Philosophy

[Trent Rott]

From the other thread, Amused Human said:

Amused said:

Is it the responsibility of the game creator to also program in morals of fair play? I think not.

Morality is not an issue. If you want to use tactics which are unpopular, including lying to allies, that's all LEGAL.

The author of a game does have a responsibility to create a game such that breaking the rules is both difficult and unrewarding. Just saying "don't do that" isn't enough if there are no repercussions to doing it.

[zeug]

I agree, first we have the actual UD gameplay itself where all possible actions can only be derived from the potential of the game itself and its underlying code. "Anything goes" in the context of an honestly declared total war of extermination between Extinction and the DHPD refers firstly to any action that is actually possible, such as zerging and bot abuse. We couldn't argue about either their "practicality" or "morality" if they couldn't actually be used in-game.

To muddy the moral waters even further here's my response to fmrpfcbob on the question of whether I personally support zerging.

My previous statement:

As far as I'm concerned, being a brain dead zombie working towards brain rot, all tactics are fair play, even zerging or CR or whatever, so long as the code supports them. It's up to the game developers to find a balance although I'll abide by whatever rules of play the Extinction founders consider fair.

So ... do I support zerging? Well I was thinking out loud, and you should take it in the context of what I was saying about the concept of extinction which is basically to bring UD to a conclusion in a complete zombie takeover and a final solution to the survivor problem.

Blatant zerging including multi abuse is more or less supported by the code if not the rules of play so technically speaking, in the context of a total war ideology, it is a potential end game tactic. Although if it got completely out of control I imagine the devs can start mass deleting characters or perhaps resort to IP banning to stamp it out in which case it would become an 'unprofitable' tactic.

How much do you think the 24hr limit on AP's has an effect in controlling it? And do players that donate to the game as I just did get some moral leeway in interpreting the rules of play?

Secondly, the rule itself is somewhat vague:

zerging: creating multiple throwaway characters for a single purpose.
multi abuse: using two or more of your own characters in collaboration.

Define "throwaway", "single purpose" and "collaboration".

Does using zed alt's in general to for instance secure a ransacked NT constitute multi abuse in your view if they're both members of Extinction? The zombie sentinel isn't a throwaway character as it stays behind while the combat player moves on to the next seige. And the two characters "collaborate" in the wider tactical strategy yet not directly within the same gameplaying area thus avoiding the proximity countermeasures. Also the player knowingly takes a hit as far as the IP limit is concerned. How is this not a valid tactic?

And what constitutes "bot abuse"? Does the DHPD use barricade bots for instance, and if you did would you admit it? Does running a zombie sentinel bot constitute bot abuse in the context of a declared total war against the DHPD?

Speaking as a player rather than an amoral zed, and being sysadmin for two web servers and various shared accounts, I would define bot abuse as any regular scripted server hits that unduly drain the UD server resources. That is real world abuse and something that is rampant on the internet, and it has real world consequences by increasing the server maintenance workload for already massively overworked sysadmins.

Perhaps low frequency bots then could be put to use by both sides in a total war, but if those bots get overused the cumulative hits on the server will still drag it down. In the practical interests of maintaining a responsive server load and paying respects to Kevan (if not "fair" gameplay as all's fair in love and war as they say), should we agree to ban all bot use apart from UDTool extensions?

All these considerations so far are from the point of view of practical approaches to gameplay rather than the morality of game rules. As a role playing Extinction zombie I have a moral system of sorts, it's called pragmatic amorality and something zed's in general share with most military strategists around the world, just ask the war criminal and "great statesman" Henry Kissinger.

[FmrPFCBob [DHPD]]

Wow! Many points to address, I don't have responses for them all right now but here's a start.

I have no problem with Extinctions plan to bring about an end-game by eliminating the supply of syringes.

Yes, technically zerging and alt-abuse are possible. However the game creator, Kevan, has established that in the spirit of the game they are not permitted and has tools to punish abusers. As the game community has taken on a seperate life from the creator it has helped enforce and define the spirit as well.

Donating does not grant leeway for interpretation.

I personally feel any 'bot' or automated program is against the rules, and no the DHPD does not use them. We have a forum chat that is always open for coordination.

DHPD does not allow alts in the group and our alt groups stay away from DHPD's area.

[zeug]

Well ... what would you say about the idea of "total war" as a formal Urban Dead rule?

