There's been a lot of talk lately about Fort's strict "no goodie kills" requirement.

RP-wise, it makes perfect sense. Of course Maran shouldn't kill goodies. The problem is that the CF's hardcoded NPC behavior has never been consistent with the imms' interpretation of what being "good" means.

Past imms have made it very clear that a good rager who regularly slaughters good mages will not remain good for long. Ditto for a Sunwarden who hunts paladins. Even good Tribs are expected to give good criminals a chance to turn themselves in before hunting them.

This is how the immstaff have ALWAYS interpreted the good alignment (all goodies, not just Maran). Good guys don't kill other good guys - at least not without a LOT of forethought and a LOT of remorse - or they get turned neutral eventually.

The problem is that's not how CF mobs behave.

- Good cityguards attack good criminals, basically without hesitation. (A behavior more consistent with CF's interpretation of "good" would be for them to say something like "Criminals are not welcome here" and bar goodie criminals from going further into the city, but not attack them; or to give them a ten second warning before attacking.)

- As noted elsewhere, angels and archons attack good conjies. This makes no sense; in CF/DND lore, these are literal embodiments of good, they should NEVER try to kill a good person. The obvious rebuttal is "well, it was justified because you tried to bind them!" - which is tantamount to saying "Outlander/Entropy are right, conjuring = enslavement which is an inherently evil act." In which case it shouldn't be possible to roll good conjurers at all.

- Blades can shove people into fights with goodie mobs. RP-wise it makes no sense that good NPCs would mindlessly attack another goodie who was literally pushed into them.

I could come up with other examples, these are just some of the more prominent ones. (Historically, of course, the biggest one was the whitecloak encampment, but I understand that's changed now.)

We all know why NPCs function this way. It's partly game balance (with no threat from servitors, goodie conjies would be OP) and partly practicality (coding a separate behavior for good cityguards would take time and resources). But the upshot is still that CF holds its own game world to a different standard than players.

Bluntly, good NPCs do not act good. They act neutral, which makes accidental goodie kills more likely than they should be.

That's always mildly annoyed me, but only turns into a real issue when you set a zero-tolerance "no goodie kills" rule on the largest good cabal. The truth is that while that rule makes perfect sense, it is at odds with how CF was designed.

I think that the rule should be scrapped until and unless NPCs act in a way that's consistent with the standards applied to good chars across the board.

I'm not going to address this entire post but I will say that there
are currently people in the cabal with good mob kills on their
records. To say this is "zero-tolerance" is inaccurate. These
occurrences are reviewed on an individual basis and "punishment"
is assessed as such.

If you're joining Fort with the belief that you have a "freebie" goodie
kill, you're doing it wrong.

If you think you're going to get booted/demoted for a single goodie
kill, it depends.

If your intent is to sweep it under the rug, then we'll have some
problems. If you're willing to roleplay, there's probably a place
for you. The worst, most consistent issues I've seen are people
who frag goodie mobs and blow it off/don't acknowledge it - and it
has absolutely happened A LOT in the last 2-3 years.

I've also watched at least 3 people pledge with 1-2 good mob kills
before level 20, some shrugging it off as no big deal.

If this hardline stance is uncomfortable, know it's a response to poor
in-game behavior that wasn't addressed previously but should have
been.

Poor in-game behavior that should have been addressed is no reason to turn the screws on everyone. Sounds like you're saying an IMM should have stepped in before and didn't. Well, the solution for that is in IMM-land, not on the ground.

Reminds me of when someone got tons of edge points by gaming the role updates and then instead of having IMMs step in when abuse like that occurs, everyone paid for it with much fewer edge points. I know that wasn't the only reason, but it was one of them if I recall.

Also, Hell closing because *1* person decided he wanted it closed and leaked logs on Dio's. Scar obliged him.

Closing ST for everyone because someone broke the first rule of ST club.

Collective punishment seems to be a theme. Unfortunately, it's useless in this setting because we have no influence over other players. If we could give them a code red in the middle of the night, I'd be all for it, but we cannot.

I think the current progress is fine. Basically there'd better be a damn good explanation for what you did, and evidence you have taken it to heart.

Certainly for my character it had changed the way I play and made me much more careful.

However, I can see why an angel using conjie would have issues. I think such a conjie needs to blow edge points on the dismissal edge, or needs some alternative such as making sure there's a decent circle within the reach of one spell or power. Because angels do turn on you with no good reason, sometimes.

http://forums.carrionfields.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=6&topic_id=68526&mesg_id=68526&listing_type=search

Pretty clearly stated freebie policy there. Could you update that post and clarify your expectations. Is Fort more of a RP cabal now in your eyes than PK? That seems to be the disconnect.

Unfortunately, the references are quite dated (3+ years old). Also the second part is clearly marked with a caveat of "My Interpretation". Which means that was how I was managing the Fortress at the time. To be more specific, the "accident/mulligan" was always looked at to see if it was truly an accident, e.g. city guard in redhorn getting one shot, conjurer angel fight, etc. They were handled exactly as Padwei described. You have to look at every situation and judge accordingly.

Needless to say, how I handled fortress was how I alone handled it. There are new/old ways of looking at things now.

Link for your convenience:

http://forums.carrionfields.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=6&topic_id=71351&mesg_id=71357&page=

on binding angels. If an angel is attacking you for doing something, a good char should not be doing it. That sounds like an immersion breaking contradiction now that you mention it.

Is wasted on the unreasonable. Whoever continues to maintain these policies against the objection clearly doesn't understand CF or its fun-economy, and doesn't want to.

They're entitled to play their stupid game, so give them their stupid prize: quit playing Fort.

is not wrong. I wanted to roll a Fort for a long time especially at times where there were high Empire numbers or when there was a powerful evil char wreaking havoc. But, getting booted for something out of your control was a deal breaker. Now, some can avoid killing a good mob. But, I haven't played a character who has had to worry about what they killed for a decade or more. Knowing what good mobs are aggro, what align different guards are, etc. is a learning process. I didn't want to roll a new character every time I learned of a different way you could accidentally kill a good mob. I would not enjoy exploring all the new RP possibilities that come with getting kicked out of a cabal I spent 100+ hours getting into, so I've played mostly neutral characters. But, if the rule was removed or lessened *considerably* I would probably give it a go. But I'm not holding my breath.

It wouldn't be so bad if there was a golden grimoire style edge for songs, but far as I know there isn't. And yet there is troubadour for tribunal bards.

You end up using serenade, lullaby and flee a hell of a lot more then you would otherwise.