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Daryan_AT

If allowed i would like to ask a serious question about the rules

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I have the feeling it is quite obvious, but as i has a private talk this evening again about it, i would still like to ask. I do not wish this topic to be enflamed, it is not meant as a trolling topic, i hope we can all stay quite logic here.

There is a section in the rules book.

 

Play Nice Or We Will Rip Your Heart Out (griefing)
Definition: Activities that are not constructive and with deliberate intent to do harm to others.
A ) You may not block access to deeds, merchants, or structures not belonging to you.
B ) You may not call guards to kill penned animals on deeds you are not a citizen of. (They ain't hurting you!)
C ) You may not steal deeds from the original mayor or residing citizens.
 - resident citizens on democratic deeds may vote a new mayor for any reason.
D ) You may not intentionally create player traps. (i.e. Using siege shields to trap other players)

 

I do understand these, as 4 rules: A B C and D    correct?

Is the "play nice" rule, also a real rule by definition, or is this head line by fact only a fitting headline?

 

Of course, we do not play nasty if it is not a rule, but i wondered about this detail when i was reading the rule book. 

The other rules A B C and D are very clearly defined.

 

If "play nice" is also a real game rule, not just a common sense to live by, may i dare to say, i find this "rule" can be interpreted different from person to person?

 

Please, let'*s not create some hateful topic, let's stay civic with our words ?

If any moderator can answer, i would be very interested about opinions.

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This rule is pretty much a catch-all rule GMs use to address any issue they could not think of at the moment the rules were created. For example, someone could use a cart to phase to the inside of a fence and pick up a drake set from a chest they would not otherwise be able to.  Or someone drops dirt in front of someone's docks beaching all their boats in the process. Or a dude comes and parks all his caravels on your deed because they block his view, so he rather blocks yours.

 

Rules like these allow GMs to address unexpected situations by using a "catch all rule". Generally this applies to common sense actions which a reasonable person would say "Yeah that's a shitty move". On principle I don't like these rules because the person applying it can be completely subjective and their application is based on what the perception of morality the GM has at the time. Humans are quirky creatures, and its hard to predict what bothers one person and not another.

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Angelklaine's explanation is pretty spot on.  And the feelings behind it are pretty spot on as well.

 

Wurm Online is a huge world of possibilities and when you mix humans in the mix... well sometimes 2+2 doesn't come anywhere near to 4.

 

We would prefer to help all involved and to understand and explain any issues that are causing unrest.

Very rarely have we had to invoke this rule, and the few we have had to actually ban over it, wow... just....wow...

 

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I understand the need for this type of catch all rule, however, I do have a concern regarding where the line is. There are clear cut cases, im sure, where the everyone would agree that the perpetrator has crossed the line, however, there seems to be a huge gray area. A recent griefing event made public on the forum comes to mind that I am sure the gms had to think twice about (at least I hope they did) as it seemed to me that the player base was split on whether the “play nice” rule was violated.

 

I can see how making an air tight rule in a sandbox game like Wurm regarding these situations would be impossible, I do feel as though some improvements to the current iteration of the “play nice” rule could be made to shrink the gray area and narrow the line between playing nice and griefing.

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rules like this can be  expalined in this words aswell... so beware :P

 

<Enki> This is Freedom Isles, you must learn to ge along wiht your neighbors, collaborate, and adapt,  or leave for a new place or better yet leave to the PVP servers
<Enki> Since there is no viable way of sorting out your personal issues my judgementi s as follows
<Enki> maintian clear access, and get along with your neighbors,  or move.

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8 hours ago, Enki said:

Angelklaine's explanation is pretty spot on.  And the feelings behind it are pretty spot on as well.

 

Wurm Online is a huge world of possibilities and when you mix humans in the mix... well sometimes 2+2 doesn't come anywhere near to 4.

 

We would prefer to help all involved and to understand and explain any issues that are causing unrest.

Very rarely have we had to invoke this rule, and the few we have had to actually ban over it, wow... just....wow...

 


so mine around a deed, wait a unique break tiles and enter is not banneable?

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12 hours ago, Daryan_AT said:

Play Nice Or We Will Rip Your Heart Out (griefing)

 

The law and the spirit of the law... Because you can do something doesn't mean you should do it (or have to!)... and walk away freely from it.

 

The case went on for the RoS ninja-ing, the uniques penning, stealing, drama-ing and other shady business, we can also mention the terraforming of large areas against people will up to their deed border.

 

We used to have the freedom code of conduct and other guidelines that were quite useful and setting decent rules for all. We used to play nice(ish) without having hardcoded lines, we used to play without having borderline PvP behavior on the freedom servers.

 

THE golden rule remains "Do not do to others that which angers you when they do it to you (Isocrates)" ... so how many who jumped back and forth on that grey line are willing to say : yes I want to have my evening wasted, my cash wasted, my fun wasted and ruined because someone else decided to.

 

1 hour ago, tamat said:

so mine around a deed, wait a unique break tiles and enter is not banneable?

