Rogue Judges

[Draco Tanos]

Pretty sure there's an option to banish all rebels after a failed rebellion en masse rather than individually.

[Ender]

I was wondering what was going on over there. Who was the judge working for exactly? Or was it just a rogue judge who had his own agenda?

I know in all my years a-judgin' that I've only ever needed to ban maybe two people at once. I can also safely say that as a Judge I typically had a decent hour pool to work with. To prevent this kind of abuse, 1 hour may be a little low, but if it was raised I'd still make a few bans possible with a full hour pool.

[Scarlett]

I'd actually prefer not to discuss who Cathay thinks the Judge was working for because there is a lot of supposition and piecing together of circumstantial evidence such that having a blatant OOC conversation about it would ruin some of it. In other words, while Galiard is certain he's right and the fact that the Judge banned everybody ever certainly made him appear right, it's still subjective and should stay that way.

I've only seen this happen twice, though coincidentally the other time was fairly recently on Dwilight. I don't think it ever would've occurred to me to do it when I was Judge, or to ask someone else to do it, mostly because I can't translate it into RP terms. I recognize that for game balance reasons, the Judge is often a counter-weight to the Crown, but I can't think of any medieval precedent where someone other than the King could banish anybody unless the King was somehow removed from power. This is just one of those areas where medieval-y stuff takes a back seat to the game and that's fine, but it ends up feeling very 'gamey.' Maybe that's why it's easy to call it abuse. It isn't cheating, after all; we empower Judges to ban people and we empower people to protest judges, so why care how they exercise it at all?

Because it does affect the feel of the game and because as much as I enjoy both pulling one over on the enemy and having a good scheme pulled over on me, this kind of thing is just sour. Up until it happened I would've taken my hat off to the Judge for having been a foreign agent for a while and getting away with it even though Galiard wants to wear his intestines as a hat. I can ICly explain away a high-level functionary causing some administrative damage to the realm. I can't explain away soldiers in the Royal army suddenly turning on each other and fighting because of a bureaucrat.

As an alternative suggestion, what about keeping the current delay of 1 day in place for new judges to ban people, but removing it for new judges to lift existing bans?

[Ender]

I'd actually prefer not to discuss who Cathay thinks the Judge was working for because there is a lot of supposition and piecing together of circumstantial evidence such that having a blatant OOC conversation about it would ruin some of it. In other words, while Galiard is certain he's right and the fact that the Judge banned everybody ever certainly made him appear right, it's still subjective and should stay that way.

Fair enough! I'll just wait for something to trickle down the grapevine in game.

[Tom]

Wonderful. Wouldn't it be better to make it two hours though?

No, we must balance abuse protection against just making things suck for everyone.

[ScooterMcCabe]

Okay I feel like I should clarify somethings.  First I really am out of state, my family happens to live in the land the internet forgot, at least since I had been there.  In addition to WiFi the town now has standing volunteer fire department no longer sharing the same building as the local sheriff's office.

That aside I see this game as a sandbox, we have the mechanics we work in, but this game is driven by player content.  If I am playing a judge turned traitor or a puritanical judge gone rogue, it makes sense I would make use of my powers even in one last blow to the realm.  The fact that an infiltrator was used to try and wound me was to force me to leave my position without being able to do anything.  The infiltrator failed and having a lot of gold I used it to take down a realm.  Now understanding the game mechanics is no crime, and I have kept all my stuff in game.  I know there are some unhappy players because I just did the equivalent of putting up a for sale sign on a house, and selling it away while a family still lived there.  But it was done all in game and when the natural in game answers failed to remove me, the infiltrator failed and the protests were not great enough to unseat me, I responded with my in game ability to hammer blow the realm.

I don't mind being called a douchebag for what I did.  I would feel hurt to if I was on the other end of this.  But restricting the sandbox is a bad idea.  The emergent content that will arise from this is going to make for a really interesting game.  When you talk to your friends about games, and this game you can talk about how an entire island now has to deal with the ramifications of a realm disappearing.  Its not gamey, no one ultimately wins from what I did.  It set people back, and helped others but certainly its not a game ender.

I hope this clarifies some things.

[Velax]

I'm not sure how calling it a sandbox really justifies being an !@#$%^& and attempting to wreck the experience of a couple of dozen people with a power you shouldn't really have and isn't vaguely realistic (as banning nearly a whole realm is certainly not what the Judge's power is meant to be for). It is indeed unfortunate that game mechanics have to be changed to prevent idiots abusing the system, but I guess it's the same reason we have locks on doors.

[Zakilevo]

Okay I feel like I should clarify somethings.  First I really am out of state, my family happens to live in the land the internet forgot, at least since I had been there.  In addition to WiFi the town now has standing volunteer fire department no longer sharing the same building as the local sheriff's office.

That aside I see this game as a sandbox, we have the mechanics we work in, but this game is driven by player content.  If I am playing a judge turned traitor or a puritanical judge gone rogue, it makes sense I would make use of my powers even in one last blow to the realm.  The fact that an infiltrator was used to try and wound me was to force me to leave my position without being able to do anything.  The infiltrator failed and having a lot of gold I used it to take down a realm.  Now understanding the game mechanics is no crime, and I have kept all my stuff in game.  I know there are some unhappy players because I just did the equivalent of putting up a for sale sign on a house, and selling it away while a family still lived there.  But it was done all in game and when the natural in game answers failed to remove me, the infiltrator failed and the protests were not great enough to unseat me, I responded with my in game ability to hammer blow the realm.

