Things that annoy or puzzle you about Cantr

[Snowdrop]

If I recall, some of the logic behind making things take awhile to disassemble (machines in particular) was to slow down people from destroying an entire town while its residents were out on a trade run. I could be wrong on that but I know there was some concern about scavengers being able to tear things down too quickly.

Oh, I get the machines, that's fine. It's just pointless that something like wooden shields take so long compared to repairing them, when the main reason for wanting to take them apart is to rid the world of them because you've amassed so many that they won't all get used...

I know realism is a very poor argument, but imagine finding a tool in real life that would take you one whole hour, or even worse a whole 8th of a day, to make look brand new, and suddenly your complaint here makes no sense to me. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the sentence?

Now from the game-play angle, forgetting how things work in real life, why would you want it to take more than an hour or two to get your tools back brand new?

Yeah...you definitely misunderstood.
My issue is with the way, for example, a shovel will go from looking 'brand new' to just 'new' when all it needs is a couple of hours repair - if that - which is kind of pointless to do. Meanwhile, there are other things that can still look 'brand new' when they need a full day or more of repair...

[Marian]

When we create an account and every day when we log in, we are agreeing to play by the same rules. It shouldn’t require babysitting for you to make choices to preserve the integrity of the game. We do this out of respect for fellow players.

I think we're just going to have to have to settle for having completely opposite opinions here. The rules are the rules, but my take on it is always going to be 'it shouldn't require censorship for people to make choices to not cheat'. Pointing out again that any player that's ever had more than one character knows specific things about the game world that their character's don't. And those that have been around a long time playing dozens of characters all over the place know a lot. Every day in the game they're trusted not to abuse this information, but the same trust doesn't extend at all to the forums and so we're all extremely limited in what we can talk about. For people complaining about the negative forum environment, I wonder if it ever occurs to anyone that there's all kinds of positive or interesting things people might want to discuss, but can't?

Maybe I'm being naive but I just assume that most of the players still remaining have been doing this for awhile and are invested enough in RPing their characters that they aren't going to suddenly start having them behave OOC just because of something they read. (Unless you count things like everyone suddenly, simultaneously getting the idea of climbing on a horse's back as OOC...) Most people care about their characters and take keeping them IC extremely seriously.

And now since I'm on a roll I'll even take it a step further and complain about the CR itself. While I think it's is invaluable as a standard and a guideline, it bugs me that it has to be followed so slavishly to the letter even at the expense of the spirit. Out of my five characters, three of them have run up against situations where either they or others have been forced to act OOC (and two of these times, dramatically so...) in order to not break it, which seemed incredibly bass-ackward but what else could we do? The rule was right there with its assumption that players by default either don't know how or aren't willing to remain IC...which doesn't fit at all with what I see of the current playerbase, who are some of the people most dedicated to the 'integrity' of the game I've ever seen.

And of course the CR ensures there will never, ever be a large organization of any kind anywhere in this game, but that's a whole nother rant...

[computaertist]

I know realism is a very poor argument, but imagine finding a tool in real life that would take you one whole hour, or even worse a whole 8th of a day, to make look brand new, and suddenly your complaint here makes no sense to me. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the sentence?

Now from the game-play angle, forgetting how things work in real life, why would you want it to take more than an hour or two to get your tools back brand new?

Yeah...you definitely misunderstood.
My issue is with the way, for example, a shovel will go from looking 'brand new' to just 'new' when all it needs is a couple of hours repair - if that - which is kind of pointless to do. Meanwhile, there are other things that can still look 'brand new' when they need a full day or more of repair...

If I found a shovel that took a whole hour or an 8th of a day to get looking brand new in real life, that would make perfect sense that it didn't look brand new before the hour of work was spent on fixing it up.

Is your issue with why some tools take longer maybe? I ask because I feel like I'm really missing something, and feeling like I don't understand something that someone else is speaking of as basic bothers me.

[sanchez]

I think we're just going to have to have to settle for having completely opposite opinions here. The rules are the rules, but my take on it is always going to be 'it shouldn't require censorship for people to make choices to not cheat'. Pointing out again that any player that's ever had more than one character knows specific things about the game world that their character's don't. And those that have been around a long time playing dozens of characters all over the place know a lot. Every day in the game they're trusted not to abuse this information, but the same trust doesn't extend at all to the forums and so we're all extremely limited in what we can talk about. For people complaining about the negative forum environment, I wonder if it ever occurs to anyone that there's all kinds of positive or interesting things people might want to discuss, but can't?

Maybe I'm being naive but I just assume that most of the players still remaining have been doing this for awhile and are invested enough in RPing their characters that they aren't going to suddenly start having them behave OOC just because of something they read. (Unless you count things like everyone suddenly, simultaneously getting the idea of climbing on a horse's back as OOC...) Most people care about their characters and take keeping them IC extremely seriously.

And now since I'm on a roll I'll even take it a step further and complain about the CR itself. While I think it's is invaluable as a standard and a guideline, it bugs me that it has to be followed so slavishly to the letter even at the expense of the spirit. Out of my five characters, three of them have run up against situations where either they or others have been forced to act OOC (and two of these times, dramatically so...) in order to not break it, which seemed incredibly bass-ackward but what else could we do? The rule was right there with its assumption that players by default either don't know how or aren't willing to remain IC...which doesn't fit at all with what I see of the current playerbase, who are some of the people most dedicated to the 'integrity' of the game I've ever seen.

