Law and Exile

=The Law=

(Note the following is taken from the original World of Torr website, the following may change to reflect future diffences between the original and Vane's version of the module.)

Life in the cities can be ruff. Almost anything is considered a crime in the cities and the guards don't give anyone any slack. There are dozens of infractions you may accidentally commit and suspects are usually considered guilty until proven a heretic! It would be wise to familiarize yourself with the laws so as not to break them (unless you really want to).

Players who are pick pocketed, attacked or otherwise victimized by another player must yell out "GUARDS" for the guards to respond, NPCs automatically call for the guards whenever they are victimized. It is recommended that you pick a quick slot and make it a Text Macro that yells GUARDS so you can call them quickly. You can do this by Right-clicking an empty quick slot and selecting Text Macro, then give it a display label and enter GUARDS for the text, you can then simply click that quick slot to call the guards from then on. Guards must be in perception range to respond to anyone calling for help. Calling the guards for no reason is called "Crying Wolf" and if you cry wolf more than twice within 60 seconds you will be arrested!

Guards will not arrest someone unless they openly committed a crime, picking pockets successfully will not warrant an arrest, a thief would have to fail his attempt and be noticed. However players carrying stolen goods who call for guards for any reason will be arrested. Don't call for the guards unless you haven't done anything illegal yourself.

Every Kingdom has generally the same legal system. The laws are enforced by guards in all populated areas and will respond to any illegal act. It is also important to note that every kingdom keeps a separate criminal record on you. Being wanted in one kingdom does not make you wanted in another. When you commit a crime you will get a message to the fact as well as a journal entry to describe your legal situation. There are dozens of crimes that you can commit and each crime has an associated demerit value associated with it as follows:

Witnessing a Crime
Whenever you commit a criminal act which involves stealth (Breaking into homes, Pickpocketing, Assassination) everyone in a 30 meter radius will get a chance to spot and/or hear you which will be the same as if a guard saw you. This includes Guards, Commoners, and players who are not grouped with you. Victims of a crime (i.e. Pickpocketing) do not get this additional check at all but do get the standard BioWare one. The Difficulty (DC) checks will be (Hide vs. Spot) and (Listen vs. Move Silent). If the spotter does not have a clear line of sight to you (around a corner, blocked by a big object) then only a listen check is made. There are modifiers for distance which should be taken into account:

Spot: The DC modifier is 0 at 15 meters. For every meter the spotter is closer to you its -1 to the difficulty and +1 DC for every meter past 15 meters (30 meters is maximum spotting distance ). For example, you try to break into a home, if you have a Hide of 15 and a guard has a spot of 5 at 15 meters away, his DC is a straight 15 (bout 50/50 chance with a skill of 5), but if he's only 5 meters away his DC will be 5 (pretty much automatic)

Listen: Hearing checks are done the same way except that there is no DC modifier at ZERO meters and then a +1 DC for every meter away the spotter is. Listening ignores walls you can get "detected" by a guard who is on the other side of an alleyway if he hears you!

Lighting / Visibility: Any check done during Dusk/Twilight has a DC bonus against someone to SPOT you of +3 but a penalty to HEAR you of -3. At night its +5/-5 and indoors or underground it is +8/-8.

Pickpocketing: Due to its subtlety, Pickpocketing has a straight +10 DC penalty against anyone trying to spot you. Nearby people also do not get a chance to Hear a Pickpocketing attempt. A Pickpocket attempt done at night for example will start off at DC 15 against witnesses event at point blank range.

If you are spotted or heard you will see a message declaring who spotted or heard you and at what difficulty they were successful at. You will also be forced to play the "pickpocket" animation for about 3 seconds before being able to move. The door you opened will also be immediately locked.

Being stealthed has no bearing on this check neither does being silent or invisible, this is probably temporary until it is coded better to handle those situations. Just because you are invisible doesn't mean guards don't notice and hear doors opening up or suspicious players hanging around homes that don't belong to them, they catch thieves for a living!

Getting Arrested and Standing Trial
If you commit an illegal act the guards will immediately come after you and attack. When they have beaten you down to the ground you will be arrested and taken to the local kingdoms prison and await your trial. After a few minutes in prison, your trial will start and you will be transported to the cities public court.

At your trial the judges will ask you if you to enter a plea. Claiming you are guilty will guarantee a punishment but will reduce the maximum sentence the judges will place on you while claiming you are innocent will cause your verdict to wither be greatly increased or decreased depending on whether the judges believe you or not.

After entering a plea, the judges will ask the common people to voice their opinion on your guilt or innocence. At this point any other players will be able to use a nearby lectrum and select whether they wish to support or boo you. The opinion of the other players greatly influences the decision of the judges. However the amount of crime demerits leveled against you is still the starting point to their decision. It would take several people claiming your are innocent to get away with several murders but even a few people can swing your sentence into a more favorable one (or vice versa).

The four types of punishment that judges can impose as well as what amount of demerits you can expect them at are as follows

innocent
Without influence by the public, you can only be considered innocent if you commit very minor crimes that result in no more than 3 demerits and get a favorable judgment. The judges do have a slight randomness to their decision making but it does not vary greatly. If you are standing trial you are almost guaranteed at least a Fine before being released. If you are found innocent then you are free to go without any more hassle.

