Author Topic: He\'s threatened to have characters fined for inactivity.  (Read 11316 times)

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Summary:He\'s threatened to have characters fined for inactivity.
Violation:Playing at your own speed, timing and activity level
World:Far East
Complainer:Zach Eubanks
About:Magnus

Full Complaint Text:
Hello! I'm here to request that an argument be settled. Not just some silly argument, of course, but an argument regarding game rules that seems to have sprung up. So, Magnus Himoura is the general of Kindara, where one of my characters is. We've been taking over a region, but his character apparently thinks we're doing it too slowly. In one of his orders, he mentioned that he would have anybody who was not actively supporting the takeover fined. I considered that this action he threatened was a breach of the first inalienable right, and I made the mistake of mentioning that in-character. The whole affair spawned some pretty good roleplay, but now we're having a realm-wide discussion on it out-of-character. I mentioned that I would have to contact the titans or magistrates if anybody got fined for inactivity, but then I was reminded the bit in the social contract about that, so I had to follow through now rather than later. I'd really appreciate it if you could shed some light and settle this argument.

Penchant

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Well first, to be certain one way or the other, sharing the related letters is necessary.
“The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.”
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Stabbity

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For reference, I am enclosing pertinent messages. Its already been discussed, and I've seen this issue beat to death time and again, I have not threatened anyone with fines for inactivity. I have given orders that those who are not supporting a takeover to be fined for inactivity, and even went on to clarify that this would be for consistent disobedience, and that anyone who felt like they received a fine and shouldn't have is free to send me a message ooc to fix everything. I can see the confusion with my first sentence there, it was poorly worded, but I did clarify.

Orders from Magnus Himoura   (10 hours, 43 minutes ago)
Message sent to everyone in your realm (34 recipients)
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Everyone in Paplarmi is to be spendjng all of their hours every turn supporting the takeover. I can count on one hand the number of nobles that helped support the takeover last turn. I do not wish to ask fines but if that is what it will take I will. We need to finish this takeover and it requires EVERYONE'S support.

Sir Magnus Himoura
Commander of Kindara
Count of Edairn

Out-of-Character from Magnus Himoura   (5 hours, 29 minutes ago)
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Nobody is being fined for IR reasons. Consistently not following orders is ALWAYS a valid reason for punishment. Go to the forum and read similar magistrate cases and you will find it to be so. I'm not asking people to log in every turn, or even every day. I am making a very simple order to click a few times when you do log on. In the future, please avoid throwing around the IR as a gigantic "I do what I want" shield.

Justin Licht


Out-of-Character from Magnus Himoura   (4 hours, 56 minutes ago)
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Granted. I have never been a player to care about 100% movement 100% of the time. RL takes precedence. I missed a whole turn yesterday because of a kidney stone (which might explain if I seem irritated, if I do I apologize, its my shredded urinary tract talking, not me). The issue Magnus is taking is that he sees very, very few reports of takeover attempts, and I even talked to one of the devs to how many show up and whatnot, because in my experience I've seen a lot more in a realm with fewer nobles (its actually based on how effective your attempt was, if it was only marginally effective, it doesn't get reported). Pus its memorial day weekend, I don't expect too many people to be on. I've got a parade to march in tomorrow, and a barbecue to follow, I might be on BM during part of it, but I'm an addict :p, and that's the exception not the rule. I'll never push for punishment because someone couldn't log on, but at the same time if someone is just sitting around soaking up tax gold, I'm not going to sit around and not say anything. If there is ever an incident where Magnus pushes for punishment on someone, and they shoot me an OOC note saying "hey I haven't been on because of xyz" I'll let it slide. I've played for ten years, and enjoyed it, and have a number of people I know enjoy playing in realms I'm in, and I do strive to make it fun. But, Magnus is a character, and he's a rather serious type. He is the third generation of his family to war with PoZ and he badly wants to put an end to them.

Justin Licht
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Fanofgaming

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Zach Eubanks here. Thank you, Stabbity, for posting the messages you've sent. For my purposes, only the first will be relevant. The argument is not over Magnus's intention -- I can respect the fact that he would want his orders followed. The argument is over whether or not you can force people to consistently check the game at least every 12 hours, and I am only asking for an answer from somebody who has the authority to settle the argument, not for any disciplinary action to be taken.

Stabbity

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You cannot force someone to log on every 12 hours and check. Its an inalienable right. There's no debate on that subject. My wording was poor (thank you vicoden), and I addressed it in later messages. No one is being fined for not logging in. No one has been fined.
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Penchant

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Zach Eubanks here. Thank you, Stabbity, for posting the messages you've sent. For my purposes, only the first will be relevant. The argument is not over Magnus's intention -- I can respect the fact that he would want his orders followed. The argument is over whether or not you can force people to consistently check the game at least every 12 hours, and I am only asking for an answer from somebody who has the authority to settle the argument, not for any disciplinary action to be taken.
Yes, his intentions are what matters. As he stated, his first letter sounds a bit incriminating until you hear the rest the story behind it. Clarifiying no one will be punished if they simply don't log on is saying, he doesn't care if you are inactive, just let him know so that either the punishment gets revoked, or just not done if you let him know in time, aka, he is going out of his way to let you know he will never punish you for inactivity aka he won't/is not breaking the IR related to inactivity. He never stated anyone needs to consistently check the game at least every 12 hours, he actually said that it is quite understandable and that he doesn't always either.
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Fanofgaming

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The fact that nobody is being fined yet is the reason for which I am not requesting that any disciplinary action be taken. Again, this argument is about whether or not you can do what Magnus has threatened to do. Although you may have explained his actions, he has not yet withdrawn his threat, and just because you say that he would not be fining characters for inactivity does not make it true. As I recall, the harshest punishments are said to be reserved for players who attempt to "weasel around" the inalienable rights.

