Official rule on /showitems

[Entity]

On 2/8/2021 at 5:34 PM, Smilesville said:

I am absolutely against the normalization of asking for /showitems in any way.

 

Let's suppose a robber asks for /showitems after a robbery and a victim acquiesces, yet the former had a concealed SNS pistol that the robber failed to locate. Would that not impact the RP of that robber in as significant a manner as asking for /showitems before even RPing a pat down?

 

All this will do is cause /b fights to ensue about who was hiding what where.

 

Leave the rule as it is. /showitems has no place in a robbery.

 

I want to start this off by saying that I'm not a fan of most robberies that take place on the server and that I am not, in any way, involved in this type of roleplay, however I believe that /showitems should definitely have a place when a robbery is being performed. Being forbidden from asking to see the other person's inventory will lead to an enormous amount of abuse. If that were the case, no items nor money would ever be robbed from that point on - everyone would roleplay having nothing on them and the robber would never be able to report them for that because they would never know if they lied or not.

 

There has to be some sort of standard regarding when it is appropriate to be shown the inventory and I believe that the best time for that to happen is after all of the frisking has been done. Once you're shown the inventory, you can't go back and frisk them again to find something you didn't find the first time. This would make it fair for the player being robbed by preventing the robber from finding out about their items OOCly and looking specifically for them and it would also be fair the the robber by giving them a chance of actually finding something. If the RP is not properly done and they don't specifically look in a certain area (e.g. /me frisks X compared to something more in depth) then that's on them. This would work best with a script addition in which you'd be able to set the location of all of your items (a simple /itemloc [id] [description]). That's the best and only way to make it fun and fair for everyone, in my opinion.

[Smilesville]

1 minute ago, Entity said:

Being forbidden from asking to see the other person's inventory will lead to an enormous amount of abuse. [...] everyone would roleplay having nothing on them and the robber would never be able to report them for that because they would never know if they lied or not.

 

There has to be some sort of standard regarding when it is appropriate to be shown the inventory and I believe that the best time for that to happen is after all of the frisking has been done. Once you're shown the inventory, you can't go back and frisk them again to find something you didn't find the first time. This would make it fair for the player being robbed by preventing the robber from finding out about their items OOCly and looking specifically for them and it would also be fair the the robber by giving them a chance of actually finding something.

I disagree. In my view, being permitted to infallibly view the entirety someone else's inventory at any point in time leads to enormous amounts of abuse already - which is why "/b /showitems" is so popular with robbers. Furthermore, assessing someone's inventory after a robbery will produce three problems for the singular issue it allegedly fixes.

 

Robbers who see something they missed (but also like) will:

1. Start an argument in /b demanding to know where the item was.
2. Use that knowledge in a later robbery of the same individual.
3. Alter their behavior based on whether or not a weapon still exists in the victim's inventory.

For example, let's say a robber emotes running someone's pockets. They make off with some cash and a phone, well and good - but let's say the victim is made to use the /showitems command afterward and the robber spies a SNS pistol in the inventory. The victim has this pistol concealed in a shoulder holster, which is itself concealed under a light windbreaker. At this point, what do these three problems look like?

1. "/b Bullshit, I ran your pockets, where was the SNS pistol? Can you prove it?"
2. The robber will actively seek out this person in the future with the hopes of obtaining the SNS pistol.
3. Rather than simply getting onto a bicycle or leaving themselves similarly open to retaliation as they may have originally been inclined to, the robber could emote restraining the victim after a robbery to avoid being held at gunpoint himself.

We're talking about the most common, most antagonistic interaction two players will have on the server - and I am vehemently opposed to providing fodder for metagaming, especially when it's not necessary.

 

If you rob someone and you suspect (or know) they're holding something back that you should have found, report it. If you're afraid of sending too many reports of this nature, you should probably rethink the chain robbing you're engaged in.

[Entity]

2 minutes ago, Smilesville said:

I disagree. In my view, being permitted to infallibly view the entirety someone else's inventory at any point in time leads to enormous amounts of abuse already - which is why "/b /showitems" is so popular with robbers. Furthermore, assessing someone's inventory after a robbery will produce three problems for the singular issue it allegedly fixes.

