Member Questions

Just opening this up here, since a few questions were asked in the Discord tonight. Feel free to chuck in your own questions or thoughts! <3

I believe the original conversation centered around questions on what exactly constitutes "meta-gaming" for Wild Fauna. I'm also curious about this, since the general rule from the guidebook seems to stifle creativity when it comes to Wild Fauna x Wolf interactions:

These characters may be close companions to wolves but cannot be used unfairly to meta-game or aid in combat. It will be the responsibility of involved players to report any suspected abuse.

What exactly does this mean? To me, and based on what I read in chat, it means that my weaksauce cougar Umi would be unable to help a wolf she was best friends with if they were in trouble.

It was mentioned that using a bird Wild Fauna to learn about pack whereabouts is considered meta-gaming, but I don't think this should be the case. If I'm a player willing to play a bird, and I'm willing to put in the time to have my character cross a large swath of map and try my best to listen in on a conversation, then go all the way back and tell (potentially incorrect information) to a wolf, why is this a problem?

For NPCs, this rule makes more sense, since in general NPCs can't be used to gain new information or aid in combat. An actual character makes less sense, and I'm honestly not sure where the line is or why it's there.

I always thought that rule applied to wild fauna NPCs specifically, because we had instances in the past of people using NPC animals for information (birds) and pack protection (apex predators) and had to curb that. Neither packs or characters should ever be able to use NPCs for any kind of advantage, wolf or wild fauna, imo.

But it wouldn't make sense to tell a player that their written character can't participate in whatever fashion they want, whether it's a wolf or a bear, beyond natural confines, i.e. bears can't join wolf packs. If I'm writing a bear and I want it to ally with a pack and attack another pack, why should I need special permission for that? Most wild fauna are not overpowered compared to wolves. A bear will destroy a single wolf, but it will lose to a wolf pack the vast majority of the time, for example, which is also true of elk and moose and other wolf prey animals. That is exactly why wolves live in packs.

If it applies to played Wild Fauna characters as well, that seems unnecessarily restrictive for a situation that might happen rarely, if ever. I can see how it could become problematic if multiple WF are teaming up with a specific pack, but I don't think it ever would, and would make more sense to address case by case?

The rule is the same for both because in general, wolf characters ignore the wild fauna around them.  That's something they can do because the only characters (in general) wolves worry about competing with is other wolves on site.

when you toss wild fauna into the mix, it becomes very easy to get messy.  Birds can be assumed to "spy" on any private thread and ruin plots they weren't meant to be involved in.  They can trespass on pack ground without repercussion.  Larger wild fauna can "join" packs in theory and slant the odds ridiculously in their favor when it comes to interpack conflict.

a good rule of thumb is "does this feel unfair to other members" when using wild fauna.  Are you using them in a way that gives your favored side an advantage? If so, then don't.  However, if all parties agree, and they are used to increase the fun for all, that is a different story.

We only really ever mind wild fauna participation when it is reported to us by a member that they are being used unfairly.  Otherwise, feel free to have fun with them!

The simplest way to make things clear would be to not allow wild fauna at all since they don't follow really... any of the rules or limitations wolves do.  We don't want to do that, however! So instead we have the compromise of allowing them for plot and writing reasons but disallowing them from being used as cheat methods to gather information, gain advantage, or provide muscle to wolves against other players.

(Others feel free to weigh in though! This is my take)

Birds can be assumed to "spy" on any private thread and ruin plots they weren't meant to be involved in.

If it's an NPC then it would be cheating to use it this way and that not being permitted makes sense. The rule came about because of this exact scenario, iirc. If it's a played character, though. it still has to be invited into a private thread, same as a wolf character. There's no advantage here.

This is why companions is such a grey area. Birds are used for information in real life, do birds understand wolf-speak or not? IMO, companions shouldn't but then that brings up which creatures can or cannot speak wolf-tongue. But if birds cannot speak to their companions, then what would be the issue? It would make all this harder to metagame, or at least just nudge metagaming by having these "spies" pop in and out of threads without any IC reason for it.

