User:Colette/Rantings

I'll use this space to post and discuss my rantings, ideas and topics about the game. Feel free to give your opinions and comment in the Talk page.

Tolerance extremes are always harmful

It always happens when I arrive to a new town, and in practically every town I have played in so far. There is always at least a handful of players that refuse to cooperate with the town. Those that stay in town doing nothing, those that hoard items or build Houses and fortresses for themselves and those that don't read the forums or ignore the indications in them. They bring the town down, their actions affecting the town as whole. And what can honest citizens do?

The most basic response for such behavior would be to give the uncooperative citizens a form of punishment. And indeed, such forms of punishment exist. There is the option of getting the citizen Shunned, or hanging them in the Gallows. The Meat Locker option even gives a temporary defense to the town, although the cost and need for a blueprint makes it a less feasible option. So what is the problem?

The answer is simple: Most citizens are reluctant to punish selfish or lazy players.

For some reason, most citizens seem uncomfortable with the idea. For most citizens, the only players that deserve punishment are those that are a severe threat or annoyance to the town. While it is common to see griefers being hanged, punishment is usually reserved for only the most severe cases. That means that other bad players can, directly or indirectly, keep harming the town with impunity.

Why selfish and lazy players deserve punishment?

If a player only logs in every two days to drink, doesn't go outside to scavenge and doesn't cooperate with the needed constructions, they are unnecessary to the town. Most of them won't even bother to check the forums and see what's needed, much less participate in the discussions. If they take items, it will be very difficult to get them back if they refuse to give them. They spend resources without cooperating with the town. The costs of having such citizens in town outweighs any benefit they may give.

Selfish players, on the other hand, can be much more harmful to the town. They will take the best items for themselves and will refuse to give them back. Although they may cooperate with town to a certain point, they will show their true nature once the end of the town approaches. They are typically the first ones to build their fortresses and steal all the defensive items of the bank. And sometimes they will take the best equipment of the town trying to camp far from the town. They get killed and the equipment is lost with them.

Obviously, it is always a good idea to send a warning to those players, exhorting them to stop their harmful behavior. The downside is that they will likely reply with a complaint, as it has happened to me many times before...

Shunning Vs. Gallows

Ideally, players that are less harmful should be shunned, while those that are worse should be hanged. The problem is that once gallows are built people can no longer be shunned.

People often think that building the gallows is a waste of time. I think it's not. It is a very cheap building (a Rusty Chain, a Patchwork Beam and 13 ), which means that two persons can finish it in one day, and can be finished very early. And nobody will miss a chain, since it's a breakable weapon. Mediocre at most. The Gallows have an advantage: It will remove the victim from the town immediately. People can argue that a shunned citizen can still cooperate with the town, but the help they give is usually negligible.

The opposite extreme

In the opposite extreme, we have a totalitarian regime in which a group of players dictate exactly what has to be done, and any resistance is met with death. While theoretically it could achieve an awesome level efficiency, I think it's quite impossible to achieve. And towns where people often get hanged are usually run by griefers. Players need a certain degree of liberty. This is a game, not service in the Army. It's important not to go to the opposite extreme either.

Conclusion

My conclusion: Players need to be harsher in terms of punishment, although not excessively. Most players are too soft in that sense. When I go to the forums and suggest hanging someone for making something wrong, people always take it as a joke, or see me as a psycho that is obsessed with hanging people. I'm a psycho? Maybe. But I prefer more refined ways of execution... Ahem, sorry. I was talking out loud... That's all for now.

Don't be stupid! Think before acting!

People should always assume the consequences of their actions. It's part of that thing called responsibility, and should be something basic in everyone, everywhere. And people should always use their better judgment. Bad judgment can lead to bad decisions, and bad decisions can lead to bad actions. And everything is screwed up in the end.

Sometimes that bad judgment leads to hasty decisions. While sometimes it's important to act quickly, it's never a good idea to be hasty or have prejudices when making a decision. What I want to discuss here is something that happened to me recently. I want to cite a clear example of a bad hasty decision that can have bad consequences:

The anecdote

In a town with practically no organization, I found myself struggling unarmed against the hordes surrounding the town. With no other option, I took a Battery Launcher 1-ITF (empty) from the bank. Not enough firepower. Someone tells me of a Calibrator in the desert. I know that the Battery Launcher Mk. II (loaded) will be a good weapon. I returned to town, calibrator in hand, ready to upgrade my old launcher. And so I did. However...

