City Laws, Alliance

I'm all for player actions altering the world and such, but I'm not too fond of ignoring an entire faction, or denying something that was decided by the Alliance as a whole. Making extra laws on the side of the (very few) existing ones in one of azeroth's largest cities is one thing, but ignoring the few that exist as well, and making ones that contradict them completely, is another.

I wouldn't mind if it was just a group of Alliance (player) characters being hostile towards them, but when it is decided for the entire Alliance capital, and the largest rp hub on the realm, I do mind. Whether people there want to be involved in it or not, it's bound to affect their roleplay one way or another. Broken/altered lore is forced upon them by other players.


On another note, I'm all for being hostile towards Scarlets, just not specifically Scarlet Renegades. In my personal opinion, those shouldn't be banned from Stormwind. Sceptism towards them is likely though, and I wouldn't be surprised if guards frequently checked them for corruption or illegal activities.
That's taking action alongside already existing lore, rather than breaking it.

Player actions -should- matter. Yes.

The player council, however, shouldn't be able to veto decisions that fall on the authority of the king. Putting a blanket ban on Scarlets in Stormwind serves to provide NO rp at all, while alienating people who may want to RP a scarlet character (we don't have the playerbase to provide a hub for them outside of Stormwind anymore) AND there's evidence (and official lore) to support the claims that you're actively going against the King's commands.

If you think you have the authority to make this decision, would you then also consider it feasible if, say, all the night elves started being a nuissance in Stormwind, to make night elves in Stormwind arrest-on-sight?

Point, summed up: I think declaring enemies of the state should be a privelege available only to the King, and nobody below him. Not advisors (council), not commanders (Ralegh, Falrock and co.), NOBODY.

Additionally: I find it highly questionable that you'd enforce a complete ban on wearing the Scarlet tabard because of the actions of the Crimson Flame. That's 5 years ago. Do you intend for the King to enforce your ban on them forever because of what one guild (that only represented a fraction of the Scarlet Crusade. Remember we had a friendly guild around, too? One that hung around SW and even had their guildmaster in the council? The "Good" Scarlets even helped fighting the Crimsons)

Ixirar/Kavalis wrote:If you think you have the authority to make this decision, would you then also consider it feasible if, say, all the night elves started being a nuissance in Stormwind, to make night elves in Stormwind arrest-on-sight?

Like what the Silvermoon Council did with Forsaken?   

Gor'Thrak Frosthowl wrote:I'm all for player actions altering the world and such, but I'm not too fond of ignoring an entire faction, or denying something that was decided by the Alliance as a whole. Making extra laws on the side of the (very few) existing ones in one of azeroth's largest cities is one thing, but ignoring the few that exist as well, and making ones that contradict them completely, is another.

I wouldn't mind if it was just a group of Alliance (player) characters being hostile towards them, but when it is decided for the entire Alliance capital, and the largest rp hub on the realm, I do mind. Whether people there want to be involved in it or not, it's bound to affect their roleplay one way or another. Broken/altered lore is forced upon them by other players.

This sums up my opinions, and my problems with player-made authority nicely.

Though the root of the problem isn't that players are making laws and enforcing them. It is that players have different interpretations of the lore, and what is and what isn't acceptable. The people who wrote the current laws have extremely conservative opinions on some matters, especially the use of "black magic". I have yet to see in-game evidence that priests of the holy light don't use any shadow spells, for example. There's no sneaky hidden place where a sneaky priest in dark robes is whispering to you about the dark side, it appears to me that shadows spells are a normal and healthy part of the priests total package. Alliance priests are persistently portrayed to be using both. There's a difference between casting shadow spells, and being a cultist that worships the shadow as a holy ideal. Some others disagree, and vow that all use of even the tiniest trickle of Shadow Magic is evil and illegal.

