One GM, Seeking Chiropractor

[TheShammySocialist]

Let's face it, the GM position in CNRP has meant less and less since it became an elected, rather than moderator-appointed position. That's not to say that it isn't relevant anymore, but the decisions made come under a lot more scrutiny than they used to.

 

That's a reality we face now in CNRP.

 

To be honest, I usually don't react when people lash out at the GMs or joke about them, as most of the time, it is an emotionally or jokingly driven affair, and really tends to not draw my attention.

 

Some people have chosen to view the most recent events in CNRP, and if you're completely out of the loop, that being the invasion of Britain, just highlighted "spinelessness" within the GM Team as a whole. Whether or not things would have been different if we had other members of the GM Team is irrelevant now, as the roleplay is essentially over and done with, and basically revisionist history, which I for one never particularly liked dealing with in college.

 

I personally found that the invasion of Britain and the killing off of lkfht as distasteful, and I can't say that I found myself feeling some sympathy for the latter mentioned because of it. On that note however, there have been recent allegations concerning this as OOC reasons, brought over into an IC event. But I'm not here to talk about whether it was or wasn't. I think this event highlighted the issue of OOC crossing over into IC, but it also yields a new question; if a player uses an IC reason to attack someone, however farfetched as it may be, can we claim that an OOC/IC line was crossed?

 

There is no checks to whether people can wholesale invade others without warning, anyone can claim propaganda or lies anything ICly through words, so long as it doesn't break the standard tech rules or the forum rules. It doesn't have to be true, no one has to like it, but its a sworn fact that this is a truth in this particular roleplay. I'll state that right now, such cases pretty much nullify the extent of a GM's powers. One side can claim it was OOC, others can claim that it wasn't. And who hasn't done things in CNRP that weren't OOC driven? I don't think I can think of anyone to be honest.

 

Basically, it boils down to the fact that the OOC/IC line cannot be enforced properly by the GMs, and without the community acting to correct that, they cannot enforce a proper OOC/IC line. I'm asking the community as a whole, to discuss how they feel on this matter that I'm highlighting. Basically, I am doing this on my own initiative because I've heard a sizeable amount of commentary making accusations on whether the GMs do their jobs.

 

Does anyone feel that this can be rectified in any manner, do people even want it rectified? How do we go about it? Seriously, I am putting this up for discussion, because I feel as though the time is right for it and there has been notably more discussions about it.

[Evangeline Anovilis]

As it currently stands, indeed, it isn't the job of GMs to watch over the IC/OOC divide in this affair, given it is one of the more ambigious areas. I wouldn't say that the GMs lack spine for doing nothing, in the first place, they lack the power to do anything. I do not know whether this ought to be rectified or in what way, though it appears to me, that it should be handled by the community, rather than just a few GMs.

 

However, looking at how Europe played out, I think in general people are getting spineless and I'd not consider such a good quality for GM-ship. Mybe someone has any idea on this, though I'd not be surprised if it turns out to be a basket case.

[Lynneth]

Imo, trying to police anything in regards of OOC/IC is nearly impossible without logs, screenshots, etc. Even then it's difficult, due to doctoring being possible.

 

Personally, I hold the stance that in the sort of RP that CNRP is, and with the sort of community it has, dividing OOC and IC clearly is nigh impossible unless there's a blatant and open disregard. Legally, GMs can't do shit about this. We don't have the power, and never really had since the mods distanced themselves from this community. And we won't get it because most of the community seem to be against heavier GM-surveillance.

(Not to mention that the constant elections imo lessen legitimacy of the post, because bad or inexperienced people may come in and fuck shit up.)

[Uberstein]

People have bitched about things in CNRP since day one. Nothing has changed, nothing will. GM's never had power, but people still want them to solve all their problems.

 

Frankly I feel the GM's are there to resolve disputes, not act as police. It isn't spineless for the judge to sit there and wait for the case to come to them, that's just what a judge does. Theoretically CNRP is a self-policing community with a set of elected judges. The only way a "spineless" argument could reasonably be made is if a case was brought to them and they refused to take action out of fear of IC attack.