 

Robbers who see something they missed (but also like) will:

1. Start an argument in /b demanding to know where the item was.
2. Use that knowledge in a later robbery of the same individual.
3. Alter their behavior based on whether or not a weapon still exists in the victim's inventory.

For example, let's say a robber emotes running someone's pockets. They make off with some cash and a phone, well and good - but let's say the victim is made to use the /showitems command afterward and the robber spies a SNS pistol in the inventory. The victim has this pistol concealed in a shoulder holster, which is itself concealed under a light windbreaker. At this point, what do these three problems look like?

1. "/b Bullshit, I ran your pockets, where was the SNS pistol? Can you prove it?"
2. The robber will actively seek out this person in the future with the hopes of obtaining the SNS pistol.
3. Rather than simply getting onto a bicycle or leaving themselves similarly open to retaliation as they may have originally been inclined to, the robber could emote restraining the victim after a robbery to avoid being held at gunpoint himself.

We're talking about the most common, most antagonistic interaction two players will have on the server - and I am vehemently opposed to providing fodder for metagaming, especially when it's not necessary.

 

If you rob someone and you suspect (or know) they're holding something back that you should have found, report it. If you're afraid of sending too many reports of this nature, you should probably rethink the chain robbing you're engaged in.

I totally agree with you and all of those examples. Being forced to use /showitems will one hundred percent generate one of the three situations you've given as examples more often than not. That's one big issue we're currently facing because of how widespread robberies (poorly executed ones especially) are.

 

If you do believe someone's holding something back and you use report in order to find out, you'll either find out that they weren't holding anything back (while giving the staff team one more task - to check inventories after each robbery) or you'll find out that they were indeed holding something back and end up in one of those there situations once again. This isn't the solution either.

 

The situations you gave as examples happen way too often and give the robbers a huge and unfair advantage over the players they are robbing. The problem with forbidding robbers to ask for /showitems is the fact that the wheel would just completely turn. The robbers would be at a huge OOC disadvantage.

 

As a clear example. You, as a robber, go ahead and pat someone down. You do it thoroughly and they have $5,000, three phones, five diamond rings and necklaces and two pistols on them. They roleplay having nothing. What's your course of action? You would normally be able to ask for them to /showitems and you would see they were lying OOCly but if you're not able to? You would never be able to report them for lying and you would never even know that they were. If you go ahead and /report them just to make sure, you'd just fall into the situation given above. This would be the end of all robberies on the server and while I do like that idea, I don't support it if it's based on an OOC unfair limitation.

 

Being forced to use /showitems gives a huge unfair advantage to the robber and being restricted from using it give a huge unfair advantage to the victim. There has to be some sort of middle ground that's standardized, fair to both parties from an OOC point of view and neutral, as much as it is possible. 

[Smilesville]

4 minutes ago, Entity said:

The problem with forbidding robbers to ask for /showitems is the fact that the wheel would just completely turn. The robbers would be at a huge OOC disadvantage.
[...]
If you do believe someone's holding something back and you use report in order to find out, you'll either find out that they weren't holding anything back (while giving the staff team one more task - to check inventories after each robbery) or you'll find out that they were indeed holding something back and end up in one of those there situations once again.
[...]

Being forced to use /showitems gives a huge unfair advantage to the robber and being restricted from using it give a huge unfair advantage to the victim. There has to be some sort of middle ground that's standardized, fair to both parties from an OOC point of view and neutral, as much as it is possible. 

Victims are already under no obligation to use /showitems, so this is the current state of affairs - and yet, I wouldn't say that robbers are at any OOC disadvantage. By the very nature of the interaction and the server structure, the robber will never be at an OOC disadvantage - which is why it's the go-to activity for violence-oriented players looking to farm script cash and PF weapons.

 

If a robber pats someone down and finds even one pistol, that's a 100% return on investment (the gun originally used for the robbery, and the only thing you stand to lose) in the span of five minutes, max. That far outstrips any other method of earning on the server with minimal risk - the most you stand to lose is the gun and ammo you go robbing with, along with maybe an afternoon in jail if you're caught instead of shot. This isn't remotely realistic, but a byproduct of all the systems we use to deal with crime, fear RP, and armed robberies specifically.