To a lesser degree, the same could be said for warlocks. They are rightfully played as shunned bu society, and their teachings are do not appear to be legal in a traditional sense; But they do appear to be tolerated to a certain degree. They are portrayed as fighting with the alliance, in the military, and most certainly as a part of adventurer's parties. But again, some disagree, and believe that any warlock would be detained on sight without having committed any tangible crimes, like theft, assault or harassment.

Because the difference of opinion here is so fundamentally out of character, those who have a different interpretation then the one that's been used to institute the laws feels cheated and left out. We feel our world, the world we play in, has been altered without our consent.

I personally feel the player laws should not touch on fickle things like alignments or use of specific magics, but instead focus on actual criminal activity. No-one is going to have a fundamental disagreement about the illegality of heinous crimes like murder, assault, harassment or rape. A murder can be committed with a gun, a bare fist or a strike of fel-magic. Regardless of the tool, it is still undoubtedly, a murder.

With that said, would that not also count towards shadow users, aslong they are not openly out after harming citizens, which laws are already in place for? Seeing those are used by the Alliance in war times. Demons ofcourse is understandable wont be able to wander around the city without pitchforks and guards running to arrest people but shadow has been in use by priests for some time now right?

and also, I follow what erwt said there.

It should be a universal agreement when attributing authority to player characters, that said authority can't be used to directly counteract official lore.

The Silvermoon Council declaring Undercity an enemy of Quel'thalas is as preposterous as the Stormwind Council making this decision on behalf of King Wrynn, when all evidence points to King Wrynn disagreeing with it. Keep in mind, in the lore, Stormwind is a monarchy. The Council is justified in existence by being an advisory unit to the king, not by being a democratically elected body to govern the kingdom. You can make no decisions or laws that would directly counteract Varian's decisions.

Two such are, for example, banning priests from using their shadow spells entirely, as described in Erwt's post. Anduin Wrynn uses shadow spells to escape the SI:7 in the Jade Forest. Who would've taught him those spells? His teachers were the Church of Holy Light and Velen. If shadow magic was indeed illegal to the degree that these laws suggest, HOW would anybody have gotten away with teaching it to the PRINCE OF STORMWIND, an individual I'm sure we can agree on being very much in the spotlight by people who would act against that.

Second, declaring enemies of the kingdom when evidence points to suggest that Varian Wrynn disagrees with those declarations. Such as the Scarlet Renegades being friendly with the Alliance, and them having an emissary in the Church.


As a final mention, I am thoroughly disappointed that, when you -do- take the liberties to consider your institution above the limitations of Blizzard lore, that you only employ this liberty in areas that makes it -harder- to RP in Stormwind. If you decide to consider yourself above Blizzard lore, such as in these cases, I would be much more eager to overlook the transgression if you then took your newfound, self-entitled freedom and used it to make it -easier- to RP in Stormwind, to -facilitate RP- rather than to demolish it.

I was under the impression that this new council was supposed to be a "people's council" and actually make good on the promise that it exists for the better of RP. This isn't how you go by it.

Laws are an iffy subject.

I'd be more willing to accept it if there were something like an organisation or guild that decided they didn't like a specific thing, and went about "removing" it on their own. There was something like that once. Makes it dangerous to be something, but not illegal.

Edit: And no I don't mean like Scarlets yelling and attacking people in the streets when guards are watching. They will obviously be stopped themselves for committing a crime openly.

(I know that my opinion on this doesn't really matter since it is entirely up to the majority of the server, however I feel like speaking my mind.)

Personally I feel that the Stormwind council and any kind of council should be shut down, it limits roleplay within the city drastically and it is extremely lore breaking, especially the Stormwind council.

Now for ideas, beware that you are entering the mind of someone who is bat shit crazy. You are warned.

Alright, my idea is that we close the Stormwind council and reset most of the laws that has been set by them and think trough again before setting up the new laws, lets begin with Warlocks.

