MUSH Policy

The admins reserve the right to interpret, amend, administer, fold, spindle, and mutilate OutremerMUSH policies as we feel necessary in response to events on the game. Our highest priority will always be to provide the most colourful and eventful roleplay you'll find anywhere in the MUSHing world, and to bring the greatest possible creative glee to our players. If we have to move the goalposts to do that, then, by Heaven, we shall.

However, as our MUSH is not just starting small but likely also to remain small, our aim is to deal with each player and each character as an individual. Our preference wherever possible is to have guidelines, rather than rules set in stone. If you think a policy is unfair, or should for whatever reason not apply to you, please bring the matter to us rather than suffering in silence. We may very well uphold the policy as it is written, but we will gladly listen to your thoughts.

If and when new policies are codified, or existing policies are more than cosmetically altered, a notice will be posted on the Announcements board (+bbread 1). You will not log in one day and find that the rules have changed without anybody informing you. This page may from time to time lag slightly behind the policy files hosted on the game itself (+news), which must always be considered the definitive edition.

Harassment

We at OutremerMUSH share the goal of creating a friendly environment in which people may exercise their creativity together -- and have a fabulous time while so doing.

To that end we will not tolerate harassment. Any player found to be harassing others will, depending upon the situation, receive a very strong warning or be +jailed. If it happens again, the harasser will be sitebanned. If you feel you are being harassed, please contact a member of staff at once to set this process in motion.

Consent

We believe, on the one hand, that it would be impractical to try to portray life in a 12th century war zone under a full consent policy. On the other hand, we are committed to taking into account players' wishes regarding their characters whenever it is thematically possible to do so.

Thus OutremerMUSH is neither a full-consent nor a non-consent game, but something in the middle. Call it, perhaps, a consultation game.

The admins reserve the right to direct the overall story, and may occasionally require certain actions of certain characters in the interests of thematic verisimilitude and narrative cohesion. There may also be times when a character is roleplayed into a situation requiring sanctions or even death: our policy is that IC actions should have IC consequences, and that no PC, not even a staff alt, can rely upon a get-out-of-trouble-free card. A knight in an unequal fight may not survive; a religious who speaks out publicly against the church may be excommunicated; a ward may be given in marriage, or a faithless wife divorced.

We can't promise that nothing will happen to your PC without your consent. But if you'd ever like to check "What will happen if I do such-and-such?" or "How can I avoid such-and-such?" we encourage you to put in a +request.

We will try to be considerate and flexible, and we hope you will too.

Rating

Mature situations may arise in our theme: violence certainly, sex probably.

At the risk of stating the obvious, it is entirely up to you whether you roleplay mature situations. You may choose to play a character who is unlikely to come across scenes of a nature you wouldn't like to play out. And if such a scene comes along anyway, you can skip over it and simply talk through anything the other player(s) involved might realistically need to know in order to move on to the next part of your mutual story.

The admins cannot control and are not responsible for what players get up to during the course of private roleplay on our grid. What matters to us is that you play thematically in public, and that you take care to respect the roleplaying preferences of the other player(s) with whom you are scening. We would rather not give the MUSH as a whole a specific rating, but trust instead to our players' discretion and good taste.

We ask that if you post a log to the wiki which contains an element of mature content, you include in the infobox on the right a warning to potential readers of what they'll find within.

History

The start of play on OutremerMUSH is on the 9th of October 1192. Historical events prior to this time are considered canonical within our theme (with a few minor exceptions built in from the start); but the future is wide open for enterprising players to rewrite in their own image.

We are beginning with a mixture of historical and fictional characters and the aim of transitioning over time to a mainly fictional character base. Those playing historical characters are required to adhere to their established pre-1192 pasts, but have considerable leeway in filling in lacunae and determing what comes next in their lives. Historical characters will often be required to die at roughly the date when they died in reality (if not necessarily in the same manner), to pave the way for their replacements.

Our plans include someday to play flash-backs and flash-forwards to other times in the history of Outremer. Players will have the opportunity to puppet fresh characters, perhaps even play their main PCs' ancestors or descendants.

Death

The world of Outremer is a changeable one. The mortality rate is high. Death in battle; death in a duel over a woman's favours; death by assassination; death in childbirth; death via ghastly 12th century illnesses; death by runaway horse; death by a scorpion you met unexpectedly in the garden.

If you are in principle willing to meet a thematic death at any time, please indicate this by setting the attribute &deathok me=yes on yourself. This will be visible only to staff.

If you are especially keen to keep a current PC alive, the best advice we can give is to avoid roleplaying yourself into potentially life-threatening situations. There will be few circumstances in which the admins will require a character death (this usually in the case of a historical character who must die on time to pave the way for a new fictional character), but there may be circumstances in which a character's IC actions are considered to have led inexorably to his or her demise.

Any PC who dies is entitled to an epic death scene with one or more staff members present, after which his or her player will receive lavish praise and usually move on to a more powerful and/or interesting character, taking along the skill points earned in play by the late lamented. Death is not always a tragedy.

Alts

All alts must be registered (see the +help +alts command on the game). The maximum number is four.

You may apply for your second, third, and fourth at two-week intervals after your first. The rationale for this is threefold: to give players a settling-in period with each new character; to discourage them from taking on, too quickly, more characters than they can realistically keep active; and to allow new characters to be thoughtfully planned.

If one of your alts is not working out and you would like to retire him or her and create another, a staff member will work with you to determine what happens next. If you are a player in good standing who has been active on four alts over a period of time, and you don't feel that's enough, it may be possible to arrange something more for you.

For more detailed information about alt restrictions, please see the [CG Guide].

Activity

The activity requirements on OutremerMUSH are not hard and fast. They depend upon character types, and upon ongoing plots and the number of close links which exist between your PC and others.

The rule of thumb is that players of Plot PCs should be online and providing the information staff and other players need about their PCs once a week or more. Otherwise, staff reserves the right to make on their behalf whatever IC decisions cannot be deferred, in order to keep the story moving.

If it is often difficult to get hold of you at important times, you may be gently asked to have your character step back from some of his or her IC involvements. We understand that RL can and does intrude itself upon one's game time; but at the same time we understand how frustrating it is for a player's roleplay to be consistently held back by another player's absence.

Idle

A Plot PC is considered idle after having not logged in to the game for 30 days; a Colour PC is only idle after 90 days. The admins reserve the right to utilise, retain, or dispose of idle characters in the best interests of the overall story.

To avoid this happening to you by accident, please submit a +request to notify staff if you're planning to be away from the game for a period of time. Please also include details of where your character will be ICly during this time, your involvement in ongoing plots, and whatever else you think staff might need to know in order to keep your character integrated into the story during your absence.

If you prefer to leave the game in an organised fashion rather than by idling out, a staff member will work with you to determine your characters' fates in a way agreeable to you as well as to us. If you are happy to leave your characters open to be picked up by potential future players, this can usually be arranged; otherwise, there are many options available for death or retirement.