Discovery Gaming Community

I will pull one quote by Igiss from an unmentionably sad post in the RP forum:

"The ID system cannot fit RP precisely. Not many people tried to act precisely like their NPC allies."

In other words, one should pick an ID that most closely resembles the type of character/faction they wish to create but it does not have to be a carbon copy of the NPCs whom that ID represents. Looking at the currently active factions, the older ones tend to look for more liberty and freedom from their NPC ID in terms of background story and motivations (Helghast, AW, Phantom,) a few older factions are purists (RM, GOR, SF) and most of the newer factions now are purists (KNF, SA, JOS, Brotherhood.) Basically we see two role play philosophies interacting on the forums. Looking at past topics on IDs plus the rules, it appears we are trying to accomodate both philosophies at the same time which breeds vagueness and confustion and therefor conflict and pain in the community. Examples are arguments centered around a faction's identity and proper conduct for said faction. If an ID grants its owner rights for certain role play activities, and those rights are derived from an existing NPC faction, one should not be able to turn around and say "my faction is not related to the NPCs that control my ID, therefore I don't have to heed it." That kind of thinking goes against the whole spirit of using IDs in the first place. Why have an ID that identifies you as a certain type of character if you aren't playing as that type of character?

Now to answer the greater question that vexes us with the Zoner ID, we have to dig deeper. Considering the rules stated on forum and on faction ID, plus the supplimental topic Igiss published just prior to the release of 4.8, there are 2 items that will inevitably cause flaming on these forums:

From New Role Play System, of Discovery Server by Igiss:

"Each ID grants its owner rights for certain roleplay activities (I'll cover this part later). These activities are briefly listed in ID descriptions in-game. For each group I listed above (Military, Police, Trader, Pirate, Terrorist) rights and obligations are nearly same. ID also limits ship types you may use. However, if you join a server faction, you may act differently from what's written in your ID - if your faction requires you so. For example, military cannot attack lawfuls, but in case of war owners of military IDs may attack fighters and even traders of the opposing side."

...

"Traders

IDs: Corporations, IMG, GMG, Zoners.

Allowed: Trade, escort traders, scan for contraband.

Not allowed: Fulfil bounty contracts, participate in military operations and unlawful activities.

Allowed ships: Fighters, Freighters, Transports

IMG, GMG: Can fulfil bounty contracts.
Zoners: Can fulful bounty contracts & participate in military operations (lawful)."

Perhaps this last tidbit is out dated as I don't think the Zoner ID is classified as a trader ID anymore (it can't anymore or Zoners wouldn't be allowed to fly their Juggs.)

At any rate, if this explaination still applies, and affects the published 2007 server rules, it means that a faction can go against the written rules on it's ID if it goes to war with someone (this was the only example Igiss gave on when a faction can override its ID, but he implied others exist too.) I imagine this little bit was added to allow Kusari and Bretonia navies to attack each other's corporate transports, but it could be extended to any other faction that wants to go to war.

So, you carry a navy ID and you want to do something unlawful? Easy, declare war on someone and there you are. Same goes for the AW I guess. They declared war with SA (a lawful faction,) so they can go fight SA unprovoked by overriding the 'lawful clause' in their Zoner ID.

Ok, so AW goes to war with SA because AW has an alliance with HF, a Lane Hacker (loosely affiliated but Hacker guard system owning) faction-who were fighting their arch enemies, the Liberty Navy (SA.) I don't know when the alliance between AW and HF was struck, but I would wonder if anyone was at war when the deal went down or if any other hertofor unmentioned 'conditions for ID override' were met that allowed a lawful faction to ally itself with an unlawful faction.

The result of this duplicity in the rules will be anarchy and render IDs meaningless.

I ask that the admins consider two things to address this problem:

1)Require strict adherance to ID info cards at all times regardless of whether you are individual or player faction.

or

2)Change the Zoner ID to being niether lawful or unlawful and able to participate in either side of a military action. Someone mentioned how the Junker ID is similar to the Zoner ID, but it isn't because they are max hostile to Xenos and Hogosha so that ID doesn't need to be changed.


The first person who takes this post personally and flames it will get a 3 gallon pie in the face from Malaclypse666....you have been warned:cool:

I'll try not to flame. First of all, the AW HF alliance has existed for a long time, before you were even here Yngen. It's been getting a lot of flames lately. As has the AW usage of the Zoner ID. *grits teeth* I'll just get it out. I'M SICK OF IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ok, better now.

I do remember that ID system, and you will also remember that it was voted down. Discovery didn't want it. I thought it was a pretty good idea, but it was voted down.

I understand how you feel, with the whole ID system under questioning, that it should be changed, but I don't feel that this is the right one.

We need to try to stay calm. Everyone here needs a vicodin and glass of magnesia.

Everyone RPs in their own specific way, and when we feel like a specific person. The South Alliance are "Purists" as Yngen points out, and we are proud of that. I'm also a member of the SCRA, and we now wear the Xenos tag, despite the fact that we are Coalition.

We must realize that the South Alliance is not purist due to choice. We are purist because we are lucky due to the fact that a Liberty Navy already exists, and it was the closest thing to us. The RM and SF, they essentially are the factions that are in the game, as is the SA.

On the other hand, factions like the Phantoms and SCRA are unlucky. They do not have tags that match their description properly, resulting in the fact that they must wear another tag.

Igiss assigned the AW their current tag, and personally, I cannot argue against it. Thus, I will argue for it, despite the fact that it may be overruling my personal intentions.

The gods have willed it so, and I say, leave it be.