 

If the GMs says it's free game... which is apparently the case depending on the quotes from Enki some people like to spread out. Anyone will be allowed to mine all around a deed perimeter, cast AoE spells to get aggro from the unique and get it to mine straight toward you... and we are back to what I wrote above... Where do we draw the line?

Edited by Odynn
typos and stuff
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2 hours ago, McGarnicle said:

I understand the need for this type of catch all rule, however, I do have a concern regarding where the line is. There are clear cut cases, im sure, where the everyone would agree that the perpetrator has crossed the line, however, there seems to be a huge gray area. A recent griefing event made public on the forum comes to mind that I am sure the gms had to think twice about (at least I hope they did) as it seemed to me that the player base was split on whether the “play nice” rule was violated.

 

I can see how making an air tight rule in a sandbox game like Wurm regarding these situations would be impossible, I do feel as though some improvements to the current iteration of the “play nice” rule could be made to shrink the gray area and narrow the line between playing nice and griefing.

 

While I have access to see the GM inner-workings, I can't speak on this situation specifically. What I can say is that every time an issue like this comes up, it's quite rough for the team. On one hand, GMs are highly aware of the "sandbox" mentality of Wurm, and on the other there's the need to ensure everyone has a fair chance at having fun here. We can see this same gray area in real life with the idea of "the right to offend". On one hand, this usually encompasses the freedom of speech, and on the other it encompasses someone's right to live in peace.

 

Wurm is a weird microcosm of real life. It often takes a lot of "real life" time to accomplish things and there's often real feelings involved in every aspect of this game. You put so much of yourself into it that an attack on any aspect of what you've done feels like an attack on your person at times. Some might say "it's just a game", but that's a matter of perspective.

 

I'm not entirely sure what we could do to shrink this rule and make it more narrow. There's a history of people who read the rules and find loopholes to abuse. Not to make a joke of this, but I know a few "Wurmian Lawyers" out there. They make work out of interpreting the letter of the rules here and even sometimes dictate their interpretations back at the team.

 

Perhaps we need to be more transparent when this rule is invoked? If so, in what way? What information can be provided? Is it important to protect the offender as well as the victim, particularly in situations where both parties were injured but one crossed a line? I've seen a fair share of issues where miscommunication gave way to verbal attacks and slights, which gave way to rebuttals and retribution, resulting in grief and a mess for the team to sort out. I'm sure we'll want to protect both parties in this case, as both could be normally good people - just heated over something silly. It's also cases like this where I've seen the "Play Nice" rule used, usually against both parties. Whether punishments are handed out or not, the point is made.

 

TL;DR: I think this rule stands to make the point I just mentioned. It's more of a deterrent than something I see the GMs use frequently. If you know that "not playing nice" may spark the ire of the GM team, you'll be less likely to take a dispute to that next and unfortunate step. When it is used, it's used sparingly and with much thought and debate, careful to keep the spirit of a sandbox game and the player base in mind. Just because the game mechanics allow you to do something doesn't mean it's "playing nicely" to do so.

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I do understand the need for umbrella rule. But since some specific situations occur over and over again, there is need to set specific set of rules for them so everything is clear atleast if we can't do it by means of programming... Like uniques for example, what is being a ###### and what is having healthy competition, clearly those things need to be specified by higher authority shown by events and dramas tied to them in the past.

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I agree, we need some clear defined rules about this kind of thing to help stop it from continually being an issue, or to let us know how we are going to handle things like this in the future.

 

All we are asking for is clear rules to follow.

 

and I quote “Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”  ?

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It would seem to me that Rule A should apply to the practice of putting larger wood structures around other decaying structures to prevent access and restrict looting. Why does it not?

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30 minutes ago, Beanbag said:

It would seem to me that Rule A should apply to the practice of putting larger wood structures around other decaying structures to prevent access and restrict looting. Why does it not?

 

3 minutes ago, armyskin said:

It does. You can't block access to a building not owned by you.

But i guess the owner of building should appeal not another looter :D 

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28 minutes ago, kochinac said:

 

But i guess the owner of building should appeal not another looter :D 

What terrible logic regarding rules

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1 minute ago, Beanbag said:

What terrible logic regarding rules

That would be an example of wurm layering as Enki said :D It raises quite the questions. Is person guilty for lockpicking such fence, why would be, but also, seriously why would fence around someones house bother you if you don't own the house, it's quite legitemate canandrom.

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The problem with putting out rules for every conceivable situation is that we quickly end up with a massive, unwieldy pile of rules, that the determined griefer can find holes in.  So we patch the hole with more rules, and the problem repeats, getting worse every time around.  Wurm is not a static game, so the specific situations we as a team would prefer not to see evolve over time.  This means that maintaining such a set of rules becomes a full time job in itself.  Which leads to ever moving goalposts for what's acceptable and what's not, and ultimately, the people that get caught out tend to be the innocent mistakes rather than the determined rule-breakers.

 

It's far better to allow some scope for moderation teams to use their own judgement within a framework.  We do have internal guidance for the various teams about how to handle the nuances, and we do have review processes in place to ensure that decisions stand up.  Serious actions in all but the most obviously serious cases tend to be taken after some internal discussion.  Most rule infractions are not black and white, but rather fall into shades of grey, and dealing with that is far better done by humans thinking about what they're doing than blind application of a (byzantine) set of rules.

