Enabling Conflict

[Azi]

Hi I'm Azi! My main is super lawful and invested in everyone being good and getting along.

But also maybe since we just got a new recommend qualifier added - Enabling conflicts to continue - maybe we can discuss some fun and not sucky ways to keep antagonism alive! I'm going to post my own opinions and I'd like to establish right here that I'm not intending to target anyone (especially not you, you scamp!).

We can avoid going too easy:
I remember when Galen's player and I first started playing on TI we were sort of surprised at how hard it was to play a struggling Freeman because of how easy money comes and how helpful everyone is. "Everyone too helpful" is not nearly the worst problem to have, but it does kinda gum up someone's character concept and deny them the sort of RP that they like (overcoming struggles). Especially if they looked at the big discrimination warnings in the chargen nanny list of races and still chose to play one of those races, for example.

We can also avoid going too hard:
The other thing that tends to throw a wrench in the works is when people crank up the law enforcement up to 11 over minor crimes, ostracize people, or make their characters unplayable for getting caught out trying to rock the boat at all. Reeves, for example, join the Reeves to participate in Reeve RP; if they scorch the earth over every pickpocket, no one's going to want to enable that side of the RP for them and they'll suddenly find themselves complaining of boredom!

I get that sometimes it's exciting because of our limited playerbase - when you see a crime mood or hear of something wicked, you jump on that RP hook and you ride it hard. But we (lawfuls) don't have to win every encounter - I've OOCly let mages go just because it would be boring and suck really hard if I'd caught them at that time; I got really excited once and brought a mage in after catching him wilderness evoking and just kind of felt crappy about it after. The ones I let go eventually got the pyre, but after much more satisfying stories with exciting resolutions. Just look at what happened with Jemven (log's in the fanfic section)! People put a lot of work into their characters, so please burn (literally or figuratively) responsibly. This game is very lawful-biased and we need to cherish our villains, our shitty furniture, and our manure smell.

We can forgive mistakes:
I can't entirely blame anyone for being too zealous in stamping out crime, corruption, self-serving behaviour, etc; I think there's a very real fear that if you ever "fail" it'll dog your character for ever - I've been on the receiving end of this. There's a lot of pressure to be perfect, but perfect is super bland. The best thing we can do is try to recall that thanks to time compression, our characters will at any given moment have forgotten 4x as much as us, and things will stop stinging 4x as quickly for them. Blood feuds and grudges are great until you've barred all avenues for someone and effectively socially PK'd them; it's good to try to only keep feuds alive if they're creating RP and not stonewalling it. In improv, it's poor form to say "no" and leave your RP partner with no cues or direction to take. =) And if someone keeps giving second chances and engaging with an antagonist, don't hold it against them.

Also:
This is more a personal pet peeve, but it's uncomfortable sometimes when people make awkwardly sincere attempts to smack each other down or hurt a character's feelings, and sometimes it does come across that they're trying to make the player so upset that they leave the game. I know OOC separation is expected, but we're still trying to make this a fun game and not miserable for anyone who wants to play with us (also a lot of the whole You Need To Not Have Feelings ARE YOU HARD ENOUGH TO PLAY TEXT GAMES ON THE INTERNET WITH US is dumb and part of the worst side of MUD culture and I hate it). My own personal rules are:

1. I try to let people know they can send me a tell if I need to tone down the uhh... creative insults, which was important as Haizea. I think I didn't do this well enough the first time, and it feels crappy to know anyone might have been up at night over it. We're pretty good at making people feel comfortable enough that they can hit "graphic" or say "I'm not having fun" - but a lot of times it's kind of nerve-wracking and embarrassing to admit you're uncomfortable. It's literally never hurt to check in with someone and make sure they were okay in a scene. Non-consent doesn't mean you have to put up with being miserable.

2. I try to keep it within the realm of "this wouldn't be totally awkward to watch on TV." - If TI were a movie playing on TV and I'd change the channel over what was going on in a scene, there's probably a better direction for me to take the RP in. You don't have to go full comicbook cartoonish like I like to do, but even in gritty dramas, needlessly gratuitous language and violence is just a sign of a poor writer. TRUST ME IM WRITE COMIC BOOK's FOR MY FOOD.

Anyway, I'm interested in hearing what others think - this is basically just a self-serving wishlist.