As for other WF characters helping their wolf friends, most WF don't trust or work well with wolves, at least this shouldn't be common. It's also unfair for someone who plays a WF or the wolf who worked at befriending them to not have them as a battle companion should things get sour and both are in the same thread. But then, that also brings my point in the discord chat - large fauna companions (bears, eagles, pumas). All of this seems like a headache. How would a companion bear be any different than a player played WF bear? In my opinion, companions shouldn't be bigger than a wolf, they should always be a lot smaller like a cat even.

PPS: And I agree with chelsie above. if its player played bird, it still has to be treated like a player played wolf and be invited and not just swing in for the shit of it

Birds can be assumed to "spy" on any private thread and ruin plots they weren't meant to be involved in.

TLDR; I shadow-posted Noki and they hit the points I was trying to say

In this case, it seems clear that it's the assumption that's the problem, not the action itself. This is absolutely one of those cases where the Wild Fauna player should check in with other players involved (the same way they would for most cases as a Wolf character). There's nothing that stops a wolf from also being able to do this.

I get that unfair advantages can feel pretty crappy, but if it's an advantage (and a slight one, as Chelsie points out) that makes in character sense, I don't see the issue.

The way the rule in the guidebook is worded, it reads as though all combat scenarios are off limits. Maybe just a wording adjustment is needed?

I feel like the same rules that apply to Wolf characters should apply to Wild Fauna characters in conflict scenarios. NO ONE is allowed to metagame. Wolves can't do it, birds can't do it, bears can't do it. 

When you say this:

Birds can be assumed to "spy" on any private thread and ruin plots they weren't meant to be involved in.

If it's assumed, it's metagaming. Nudge it.

As far as an advantage in conflict scenarios, we have safeguards in place for wolves not to take advantage of those scenarios. Why would adding wild fauna into the mix make it different? You can't have an overpowered wolf make every hit in a fight, you can't swarm a thread with members that are on the other side of the map — ergo, your bear character shouldn't automatically turn the tide for the pack it's fighting for, because that's metagaming.

And to me, the rule is more restrictive on the Wild Fauna characters that DO exist and it's based on unlikely hypotheticals. It just doesn't happen. And so I agree with your sentence:

a good rule of thumb is "does this feel unfair to other members" when using wild fauna.  Are you using them in a way that gives your favored side an advantage? If so, then don't.

Which to me, eliminates the need for the "no aiding in combat rule" because a Wild Fauna character being actively played is subject to the same metagaming standards as a Wolf character.

The only wild fauna that should be held to this rule are NPCs, IMHO.

EDIT: I am addressing Starr; I was beaten to the punch by like three other posters LOL

The reason I think it is different is this - 

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.

Wolves can "listen in" but borders and such prevent that a lot more with wolves than they do with birds etc.  it might be redundant with meta gaming rules!! But I still think it's worth having in the guidebook.

"Unfairly" is the absolute key word here.  "Unfairly aid in combat" means, to me, in a way that is not agreed on.  IE a way that makes players uncomfortable.  We are a wolf rp first and foremost.  Not to say maybe another wording might not be better, but I'd have a hard time finding one that encapsulates this.

They don't do so against wild fauna.

But..they do. Certainly against apex predators they do.  

"Unfairly" is the absolute key word here.  "Unfairly aid in combat" means, to me, in a way that is not agreed on.  IE a way that makes players uncomfortable.  We are a wolf rp first and foremost.  Not to say maybe another wording might not be better, but I'd have a hard time finding one that encapsulates this.

Again, the direct quote is this: "cannot be used unfairly to meta-game or aid in combat."

This reads like: "cannot be used unfairly to meta-game, or to aid in combat at all."
If this is not the intention, the wording needs adjustment.

All apex predators fight among themselves for land and prey, wolves fight bears and cougars all the time for resources - they just usually don't because wolves need numbers and most predators won't risk injury unless food is absolutely scarce and its that or starve. So a bear or cougar would absolutely be treated like a threat by the pack, especially when puppies could easily be killed or eaten

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?

