Prisons will be hard to control to some extent since there will need to be a prison built, guards, food and clothes for prisoners, etc. Jailing someone for short term might be possible, but a long term prison I do not think will happen. At least not at launch.

I am sure there will be those players who are found guilty and will be executed, their belongings confiscated / fined, or banished from the settlement. So yes. Permideath for those found guilty. It's player run so I am sure that will happen.

As for things that are illegal? Well that changes per territory. What might be illegal in one settlement may not be in another. We can assume violent crimes will be, but other things like bar fights will not be.

I know we brought up public executions to Caspian and co once upon a time where if the criminal is infamous enough a coup de grace would be perma death.

I don't think other players will be able to just perma a criminal by any other means though.

But as PH said, laws are set by kingdom, duchy, county, barony, town etc. Likely some will be tribe/culture based.

And other than possibly fines, most other punishments will cause spirit loss, which reduces the time your current spark/char will last/live.

Players actually staying in a prison isn't happening last I heard. Reason being that not allowing a player to actually play is a good way to make them quit.

Nooooo ! Not another debate about the prisons !

Nobody knows anything about the exact implementation laws, crime or the investigation process. The developers are still debating and going back and forth on the very core interactions in these systems. Any small info we do have should be considered likely to change.

In a video they posted about the process of map generation at time stamp 11:03 they had a bunch of industries/buildings and one of them was jail. Now I'm not saying their is jails but having jail in that seems to me that they are at minimum considering jails in game.

I've said many times I fundamentally believe laws, enforcement, and penalties should be determined not by the developers but by those in power via players or NPCs. On mayor, count, Duke, king levels just like in every real life society. Then we as players choose where to live and travel in based off those laws, enforcement, and penalties. This way players have the choice of living in places where they agree with the laws, etc. Some players may want strict laws and punishments for breaking them. Others may not. By letting the people of power implement and carry out this compared to the developers you have alot more differences in how cultures look at things. Example. Say a Kypiq views cutting down a tree worst than theft. Those kypiqs in power be that npcs or players should be able to set laws against that and harsher penalties for those who disregard that law if caught by enforcement.

Let players/npcs in power determine if a long jail sentence is just or unjust. Let them decide what is a crime and what is not. Let them decide if it should only be a fine, and the process of acquisition of property or person if fines are not paid.

I'd love to see laws I fully disagree with and those I like. That makes the world look more diverse and more of an adventure learning different areas.

Posted By Drew Zimmerman at 09:56 AM - Wed Jun 05 2019

Let players/npcs in power determine if a long jail sentence is just or unjust. Let them decide what is a crime and what is not. Let them decide if it should only be a fine, and the process of acquisition of property or person if fines are not paid.

I'd love to see laws I fully disagree with and those I like. That makes the world look more diverse and more of an adventure learning different areas.

There will probably be developer restrictions or mechanical restrictions to how punishing sentences can be. The social or moral reasons why in all developed countries there isn't a death penalty for stealing an apple doesn't exist in games for the players. There is no inherent incentive not to turn every law up to 1000 in games unless there is a hard developer restriction that flat out stops you or a mechanical soft restriction that makes it punishing to do so.

Now for some speculation: Honestly w/o either type of restriction you are more likely to see zero diversity than increased diversity because nobles would be inherently incentivized to invoke the death penalty for all crimes as this eliminates deviants from their domain and they have no moral/social tie to them as humans. This would then probably cause the deviants to run from those domains and huddle in a concentrated area where the few domains who don't have such laws are, however, all the deviants moving to this new domain would be a call to action to increase penalties to combat the rise in deviant activity and further compress the deviant population until most locations need to adapt these severe law styles or be over-run by the deviants fleeing former oppressive regimes.

What @Takeda_Shinukage posted deserves serious consideration. I am reminded of a historical anecdote from the later Qing Dynasty period. A unit of soldiers was traveling under orders from one place to another, and realized they were going to be late. A conversation such as this ensued:

"What is the penalty for being late?"

"Death."

"What is the penalty for rebellion?"

"Death."

"Let's rebel rather than be late."

