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New Griefer Punishment - Crucification
garylian writes "I found this interesting little news snippet from the game Roma Victor. Apparently, the game designers have decided that since their game is going to be based on realistic events that happened in the Roman Empire in Europe, there is nothing wrong with handing out punishments that were handed out in that time. The game's site has a letter from the Publisher's CEO explaining about how crucification is an appropriate form of punishment for in-game behavior. There are also pictures of the avatar hanging from his week-long perch."
Good...
He led a raid on a Dev Run city, took it over, and the Devs punished him by a 7day ban, ie, crucification ingame. They made the mistake of not putting an NPK timer after death, and thought that people wouldn't be spawncamped? I'm sorry, but that's just plain stupid.
It would be neat to have trolls crucified somewhere with their accounts suspended.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
I will rise again! (and get the phat loots next time)
As far as I know, it should be Crucifixion. And it's in the title even! We really need a -1 Spelling/Grammar mod.
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In my day, we put their heads on a pike and fed their bodies to the dogs, and we liked it.
Why not just strip them of their gear, and exile them from the city, never to return on penalty of death.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Pillories for griefers, cheaters and EBay money sellers!
As much as I'm against it in RL, for the simple reason that a one-time criminal is going to be branded as a criminal forever, it's a bit different for games. You can, after all, toss your character and start another one.
Is there a more literal way of "changing completely and becoming a very different person"?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Even though this game probably will not be the next Great Game, it will hopefully help stop the idea that crucification was special for Christ.
Maybe, but it's also spawned a monstrosity of a spelling mistake that seems to be infectious. I think it would be safest if we quarantine Slashdot and not let anyone leave until there's a curification for it.
Most Christians don't subscribe to the idea that only Christ was ever crucified. The Bible itself states that two criminals were crucified alongside Jesus and that crucifixion was a relatively common punishment. The uniqueness was in Christ himself, not in the exact means of death. Go troll somewhere else.
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Christians don't think that. It says right in the bible that 2 others where crucified with him, they did it so that the people would see he was no better than common criminals.
AC to avoid slashdoters that can't wrap their open minds around a christian that follows both christ and evolution.
That's "crucifixion", not "crucification", just for the record. As in "to be fixed to a cross (crucis)".
Crucifixion was in fact a fairly common form of punishment throughout much of the Roman Empire. It was both a particularly painful and notably humiliating way to die; victims often lingered in agony for days while being jeered at by passers-by. Few understand that Longinus did Jesus a huge favor when he stabbed him in the side with his spear.
It will be interesting to see how this punishment works out in Roma Victor. As the player will feel no pain, and loses only a week of game time while on the cross, the real punishment will come if others in the game take having been crucified as a mark of shame rather than a boastworthy accomplishment. Given typical online-game culture, I fear the latter is more likely.
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
Interesting how this hubbub and article come out shortly before the game is scheduled to go live. Pre-order today!
Regardless, only a 7-day suspension? If they really wanted to punish the guy they'd change it so that on his next logon the offender was stuck playing an SOE game.
The only thing I hate more than hypocrites are people who hate hypocrites.
Well, you could be stabbed.
I'm Spartacus!
I don't care what youre doing so much as the idiotic way you're doing it.
A line of prisoners files past a jailer.
Coordinator: Crucifixion?
Stan: Yes.
Next prisoner.
Stan: Er, no, freedom actually.
Coordinator: What?
Stan: Yeah, they said I hadn't done anything and I could go and live on an island somewhere.
Coordinator: Oh I say, that's very nice. Well, off you go then.
Stan: No, I'm just pulling your leg, it's crucifixion really.
laughing
Stan: Yes I know, out of the door, one cross each, line on the left.
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
i didn't see any blood in the screenshots
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Who said crucifixion is special for Christ? It was a very common way of executing criminals in ancient times, actually it's older than the roman empire.
First it was a way of treating slaves that tried to escape, later, during the time of the emperors, it became the way of executing non-romans. That's the reason why Saulus/Paulus was executed with a sword instead of crucifixion (he was a Roman citizen).
Is there really anyone who thinks the Romans came up with crucifixion for Jesus? I mean, for them he was a quite ordinary criminal (and one they couldn't have cared less about to top it off), why'd they go to lengths and come up with an ingenious way to execute him?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
If you saw the screenshots and read the dialogs in them, "no throwing dung, it's too expensive. Throw apples, they are cheap" "Awww, missed!"
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
That's often read as a gloss on the original text, written by someone who didn't understand the mechanics of crucifixion. Why stab someone who's already dead, especially if he's going to spray blood and water all over your nice clean tunic?