Warlocks has been a great threat against stormwind and its citizens a great many times, it was also the cause of the first invasion of the orcs and demons. However in defense of this they have been a great use against the invaders to, the king himself has recognised this and have allowed them to stay in Stormwind as long as they do not practice their magic in public and summon demons within the walls. This is an actual law set by the king himself (Blizzard)

Change:
What we change is that they are still permited inside the walls however they will need to carry a certain document created by the guards or violent hold to be permitted to use it inside the walls, this would be created through GHI by one and only ONE person to make sure that not everyone can use warlock magic.
By breaking whatever is written on the document you loose your paper and are forbidden to use it within the city walls, if you do something bad enough you are put in prison without any second words.

Think this is a good idea? It could create a lot of interesting roleplay and its easy.

IM afraid I agree with most here.. the short time drustai was a counciler . she actualy started to make the council more aprochable whilst yet at the same time started working the council in the direction to create a moreopen enviroment for rp now she has gone it seem's the council has gone back to its old ways sadly.. i am in agreement that to many laws is restrictive

Since everyone else is throwing down their opinion like freesheet newspapers on the London Underground so I reckon I will too.

If an organization, class, object, kind of magic, animal, foodstuff or anything you want derived wholly or mainly from the game or the official lore is not explicitly shown or stated as illegal by a quest, by a blizzard lore dude or by any piece of current lore material then it is not the place of players to go around making it illegal. This does not mean your character has to like it, just that it's not your place to ban it. The only exceptions are for the obvious crimes - theft, assault, murder which are implicitly but not necessarily explicitly shown as illegal.

So for example, if I roleplay a practising Warlock (I don't) there is nothing in the lore that says that it is illegal for me to be a Warlock or to use Warlock magic. In fact the presence of a number of open Alliance oriented Warlocks both in game and in the sub-pulp novels openly using their magic on behalf of the Alliance rather seems to indicate that Warlocks are at the very least tolerated. Now, if I were to go about roleplaying a Burning Legion supporting nutter who wants to summon demons for their evil MURDERCHURCH rituals or what have you - sure, then what I'm doing is illegal. But not because I was doing Warlock magic, instead because I was aiding the enemy -the Burning Legion is an explicitly stated enemy of the Alliance (and everyone else who isn't Burning Legion) and also probably planning to commit or actively committing murder and grievous bodily harm.

Now, Scarlets are weird because there's proof going both ways - the Alliance simultaneously works with them but also sends you on multiple Scarlet murdering quests. That said at this point they seem pretty wiped out so I'm just going to pretend they don't exist.

No player group, no matter how much I like members of it should ever try to legislate for or against things which Blizzard has created themselves. Ignoring everything else I've written here the big reason you shouldn't do this is because you cannot possibly ever hope to enforce your will on every single person and the dissonance between how your pretend elf politics works and how my pretend elf politics does will pretty much inevitably end in lovely drama, wailing and gnashing of teeth.

That said if a player run organization makes another player run organization "the enemy" say, a guild saying that an evil cult guild is their enemy that's fine by me - because you're not imposing your beliefs on how 7.6% of the level 90 population of roleplaying realms should roleplay their character - you're saying that people roleplaying an evil cult guild are the enemy of your good-hearted adventurers.

Thorald wrote:
Change:
What we change is that they are still permited inside the walls however they will need to carry a certain document created by the guards or violent hold to be permitted to use it inside the walls, this would be created through GHI by one and only ONE person to make sure that not everyone can use warlock magic.
By breaking whatever is written on the document you loose your paper and are forbidden to use it within the city walls, if you do something bad enough you are put in prison without any second words.

But, who gets to dictate who can have a licence or not? Which player can be trusted to be 100% unbiased towards any player? What if icly, they simply dislike that character?

While I feel as I have said before that distrusting of Arcanists and Shadow users by the Church brings some fun RP, it should never ever be mixed in with politics. As things stand, not only is the council trying to once again govern RP, but it is also hindering RP.