 

Was Triyun randomly invading a guy and rolling him a dick move? Yes. I think most of us can agree on it. Is it a case for the GM's to handle? That is an entire other debate on what the role of a the GM is and what exactly this community wants. This community cannot argue for looser rules and anarchy and expect powerful GM action at the same time. Either we accept the fact that the way things are set up, no rules were broken and the GMs have no reason to intervene, or we accept the fact that the only way to give the GMs the power to prevent random attacks is to give them unprecedented power in terms of policing the RP.

 

I hope this makes some kind of sense, I haven't gotten much sleep. I'm going to go take a nap now.

[Justinian the Mighty]

I always thought the GM's were arbitrators, not police. Thats why the GM's Court evolved. If I ever felt slighted I'd file a lawsuit in the GM Court of Appeals and duke it out.

 

On another note; These sort of things never happened when I was a GM! Back when I was a GM we had to walk in the snow, uphill, both ways to resolve a dispute. Now they just sit in their fancy robes and powdered wings and pass judgement on us!

[Triyun]

The people who've talked about an OOC/IC line have all exclusively been on the other side of the political divide.  As best I can tell neither Cent or I were ever asked.  It was a bunch of people who were no at all privy to my thought process spewing crap to further OOC hatreds.  So I'd challenge that first premise.  I saw a lot of complaining that it was OOC Cent and I were cooperating on it.  To be honest that's shocking and dumb.  Cent and I have three MADPs.  Our elected governments have their differences, but the Monarchies remained close.

 

But that brings up another issue.  Which is that there is hypocrisy in the OOC/IC line.  Never once is it complained about when people try and strike IC deals OOC, particularly controversial ones.  But it is complained about when those same people wind up getting hit over a different IC reason.  That's stupid.  If I privately go, "Hey want to kill Cent with me." to 11 people.  Get everyone onboard, then make a fig leaf IC treaty thread.   Its retarded Cent can't respond, its also retarded, an informant can't inform Cent in an IC manner imo.  If you're doing an action of IC consequence, it should be considered IC.  People will say, "Well if I had to be responsible for something IC I'd never do it."  Well then tough.  I can tell you (and again this wasn't the IC reason he was rolled) that lkhft approached Cent and I multiple times over the past month to play each other off against one another, and did so with conversations exclusively focused on creating IC consequence.  In other words he was talking to us like Ukrainian negotiators may be right now talking to Russia and the West.  He was talking about IC actions.   

 

When we took action in the security council to enforce a resolution, he approached us as if approaching someone IC at he end of a session or summoning an ambassador, via query to both voice complaint and seek favorable IC resolution.  Was all of this really OOC?  Does that make sense.

 

I illustrate this because to be honest there in my judgement is an emotional view of preference for 'the little guy' in this community.  Not among everybody but for a great portion of them.  There is also the assumption of primacy of characters over populations.  In other words there is the assumption of the morality of protecting the characters of a player, often at the expense of views of the population.  That didn't necessarily lead to this war, but like I've had others where I've sought regime change of a government guilty of some fairly egregious human rights abuses, and the response has been that its bad to try and kill their characters and in fact that I'm being OOC.  Well I think we all know that in the real world, the United States would go after leaders, and in fact [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decapitation_strike]decapitation strikes[/url] are a legitimate military tactic.  

 

Beyond all of that you basically turn CN RP into a mob rule and destroy individual choice to take action.   Mob rule over individual choice is a horrible idea.  It turns CN RP from an inherently IC based medium to one of popularity and judgement not particularly based on anything other than emotion.  And beyond all of that you're opening things up if you did regulate it even well to constant bickering.   In fact I would argue this would destroy the GM position as we know it and turn it into a partisan political one.

