Fantasy roeplaying tropes: The Thieves Guild/The Mafia.

[Hellzon]

Whee! A reply to analyze.

But, moving on to the hit-and-run crimes, well... what if the thieves aren't the only ones with vehicles?
(Because they aren't... there are places where law enforcement has the most efficient vehicles)
And speaking of vehicles, this would require the vehicles to be unidentifiable, to really work.

Quite true. (I'd like to mention that I haven't seen much of Cantr yet. So I may have underestimated the effectiveness a police force could have.) A competent law enforcement can make life difficult for thieves. (Which is the point, innit?) Raids would be easiest (if at all possible) at towns at the edge of an empire. Thus encouraging towns to start colonies around them. Coastal towns are probably rather vulnerable to this, and if I'm not mistaken, I'm hardly original for coming up with piracy.

And yes, you probably shouldn't use the same vehicle more than once. Which means you should get new ones. Which is darn expensive and probably eats any profit from the thefts. Hmm. All right, it IS difficult.

2. Again, this "guild" of thieves would require organization on a level that takes it ooc, unless you're accepting that you're just running a clan like any other in the game, except that your clan happens to steal.

As Sho said. Well, yeah, it's "a clan that happens to steal". A clan that has spies, hopefully. 'Cause spies are cool.

So, you'd need multiple people in every language group, in every city, to keep an eye on likely candidates.
And once someone turns down the offer to join, they'd know that the ones who made the offer were in that criminal organization.
There goes the secrecy, straight out the window.
Doing bad stuff to you if you don't join? Ah, so the criminals are not only the only faction with vehicles, but also the only ones with weapons and shields... and law enforcement is just standing around picking their nose while someone gets knocked off in front of them?

While I don't agree on the language thing (or is there that much intermingling of languages?), you're right on the "problem with secrecy" thing. A bandit town which recruits or kills its newspawns ( :wicked: ) might have an easier time getting new members.

And the people who enjoy Cantr because it is Cantr, well, they might not enjoy it being another game.

Oh, believe me, I don't want stuff to change to accomodate this. I disagree on OOC being necessary, though.

Then, there's the fact that if radio's are so cheap to get, that law enforcement and other law abiding people who most likely assist the town, will also have radio's.
And yes, it isn't safe from eavesdropping at all.
Anyone in the same room as the radio can hear what's being said, as well as anyone elsewhere who is on the same frequency.
As for the whispering... it's annoying when you're running out of minutes just because your char lights up on that list of chars that you have, just because people keep whispering.
So, unless you want your chars to be killed real fast, let's keep the whispering to a minimum.
Seriously, you'll understand when you play 15 chars, but don't get to check up on 12 of them because whenever you want to switch, you see activity with three of them that makes you have to check up.

I agree on radio. Not safe. But you mean people actually get killed for talking to each other!? Well, I'm sure you understand that I didn't count on such draconian rules. As I said, I'm a bit new at Cantr.
And I have six chars and already have trouble keeping them apart in my mind. People commonly play 15!? Yikes! (yes, I know that is the top limit)

Besides, with law enforcement having access to radio's, well, to flog a dead horse here, you'd simply have law enforcement waiting for you in the next place.

Which is extremely cool. Now I'm tempted to do this just to stimulate growth of law enforcement in places that don't have it yet. :wicked:
As for the point, that is why you rob villages at the edge of countries. You've managed to convince me that locations further in in a country are relatively safe from this.

Uhm.... yeah, nobody would notice the thief trading stuff that he isn't supposed to have... and what if another person also has access to storage, and happens to see it happen?
Spy gets caught, they know which people he traded with in the past, and they'll know when another person comes to trade with them that it's someone from that criminal organization.

They wouldn't notice if he did it in his home. Thus the reference to "spying". He would have to make sure he had legitimate reason to enter the warehouse so often, though. Yeah, not easy...

And access to the memories of the other townfolk who know how much they stored of everything?