I know you would all love a good villain guild to come along and cause mischief again, but the fact of the matter is by harbouring these extremely conservative views you're only chasing away potential Shadow RPers.

Additionally, I think it's disgraceful that the council players would be so OOCly behind their IC decisions too, to the point where they won't let anyone try and change their dark magic laws even through RP, which is the impression I was given from the reaction to an earlier draft of erwt's proposal.

What's IC is IC. If you're going to be so bold as to try run the Kingdom ICly, then let yourself take the IC consequences rather than bickering OOCly.

Or at the very least provide a convenient way to opt out of council business, rather than the "like our laws or gtfo Stormwind" approach that Wulfgnar and Co. seem to favor. Erwt's proposal would do this almost perfectly.

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edit:

I'll be honest here, as much as you think your opinion matters, it really doesn't. As much as you think your opinion is valuable for the conversation, it really isn't. Neither is mine, Neither is the maker of these laws. this is a discussion that's been had sooooo fucking often, to noooooo fucking point, that it has completely become pointless.

You have One option and only one option here, and that is simply to choose to participate or not. That's the only option you have. The only option that has any weight, and the only thing that's not either a waste of breath, or time or both.

However; If you believe you really think your opinion matters as the the thing that's going to be the difference in this conversation, first read through this small selection:

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If by any chance your opinion hasn't been discussed or mentioned here, give me 30 minutes and i'll find you all the threads dealing with the various councils.

Domovoi wrote:

Thorald wrote:
Change:
What we change is that they are still permited inside the walls however they will need to carry a certain document created by the guards or violent hold to be permitted to use it inside the walls, this would be created through GHI by one and only ONE person to make sure that not everyone can use warlock magic.
By breaking whatever is written on the document you loose your paper and are forbidden to use it within the city walls, if you do something bad enough you are put in prison without any second words.

But, who gets to dictate who can have a licence or not? Which player can be trusted to be 100% unbiased towards any player? What if icly, they simply dislike that character?

We will need someone often online, someone who we can trust and that actually make sense IC to. It could be Feral/Blackfall, One of the freelancers (Not me because, I'm kind of dead.) Or one the Blazing shield / Regiment. It could also be someone from the violet hold. It could even be the disciples.

Amaryl wrote:You have One option and only one option here, and that is simply to choose to participate or not. That's the only option you have. The only option that has any weight, and the only thing that's not either a waste of breath, or time or both.

That isn't even an option while the councillors (you know who you are) say "If you don't like it then leave Stormwind". There is no way to opt out of this and continue to RP in Stormwind, despite the general consensus being against a player ruling body.

I see alot of OOC agenda's in this thread <_<

Adry wrote:

Additionally, I think it's disgraceful that the council players would be so OOCly behind their IC decisions too, to the point where they won't let anyone try and change their dark magic laws even through RP, which is the impression I was given from the reaction to an earlier draft of erwt's proposal.

What's IC is IC. If you're going to be so bold as to try run the Kingdom ICly, then let yourself take the IC consequences rather than bickering OOCly.

IC, Rihani tried the exact same thing. Although she turned out to be the murdering demon we had been chasing for months. Their are reasons why the Stormwind council won't allow Warlocks and dark magic, due to players (exactly the same with the Scarlet conversation earlier). Whats the problem with hiding as a Warlock or a Shadow user? There is a reason why Warlocks hide in the slaughtered lamb and claim "Maybe one day they will trust us" or whatever. Why does every-thing have to be in the open and accepted? The mystery will be gone and it will hinder cultist rp.

OOC, there is a reason why we chased Twilights hammer out of the city. Why we took down Arthas and Illidan, why Kirin Tor banned and wrote tons of books of the Dark magic being evil, why the plaguelands exist and we fought to reclaim it. Why the Outlands has been devastated by demons. I just don't understand why people are obsessed with having Warlocks and Shadow Priests accepted in society. Isn't it more fun to try and hide it, avoiding those religious nutjobs..