 

You would be having GMs rule on whose reasons were valid and whose were not.   They could veto wars  that hurt them IC/OOC and vice versa.  You just said you can't think of anyone who can completely separate IC and OOC Shammy.  Do you really want to then turn the GMship into a Kingmaker position?

 

Edit:  Also just to clarify, if someone chose to play an explicitly expansionist Imperialist regime such as every single great power aside from Wilsonian America, who sought to expand its territory simply for wealth, ideology, or national glory, should the GMs get rid of that for not being IC?  Cause if this is a role playing game, I think people should have a right to choose their roles.

Edited April 17, 2014 by Triyun

[Captain Enema]

 

I personally found that the invasion of Britain and the killing off of lkfht as distasteful, and I can't say that I found myself feeling some sympathy for the latter mentioned because of it. On that note however, there have been recent allegations concerning this as OOC reasons, brought over into an IC event. But I'm not here to talk about whether it was or wasn't. I think this event highlighted the issue of OOC crossing over into IC, but it also yields a new question; if a player uses an IC reason to attack someone, however farfetched as it may be, can we claim that an OOC/IC line was crossed?

 

In this case the blatant nature of it stunk high to heaven. You were right there in #cnrp and saw the exact same conversation that I did, which ultimately led me to conclude the GM team in CNRP are and have been for quite a while, a bunch of spineless wimps. 

[Captain Enema]

 

But that brings up another issue.  Which is that there is hypocrisy in the OOC/IC line.  Never once is it complained about when people try and strike IC deals OOC, particularly controversial ones.  But it is complained about when those same people wind up getting hit over a different IC reason.  That's stupid.  If I privately go, "Hey want to kill Cent with me." to 11 people.  Get everyone onboard, then make a fig leaf IC treaty thread.   Its retarded Cent can't respond, its also retarded, an informant can't inform Cent in an IC manner imo.  If you're doing an action of IC consequence, it should be considered IC.  People will say, "Well if I had to be responsible for something IC I'd never do it."  Well then tough.  I can tell you (and again this wasn't the IC reason he was rolled) that lkhft approached Cent and I multiple times over the past month to play each other off against one another, and did so with conversations exclusively focused on creating IC consequence.  In other words he was talking to us like Ukrainian negotiators may be right now talking to Russia and the West.  He was talking about IC actions.

 

 

If it isn't posted on the forum, it isn't IC. End of story. Stop using conversations out of shop to justify hitting people. 

[Kevin Kingswell]

I'm still trying to figure out why anyone has to justify hitting anyone. At any time any player could declare war on another for whatever reason they want be it for land, politics, shits and giggles you name it. It might be distasteful to some what Triyun did but it is all still perfectly within what Triyun can do. Brekaing the IC/OOC line would be if someone on IRC mentioned moving troops to the border for a sneak attack and the player he plans on attacking hearing this on IRC and moving troops to the border in preparation. 

[xoindotnler]

Someone makes a compromise anytime soon, nothing will change and in a few months we have complaints again. Aaah the wonders of CNRP.

[Markus Wilding]

As I said to Triyun the day of that whole fiasco, I'm fine with people declaring war in support of a nationalist movement (or a Free People CB as it would be in Vicky 2) but my problem with his declaration of war on lfkht was that there was zero RP whatsoever that the Australian and NZ population were ever displeased with the Irish government. If he had built that up over time, I would have rented it. Would I have agreed with it, no, but I would have rented it. From my narrow view, I think it is crossing the OOC/IC line to set up a movement and declare war in support of said movement all in one post.

[Triyun]

 
 
If it isn't posted on the forum, it isn't IC. End of story. Stop using conversations out of shop to justify hitting people. 

I'm not I favor no action but the question remains why can one ooc choice with ic rationale be taken as bad but another be fine? There is only clamping on this when someone thinks hegemony is hitting someone. But nobody talks about the countless treaties, diplomatic deals, requests etc that go on OOC to avoid asking them IC all the time. That is my point. What my ideal would be is all diplomacy be ic and anytime you make an ic related request in query you have to post logs and have it be a actual RP, but absent that let's not pick and choose or speculate about why people do things or question ic choices.

