Announce post #3326: Aegis, PK, And A Reminder

Autoposter

2/15/2022 at 23:52
Ictinus, the Architect
Everyone
Aegis, PK, And A Reminder

Hi folks,

I've just updated HELP AEGISPK to be clearer when it comes to defensive rights regarding them. Specifically:

Nobody but the owner has defensive rights on an aegis UNLESS that aegis is in a location owned by an organisation you are a member of, or a location that you personally own such as a shop, personal residence and so on. If you plant an aegis somewhere public that makes others want to destroy it, that is your responsibility and yours alone.

(Yes, this means planting an aegis somewhere public and using it as cause-bait to bring a large team to defend it is not allowed)

If you are planting aegises in the event locations and logging off, that is a risk you take.

Further, I'd like to remind everyone of this section in HELP PK:

Any time you assist another player, or group of players, in slaying someone - you are expected to have a strong reason to help kill them.

Please keep this in mind when deciding whether your friend who just initiated a fight really needs six of you to come and save them from something they started.

Please keep this in mind when deciding whether you have a stake in a conflict beyond 'it's my friend'.

And please keep this in mind when deciding to file issues because you jumped into a fight that had nothing to do with you and were later killed for it.

Thanks.

Penned by my hand on Kinsday, the 1st of Slyphian, in the year 500 MA.

Eliadon

> Point 1: Nobody but the owner has defensive rights on an aegis UNLESS that aegis is in a location owned by an organisation you are a member of, or a location that you personally own such as a shop, personal residence and so on. If you plant an aegis somewhere public that makes others want to destroy it, that is your responsibility and yours alone.

> Point 2: Any time you assist another player, or group of players, in slaying someone - you are expected to have a strong reason to help kill them.

Brought this up on Discord, but it went without any contribution from the administration so I'm putting it here.

Can we get some clarity on what exactly 'a strong reason to help kill them' is?

Using an Aegis as a framework here, because it's currently the most pertinent:

Scenario 1:

Let's say Razmael has an Aegis at North of Trees, but has his enemy list disabled so no one will be hit by it.
Keroc doesn't like this very much, so Keroc says to Ra'ah, Brax, Silena, Xaspher, and Zeheia, "Hey, I don't want this Aegis here. Come uproot it with me so we can 6v1 Razmael if he shows up."
Keroc proceeds to uproot the Aegis, Razmael arrives to defend and only attacks Keroc, the other Celani join in Keroc in killing Razmael despite Keroc being the aggressor.

When asked why they helped Keroc, the other Celani say, "Why, because he's my friend and I wanted that Aegis gone."

This leaves Razmael in a tough spot - he's out time, he's out resources, and he's out exp. He can't even bring Ictinus with him to mass zap the Celani because he's the only one allowed to defend that Aegis.

Would the Celani killing Razmael be justified here? Possibly, because the Aegis was present and possibly annoying - but it was not hitting any of them, nor did Razmael hit any of them. That said - Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brough the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Razmael under no circumstances can reasonably defend this Aegis, even if it's important for current events.

Scenario 2

Now, let's change the framing and remove the aegis - let's say Razmael's trying to raise a shrine in a new zone. Keroc defiles it. Razmael tries to kill Keroc, but Keroc's got the Celani squad and 'he's my friend!'

Is that enough justification? Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brought the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Scenario 3

Keroc shouted that Razmael's mother is a unicorn, and Razmael took offense to this. Razmael attacks Keroc, which is completely justified, but then the Celani squad jump in and defend him because 'he's my friend and Razmael was attacking him'

Is that enough justification? Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brought the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Scenario 4

Razmael's minding his own business outside of his house and Keroc shows up and starts hitting Razmael. Razmael attacks Keroc back, but then the Celani squad jump in and defend him because 'he's my friend and Razmael was attacking him'

Is that enough justification? Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brought the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Scenario 5

Keroc wrongly attacked Razmael earlier and now Razmael has cause on Keroc. Razmael jumps Keroc, but then the Celani squad jump in and defend him because 'he's my friend and Razmael was attacking him'

Is that enough justification? Keroc attacked Razmael without cause, Razmael brought the fight because Keroc attacked him, Keroc teamed Razmael.



I understand that RP should be the motivation for most PK related actions, but without some explicit examples for 'a strong reason to help kill them' people are going to continue to subjectively interpret this rule without any actual context beyond the hearsay from previous issue responses.

Some identifying information redacted issue results that fit scenarios like these could be exceptionally instructive, or even hypothetical issue responses.

