Cloaks Reloaded

[Sarras Volcae]

...omg, this is ridiculous

imagine this. cloaks = jacket. do you have a jacket irl? does it have a hood? that's the same thing as having a cloak. it's the same deal irl and in Planeshift. just because nearly everyone has one doesn't make it bad. hoods are there to cover your head, and yes they can be used to hide your identity. but that doesn't make them a mark of evil.

[Rigwyn]

If your character has a double identity then its pretty important to be able to cloak. Its not like you can just whack someone to shut them up for good. ( i guess you could permakill them but who's really going to let you do that )

[Mordraugion]

Hoodies are just sweaters with hoods on but if you walk around with the hood up then you will be treated with suspicion

[Under the moon]

And no, they don't hide your identity.

[Rigwyn]

Some of you have been playing much longer than myself. I don't mean to digress from the subject too much but would you you mind perhaps offering an idea as to how one could work around the problem of having to conceal their identity without usinhg a cloak ?
 

[Timmothy Perriwinkle]

Plz, there's no way to wholly conceal your identity, that's what everyone seems to forget. There will always be something giving you away.

It's like, when you're sitting in a chair in a quiet tavern and someone starts creeping around behind you and you turn around, then they're all NUUUU YOU CAN'T HEER ME.

Well even if it's true, and you're superninja death-quiet, have you ever been sitting, doing nothing and had someone creep up behind you? It's different when you're doing something, but when you're just sitting idly you can feel them behind you.

[Rigwyn]

I agree that misuse of a cloak or a disguise is unfair - just like saying that you have some rp'd weapon or skill that makes you damn near invincible. I think a well thought out and reasonable cloak/disguise/sheet-with-holes/whatever should be fair game though with realistic limitations.

 

[Marqsaynt]

Cloaks as they have come to be used seem to me (unintentionally) lazy roleplay. Not only are they overused but they are a missed opportunity to RP something creatively.

Think about it, this is a chance to change any or virtually all aspects of your character's appearance and even mannerisms... A change of clothes can make a wealthy merchant an ignorable pauper, a change of hair style, color, and attitude a person that acquaintances might not recognize out on the plaza. Sometimes taking a character outside of their normal context can be the best disguise.

I believe most people agree characters always to some degree are recognizable no matter what they are wearing, personally I'd just like to see a little more thinking outside of the box when it comes to concealing a character's identity.

[Orgonwukh]

10 months ago, I submitted a document to the settings team. Its title was "Proposals on how to improve the rogue atmosphere in Planeshift" and contained several detailed proposals for the PS team, including the cloaking one. The authors are Aiwendil, Elvi, Eurac, Garris, Kaisa, Lhaa, Lokter, Morla, Nedoko, Raekh, Semutara and myself. Taken from this document:

“Real” cloaking
People should be able to hide names and guild tags when at camp banished. Another idea would be a rogue's cloak, which you would obtain from a long chain of quests only for the "bad guys". If you equip the cloak on the back slot of your char, the model becomes a rogue model. No name or guild tag, but a green “Rogue” tag would tell other players that this is someone in disguise. The cloak should be editable, so that the standard player's description is replaced with the text written in the cloak. The default (and unchangeable) content would be 'A $racename in disguise' while a cloak name (unique) must be added (to enable identification of the player in main chat tab). If this is too complicated, a standard description would be an easy solution.
It might also be a good idea to make a char in a rogue cloak attackable by default. This might also be restricted to camp banished. Progression points and/or a loot of some tria might motivate an attack on a player rogue. The cloak should also only work in non-city maps.
A cloaked rogue would be able to attack (or maybe pickpocket). However, the victim would get warned with a message like "You notice a cloaked shadow appears behind you", then a timer would count down, giving the victim time to flee. The countdown time could be dependent on the skills „Hide in Shadows“ and „Pickpocketing“.

Pros:
- players could contribute to the bad reputation of rogues
- rogues would become more difficult to find and kill

Cons:
- OOC attacks
- abuse of anonymity

[frogimus]

There was a time in history when cloaks were used as a symbolic tool and were completely acceptable.  Even if someone knew the identity of the wearer, they respected the wish to be incognito and pretended to not know them.  A city official could wear a cloak to signify that they were on unofficial business.  Two feuding families could attend each other's weddings, conduct business, etc while cloaked without offending their family.  Cloaks were not always used for foul deeds.

[Marqsaynt]

First off, it seems to me necessary that people can actually get away with crime… even if only temporarily or at the cost of always having to look over their shoulder in certain towns. Some sort of cloak/mask/whatever could be a means of accomplishing this essential. But why not take it a step (or 10) further?

What if being “cloaked” was possible within city walls, as long as no guard took any notice? It seems completely realistic that someone could find a dark alley somewhere, conceal their identity, and lay in wait for a target. And if a guard does take notice, well I am sure there would have to be some sort of penalty… perhaps a fine or even just having to hand over the disguise/cloak/etc.  That is assuming they are not already wanted for some other crime…

But how can someone actually be wanted for a crime? The guards wouldn’t know… would they? As the old saying goes, ‘it takes two to tango’ so if you have criminals you have to also have law enforcement types. Why not have “victims” or nearby witnesses able to report a crime to the local guards, perhaps with some randomized information on the character that committed the crime? The amount of information gleaned could be directly based on the criminal character’s skills in Hide in Shadows, Pickpocket, etc. and/or the quality of the disguise they were using. If you feel like getting really fancy, the identity information could even compound based on how many witnesses report the crime and could possibly be based on what people actually have in their character’s physical descriptions!

