The role of scripts and admins in maintaining order

[kolun9i]

Hey. I have been playing commander battle for a very long time, and I love the server eu_commander for its stability. However, there are some controversial things that I would like to bring to the discussion. 

It's about the rules. Initially, the mount and blade game is imperfect, there is a huge scope for cheating and spoiling the game, and therefore on the server there are a huge number of rules that are disadvantageous for the player. It is justified, it is necessary, and makes the game better. Problems begin when the human factor comes into play. It is expected that many players do not want to follow the rules, and control is needed, for which there are dozens of admins on the server. Situations happen absolutely regularly when admins simply do not see violations, and when other players turn their attention to them, admins ask for evidence, since they did not notice. Admins often interpret violations in their own way, inventing their own rules and criteria on the go. It makes no sense to complain about such incidents, because the server management does not even respond to obvious excesses of admin privileges. Playing in such an atmosphere of injustice and unpredictability is uncomfortable.

In addition, the function of admins is very doubtful. In fact, 90% of the messages that the player should dismount, the rest about the fact that you can not ramboing or swear.
The main problem, in my opinion, is that the control method does not correspond to the types of violation. Admins are people, they are less likely to detect minor and frequent violations, they are unable to promptly and impartially respond to them, but they can understand rare and complex situations, such as conflicts.

I can talk for a long time about admin ethics and the distribution of roles and powers of the admin and the player, since I myself have been an administrator for 2 years, and the players could even insult me as an equal player, not fearing bans, but being afraid to break a few but unambiguous rules, but instead I will offer some useful solutions.

1. The most common problem - players do not dismount when necessary. In half the cases, admins will not notice this. This is exactly the case where human control is a bit like nailing with a microscope. The simplest trigger that causes horses, for example, 15hp damage every second, if the player is alone on the horse in the squad, will leave enough time to escape from the battlefield, but will make the game ramboing and delaying impossible. And, most importantly, the script has no mood! Unpleasant situations will still be possible when, for example, the horse suddenly died during the battle, but this is a rule, not an interpretation of the admin, and everyone will be equal. Technically, this is elementary done, I can help with the code.
Already at this stage, 75% of admins can simply be dissolved.

2. Modify the anti-rambo script a bit, namely, “if a player remains 1 in the squad, then upon impact we check the distance not to the member of his squad, but to the nearest allied bot”.
At this stage, any ramboing is defeated, and players will be able, with a clear conscience, to do what they can technically without fear of comments.

3. Correct the rules. We need a few clear rules. This horror, like "if you are in an attack, you can not dismount, but if you dismounted, then you can’t attack" can be thrown away. To leave things in the rules like a ban to interfere with artillery and mention of illegal actions, such as racism, threats, etc. (in my opinion, it’s pointless to ban for obscene language, especially for insulting “their majesty” admins, since the essence of the administration is not in untouchability but in duties and powers), but I understand that it is unlikely.

By completing only these 3 points we will get a comfortable and predictable game, many times easier task for administrators, and avoid many conflict situations

I have some more interesting thoughts on improving the gameplay, but I decided to start with the main one, and I hope that the server’s management takes care of the its future.

Wish you all the best.

[Diamond63]

Thanks for the suggestions! I will discuss everything here with other seniors, then we will reply.

[Black Knight]

I like idea behind 1st suggestion. We already have a scripter who do all whats need to be done for server. So we need to see if this is doable and maybe implement this to server. Would help a loot in terms of removing human factor from equation. But still needs to be discussed for potential problems.

Not sure I competently understand the second suggestion. Could you elaborate that bit closer? 

Keep in mind that rambo rule is more about confusing bots and exploit game engine in that way, and less about rambo killing all bots on map. As someone who is well familiar with game itself and game engine and its limitations am not afraid of lone cav attacking me as much as lone cav drawing away my fire when maybe i need them to aim on enemy line. So that is  the whole logic behind that. Its also hard to write 2 word rule but not to make it to confusing or too short for anyone to understand what you want to say.

I would not agree whit your 3rd point. We discussed about our rules in general in our meeting and also we discussed about rules text. So in no change will be done in that particular way. Rules are what they are, and if all just follow those few simple stuff we will have no problems. Keep in mind that if all would be on their best behaviour we would not have any need for admins in term of dealing whit rule breakers.
Even developers saw need to do something regarding rambo units so made add on whit script. 

What concern me the most is game play rules, or rules that affect fair play. So we tend to keep it as clean as possible. Slur and insults are not allowed but its common sense and no need to list them on server as that. Everyone who overdo it will be dealt with. I in general hate small takes about anything that is not game related because it distracts player from game and he losses perception on things around him. But that is just me...

Thank you for your suggestions, if you have anything more feel free to share it here in this thread to keep things neat. 

Respectfully
HA of EU Commander
BK

[kolun9i]

Regarding the first point, it is very simple. If anything, feel free to ask me. And potential problems can be honed. In any case, it will be more effective than admin control.

The second point. (Sorry, I am writing with a translator, so there may be inaccuracies)
Now the built-in anti-rambo script looks something like this: when a player hits, his distance to all bots on the map is checked, however, if the next bot from the cycle does not belong to the player’s squad, then the check is not performed. And if the player is alone, then the check is not performed at all, and therefore he freely strikes. The idea is that the player could not inflict damage far from allied bots, even without bots in the squad.
I suggest simply replacing the condition "if the bot is from the player’s squad" by "if the bot is from the player’s team." These are 1-2 lines, I don’t remember exactly what this script looks like.


As for true rembing, I agree, distraction is a problem. But I was 100 times faced with the fact that my cavalry detachment, for example, was taken by 1 player. And I have never seen a warning for such a violation. As a result, there is absolutely no fight against distraction, and a very ineffective fight directly against single attacks. By the way, I also have an idea how to avoid distractions. It is also very simple, but I do not want to overload the message now, I will definitely present my ideas in a separate post. At the very least, anti-rambo will allow you to avoid exactly the attacking component, this is a plus.

"if all would be on their best behavior we would not have any need for admins" it seems to me that this is a very big "if" But this, of course, is logical.

I repeat, the point is not to cut the rules, but to shift the details not to the players themselves, but to the scripts as much as possible. And let the rules be something like a constitution, and, for good, the implementation of 1 point will allow you to clear the rule regarding ramboing, save the admin chat from flooding, and everything that is necessary can get into the game rules.
Do you think this is a very clear rule? )
"If you had charged with your men, and all of them were killed, you are allowed to keep fighting on the horse, but when the charge ends you must dismount and join friendly line."
After the introduction of changes, 1-4 rules are no longer needed (1 - and so the rudiment, it only confuses players)

And regarding the insults. I am not a supporter of prohibiting insults, it smacks of restriction of freedom of speech and moral dictatorship, but this is not the main problem. You can easily insult anyone, but for insulting the admin you catch a ban. An admin is an player with more power. If he was insulted as a player, then what right does he have to use powers that his opponent does not have? And if he reacts like an admin, then how could you insult him precisely as an admin? I see this as a contradiction, but this is my personal opinion. You either ban for ALL insults (agree, this is unrealistic), or indicate in the rules that admins are elected, and no one can insult them.
Or give players freedom

Sorry for the volume, too caring for the mount&blade )