As I logged back, I noticed some citizen had attacked me twice, albeit unsuccessfully. Calling me a griefer in the forums for taking an Electronic component, he had attacked me without even asking why I had taken the materials from the bank.

Read, investigate and discuss. Never attack.

It's easy to use the word "griefer" as a sort of insult and apply it to people you dislike, or to people you think is doing wrong. In that sense it's hard to tell which one is the actual griefer, the one who accuses or the accused one. In this case, the citizen made a hasty, unnecessary decision that ends up harming the town.

As I told previously, it is necessary to apply proper punishments to people that break the rules. But it is more important to apply punishment to people that deserve it in the first place. A rushed conclusion can lead to the unfortunate event in which an innocent citizen gets punished. So before you try to get someone punished, read The Great Register and investigate the actions of a citizen. Has the citizen made a mistake or anything that harms the town? Is there any possibility that the mistake was done in good faith? Has the citizens made repeated mistakes?

Instead of discussing the issue, this citizen I talk about made the hasty decision of attacking me. I can't really think of something more stupid to be done. He wasted his AP in a way, started a discussion that was unnecessary and earned himself a complaint, and possibly a hanging.

Conclusion

Just a simple one. Use your brain before making a decision. And if you have a problem, discuss first. Trying to solve things by yourself before even thinking about it will only get you problems. And make you look like a fool.

Individualism vs. Selfishness

One day I found myself cursing the RNG right after The Attack. I was dead, despite having some of the highest defense in town. With nothing to do but to wait for the surviving members of my coalition to join me in Valhalla, I began reading some of the threads in the World Forums. And among all the trash, spam and boring games, I noticed a few discussion threads. Some of them particularly caught my attention, as they were discussions about how players should behave. And in particular, how bad selfish players are and how to deal with them. Some players exposed good arguments, while others were extremists that almost made Joseph Stalin look like a saint.

I believe that getting caught in the extremes is always something negative. And this time I started to wonder when individualism turns into selfishness. There are those that believe that towns are like beehives and every citizen is like a worker bee, while others have their own goals, styles and plans in mind.

Distinctions

One of the most hotly debated aspects of the game is getting Distinctions. Personally, I think that gathering Distinctions is one of the most fun aspects in the game. It gives you a personal goal that goes beyond the mere need to see how long the town can last. Some Distinctions (and the titles they give) are pretty much easy to get and cause no problems with the town. Others, however, can cause harm or annoyance to the town or to other citizens. For example, it is unlikely that someone will get mad at you if you dump dead bodies out for the Cadaver Collector distinction. But if you decide to water them for the Sprinkler one some people can get mad at you for using (or wasting) water.

When getting distinctions, and the nice titles that come with them, it's often necessary to give something in exchange, and that something can potentially be useful for the town. An item, your AP, your inventory space or your safety, for example. You can't get the Daredevil Camper distinction without risking your life outside, or the Nights in the desert without dying. So it's often up to the player to decide if the Distinction is worth it, and if it is harmful to the town.

One distinction that is especially debated is the decorations one. Most of them have other uses, like as weapons or construction materials, consume batteries or are in very short supply. Almost nobody will complain if you have a Rocking Chair at home (although I've met a few jerks that have done it), but if you have a Fat Cat or a Mattress you'll have people complaining about you, since the first one can be used as a decent weapon and the second one as a defensive item. The question here is if citizens can freely choose to sacrifice the potential benefits of those things in exchange for a distinction for their own souls, or if such distinctions should be avoided at all times for the good of the town.

Items

Related to the Distinction issues, here are the items. Items in the desert are uncommon, and the useful ones are very scarce. Weapons are relatively plentiful, but most of them are trash or use water or batteries. And they run out pretty quickly. Go out there armed only with a Box Cutter and you'll find yourself surrounded by the hordes pretty quickly.

Being some of the most useful weapons, the Machete and the Battery Launcher Mk. II (loaded) are worth their weight in gold. They can clear safe paths for scavengers and expeditions, save trapped citizens or help explore buildings. So when you get a hold on one, would you leave it so easily?