Adry wrote:

Amaryl wrote:You have One option and only one option here, and that is simply to choose to participate or not. That's the only option you have. The only option that has any weight, and the only thing that's not either a waste of breath, or time or both.

That isn't even an option while the councillors (you know who you are) say "If you don't like it then leave Stormwind". There is no way to opt out of this and continue to RP in Stormwind, despite the general consensus being against a player ruling body.

No no no, the option is to not roleplay with the council, but roleplay in stormwind. Nobody can force you to do anything you don't want to. its exactly the same as ignoring power-emoters/lollers/oocers.

But if you don't want to do that, that is fine, just know you're letting the people you disagree with have power over you.

its quite simple if the general consensus is against the player ruling body, and they don't let themselves be ruled, it will dissapear or adapt.

Rae Wulfgnar wrote:

Adry wrote:

Additionally, I think it's disgraceful that the council players would be so OOCly behind their IC decisions too, to the point where they won't let anyone try and change their dark magic laws even through RP, which is the impression I was given from the reaction to an earlier draft of erwt's proposal.

What's IC is IC. If you're going to be so bold as to try run the Kingdom ICly, then let yourself take the IC consequences rather than bickering OOCly.

IC, Rihani tried the exact same thing. Although she turned out to be the murdering demon we had been chasing for months. Their are reasons why the Stormwind council won't allow Warlocks and dark magic, due to players (exactly the same with the Scarlet conversation earlier). Whats the problem with hiding as a Warlock or a Shadow user? There is a reason why Warlocks hide in the slaughtered lamb and claim "Maybe one day they will trust us" or whatever. Why does every-thing have to be in the open and accepted? The mystery will be gone and it will hinder cultist rp.

OOC, there is a reason why we chased Twilights hammer out of the city. Why we took down Arthas and Illidan, why mages write tons of books of the Dark magic being evil, why the plaguelands exist and we fought to reclaim it. Why the Outlands has been devastated by demons. I just don't understand why people are obsessed with having Warlocks and Shadow Priests accepted in society. Isn't it more fun to try and hide it, avoiding those religious nutjobs..

OH MY GOD WULF SO MEAN I want to roleplay as an accepted warlock who flies around on a pink fel dragon and conjures pink dildo's during a war-meeting! with imps in PVC biting ankles.

I can't really talk from their perspective since all those dark magic users I've done were always evil, but I think something should be there for those that don't wish to be evil murderers. Be it through a certificate or something else. I see no reason why not, personally. And as previously stated it restricts rp rather than create it. Which is where we should start drawing a line. The adventurers exempt or whatever it was called that erwt wrote was a good compromise on that. Ofcourse necromancy within the city walls wouldn't be too wise anyway. Everybody understands that.

Rae Wulfgnar wrote:Isn't it more fun to try and hide it, avoiding those religious nutjobs..

.. The thing is that its time for a change, a change that might actually make more roleplay available In game for other characters.

I liked the idea that there was this secret council idea that was trying to change everything that was wrong with the city, somebody do that instead of breaking lore with the current council because that's just getting old.

So, since this server has seen its share of problems from shadow users and warlocks I suggest something, the king has decided to allow Fel magic in the city however the chapel is strictly against it, they refuse to accept this heresy against the light!

PRacticaly a secret war breaks out between the two factions, disciples are willing to thoss anything they have at Fel users and the same with the rest of the people in stormwind, THIS makes sure that even thought it is allowed its shunned on and makes sure that the warlocks still have to hide, yet their not instantly thossed inside a cell.

(( Editing later. ))

Rae Wulfgnar wrote:OOC, there is a reason why we chased Twilights hammer out of the city. Why we took down Arthas and Illidan, why Kirin Tor banned and wrote tons of books of the Dark magic being evil, why the plaguelands exist and we fought to reclaim it. Why the Outlands has been devastated by demons. I just don't understand why people are obsessed with having Warlocks and Shadow Priests accepted in society. Isn't it more fun to try and hide it, avoiding those religious nutjobs..

