Onlining, An Editorial:

[Ruddertail]

There are a lot of opinions about onlining, and they all conflict. So, I thought it time for me to set down my thoughts on the subject, clearly and in "writing", not in the "conversation" of the shoutbox, or in a heated, hurried debate about whether someone was onlined or not.

There are two mass held public opinions on this subject. The first, that there is nothing wrong with onlining, the second, that it is a complete and utter evil. I dissagree with both.

In my opinion onlining is an act of war. Nothing more, nothing less. Certainly, it is dishonerable and very agreesive, not by any means the same as non-online attacks.
On the other hand, it is not a mortal sin. It doesn't instantly warrent death, like killmongering, or the killing for pleasure of the upper ranks(which doesn't really have a name).

It certainly warrents heavy retal from the person, and possibly from his allies. They may want to resort to other less then honerable options (mass murders, onlining him back), or just smashing the guy into the ground every day for a few days. Yet is by no means as bad as killing with no reason. There are two resons for this.

1: While onlining can do major damage to a warband, an alert person can catch it pretty quickly. If you're attacking and your land is going down, that's a pretty good alarm right there.

2: Even if someone does take major damage, it is highly unlikely that it will damage them permenantly, within a run or two, they'll be back to where they were before. It's not hard to bounce back, especially not on BFR.

However, just because I don't belive onlining as serious as killing, don't think I belive it to be ok. As I stated above, I don't. I belive it warrents retal, and, repeated, unprovoked, onlining may warrent death, at the hands of the victom and their allies, or, if necessary, the community.

To sum it up, online attacking is a declaration of war, and a very nasty way to do it, I might add. It's not as evil as some of you seem to believe, yet by no means is it acceptable.

-Ruddertail

[ohmyjapan16]

ohmyjapan's black and white view of onlining.
Circumstances:
1. during a run- if i got onlined during a run for some heavy damage, i'd probably kill their warband.

2. camping- if someone is camping (you know when someone is camping), i will online them if they have all the land. i will expect retal but certainly not death.

for some people, onlining is an act of war, for others it could be something that they accept and do not take it personally.

[Ruddertail]

I take very few things in this game personally. I still retal for them, however. It's not about whether they like me or hate me, it's about whether they can get away with hitting me hard. Of course, things are different if it's agreed. (I'll at times message people saying (go ahead, I'm just sitting here, talking. Normally, only with a friend). And, yes, camping is an interesting issue. There are different veiws on that, maybe we can settle that issue once and for all, and decide what our veiw is going to be on it.

[ohmyjapan16]

Well, since you can alwys tell when someone is camping, that is not the issue. No what-ifs. To me, camping is worse than onlining a camper. Your not depriving me of thousands of acres of land per run, just so you can have it the next time you run turns. You don't need the land when you're not running turns, and I find it down-right dispespectful to use someones honor against them.

[The Beatles]

Good call, chaps. I would just like to add that onlining and camping are matters of game etiquette, and as such, belong in a different category than the determination of --for example-- what constitutes "too many attacks". Whether you think the limit on attacks ought to be drawn at 6 or 20 is up to you, and a response to attacks is up to you. With onlining and camping, the perpetrator must know that they are against common etiquette, and must expect an in-game retaliation. Which, however, is entirely up to the victim of the aggression to mete out. Onlining and killing are however, both somewhat of a grey area, and again, any consideration of them is subject to the circumstances.

What I am driving at, is that while all of us generally condemn onlining, camping, and killing, any retribution (whether personal or sought through forums) and forgiveness must ultimately be determined by the victim.

[Ruddertail]

It would seem to me that, in some cases, what is too many attacks is partially game etiquette. More, perhapps, as a guidline as to what is appropriate and what is bound to earn you more then just retal for the land. For example, if people say hitting someone over 12 times is "too many attacks", then a person hitting another over 12 times could expect to earn heavy retal, while a person staying under that could expect only retal to regain the land they took, not a heavy smashing. In that case, hitting someone no more then 12 times would be a matter of etiquette. At least, I would see it as such.

[The Beatles]

Yes, but my point exactly is that people rarely, if ever, agree on a standard "hit limit", whether soft or hard. Some people consider 6 excessive, some take even 20 as routine. (More or less.)

[ohmyjapan16]

I hope this is about what you guys are talking about. (I'm tired)

The way I see it is that Rudder is trying to get the whole community to agree, but you can't really set a standard hit limit for the community when everyone has learned to accept different amounts of attacks. That might not even apply to some people like me. I don't mind how many attacks someone does on me, so long as I have a decent amount of land.

[Ruddertail]

Well, yes and no. With something such as this non-reseting server I'm proposing, we could decide from the start that on it, we're only going to accept a certain number of attacks. I also don't care how much they take so much as how much I have left, but if the community agreed on a hit limit, I would limit myself and others too it.