If there's only one good weapon in town, only one person can use it at a time. The others are left to use lousy weapons, or worse, their bare hands. So is it selfish to keep the weapon for yourself? If you give it to the town, especially in random towns, chances are that you will never see your weapon again.

Food, water and drugs are also very useful, and in very short supply. Which is the main reason for implementing rationing plans. Water is vital, as failing to drink will kill you. Something that many new players somehow fail to realize. The well usually has a supply for two or three days at the start, and it will run low pretty fast from there. Every citizen gets a food item at the start of the town, but after that you need to scavenge to get more. It's not too uncommon, as Cans and Doggy Bags are not too rare. And drugs are the rarest. Especially without a laboratory in town.

Water and food rationing measures usually tell people that scavengers can take food, water and drugs. Builders, however, can only drink every other day and cannot take food nor drugs. Obviously, that means that construction AP is halved. Being both a builder and an scavenger myself, I kind of understand both points. Having used food for building, I have been called a selfish player (Aside from "griefer", "fascist" and other niceties). I was also scolded by some players once for filling a water pistol when I was a newbie. However, it is always funny to see that the players that get upset are always the first ones that take the weapons, drugs, booze and food from the bank whenever they have the chance. So who is the selfish player in the end? The one that takes and uses the resources for the town (No builders = No defenses. No defenses = No town) or the ones that take the items for themselves and complain about others that do the same?

Camping

I've seen it countless times. Someone finds a building far, far away. A Construction Blueprint (rare) is hidden there. So one citizen goes, loots the bank, gathers lots of supplies and goes to camp in there. But the poor guy did not take the zombies in account, or was unlucky. After midnight we can see in the Gazette that the guy is dead. Now thanks to our unlucky friend, or weapons, supplies and other items are lost in the far away place that is potentially full of zombies now. It will take a lot of effort to reach the zone again to retrieve the items, particularly in later days when zombies fill the map.

This has been reduced with the introduction of the Survivalist class. But not everyone is a hero, and not everyone can achieve the perfect chances to survive.

Home defenses

This is a very touchy subject. It is generally agreed that building anything past a Tent in the first few days is a waste of AP and resources. And doing it will earn you a few complaints. But it gets more complicated from there. Only one upgrade can be done per day. So if one of your neighbors builds a hovel while you only have a tent, they will be able to build a shack the next day, while you'll be lagging behind while you build your hovel. It doesn't sound important, but it is.

Personal defense between levels doesn't seem to vary much. But in reality, it means the difference between life and death. When defenses are not enough to cover the number of zombies, a small number of them will enter. And your chances of survival depend directly on your personal defense.

It gets even touchier when it comes to the LMS distinction and the nice Hero days prize it carries. It's no wonder that those that were selfless enough to never waste their AP or resources on personal defenses will never see that shiny golden trophy in their souls page, while those that were careful (and wily) to build their own personal fortresses will see it more often. While part of it is random at the last moment, (and that randomness was ultimately what lead me to write this), it's the selfish player that gets the prizes and stuff while the selfless player gets nothing.

Conclusion

Being selfish is sometimes just a matter of perception. It's easy to place a "selfish" tag on someone that does not follow your plans or simply doesn't play as you think he/she should. Before accusing someone of being selfish, try thinking if he/she is really harming the town, and if he/she is doing it in good faith. If they are really harming the town, send them a message. Be nice, nobody likes rude people. And if they continue their behavior, send them to the gallows. Perhaps that will make them learn the lesson.

Don't engage in futile discussions. It doesn't matter how many thousand Soul Points you have or not, you don't have all the answers and you're not perfect. We're all here to play and have fun, so don't be a totalitarian jerk that thinks all players must work as you think they would. And don't be a jerk that doesn't care about others either. And if you do, don't be surprised if you find yourself hanged by the neck by an angry mob. Don't tell me I didn't warn you!

Don't be afraid of quick justice

Something I find interesting, and often irritating, about Die2Nite is how human nature can be reflected so well in a game. To avoid getting into a pseudo-philosophical argument, I'll go straight to the point: Players avoid hanging other players. The reason? I don't know. Probably because they are afraid of following the same fate.