Edit: also did people miss where I said the horde thrives on fighting? I will say I have rped my leaderships love of war for the sake of itself as recently as Sarah's leader going to request independence and explicitly saying the empire was spoiling for a fight. Edited April 17, 2014 by Triyun

[xoindotnler]

You're the tumor CNRP can't wait to be relieved of.

[TheShammySocialist]

You would be having GMs rule on whose reasons were valid and whose were not.   They could veto wars  that hurt them IC/OOC and vice versa.  You just said you can't think of anyone who can completely separate IC and OOC Shammy.  Do you really want to then turn the GMship into a Kingmaker position?

 

Edit:  Also just to clarify, if someone chose to play an explicitly expansionist Imperialist regime such as every single great power aside from Wilsonian America, who sought to expand its territory simply for wealth, ideology, or national glory, should the GMs get rid of that for not being IC?  Cause if this is a role playing game, I think people should have a right to choose their roles.

 

Much of this topic was written on my lunch break, so perhaps my point of this conversation did not get across. There were a handful of people that brought up these concerns with me, I saw no forum discussion about it formally, so I moved to open it. I think that my own views about the whole situation, on a personal level, were similar to those of Markus. Take a picture, quick, this is one of those few times that he and I actually agree on something, on a personal level.

 

I brought up this thread to foster discussion, especially considering there was concerns about the GM Team not doing their jobs. I do not believe that given the current status of rules, that any GM intervention on this matter, that being the invasion of Great Britain, would have been able to be a binding resolution. Such invocation of rules would set a precedent that forces the GMs to judge what IC hooplah anyone can cook up, is not actually "OOC based".

 

To answer your question, and to be honest on both a personal (player) level, and professional (GM) level, I don't feel as though the GMs should be King or Queenmakers.

 

I wanted this thread to be formal discussions on these recent matters, that seem a little more pronounced than normal. What results of it, I do not know. Making the GMs King or Queenmakers is not my intent, as I feel at the core, they are arbitrators that have little power beyond that.

 

 

In this case the blatant nature of it stunk high to heaven. You were right there in #cnrp and saw the exact same conversation that I did, which ultimately led me to conclude the GM team in CNRP are and have been for quite a while, a bunch of spineless wimps. 

 

Was this the conversation we were having with Centurius? About how blurring the OOC/IC line happens all the time (something I agree, happens all time)?

 

To be honest, I can hardly remember what I had last night for dinner, I come home and do my thing after work. CNRP is a hobby for me to play around with. But when a handful of people speak to me in confidence, I'll bring up the problems that they have, and I see right here.

 

Which is exactly what this thread is about, because at the end of the day, the GM serves at the community's behest. And facilitating discussion, if its not happening, I see as part of that role.

 

Instead of being the one of the few, if not, the only person taking a dump on the GMs for their alleged "spinelessness", you'd be in a better position to argue your case without continually insulting people if you actually brought your true concerns out here. If you don't like the current GM team, make a CNRP nation, and boot me, Mogar, Lynneth, or the whole lot of us out.

 

Hell, I'll even nominate you if you come back to CNRP, so you can show us how an alleged "non-spineless" GM deals with things.

[Captain Enema]

 

Much of this topic was written on my lunch break, so perhaps my point of this conversation did not get across. There were a handful of people that brought up these concerns with me, I saw no forum discussion about it formally, so I moved to open it. I think that my own views about the whole situation, on a personal level, were similar to those of Markus. Take a picture, quick, this is one of those few times that he and I actually agree on something, on a personal level.

 

I brought up this thread to foster discussion, especially considering there was concerns about the GM Team not doing their jobs. I do not believe that given the current status of rules, that any GM intervention on this matter, that being the invasion of Great Britain, would have been able to be a binding resolution. Such invocation of rules would set a precedent that forces the GMs to judge what IC hooplah anyone can cook up, is not actually "OOC based".