Personally, I think Zoner should be changed to be neither lawful or unlawful, and allowed to defend themselves and attack people who have attacked them before (personally I think this falls under self defense. If the guy has attacked you, and you know they will attack you again, its common sense to try to get in a punch in the second encounter.).

Elgato basically hit the topic straight on. Some factions are lucky, some are not. Unfortunately we don't have an 'AW ID' so we have to pick the closest fitting thing. And thats Zoners. Others might have called themselves the Zoners while doing this. Since I believe it IS wrong to call the AW Zoners, but there is no other logical ID/tag to use, I have tried to make a way and RP where we can use the tag without calling ourselves Zoners, as we do not fit the Zoner way of life. Funny, we get flamed anyway..

And yes, HF and AW alliance was made before SA was even formed. Its been a most popular rumor that we used HF to get into war, no we didn't. We were allied to HF for quite awhile, but we refused to go into war with SF because the hostility was pirate to house, it wasn't a war until the SF and SA sided against HF.


No, I'm not getting this personal, but I want to clear up some facts Yngen has wrong about this war.. We didn't declare war to override our lawful part of the ID. We went to war because we said we would if SF entered the war on the SA's side. They did and that was an act of war. *Shrug* So we went to war. War was the right word for the situation, not hostility.

And I don't think alliances are against the ID, never says they are.

Heck, SA was trying to be neutral with Bs|. Liberty and Order. Technically, they could have an alliance, as the ID does not prohibit it.. Though it would be slightly odd for SA and Bs| to ally, as their NPC hosts are hostile to each other..

I think the fact that ID is separate from tag gives you a little bit of extra freedom. Especially the "generic" tags, such as mercenary, military, and pirate.

' Wrote:And I don't think alliances are against the ID, never says they are.

Yes that is correct, it never says anything about alliances, in fact there are no rules regarding alliances at all.
So some guidance on how an alliance would or should be influenced by a faction being 'lawful' or 'unlawful' is one improvement that could be made. Currently all factions are losely associated with one or the other. To think that so many factions would have identical laws and morals and could be wrapped up with so many unrelated groups and interests is just crazy.

So maybe we should do away with the whole concept of lawful/unlawful: this eliminates the grey area from the faction list. Some other rule regarding faction behavior could be made that relates more closely to the faction info card, i.e. who they are allowed to ally with, who they are allowed to declare war on etc. I would limit such rules to alliances and wars only (they are the uber diplomatic devices.) Take the 'lawful' aspect from the Zoner ID and Zoners are free to war on anyone they want (save perhaps the BHG?) Other factions would be limited to enemies shown on their info card-same for allies (like preventing Lib Navy faction from warring on the LSF, or allying with the Xenos.

In regard to the HF/AW alliance it was established when neither faction was at war the history behind the alliance would a take a while to explain and most people except those whom have left/been kicked from the WA (Warriors of Aesir, clan on many games) would understand. And it has been a now a long standing alliance second only to HF's alliance with the Helghast. Hope that cleared a bit up for you all...


As for doing away with unlawful and lawful faction restrictions it should be null when speaking about player factions. ie, Outcast faction shoots Lane Hacker faction...the Lane Hacker faction should be able to retaliate with all their might against the Outcasts without the NPC allignment getting in the way at all.

And for a further foot note, AW only joined the war because the BSG were being "server police" (which irritates me) and fired on AW so they joined in the war...and now it is a street brawl...

As for factions and whatnot player factions as the BSG based on their Rp should merely defend their interests not police Sirius that is what the lawful factions and their large armies are for. A group like BSG should focus on getting settled to Sirius and defending their settlements and stations so that they can live in peace... why after a long haul would they fight again? I don't mean to pick on anyone here but this is an example of ID issues...Planetform does not seek out and attack hostile factions.

BSG is actually a good reference point for BOTH sides of the debate (exact ID and loose affiliation)... And HF is as well, we are Lane Hackers but not Lane Hackers in a way just as the AW are affiliated with Zoners and the BSG affiliated with Planetform... Which is why some of my previous statements above are meaningless... Although BSG is planetform that do not have a solid PlanetForm RP base they use them because it MAKES SENSE

Same with AW and Zoners, HF and Lane Hackers I say this...if you are all going to pick on AW go after me and BSG as well...but that is not the point of this topic the point of this topic is to discuss the actual purpose and definition of an ID...

Which seems to me to be a static thing not exact but not worthless...have I made any sense...probably not...but that is my take on the ID situation (I am sorry for using BSG as an example I do like you guys)...

In the case of Zoner ID, my suggestion would be this:

Zoner factions may not have allies or enemies but may support both lawful and unlawful actions by friendly ships(Edit: restriction being that the hostilities be unprovoked).

Only if a Zoner IDed faction is attacked directly, in an unprovoked manner, may they may become the belligerent(declare war).


This would allow the support of friendly ships directly at the time, however, the Zoner faction would not be able to declare war unless they were attacked in an unprovoked way.

This should meet the Zoner neutrality requirements without being overly restrictive, as well as allowing both lawful and unlawful actions.
Of course, this would not prevent declaration of war by another faction if the Zoner faction was supporting an enemy of theirs.

Sound reasonable?

I have an idea how to fix these problems altogether.

Going to create ID tags for all factions that were created before ID system was established, and add these tags for sale serverside (they won't be available for other servers). Phantoms already got their own ID. I believe AW has a right to get one too. If there will be other requests (Helghast?), I'm ready to listen.

As for ID system on the whole, I'll think about it.