Laws in RP

[Balatro]

Some have you may have heard about our community project (ravenmire, more info here) But the idea is overbearing laws and government.

We were discussing laws and prohibitions and Im curious what laws the community has put in place or been subject too!

What have you encountered. How did they effect RP?

Discuss

 

[Teeke]

I've found most people/characters ignore laws to just about the maximum degree. I think this is because people don't care about the (non-existent) punishments.
With being unable to properly jail people, and death being little more than a temporary impediment what reason would people follows laws?

*People who follow religious laws, such as Shalherana's laws, etc seem to stick to those - but this is because it's part of the character him or herself.

 

[Anithola]

Agree with Rain. Although I rarely RP, I feel like there is not enough punishment for what people can do in RP. There needs to be a trade-off, or else people will just do whatever they want without any sort of consequence.

"Hey, don't threaten to kill that entire family! Or else I will... not talk to you ever again!"

 

[Tempy_]

I've found most people/characters ignore laws to just about the maximum degree. I think this is because people don't care about the (non-existent) punishments.
With being unable to properly jail people, and death being little more than a temporary impediment what reason would people follows laws?

*People who follow religious laws, such as Shalherana's laws, etc seem to stick to those - but this is because it's part of the character him or herself.

I agree and actually admit to partaking in the former stated by Raindes, but I believe the reasoning for people such as I to not follow the law is because of the following:

When people have gone against the law, comitted a crime and such has been made known, it is rare for them to be actually punished for such. With a lacking amount of guards, peace keepers and more, people are not easily arrested and/or put to a stop for their crimes. And, in the rare situation when they are, through friendship policy, biased trials and just simply not being able to keep a strong, law enforcing judgement system, even if you are captured, you are easily set free once more without a serious punishment having been delivered.

(Personal opinion, and it can be that some regions actually do firmly keep people in check and follow the law, but I have yet to see such.~)

 

[Anithola]

Do I smell a reinstation of the Silvercloaks? :3

 

[Balatro]

Namely thats what we are endeavoring to change atleast for the people who are interested in a more bottled punishment and enforcment RP with ravenmire.

But more specifically im interested in WHAT laws you have encountered. Not to say that I dont also agree with you.

 

[dogbew]

We had plenty of laws in Wolfstadt, most people didn't like them.
Mostly though, the various nobles of the city interpreted the law into what fit them, and most people never really caught on to toss. For instance, it's illegal to be an Earthspawn in Wolfstadt but the punishment was only ever kicking them out of the city. My character took it upon himself to make sure every minority got the punishment they deserved, even if it wasn't against the laws. Everyone always said that the government was corrupt, when it was really just my character not enforcing the law correctly. The actual Arch-Duke was a very kind man, he was just too trusting in the wrong people.
The only other rp where I dealt with laws outside of Wolfstadt was possibly the worst rp experience I've ever had. We were trying to get a certain prisoner out of Tambry and, the rp with Anthology was great. I love how they do laws in Tambry, though it doesn't really work out with how he did things in Wolfstadt. Everything else that happened with that rp was absolute cancer, though I do think we could have built some nice international relations of that rp were able to be finished.
Back on topic though, I think the fact that the rp happens in a little tavern in the middle is nowhere really puts a damper on laws in general. Why bother following the law when I can go to the magic inn and be protected?

 

[Teeke]

Most laws I encountered were back when Port Silver was undamaged.
These laws revolved mostly around drunk and disorderly, murder, assault, theft - the general law affair.


((And dogbew not enforcing laws correctly basically = corruption))

 

[dogbew]

((And dogbew not enforcing laws correctly basically = corruption))

What I was trying to get at is that the entire government wasn't corrupt, most of our nobles were very reasonable. It was really just my character doing the bad things. Though I guess if you look at it from the outside, my character was one of the most active nobles, so most of the experiences people had with the government were with a bad person.

 

[Immerael]

Only laws I've encountered in my time here are OOC ones such as "No fighting in the Crossroads or peaceful regions." Even with guaranteed punishment folks still broke the laws or tried to do such, in the case of peaceful regions.

Um.... personally you may find a rather reasonable IRL law of not causing a disturbance would have most of HW locked up at one point or another.

 

[Azur]

Back on topic though, I think the fact that the rp happens in a little tavern in the middle is nowhere really puts a damper on laws in general. Why bother following the law when I can go to the magic inn and be protected?

The protection isn't there to protect those who break laws and do bad things in RP. The protection is there because large groups of people like to go out and cause trouble/harm people whenever they want. It's a way for people to RP without having to worry about these people stepping in and trying to kill their characters without any good reason.(Not that it works /too/ well, Damon has attacked people in the Crossroads, and vice versa; but you just have to hope that it's being thought about and fixed. )

 

[skuller]

Engems had a no cannibal law everyone seemed to be against for some reason.

 

[dogbew]

The protection isn't there to protect those who break laws and do bad things in RP. The protection is there because large groups of people like to go out and cause trouble/harm people whenever they want. It's a way for people to RP without having to worry about these people stepping in and trying to kill their characters without any good reason.(Not that it works /too/ well, Damon has attacked people in the Crossroads, and vice versa; but you just have to hope that it's being thought about and fixed. )

That might be why it was created, but that's not always why its used. I've had several law-breakers (innocent or not, reference the above post) run to the crossroads to escape punishment. The same thing happens in the peaceful regions, just not as often.
((How do people even get to the Crossroads from somewhere like Wolfstadt? None of our boats would let a criminal on, and we probably don't even sail to the crossroads, as most of our boats are either military or trade.. Do they walk across the continent to Le Havre? Do they swim there?))

 

[Chico_genre]

I've RP'd on a lot of servers and yeah mostly people don't care about laws because hey they can indeed run away via the magical warping boats, to a place where you can't be harmed due to the reason that yes mobs of people are jerks and would try to kill you for just looking at them. I've only seen one server (which broke down quite fast due to a mass increase in trolls) where people actually followed the laws... but obviously that didn't last long. Point is people will try to find loopholes in anything, in anyway they can because there isn't anything stopping them from doing so. "Oh look guys there's a law about not burning down houses" *looks around and see's no actual guards that ever existed ever, and burns it down IC because -loophole-* I mean you couldn't actually do that you'd need permission but still, it can happen.

 

[Balatro]

Again. Its something difficult to uphold. But even with all the flaws because of system mechanics we still want to atleast try to have laws IC because it makes sence to exist.

Im interested in the laws people have put in place in there towns. Upheld or otherwise. Because many of us created very different sorts of cultures with different social norms.

 

[Tybalt]

Please make it illegal to tie a Crocodile to a dock post.

 

[Tomato150]

Please make it illegal to tie a Crocodile to a dock post.

How'd @Landem get around?

 

[NIAH]

I'm not really throwing my two cents into this law debate that seems to be raging. But if you're wanting examples of laws, which is sort of what I'm picking up on, if you browse the census thread most all the towns have their laws posted. Or at least the towns with nice threads do. Though some are more OOC and some more IC. I remember Calan having some cool IC laws.

The major Houses in the House sub-forum also has many. I know I wrote some up for Mithtanil way back when for when Eriden got going. Different places to browse for them. Now... Whether these were followed is another debate, which... looks like is raging here anyway.~

 

[Sankera]

*breaks divine laws* peasants, get on my level

 

[Immerael]

Please make it illegal to tie a Crocodile to a dock post.

Tybs no. That is Zima'maloj's first line of defense. I will not cripple our city's defenses in such a manner.