 

To answer your question, and to be honest on both a personal (player) level, and professional (GM) level, I don't feel as though the GMs should be King or Queenmakers.

 

I wanted this thread to be formal discussions on these recent matters, that seem a little more pronounced than normal. What results of it, I do not know. Making the GMs King or Queenmakers is not my intent, as I feel at the core, they are arbitrators that have little power beyond that.

 

 

Was this the conversation we were having with Centurius? About how blurring the OOC/IC line happens all the time (something I agree, happens all time)?

 

To be honest, I can hardly remember what I had last night for dinner, I come home and do my thing after work. CNRP is a hobby for me to play around with. But when a handful of people speak to me in confidence, I'll bring up the problems that they have, and I see right here.

 

Which is exactly what this thread is about, because at the end of the day, the GM serves at the community's behest. And facilitating discussion, if its not happening, I see as part of that role.

 

Instead of being the one of the few, if not, the only person taking a dump on the GMs for their alleged "spinelessness", you'd be in a better position to argue your case without continually insulting people if you actually brought your true concerns out here. If you don't like the current GM team, make a CNRP nation, and boot me, Mogar, Lynneth, or the whole lot of us out.

 

Hell, I'll even nominate you if you come back to CNRP, so you can show us how an alleged "non-spineless" GM deals with things.

 

Yeah no, i prefer to throw stones in my glass house. 

[Triyun]

 

Much of this topic was written on my lunch break, so perhaps my point of this conversation did not get across. There were a handful of people that brought up these concerns with me, I saw no forum discussion about it formally, so I moved to open it. I think that my own views about the whole situation, on a personal level, were similar to those of Markus. Take a picture, quick, this is one of those few times that he and I actually agree on something, on a personal level.

 

I brought up this thread to foster discussion, especially considering there was concerns about the GM Team not doing their jobs. I do not believe that given the current status of rules, that any GM intervention on this matter, that being the invasion of Great Britain, would have been able to be a binding resolution. Such invocation of rules would set a precedent that forces the GMs to judge what IC hooplah anyone can cook up, is not actually "OOC based".

 

To answer your question, and to be honest on both a personal (player) level, and professional (GM) level, I don't feel as though the GMs should be King or Queenmakers.

 

I wanted this thread to be formal discussions on these recent matters, that seem a little more pronounced than normal. What results of it, I do not know. Making the GMs King or Queenmakers is not my intent, as I feel at the core, they are arbitrators that have little power beyond that.

 

 

Was this the conversation we were having with Centurius? About how blurring the OOC/IC line happens all the time (something I agree, happens all time)?

 

To be honest, I can hardly remember what I had last night for dinner, I come home and do my thing after work. CNRP is a hobby for me to play around with. But when a handful of people speak to me in confidence, I'll bring up the problems that they have, and I see right here.

 

Which is exactly what this thread is about, because at the end of the day, the GM serves at the community's behest. And facilitating discussion, if its not happening, I see as part of that role.

 

Instead of being the one of the few, if not, the only person taking a dump on the GMs for their alleged "spinelessness", you'd be in a better position to argue your case without continually insulting people if you actually brought your true concerns out here. If you don't like the current GM team, make a CNRP nation, and boot me, Mogar, Lynneth, or the whole lot of us out.

 

Hell, I'll even nominate you if you come back to CNRP, so you can show us how an alleged "non-spineless" GM deals with things.

 

Cent's reasons and mine were a bit different.  Honestly the Horde's relations weren't that good since the Sierra Leone intervention.  What I think Cent was trying to highlight was the idea that lkfht was merely minding his own business was not true.  That this was he primary reason for the war isn't so much the case.  

