This is a non-choice. There is no mechanism to plot against a Duke who is also a Royal, and the only mechanism if they aren't a royal is banishment
That's simply not true at all. There are several options you have. Some of them may or may not be possible in any particular case. Some depend on him being a lord, others on not being a lord. Some ideas off the top of my head:
* Have him assassinated. Repeatedly. I bet that will gt their attention. If you're lucky, they may lose the office due to long absence.
* Get all his vassals to swap to other duchies. This is especially powerful if he's not a region lord. He could end up as duke of an empty duchy.
* If he's a city lord, stop selling him food. If he's a rural lord, stop buying his food.
* Exile him. Especially powerful now that you get all your taxes in bonds.
* Get religion involved, and have him auto da fe'd. Works great for region lords. If you get him out of the region, then get all his lords to leave him.
* Have diplomats and ambassadors badmouth him in his own region, and maybe drive the region rogue. Get priests involved in it, too.
* Switch regional appointments to voting instead of appointing, and work around him.
* If he has a steward, work with the steward to buy/sell food.
Each one of these is a way to plot against a duke, royal or not. And if he's not royal then just banish his ass and be done with it.
which could run afoul of inalienable rights. Back in '05 and '06 the Titans didn't usually care too much when somebody high-up got the ax for never doing anything but perhaps that's changed. EDIT: just saw 'The Inalienable Rights do NOT protect you from the IC consequences of your IC actions or inactions' which is a more accurate description of how things were viewed back when I had any business viewing them. Not like 'you must login once every X hours/days' but 'is the job getting done.'
This is, and always has been, the policy. It hasn't changed. People just get hung up thinking that the inactivity IR protects them as a 100% safe blanket from actions against them. That's simply not true.
So saying 'find an IC answer' is a little bit trite: if there were one that could amount to anything other than grumbling, it would've happened by now and Velax wouldn't be here complaining about it. It's like trying to play monopoly with your cat. Anybody in BM would prefer an active character who is actively opposing them rather than an inactive character whose player just won't admit 'you know, I don't have time to be Duke/King of blah.'
I agree that playing against an active player is more fun. But saying that you simply can't do anything about it is not correct. You can. It may not be clean or easy. In fact, it may leave a bit of a mess behind. But it can be done.
it was very, very difficult to drum up support against a Duke in Toupellon who was a great character and who had (has) a great player but just didn't ever get involved in anything.
Yes, people don't like acting against someone who doesn't do something blatantly wrong. Inactive people who don't make waves are likely to be difficult to target with any kind of IC campaign against them.