Member Questions

Wolves protect their borders against other wolves. They don't do so against wild fauna. This rule is meant only to give members the ability to call out wild fauna who are being used against them in a way that is unfair.

This isn't really true in real life, though, and shouldn't be true on the site, either. Wolves frequently protect their territory and their kills from other apex predators and even some smaller predators. In Yellowstone, at least, wolves compete more often with bears than they do with other wolves, and they often run off and kill scavenging coyotes. There are many documented reports of wolves and ravens aiding one another when it comes to finding food. On the other hand, wolves are absolutely disallowed from crossing pack borders without consequence in the game, but in real life, wolves do this all the time because borders overlap and fluctuate, so packs don't necessarily protect against other wolves, either. They simply protect their resources, period.

Regardless, for someone to have a bird wild fauna character listen in on a pack discussion in a pack territory, the thread either has to be all welcome, which means it's fair game, or they have to be invited to participate. If they've been invited, then the listening in has presumably been agreed upon, and if they turn up in an all welcome thread and the wolf players prefer they not be there, they can just contact the bird's player. I don't think most players on this site would be unreasonable about that. If it's an NPC bird, it's cheating, and if it's assumed BTS that the bird overheard it but wasn't actually present, that is metagaming. Besides that, I don't understand treating player controlled wild fauna any different from player controlled wolves. The issue was only ever with NPCs, so I always assumed the rule was specific to NPCs, not played WF. It's not metagaming if a player controlled bird overhears something in one thread and tells a wolf in another thread. This is no different than a wolf telling another wolf something.

The definition of metagaming is as follows:

In role-playing games, a player is metagaming when they use knowledge that is not available to their character in order to change the way they play their character (usually to give them an advantage within the game)

If they obtain knowledge through fair means—such as a player controlled bird hearing something in a thread, and then relaying that information in another thread—it can't be called metagaming. Just because a bird can fly doesn't necessarily mean it's unfair.

If something happens that players feel isn't fair, it can be nudged and/or reported, but I don't understand having a "no aiding conflict scenarios" blanket rule for roleplayed wild fauna characters when this problem has only ever arisen with NPCs. It would probably never even become a problem, and if it did, I think everyone here is reasonable enough to pull their wild fauna character out if it's making people uncomfortable. Most wild fauna aren't interested in wolves, anyway, but why stifle that creative liberty when creative liberty is the whole reason this site is semi-realistic?