[Pixie]

I tend to pretty strongly feel that people let things skirt by too often, and tend to make allowances for ages and ages before putting the smack down. Even the wildest troublemakers get away with a great, great deal, often for hugely long periods of time (sometimes OOC years). I've only ever really seen somebody get executed for two reasons, for example: Magery (expected) and pushing the lawmakers and other "good" types so far for so long that they had no other option than to put them down. This is usually after literal years have passed and countless, obvious "HELLO, I AM HERE TO CAUSE SERIOUS TROUBLE" points were repeatedly glossed over. I would love, love, love for the setting to be far harder than it is (I have this imaginary scenario in my head where troublemakers get craftier as a result!) but I completely understand that it's tough to impossible for lawmakers and other leadership types to balance creating widespread fun and adhering to that preference (if it's even a preference they share! Depends on the player).

That said: Conflict isn't just accomplished by antagonists being antagonistic. The backlash that comes back at them from the "good guys" is also conflict; it's just conflict the antagonist is having to deal with, rather than creating him or herself. That's an important thing to remember. The antagonist's conflict is not better than the backlash conflict just because they're the "bad" guy.

Onto feelings!

The people behind the screens will always have feelings and we should, as fellow human beings, treat a typist like we would any other person. What we're doing is inventing a story, however, with fictional characters even less tangible than a paper doll. There are some who handle IC criticism and backlash a lot better than others. I can cycle back and forth, sometimes, but usually default on "this is a few kilobytes of text and does not pertain to me as a real life human being." I have absolutely had some residual hurt feelings after some IC run-ins, but I would feel confident asserting that the MUD is not equipped to counsel us through an inability to divide real feelings from imaginary feelings -- It's a responsibility that lies with each individual player. Putting division between OOC and IC is a thing that each person must do for themselves, and we can't expect the game setting or playerbase (who are all very friendly people) to either fix it for us or change IC behavior that is contextually appropriate, solely to sate us.

While I can't speak for everyone, one thing really stood out and startled me in the original post. I'd counter it: The point behind going after someone else's character is not challenging them to deal with it on an OOC level to prove they're "hard" enough to play with you. That's an odd and sort've twisted concept I never would've even... conceived of being a thing. We can't both celebrate conflict and label it OOC elitism.

In closing...

As a player who absolutely loves it here, I want everyone to feel welcome to play TI, but in order to do that it does require... playing TI. It's a difficult, adult medieval world where people are viewed certain ways based upon their actions or, sometimes, something as simple as the way we chose to make our characters look or behave. Sometimes characters get slammed for things that that are wholly imaginary; just because it makes a juicy rumor. This is not an OOC attack upon a player, but a symptom of world simulation.

...And it's good to remember that for all the conflict X player creates, player Y backlashing against them is an equally valid form of conflict.

[Azi]

I think the whole "you need to be TOUGH if you want to play with US" mentality is (unfortunately) a pretty common thing in MUDs - TI's really good about it, though, and that's part of why I like it here. The staff check up on new players who are having a bad time to make sure they're not having TOO bad a time and stuff, and it's nice.

Backlash is definitely valid, and people do certainly get framed or just put in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that's legit - the problem that I'd like to poke at is that sometimes it seems there's no bouncing back and it becomes more appealing to start a new character (not avoiding warrants or jail, just rather not spend fun time that way when i got stardew valley over here).

It sucks when there's no dip and rise in your character's storyline, they just flop around trying to get anything done before they're demolished. Maybe something to work on as a community is making sure that RP extends out to the targets? The revenge book and the new recommend crit will help, I think, and I know sometimes it does take a weirdly long time to get a big bad character who's already established out, but my admittedly limited experiences have been kind of a bummer with regards to feeling paralyzed early on.

That being said, I know not everything has to be for everyone and I wouldn't demand that everyone change their preferred RP style just to accommodate me if it is just me and a couple other players. I will happily retire from rocking boats, but I often hear from staff that we are constantly in need of antagonist characters.

[Pixie]

Rocking the boat is fantastic, and it creates a situation where two sides are able to generate conflict for one another.