And of course the CR ensures there will never, ever be a large organization of any kind anywhere in this game, but that's a whole nother rant...

If you truly believe this, then probably you are being naiive. Maybe you should apply to PD, and get another perspective. I can only think we are not playing the same game.

Either way, you’re missing the point. Nobody is asking you to respect the ‘letter’ of CR. CR is deliberately formulated vaguely for this reason. The spirit of the in-game rule is exactly what matters, and also what should prevent you from revealing OOC information to other players in any way that could influence their gameplay.

You’re not the first person to suggest it would be more fun for you to play more openly OOC. For you to simultaneously be suggesting there is less OOC play in the English Zone now comes across a pretty insincere. And there do exist large organisations in the game. But it takes commitment on the part of players to maintain them fairly.

The concept of ‘acting OOC in order to preserve CR’ is a canard. You are controlling your chars. The purpose of the rule is to prevent you from taking unfair advantage over the chars of other players, not least from OOC knowledge. And there are circumstances in which no kind of roleplay, however well-intentioned, can prevent your chars from having such advantage as it may be intrinsic to their being controlled by the same individual, if for no other reason than because it’s you as a player who decides when they are awake and what they do.

[Marian]

I can't really pretty a long reply to all that from my phone. But no one is suggesting 'we should be able to play more OOC', and I'm confused where you even got that from.

OOC behavior, like OOC chatter, absolutely sucks and ruins immersion. My complaint was about the times myself and others have had to stop in the middle of our RP and do both those things to prevent the appearance of a CR breach. And the fact that I only have five characters and it's already happened with three of them makes me think this must be something that's not uncommon.

The organization thing, I've already posted my views on in another thread. I'll dig it up later. But I've already seen it in action and effecting an entire town.

And computaertist, I think the point they're trying to make is that it's silly for an item needing 2 hours of repair to be shown as being in the same shape as an item needing 12. I've always assumed that those labels were applied based on a percentage of the items durability though.

[computaertist]

And computaertist, I think the point they're trying to make is that it's silly for an item needing 2 hours of repair to be shown as being in the same shape as an item needing 12. I've always assumed that those labels were applied based on a percentage of the items durability though.

Ah, thank you, that makes sense; it seems like an inconsistency from one angle. I can rest easy again now

[sanchez]

OOC behavior, like OOC chatter, absolutely sucks and ruins immersion. My complaint was about the times myself and others have had to stop in the middle of our RP and do both those things to prevent the appearance of a CR breach. And the fact that I only have five characters and it's already happened with three of them makes me think this must be something that's not uncommon.

Here I think is a common misunderstanding. It’s not the appearance of a CRB that should concern you. It’s true that certain actions in game are more likely to lead to a reminder from PD. But there are many more that nobody but you is likely to know about. And those are just as important. For example, two chars in proximity might be both easy to notice and also harmless. But your using two chars to influence the same set of events from a distance is a serious problem. Rules don’t exist only in their ability to be enforced. At least, one as interesting as CR requires the players to take responsbility for it. It’s not PD’s job, it’s yours. They help new players understand the rules, and they take care of the most serious cases. But day to day, you have to make choices about letting events unfold in game, and also preserving that for your fellow players. Especially when you know you are playing alongside your friends, or you have multiple chars involved in related events. And the same holds for this forum. Most people reading this forum don’t know about the town that was edited from previous discussion. A majority of all Cantr players have had at least one char in a single city in another zone, but it still wouldn’t be right to post currency exchange rates from there. You need to discover that, and I’d argue you should want to discover that, solely from inside the game, and not this forum.

Switching threads, some of the description definitions for repair states were adjusted because it was assumed that the complaints about rot had more to do with the appearance of ‘used’, rather than the time it takes to complete the task, or how frequently we must initiate these projects. They are wildly uneven now, which I strongly agree is both puzzling and annoying. And, it would make sense for disassembly times to be shorter for more primitive items, such as wooden shields, when they have very common iron replacements.

[Swingerzetta]

I've felt the need to alter my characters' behaviors to adhere to the appearence of the capital rule, too; specifically, avoiding having two chars in the same place, even if one sleeps. I know I'm not alone here. It's a bit annoying. Not really annoying enough for me to bother to make a post about it normally, but, since it came up...

(Also, the discussion that I saw wasn't about the mystery town's rates, but their SYSTEM of rates. Also also, I know that the mystery town is not the only one who uses such a system, its just the most famous.)


So, this is one of those times where I type something, go do something else, return seeing that I forgot to press submit, and now have other thoughts. Only this time instead of pressing cancel, I'll just add to it. The capital rule, in all its strict, somewhat-appearence-based glory (because many people WOULD be able to tell the story of two unrelated people who are in one organization without letting one influence the other) is really there as a mechanism to allow us multiple characters. In most games like this, you only get one char. It's a pretty fair price to pay, really.

