metagaming

[malleus]

Sept 16, 2012 19:36:49 GMT -5 @soulfien said:

This thread reminds me of when the Cyrics were destroying temples left and right. They carved Cyric's symbol into the the dead priests/priestesses and left banners behind while making claims about false gods and their temples being cleansed.

The leader of the Cyric group was well known, in public, and always hung out openly in large groups of adventurers yet it was considered metagaming to go after him because there was no proof that he or his church were responsible.

Yeah I remember that I had a ton of fun killing all those people until one day where we was sneaking up on a defenseless druid girl and her friend, my brother and I killed them, on the way back there was a full buffed mage in the middle of town that we just before the killings knew went the other way unbuffed.

I´m not saying it was metagaming I just wondered why the mage would suddenly come running back across town buffed for a full war starting to throw spells at us.

Well we where lucky to get away from him alive and after that my brother and I kind of took a break from the Cyric group..

so yes sadly metagaming happens, and this time it kind of broke a bit of the fun for us.

[soulfien]

At the very least, the leader of that group should have been imprisoned and interrogated and if he didn't give any other names, hanged for the crimes himself.

Since he never hid and was always o vocal about being the leader.... that's how it should have happened, but he was granted total immunity.

That's what ruined it for me. Just seemed that evil could get away with anything unless you had forensic evidence

[Grozer]

Sept 17, 2012 11:40:35 GMT -5 @soulfien said:

At the very least, the leader of that group should have been imprisoned and interrogated and if he didn't give any other names, hanged for the crimes himself.

Since he never hid and was always o vocal about being the leader.... that's how it should have happened, but he was granted total immunity.

That's what ruined it for me. Just seemed that evil could get away with anything unless you had forensic evidence

A valid point but that does not excuse metagaming which is the topic at hand. Villains at some point have to face consequences or at least the appearance of them, similarly I think those that hunt or cause villains grief need to be prepared to face consequences as well.

Personally I think both sides of the discussion on this topic have valid concerns/comments/perspectives or whatever else you want to call it. Metagaming damages the fun for everyone. In my humble opinion, Aodhan's comments said it best.

The only advice I would offer those that play villains is yes it can be tough and metagaming may happen but do not fall back to quickly believing that to be the case. Think through what's going on and do ask in an OOC non confrontational manner to help get clarity. Keep in mind there are on average 30-40 PCs logging into this game and hundreds if not thousands of seen and unseen NPCs which can work to piece together the tinest of details and arrive at conclusions. Something I learned in my time, neutral and good aligned PCs, heck even some evil PCs that may be trying to destroy another evil DO share info so do NOT underestimate that power in learning your secrets. (Ranan has wanted to decapitate a certain smart pyro-maniac hin on a number of occasions!)

Having been involved in a number of situations where I thought I was metagamed (some legimate others not), sometimes the best recourse is to turn the tide of information IC and perhaps using it to your advantage. And no I dont mean posting something on the forums so you can claim metagaming, I mean manipulating the situation in character. Last bit of advice from my own experience, one needs to be the utmost sportsman to play a villain and do so to bring about stories and "fun" confrontational RP, don't do it to "win" and definitely be prepared for any and all consequences.

I guess should also admit I am speaking from experience and my own mistakes here. Admittedly I have been quick to claim or conclude metagaming and I did so out of frustration at times. Its not a fun situation for either the accuser or the accused so at least do some checking and understand where both sides are coming from before falling back to that accusation.

[Carpe]

YOU CAN'T KNOW I'M EVIL! YOU HAVE NO PROOF!

...actually what that means is I can't take you to court and convict you of being evil.

Can I accuse you? Sure. Can I tell all my friends you are? Sure. If they're clever they'll ask why I think that. If I'm clever, I'll have a reason.

And if YOU are clever, you'll continue to deny it IC, instead of jumping immediately to OOC with butthurt about having been meta'd.

In the course of a murder investigation, do you know how many of the suspects committed the murder?

ONE.

Do you know how many suspects are told during questioning that the police have proof positive they're the murderer?

ALL OF THEM.

If you can't think of why someone might do this strangely illogical thing, you have no business playing evil.

I'm sorry Sky but I will not back you up on this. Most cases of metagaming we've investigated have been found to be absolutely legit. And something like half of the cases we've investigated came from the same handful of people who simply can't admit that they've slipped up somewhere along the way, or that things could possibly happen that they didn't account for first.

CHECK BEFORE YOU WRECK. You have NO idea who's been watching you, or who's sold you out. Just because you didn't out yourself to that person, personally, just because you didn't release the information for the public, does not mean they couldn't know. And they're allowed, I say again, ALLOWED, to GUESS. It is up to YOU to deflect those guesses, not the Staff Metapolice.

While I would still encourage anyone who wishes to report metagaming instances so we can sort it out, always jumping right to a stance of YOU BASTARD METAGAMER is really going to bite you in the butt, and hard.

[ladyphoenix]

And I will be blunt, Those that hang with Aris are going to be seen as neutral or suspicious until proven otherwise by my character. Those seen very friendly with him or associating with extensively are going to be suspected of evil. That is how my character thinks.

She has a couple others that she treats the same way but they are also associated with Aris or she was told was part of his group.

If my character dies, odds are that his circle of friends will be first people accused and questioned because my character has formally make that likelihood known and is expecting them to ambush her.