 

I say all of this to arrive to my point that robbers already have an immense OOC advantage.

 

I'm typically a proponent of working the server to more efficiently deal with issues that staff would otherwise have to oversee, but in this instance, not so much - if you're robbing someone at random as opposed to selecting someone you know has money, jewelry, weapons, etc. then I'd venture to judge that you're abusing the server structure for script gains rather than aiming for a realistic encounter. Someone who knows what they're doing is poor RP won't go through the trouble to /report and draw attention to themselves, while the good RPer whose target is staked out will have a good idea of whether their victim is lying.

 

Not only should robbers not be given permission to ask for /showitems after a robbery, they should be explicitly barred from asking a victim to do so.

[EffPee]

3 minutes ago, Smilesville said:

which is why it's the go-to activity for violence-oriented players looking to farm script cash and PF weapons.

 

Criminal RPers have to resort to such methods for script cash because there are barely any actual incentives for them to make money in an illegal environment.

 

Selling drugs? Next-to-no customers available to sell drugs to, unless you already know someone, due to people being scared of scamming or just not wanting to RP around personal drug usage. People are consistently looking for huge amounts rather than their casual fix.

 

Scamming (yes, it happens)? Difficult to scam people with sufficient RP without them making the assumption you're just in it for the OOC gain or you're a subpar role-player, as they are scared out of the topic by other poor portrayals of the situation. I'm certain there are plenty of people that want to scam for development as well as the monetary gain that comes out of it, whether legal roleplayers like it or not.

 

This brings us to robberies, the only method to make good money script wise for illegal roleplayers, at least for gang roleplayers that are not higher up in their gang hierarchy. We don't have the option to run a lossless business and get $4000 an hour from working in said businesses, we don't have many other options and I think more ways for criminal roleplayers to make money outside of robberies should be explored before changing how robberies are carried out.

[Smilesville]

12 minutes ago, EffPee said:

Criminal RPers have to resort to such methods for script cash because there are barely any actual incentives for them to make money in an illegal environment.
[...]

This brings us to robberies, the only method to make good money script wise for illegal roleplayers, at least for gang roleplayers that are not higher up in their gang hierarchy. We don't have the option to run a lossless business and get $4000 an hour from working in said businesses, we don't have many other options and I think more ways for criminal roleplayers to make money outside of robberies should be explored before changing how robberies are carried out.

Most gangsters who aren't higher up in their gang hierarchy are poor anyways. The illegal RP community has a number of self-inflicted problems with regards to interacting with characters that don't commit crimes on the regular, but their issues don't entitle them to unrealistic script access with potential to metagame - especially considering improper robberies are where we see a good number of our actionable reports come from.

 

Under no circumstance should anyone be required to use the /showitems command for another player, and anyone ordering other players to do so for them is attempting to metagame. Period.

Edited February 11, 2021 by Smilesville

[Topiyo]

6 minutes ago, Smilesville said:

Most gangsters who aren't higher up in their gang hierarchy are poor anyways.

A majority of middle class workers are poor too. The server script makes it so that you can RP a cashier and earn $4,000 an hour when you should in-fact be wasting most of your money on bills, food and mortgages. So how on earth can you make the argument that people in gang hierarchies are poor anyways? People who resort to drug dealing do it so they have cash on the side to pay for luxuries. Money from drug dealing is not taxed and earns you more than you could make as a cashier. It just comes with the risk of losing years to a prison sentence or worse. Any good role player that spends their time around drug dealing knows not to RP becoming rich from the drug game because it also has it's expenses but it's meant to come with it's profits too.

 

I went through the concluded reports section. Robberies are not where the most actionable reports come from. It's actually common courtesy reports because people feel offended by everything.

 

It should fall under common courtesy to /showitems AFTER a robbery has been committed to prove that you were not lying about your possessions during the robbery. If you somehow lied about a METAL object such as a firearm not being found during a physical search, then you are the problem and should be punished the same way a criminal would be punished for meta-gaming that they found your 1 gram of marijuana inside your sock.