 

To misquote Churchill, it's not a perfect system, but it's better than all the other ones we've tried.

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Epic is the true sandbox that wurm was meant for, where the players rule themselves, if your neighbour griefs you, you go kill him. If you can't kill him, you got other options:

Political - You could bring it up with your alliance and get votes/him her removed
Money - Pay somebody to kill them or for them to leave you alone
Allies - Bring your friends down and be like oi m8 gtfo

 

on Freedom: Get a gm cause you can't do ANYTHING.

 

I believe Freedom is not a sandbox because you need rules to make sure you're fine. You limit players actions. You limit the possibilities. You play 50% of the game. 
On Epic I don't think I ever had to call a GM over to Serenity or Desertion on another player, because we all dealt with it ourselves. 

We had a guy steal the Forest Giant corpse at a slaying and we had to deal with a bigger alliance ourselves to get it back (which we did) 

No big group wants a home server war and no neighbour wants a neighbourhood battle, it was all great.

 

Wurm is Politics, being social and not being hand held. 

Don't cry about the wordings of rules that pretty much Freedom requires because you're all soft. Try going Epic, you'll find it much less drama and barely any rules outside of cheating/macroing and meta gaming and with that you will worry less about the wording of rules because you deal with it yourself.

Freedom? More like Restriction. Should really get that name changed.

 

Edited by Mclavin
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2 hours ago, Beanbag said:

It would seem to me that Rule A should apply to the practice of putting larger wood structures around other decaying structures to prevent access and restrict looting. Why does it not?

 

2 hours ago, armyskin said:

It does. You can't block access to a building not owned by you.

People do it and seem to get away with it even, one of the worst things I've seen people do on freedom recently.

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As niki said very popular way of solving things now on freedom.

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Sandbox is in the eye of the beholder.  Rules are needed, but staff discretion is needed as well.  Too many computer-chair-lawyers as it is.  :)

 

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Edited by Amadee

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19 hours ago, Daryan_AT said:

Play Nice Or We Will Rip Your Heart Out (griefing)
Definition: Activities that are not constructive and with deliberate intent to do harm to others.

A-B-C-D "rules are really just examples of the above "definition". It seems to me that since the GM's form a consensus about these situations that are more significant, that they are handled well by them. If some GM has a personal issue with someone (which I think rarely influences them in these circumstances) the rest add their input and nullify any individual prejudice that might arise.

 

More so the real problem here are the individuals who push these rules to the edge of acceptability and then play innocent of any intent to harass others with their actions. Then to them whatever guidelines that exist become unclear, vague, hard to understand or just GM's exerting their power unreasonably, while they feign innocence of any wrongdoing. The GM's are the authority in these types of situations and if you can't accept their decisions then get out. The game will be better off without you certainly and few will miss your presence. The GM's show much more patience in dealing with these types of individuals than I ever could, so I am quite content to let them deal with these miscreants and the problems that they create for others.

 

I've said it before, most players never have problems with these rules or GM interventions within their game experience. If they do most can accept their judgements and realize that they just made a mistake, possibly unintentionally. The "Definition" above is just to make it clear that these types of individuals won't be tolerated within the game. This is a good thing for everyone else.

 

=Ayes=

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I think the umbrella rule is a good idea,
but it should be extended at an soft way, more like a guideline and not as hard rules.

(So GMs will still have space to work and players have an idea how to behave onself.)

 

And inside the guideline should be "gray zone problems" added and made be clear, if they trigger oner or more of these:

- they often apper                     

  (If the guidline is clear the GMs should solfe es with less stress and worktime.)

- involve many player               

  (The problem could be grow fast and makes a lot of trouble, maybe involve other players too than.)

- making a toxic mood/spirit

  (Ever player with an taxic mood could be a player leaving the game, thats really bad for the game.)

  (As special note: The players are leaving are mostly not the player that start toxic actions, but they countinue with it ....)

Any added entry should have an generell example and the reasons/design choises why it is a bad idea to do this.

 

With these the players old or new can see the way why they exists and it could be talked in other threads about it,

this cant be happen if nobody know why it it a bad idea.

(Maybe a forum section with one thread for any guidline?)

Not every players has the same ethics and can understand without a reason why a guidline was been made.

 

In an other point GMs and his assistends could say: "Hey what you are make is not good, you can see an example in the guildine why it is and can we now talk about a solution.".

 

 

And i think Mclavin is right, the most problems accour becouse PvE has player limitations that PvP dont have,

but just for the PvE play itself is is good have these limitations.

The only problem with it is that the game/GMs needs to solve the problems that come with them.

 

 

 

Other theme:

Not sure if something exists becouse im more rare at forum.

 

It could be helpfull to have something similar for often ask questions.

Like an FAQ about design choises like : "Why cant be an PvE Kingdom created?".

 

 

Sry for all the gramma and syntax fails ...., plz ask if something is not clear.

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