Pay a Fine
Committing crimes between 1-10 demerits usually warrants a fine based on the amount of demerits held against you. If you can pay the fine then you are set free immediately. If you cannot pay the fine then whatever gold you do have will be taken and you will spend time in prison to "pay off" the remaining fine. The time is prison will be based on the percentage of the fine you were able to pay (i.e. paying half the fine will half the jail time you would of gotten if you paid nothing)

Jailed: Anything over 10 demerits will usually get you a long stay in jail and the time you are required to serve is based of your crime demerits. When serving jail time, another player can pay a bail amount to the jail warden and have you released immediately. The amount of bail is based on how much time is remaining in your sentence. Once this time is served, you will be released without any more concern.

Execution
If your crime spree surpasses 30 demerits and you are caught, you can expect to be executed for your crimes. This is usually a bloody spectacle by the executioner. The penalty for dying in this manner is quite severe and is based on the amount of crime demerits you have accumulated.

Exile
This involves the permanent banning of your character from the good cities while at the same time becoming neutral or friendly to many once hostile creatures in the world which you may take control of and attack kingdoms with. See Becoming an Exile

Being Shackled
If you have 20 or more crime demerits when you are arrested then you will be placed into a different type of cell and be "Shackled" during any jail time and during your trial. When shackled you cannot do anything at all are are essentially paralyzed. The only way to escape while shackled is if someone picks the lock on the shackles themselves

Getting "Fleeced"
Whenever you are arrested you will have all items you are carrying tranferred to the Jails Vault for safe keeping until you are released. Upon your release you can simply open any of Jail Vault chests and retrieve your belongings. While in prison you will be given Jail Rags to wear (walking around naked is illegal).

Escaping from Prison
The system does allow for escape attempts and forced rescues. The jail doors are locked but can be picked and the jail guards are carrying keys to the jail cells. If you are not shackled you can try to run away or attack the judges while you are on trial but you might not get very far without some help. Escape is possible especially with help from the outside however the penalties for escaping are quite high and anyone who helps you escape will surely take a hefty warrant themselves.

Wanted Criminals and Bounty Hunting
Just because you stay away from a kingdom where you murdered 16 children, mugged 3 judges and have 23 counts of public nudity does not mean you are safe from the law. Any other player can take out a bounty contract to have you brought in. This means at anytime, at any place, you can get ambushed by another player, beaten down and hauled off to prison under the same system as if a guard arrested you.

Exploiting the System
The system was built with player exploitation in mind. Leaving the game or getting yourself killed on trial in an attempt to avoid the penalties will not only fail, it will increase your penalty as soon as you enter the game again. Upon re-entering the game, even on a different day, you'll find yourself in jail and await trial again, except this time your crime score has been increased even more. The entire trial process is being kept track of in the database and players DO NOT get the benefit of the doubt when it comes to disconnects during trials. It should be noted that even execution carries an XP penalty that is based on your current crime score. Being executed with 30 demerits and being executed with 90 demerits is more than a 3x difference in XP penalty!. Running away from trial is just another crime as far as the system is concerned and there is no way to avoid the penalty of the courts, only make it worse. It is in your best interest to go along with whatever penalty you receive from trial, even execution.

Becoming an Exile
When players act murderous, do evil things and even "grief" other players, they eventually build up a "crime score" score that if taken high enough (which isn't hard to do) will earn them a status of "Exiled". Acting in this way is NOT frowned upon, in fact it is encouraged! The world needs truly "Evil" players to play the "bad guys" in PvP quests and this is the only way to earn it. Players who want to attack farmers, kill chickens, throw fireballs inside of town, kidnap small children for demon sacrifices, mug low level players for their tradeskill money and constantly harass the goody-goody fluffy Care-Bear like Lawful Good players they hate so much have a place in this game world!

If you become and exiled player, you will be attacked on sight when approaching any good kingdom. Doomsha will be your new home. Kalmoor is the only Non-Good Kingdom which any player can freely enter. Every non-exiled player in the game will be set to Dislike you and vice-versa. If caught by guards they will NOT take you to trial, you will be killed outright as an invader. All exiled players will always have items moved onto a corpse if they respawn after death. However, you will also find that many normally hostile groups of monsters will now be neutral towards you. Many of these groups of monsters can now be conversed with as you've become one of the hostile entities of the game world now. In fact, you can even take control of many of these monster groups and lead them into assaults into "Friendly" territory.

Exiled players find safe haven in places like the The Yuan-Ti Temple or the Orc Forests of Rug'Lak as well as scattered camps of Doomsha affiliated monsters. These are the same places that non-exiled players normally attack for quests. The kingdom of Kalmoor will also remain neutral towards you as it is a "Lawless" kingdom. Exiled players will find many more "opportunities" available in Kalmoor and Doomsha after becoming an Exile.

PvP quests usually involve doing something diabolical to a local town or kingdom. When these quests are initiated, non-exiled players with the right status or prerequisites will be notified by other NPCs of the event and asked to deal with the situation, much the same way normal quests are taken except in this case it will be another player you will be up against!