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
Not being able to play is actually a fairly effective punishment. We used to use that back on the MUD I worked on. We would "hell" players. You just issued a command in the form of hell . They would then be sent to hell, which was a location where they couldn't do anything. They could still talk to people, they just couldn't play the game. In more severe cases, we'd ban them from connecting, but hell provided a good intermediary. It also had the deterrant effect in that they'd sit and whine to all their friends about it (it was amazing how much time people would spend logged in when they couldn't play). It was actually generally more effective in cases to hell someone and silence them so they'd just sit and stew about it (why they didn't just log off I'll never know) than to outright ban them.
So I imagine it will not be so much about the shame, but just about not being able to play. It's just a more amusing way to do bans for all involved. I know if someone had broken the rules and it affected me, I'd take pleasure from seeing them up on a cross, knowing they were in time out effectively.
A favor? If you read the Gospels you'll find that Jesus was already dead when he was stabbed with the spear. The Romans were breaking the legs of the three being crucified, which due to the shock would generally hasten death (crucifixion usually allowing the victim to live in agony for days otherwise). A soldier remarked that Jesus was already dead (when in reality he should have lasted much longer), and his superior, unbelieving, thrust the spear in Jesus's side to both prove the point that he couldn't be dead yet, and finish him off. Imagine their shock when "blood and water" poured forth from the wound, and Jesus didn't move at all, having already "given up the ghost."
To check that he's dead. The fact that both red and clear liquids come out is the medical evidence that convinces doctors that he was in fact dead.
Nail 'em up, I say! Nail some sense into 'em!
A recently-dead corpse will spout blood and water from a chest wound, as Roman soldiers assigned to crucifixion duty would presumably know well. So stabbing a body in the chest wouldn't make a very good test for life (talk about observation influencing the observed). I side with those who read the "already dead" language in the Gospel of John as a later insertion by someone unfamiliar with the mechanics of crucifixion.
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
Just a quick correction: having the victim's legs broken would hasten their death since the victim's legs could no longer support them and they would dangle from their arms and asphyxiate comparatively quickly. I guess shock would affect the death duration too, but it was not the main reasoning behind it.
When Argumentum ad Hominem falls short, try Argumentum ad Matrem
Yep, Rabbi Yeshua, sometimes known as Jesus H. Christ, random founder of a random jewish sect that later developed into a monstruosity known as Christianism thanks to the insight of early converts usually called The Apostles who were really the Marketroids of that time.
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If he was dead, it wouldn't 'spray' out would it? It would leak out, but I thought the spray was caused by the beating heart.
Make it mandatory that part of the time must be spent with the person ON LINE! Don't just have it so that the person just doesn't log on for a week, and then comes back and his griefer is ready to roll. Make it so that he has to spend time on line, and BE ACTIVE, otherwise he gets auto-logged out. Now that would be a more suitable punishment.
..........FULL STOP.
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did you know that there is a Journal of the American Medical Association article with the "gory" details "http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/255 /11/1455"?
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usually they were just tied with ropes around their wrists.
Jesus, i believe, was tied and nailed. (If he existed, etc..)
If you've ever tried nailing someone suspended to something with nails through their palms, it doesn't work. The hand just splits down the middle under their own weight.
my password really is 'stinkypants'
In my day, we put their heads on a pike and fed their bodies to the dogs, and we liked it.
If you're going to use an old formula for a joke, get it right. The formula is:
In my day, [we did something horrible and exaggerated to ourselves] and we liked it.
Examples:
- In my day, we walked ten miles to school in sleet and hail, uphill both ways, and we liked it.
- In my day, we played computer games off of LP records. If you wanted to write your own, you'd have to get a needle and a magnifying glass, but we liked it that way.
The whole joke is doing something ridiculous and unpleasant and liking it ('cause you weren't spoiled like rotten kids today). It's not really all that incongruous to say that you did horrible things to other people and liked it. That's just human history right there. What exactly implies that kids are spoiled today for not getting to put their enemies' heads up on pikes?
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Now, come on. How active can you be if you're NAILED TO A TREE? Do you have to hang there all day tapping your toes and singing "Always look on the bright side of life"? Or maybe scream out "I'm Spartacus!" at any passer-by?
Ahh - My eye!
The doctor said I'm not supposed to get Slashdot in it!
Crucification for the monstruosity! Crucificy him!
Far as I know there were several crucifixions in the 20th century.
Didn't the Nazis crucify a few people in a concentration camp as part of an experiment?
Also. In some catholic cultures a few zealots are crucified on Good Friday each year. Unlike other crucifixions however these people 1. Volunteer for the "procedure" and 2. are removed from the cross on the same day and provided medical attention. The usually survive.
Crucifixion was a very slow torturous execution. Men would hang on crosses for days before they died.
Well it did say Britain. All the crucifixions of which I spoke are in other countries.
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
:-O
I seem to remember that modern experiments, first by the Nazis on prisoners and later by professors on grad students, showed that if you were crucified as shown in the screen shots you'd probably exhaust yourself then die of asphyxiation within six hours.