 

In regards to the movement, I'll be honest I didn't expect many to have a problem, so long as I had some reason.  What I did want to achieve was the element of surprise.  That was done rather well.  Most people thought I was hitting Zoot.  I do wonder though since I did forecast I was going to hit someone, and the signs all pointed to Zoot.  Why didn't people bring up a topic like this prior to the war?  It seems odd.  In fact the only signals of assurance that I was hitting lkhft was him asking about getting a treaty from me OOC.  Which again, if I understand the principle you're talking about correctly should be its own problem if that was taken as reason for this coming out of the blue and therefore, 'out of character.'

 

My interpretation and understanding of OOC is essentially the same as what KK is talking about.  Its btw something people do do a lot when someone else is making movement, even ones they shouldn't observe.  I don't think I broke any of that.  I also don't think, which at least what lkfht said, which was that it was OOC Cent didn't defend him, is very valid as Cent is my ally.  If your contention is that I should've RPed the Brits building up more before the attack as OOC, honestly that was the furthest thing from my mind, but I will take that under advisement however if such a thing is thought of as a norm to do, so too should be a strong stigma against reacting to it when you have no way of knowing.  That's something that in fact was routinely done by many nations, including the querying and forming of OOC coalitions formalized by fig leaf IC diplomacy which again nobody here is complaining about.  

 

The problem I have is singular outrage with my more effective execution of a available means, while when its routinely executed more poorly by someone else its fine.  You can't treat different nations to different standards OOC based on politics, that should be done in the IC domain.

[Evangeline Anovilis]

In regards to the movement, I'll be honest I didn't expect many to have a problem, so long as I had some reason.  What I did want to achieve was the element of surprise.  That was done rather well.  Most people thought I was hitting Zoot.  I do wonder though since I did forecast I was going to hit someone, and the signs all pointed to Zoot.  Why didn't people bring up a topic like this prior to the war?  It seems odd.

Just because you said that, did not at all mean you'll be hitting lkhft over an IC reason you made up in the same post as the DoW. You said you'd be hitting three people in the coming weeks, which could still be assumed to be a reasonable timeframe for a reasonable build-up.

[Triyun]

I sent a huge fleet to the North Sea.  I deployed naval ships to harass Zoot and play ramming chicken in the post before the invasion with the seeming intent of provoking a war, I also sent bombers right up to his territory.  Both very provocative hostile attacks.  I did all this without posting any reason why I'd send such a huge deployment.  All signs pointed to Zoot.  Nobody said anything along the OOC note.  Then when I hit the person you weren't expecting its evidently an issue.  I'm trying to understand from an IC vs. OOC perspective why this is a unique and special case.  That's what doesn't make sense to me. 

[Markus Wilding]

The issue (the one I have at least) isn't that you hit someone we weren't expecting. The issue is your entire declaration of war hinges on the Australian and NZ populations under your control are displeased with Irish rule over England. Your entire post speaks of Australian and NZ soldiers under The Horde's command and guidance beginning a fight....all to be explained by what is basically a tacked-on paragraph about the Australians and NZ political thoughts in the same post. There had been zero word on that beforehand and zero indication the ANZ population were so inclined to take up arms to see Great Britain restored.

[Evangeline Anovilis]

First, being provocative is not the same as just outright declaring war with a CB that seems made up on the fly. If you were just harrassing Zoot or lkhft, well that's one thing. But launching a full invasion, with the kind of IC reasoning you gave, is quite a few steps further. The reason why noone bothered to make a thread before, is mostly the tolerance treshold of parts of the community, which was only crossed by the later.

 

Second, if you hit Zoot over some similarly made up reason, responses might've been similar. Because people don't root for lkhft, due to his great amount of charisma, and Zoot isn't completely hated by the community.

[Triyun]

The issue (the one I have at least) isn't that you hit someone we weren't expecting. The issue is your entire declaration of war hinges on the Australian and NZ populations under your control are displeased with Irish rule over England. Your entire post speaks of Australian and NZ soldiers under The Horde's command and guidance beginning a fight....all to be explained by what is basically a tacked-on paragraph about the Australians and NZ political thoughts in the same post. There had been zero word on that beforehand and zero indication the ANZ population were so inclined to take up arms to see Great Britain restored.

