Monster Policy: Bluff and Community Acceptance?

[Diilicious]

how would anyone tell them apart?

[Iceborn]

I remember that back in the days, one of the issues I've had with the server was the somewhat narrow stance of monsters that I was presented with. I think I loosely recall arguing with Mithreas, or some other DM, about it. And while I outgrew most of my issues with the server and my own RPing sins, it would seem that I have to challenge this yet again.

Even, yesterday I was this close to send a PM asking to write my personal observations in the wiki. It seems I'll do it here:

Monsters are monsters. From a social point of view, they would always be monsters. It would take one to be a monster oneself, to have gazed into the abyss, to be in presence of one and your first reaction not being reaching for your trusty sword/bow/spellbook/fish. It would take some natural understanding of what the monster you are presented with truly is to know how in danger you are, for even the kindest of the monsters are still dangerous and dark creatures. No one should ever assume that this specific kobold/orog/drow/troll/goblin/sentient ooze in front of you is mentally different from the race it belongs. This means, however, always allowing the space for interaction, but the interaction should be pointed in both ways. You shouldn't expect anything good from the monster, and neither the other way around.

And speaking the other way around, let's speak of the monster side of the story:
As a monster, you are meant to be a creature of the dark. Your life thus far has been, most likely, a long sequence of abuses. You were taught from little to hate, to hate your life for the things that you were deprived of. To hate the drow's boot that is always a danger to be on your neck, to hate the races of the surface for hating you. Nearly everything is your enemy, nearly everything wants you dead. Some races may have some slight conditions that may alleviate these things.
Some specifically lucky kobold may have been hatched in an isolated warren, some ogre may live a simple and happy life of raiding (do ogres even care about anything else?), maybe your goblin was the generic wizard's pet and got mindraped and it got all hate erased from its brain (I don't really like these sort of characters, but they are fine by other people), but the moment your character steps out of its background and joins Arelith, they are presented with a whole new environment. It may bring its views and a dark version of a happy-go-lucky attitude, but at end of counts, you are still a monster, and you are meant to respect your nature.
Your character is the combination of its nature, its culture, and its personal life. If you disregard any of these, you end up with an anomaly, an oddity, and playing oddities is fine. It's what most of the people here like writing stories about, but the trick of playing oddities sensibly is that, no matter how far off your story reaches, you always retain the core of your being.

As monsters, we have a reputation to maintain. Not just ours, not about our character, but about our races. We represent our races, we are presenting examples of roleplay, and those examples must have a logic behind them. They define the setting, the atmosphere. The 'feel' of the server, and this is something that is precious in Arelith. The atmosphere is the first thing everybody catches on, new or old player. It's the general tendency of things, the general perception of the 'reality' of the game.

Before RPing in Arelith, I was an Amia player, and we didn't have this atmosphere there. Underdark was dead there, and monsters had grown to be almost socially accepted creatures. It's not bad, but it's a completely different setting than we have here, and I very much rather the feel of Arelith.

Now, I will address Mithreas.

Why are you doing it?

Why, why indeed? Why would you break the archetype, and go all out of the way to do something you aren't supposed to?

Because the situations that can come from having greatly conflictive elements mesh together can have a very interesting impact. Because it shows a different face, it shows a completely different side of the coin to the same characters.

I've played all kinds of monsters, and I've sinned of all kinds of cheesy forms of RP.
There's some of it that was cringeworthy, and some of it that was precious.
Kaissar was my first character in Arelith, and to the core he was a kobold that hated the Underdark far more than he hated the surface. He was a bitter creature that found more kinship in the naturewalkers than in his own kind. Was it odd? Yes. Was it damaging to the server? I don't know. And yet, I would still do it again.

If Mithreas is right in something, is that every few and then having the exception of the rule colors the server, but if the exception becomes the norm, then the precious feel of the server is damaged, and that is something that we all should be wary of.

[milosr]

Oh and regarding Duergar, and conflicting messages, I found the guilty post:
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=8572&p=70535&hilit=Duergar#p70535

So...would someone be as kind as to give me a final ruling on this?

[Queen Titania]

Oh and regarding Duergar, and conflicting messages, I found the guilty post:
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=8572&p=70535&hilit=Duergar#p70535

So...would someone be as kind as to give me a final ruling on this?

The Kill scripts were removed entirely, so at least that part of things is settled.

Addressing Archetypes:

You can have a meshing/conflicting relationship with monsters and still respect the setting and how NPCs would react.

You could be a Duergar trading at the far outskirts of a town, away from general sight and in the eye of traveling adventurers. Skeptical, hand at your weapon, but you complete several transactions all the same. Or maybe he does go in, risking a few more customers as he keeps himself disguised for his safety, earning even more gold for his risk. Yet his life isn't in the town, its in his home, and he has no reason to remain for a long period of time. No UD race should own shop or property within a settlement, but in non-civilized areas such works and can be interesting for trade-points as for example of Duergar.

