improving the game via prison

[Tom]

A simple idea that might solve several issues at once:

   
• newbie retention
• position turnover
• in-realm political fighting

The idea is this: Make prison time dependent on the character captured:

   
• simple nobles with no position: 2 days
• knights (nobles with an estate): 3 days
• marshals, stewards, etc: 5 days
• landed nobility (lords): 7 days (as now)
• dukes: 15 days
• government members: 30 days
• rulers: 40 days

The first part should be obvious: Prison is no fun, especially for newcomers. So release them quickly.
The second part is less obvious, but important: Put the high-ranking characters behind bars for really long times. This will achieve several things:

   
• it will make things like ransoming your king interesting
• it gives ambitious other characters within the realm an opportunity to make their move
• it makes government members high-value targets in a war

It would be fairly easy to code.



Disadvantages:
It'll piss off some old geezers and might make them even more reluctant to start a war.

[vonGenf]

At first sight I like it! The highest bars are maybe a bit too long, but the idea is sound.

I can see an exploit: infiltrators would tend to remain estate-less to escape prison faster, or could even drop their estate prior to attempting an infiltrator action only to retake it if they succeed. Would it be easy to differentiate between prison caused by a 'criminal action' and prison due to being captured in battle? I could see the low limits applying when captured in battle but a hard floor of 7 days when captured for a specific act.

[Arrandal]

:( this isnt a good idea, I'm a great Duke (and only have been one for 2 months), and Lord, very active, and part of everything. I have even been told that I bring a lot of colour, this will punish my good activity, and also make me have to chose if I will take part in war with my Realm - of which I am Marshal of. My Realm was pretty much dead before I was there, not saying it was all me, its not, but just saying it was pretty slow, now we are more active, but we are still finding it hard to fill all positions as it is. In the short 4 months I have been in Riombara, we have had 3 Duke elections, already + around 12 Lordship elections. Inactivity is more than making up for changeover in Riombara. Our turnover in Council positions has been pretty frequent too.

[Indirik]

I like the theory, bu as with egamma, I see the high-end bands as being awful long. Just think of what would happen inf your 15-person realm got into war, and their top 5 people (all councilors and he duke) got captured in a battle. One-third of their realm would be in prison long enough that the war would essentially be over. Some people may view that as a plus, but I don't really think it is.

I'm not against making prison stays longer than they are for the top people, if those at the bottom get less. But 40 days? If I was looking at that, I'd stop playing my character and just let him pause in prison.

About this line: "it will make things like ransoming your king interesting" - Is this an allusion to allowing the realm to pay the ransom for the imprisoned characters?

[vonGenf]

Is this an allusion to allowing the realm to pay the ransom for the imprisoned characters?

This does not require a new game mechanic - the Judge can let the emprisoned character go if he is convinced to. Few people bother to do that now mostly because by the time the negotiations could take place, there's a 50% the character is already out of prison anyway.

[Anaris]

I think the idea is a good one. Personally, I'd make the shortest times be reserved specifically for players who have been in the game less than a month and players who have been in the game less than six months. Then make the "standard" length for a noble with no feudal or government position be 5 days.

Then, on the high end, as others have said, I'd pull it in a bit—maybe make Dukes 12 days, government members 16, and rulers 25, or something along those lines. I think 30 for government members and 40 for rulers is too steep.

There's something else to consider here, too: Should we make prison no longer count as inactivity for the purposes of losing positions? Because right now, if we did this, it would just cause all the position-holders to time out after 5 days, so someone new could be elected/appointed. Then the poor old ruler just gets to languish in prison for the next 5 weeks without any position or anything.

As a final note, I like the idea of the realm being able to pay a ransom for a captured government member. That would make a very interesting dynamic...particularly if the government member in question isn't universally loved ;D

[Arrandal]

I'm not spending 12 days out of a game, that I enjoy, 7 days was, and is hard enough.
One of my chars just spent 7 days max in a prison on Dwilight, and it was 'okay' only because she only just arrived to the realm, and my other chars are busier than her, so I could leave her go in prison, without getting frustrated.