I agree with part of that. I do believe people in power will need to be able to carefully balance laws so that crime is minimal and punishment is just. Players or NPCs will generally want laws to protect them however generally they wont want over zealous laws either. If people in power do not impose laws you can expect what would be common crime in real life considered not a crime in game thus letting people use their own moral judgement on if they should or shouldnt do things. If people in power impose over zealous laws sure they might simply move to another location. But what happens if they have set up their lives somewhere and families. I'm sure they will want to stay and either rebel against those in power, try to gain a consensus to try and overturn or rewrite the law, or simply just take their chances and continue to break the law. In many places when harsh laws against something are implemented. An underground black market business developed. Think American prohibition, or drug trade. I'm sure many basic laws will be dont steal, dont kill. However the creativity really gets interesting after that in terms of making laws. Maybe a person of power wants to make relgious laws preventing anyone practicing religion other than a certain one like throughout real history. I think people in power should have the ability to do so. Even if it I may or may not agree with it. Then if imposed let's see how things react. For better or worse.

What would be the best option? Instant spirit loss. Let's say you break a law. You are supposed to spend 24 hours in jail. Instead of actual play time they remove that much Spirit from you as if you had spent that much time in jail.

Do something really bad? Loose 50 years of Spirit if found guilty.

They take you to the "Jail" where your spirit is sucked out or something like that in a minute.

That would fix the issue of people not wanting to play a game if they are forced to spend half the day in a jail doing nothing.

Posted By Drew Zimmerman at 08:30 AM - Thu Jun 06 2019

In many places when harsh laws against something are implemented. An underground black market business developed. Think American prohibition, or drug trade. I'm sure many basic laws will be dont steal, dont kill. However the creativity really gets interesting after that in terms of making laws.

I think your definition of "harsh" player laws aren't matching mine. When you think of harsh laws players would enact you say american prohibition. Imo that's not even harsh and generally for players in a video game that would even be a "meh" type law at best. An "Oh well, they banned these potions, that sucks, we'll craft some illegally but if we can't oh well". When I see the destruction players can cause with no checks lets talk about modern day North Korea or Nazi Germany or @Poldano's example.

I have to strongly disagree with the "just rebel" argument and any implication that all imbalances will be solved eventually with such rebellion. Who is going to help the deviant rebel against the death penalty for crime? why would I as a farmer want crime not to be the death penalty? I will never commit crime, I will not be impacted. Why should I help this random deviant when he will only come back to hurt me? In real life, there is social and moral weight to the situation. Generally we as humans do not want to see another human DIE for stealing an apple. Again, this does not exist in games. We could not possibly care less if someone's character dies for stealing an apple. Especially the more scared players who think any crime = griefing. They will be cheering while a deviant is being beheaded for that stolen apple. Hell, they might even tip the executioner.

How would you even get the CB?? It's not gonna be wealth or favor in that type of government. Especially since you are likely a deviant in our scenario. The only CB you would theoretically viably be able to get in a NK style system would be fame but even then since your famous they would already know to watch out for you.

Your only viable option would like I said earlier be to flee. Sure theoretically you can rebel but again, where is your CB coming from? And even if you could, if were saying death penalty is allowed for all crimes in CoE how much money or game time worth have you robbed players during the 28 day siege? $20? $200? $2000? How many times have you been convicted during this siege for treason? I mean if penalties are all the way up that means you would literally run out of bodies to throw at the siege. If we are saying the death penalty should be allowed, that means every who is in the siege will be perma-killed when captured while the defenders cannot be and will respawn like normal.You would need to compeltely outmatch and outnumber the enemy in every way. Not counting reinforcements coming from other cities, other counties, the duchy, etc.

Posted By Takeda_Shinukage at 09:36 AM - Thu Jun 06 2019

Posted By Drew Zimmerman at 08:30 AM - Thu Jun 06 2019

In many places when harsh laws against something are implemented. An underground black market business developed. Think American prohibition, or drug trade. I'm sure many basic laws will be dont steal, dont kill. However the creativity really gets interesting after that in terms of making laws.

I think your definition of "harsh" player laws aren't matching mine. When you think of harsh laws players would enact you say american prohibition. Imo that's not even harsh and generally for players in a video game that would even be a "meh" type law at best. An "Oh well, they banned these potions, that sucks, we'll craft some illegally but if we can't oh well". When I see the destruction players can cause with no checks lets talk about modern day North Korea or Nazi Germany or @Poldano's example.