I think there's a stigma against people throwing conflict back at antagonists, though, as if that weren't an equally valuable thing. Not saying you're part of that stigma, just that it feels like it exists, in general, game-side. The Justiciar staging a campaign to hunt down an antagonist criminal is as great a conflict-driver (for the antagonist) as what the antagonist provided the Reeves by being a criminal -- very simplistic example, but you get what I mean? I get uneasier and uneasier the more we inadvertently discourage lawful conflict-generation. They're still making waves, just from the other side.

Discussion and leeway has always looked like a great way to generate story for both sides, to me (even though I said above that I'd love to see things be harsher and harder, the point stands that making reasonable and rational allowances is awesome). I tend to be involved in veeeery little conflict, for my part. I just watch it go down. But some of the most amazing story arcs I've witnessed involved antagonists and "good guys" giving each other leeway -- not just the good guys to the antagonist, but both ways. I've gotten a little off-topic and have started repeating myself, but... the would-be hero of the story should be equally enabled to act and act decisively against antagonists, the same way we enable antagonists to antagonize the crap out of the would-be hero. It's all conflict, and it's all useful!

I'm not sure how to handle it being easier to restart with a new character, rather than leap into the delicious mess one created and ride it out to conclusion. It seems like it'll always be that way, unless the individual behind the antagonist is invested. Longer-term villains are best, I think, for that exact reason. Gives the player time to get attached -- what you do and how you handle things matters a lot more when you're invested in the character. (This is probably where making allowances comes in! If long-term is better, talking out how to mount a long-term conflict and make dual-sided allowances... yadayada).

Maybe something to work on as a community is making sure that RP extends out to the targets?

A million times this.

(Also you play stardew valley omg lets grow parsnips all spring forever)

[Azi]

(stardew friend!)

It sounds like both sides might have the same sort of perception of helplessness! I wonder what we could do about it? I haven't so much seen the stigma of throwing conflict back at antagonists; I've seen mages get a hard time for not allowing a room full of battle badasses a full round of attack poses before fleeing and I've seen plenty of pickpockets and urchins give up within weeks of starting. I think it's not so much that RP needs to be halted so much as it needs to be dialled down to a level that doesn't halt RP. We seem to have a really tough time convincing people that they can get any sort of worthwhile experience out of playing a covert role currently.

My own difficulty with playing any sort of hard-to-get-along-with character tends to be that I still want to dive into things and bring loads of people in on my plots, but I feel like I get shut down and ostracized (to the point of getting irate tells) every time I try to go off-books or act anything less than altruistic. And then it's a black mark on my reputation and a quick road to "well, whatever." Low-key antagonist personalities might just be a thing that's not realistic for me to be able to do here, though, and I'm willing to accept that, but I think they'd be super valuable if TI were willing to be more accommodating of them.

[BattleJenkins]

I have a lot of complicated feelings on this whole subject but I'm about to go to bed so I'll just throw in two cents for now and dive in later!

As someone who played a low-key antagonist at one point (someone I made with the express purpose of being a persistent but harmless nuisance) I ran into a lot of the same problems that Azi's player did - you maybe get one shot to make a splash, but then you end up getting shut out once it's clear that you're here to cause trouble, no matter how ultimately benign. One thing that contributes to this is that the power is definitely stacked in favor of the establishment rather than the underdog. A lot of this is core to theme - TI:Legacy's game world is built around a culture of conservatism and conformity, where the general rule is "keep your head down or you'll get dealt with" one way or another. But a lot of this just comes from the way we handle games where being around for a while gives you an advantage - not just coded advantage like a deep well of XP, QP, resources, experience, and skill ranks, but RP advantage like an established circle.

I might as well come out with the story here - I played Arioso dul Cavata, Count of Upper Gerdain, a ridiculous, self-obsessed fop who looked for every way possible to use his station and resources to boost his own ego. I never intended him to actually ever succeed at his ridiculous plots - indeed, I was hoping to have him lose over and over again, each humiliating defeat more hilarious than the last. He started an ill-advised fashion war during lean times, motivated completely by pettiness against a single person who insulted his style of dress (in response to an unprovoked and much more serious insult Arioso threw out first, of course). Unfortunately for Arioso, this single person had been around a long time, and had amassed quite a network of resources and high profile connections. He was destroyed utterly and it was highly entertaining.