For the first circumstance, the best overall outcome that I can think of is 'only Keroc can fight Razmael for this Aegis, and the next person who uproots fights him. Until Razmael loses a string of 1v1s, or kills them all. Similar idea for shrines, really.

edit: formatting
edit2: Another scenario, and redundancy

Toz

I think that grey areas are always going to assist. I'm going to suggest that the following are no longer grey areas:
- an aegis outside of an org's territory that is actively hitting people

- running from your city/elsewhere to join in on a fight because your friend is under attack

- someone is raising a shrine, outside of active conflict zones

Personal takes below:
If you have an aegis at NoT and 6 people show up to uproot it, that's probably a good indicator that you are doing things with said aegis that people dislike, enough so that 6 people showed up to deal with it/you. "This aegis has been/will be a problem, so I am helping remove it" seems legit. If you don't want to lose aegis comms, don't put an aegis up at NoT. That seems pretty straightforward?

If you are fishing by yourself, and you get jumped because your aegis was hitting someone, and you call in your friends? You're wrong and so are they.

If you are group fishing and someone shows up to beat you up, then they should reasonably expect to deal with all your friends too, even if they can jump your friends later for it. If they bring uninvolved friends to help, honestly I say you just call it there or start finding battleground angles because you're already doing group v group pk.

I think defiling aura should spread on assist if the fight happens in a room where a shrine is being attacked. If you heal the defiler or attack someone in the order/cong, you should be just as open to PK as they are.

Eliadon

Prob should have clarified, each scenario after #1 was strictly sans-Aegis. Reworded to clarify

Iesid

Just for everyone's information in the future, since I also endured a lot of whining about shrines specifically:

You sent the following message to Ictinus:
Oh, hey - this issue response from Veritas makes mention of aegis, but what about shrines in those
areas? The message says 'aegis are not shrines' - is that something we're still allowed to fight 
over between spear events? Just asking so I can save people some heartache.

Message #7491  Sent By: Ictinus         Received On: 2/16/2022/1:23
"That falls under my prior ruling - area of significance applies to a shrine being raised in this
instance. Have at it."

Tetchta

That's a helpful clarification to post (I was curious myself), but, man, it's sucky to call everything you don't like "whining." You're better than that.

Illikaal

I'd also just like to point out the grey area in more new rules that got implemented here:

https://forums.aetolia.com/discussion/comment/112686#Comment_112686

Because the exact situation I described would happen is already happening, and it never got any clarification despite players thinking the rules were clear enough.

Tetchta

The question of me (some guy not in an order) defending, say, Almol (damsel in distress 🥺) while he raises shrines, and whether or not you get PK on the person defending? And whether that person has any right to defend to begin with? Did I read that scenario correctly?

Ictinus

Eliadon said:

> Point 1: Nobody but the owner has defensive rights on an aegis UNLESS that aegis is in a location owned by an organisation you are a member of, or a location that you personally own such as a shop, personal residence and so on. If you plant an aegis somewhere public that makes others want to destroy it, that is your responsibility and yours alone.

> Point 2: Any time you assist another player, or group of players, in slaying someone - you are expected to have a strong reason to help kill them.

Brought this up on Discord, but it went without any contribution from the administration so I'm putting it here.

Can we get some clarity on what exactly 'a strong reason to help kill them' is?

Using an Aegis as a framework here, because it's currently the most pertinent:

Scenario 1:

Let's say Razmael has an Aegis at North of Trees, but has his enemy list disabled so no one will be hit by it.
Keroc doesn't like this very much, so Keroc says to Ra'ah, Brax, Silena, Xaspher, and Zeheia, "Hey, I don't want this Aegis here. Come uproot it with me so we can 6v1 Razmael if he shows up."
Keroc proceeds to uproot the Aegis, Razmael arrives to defend and only attacks Keroc, the other Celani join in Keroc in killing Razmael despite Keroc being the aggressor.

When asked why they helped Keroc, the other Celani say, "Why, because he's my friend and I wanted that Aegis gone."

This leaves Razmael in a tough spot - he's out time, he's out resources, and he's out exp. He can't even bring Ictinus with him to mass zap the Celani because he's the only one allowed to defend that Aegis.

Would the Celani killing Razmael be justified here? Possibly, because the Aegis was present and possibly annoying - but it was not hitting any of them, nor did Razmael hit any of them. That said - Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brough the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Razmael under no circumstances can reasonably defend this Aegis, even if it's important for current events.

Scenario 2

Now, let's change the framing and remove the aegis - let's say Razmael's trying to raise a shrine in a new zone. Keroc defiles it. Razmael tries to kill Keroc, but Keroc's got the Celani squad and 'he's my friend!'

Is that enough justification? Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brought the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Scenario 3

Keroc shouted that Razmael's mother is a unicorn, and Razmael took offense to this. Razmael attacks Keroc, which is completely justified, but then the Celani squad jump in and defend him because 'he's my friend and Razmael was attacking him'

Is that enough justification? Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brought the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Scenario 4

Razmael's minding his own business outside of his house and Keroc shows up and starts hitting Razmael. Razmael attacks Keroc back, but then the Celani squad jump in and defend him because 'he's my friend and Razmael was attacking him'

Is that enough justification? Keroc picked a fight, Razmael brought the fight, Keroc teamed Razmael.