 

[EffPee]

25 minutes ago, Smilesville said:

Most gangsters who aren't higher up in their gang hierarchy are poor anyways.

Exactly, they're poor so they resort to robberies to get money because they know that is where the money is at.

 

I don't think /showitems should be forced during roleplay but it should be common courtesy that if you are being robbed and the items on your person would be taken, you should give them up to avoid being spammed in PMs to /showitems or to give up your items. This is the rule right now but people abuse it so easily because most people aren't willing to wait around to find out if the victim lied to keep their 4 grams of cocaine hidden deep in their pockets. This suggestion allows both sides to be honest with each other, and there's less room for people to lie about their belongings. Most if not all robbers will see the /showitems and not return to get those items after, provided the victim was honest about what they had.

 

You're wasting your own roleplay time and the time of others by stalling the roleplay trying to enforce the fact you have no items or cash knowing full well you're carrying $2346 and three phones.

 

Naturally, the main goal of robberies should be roleplay over monetary gain, however in the state that the server is in regarding illegal roleplayers, roleplay is not being put in priority because people are using robberies as their main source of income. 

Edited February 11, 2021 by EffPee

[Taina]

4 minutes ago, EffPee said:

You're wasting your own roleplay time and the time of others by stalling the roleplay trying to enforce the fact you have no items or cash knowing full well you're carrying $2346 and three phones.

My character doesn't typically carry more than a few hundred dollars and I become very frustrated when someone spam's me with /showitems or accuses me of stalling. It's a quick way to ruin a good RP because the person robbing me is prioritizing monetary gain over roleplay.  It should never be assumed that another player is 'lying' about items or 'stalling'. The suggestion made in the OP is a good way of addressing this problem.

 

8 minutes ago, EffPee said:

Naturally, the main goal of robberies should be roleplay over monetary gain, however in the state that the server is in regarding illegal roleplayers, roleplay is not being put in priority because people are using robberies as their main source of income. 

 

And this just points to a major character development issue. If a character is that hard up for money, then he/she should be seeking an additional  source of income, whether it's legal/illegal - like people do in real life. Otherwise, they should just RP struggling to survive on the very little they make while relying solely on robbing people as a source of income.  But prioritizing monetary gain over roleplay is something that should never happen - whether or not robberies are a character's main source of income.

 

[Xaleya]

On 2/9/2021 at 3:46 AM, Garras Up said:

There's also the issue of cunts rping robberies simply for items. The vast majority of times I've committed robberies it's been for money. Half the time I'll just rp taking their wallet and leaving, it usually makes for decent RP scenes when you're not just full patting them down in the middle of the street like you're some sort of army soldier.

 

I'am a person who had to deal with robberies IRL, from the simple robbery without gun to knifes and pistols.

Since they are quick moments, go in and out. They will only check your pockets and any place where you could hide something logical, like a phone which is what they mainly search IRL plus money. Actually i got robbed several times IRL and they missed my phone like 2 times (I never got anything taken out) because they checked the wrong pockets and forgot my hoodie or i had it on my backpack and i blantantly lied about it with my best calm face so they didn't had the chance for checking because it will raise suspision.

The non-regular criminals are the ones who goes for precise targets, people with wealth, luxury shit than are harder to caught but offers easy chances to rob, their houses or their vehicles and if during such actions there isn't a noticeable alert to LSPD they will keep harassing that person even with multiple kidnappings. 

The regular criminal goes for easy, phones and cash but you may wonder why I said phones like 3 or 4 times, because IRL you have a few things called "boxes" (also cracked programs) like the following image, than its used for breaking into the phones (with security locks) and changing their IMEI number (The International Mobile Equipment Identity) which is used for tracking the phone, making it reusable but police will notice than its illegal upon checking properly the numbers. This kind of modification can only be done by people with more than two brain cells and not regular criminals itself, but its how it works on the streets. The regular criminals are 99% of the time peasants with poor education than can't go out of such hell, not the smartest person on the alley and often the poorest, making robberies for drugs and the daily food 

Edited February 11, 2021 by Xaleya