The only problem was, once you're destroyed utterly, how are you going to top your last attempt? I wanted to do more with Arioso, but I wasn't able to, mostly because I was busy with Galen running the Merchants Guild during a very active period in the game (and everyone wanted outfits, too!) - but also because it seemed even more daunting than before. There's no way he could hope to join court, he was already the laughing stock of the city, and he didn't really have much to fall back on. He actually wasn't that wealthy despite his shows of luxury, and he didn't have very many allies (and certainly none who didn't secretly or rather transparently hate his guts) - and I started to get the vibe that he would be dealt with more seriously if he ever got to be more of a persistent nuisance.

Arioso certainly didn't have it that bad, and I think that if I had a chance to focus on him more I could have easily gotten a lot more fun and mischief out of him, even in spite of all these obstacles. And, in this case, I do commend the restraint of everyone involved - Arioso definitely picked his battles poorly and his rivals could have done much, much worse to him. But I definitely felt like those obstacles were there, and I feel as if these obstacles would have been much more dire if Arioso was presented as a serious threat of any kind to the status quo - even careers and reputations, let alone actually posing the threat of harm and death. And, keep in mind, even playing Arioso, I was rooting against him from the very beginning. I wanted to see him repeatedly humbled, to constantly hatch even more hair-brained schemes with the goal of boosting his reputation and humiliating his rivals and get shot down more spectacularly every time - and maybe even to see sparks fly when he's forced to work together with those he routinely tries to undermine. But, while this is a game in the roleplaying sense, it's also a game in the game sense - characters have skills, resources, and such that players work to gain and loathe to lose. From the RP side, everybody wins - but codeways, there are definitely winners and losers, and the play-nice friendly establishment who's been around long enough to have the resources and connections to meet any challenge will always end up being the winners from the code perspective.

For the record, I do know that clever players can, and have, successfully used their wiles to snatch victory from those much better equipped than them - but this is definitely the exception rather than the rule. And I do know that we've had some wonderful antagonistic players that have managed to have long careers of conflict before meeting their spectacular ends. But this, too, I fear, is the exception rather than the rule - I feel like we would have more antagonistic players if we looked at some of these obstacles that cause so many of them to burn out so quickly and see if they can't be addressed - and in this sense, I define 'antagonistic' not merely as 'bad guys' or non-lawful folks like thieves and mages, but people who stand against the characters in power, even harmlessly like Arioso). Some of it is definitely an RP culture thing, and I'm definitely not for trying to force people to RP a certain way, but I feel like it might be worth seeing if it can't be handled from a rules / code / policy perspective as well. I would even go far as to advocate occasionally giving antagonistic players some staff cooperation - RPA benefits or resources and support from NPCs and the like - but I know that such a thing would definitely require a LOT of consideration and fine-tuning, and could easily go too far the other way.

I have a lot more to say on this and clearly didn't mean to say this much on the topic, so I'm cutting myself off for now! This might be something to bring up in an OOC meeting down the line... but, long story short, I think that 'low-key antagonist personalities' are something that TI could benefit from immensely.

(THIS SECTION IS JUST FOR ME TO REMEMBER THINGS TO TALK ABOUT LATER:
- High stakes vs. Low stakes conflict
- The scale of power in the game v. playerbase size
- Reconciling the two 'halves' of the game design (resources/achievement v. RP/storytelling)
- More about how the theme plays into things being stacked against troublemakers

OKAY CUTTING MYSELF OFF FOR REAL NOW I GOT OPINIONS!!!

[Gerolf]

I hear you all, but as someone who has played both in the order and in the reeves I am going to come down hard on this subject:

This is a middle ages inspired game. If you get caught stealing repeatedly, it is thematic to get your hand cut off. Back talk a Reeve? Get your ass fined. Commit a sin in front of an inquisitor? Get ready to be dunked in the Bren or worse. That is their IC -job-. If you don't want that to happen to your character, be a better sinner or criminal.

Note, I didn't say don't be a criminal. Just don't get caught, and understand it is a Reeve's job to track those who commit crimes. And to be fair, pulling up the case list we have tons of unsolved disappearances, murders, and thefts. It isn't that difficult to be smart about it.

So yeah, we reeves get to be hard-asses.

[Dice]

Well, I find myself in the weird and uncomfortable position of agreeing with... everyone??