Scenario 5

Keroc wrongly attacked Razmael earlier and now Razmael has cause on Keroc. Razmael jumps Keroc, but then the Celani squad jump in and defend him because 'he's my friend and Razmael was attacking him'

Is that enough justification? Keroc attacked Razmael without cause, Razmael brought the fight because Keroc attacked him, Keroc teamed Razmael.



I understand that RP should be the motivation for most PK related actions, but without some explicit examples for 'a strong reason to help kill them' people are going to continue to subjectively interpret this rule without any actual context beyond the hearsay from previous issue responses.

Some identifying information redacted issue results that fit scenarios like these could be exceptionally instructive, or even hypothetical issue responses.

For the first circumstance, the best overall outcome that I can think of is 'only Keroc can fight Razmael for this Aegis, and the next person who uproots fights him. Until Razmael loses a string of 1v1s, or kills them all. Similar idea for shrines, really.

edit: formatting
edit2: Another scenario, and redundancy

This (excellent) post is a perfect illustration of why I don't like having to extend or alter PK rules at all, because ultimately it's obvious that perfectly accounting for every situation is impossible, that there will always be loopholes, grey areas, etc for people to play around.

Arguably those NEED to exist in order for PK to happen at all outside of pre-scripted scenarios, and I'm not interested in trying to perfectly elucidate every permutation of every possible conflict scenario - Achaea attempted that in the past and it led to some of the worst examples of rules-lawyering I've ever seen.

That said, I am happy to go on the record and state that I don't find "it's my friend" to be an acceptable reason to jump into someone else's fight. If you're in the room when it happens? Fine. If it's your spouse or something? Fine. But outside of that, and absent another compelling reason, if your friend has started a fight or gotten jumped for something they did to bring cause down on themselves - that's their problem. If they don't want to deal with being killed after the fact for something, then I recommend they don't give people reasons to want to kill them in the first place. Defiling isn't an exemption from this either.

Obviously this is virtually unenforceable without some sense of sportsmanship on both sides - sometimes a 1v1, 2v2, whatever will erupt into a group fight, which is its own beast.

I think that covers most of your scenarios, @Eliadon . As for aegis - it's on the mage to see to its defence regardless of whether there's a group there dampening it. The group should still try to adhere to the need for an actual reason for being there in the first place - but ultimately an aegis is a weapon, the mage is making a choice to antagonise people by putting it there, they're knowingly opting in to being an aggressor in this instance, and nobody has any innate right to place an aegis freely and without consequences. If the mage doesn't want to have to deal with groups trying to remove it, they have the choice not to place them in public areas.

The bigger problem I've observed here is that a lot of people's first instinct whenever someone kills someone else is to assume it's unjustified instead of taking 30 seconds to reflect on the situation or - dare I say it - to give someone the benefit of the doubt before threatening issues, blowing up in webs with pitchforks and outrage, or - most commonly - deciding that because someone dared to seek justifiable retribution against one of your allies, that they now deserve 10 of you to come down on them to show them the error of their ways. These are problematic attitudes, and everyone would do well to treat the people on the other side with a bit more respect instead of falling into this habit.

The amount of actual unjustified PK that takes place in Aetolia is minimal. Most people follow the rules, that's a simple fact.

A final note on bounties - if someone has filed a bounty against you for a legitimate reason, you cannot then bounty them back for filing a bounty. Nor can you go after them for filing it. Again - if you don't want a bounty on your head? Don't give someone a reason to file one. It really is that simple - if it's a bogus bounty, then feel free to issue about it, but I'd strongly advise being certain of your facts before doing so.

Tetchta

Ictinus said:

Nor can you go after them for filing it.

Iesid

Since I'm never without a question...

You sent the following message to Ictinus:
I am your friendly Spirit-tethered headache, here with a question on your forum post: regarding
'it's my friend', I am actually pretty sure I get the distinction here. However, does this mean
we're expected to not even the odds if someone brought a group for one person and you can't
immediately think of why they'd deserve a full party to come kill them? Last night's --- vs.
--- situation is a good example of what I mean. People started joining in until it got out of
hand.

Message #7511 Sent By: Ictinus Received On: 2/17/2022/0:22
"Honestly at that point I'd just write it off as a group fight probably. If people start off with a
team then that's a very different thing to a 1v1 spiralling into a 10v1 stomp imo."

Eliadon

Thank you!

Lim

What if it's my really really really really really really really good friend?

Illikaal

Actual question. Is it valid to pursue PK on someone who puts a silly bounty on your head instead of issuing if the situation is appropriate, or should we always issue as the recourse? Someone put a bounty on my head during the war because while in the process of killing this person while they were active militia, they unenlisted before they died as some smug attempt to say "Haha you can't kill me now" but we finished them off anyway. They used sect for the bounty and the reason was "Killing me while not active in the war", but of course nobody tried to claim it. What would be appropriate there?