[lordpidey]

Hello,

There was an incident I've heard about recently.

Admittedly, I have only heard one side of the story, so I am withholding judgement at this point in time.

However, the incident itself as described to me raises a question.

If there is RP that would logically result in likely visible injury, deformity or other visible change, what is needed before acting on that, in future RP, or in self profile/alias manipulations?

If I'm arrested and handcuffed, am I allowed to change my alias to "Handcuffed person"?

If someone steals my lucky sombrero, am I allowed to RP around being bummed about not having my hat?

If I'm hit in the head with a metal object in a 'harsh blow', can I have a bruise?

If someone I'm trying to arrest pulls a knife on me and stabs me during a conflict, do I need permission from the attacker before having a visibly bleeding abdomen?

From my understanding (Which again, I've only heard one side of the story, and thus may be wrong), a person was struck in RP, and did not get permission from the attacker to have a visible injury, which was one of several things they were punished for.

[matthewmwps]

Hello,

There was an incident I've heard about recently.

Admittedly, I have only heard one side of the story, so I am withholding judgement at this point in time.

However, the incident itself as described to me raises a question.

If there is RP that would logically result in likely visible injury, deformity or other visible change, what is needed before acting on that, in future RP, or in self profile/alias manipulations?

If I'm arrested and handcuffed, am I allowed to change my alias to "Handcuffed person"?

If someone steals my lucky sombrero, am I allowed to RP around being bummed about not having my hat?

If I'm hit in the head with a metal object in a 'harsh blow', can I have a bruise?

If someone I'm trying to arrest pulls a knife on me and stabs me during a conflict, do I need permission from the attacker before having a visibly bleeding abdomen?

From my understanding (Which again, I've only heard one side of the story, and thus may be wrong), a person was struck in RP, and did not get permission from the attacker to have a visible injury, which was one of several things they were punished for.

Roleplay is a consentual experience, inherently speaking. So if you want to be injured by someone, or deal with something, you need to have prior discussion with the person beforehand. Communication is important!

In most situations people will be able to come to an understanding so long as things are established beforehand. Of course there is some reason required, but it's usually something both players can easy agree upon.

[Balor]

I think this is a loaded topic and post after the recent Ban Log.

However if you want my opinion then it's contextual, if I were to say play a character in a relationship and was domestically abused by my spouse. That carries a great deal of stigma and therefore I'd want to stop and discuss the matter at length and set boundaries OOC with my RP partner before we move forward.

Having been in that position before, I'd rather not leave anything to assumptions. As it would become very easy to twist and manipulate the narrative were boundaries and comfort levels not set ahead of time.

EDIT: If someone were to suplex me in a spar, me RPing bruises and such is something known as selling and building up my RP partner. Which is far more kosher and doesn't require as much communication. Intent and honesty is the contention in any situation like this.

[zericosmic]

Generally it's a combination of common sense and communication.

Escalating an injury taken compared to how it was emoted is something that needs to be communicated to not rob a player of their agency.

A simple slap being escalated in to broken teeth and multiple bruises is a bit of an escalation, when the opposing player simply intends it as a single normal slap, usually under most people's assumptions this wouldn't be so grievous, but in case of wanting to have it be so, talking with the other player and being transparent with the intent is the best way to go.

There have been situations where people emoted losing an arm due to a casual punch in a spar, or straight up saying that their character has taken a deadly wound that might kill them from a simple practice fight, dropping that on the other player non consensually, on a character that might never wound someone like that.

In these situations, it is important to communicate with the other player, to make sure that you are not making their character out to be something that they're not.

If your character is being handcuffed, that is clearly the intended situation of the other player. However if you were to escalate being handcuffed in to you taking a grievous injury from being applied handcuffs, it would be something that you should communicate with your fellow player, to make sure everyone has some amount of agency.

[Salsaccino]

Controlling the outcome of a roleplay scene without the consent of the person you are roleplaying with is Godmodding and against the rules. Most people contribute the term godmodding as being the one to inflict or avoid harm but it can be used in the opposite sense.

Furthermore, not only was the outcome of the roleplay scene completely dictated without the consent of the other participating party, but it was used to make very serious allegations in-character against the wishes of the other participant.

It’s not difficult at all to simply communicate intentions with your roleplay partner to ensure everything you wish to implicate is alright to begin with. In this instance what was a simple back handed slap was spun to implicate a domestic abusive relationship, against the wishes of the other person. Hope this helps.

[Poruku]

Basically if the injuries are important / could have consequences you always double check with the person if you aren't certain of their intent.

[lordpidey]

I see.

So what I'm getting from this is people can attack me, and then tell me "Nah, I'm not letting there be any consequences to my character"

[Poruku]

It's kind of a grey area I feel. Because in the case of a misunderstanding where the two parties aren't on the same page, the responsibility to be clear about it is on both in my opinion. Something that is obvious to one person might not be to another. A slap can definitely be considered a big deal, depending on the strength and the intent, in the same way that getting stabbed can be funny.

In my opinion if there's a disconnect it's probably better to just retcon the action. RPing the effects of injuries has been a point of contention many times in the past, and I've seen something similar happen multiple times. Nobody ever called it "godmodding" though, let alone banned someone for it.

I do want to point out that it's not specifically against the rules to roleplay in this way, it's just something that is looked down upon, at least until now. Godmodding in the rules is explicitly something different and is about not affecting other people, with no mention of the consequences of their actions on your own character.



I think there's definitely a grey area between the spirit of the rule and actions having unintended consequences.

[Salsaccino]

I see.

So what I'm getting from this is people can attack me, and then tell me "Nah, I'm not letting there be any consequences to my character"

I feel like you are missing the point entirely.

This was not a matter of someone attacking another person and then back peddling their actions. What actually happened was someone slapped another person, and that person dictated how much harm was done to themselves. Slapping someone across the face does not automatically mean you are getting bruised and your teeth knocked out of your skull. It can just as easily leave nothing but a red handprint on your face and you’ll be fine.

This was a matter of another player’s agency in the scene being taken from them, as they could not define just how hard they had hit the other player. It is godmodding because of this reason; someone is directly dictating the outcome regardless of the other participant’s consent on the matter.

It would be one thing if these injuries were implicated from the start by the person attacking, but this was not the case. By taking away that agency you are directly controlling the other person’s actions and taking full control of the narrative.

Communicate with your roleplay partners. Discuss your desired outcomes regarding scenes you are roleplaying. It truly is that simple.

[Autumn]

I didn't think this thread would need to be worth replying to but I guess I'll just add my opinion on the rule has and always been, in SL2's roleplay setting it's generally considered that if you are forcing injury to occur from another's character you are powergaming or godmodding a bit, not only is it not something the other party agreed upon but it could also get their character in trouble with authorities in an undesirable and unintended way.

One could argue that if someone's going too far with their RP towards you that you should also ask them to tone it down, obviously if I am RPing deliberately chopping a sword into your shoulder with great force that responding to that without injury could be difficult (I mean in which case just clear it up in looc with a few quick words), but generally in this setting characters are able to hold back to a point of non-major injury, spars happen every day where-in people just get hit by giant suns and building swords and then walk it off to go and get some potions afterwards.

The short of it is, forcing an outcome is powergaming, and it's just important to be cognizant that reacting to a sword slash by getting your arm chopped off (or whatever else, this is just an example) instead is not on the other person's mind, both parties should be respectful of eachother.