Duels costing honor when not done

[Foundation]

If worth discussing, probably worth a new thread.

[Zakilevo]

I think we should discuss this after Tom is done with the new Honour and Prestige system. Feels pretty meaningless to discuss this any further at this point.

[egamma]

I would support a new feature request (in a new thread) that adds a listing of duels offered, rejected/ignored, won, and lost, to the family history.

[Tom]

This has been rejected at least 20 times before. Way too easy to game the system. Want to have someone lose a lot of honour? Repeatedly challenge him with a few skilled swordfighters.

No way.

[Chenier]

The only case I'd consider honor cost being justified is if someone accepts a duel challenge, but then moves away, because 1) it's cowardly and 2) he accepted the challenge himself, it was not imposed upon him by the game or another.

Otherwise, as for honor loss for not accepting, that just opens the door for a lot of griefing.

[Crusader]

This is a problem I have seen myself. On Dwilight, even though it is SMA, people are not treating duels with the seriousness as they should do. Especially legitimate duels (ie, ones with valid reasons/RP)

Im sure that back in the middle ages, someone who was called a Coward, was looked down upon by his fellows and was not trusted by his men. Especially as we are playing a game called "battle"master, we need to encourage people to play like nobles in the middle ages.

The way I see it is that people are afraid of losing their positions/chars/titles especially with a duel to the death. Im not sure how common death happens, but the last two duels my char has been in have resulted in tow serious wounds for the other guys.

I think that it is a bit gamey by those who refuse duels due to that reason. Sometimes, it is the only way to get that entrenched Duke out of his city. Yet, if he keeps refusing to duel (again their has to be good reasons/RP) then he is gaming the system, as he will not affect him in respect to the game. Players have short/selective memories sometimes, and will not remember every duel that he refused.

I know people have mentioned and will mention about the balance between someone abusing it by challenging and those who abuse it by refusing, and that is a problem.


How about having a referral option? A bit like the vulgarity option.

I shall explain. Noble A has just lost his throne because Duke B has organised the rebellion. Noble A wants revenge, so challenges Duke B to a duel to the Death. Throw in a lot of heated discussion that every realm has when these things happen. Lets say Noble A has a legitimate reason for duelling. He writes out the reasons in the box provided as normal. The offer is sent.

If Duke B accepts: then there is a duel, and an outcome.

If Duke B refuses: then Noble A can refer it to his peers to be judged. They will be randomly selected by the game, and asked to decide whether the challenge is valid or not. If they say yes it is a valid challenge, the Duke B loses honour/prestige. If they say no, it was not valid (spam etc) then Noble A will lose honour/prestige.

This will hopefully stop spamming (and losing stats due to refusing) but it would also stop the defender from gaming the system, by not having any penalty for refusing a valid challenge.

[Anaris]

This is a problem I have seen myself. On Dwilight, even though it is SMA, people are not treating duels with the seriousness as they should do. Especially legitimate duels (ie, ones with valid reasons/RP)

You mean that you want people to duel you, and they won't.

There will be no cost to a refused duel.

You lost your throne, and now you want to kill the person you feel is responsible because you know you have a higher swordskill than him. It doesn't work that way. You don't get to bleed people for honour or kill them just because you spent ages training at the academy.

[Tom]

This is my absolute final word on this topic, please link any further requests to this answer:


There will NEVER be a game-mechanics penalty for refusing duel challenges.

Refusing a legitimate challenge can and should have social consequences, those are entirely left to the players to decide and play out.

[Crusader]

You mean that you want people to duel you, and they won't.

There will be no cost to a refused duel.

You lost your throne, and now you want to kill the person you feel is responsible because you know you have a higher swordskill than him. It doesn't work that way. .

Have you read this topic? I am not the only one that has come across this? If we are playing on a SMA atmosphere then lets play as SMA. Do you really think back in the middle ages you could just refuse a duel to the death with a real, valid reason?

You don't get to bleed people for honour or kill them just because you spent ages training at the academy

Then why do we even have the academy? I just used my experiences as an example. I am trying to stop people gaming the system that are entrenched into powerful positions with no way of getting them out. You can remove a ruler quite easily, but not that of a Duke, or even a lord. Allowing it the way I put forward, allow the players to able to contribute to the game. If they think it is a valid reason, let them have that say. 

People are too scared to lose their Chars, and ignore real RP reasons. That is gamey. Everyone moans about people spamming, but we never moan about those who play the system to their advantage such as in this case. A noble in the middle ages would never have let someone else call them a coward. They would have done something about it. We can do that, called Duels, but those who want to keep their cushy positions will always refuse a duel for fear of losing it. Not very noble.

[vonGenf]

Do you really think back in the middle ages you could just refuse a duel to the death with a real, valid reason?

Wikipedia has a list of "famous duels":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_duels

Among those, I count only three that were in the middle ages. Duelling was really mostly an 18th century thing.

I am certain there was duelling among the young nobility looking to make a name for themselves, but Dukes were never expected to accept duels.

[Crusader]

Maybe because they are not recorded?

However, search for the history fo Duels:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duel

[Crusader]

There is this also.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_duel

[vonGenf]

Maybe because they are not recorded?

However, search for the history fo Duels:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duel

I'm not denying that there were duels in the lower nobility, for example (from wikipedia):

According to Ariel Roth, during the reign of Henry IV, over 4,000 French aristocrats were killed in duels "in an eighteen-year period" whilst a twenty-year period of Louis XIII's reign saw some eight thousand pardons for "murders associated with duels".

However, if Dukes were killed in such duels, it would certainly have been recorded. Not necessarily in that list, but somewhere.

As for trial by combat, they are a completely different phenomenon. They are a judicial means to establish guilt, and not a personal mean to defend your honour. In BM, the best equivalent would be for the Judge of the realm to require a duel to settle a dispute, and to threaten with a ban or fine anyone who refuses such duels. No change in mechanic is required for that; depending on the case, a change in judge may be in order. 

[Crusader]

Taken from the Duels page.

The duel was based on a code of honour. Duels were fought not so much to kill the opponent as to gain "satisfaction", that is, to restore one's honour by demonstrating a willingness to risk one's life for it, and as such the tradition of duelling was reserved for the male members of nobility,

This is what most players don't do (except Heros in battle), Is to risk their life. Especially when their honour has been insulted. Yet, if you read the articles, the nobles did fight to restore their honour. Most likely they did not die from the direct duel, possibly form infection, but not from the duel itself. Only in the 18th century and the availability of firearms do we get serious deaths from duelling.

Which Is why there need to be some way to enforce Duels especially on SMA worlds. Having it social and RP is fine, but then there needs to be some sort of record of what duels were refused and why. A history of refusing to participate in a duel (where there are valid reasons) should be known to all. If there was a duel between King Richard and Prince John in the middle ages, then the entire country would know about it. What ever happened would become public knowledge as soon as the news could travel.

If Prince John had refused to duel his brother (as John had tried to take the throne) the Prince John would lose respect of his fellow nobles and that of the peasants.

This is just a made up example, but it has relevance to battlemaster. Do you think John could have gone about his daily business if he had of refused?

[Anaris]

Crusader, Tom has stated flat-out that there will be no such game-mechanic consequences, no matter what you say.

If you don't like it, you're free to play on non-SMA islands.