Sorry gonna jump in on this,
It is my belief that we needed to find a middle ground when dealing with PvP situations. In order to keep the quality of an RP server in a PvP game some rules that quantify RP is needed.
The RP needed before a PvP is one of those rulings I feel is necessary for an RP server. This is where it gets complicated: How to set a quantified RP ruling without "restricting" RP.
It is my belief that the Admins were quite comprimising by making the required amount RP words needed before a battle real low. (3 words min I think).
Thing is, in my opinion, if we didn't set such a minimum quantified RP ruling we would indeed have many more attacks and much less system chat. The small RP requirement is really not all that big of a deal and I'm sure we can be imaginative enough to come up with a few words.
It's how I viewed the ruling so far.