Why that one rule is one too many.

Published: 2012-08-09

Author: Teddi

It’s not uncommon to see your typical server having rules such as no swearing, no racism, no cheating and so on.

In fact it’s actually expected of many users in Garrysmod today and these rules usually go inline with something like a Message of The Day (MoTD) screen notifying you of them. Yet Roleplay has no actual defined rules beyond “use common sense” and “no malicious activities” which are more than reasonable.

But why no actual rules to dictate gameplay and boundaries?

Garrysmod by all accounts is a “sandbox” gamemode, the only limits being that of your imagination and sources own physical limits. This means you can often create the wackiest contraptions, pose the worst scenes imaginable and for the most part create something you would like to see exist. Why should we force ourselves to be restricted by rules which blur the boundaries so much that everyone has their own interpretation of them?

Lets take a few generic rules of the typical roleplay server.

• No Random Deathmatching (RDM)

Everyone has their own interpretation of what this means. For some it means that you cannot run around being a mass murderer unless your job / status is something along the lines of “hitman” or “crazy person”. For others it means that once you’ve hit x kills, you should be banned because yknow, any less than x kills and you’re simply just “murdering” instead of “mass murdering”. The fact that everyones version of this rule blurs between various shades of grey makes this nigh impossible to enforce with 100% solidarity.

• Respect the New Life Rule (NLR)

This one is fairly interesting because everyone always attempts to twist it for their own needs. For example when you spawn as a character, most servers define it as a ”brand new character that has no recollection of any previous life”.  This is usually accompanied with a slight extension that “you may not return to x area or go within y meters of z location”.

My main issue is that this rule is effectively a paradox. You’re a person that is effectively new to an area with no recollection of anything,  yet you often still have the same items as you did before, the same keys to open those doors you somehow own and yet somehow you’re expected to just somehow ignore that you’ve been given this random gift from ye olde gods from Valhalla. If anything the first thing I would do is find the nearest transport to check out what sort of place I own and if there’s anything there I could sell / use otherwise. It’s a stupid rule that really shouldn’t exist (and to be honest, it may as well not it seems in most cases).

• As x class, you must perform y task at all time and never ever deviate.

This is also an exceptionally common rule which whilst I can see the logic behind it, doesn’t really come into play too well. It’s also commonly used to control the few classes in these gamemodes that have the ability to get items (typically gundealer). Why does a person have to sell to everyone? What if they don’t like x person and don’t desire to trade with them? The beauty of being self-employed is that you’re able to pick and choose your clientele. That person wants to buy from you and is annoyed you won’t sell? Well tough, that’s not your issue as far as you’re concerned.

A person should never be forced to play a role 100% in a specific way. There should be incentives to yes, but they shouldn’t be outright forced to. If a banker starts siphoning money, we don’t ban that person from Earth and jettison him to space. Instead the local authorities alongside laws dictate that persons outcome. To force people to always do the same task is monotone and will eventually get boring.

These things will not affect players in Roleplay. I’ve always pondered why don’t we actually have enforcement in the gamemode instead of having these lame-arse semi-interpreted badly thought out rules? These terrible rules not only cause disruption and discord between players, but the Admins forced to administrate and enforce these rules eventually become tired out and come to hate the very thing they once (somehow) enjoyed.

This is why you will most likely rarely see Admins actually physically around in Roleplay, because they simply will not be needed for the typical autonomous tasks which is required of the role in other gamemodes, allowing them to actually have fun(?!).

(Forum Thread: http://www.bbservers.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?7961-Why-that-one-rule-is-one-too-many )