It they REALLY didn't like you they'd give you a little seat to sit on. Then you could last until you died of dehydration (a couple days) or I guess of starvation if they really, really didn't like you.
Sounds good. ;)
I guess they could let them down to break rocks, but that's not nearly as entertaining.
Hey, it was the Roman empire, just revoke their citizenship and make them slaves for a while.
Peter was crucified as well. Cruxifiction was *historically* the ultimate death penalty by the Romans... which I believed only one person has ever survived from - and only because he was granted a pardon right after he was put up.
You mean people can't be crucificated?
Fnord.
I guess they could let them down to break rocks, but that's not nearly as entertaining.
Hey, that's a great idea.
Rather than ban the player for seven days, send them to a prison where they're released once they perform boring, repetitive tasks until they earn their freedom.
Hmm, actually, I guess that basically describes most of the MMORPG experience, so nevermind.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
and have him assaulted by farm animals for the week.
Fraidnot
Rather than ban the player for seven days, send them to a prison where they're released once they perform boring, repetitive tasks until they earn their freedom.
Hey, sounds just like the jail in Nexus.
Hmm, actually, I guess that basically describes most of the MMORPG experience, so nevermind.
No, that describes the RPG experience.
Some people will never actually get the MMO part of it. There are communities, they are persistent, and they always have the game world and gameplay as a metaphor and reference point, which helps a lot for an online community. The only other such communities I really see lasting are the ones which are based around something like software development.
A community cannot last long if it literally has nothing to do but sit around and talk. I suspect it's got to do with having something to gather around. Physical communities are usually about location (towns/cities), or a campfire. On the internet, it's generally some sort of shared hobby. And while I do like to program, sometimes I want to just take a break and go kill something.
But, the game itself isn't that bad, and I really don't know how to fix it. Honestly, most of the RPG elements have to stay, even the ones everyone hates.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
I have not only friends, but family members pretty much all across the political spectrum. If you're so overzealous about your progressive, liberal, uber-tolerant views that you can't stand to be around a 'conservative'. And which flavor of conservative, might I ask?
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
Not to mention the fact that if the blood spurts, he's alive (heart is beating, sending blood pumping through the body). If its trickles out, he's dead (steady stream indiacates the heart's stopped).
Want to find other gamers to play board and role playing game
As to only one survivor, I would doubt that. The whole point of crucifixion is that it is a degrading, painful, and long way to die. Records exist of strong men (eg. deserting soldiers) lasting up to three days on the cross before dying.
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by professors on grad students
That is a joke right?
Freedom or George Bush
Yeah, no. It's not.
I'm a grad student, I can believe it.
They used ropes instead of nails (real crucifixions often used ropes too) and obviously didn't leave them up there until they were in serious danger.
Although some people think crucifixion is no longer practiced, unfortunately it's just not so.
"Al Jazeera reported in 2002 of the crucifixion of 32 Christian priests and other males, some as young as their early teens. They were allegedly whipped severely and affixed to crosses with six-inch nails through their hands, ankles, and genitals. Other reports suggest that crucifixion has been making a comeback in such fundamentalist Muslim nations as Nigeria and Yemen."
[Wikipedia article]
"If they really wanted to punish the guy they'd change it so that on his next logon the offender was stuck playing an SOE game."
Now now, I dislike griefers as much as the next guy, but forcing them to play a SOE MMO is just cruel and might leave permanent damage. We're no longer in the middle ages, you know. Regardless of what evil deeds someone did, you can't just strap someone to a chair and subject them to chinese water torture or a modern day SOE equivaletnt until their sanity crumbles.
Joke aside... actually, come to think of it, it wasn't really a joke... _anyway_, dishing out punishment on the human at the keyboard is still a prerogative of the state. A company may put in its EULA that it owns the data in your account, characters included, and may do whatever it pleases with it, including deleting it and display it on a cross on Golgotha. But that ownership may extend only to the bytes and bytes in that data, not to the player who "created" that data.
Same as, say, a forum moderator may do whatever it pleases with your posts, including deleting them. But the same forum moderator can't drop by at your house and kneecap you for posting crap on his forums. The same applies here: the company can block an account or mis-use someone's avatar, but they can't come seize the actual human and give him a righteous punishment.
And even the data on their servers, depending on the region, there may be some legal restrictions as to what they can do with it, and with which parts of it. E.g., I don't know about the USA, but here in Europe all countries have some pretty strict privacy laws. So you can't, for example, publish a web-site with the offenders' name, address, email, telephone number and/or credit card number, to teach them a lesson. That data is legally _their_ data, not yours, and they may grant you access to it for a well-defined purpose. If you use it for anything else, you may have a huge legal problem on your hands.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
He led a raid on a Dev Run city, took it over, and the Devs punished him by a 7day ban, ie, crucification ingame. They made the mistake of not putting an NPK timer after death, and thought that people wouldn't be spawncamped? I'm sorry, but that's just plain stupid.