Let's say that down the track a bit the current Extinction campaign against the DHPD becomes a threat to your continued existence as a coherent player group. Dunell Hills and surrounds are lost, the Bascombe becomes the center of a heroic last stand, but morale is failing and your players are starting to give up or even worse ... go on strike!

The full capitulation and thus annihilation of the DHPD as a "real world" player group looms as a real possibility!

Just speaking hypothetically, in this sort of last ditch defensive context, would you consider agreeing to the formal declaration of a state of "total war" in Dunell Hills and its immediate surrounding suburbs?

It would have to be a formal agreement worked out beforehand between the Extinction and DHPD leadership elites of course, "pre-emptive unilateralism" wouldn't work here. And it would have to be gazetted as well, on the wiki I guess. But the agreement would delimit the geographical zone as well as a clear time span within which all the normal UD rules of play are suspended in favour of an "anything goes" total mobilization of all the forces and potential available to the combatants engaged in a formal war of extermination or Vernichtungskrieg.

We could set a formal precedent and guidelines for a new UD ruling and take the gameplay to the next logical level.

[FmrPFCBob [DHPD]]

zeug said:

Well ... what would you say about the idea of "total war" as a formal Urban Dead rule?

I'd say if that came to pass I'd stop playing.

I enjoy the spirit of the game and am willing to accept victory or defeat under those terms. Winning by better programming would be a hollow victory at best.

[zeug]

Well I'm sure the Supreme Commander could arrange for some discount pricing at the Extinction bot factory for you guys n gals ... we could run you up a few DHPD special models. How's about a cream donut dispensing bot for you cops? I couldn't guarantee it wouldn't be infected tho, you know what zombies are like.

But if you'd like to delete bots from a "total war" agreement that's fine by me, as I said above they can really bork a server if the load gets too high. So then it's just down to free for all zerging and whatever else we might come up with?

[FmrPFCBob [DHPD]]

Sorry, I should have been more clear. I prefer not to play with zergers, on my side or against.

[Razi]

we don't need to use bots- we've got more than enough players.

If we did use bots, however, they would all be fired for doing such a piss-poor job.

There will be no declaration of total war, as infinite accounts behind IP masks would heavily favor the zombies. Why would we want to do that? Besides, as Bob said, it would take the fun out of the game.

As an extreme example to prove the point, Total War would also mean it would be fair to hunt you down in real life, shoot you in the head (as if you were a zombie), and take a high powered electromagnet to your computer. Sure it's amoral, but in the spirit of Total War, is this not acceptable?

Obviously you can see the flaw in that statement. the goal of the game- any game- is to win within the context of the rules, whether written or unwritten.

Regardless of your professed ideals, this is a game, not a war.

You want an example of a group that won the game? Shacknews. They stomped the hell out of everything that stood in their path and they did it properly.

I applaud your idea and effort, but using a ton of multiple accounts so a handful of people can camp all the NT buildings isn't the way to do it. You have the right idea- implement it correctly.

[Trent Rott]

Razi said:

...using a ton of multiple accounts so a handful of people can camp all the NT buildings isn't the way to do it.

Neither is using a ton of multiple accounts to do your barricading for you.

[zeug]

Razi said:

There will be no declaration of total war, as infinite accounts behind IP masks would heavily favor the zombies. Why would we want to do that? Besides, as Bob said, it would take the fun out of the game.

Well fun is a relative concept and while I can't be bothered running more than one character and am already massively overworked scripting websites to try and get into UDtool I would still have fun in the context of a limited area of complete anarchy within the UD space.

I enjoyed the journey to the Bascombe from the other side of Malton, very uneventful, met one survivor on the way, lots of open doors, just exploring a rather genteel wasteland with nothing much going down apart from all the zombies.

Get to the Bascombe and suddenly the game lights up and Extinction rolls the NT! Taking that to the next level in total anarchy within a geographically and time delimited online space is for me an interesting idea, but it would require the DHPD's agreement.

As for why you lot might want to do it ... well what about as a social web experiment? Or ... a final defensive measure as your players give up on the DHPD and it dissolves like so many other player groups. Or ... just for the fun of pushing UD to its techno-logical limits?

As an extreme example to prove the point, Total War would also mean it would be fair to hunt you down in real life, shoot you in the head (as if you were a zombie), and take a high powered electromagnet to your computer. Sure it's amoral, but in the spirit of Total War, is this not acceptable?

