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#325 - 12/04/07 10:36 PM
Summon
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Cerberus
addict
Registered: 11/28/07
Posts: 608
Loc: Arlee, MT, USA
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Some of us remember the arch-mage spell summon. For others of us, this will be a brand new topic. In the summon of old, an arch-mage could create a silent lock on a player and put them anywhere on the mud, with the most likely places being in locked rooms of castles where most could never get out.
Summon has seen many permutations over the long course of years, first being reborn as the spell "portal", then being returned with the added requirement that a summon target be in possession of a token of some sort. This spell has been one of the most contentious spells (alongside harm, perhaps) in my stay on Darke, and so now we relaunch the debate.
The arguments for the removal/alteration of summon, to paraphrase those presented on chat tonight:- Summon was added as a purely beneficial spell, so shouldn't be able to move players against their will
- As the only spell that is capable of moving a player against their will, it is also the only way on the mud to effectively capture any player and force them to stop playing Darkemud. This is the major sticking point, and I'll explore it further later.
- Summon is anti-competitive in that if someone with summon wants to kill another individual, they choose the terms that are fought on to such a degree as to make the other party's preparations completely useless. This is related to the previous point, and will be explored further as well.
- Summon was at one point replaced by the spell portal, which is only insufficient in terms of secrecy.
To elaborate on the two related points, "Anyone the AM can scry, he/she can either choose to fight in exactly the situation of their choosing (with no risk, due to trigger spell) or simply put them in a locked room and let them rot." is one of the direct arguments against summon being around. I'm not particularly fond of this, as it essentially says 'this guild has the tools to make exceptionally effective interactions too easy', but it highlights another point. The fact that a person can be put into an unwinnable situation against their will is very detrimental.
This quote comes from the same source: "The biggest penalty in this game is being unable to play it. DC is meant to make it harder to play (or near impossible if you have too much). Even the old xp-loss death penalty was meant to make you lose time regaining lost progress. An AM can quite easily remove players (in non-trans guilds) from the game...so they can basically enact penalty worse than death or looting." This is truely the worst case scenario. While killing someone will result in a slight drawback, and looting their corpse a much heavier drawback, unless you're in one of the three guilds with a transportation spell (or five, if you count clerics and enchanters who have prepared for such an eventuality) you can be permanently and irrevocably removed from the populace at large.
While it is no small feat to accomplish, the removal of a player entirely from the ability to play a game should be relegated to the realm of admin and admin alone.
The arguments to keep summon follow:- Summon is a powerful tool against rule breakers of all calibers. While this usually the charge of admin, we at Darke have a player-centric view on enforcement and fair play.
- The fear that players will be locked away eternally at will is unfounded. A quote: "Anything can be run into the ground, it's pretty much all perspective, you can kill a thousand people with an overpowered spell, but it will eventually catch up to you"
- Summon already requires a token be present on the summoned player, allowing for a number of defenses against aggressive summons.
- There are rooms on the mud that can't be summoned to/from, so if it becomes a true problem one can simply stand in one of these no summon rooms, and avoid an irritating summon.
Again, there are two related points, both centered around the available defenses for the summon spell. While it's true a determined summoner can undoubtedly circumvent most of these, it's also true that there should be no way to be 100% safe at all times. A player who is found to be abusing their guild's powers to such an extent that it puts the guild under fire for nerfing or removal will be unlikely to find solace in their guild, or at all if the spell they're abusing happens to be summon.
What's more, one of the strategies of pure caster guilds has classically been outnumbering opponents with pets, or overwhelming them with surprise. Summon is just another permutation of these strategies, even if it is potentially the most effective by some amount.
It would be great to hear everyone's opinions on this topic. Shadowraith has expressed a strong desire to make a solid review of summon before making any decisions, and I think we should all respect and participate in what will surely be one of the better documented decision making processes!
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#326 - 12/04/07 10:52 PM
Re: Summon
[Re: Cerberus]
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Kim
enthusiast
Registered: 10/11/07
Posts: 204
Loc: Europe
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"Summon is a powerful tool against rule breakers of all calibers. While this usually the charge of admin, we at Darke have a player-centric view on enforcement and fair play."
This is an extremely invalid argument. I'm sorry. But a player character simply can not know if another player is breaking the rules most of the times. If, for example, an AM suspects you are botting, and talks to you, you are completely within your rights to ignore him. And It's Arch-mages, not Arches. Ignoring a pesky inquisitive AM doesn't mean you are breaking the rules.
"The fear that players will be locked away eternally at will is unfounded. A quote: "Anything can be run into the ground, it's pretty much all perspective, you can kill a thousand people with an overpowered spell, but it will eventually catch up to you""
No, not everything can be "run into the ground" of the level of summon. Just the fact killing is used as an example shows a complete lack of understanding of what makes summon troublesome. (the can't play, can't even rebirth aspect).
"Summon already requires a token be present on the summoned player, allowing for a number of defenses against aggressive summons."
And there is, thanks to among other things trigger spell, no real penalty for the AM trying over and over and over. The AM can't fail so it hurts, and he only has to succeed once. The AM also has a wide array of spells to help with making sure you can't get rid of the token before the summon, from delay to power word, stun.
"There are rooms on the mud that can't be summoned to/from, so if it becomes a true problem one can simply stand in one of these no summon rooms, and avoid an irritating summon."
Very very few. And furthermore... The same applies to transport/transgate, which nobody is suggesting be nerfed/removed. Simply because failing for a moment to protect against those will just result in your death, not inability to play.
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#330 - 12/05/07 06:24 AM
Re: Summon
[Re: Shadowraith]
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carmy
member
Registered: 10/14/07
Posts: 164
Loc: South Korea
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Could always summon people to a cano too, or underwater. I don't really like the idea of summon at all. Can summon people to areas of the worldmap they don't know, at night, and they'd be lost for hours. There are areas of the world map that you can only get to by flying, and people could be trapped on an island with no way off other than another summon or portal. Even the world map could be a sucky place for some players, especially new players.
If this is simply a way for summon to be a more discrete spell than portal, than perhaps make an "accept" function. I don't really enjoy the idea of summon as an aggro spell, I think there are always going to be ways to really screw people over, where they sincerely have no defense against it. With transgate, or transport, sure, the person is killed, but they aren't screwed over and unable to play.
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#345 - 12/05/07 08:27 AM
Re: Summon
[Re: Shadowraith]
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Kim
enthusiast
Registered: 10/11/07
Posts: 204
Loc: Europe
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"So we nerf AM's then they complain about how easy NB's kill them (which they probably can do now) then the NB's get nerfed and they complain about how powerful fighters are, etc. Its a vicious cycle."
No. Not quite. This is simply not true. From a PK perspective. AMs are considerably stronger than NBs. Both can transport to a player. AMs have better defensive spells, and much better offensive spells. NBs have... Iron will, meaning they can probably get away from the AM.
Of course, trigger spell means the AM always gets away, unless REALLY unlucky with an IK, which is rare. And even if IKed, trigger spell works and transports the AM away.
And nobody, except Capulet, complained about summon not existing when it was gone, and AMs were still the most powerful guild.
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