Rules and RP

[Athenian]

Saturday. It's been a tough week. I sit down to play Discovery. I've played other mods on other servers, but Discovery is by far the best. I enjoy RP. I enjoy the balance between flexibility and rigidity that the Discovery Rp 24/7 allows.

I'm a pirate in a Corsair class GB, carrying a pirate id, and my tag says The Order, through no fault of my own. The ship is kitted out with anything I could get my hands on - and is a good illustration of the varied career this character has had in the five months since I started playing. I have other characters on the server so I'm pretty sure that I can follow the rules regarding factions. BUT this character works independently, plying his illegal trade on the lanes thru Colorado. I'm at Pueblo. This is normally a pretty dangerous spot because of a battleship patrol, but the money is important.

A Bounty Hunter fighter announces his presence in the system, uses the lanes and arrives in front of me outside Pueblo. I knock his shields down, damage him some, and he runs off, complaining about my RP. What did he want? A formal notice of my intent to wipe BH scum out wherever I encounter them? His scanner not working?

A ship called Lane Security (Ageira - I know them already) enters the system. He gets the same treatment. He threatens me with reports for rule violations. Specifically 6.6. This is pure sour grapes. A guy F1'd on me earlier but I opted not to report it - his shame and cowardice will live in his memory.

It's clear from the dialogue with both these two characters that they didn't scan me or they would have seen the id.

What do they expect from a pirate? I ALWAYS scan ships before deciding on a course of action. I'm jumpy, I'm in a hostile system, the BH guild has ships surprising me at every turn.

The SA, LSF and some Bounty Hunters turn up to see me off. It's clear that they didn't scan me either (the cruiser taking me on didn't even realise that i was in a gunboat) or they would have seen, yes, the pirate id. What should be RP degenerates into people accusing me of all sorts of rules vioations - i'm in the wrong system, ship, I can't go here or there, do this, or do that. Someone says I shouldn't be in a CRUISER!! When I refused to budge they showed me the error of my ways. After a few shots at each other I opted to leave the area and they pursued. To keep the RP going I requested permission to dock at Ouray on the puiblic channel - they say I can't, I'll be fined - it's out of RP. Does this count as posing as an admin?

Remember : this is a pirate character, requesting to dock at the base of an outlaw faction I am on good terms with. But I give them the benefit of the doubt and make my stand. Their ships swarm me, I accidentally hit the cruiser and then I get accused of intentional ramming. I'm then told to go to Toledo and sort my rep.

Of course if i do that, i'll end up with a gaian or xeno tag (even though i chose a pirate id) and get accused if everything from bad Rp to being responsible for. I've never even docked at a gaian base!!

What do I do? I joined the server to play and enjoy this game, not get involved in legal wrangling with players who don't follow the rules themselves. It seems to me that people invoke rules when they can't take a beating (a beating in both cases mind, not a killing) or when it serves their purpose to intimidate other players.

If having Pirate and Merc id's is going to cause such problems for people too lazy or anxious to scan and see beyond the tag , why not get rid of these ids altogether? Or maybe these people should look up the word "freelancer" in a dictionary?

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Former member of "the most paranoid group of people in the community"
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