;)
None of what you said is actually true. I'm going AC because I'm a tester at Roma Victor and I was there. The game's still in development and the guy was exploting a spawn point on a test server while your "NPK" mechanics weren't working. They have no problem with PKers at all as it happens - it's griefers that get crucified. Probably best to find out a little bit more information before declaring your undisputed intellectual superiority.
Cynewulf, (in real life a 27 year-old electrical engineer from Flint, Michigan, USA)
Some would say that having to live in Michigan was punishment enough.
[Insert pithy quote here]
Shouldn''t that be "infexious"? :-)
They oughta implement a more durable punishment, like cutting off a leg or something. Make the character hobble around begging for the rest of their short life. Or put out an eye and make half the screen fuzzy or cut off an ear and attenuate the sound on one channel. That'd serve as a persistent reminder, both to the player and to others who interact with them.
No, that describes the RPG experience.
The traditional one, yes. I was mostly joking, but the boring repetition is why I've given up most RPGs over time. I thought Morrowind did a good job of eliminating the level-grind aspect, so that's the one kind I'll still play.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
Crucification would imply being turned INTO a cross. Which itself sounds like an interesting punishment, in a darkly comic way.
I fully support abusing you, but you don't see me coming over to your house to shove a hot poker up your ass.
Plus, they didn't usually guard them too well. They'd put them up on trade routes and such outside of town as a warning, and from time to time some friends would be able to save them.
I'm guessing that there's many reasons people become griefers, but you'd have to think that one of them would be to gain notoriety. i.e. thinking its cool to have people recognise you in the (virtual) street & turn to each other & say in hushed whispers... "there goes teh_griefer". Surely crucifixion would just be giving them more of the infamy they're after?
*eyeroll*
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seems to me you will only be giving these guys a messianic complex. matrydom the sign of a true PKer, blah, blah, etc...
by professors on grad students
That is a joke right?
Not to the students!
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On one mud I created a bot that went around stealing as much as possible from other charaters, selling it, and turning the genrated gold over to my main character. Some wizards eventually deduced what I was up to, and teleported both my characters into torture chambers.
They demanded that I admit that both characters were played by me, but of course I played them as if they did not know each other. These wizards then proceeded to torture my characters ingame for over an hour before finally banning them.
To this day I still have no clue what they intended to accomplish with their torture.
Play Command HQ online
People who can't spell "crucifixion" should suffer extradictation or at least get severe restrictations!
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> Why stab someone who's already dead,
It wasn't good enough to _think_ he was dead. They had to _know_. There are several reasons for this, some more obvious than others, but the most obvious reason for those who were there at the time is that if he wasn't dead, they needed to break his legs so he'd die quickly, because they needed to get the dying men off the crosses before the holiday.
So they stuck a spear in to see what came out. The blood had already separated, so blood and water came out separate, strong evidence that he wasn't just unconcious (or faking), but actually dead.
> especially if he's going to spray blood and water all over your nice clean tunic?
It was a soldier who did the stabbing; presumably he was in uniform, and laundry was presumably not a major consideration -- probably he was accustomed to carrying out his duties despite such trivial personal concerns. In any case as someone else pointed out nothing was going to "spray" out with any great force if the body was in fact a corpse.
If there had been a spray of just blood, rather than a flow of blood and water, they would have broken his legs, so that he would suffocate.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
For the same reason that 'dead' gladiators would have hot iron brands applied to their feet; try to catch fakers. Longinus is usually regarded as having stabbed too hard; it's supposed to be a prick, basically, to the lower ribs that would cause in involuntary flinch. If Jesus wasn't already dead, he would be pretty quickly, from the stab wound.
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See what happens when you don't follow the tenets of Christianism?
In addition to the public humiliation of your character for a week, it would seem to make sense to handicap them in other ways for a limited time which would increase in severity for each 'conviction'. Off the top of my head, here are a couple of things I could think of. For 1 month after the crucifixion:
- Add a surcharge of 25% for any financial transaction. The recipient of the transaction would still only get the requested amount, but the payor would pay the requested amount + 25% tax to the game.
- Slow the character movement across the gamespace by 25%. This would REALLY hit the player since it would be a pain in the ass to get from A to B. It would also hurt them when attacking, even worse for retreating.
- Make the player mute for a shorter time than 1 month (10 - 20 hours of non idle PLAYTIME). Can't talk but can hear everyone.
I don't play MMOs, but controlling convicted griefers in-game seems like it is possible
http://www.tomandemily.com
Crucified gamer, Tuesday, April 4, 2006
http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/article.html?in_artic le_id=11519&in_page_id=2