"Unfairly" is the absolute key word here.  "Unfairly aid in combat" means, to me, in a way that is not agreed on.  IE a way that makes players uncomfortable.  We are a wolf rp first and foremost.  Not to say maybe another wording might not be better, but I'd have a hard time finding one that encapsulates this.

Again, the direct quote is this: "cannot be used unfairly to meta-game or aid in combat."

This reads like: "cannot be used unfairly to meta-game, or to aid in combat at all."
If this is not the intention, the wording needs adjustment.

Wholeheartedly agree with this.

I've been reading all the replies, thank you guys for chiming in!

Are players feeling that the current WF rule as it stands is that restrictive? The way it is now, players of WF could aid in combat if it is agreed upon by all parties. The rule is put into place because players would try to use NPCs (and sometimes, would make a WF account) to gain unfair leverage in plots like wars.

Would players be okay then, with WF totally being able to participate in war plots -- even if it meant their side losing?

Follow up question - this has been a rule in effect for a long time and we've never had players voice an issue with it. Why is it an issue now?

In my opinion it’s only an issue if a player purposely plotted for a wild fauna to help out during a war as opposed to just naturally through play. It’s pretty obvious when it happens too as suddenly when a war plot is in talks, one side gets a wild fauna character that was freshly made, suddenly reactivates, and/or never spoken to them before is on their side. 

metagaming is already against the site's policies so I just can't understand why it's an issue to begin with? Or why it's any different than someone speed threading with minimum effort to mastery to prepare for a war either? Both are unfair, and technically mega.

And it only became an issue to me when I found out about it. Sure WOLF is mainly focussed on wolves, but when you have the ability to play wild fauna and it’s so restrictive despite having the same clock as wolves to post (two weeks) as well as other player restrictions, and fauna specific restrictions, it seems redundant to even have them at all. Especially when if it’s done without mega gaming, you have to purposely plot for that player played fauna to be somewhere else regardless if it makes sense for them to or not.

I'm just going to play devil's advocate for a moment then!

if we remove the restriction for wild fauna, and allow them to participate, then we are hands off on wild fauna.  If you want pack meetings to remain amongst pack only, you'll need to mark them private, because birds will be able to hop in with no repercussions.  Smaller wild fauna (I am aware larger ones are similar to wolves!) will also be able to trespass and gain information (and kickstart conflict) with few repercussions as well.  And Wild fauna will be able to participate entirely in war plots without restriction.

Things like "unfairly" allow us and members to interpret the rule on a case by case basis.  If we remove this restriction, then no matter what, wild fauna participation in wars will be allowed and valid.  I don't feel comfortable addressing rules and enforcing restrictions that don't exist in the guidebook for players to reference.

im not against changing the wording to better indicate the "unfairly" is on both, but if we did remove it entirely, it would be on members to work out amongst themselves how WF work.  We'd no longer have any hand in it to prevent meta gaming.  If the character joins a thread, they gain whatever they gain, and packs would be able to ally with any number of wf they choose.

I'm just going to play devil's advocate for a moment then!

if we remove the restriction for wild fauna, and allow them to participate, then we are hands off on wild fauna.  If you want pack meetings to remain amongst pack only, you'll need to mark them private, because birds will be able to hop in with no repercussions.  Smaller wild fauna (I am aware larger ones are similar to wolves!) will also be able to trespass and gain information (and kickstart conflict) with few repercussions as well.  And Wild fauna will be able to participate entirely in war plots without restriction.

Things like "unfairly" allow us and members to interpret the rule on a case by case basis.  If we remove this restriction, then no matter what, wild fauna participation in wars will be allowed and valid.  I don't feel comfortable addressing rules and enforcing restrictions that don't exist in the guidebook for players to reference.

im not against changing the wording to better indicate the "unfairly" is on both, but if we did remove it entirely, it would be on members to work out amongst themselves how WF work.  We'd no longer have any hand in it to prevent meta gaming.  If the character joins a thread, they gain whatever they gain, and packs would be able to ally with any number of wf they choose.