When I first got into the game, I got a 7 day prison sentence from a rogue prison, and I tell you something, if my partner wasnt playing the game, I might have walked then.

[vonGenf]

When I first got into the game, I got a 7 day prison sentence from a rogue prison, and I tell you something, if my partner wasnt playing the game, I might have walked then.

With this new system, those new to the game would only stay two days in prison, instead of seven.

[Tom]

Would it be easy to differentiate between prison caused by a 'criminal action' and prison due to being captured in battle?

Not only easy, the game already does it. When you are a judge, for example, you can see how your prisoners were captured and where.

[Tom]

About this line: "it will make things like ransoming your king interesting" - Is this an allusion to allowing the realm to pay the ransom for the imprisoned characters?

No, its an allusion to thinking about other options then the random escape chance and just waiting until it's over. That is why I put the max terms extremely high intentionally. I want people to NOT wait them out, but figure out ways of getting out earlier. Ransom is just one obvious one. Making a deal with the enemy judge is another. Prisoner exchanges are a third.

None of them require new game mechanics.

[Sacha]

While I like the idea, I do worry this might turn into a griefer's playground. There's already a lot of OOC tension in IC wars, I worry some people might seize the opportunity to screw each other over by letting their enemies rot in prison for the full term, despite efforts towards early release.

[Arrandal]

Ah yes, of course, and something that would be a fix to the game, but anything else...to do with this. I would consider myself personally dissapointed should the time be extended past 7 days for anything else. I'm not all that interested in not being able to play for a week, its equated in my mind already to a forum ban, and as some form of punishment for prison, as it is. I do not see the whole point to prison, which is basically just a ban from the game. It should actually still be something that keeps me entertained in the game, Im not here because I want to 'not play'.

Plus there was a mention of ransoming for a King or Ruler, while fun, as stated, by the time 7 days rolls around, the agonising interplay of the nobles, and finally convincing the other Judge to let the Ruler go etc, too much power to ruin someones game time, in another players hands, far as I am concerned.

Prison is a ban, its a 'player punishment' regulated to the form of a chracter lock for doing something wrong, ie the Magistrates, but  I didnt do anything wrong, except play the game...

Fix the mentor system, would be more important than this simple coding. If not for my partner, again, who encouraged me to try other realms, etc, I would not have stayed past my first realm. Because of the lack of contact that was made to me, and lack of help. I learned this game via another person, and many do. 

Encouraging more public letters, instead of private is also a good thing, and this just needs to be a highly recommended pl;ayer culture, perhaps a notice when people click on other peoples names to send a message, a pop up appears, saying: "Think about the other people in your Realm, does this really need to be a private message, or could you do more and share more with the other members of the Realm, so they too are a part of what is going on, if so, consider posting this to the user group, unless strictly personal." Or something like that. Frankly using this in my Marshal's role has led to better interaction between characters, more imput and involvement, to the point that all Nobles in Riombara have involved themselves in the Realm's recent war, which it didnt used to have.

[trying]

I also agree that anything more than 2 weeks is just absurd. Why not make it so that there is a default sentence of 3 days and then extending that sentence costs the Judge gold? Each extension would cost more and more gold however the cost of holding someone in a government position would cost less than holding a plain knight. That way the Judge can hold on to the rulers and dukes longer than the average peon.

[vonGenf]

Prison is a ban, its a 'player punishment' regulated to the form of a chracter lock for doing something wrong, ie the Magistrates, but  I didnt do anything wrong, except play the game...

It shouldn't be. IC bans are not player punishment either, they are normal things to be expected once in a while.

If you fight against the odds and instruct your troops to fight it out to the last man, you are likely to be emprisoned. It's alsways a bit of a dice roll, of course, but when you bet high you can lose big.

If you use small retreat percentages and fight conservatively, you won't go in prison. You won't win big either.... it's always a choice.

[Telrunya]

An IC ban doesn't stop you from playing the game. I think that's the point, that going to prison locks you out from the game. It shouldn't work as a 'sorry, you cannot play the game with this character for a week/month'. It's not like prison can be entirely avoided except by sitting back in your city and doing nothing (And I don't think we want to encourage that either).