I agree with Azi and Galen that we should definitely be better about enabling conflict and allowing people causing low-stakes conflict to go ahead and continue to do so. However, I also agree with Pixie that sometimes it seems people responding to conflict are being judged just as much or more for not responding in the right way. I'm also not sure.

Overall, I don't get a very strong sense for what is really being -asked- of people in the responder's position.

So I wonder if maybe we could try to move the discussion into a slightly more concrete realm (not with actual examples unless people feel comfortable!) to discuss what could have been done differently?

With one actual example, I'm fine with putting myself out there (as I play Ariel, who responded to Arioso) to hear some specific discussion of that one case - from my perspective I just threw back the ball that was thrown to me, and not in a way involving any kind of destruction whatsoever. Didn't try to get Arioso snubbed or ostracized, didn't try to get him thrown out of Court, etc - just tried to get his fashion style seen as unfashionable as a petty blow to his cachet. That would not seem to me to be utter destruction, but instead exactly what you're asking for!

That said, I'm totally open to hearing how it wasn't the sort of response that you view as enabling a conflict to continue - and I'm not sure discussion can progress much further without that kind of clear illustration of the point, because I legit have no idea how to enable a conflict to continue if that wasn't it.

Regarding other examples that aren't specific, there are some things I do feel we can do to enable conflict.

* Let an antagonist escape when there's a plausible path for it and they've requested it;

* Don't come down hard on other people for letting antagonists off the hook in such a way;

* Don't proactively hunt down 'suspicious people' who might be criminals or heretics based off small things - focus on actual obvious cases of wrongdoing or major evidence;

* Remember we live in a huge world of vNPCs and use that to let people off the hook. You can't recognize plain objects, you may not always recognize a person after meeting them once (especially in a dangerous situation!), you can't possibly track down every single crime that happens in Lithmore so maybe Pickpocket X gets a fine and a warning, etc.

* Avoid exaggerating the importance of crimes. I've often seen people stretch to construe something as treason, murder, or heresy to justify a serious punishment, and it's usually just when "so-and-so has annoyed me for too long!" While this is IC, it's just not a good idea.

And maybe some thoughts about what conflict-seeking PCs can do?

* TI as a theme is very much about secrets and conspiracy, as I think Galen said earlier! I think that the public appearance of conformity is an important aspect of theme I've rarely seen played up. So I'd honestly like to encourage subtle conspiracy and antagonism.

* Make your antagonist sympathetic/likeable to some extent, and make some friends first! Much, much easier to get ahead.

[Dice]

And I'd like to make a point re: the hard-ass Reeves - you can even play this trope and STILL enable conflict. Don't cut off a hand on the first try. Don't levy a fine a person can't pay, and if they can't pay anyway, offer them creative options to make up for it. Don't be obsessed about catching the guy who pickpockets 10s, because even if it is your job, you live in a city full of crime that is FAR more important. Allow yourself to fail.

And this isn't me preaching what I don't practice. I HAVE allowed myself to fail as a Knight on repeated occasions. Pretty much every time I RP, I see stuff that lets me go "oh, THAT person's a mage, for sure" but I don't take that suspicion ICly. I let a lot of not-so-religious talk pass by with a shrug and the IC excuse of 'maybe he didn't hear that', or 'maybe he did hear that but assumes the person just misspoke', etc. Sometimes I won't even hunt a mage for a day or two after a warrant comes in... or even more.

It is our IC job to catch bad guys - but it's not our OOC job. The game only -needs- us to handle the obvious, in-your-face, can't-be-allowed-to-continue stuff.

[Gerolf]

Ok, now that I have had my morning cup of coffee, and my afternoon cup, and completed a task at work I am far less crabby than I was this morning. I would first like to apologize for my attitude earlier.

Second, I’d like to re-frame the discussion and address some of the points brought up:

We can forgive mistakes

You would think. Alas I have had two characters killed off because of “mistakes” which were my attempts to open up RP for myself and other players. It is a personal struggle for me to want to continue that behavior when others don’t appreciate it. Simply, why do I want to risk this character I have worked so hard on, just to have it thrown back in my face?

ARE YOU HARD ENOUGH TO PLAY TEXT GAMES ON THE INTERNET WITH US

Hear! Hear! I don’t know how many times I have had to remind people (mostly myself) that this is a game and should be for entertainment. When it stops being fun you need to change the paradigm or leave but! We are also a community and need to be supportive of our fellow players.