I can definitely see your point here! I think a clarification that "unfairly" applies to the full sentence rather than just the first would solve things, at least IMHO.

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I'm just going to play devil's advocate for a moment then!

if we remove the restriction for wild fauna, and allow them to participate, then we are hands off on wild fauna.  If you want pack meetings to remain amongst pack only, you'll need to mark them private, because birds will be able to hop in with no repercussions.  Smaller wild fauna (I am aware larger ones are similar to wolves!) will also be able to trespass and gain information (and kickstart conflict) with few repercussions as well.  And Wild fauna will be able to participate entirely in war plots without restriction.

Things like "unfairly" allow us and members to interpret the rule on a case by case basis.  If we remove this restriction, then no matter what, wild fauna participation in wars will be allowed and valid.  I don't feel comfortable addressing rules and enforcing restrictions that don't exist in the guidebook for players to reference.

im not against changing the wording to better indicate the "unfairly" is on both, but if we did remove it entirely, it would be on members to work out amongst themselves how WF work.  We'd no longer have any hand in it to prevent meta gaming.  If the character joins a thread, they gain whatever they gain, and packs would be able to ally with any number of wf they choose.

obligatory mention of my tone possibly not coming off the right way apologies in advance 

why is the knee jerk reaction to just go hands off completely? There is absolutely a happy medium here and it shouldn't be left _entirely_ up to members on how something is handled, especially if can disrupt game play. I 100% agree with previous mentions of lifting such heavy restrictions from WF characters but I'd DONT think that the CMs should resort to a hands off approach. It doesn't have to be all in for either solution. Like I said, maybe a happy medium? I'm not sure what that would look like (brain is dead from work) but I'm sure something could be proposed.

Any kind of metagaming according to the guidebook is against site policies. Whether it is Wild Fauna or regular wolf characters. 

I also don't understand why changing his would have no restrictions on wild fauna and instead treat them like regular characters, which, for me, I thought was how it always went up until now because it makes more sense since it is a player played character. Metagaming is against the site's policies, and a character obtaining a wild fauna to help them during a war or whatever and they drop off the face of the earth after - or randomly come back for those plots is clearly suspicious of metagaming and should we warned. Just like how a character randomly appearing halfway across the map to solidify an alliance is also metagaming when OOC knowledge influences that character to do so.

Or again, spreeing half-assed threads to get masteries to gain favour in a war as well is still considered metagaming since they are using ooc knowledge to prepare for ic threads. Regardless if its WF or a regular wolf character, metagaming should be treated as that, against site policies. I really don't see the confusion here?

So far my what I'm reading, metagaming is allowed depending on the character if it's wild fauna since they do fuck all anyway or it is allowed if it's justified despite it clearly being influenced OOC because staff are "hands-off" on any ooc matters.

The current is a happy medium in my mind! (Barring the word change).

The reason I don't like enforcing rules that aren't in the guidebook is there is nothing to reference when cracking down and no way for the member to know, beforehand, that what they are doing is wrong!  By definition, if we remove the restrictions from the guidebook, then we remove any official restrictions and any staff responsibility.  It would be up to members to handle it, 100%.

We can't take one player's preference over another, on ic events, when those players are fairly present in threads.  There's instances where we will step in on metagaming, but the situations above would all be fair game for a wolf character and therefore fair game for a wild fauna character if the aside was removed!

not to say the rule is going away, I just wanted to bring the thoughts and why the rule exists currently ^^

Then there is the problem, none of that should be fair game for either wolf or wf. Those instances are all considered metagaming since they take ooc context into ic threads. Metagaming is metagaming. If someone did any of those to me, I guarantee I would not be happy, especially if staff were to tell me it's out of their hands. 

It's not taking one player over another, it's reading the situation and either agreeing that ooc influenced ic in order to gain an unfair advantage on a case by case basis.