I will always insist that the Gallows is a very cheap construction, especially for the usefulness it gives. A one-time investment of a mediocre weapon, a single beam and the AP of two or three players for hanging all the bad apples in town is not a bad deal. But there is a problem: 8 complaints are needed, and people are always reluctant about hanging. The average citizen sees the gallows as extremism, as a last-resort measure to punish only the worst griefers.

I'm an advocate for quick, decisive measures when dealing with bad citizens. By bad citizens I mean those that are selfish or that commit mistakes that harm the town. But every time I call for actions against those bad citizens, another citizen jumps in to their defense. "Give him another opportunity". "He's just a newbie". "He'll die or dehydration/addiction/infection soon". "We'll lose his daily AP" or "We'll waste resources by building the Gallows". And many other arguments that are not in my mind at the moment. So then I'm turned into an extremist, elitist monster that is hang-happy, dramatic and I must calm down, and sometimes even the complaints are giving to me instead.

People are willing to give second opportunities probably because they'd want a second opportunity themselves. But what I find ironic is that I always ask for the hangings of inactive, un-participative, selfish citizens, and it's the participative active citizens that come with the defense.

I'll never ask for the hanging of a person that takes the time to apologize or explain the reason why he/she made a mistake, as long as they don't keep repeating the same behavior. But at least 9 of every 10 persons I've wanted to hang don't even take the time to explain anything.

It's very frustrating that people are so reluctant to give people the punishment they deserve. So why being afraid of hanging these bad citizens? We all make mistakes, but those that don't learn from them are not the persons you want by your side. We're not hanging real people.

A Clash of Doctrines

What's worse than a Clash of the Titans? A clash of doctrines. That is, the conflict between a group of players who have fundamentally different concepts of how to play the game, and thus a completely different idea of what to do, how to deal with problems and what can be considered fair and what not.

Although it can be considered that every player has a certain definition of what to do and how to play, sometimes those differences can cause a disruption in the town's development. If none of the parties is willing to desist, then the disagreement may even escalate to the point of personal between the parties involved.

Most players will agree that any town that wishes to go further than a couple of days must follow a few guidelines, for example, avoiding the Portal Lock or building a Hovel early on. But once again, the focus of this problem are two of the most controversial aspects of Die2Nite, justice and selfishness. The particular problem I want to cite as an example happened exactly because of those problems.

The Background

What prompted me to post this was a problem I had recently. The who and where is irrelevant. What matters is the why. If you have read this page or the topics above, you may have noticed I am an advocate for quick justice and reasonable individualism. Nevertheless, my opinions often vary from those of most citizens. I got to play with a certain group of people who did not agree with me and that ultimately caused a long, boring and stupid argument over how the game should be played and what can be considered selfish and what not, leading to personal insults and cowardly backstabbing. I will try to avoid the details and simply present my arguments and opinions about it.

Hanging: The taboo

I may sound like a broken record with this, but people are always reluctant to hang other players. The gallows often become a taboo construction, which must not be built at all. Shunning is often considered to be a harsh punishment, and hanging is literally reserved for only the worst criminals in a town, those whose bad actions and griefing literally put the town in check. This means that the Gallows is reduced to two things, one, an emergency last resort for punishing the worst griefers. And second, a tool for griefing, as hanging people can be a form of griefing by organized players. Therefore, advocating for its use is either extremism or griefing, and sometimes both.

People often fail to realize that they take an extremely lenient stance regarding this matter. To put it simple, they wait for a citizen to commit several smaller mistakes or a single large mistake before taking actions. Once actions are taken, it is too late: damage is done, the bad citizen is gone (either by accidental or intentional death), or because the town is over. The bad citizen goes to another town to continue this bad behavior, even if this bad behavior was for omission instead of intentional griefing.

Now, this doesn't mean people must assume a tyrannical stance and hang people at the first mistake. I have mentioned this before. A person that sincerely regrets what he/she did and wishes to change should never be hanged. As simple as it is, an apology in the forums, an explanation of why the mistake was made and a change of attitude should be enough. Timing is vital for this. If you don't wait enough time you might not give the person the needed time to explain, as they may have reasons not to be online at the time (Different time zone, unavailability, etc.) Waiting too much, on the other hand, lets the guilty people time to escape (suiciding, for example), or for the town to forget what happens. I call this the cool down period. Citizens tend to have short memories, and they will forget what happened earlier in town as the days go by. Therefore, it's important not to wait too much before taking actions.