If you play a villain and lose, it is rough. It is rough to see a character you love die. It is ok to be sad about that. I will admit when I lost Gerolf I got a little verklempt. People have emotions. We should all remember that.

I tend to pretty strongly feel that people let things skirt by too often, and tend to make allowances for ages and ages before putting the smack down. Even the wildest troublemakers get away with a great, great deal, often for hugely long periods of time (sometimes OOC years). I've only ever really seen somebody get executed for two reasons, for example: Magery (expected) and pushing the lawmakers and other "good" types so far for so long that they had no other option than to put them down. This is usually after literal years have passed and countless, obvious "HELLO, I AM HERE TO CAUSE SERIOUS TROUBLE" points were repeatedly glossed over. I would love, love, love for the setting to be far harder than it is (I have this imaginary scenario in my head where troublemakers get craftier as a result!) but I completely understand that it's tough to impossible for lawmakers and other leadership types to balance creating widespread fun and adhering to that preference (if it's even a preference they share! Depends on the player).

This is basically my problem with targeting the knights and reeves. We get to try hard and most of us let things slide a lot longer than would be realistic. It gets old for most of us. I agree with Pixie, if you don’t want to get caught, be a better deviant. We are willing to have fun too but you have to work with us and realize that we want to do investigative stuff. We want to provide that conflict by being good at our job. So out smart us. Beat us at our own game. Make us look the fools. I am cool with any of that.

I know sometimes it does take a weirdly long time to get a big bad character who's already established out, but my admittedly limited experiences have been kind of a bummer with regards to feeling paralyzed early on.

Right because those characters spent a long time building those relationships and cultivating that RP that let them take certain liberties. You don’t get those same liberties right out of Char Gen.

My own difficulty with playing any sort of hard-to-get-along-with character tends to be that I still want to dive into things and bring loads of people in on my plots, but I feel like I get shut down and ostracized (to the point of getting irate tells) every time I try to go off-books or act anything less than altruistic. And then it's a black mark on my reputation and a quick road to "well, whatever." Low-key antagonist personalities might just be a thing that's not realistic for me to be able to do here, though, and I'm willing to accept that, but I think they'd be super valuable if TI were willing to be more accommodating of them.

I like to think about what would happen if it were real life. My personal personality is if someone is being completely difficult I flat out avoid them. Ergo I think it is perfectly reasonable that if someone is playing a character my character doesn’t get along with, he’ll go out of his way to avoid them. That isn’t anything about the player (Maybe it is actually a backhanded compliment in a way you have a character so frustrating that my character wants nothing to do with you anymore.) but that is the risk you take. Non-consensual is on both parts. I don’t have to interact with you if I can find a reasonable way to avoid it.

He started an ill-advised fashion war during lean times

I am not sure you know how much fun and RP I got out of that little stunt and I never knew it was you who started it. A little late for a recommend now, but from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

So now, what is my constructive add? Well I don’t think I have anything to add above my response to the points above other than to remind everyone it is a game with people. There will be “winners” and “losers” and sometimes it is difficult to cope with the fact that coming up with a great character takes time. I know it is something I personally struggle with.

I want to use a personal example. There was a character who didn’t get along with mine at all. In fact we ended up in a blood feud where we both tried to frame each other as mages and rat us out to the Order. It was a knockdown, drag out fight. But I think we both had fun at it. Why? Because we respected each other and engaged in the RP. Could I have put an end to it after the first scene? Sure, but really what harm was it doing in engaging in banter?

Another example, there is a character my character loathed. No, loathed might be too soft a word, but they had a touching scene a while back where they put aside their differences for one night and have now gone back to an uneasy truce. Each of us could have ruined each other, but we didn’t. Sometimes the best way to handle IC conflict is to do what you would do in real life and just walk away.

Bottom line is I think it is all in the eye of the beholder. If you put forth the time and effort, train, become better than you are, you can succeed but the lawfuls represent the hurdle you have to overcome. It is a chess game and we are all playing against each other. So try to outsmart us, out maneuver us. It is thrilling to have to work to catch you. We like the challenge.

Don’t get caught pickpocketing in the Court Malenta and expect us to let you off with a warning. (Another interesting story for another time)