I guess I should clarify - 

trespassing rules don't apply to wf as it stands.  With birds and the like, it would be hard to resolve that since they move so freely and out of reach.

so the following would all be fair game for wolf characters if trespassing rules were not in place.  This is something we could look at, but it would stretch realism a bit (which we do at times) and limit wf more, almost, by enforcing the same trespass consequences as wolf characters.

the third instance is of course allowed, as we don't limit alliances between packs one bit.  We trust members to work out "wars" amongst themselves, and usually such things are gained by ic development.

It's already been discussed that wolves fight with wild fauna all the time irl to protect their land, young, and resources - so wf should be treated like any other character and obtain injury if they are on pack lands and thus surrounded by a pack of wolves. Wolves alone are no real threat to bears, pumas, or any other large fauna, but as a pack, wolves have a huge advantage. So again, I really do think they should all just be treated as regular members.

As for birds who are flying over, they really shouldn't hear much anyway despite trespassing through the air. They are 1. too high up, 2. the air is in their ears and birds rely more on sight than anything, 3. people can just stop talking as soon as a bird appears. It's not that big of an issue.

As for the last instance, again, the problem is ooc influencing ic, which is against site policies and should be treated as such. Characters appearing somewhere just because it furthers them along with more so is by all means, "unfair" through metagaming and once again, should be treated as a case by case depending on severity. So far I haven't really seen any issue of this, this is mostly a hypothetical scenario since now that is it out in the open, it might be an issue in the future.

Regardless of what type of character it is, metagaming is metagaming and should be treated as such.

There's a lot of hypotheticals being tossed around here that would likely never happen? What happened to trusting members to be reasonable and allowing members to nudge and/or report things they consider unfair? I know you're playing devil's advocate with those examples, but I don't think it'd even happen. If it did, as Noki said, it would be extremely obvious and easy to address.

No one is going to chuck a Wild Fauna into a pack meeting for the purpose of stealing information, for example, even if they theoretically could. It's a pack meeting. It's for the pack, specifically. I don't think it would even cross the minds of 99% of the community to do something like this, and for the 1% who would put a bird uninvited into a meeting, they'd end up being nudged, probably multiple times if they refused to remove the post after the first one. In fact, to me it's implied that pack meetings are private threads.

I don't understand why the immediate assumption is that people are going to go balls to the wall with abusing WF characters if WF characters are treated the same as wolf characters when it comes to alliances and conflict, and yeah, they should likely be held to trespassing standards or some kind of territory conditions for simplicity's sake and to quash that minute possibility of abusing them, but I don't think treating them the same as NPC fauna is right. Birds and bats flying over a territory are "immune" to damage by design, but simply add a condition that they can't overhear stuff unless all players agree to it. That's easily enforceable. Small WF will be hunted by wolves in their territory and large WF are already treated like a threat.

The rule's been around a long time but before it existed, I can't recall a single played character being misused in the ways described. It was always NPCs. I never had an issue with the rule because a) I don't play WF and b) I thought it applied only to NPC fauna.

Is this an actual issue present in game, or are these just hypotheticals? I see a lot of hypotheticals on both sides - but one thing I know for certain, is that people have abused both NPCs and played WFs to try to gain an advantage in a conflict situation. And I do know that players were unhappy with this.

Has the current ruling caused issues to anyone who currently plays or played a WF?

Would everyone be okay with Ursus rolling up on EH with three war-bears? EH members, how do you feel about this?

Would everyone be okay with Hydra having scout eagles that overhear when a pack forms, where it forms, and who leads it because the eagle put a cameo in an important thread? NWF, Saints, how do you feel about this?

Would people be okay with WF interjecting in plot-centric threads and derailing it?  Pledged and forming pack players, how do you feel about this?

Would you (specific) be okay with your character's pack losing in a war-plot because a WF gave your opponents an advantage?

WF have restrictions to keep the game wolf-centric and the narrative fair. Are players ready to embrace things not going their way because a WF is involved?