Generally speaking you really shouldn't be making silly threats on public forums about hunting people down and murdering them, and besides, us Aussies don't like being hunted down and shot and you might find yourself a wee bit in over your head

As far as UD gameplay goes though it's also a stupid example as there's no code provisions for actually arming yourself with a real weapon or buying air tickets to travel around to the other side of the planet.

In the "real world" of course "total war" refers to the use of whatever's in your arsenal, including phosphorus and poison gas bombs, nuclear weapons whether depleted uranium or atomic bombs, and the use of terrorism against defenceless civilians all of which we have apparently already deployed in the Iraq war although I wouldn't call that a total war, not yet, unless we nuke Iran and the entire Mid East ignites. You old enough for conscription? I give it 5-10 years.

In terms of gameplay I still don't see how this "total war" concept is any different from the other rules of play, and if two or more UD groups declared their specific area of Malton as a total war zone for a month would you complain?

Obviously you can see the flaw in that statement. the goal of the game- any game- is to win within the context of the rules, whether written or unwritten.

Yes, "unwritten" rules is what I'm referring to in regards to a declaration of "total war", just like all the other unwritten rules in UD written up on the wiki. The game is a dynamically driven social network, its rules are flexible so long as the players can more or less agree on how to proceed. That's the point, if we agree on "total war" as a UD gameplay concept then it comes within the context of the rules in that it suspends all others ... much like the emergency defence powers of any democratic executive take precedence over all other state and civil rights in a time of total war.

Regardless of your professed ideals, this is a game, not a war.

Well duh! Have you heard of "war games"? Not just the military kind but games that use warfare concepts as part of the gameplay? I can think of one, it's called Urban Dead, a post-apocalyptic zombie infection scenario where survivors battle to reclaim their beloved city. It features military, scientific and police forces, running battles and sieges. It also uses metagaming methods like forums for strategic and tactical planning and intelligence gathering, and real time chat for command and control. It's a "war game" whether you like it or not.

I applaud your idea and effort, but using a ton of multiple accounts so a handful of people can camp all the NT buildings isn't the way to do it. You have the right idea- implement it correctly.

Or a ton of bots for barricade defence? And scripted alts to boost survivor recruitment? Etc. If at any time in the DHPD's future failing efforts to remain an active and viable force in Malton these defensive and offensive possibilities start to look like a viable option, even just to try the concept out, then perhaps we can revive this thread.

All it takes is a rethink of your habituated acceptance of the current norms of "fair play", much like we all now generally seem to accept the concept of torture as a form of democratic justice. And despite all the rather naive protests about virtual "game worlds" not being the "real world", gameplay is still necessarily a fictional reflection of our real world concerns. That's generally why people find it so fascinating.

[razi]

We don't have any barricade bots, nor do we want them. We're not Caiger Mallrats. You guys are really barking up the wrong tree with that one.

on one hand you say you support zerging but on the other hand you say you don't have time for it. Pick a stance, man. In your Mar 31, 2007, 4:33am post, you never actually said you were for or against the practice. Are you a lawyer?

don't take the 'come-to-your-house' example as a threat- it wasn't. Not only is that practically impossible (regardless of where you live), it's rather illegal, or at least shows malice and forethought. It was an example of "outside-the-box" thinking parallel to multi-account abuse. This isn't a d*ck-waving contest, nor should it become one. From what I've heard about Aussies, you'd definitely lose that one anyway.

I understand that it is at it's core a war game. Real-life comparisons can be made to all aspects of international diplomacy, if one wanted to.

No one is nuking Iran first, but yeah, I agree that it'll probably go up in flames within ten years. That's a different discussion for a different forum, though.

[Ragged Robin]

Razi said:

You want an example of a group that won the game? Shacknews.

That's obviously false, since we're all still playing it and I don't recall any reboots. Shacknews did a great job, but their significance was to heal a scar inflicted by certain doorknobs who over-roleplayed the whole Caiger thing.

They stomped the hell out of everything that stood in their path and they did it properly.

I applaud your idea and effort, but using a ton of multiple accounts so a handful of people can camp all the NT buildings isn't the way to do it. You have the right idea - implement it correctly.

There are no particular standards for correctness or properness as you're calling for them here. What you're basically saying is, "if you're going to lead a successful zombie crusade, please do it in these ways that I happen to like." Well, thanks for your opinion, but everybody's got one.

Next why don't you head into a coffee shop and advise people to eat their donuts properly by dunking them first.