Penchant, what I got from his explanations is essentially "I'll fine you, but then I might un-fine you if I like your explanation." To quote Stabbity's second OOC message, "If there is ever an incident where Magnus pushes for punishment on somepony, and they shoot me an OOC note saying "hay I haven't been on because of xyz" I'll let it slide." The implication that I am receiving is not that there is an overwhelming desire to defend the IRs, but rather that Stabbity does not see what his character threatened to do as a breach of them in the first place and that only by the generous grace of Stabbity will some poor character be saved from monetary discipline. I'm not expecting Stabbity to agree with me on anything here, really, and that is exactly why I have brought this argument here.

Stabbity

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Look, the magistrates aren't about solving arguments. Reading previous cases holds all the answers you want:

Here is a relevant case's verdict. You can read it if you like, its titled "Banned for five days of inactivity"

Quote
A verdict has been reached, and no IG enforcement actions were necessary. For anyone who desires to cite this case in the future, the final verdict was:

"The Magistrates find Evi Dimi not guilty of violating the Inalienable Rights. From all appearances, the bans were intended to punish characters for their decisions: namely, their decision to remain in a realm for hundreds of days and repeatedly ignore or disobey orders. While few days of inactivity never merits a ban, prolonged months of insufficient responses to reasonable queries, disobedience of orders, and general uselessness to a realm is certainly sufficient grounds for an entirely IC, non-IR-violating ban. A player's right to inactivity is protected, and its negative effects are controlled for by auto-pausing. But a character's right to blasé disregard for orders is not protected.

Magistrates voted 6-0 in favor of the not guilty verdict."

This thread is now closed.
« Last Edit: May 27, 2013, 07:58:40 AM by Stabbity »
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Fanofgaming

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More relevant would be this case.
Let me also quote the final verdict.
Quote from: Vellos
A verdict has been reached, and IG Magistrate actions have been made. For anybody who desires to cite this case in the future, the final verdict was:

"It is never acceptable to order, request, or suggest the violation of Inalienable Rights. This is especially important about the right to play at your own pace. No player should ever be threatened with punishment because they fail to make daily reports. Moreover, it is especially important to note that it is a violation of inalienable rights even if no punishment is given: sending messages that violate Inalienable Rights is a punishable action.

Given that no punishments were actually handed out, and given that the player of Balewin clearly had no malicious intent, and given that the player of Balewin evidently understands that he overstepped his bounds, the Magistrates will only give a warning this time."

Magistrates voted 8-0 in favor of a warning with no lock as the proper response.

It should be noted that, in addition to demanding that each noble support the takeover on a twice-a-day basis, your character also demanded that reports be included of their work. That's two reports a day, which coincided very well with my example. On a side note, reading previous cases is a very fascinating experience.

Stabbity

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Hence the OOC clarification. We all say dumb things sometimes. Doubly so while on prescription pain killers. Ordering people to report their actions is not an IR violation. The original wording of my letter, yes, that would constitute a violation, but then again HENCE THE CLARIFICATION.
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Fury

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It shouldn't have been said in the first place. Warning for first time offence. Ready to vote.

Lavigna

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The only thing i see here is poor wording indeed.

However what i want to know is if the OOC clarification was given after the report or before the report.

Fine or threaten to fine is the same thing. To me it makes no difference.So i won't judge differently.
But what i really see here is a bad wording and nothing more.

It is only expected for a General to give orders to the soldiers and demand from them to act but everytime a player gives such an order he/she should make sure to include that those who won't follow orders will be submitted to investigation as to why they haven't acted.

It is a fact that the game itself reports the actions of nobles.For example in a TO as TOs now work  everyone knows who contributed and who didn't thus those who are leading have every right to ask why those who were ordered did not follow orders and according to their answer act as they should.

That of course also means they should be very careful in how they phrase their orders because a strict one can lead players to think that in case they miss a turn they will receive a punishment.This is absolutely wrong even if the intentions were genuine.

Thus i am asking. Was the clarification given right away by the player because he himself understood that his order could be misinterpreted ? Or was he asked for one?
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Stabbity

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I gave it shortly thereafter, having realized my mistake, and quite some time before the complaint was filed.
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Fanofgaming

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There were a number of in-character messages shared between nobles between the first order given and the explanations that were provided. In fact, it was almost five hours between the two, during which (I believe) 15 letters and RP messages were shared. Before and after the clarification, there was an amount of OOC discussion on the topic as well. I believe it was somewhat well understood that, by the time Stabbity felt the need to explain himself, his character's orders were not taken well.

EDIT: For a specific example, this message was sent by one player precisely 12 minutes before Stabbity's first OOC message attempting to explain himself:

Quote
Out-of-Character from Alma Aeterdust   (11 hours, 46 minutes ago)
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Also, fining people for not logging in is in fact in violation of our inalienable rights, as far as I know. And I can really see this situation going that way, not necessarily, but quite possibly...

Raluca Borozan
« Last Edit: May 27, 2013, 12:55:48 PM by Fanofgaming »

Chenier

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I don't agree on the policy of "inactive characters will be fined until the players give me OOC justification to remove the fine". It's an undue burden on players who have a hard time logging in, and when one's only log in method is a mobile device, typing an OOC justification could take time and be overall quite unpleasant (I know I hate writing letters from my mobile).

There's nothing wrong with fining people who could have supported the TO but which you know didn't, for example: they moved to the wrong region, they looted instead of supporting the TO, or gave another indicator that they had logged in but still failed to do what you asked of them. But guilty until proven otherwise is not, as far as I know, the way we work around here. And "guilty until made innocent by IR" should not be the way players work either.
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