PvP Ethics and EFU v5

[SunrypeSlim]

What the story is, and who it's about, are things we try to control. That's futile. Log in and tell 490 stories. Renounce victory. Renounce karma. Renounce fun. Play to be.

Edit: 9/10 of the OOC bullying I receive is from DMs anyhow.

[Caddies]

I have seen numerous threads like these over the years, understandably. I think the key is to recognize our perspectives are extremely limited as individual players and our subjectivity almost assuredly negates a dependably objective view of what transpired. The truth is we do not know why premeditated FDs occur unless we are the killers / their allies. The vast majority of killings are plotted behind closed doors, or organized in some fashion IC -- a fraction are spontaneous / opportunistic, which is also fine. Really, if there was a DM present, that alone indicates an absence of griefing -- which is the only reason to raise concern about an FD on EFU, ultimately. Having said that, some deaths do indeed seem 'tasteless' from our vantage points... a good position to adopt is Socrates' "I know I do not know".  Your journey through EFU will be much better that way. Leave analysis of player behaviour to the DMs, those poor bastards!

[ARedRose]

I just checked all the replies and i now read them after all this time even though i'm not actively playing at the moment and the foreseeable future.

I think the problem with the server at the moment is summarized as follows.

People will do /anything/ to win and that includes a lot of exploits and underhanded OOC tactics. I have witnessed it multiple times with people transition ganking, switching hostility to avoid summons then attacking the summoner when in face-to-face range hostiling again, and druids exploiting plants that i saw on Discord. and other things i can't recall now that im sure i will if i start grinding my mind, i had someone steal from me all the time fully invisible time and time again (extra lame when you get PP'ed and you can't react and just lose some gold) because what's the point of stealing if there's no RP involved?

Someone said in a reply "I said hello they said hello and suddenly two people attack and loot me"
~~ This is a consequence of people Win no matter what mentality that is destroying the RP on the server and that is exactly what im talking about.~~

[SkillFocuspwn]

These threads pop up inevitably and cyclically, and always have since the beginning of EfU. Personally I believe (as Caddies said above) almost all of it is just perception based, rather than an actual shift in player approach; there are going to be times when a lot of FDs just happen to occur in a small space of time, which can give the impression of it being a change when it's actually just random chance.

I will say from this side, we do not have any kind of increase in players reporting abuses or rule breaking. I'm not denying that it happens sometimes, it is the nature of rules that people will want to break them. but from what I've seen, with EE, with the new chapter, and with the lockdown influx, we actually have had a lot of newer players coming in the last couple years from less conflict-driven servers. From my perspective, if anything I feel the wider playerbase is less interested in PvP than they have been in the past; although again, I really do believe that it is impossible to see these things clearly on such a vast server with so many players and moving parts; we are all seeing a small window of that big world, and should be wary to assume that what we see in that small window is representative of the whole.

If you have concerns about specific things that have happened, if there are events that you worry may be rule breaking, you should speak to us. We can't do a great deal about lamentations on the server's decline, but if there are any specific incidents you know about, we very much encourage you to tell us so we can investigate them properly.