I don't mind being called a douchebag for what I did.  I would feel hurt to if I was on the other end of this.  But restricting the sandbox is a bad idea.  The emergent content that will arise from this is going to make for a really interesting game.  When you talk to your friends about games, and this game you can talk about how an entire island now has to deal with the ramifications of a realm disappearing.  Its not gamey, no one ultimately wins from what I did.  It set people back, and helped others but certainly its not a game ender.

I hope this clarifies some things.

Uhhh... You sure clarified what kind of a person you are.

[ScooterMcCabe]

Because how I decide my in game character acts to a situation and how I want to play that character is an accurate reflection of me as a human being.

[Vellos]

I remember orchestrating an attempt at it in Old Rancague many years ago; though that had rebellions mixed in. Wreaked some serious havoc. It was done again in Terran by Erasmus recently– though he only banned 8 people, not 17. In Erasmus' case, I thought it really added to the game, made the political situation far more exciting, and gave him a chance to really go out with a bang. I've seen similar instances maybe one or two other times. And didn't the character in question actually get successfully protested out of office? I thought he did when I looked up his profile...

While 17 does seem a bit much even to me, I'm inclined to think that allowing the judge the power to completely screw the whole realm seems pretty reasonable. Protesting him out is not impossible (again, I've seen a rogue judge doing large-scale bannings protested out at least once, maybe twice; it's been a long time since I did much of this kind of thing). When we say that the judge can be a check on the crown, IMHO, this is basically what that looks like. This is a check on the crown. Ruler starts a war the judge thinks is illegal? Brace for every region being lordless and the army falling into chaos.

Sure, it sucks that you elected/appointed an evil maniac as your judge, that you appointed someone into a position of power who wasn't trustworthy.

In terms of RP explanation, again, it seems simple to me. The bailiffs, local nobility, bureaucrats, etc, are used to taking orders from court officials. The judge essentiall has control of said officials. They spread the word that all these people are criminals and in cahoots against the ruler. Obviously the ruler organizes a resistance– but it's really just a question of information control, which is easy to accomplish in the middle ages.

[Norrel]

stuff

This isn't EVE online. Just because the game is sandboxy doesn't mean everything at your disposal is justified; as much is made clear in the social contract.

Edit: Though that's not to say that I disapprove. If the judge can do too much damage to a realm, that's for game mechanics to dictate, not individual players. Though you really can't be surprised when giving people a metric !@#$ton of busywork to work around leaves a sour taste in their mouths. Thankfully I'm not one of those people.

[vonGenf]

I'm not sure how calling it a sandbox really justifies being an !@#$%^& and attempting to wreck the experience of a couple of dozen people with a power you shouldn't really have and isn't vaguely realistic (as banning nearly a whole realm is certainly not what the Judge's power is meant to be for).

I think you're confusing "wrecking everyone's experience" and "used the power at his character's disposal to achieve what his character wanted". As long as it was IC, there is nothing wrong with using game mechanics to achieve your goal, even if there are other people who find themselves at the wrong end of the stick. This is a PvP game.

It is indeed unfortunate that game mechanics have to be changed to prevent idiots abusing the system, but I guess it's the same reason we have locks on doors.

That is an extremely unhelpful comment.

[Norrel]

I think you're confusing "wrecking everyone's experience" and "used the power at his character's disposal to achieve what his character wanted". As long as it was IC, there is nothing wrong with using game mechanics to achieve your goal, even if there are other people who find themselves at the wrong end of the stick. This is a PvP game.

The thing is, there wasn't very much actual damage done. Most of the damage can be rectified through OOC busywork and workarounds, so really what the entire ploy amounted to was a pain in the ass for Scarlett. Backstabbing should be possible (to an extent) but the nature of the damage and the method of causing it need to be IC. While the method obviously was, I'm of the opinion that the damage was mostly done to the players of the characters, not necessarily to the characters themselves.

[Dante Silverfire]

First, I think it is perfectly reasonable to have a 1 hour requirement on the judge making a ban. For the most part this prevents massive abuse while still allowing the political intrigue.

Second, I think a judge using their power to check the crown by banning out all of the crown's supporters for instance is a legitimate power play that can be made. Just as stealing half the realm's gold was a proper play that the old bankers could make.

Third, I think its perfectly reasonable for their to be intra-realm politics that actually have a real effect on the game. Political intrigue is my favorite part of this game and although some players want it to be realm vs realm as a team the whole time, I think this leads to an overall boring experience across the board. I'm not sure being a spy and then getting elected as judge is much of an honorable move, as I am against making a character go become a spy, but it is certainly explainable although I'm not sure how SMA it is. (So wouldn't like to see it on Dwilight).

[Zakilevo]

There is one problem with the whole intra-realm conflict idea. You can do it to a certain extent but BM is trying to promote the idea of a realm as a team which has somewhat dwindled over the years.

And yes, banning an entire realm doesn't accomplish much but pissing off the players. They will just rejoin the realm and kick the judge out. It just resets everyone's number of days in the realm category.