[*Wiro]

A lot of people think it's not allowed to have two characters in the same location, but it is perfectly fine. There's nothing wrong with it and they can even interact. The rules have a special section devoted to these situations if I recall correctly.

[SumBum]

You're allowed to have multiple chars in a town - that is not a breach of the CR. It doesn't even have to be that all but one sleeps. They can even talk to each other, they just can't cooperate with each other to advance a goal.

I've had as many as 3 temporarily in one town due to various travel arrangements and somehow managed to not slip and speak with the wrong one. Personally, I prefer to not have chars in the same town because it's too much that I have to juggle and be careful about. I've known players who had 2 living long-term in the same town and it was never an issue because they were careful not to cross wires.

Edit: lol Wiro beat me to it.

[Swingerzetta]

Huh. How'd I even get the idea, then? Someone else must have mentioned it and I took what they said for granted.

[SumBum]

I think the advice that is given by many players is: avoid having multiple chars in one town and if you must then have one sleep.

It's probably easier for most to follow that way of thinking. So many players accidentally have the wrong char post something and make it obvious they play both.

[Marian]

Just paraphrasing my old post, about the difficulty of having any kind of large scale conflict/organization/business/whatever without the CR getting in the way.

The game's population is just too small for it not to be an issue. Look at the number of players we have, then take the even smaller number on the English-speaking islands. From there take the tiny fraction that are interested in the 'society' or 'simulation' side of things who would be interested in getting involved with an organization in the first place. And from that tiny fraction take exactly one single character from the potential 15.

That tiny fraction of a tiny fraction of an already small handful of players is all that'll ever be available to join your organization.

And recently I realized it goes even further than that, because you're not only limited to one character out of your fifteen (or five in my case) but by any characters everyone around them has too.

True story, again paraphrased:

Char A: Hey guys I think we should look into organization I've heard so much about, they seem legit and they could help provide our town with desperately needed resources. I really, really think we should join and I am very passionate about this!

Char B: I've met the leader in person and they are indeed legit!

Everyone else: *various degrees of agreement and interest*

Char C: *wakes up* (ooc: wait no we can't, I already have a char involved with them, sorry!)

Everyone else: WELP. *immediately lose interest*

Char A: I...guess I'm suddenly not so passionate about this after all? For some reason. v v

I mean I get the reason for the CR but if the point is to prevent OOC behavior, sometimes it does exactly the opposite. In that example the entire town lost out as well as the organization they wanted to join...but what else could be done, you can't realistically expect someone to have to choose which of their established characters is suddenly going to have to up and abandon their friends and their town for no good IC reason at all, based on a choice other people in the town made that they weren't even involved in.

[sherman]

Char A: Hey guys I think we should look into organization I've heard so much about, they seem legit and they could help provide our town with desperately needed resources. I really, really think we should join and I am very passionate about this!

Char B: I've met the leader in person and they are indeed legit!

Everyone else: *various degrees of agreement and interest*

Char C: *wakes up* (ooc: wait no we can't, I already have a char involved with them, sorry!)

Everyone else: WELP. *immediately lose interest*

Char A: I...guess I'm suddenly not so passionate about this after all? For some reason. v v

This makes me think and following scenario is completely hypothetical: Let's say Group A would invade and annex whole island, how unpractical that would be since this is just scenario. (And let's assume none of their players has chars on that island, lucky dice roll) and since they would annex island it would count as organisation or something like that since all chars on that island would be under rule of this group. Now how does CR treat this scenario? There would be players with two chars on that island but they wouldn't have choice to decide whether to join or not. (And to make it harder, let's assume all who could sail have left and people left have no option to leave in any quick schedule) In this scenario players break CR even though it's not their intention nor they can do anything about that.

[computaertist]

This makes me think and following scenario is completely hypothetical: Let's say Group A would invade and annex whole island, how unpractical that would be since this is just scenario. (And let's assume none of their players has chars on that island, lucky dice roll) and since they would annex island it would count as organisation or something like that since all chars on that island would be under rule of this group. Now how does CR treat this scenario? There would be players with two chars on that island but they wouldn't have choice to decide whether to join or not. (And to make it harder, let's assume all who could sail have left and people left have no option to leave in any quick schedule) In this scenario players break CR even though it's not their intention nor they can do anything about that.

Continuing this thought experiment, I have had as many as five characters on a single island before, with no trouble at all because it was a big enough island that only two of them ever met each other and the others all kept to their respective regions. If the whole thing were to suddenly be united...

...(1) "I, for one, welcome our new ____ overlords! "

...(2) "Stand and fight, rebels! Give me liberty, or give me death!"

...(3) "War? What war? Nothing's really changed here in ____ville. If anything does I'll think about it."

...(4) "Who, me? I'm just a traveling trader these days; I don't see why I should have to pick a side as long as they don't bother me."

...(5) ....I'm out of ideas. Unless this one can do a variation of (3) and/or (4) without seeming to be on their side (sounds easy enough, except I don't actually have many traveling characters and if these new overlords are any good then eventually each town will be effected), I guess I finally have a good excuse to cull a character?

All hypothetical, of course. For the sake of...Cantrian social science