Ponder: Do you remember if you put 3500 or 3600 grams of stone in the warehouse last time you were there. (Yes, small amounts as you said, but it adds up over time.) And as soon as two people has put things in there, do they know what the other put there so they can tell if a kilo is missing? I doubt it. I think it's possible to effectively "tax" a city, as long as you don't get greedy.

Hm, would work if you only let people with keys into your warehouse.

Didn't think of that. Hmm, and with the problem of newspawns walking into unlocked buildings and seeing what goes on, the best might be to have the fence have two keys and give one to his "customers" (they only hold it while they're in town). Weird business practice, but there may be ways to justify it. Not easy though.

With a bit more thought, there are possibillities.

You make some good points here (heck, your post is full of good points). But assassination shouldn't be easy.

Slave trade:
This would require the victims to play along, and well, not everyone is going to be willing to play a slave.
So, you'd have to get rid of those that don't play that way.
Which would ruin the game for lots of players, if they get forced to either play along to someone elses' rules or die.
And it's the freedom to roleplay whatever everyone wants, that holds a lot of Cantr's power.

True. I don't agree with slavery either, and I hold nothing but contempt for those who report people in the CRB forum for not being good little prisoners. I won't cry if this is as hard as possible to pull off. The problem is more that it's rather easy (as long as the player doesn't just give up on the character and has him starve to death).

Espionage:
Ah, but... a lot of people in charge of towns will be keeping stuff in whispers, or in lockable buildings with only those present who need to know what goes on.

Which is why you have your spy infiltrate the government.

Besides, if all secret stuff gets leaked, they'll start to eliminate possibilolities until they come to the only people who would have known about everything that was leaked.
And if they can't find out that way, it would be easy enough to set a trap to find out who the spies are.

Intrigue! I love it! Allright, not easy, but dead cool.

Framing:
Ah, but people travel, so if you successfully posed as one person, and you move on, to frame another elsewhere, well, someone from the other town would come to the other town and recognize you.
And what if the victim of a frame is already known in other places so people know that you're not who you claim to be?

True. With dynamic naming, framing is not easy.

All in all, such ideas have, to some extent, been brought up before and usually got shot down or needed a lot more thought.

And here I thought I was original. (Well, no I didn't.)

[Hellzon]

I also don't see why these things are being discussed here rather than an in game context.

Because I'm a lazy dude who wants to get this down on paper (screen?) without spending half a RL year testing it out in Cantr. As I've said, it's nothing a Cantrian couldn't come up with himself...

[Talapus]

As has been mentioned before, all of these for the most part have already been a part of Cantr, so instead of talking about it here, you should be wreaking havoc in the game. *starts braggins about his accomplishments* That said, I myself have had characters who have done some of these things. I currently have a spy, or rather an information gatherer who reconnoiters locations, and keeps profiles on characters. He currently has profiles on hundred of characters about their possessions, buildings, vehicles, keys, associates, skills (I know many characters skills better then they themselves do), and several other facts (such as their current level of health, and all of the locations and dates that I have seen them). I wonder what people will think about all of his notes when he finally dies. Kidnappings and assassinations are far more likely then you would imagine as well. Sometimes sea captains will sometimes note a well to do person who seems to be sleeping, and will manage to convince the townspeople that he is a business associate or shipmate, and get their help in dragging them aboard their ship, whereapon they will forevermore dissappear as the ship undocks. My Stone Knight was at one point about to kidnap the leader of a town and transport him to another location, but he turned out willing, and so no sneaky means were needed.

[Hellzon]

(I know many characters skills better then they themselves do)[...]I wonder what people will think about all of his notes when he finally dies.

You could sell that information to them. "Say, you're mighty good at mining, you know." It gives me ideas for an employment agency...

As for your notes. Assuming they are not deleted, they might become a tourist attraction, like the Stasi archives in RL. I know I'd like to know what information that old spymaster had on me...