The fact is, FRC does make it much harder to catch evil. Disguises are almost 100% fool proof, there is no detect evil abilities, no divination, no modern forensics, and a potion of invisibility is only 171 gold in the right store to ambush person and get away.

Even accusations and heresay based on logical reasoning only results in a 'we will invesgiate' and dies there. Catching evil doing evil is almost impossible. This s not to say my character won't watch and try but truthfully, I don't hope to reasonably ever really have success. Probably just a few deaths from the trying effort. DMs even confirmed a lot of that earlier in the thread because it was to stop metagaming. That and success in catching evil doing evil means someone loses their PC.

[FORSETIS]

Sky said metagaming is bad. Which I think we can all agree?

People jumped to defense explaining how their characters are not metagaming, with reasons how they came to gain their knowledge. If your character is in fact doing those things, then your not metagaming.. why post here about how your not? No one accused you. I think he was simply trying to remind us all to check facts maybe? I know his character himself faces alot of challenged. And I think he was just trying to drop a reminder.

I would like to comment on the "Black clothing" thing.. Black does not make you evil. I wear alot of black IRL. I assure you I dont murder people like my character does, who also wears alot of black. If your basing people to be evil, or bad because they wear black, that seems like very weak rp to me. And dont get me wrong, I realize people can conclude my toon being "bad" because he hangs with Aris. But there are IC reasons for that. Butchers done alot of evil, but fact is, he has yet to be busted. Thats who he is. Thats what he does. Thats the point of my character. To be they guy, everyone knows is shady, but cant prove it. And he will do his best to keep it that way. But to assume he is evil because he wears black? I mean, use his nick name at least. Butcher I guess can mean he's evil... or that he used to be a actual butcher... And maybe he wears black because he sneaks around dungeons? (shut up erratic, I dont care if black leaves an outline in shadows ^^ ) Or maybe he wears black because he likes the way it looks. Ok rant over, wow. My bad. lol

[Razgriz]

Ic info on the forums...Careful

It's a trap! *squidmindflayer head*

[Deleted]

Sometimes, I think people would enjoy the game more if they would lighten up about having someone figure them out, catch their character, chase them around, try to beat up on their character, etc. I mean, when you log in, people will want to play with you. If one plays a "good guy," and the other plays a "bad guy," they're going to be in opposition, but still, one player is just trying to play together with the other. Is your character there in the understanding the game's going to be more fun to someone else because of their presence and influence, and this might mean taking a fall in some way now and then? Or is the game only fun to you if you hold all the cards, to the point you'll call "metagaming" as a last ditch attempt to preserve "informational superiority" so you can be the one pulling all the surprises? Maybe somewhere in between? Point being, I think it's best if one looks at their character as having some level of entertainment value and purpose for other people, including those whose characters oppose their own, and that if one does, automatic assumptions of metagaming might kind of dwindle a little bit.

[canuckkane]

Sept 17, 2012 14:13:43 GMT -5 Carpe said:

YOU CAN'T KNOW I'M EVIL! YOU HAVE NO PROOF!

...actually what that means is I can't take you to court and convict you of being evil.

Can I accuse you? Sure. Can I tell all my friends you are? Sure. If they're clever they'll ask why I think that. If I'm clever, I'll have a reason.

And if YOU are clever, you'll continue to deny it IC, instead of jumping immediately to OOC with butthurt about having been meta'd.

In the course of a murder investigation, do you know how many of the suspects committed the murder?

ONE.

Do you know how many suspects are told during questioning that the police have proof positive they're the murderer?

ALL OF THEM.

If you can't think of why someone might do this strangely illogical thing, you have no business playing evil.

I'm sorry Sky but I will not back you up on this. Most cases of metagaming we've investigated have been found to be absolutely legit. And something like half of the cases we've investigated came from the same handful of people who simply can't admit that they've slipped up somewhere along the way, or that things could possibly happen that they didn't account for first.

CHECK BEFORE YOU WRECK. You have NO idea who's been watching you, or who's sold you out. Just because you didn't out yourself to that person, personally, just because you didn't release the information for the public, does not mean they couldn't know. And they're allowed, I say again, ALLOWED, to GUESS. It is up to YOU to deflect those guesses, not the Staff Metapolice.

While I would still encourage anyone who wishes to report metagaming instances so we can sort it out, always jumping right to a stance of YOU BASTARD METAGAMER is really going to bite you in the butt, and hard.

+1

I have a tendency to play evil characters, the end result is that people that know me tend to assume that my characters are evil because that's where I'm comfortable, as a result their characters likely experience some influence from this. That said, it does NOT mean that their characters have no valid reason to distrust my character or suspect they have a hidden agenda or that they're not a good person. If you play an evil character and you get people calling you an 'evil' person, then it's entirely up to you to discredit them IN CHARACTER. It really isn't difficult to cast doubt on someone that wants to claim you're evil. Are their friends going to side with them? Probably. Will everyone? Not likely.

One last thought here. Before you go thinking that it's not possible that someone saw or overheard you talking about your nefarious plans with your cronies, remember this. True Seeing has been altered on here, so some of the better sneaks on the server currently are probably getting around true seeing. If you have a plan you don't want others getting wind of, keep it to yourself. If you have to discuss these plans with others, work out a way to do it covertly, but expect that there's always a chance that someone else figured it out. Besides, if nobody can possibly figure out your nefarious schemes and stop you... where's the fun in that?