Though the IC premise of the game is one of court intrigues and potentially dangerous politics, OOCly the Admins desire a game where players co-operate to create the best possible story. With this in mind, the game’s basic consent policy is one that gives players almost complete control over the fate of their characters. It can be summed up as this:
Within reason, the consequences of your actions, as they pertain to your own character, are yours to determine. Furthermore, other players may not assume consequences of your actions for their own characters that you did not intend.
In order to deal with all aspects of the game and in order to accomodate those who prefer a little more uncertainity and perhaps danger in their IC lives, there are a few caveats and exceptions that expand on this basic policy. First off, we have created a tool called +prefs (see +HELP +PREFS) that allows each player to make various choices about the kinds of roleplay they like to engage in. One of the choices that can be made is between COMPLETE (the default) and LIMITED consent. But before we go on to explain the difference between these two options, there’s one thing we’d like to stress:
Always, always check the +prefs of other players and make sure you abide by their wishes as far as is reasonably possible. If something is unclear, ask OOCly. If something seems inappropriately put, speak to an Admin.
We cannot stress enough how much we want to encourage players to communicate OOCly in order to avoid causing hard feelings OOCly over IC matters. Communicating OOCly does not have to mean planning every step of a plot, but it does no one any good at all if someone hatches a plot and essentially forces someone to take part even though they have no interest in that particular turn of events. Do note, however, that there is a limit to how far one is covered by even COMPLETE consent.
COMPLETE consent is the default policy of the game. Within reason, it gives a player complete control over their character. It also gives them control over what other players can do as a result of their actions, as players have the right to not consent to actions of their own producing unexpected results. For example, if you roleplay your horse escaping the stables, another player cannot roleplay that it kicked their child in the head and nearly killed it without first obtaining your consent for such a consequence.
That initial caveat is important, though. A player cannot take just any action and not expect what most people would consider to be reasonable and foreseeable consequences. For example, a player cannot ICly attempt to kill the king and OOCly refuse to be punished. Similarily, a player who acts in an ICly scandalous way cannot consent to not being gossiped about and having their reputation ruined. If a player takes certain actions, such as those noted in these examples above, this can be considered an automatic change of their consent preference to LIMITED in regards to the specific event. However, this does not mean that engaging in combat is the same as consenting to death or even very serious harm, though it does mean you’re willing to risk enough harm to incapacitate you, because you can’t become Superman just because you want to be. Nor does it mean that walking down a dark street is the same as consenting to being robbed. Players also have the right to not consent to actions of their own producing unexpected results.
LIMITED consent differs from the basic (COMPLETE) policy in that a player automatically accepts any reasonable IC consequences (with the exception of death, unless the death preference in +prefs is set to YES) that result from their actions. Reasonable IC consequences means that a character is allowed to react more strongly towards another character than what might be normal for the average character, but it must still be IC for that particular character. For example, players of unusually aggressive characters are strongly advised to make this plain in the comments section of +prefs.
As noted in +help +prefs, the level of consent a player selects will be taken into account by any member of the Staff called in to mediate in a conflict. Although a player may have set their own consent level to LIMITED, they should be aware that other players can ‘take advantage’ of this (within IC reason) while still retaining whatever consent level they have chosen so long as they conform with the guidelines given for that level.
However, our intention with allowing several levels is not to allow players using COMPLETE consent to take advantage of players set to LIMITED without fear of reprisals, but rather to allow players preferring the same level of consent to seek each other out for conflict-filled roleplay. It is also important to note that neither choice is ‘better’ than the other (though it should also be kept in mind that the default is COMPLETE), and that we sincerely hope players will not make a habit of avoiding those who have made a different choice. The preference exists only to make it easier to handle certain kinds of roleplay.
The following examples attempt to illustrate the differences between the two levels of consent:
The situation is a scene between two characters where one of the characters insults the other character.
If the first character (the one doing the insulting) has his consent preference set to COMPLETE (the default), the second character cannot in general act against the first character (beyond insulting that character in return) without first issuing a +warn and/or initiating OOC communication to inform of the potential consequences. If the first character persists along the same path after such warnings have been issued, he then automatically consents to the consequences that were suggested.
If the first character (the one doing the insulting) has his consent preference set to LIMITED, the second character would be allowed to react in a stronger fashion without using +warn and/or initiating OOC communication, although the reaction should be within the limits of what is reasonable for that character. Unless the second character is well known for attempting to decapitate people who insult him, he should not attempt to do so without further negotiation. The second character must also respect the death preference of the first character.
While it is relatively easy to say how COMPLETE and LIMITED consent applies to actions in a scene, it can be harder to make it clear how it applies to spreading rumors about one another and/or plotting against one another.
If a character decides to spread detrimental IC rumors about another character, the second character cannot put a stop to that by saying he does not consent to rumors being spread about him. However, he can +warn the first character that further rumors may result in actions being taken ICly. If the first character persists in spreading these rumors this would then be considered as consenting to a reasonable reaction from the second character.
Similarily, anything said or done in public that is witnessed or overheard by another player is generally considered to be public information. If you feel that someone should not be able to see what you are doing or hear what you are saying, you are encouraged to take OOC measures to inform players of the IC situation and/or to use code such as +groups (+HELP +GROUPS) and +whisper (+HELP +WHISPER) to make it plain.
However, as we do encourage OOC communication, we also encourage players to consider asking whether or not some information would be known to them before acting on it, even if they would be within their rights to do so without asking. We would also like to stress, once again, that players should avoid involving each other in more elaborate plots without first discussing the general idea of the plot OOCly. For example, if Player A’s character wishes to attempt to steal something from Player B’s character, Player A would first need to discuss the basic idea with Player B.
If players believe that someone else is attempting to force what they consider to be unreasonable consequences onto them for some action or other, they should pause briefly to sort it out. Again, please remember to communicate OOCly. If that fails, contact a member of the administration (see +HELP +ADMIN and +HELP +STAFF) and they’ll try to help both parties settle their differences and continue on in the roleplay.
There are several steps you can take to make sure that your roleplaying experience is not hampered by conflicts based on disagreements about what you and other players have roleplayed:
* Make use of +prefs (see +HELP +PREFS) to learn about the roleplay preferences of other players and make sure to respect these. If your preferences are filled out (as they should be), other players will know what sort of roleplay you enjoy and what level of danger/surprise you like with it.
* Make use of the +warn (see +HELP +WARN) command along with OOC communication to make sure everything is clear. If you prefer not to negotiate things OOCly at all or as little as possible, you may want to find like minded players for when you wish to engage in conflict-filled roleplay.