We, or I personally at least, don't want to see them accepted in society. I cherish the roleplay created from the distrust and the hatred held for the dark magics, but I feel (and I know I share this opinion with quite a few people) that this negative opinion has no place in being forced into some kind of "lawful" legislation governed by players.

The reality is, we see nothing to suggest anything other than Necromancy is banned at all in any human Kingdom, and the one kingdom Necromancy is banned in is Dalaran, a seperate entity to Stormwind. We also see all these Warlocks skulking in Stormwind, we see the Priest trainers in the Cathedral training people to use Shadow abilities. To take it upon yourself to govern the laws of an NPC kingdom and to outlaw something of your own merit is downright arrogant, especially when it seems to contradict what's already there in front of us in Blizzard's own lore.

While the Council as a concept is sound, in practice it is still a force that governs and restricts roleplaying. If I were to roleplay as those Warlocks in the Slaughtered Lamb skulking around with the current state of affairs, that character would be largely unplayable and likely arrested immediately and punished in some creative way simply for existing, while we can see those NPCs have existed happily there for nigh on 9 years.

I believe the Council should not be deciding the absolutes, i.e. what is and what isn't law, and should instead be concerned with what is already there for us instead of trying to be the governing body. If the roles of councillors were to advise the King as they should be (obviously impossible to RP with the King but a representative or such could be sent offscreen to submit the Council's findings to the King), and focused instead on helping both the guilded and guildless citizens of Stormwind, as well as all the player organizations, follow and even uphold the laws that are above their station, then RP would be easier and more enjoyable (at least in my opinion) for all parties involved.

Amaryl wrote:No no no, the option is to not roleplay with the council, but roleplay in stormwind. Nobody can force you to do anything you don't want to. its exactly the same as ignoring power-emoters/lollers/oocers.

It's not the same at all as ignoring power-emotes/lollers/oocers when the council's ruling is hanging over the head of every guild in Stormwind and even beyond.

Thorvald wrote:

Rae Wulfgnar wrote:Isn't it more fun to try and hide it, avoiding those religious nutjobs..

.. The thing is that its time for a change, a change that might actually make more roleplay available In game for other characters.

I liked the idea that there was this secret council idea that was trying to change everything that was wrong with the city, somebody do that instead of breaking lore with the current council because that's just getting old.

So, since this server has seen its share of problems from shadow users and warlocks I suggest something, the king has decided to allow Fel magic in the city however the chapel is strictly against it, they  refuse to accept this heresy against the light!

PRacticaly a secret war breaks out between the two factions, disciples are willing to thoss anything they have at Fel users and the same with the rest of the people in stormwind, THIS makes sure that even thought it is allowed its shunned on and makes sure that the warlocks still have to hide, yet their not instantly thossed inside a cell.

(( Editing later. ))

What lore breaking? like running around with an orb of light owned by Uther lore breaking? And where does it say the king has allowed fel magic in the city? He uses them in the army albeit not willingly but he wants results does he not? The kirin'tor even damn such things as warlockism and necromancy the leading members of magical practice in the Alliance nay the world even.

The purpose of a Warlock is to be evil! To become a Warlock you have to be evil. Making deals with the Burning Legion means you have to be evil. You can't use Demons for good, that's not their purpose. That is what we are arguing. We aren't restricting any RP, people are free to rp hidden Warlocks. Why do they want to be open..

@Thorvald, A change? To make Warlocks be openly accepted so they can take their pet Demons and ghouls for walkies around Stormwind? Do I need to quote myself on the past wars we've had with...the Burning legion and scourge? That is why we Lighties don't allow it. Why would the King support the Burning Legion and the Scourge? Along with its magic.