If there is a way to report crimes, there also must be some sort of way to disseminate the information to citizens… for this I think a “most wanted” type system might work very well. Let’s say for a nominal fee a player could go to the local guard station and pick up a list with information on wanted criminals along with the reward for capture/kill. (That’s right, a system where you could get paid to fight crime!) Now, tria don’t grow on trees so obviously these rewards couldn’t be too much and obviously would escalate based on the severity of the crime… but, what if player characters could add to this bounty price?

Imagine your good pal gets mugged, murdered, has a shoe thrown at his head, whatever… and the perpetrator is now on the run from the law with a measly 500 tria reward for his capture… In your righteous fury, you can go down to your local guard tower and slap down 10,000 tria of your own money to add to the wanted price. That’ll draw the attention of those bounty hunter types and help expedite justice! In fact, why not go one better and make it possible to put up “unsanctioned” bounties… of course if you kill someone that isn’t officially wanted by the guards you would be breaking the law… which adds the awesome possibility of actually having law abiding AND illegal bounty hunters, and all shades of gray in between.  As for guard sanctioned bounties, it seems plausible that a serious criminal could be wanted dead or alive, and the successful bounty hunter/vigilante/concerned citizen/community watch member/etc. would be able to decide the fate the same way they can currently choose whether they kill or spare an opponent. In this case, spare a criminal they go to jail… kill them and they go to the DR.

Alright, so it seems that there are at least some really cool possibilities that all spring from the ability to use a cloak type item… but, how can you prevent abuse? The biggest problem I see would be people rapidly hot-keying  off a cloak when someone that can arrest/fine them spots them… thereby preventing a guard from doing his job even though it is painfully obvious it is the same character that just de-cloaked. Adding a “cool” down phase could help, for example, all the drawbacks of the cloak linger for a few minutes after taking off the item. This means a person fleeing and ditching the cloak could still be pursued but also has the chance to escape as long as he can avoid the people chasing him for a bit of time.

Also, I don’t think being wanted for a crime in one town should directly result in a character being wanted in another… this adds a sanctuary type aspect to things and could even make the “sanctioned” confronting of a wanted character in a different town a crime for the person that is trying to collect the bounty!

Anyway, these are just a few ideas that sprang to mind when I seriously started considering a mechanics based “cloak” system and honestly may have altered my opinion on cloaks, at least regarding their potential for RP in the future of PlaneShift.

Discuss, comment, flame.

[Elady]

OK throwing this out here to play devils advocate.

It seems to me there is already plenty of criminal activity taking place in the game. Just to the in game events section and look at how many of the threads are centered around criminal activity. And there are additional crimes being done that aren't being written up in posted about.  To me it seems that things are already unbalanced in favor of the criminal enough as it is. After all if a criminal is caught and killed what happens? after a short period the criminal s back, curse free and ready to conduct criminal activity again. Criminal doesn't want to be caught by the good guys? Criminal just jumps off a cliff or otherwise offs themselves and escapes via the death realm.

Seems to me if changes are going to be made to make it even easier for the criminals, and thus encouraging an even higher level of crime than we currently have, there needs to be changes so there are some real consequences to the criminal if they are caught.  Consequences that go beyond the bad guy deciding on their own that it is time to end their current RP so they allow themselves to be caught or quit, which seems to be the current way a criminal activity comes to a halt.

[Orgonwukh]

After all if a criminal is caught and killed what happens? after a short period the criminal s back, curse free and ready to conduct criminal activity again. Criminal doesn't want to be caught by the good guys? Criminal just jumps off a cliff or otherwise offs themselves and escapes via the death realm.

As far as I know, the only punishments are banishment (low laws, e.g. theft and hight laws, e.g. entering a burial well) and permadeath (high laws, e.g. pollution). I do not know about 'standard death' (the one which 'only' sends you to DR) as a punishment. However, most of the laws' descriptions are unclear about the punishments (leaving some freedom for interpretation, which might be good or bad).

Agreed on the cliff jumping. Criminals should rather cloak themselves and fight to death than taking the risk of being arrested and discovered, especiall when committing high crimes. That's how I play my criminal character.

[Rigwyn]

Ok, in my auctioning victims rp rigwyn is still at it because he has not been caught yet. I have not left many hints so far and I don't think its required. I have exposed rigwyn to being caught by exposing his plans ( event down to the exact time ) with other players who may betray him. As the end of the rp approaches I'm going to literallly bend over nd make it even easier for good guys to jump in and fight back. The only thing I'm holding back on is being careful about being uncloaked - because I worry that the ic consequence could be permadeath. If I had. Assurance that permadeath would not be n ingame consequence then I would go as far as being uncloaked.

As with previous crimes ( like killing mellas in the howling well ) I intend to full play out all consequences including rejection, mistrust, loss of friends, random attacks etc...

In planeshift we have WEAPONS up the yingyang .. Its about war, fighting, killing, conflict ... Yet so many want to just live in peace or something... To each his own I suppose but personally living a menial life in a virtual world is not my idea of fun.
 

[Mordraugion]

Get real kids, no matter what style of cloak it wont render you permanently anonymous, if the hood comes far enough over your face to make it impossible to see, you wont be able to see where you're going, every time you move there is a possibility of it coming open and revealing a glimpse of what's underneath, it won't disguise your height, mannerisms, voice or scent. The cloak itself may pick up dirt, stains or damage that makes it uniquely identifiable, the maker may use a distinctive stitch or colour.

In other words don't say I'm cloaked so people can not know who you are as that is just godmodding, go read Harry Potter if you want a cloak of invisibility.