 

Ah I see.  Misperception there.  I don't think you're understanding why the Aussie and Kiwis were in there first though.  Those were Horde troops with those markings were there for political effect of having the troops occupying looking like Europeans attacking a European city, and who all happnened to speak fluent English.  They weren't exiles.  Exile forces are only now being reconstituted.   The troops sent in are just as much part of the Tianxia army as any other member state.  There were people within that community who now make up the government of Great Britain, but they did not have independent armies.  

 

Edit:  I'd send troops from Vladivostok and Kazakhstan if I was marching on Russia, I'd send Arabs if I was marching on Sudan in the vanguard.  I thought that much was obvious.

Edited April 17, 2014 by Triyun

[KaiserMelech Mikhail]

I always thought the GM's were arbitrators, not police. Thats why the GM's Court evolved. If I ever felt slighted I'd file a lawsuit in the GM Court of Appeals and duke it out.
 
On another note; These sort of things never happened when I was a GM! Back when I was a GM we had to walk in the snow, uphill, both ways to resolve a dispute. Now they just sit in their fancy robes and powdered wings and pass judgement on us!

Yeah, this has been my stance on it too.  People bring things to GM's attention, and they can only obey the rules that are in place.
 

If I privately go, "Hey want to kill Cent with me." to 11 people.  Get everyone onboard, then make a fig leaf IC treaty thread.   Its retarded Cent can't respond

It isn't if everything is done in private. Regardless of the constant announcements to the world, not every agreement needs to be shouted from the rooftops.

its also retarded, an informant can't inform Cent in an IC manner imo.

Snitches get stitches and wind up in ditches.

I illustrate this because to be honest there in my judgement is an emotional view of preference for 'the little guy' in this community.

We have a preference for people who actually do decent RPs. Regardless of what you thought of lkfhtadfahasdf, he was somewhat good at what he did, and now he's gone just because you wanted more land for shits and giggles. Plenty of new people suck at this game, and we don't voice objections about when they get rolled or go inactive.

There is also the assumption of primacy of characters over populations.  In other words there is the assumption of the morality of protecting the characters of a player, often at the expense of views of the population.

Because work goes into characters. It sucks to have people you've put character development into, and it doesn't really suck with nameless nobodies get killed.

Well I think we all know that in the real world, the United States would go after leaders, and in fact decapitation strikes are a legitimate military tactic.

In the context of real life, yeah it's a real tactic. In the context of this game, it's a douche move.

Beyond all of that you basically turn CN RP into a mob rule and destroy individual choice to take action.   Mob rule over individual choice is a horrible idea.  It turns CN RP from an inherently IC based medium to one of popularity and judgement not particularly based on anything other than emotion.  And beyond all of that you're opening things up if you did regulate it even well to constant bickering.   In fact I would argue this would destroy the GM position as we know it and turn it into a partisan political one.

You're the only person that would be affected by "mob rule." Most of us have a live and let live take to this game. I want to have fun, you want to have fun, let's have fun together. You are the odd man out here.

Edit:  Also just to clarify, if someone chose to play an explicitly expansionist Imperialist regime such as every single great power aside from Wilsonian America, who sought to expand its territory simply for wealth, ideology, or national glory, should the GMs get rid of that for not being IC?  Cause if this is a role playing game, I think people should have a right to choose their roles.

You are not the only player in this game. When you make the game miserable enough that the actual majority of the players at one point decided to start ignoring you, the problem lies with you, and not with the rest of us.
 

Brekaing the IC/OOC line would be if someone on IRC mentioned moving troops to the border for a sneak attack and the player he plans on attacking hearing this on IRC and moving troops to the border in preparation.

That's not the only definition of breaking the barrier. If someone does something because they were insulted on IRC, that is breaking the barrier. If you decide to invade someone simply because you are bored, that is breaking the barrier. It is more than just metagaming.

