the session to P&P when on a PW, because not everyone has the same goal or even similar and not everyone has the opportunity to accomplish whatever they want.

This is the essence of this post. It's not about how much people love their characters, but it's about when does your right to be free and causing conflict come to a close? So far most people have said "never". How fair is that?

Edit:

And people get permed in P&P against their will all the time. I've been killed in Living FR adventures quite a few times.

[Phantom Lamb]

Another option is to amend murder rules to handle if someone is resurrected. Maybe, because life isn't fully lost, it can be treated as an attempted murder instead so that they get a lesser punishment. Maybe they have to "Pay" for the resurrection in some way. Maybe 3x the price of a res + jail time. If you can't afford it, added jail time. Since no player wants to perm themselves from being killed by other players, we'll likely only see murders against NPCs and attempted murders against PCs.

This is forcing a square peg into a round hole, IMO. We're trying to get away from forced, unnatural situations for DMs, but this is along the same lines as what is currently in place (the "oops they escaped" routine).

I believe DMs should behave just like PNP DMs for these situations. DMs should just make judgement calls on 1) was the PVP handled within our rules 2) what should capture rewards / punishments be. I'd really rather not do weird re-writes of captures just to accommodate.

Anyway, I have a proposal on the staff side that we can hopefully review. It takes most everything into consideration here and isn't really a big change. It just empowers DMs to make judgement calls in these capture situations.

[ParadoxicalAnonymity]

So far most people have said "never". How fair is that?

I'd like to say this is a gross exaggeration of the reality. I could go through and tally all the general consensus, and post results; I think it's still clear that the majority has actually endorsed the idea of factors that force a player to an ending, whether it be perma-death or harsh incarcerations.

I can only assume this comment is pigeonholed into the minority, in fact. Whether right or wrong in the opinions people have, this honestly seems like a really large misinterpretation of the majority who have chimed in.

Because I was sincerely surprised by the amount of people that welcome perma-death.

[Gurkak]

Not to be a jerk or anything, Gurkak, but you kind of contradict yourself in your post. Part of it you say there should be risk and you should be playing for other people's enjoyment, but then you say unless the player is making impact, they shouldn't suffer any risk or the enjoyment of others becomes second place.

This is where the headache that is being a DM comes into play. Essentially I'm getting a big feeling from alot of people "It doesn't matter what I do, when I die it should be on my terms." And that hurts me and a lot of people around the person.

I've said this in other posts, so I'll say it here. While I agree that P&P everyone is super human and impacts only affect a small group of people, we're in a world with hundreds of people coming in and playing and different rulesets. Where in P&P you've gone through plots and stories, directly making impacts every step of the way, in a PW you have grinding, chatting, and tons of things you never will see in P&P. So while P&P every character makes and impact, in PW every character won't.

So let me give you an example. A character comes into Aquor and starts nuking NPCs and burning buildings. Some players from the Sundren Military catch him and toss him into a cell. By your logic, unless he made an impact, we (that being anyone not the player) shouldn't be able to perm, execute, or otherwise impede his play until the impact is made.

Now your reply might be "Hey, if he does something dumb like that, he should have expected it." but what people find dumb is relative just like what people find epic or impacting. Everyone has their own views of what is awesome RP and what is crappy. So, like the real world, where do my rights end and yours begin?

Do players have the right to do whatever in the world until they're satisfied that they've made a sufficient impact and then everyone else can go to hell around them? What about the people who do tons of RP setting up allies, temples, changes to a city, and one player comes in and burns it all down. Are they to be untouchable because it's not enough for them? They just stomped all over someone else's play.

I do agree that play should be for other's benefit and that's why this whole situation is a big frustration for me, because whose benefit is more important? Attacker or Defender? Red or Blue? Yours, hers, or bob's?

And at what point does enjoyment of the DM also factor in? It's not fun to get pissed off players messaging me all the time when it's a no-win scenario for me. How great is it to have some bad guy crap all over something and have to say to someone like Peridan, "Sorry, you can't do anything about that character, because he's not done writing his epic story." or any other person on that side of the field. Or how about the other direction. A soldier puts someone to death and I go to the dead guy's allies, "Sorry, that soldier doesn't want to die yet, so you just have to sit there." At this point are we writing stories or just simply existing? And the backlash for all of this doesn't come to the player in jail, or the player escaping, or the people who stuck him in prison, it all comes on my shoulders as a DM.

In P&P DMs get a fun experience in running a plot for everyone because everyone is after the same goal. You cannot ever compare the input and output from the session to P&P when on a PW, because not everyone has the same goal or even similar and not everyone has the opportunity to accomplish whatever they want.

This is the essence of this post. It's not about how much people love their characters, but it's about when does your right to be free and causing conflict come to a close? So far most people have said "never". How fair is that?

Edit:

And people get permed in P&P against their will all the time. I've been killed in Living FR adventures quite a few times.

I'll attempt to clarify here what I meant by impact as you seem to be drastically inflating my meaning and letting the section about the aforementioned TV series escape your notice as well as the fact that the minor list of three possible outcomes were not all drastic server-wide impacts; one in case of point was limited to the companions of the character.. If you're willing I'd request a re-read or two of my prior post. This is especially shown in the non sequitur of your post where you say "by your logic" that was not, case in point once more, my logic. As tone does not come through well when typing, please note mine is amicable and discussionist, and that is all.

The impact needn't be massive, but it has to be there. In your example if a PC(lets call him Jim) walks into a town and starts blasting the event only occured if a DM was there to properly show the town's/city's defenders getting together to attack them and people running for cover etctera. It didn't happen otherwise. Events like that case require DM invtervention to have ever officially occured; therefore, if it has not officially occured it effectively did not. With that as a given, their character's impact will be summed up in a footnote that makes the local paper such as,"Crazed maniac attacks Aquor, 30 dead; attacker slain by brave Private Smith". Of course, this is only an example response to the given scenario. But if NPCs are involved a DM needs to be there otherwise it's rather silly as living people are effectively a rock not reacting to what is going on... This returns to the section in my prior post about characters who attempt to make an impact -- if they're not trying, they don't make it. If they're not trying, they shouldn't have the option to permanently die or make an impact. Now how much of an impact is what varies given the situation, effort, creativity, etcetera.

A player should accept the possibility of the most extreme negative, permanent character death, for the chance to affect the server. They go hand-in-hand but without the possiblity of a real impact then it shouldn't occur. It's a risk versus reward. The main issue is that people need to come in accepting this and not go whine when they get the risk-stick not the reward-stick, or, if they get a different reward-stick boon than expected/sought.