I have to strongly disagree with the "just rebel" argument and any implication that all imbalances will be solved eventually with such rebellion. Who is going to help the deviant rebel against the death penalty for crime? why would I as a farmer want crime not to be the death penalty? I will never commit crime, I will not be impacted. Why should I help this random deviant when he will only come back to hurt me? In real life, there is social and moral weight to the situation. Generally we as humans do not want to see another human DIE for stealing an apple. Again, this does not exist in games. We could not possibly care less if someone's character dies for stealing an apple. Especially the more scared players who think any crime = griefing. They will be cheering while a deviant is being beheaded for that stolen apple. Hell, they might even tip the executioner.

How would you even get the CB?? It's not gonna be wealth or favor in that type of government. Especially since you are likely a deviant in our scenario. The only CB you would theoretically viably be able to get in a NK style system would be fame but even then since your famous they would already know to watch out for you.

Your only viable option would like I said earlier be to flee. Sure theoretically you can rebel but again, where is your CB coming from? And even if you could, if were saying death penalty is allowed for all crimes in CoE how much money or game time worth have you robbed players during the 28 day siege? $20? $200? $2000? How many times have you been convicted during this siege for treason? I mean if penalties are all the way up that means you would literally run out of bodies to throw at the siege. If we are saying the death penalty should be allowed, that means every who is in the siege will be perma-killed when captured while the defenders cannot be and will respawn like normal.You would need to compeltely outmatch and outnumber the enemy in every way. Not counting reinforcements coming from other cities, other counties, the duchy, etc.

i was just using an example. sure prohibition isnt harsh. just used an example of a potential law that a deivent might actually like because of the potential underground trade.

im not that informed about CB on a mayor or if that is even possible. But say a count set a law that was harsh. I'm sure if the few mayors in that county all agreed against that law rebellion wouldnt be that far fetched. Sure they would need to know how the dukes and kings above the count felt so they dont get in over their head.

it does seem like half of whatever county in real life does have that hey if its a crime then they should get whatever punishment is needed. However the other half of that country generally tries to find a reasonable punishment. That person who committed the crime might be friends with alot of people. They dont want to see that players character die off. So they start to consider trying to change the law for either not wanting to see a friend die off or just because they dont agree with the actual punishment.

Now in terms of jail. Im not a big fan of any player actually sitting in jail and playing the game. sure it might be fun for 20 mins and then their gonna want to go. I more so look at people in power can choose how long their spark with be depleted in a time served type style. I get you disagree. Thats fine. We all have different opinions. I want this game to be as realistic as humanly possible. Others understand its a game and thats cool too.

Me personally 30$ for a spark isnt anything. I prefer the instant death of a character the moment they die for any reason. I get alot of players dont have money to continuously buy new characters. I just like it because its realistic plus people are less likely to yolo into situations without knowing the potential scenarios that could happen if they make a mistake. If say im a raider and i could insta die if killed. Im less likely to have a small raiding party attack a larger settlement because even if i survive i might loose half my soldiers and it wouldnt be beneficial. But because its not instant death all the time. players will go yolo and grief alot more just because they can. and even if you die alot. your still only paying like 30$ every 6 months if you die all the time which gives zero incentive not to attack people on site.

I think and to a degree I hope there is execution/perma-death as punishment for very serious, seemingly deserving crimes such as treason etc.

But all in all, I don't think it will be common place, unless treason is common place, as I suspect that NPC's and PC's alike will revolt against tyranny and injustice and nobility that tries to rule with fear and tyranny will end up facing execution themselves.

To be honest, I am not so much worried about in-game laws as my potential in-laws in-game :)

My example used people who were not deviant and would not have become deviant except for overly harsh punishments. When applied to intentionally deviant players, punishments that make everything a capital crime motivate even petty shoplifters to become mass murderers. When exceptionally harsh conditions such as too-burdensome taxes make life too difficult for intentionally lawful players, they become motivated toward petty deviancy.

There will be demands from some of the law-abiding for the most severe penalties, but these demands must be balanced against the costs and consequences of enforcing the laws and enacting the penalties.