[Kevin Kingswell]

Yeah, this has been my stance on it too.  People bring things to GM's attention, and they can only obey the rules that are in place.
 
It isn't if everything is done in private. Regardless of the constant announcements to the world, not every agreement needs to be shouted from the rooftops.

Snitches get stitches and wind up in ditches.

We have a preference for people who actually do decent RPs. Regardless of what you thought of lkfhtadfahasdf, he was somewhat good at what he did, and now he's gone just because you wanted more land for !@#$% and giggles. Plenty of new people suck at this game, and we don't voice objections about when they get rolled or go inactive.

Because work goes into characters. It sucks to have people you've put character development into, and it doesn't really suck with nameless nobodies get killed.


In the context of real life, yeah it's a real tactic. In the context of this game, it's a !@#$% move.

You're the only person that would be affected by "mob rule." Most of us have a live and let live take to this game. I want to have fun, you want to have fun, let's have fun together. You are the odd man out here.

You are not the only player in this game. When you make the game miserable enough that the actual majority of the players at one point decided to start ignoring you, the problem lies with you, and not with the rest of us.
 
That's not the only definition of breaking the barrier. If someone does something because they were insulted on IRC, that is breaking the barrier. If you decide to invade someone simply because you are bored, that is breaking the barrier. It is more than just metagaming.

 

Invading cause of being insulted on IRC is OOC. Invading IC cause you are bored is IC. Seriously we are all players in this game we write our RPs because we are playing the game. If we are bored then we will change things in the game to not be bored. Now if someone was rping as a peaceful character and suddenly went to war cause they were bored then sure I would say that it would be out of character for an in character person to react that way. But Triyun's Emperor has always been up for conflict so it wouldn't be out of character for Jia to grow bored and act on some of his people's whims. 

[Centurius]

Snitches get stitches and wind up in ditches.

 Be more picky when deciding who to trust, not talking to the allies of someone is a nice place to start.

We have a preference for people who actually do decent RPs. Regardless of what you thought of lkfhtadfahasdf, he was somewhat good at what he did, and now he's gone just because you wanted more land for !@#$% and giggles. Plenty of new people suck at this game, and we don't voice objections about when they get rolled or go inactive.

 So you are saying because of the way they rp one person is more important than the other and believe someone should be treated differently over how 'good' you think they are?

Because work goes into characters. It sucks to have people you've put character development into, and it doesn't really suck with nameless nobodies get killed.

In the context of real life, yeah it's a real tactic. In the context of this game, it's a !@#$% move.

 Well you want a strong IC/OOC divide obviously, shouldn't the IC considerations of a military command(much like rl tactics) take precedence over the OOC considerations of the player? You either want the IC/OOC divide and stop whining when we target leaders or you give up the divide. The choice is yours.

You are not the only player in this game. When you make the game miserable enough that the actual majority of the players at one point decided to start ignoring you, the problem lies with you, and not with the rest of us.

 A significant part of which are now working together with both Triyun and me in the field of diplomacy and in combat operations.

That's not the only definition of breaking the barrier. If someone does something because they were insulted on IRC, that is breaking the barrier. If you decide to invade someone simply because you are bored, that is breaking the barrier. It is more than just metagaming.

Not when an IC justification is given, whether you like it or not wars happen over very flimsy excuses and considering both the Athenian and Tianxian populations have never had to deal with long drawn out wars there are not a lot of reasons not to deploy the military icly.

[Triyun]

To make the judgement about nameless nobodies vs. characters is an inherently Out of Character value judgement.  You're judging the player's time and effort.  Whereas in character its perfectly logical for civilians lives to be valued over your main character.  On top of that so is finding a decapitation strike dickish in the context of a game.  Its a [i]role[/i] playing game.  The role is an actual national leader.  From an in character perspective I should have no judgements on what amount of out of character work someone put into something.  In all honesty I'm making a good faith effort to understand your definition but perhaps you're referring to words other than in character and out of character because your criteria are clearly based on the out of character players not in character considerations.