Nothing is illegal about having multiple zombie characters who squat NT buildings in separate suburbs. I agree that a "ton" of accounts used by a "handful" of people is overdoing it, but that's just my taste, and those are just points on a continuum.

[zeug]

razi said:

We don't have any barricade bots, nor do we want them. We're not Caiger Mallrats. You guys are really barking up the wrong tree with that one.

Have you heard of the legal term "He said, She said"? I have no idea whether you're Caiger Mallrats or not, how could I? It's none of my business really and I genuinely don't care either way.

on one hand you say you support zerging but on the other hand you say you don't have time for it. Pick a stance, man. In your Mar 31, 2007, 4:33am post, you never actually said you were for or against the practice.

It's pretty simple:

1. In the context of this thread and a discussion of the UD gameplay concept of "total war" I think all options must remain "on the table". My proviso here is that both sides should agree on the specifics as to what tactics are fair play, as well as choose a locale and time span.

2. Outside of a "total war zone" I support the Extinction Regulations as they stand.

3. Personally I have no moral feelings one way or the other concerning how other players play, although I do find the idea of some geek moving a heap of alts like toy soldiers kind of funny. It must take a lot of ... dedication ... to bother.

4. I myself don't bother as I don't find the idea of zerging to be of much use as far as UD Extinction goes. If Extinction is going to be successful it will only be through recruiting players en masse, not alts. Extinction will have to be fun to play in order to enlist a critical mass of online players at which point it will simply overwhelm the opposition. A couple of geeks with a mass of alts can't do that.

Are you a lawyer?

No, worse, I'm a philosopher.

don't take the 'come-to-your-house' example as a threat- it wasn't.

Technically speaking it was/is a threat simply by being posted in a global public forum and irrespective of your professed intent. It's just a legal technicality you should probably be aware of when posting online. These web archives are legal documents timestamped with your IP address and admissable as evidence in many jurisdictions, including the US.

I don't however take it even vaguely seriously.

It was an example of "outside-the-box" thinking parallel to multi-account abuse.

No it's an example of possible actions outside the virtual sphere of UD gameplay, completely unlike multi abuse which is actually part of the game. I'm just saying that in terms of a UD ruling on "total war" all possible gameplay options should be considered and either rejected or accepted - on a case by case basis of course.

This isn't a thingy-waving contest, nor should it become one. From what I've heard about Aussies, you'd definitely lose that one anyway.

I wouldn't know about such things, I'm just white celtic trash, but if you say your national phallus is large then good for you, be proud and wave it loud!

No one is nuking Iran first, but yeah, I agree that it'll probably go up in flames within ten years. That's a different discussion for a different forum, though.

I disagree entirely. Firstly I think the neo-conservative ideologues currently in control of the US executive are philosophically deluded enough to actually push the big red button, given the domestic and international opportunity.

Second, I think this is a possibility precisely because their ideology is totalitarian and total war is its ultimate means to secure a Pax Americana for this New American Century - via a global war that "will not end in our lifetimes".

On this forum, total miltarization is my gameplay theme, the Pentagon's recruitment and training tool America's Army is my template, and I reckon Extinction is off to an interesting start. Come join us.

[generatorkiller]

This article is a good read, pretty much explains my approach to morals within the gaming world:

www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_PlayToWinPart1.htm

Bascially, the short version of it is: Anyone who creates their own set of rules to play by in this game is a scrub and is doomed to failure.

I'm not even opposed to zerging, I just don't do it because I'd rather not risk having my accounts deleted.

I already nearly ignored Extinction after reading about a blanket "no barricading policy".
There are places where barricading can be very useful for supporting a zombie assault, notably in denying movement and parachuting. Reading a bit further made me realise that you're a smart bunch that would ignore that policy in a flash if it turned out to be of use.

Regardless, it didn't give me a good inital impression.

Same goes for this groups current anti-zerging policy:

Do not support it.

Do not condemn it.

.. and fact, there's no need to even mention it.

Treat everyone as a freaking individual and their actions in no way representative of, or the responsibilty of, Extinction.

Extinction's main page is in need of a rewrite, if you want more of the free-spirited RedRum anti-roleplayer types on board.

[unknown]

hey if there are 16,00 people in this group, why dont we all just line up on one end of the city and do a sweep of the whole city to wipe out any resistance?

[enrique]

we tried that once, dont you remember that airstrike?