We're not saying interaction is forbidden, we are requesting it is modified to fit guidelines. Even if PCs accept certain monsters who have earned it, NPCs are not as a whole going to do the same, and monsters need to keep this in mind.

Grumpy's quote on monster races is a great guideline for interaction for Surfacers to any Underdark race/outcasts.

[milosr]

Lets just get something out of the way, I just want a clarification that I won't have my Duergar deleted overnight for getting chummy with some surfacer humans or visiting Cordorian shops while under a disguise.

Because by reading that Jjjerm quote, I'm getting a bit paranoid and getting the impression that if I don't act the same as a goblin/drow/kobold/orc should that I just might get deleted by some eager DM with a very literal understanding of rules.

[Iceborn]

You will never get your character suddenly deleted. At worst, you'll get an "interview", a talking, a warning, and if what you are doing is detrimental to the server, you may get a few degrees of smacking. RPR first, a level docking, and increasing penalties until any potential ban or deletion.

The wiki article could possibly use some updating from the Nazi Germany days...

[susitsu]

Lets just get something out of the way, I just want a clarification that I won't have my Duergar deleted overnight for getting chummy with some surfacer humans or visiting Cordorian shops while under a disguise.

Because by reading that Jjjerm quote, I'm getting a bit paranoid and getting the impression that if I don't act the same as a goblin/drow/kobold/orc should that I just might get deleted by some eager DM with a very literal understanding of rules.

^^Reasons like this are why I bring up the 'strict wording.'

It's a very threatening post.

[Queen Titania]

We've never outright deleted characters. We're not heartless, we're human and understanding, (or fey and understanding).

If you have any worries, this is best continued by PMing the DM team for any case-by-case discussions. I think the general guideline has been summed up in this thread.

[susitsu]

I think that it's less about the 'worry,' and more about the post itself to me. What 'is' and 'appears' to be now conflicts as we lift up something quite old without any touching up at all.

[milosr]

Then perhaps a detailed guideline ought to be put in the announcement thread instead of that very menacingly worded threat, for a lack of a better word.

Because I'm quite sure that I may not be the only one who was reasonably worried after having read that. There might be possibly other people who have read it and felt the same, but weren't vocal enough to whine about it in this thread, or look for further clarification.

So yeah all in all, not exactly the best way to about it, to say the least...

[Irongron]

Jjjerm made that post for very good reasons, and I quoted it because, however harsh you may find the wording, I very much stand by it.

Now if you want my own, slightly friendlier wording, you can find it in this announcement.

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=8569

I'm generally very happy to engage with players, and yes, I take a softer approach. It was, after all, myself that asked for the kill scripts to be removed. This was because I have faith in our players to RP these situations, rather than suffer blanket restrictions - but that is as far as it goes.

I've been seeing this debate pop up for over 10 years, and so when I see yet another monster race character insist that they're the exception I get riled.

I've played here long enough to remember the days of kobolds in Cordor, the days when many wizards had their own goblin pets, and I recall, very well, just how terrible that was.

These races were moved to the Underdark, and the policy was created. YET time and again there were still players who felt that their RP alone justified them ignoring it, and so, to save the DMs ongoing headaches, the 'kill scripts' were introduced.

When you enter Arelith you do so under an unwritten contract with the DM and Devs to abide by the setting they've created and give their time to working upon. You may want to play a game populated by friendly kobolds, where we take every individual on their merits, not their race, but Arelith is not that place. Such an egalitarian attitude is commendable in the real world of course, but it will not fly here.

There comes a time when rules have to be respected, and when DMs confront a character about this, it is not an invitiation to start a debate, any more that discussing the statistics surrounding speed limits is an appropriate topic to raise when being pulled over by a traffic cop.

Now I don't like the kill scripts, I felt they strangled RP, conflict, and treated our players like they couldn't be trusted to roleplay their race properly. Yet if this problem returns, I will definitely either ask they are reinstroduced, or remove the offending races as a playable option.

I said in the recent annoucement that this was no a discussion, and I did so specifically because I didn't want to see this debate, because there is a zero chance it will lead to a policy change.

Playing a goblin or a kobold who wants to befriend and live with the humans is no less ridiculous than playing a human who wants nothing more than to be a goblin pet, or a dwarf who's dream is to go and live with the orcs.

To the above posters who mentioned duergar and svirfneblin, they are different, and are not conventional monsters. Really though, we see far less a problem with those races (I suspect because they're not as cute looking)

I'm locking this topic, not because it is toxic, but because it is serves no purpose. If you are in doubt about the validity of your individual character's RP then contact a DM in game.

And if you just can't stand the prospect of not being able to play your friendly monster concept, there are many very good NWN servers out there that will allow just that.

But Arelith is not one of them.