There is a huge problem, and that is the number and variation of excuses around. People will often jump to the defense of other citizens, while focusing on attacking you instead. Rather than leaving people to defend themselves, they will come up with a series of bad excuses to avoid hanging a citizen. They forget that a citizen can, and should, defend him/herself in such occasions, that bad behavior is seldom accidental and that delaying the action will give the bad citizen more time to harm the town. Ironically, certain players might be hypocritical enough to avoid hanging such people but hanging someone that forgot to put the Hacksaw from the bank before he logged in again to explain.

About griefers, things get more simple. There are lots of types of griefing, and most are especially vexing, although relatively harmless. They can send random complaints or steal decoration from people without giving them back. Although it causes no real harm to the town, they do it with ill intention. There's a big difference between stealing from someone who left an item at home for that purpose, and send it back along your "thanks", or stealing from a griefer that is hoarding items than stealing a decoration from a scavenger and not giving the item back. Or sending a random complaint with no reason and being discovered. This lack of respect is an attitude problem and I don't see the reason why someone showing such discourtesy should be spared.

That is a problem. Rather than seeing the Gallows as a taboo, as an extreme method of punishment for bad citizen, they should see it as a way of giving bad citizens a lesson. A citizen that does not read the forums at least once daily and communicates with the other citizens is rarely a good citizen, a citizen that does his/her best to annoy the town and a citizen that builds the Wooden Fencing has no reason to keep spending AP in constructions or filling up a space in town anymore.

Selfishness: Tactic or Griefing

I said I would try to avoid unnecessary details, but without the context this would be impossible to explain. I will be brief and try to omit the unnecessary details as well.

Normal town, day 10. An average town with few constructions, few scavengers and mediocre luck. The town in Chaos and about to fall. Five citizens left standing, myself included, two residents and three heroes. I was one of the residents. The estimated attack had not been calculated because of the lack of people to do it, but it would be close to 800. With our defense of barely 500, we knew that the chances of surviving were limited.

This is where it gets interesting. Two of the heroes where, not surprisingly, the people who I had differences with. One of them is a gung-ho survival enthusiast whose only goal is to make the town reach a higher count of days at the end, and especially outspoken against my hanging tactics. When someone sent me a random complaint, he denied any involvement, despite being the only citizen online at the moment, and he organized the hanging of the citizen that forgot to give the Hacksaw back. The other was a backstabbing idiot who was silent at the moment, but didn't forget to insult me when the conflict was over. Either way both of them thought it was fair to take all the drugs from the town, and using their hero powers to build all the chests as possible and hoarding all the Defensive Objects from the bank, reaching a defense of 20-28, while I, being a resident, only could get a maximum of 15.

I thought of a plan to balance out the opportunities. The theory was sound. By letting the 800 zombies attack with full force, all citizens would in theory have the same opportunity of being eaten or survive. Needless to say, I needed to be cautious and discreet to avoid being discovered and my plan foiled, so I opened the town gates at the last few seconds of the day.

It is no surprise that the first player I mentioned got mad. He said I was explicitly trying to grief. Openly accusing me of griefing, he said it was a coward and selfish move and that I was a dangerous person to play with, citing the fact that I had poisoned an item from fun (despite I had clearly stated to them that the item was poisoned).

That made me wonder about how far selfishness goes, and what can be considered griefing. He obviously did not care that I had no way of competing with his hero skill and selfish play. For him, being selfish was normal while the selfish play of someone else (who ironically wanted the same chance of survival to be equal for another) is griefing and unacceptable. I find it deplorable that a player might go as far as to make ad hominem arguments because of this matter, calling me things like "griefing idiot", "liar", "excessively selfish" and "a dangerous person to know, let alone share a town with", while the other limited to cowardly call me a "drama queen" with "a history of causing sh!t" when I was not looking.

Conclusions

The results of this clash of doctrines is quite disappointing. Deplorable. It made me realize that some people can be disgusting. Insulting someone over a dispute of a game is miserable. Realizing that some people can have a different opinion to yours, and admitting that it may be effective can make you a better person, unlike those failures of human beings I mentioned earlier. Analyze what I advocate for. Hanging someone for a mistake is not wrong, if the conditions are correct. Be a better player, not a disgusting jerk.