In my previous RPG Etiquette Episode (more than a year ago now), I adopted a rather cynical and sarcastic tone. This Episode will depart from that a bit by taking a more neutral opinion on matters.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, Godmodding essentially stands for "godly modification", where a player makes his or her character unrealistically powerful or omniprescient, like a god. Ever heard of the slang term "hax"? A godmodder is basically the text-based RPG's equivalent of hax.

Let's use a scenario to clarify this definition. Let's say you're role-playing in an RPG. Your character is a Toa, let's call him Toa A. You're fighting another player who also has a Toa, let's call him Toa B.

IC: Toa A sized Toa B up. Toa B looked harmless enough, but Toa A knew that it was most likely an appearance.

 

Toa A started off by shooting a ball of flame at Toa B to see what he would do.

IC: Toa B dodged the ball of flame. "Is that all you can do?" he said. He shot a blast of lightning that hit Toa A.

IC: Toa A rolled to the side, but the blast of Lightning glanced off his shoulder. He cursed at the smell of burning flesh coming from his wound, but he siphoned off the heat to deal with it. He then shot two streams of fire at Toa B. Let's see him dodge this in the narrow alleyway we're in.

IC: Toa B dodged the fire. "You're boring me!" He shot another blast of Lightning at Toa A. This one hit him in the chest and killed him.

Above I've illustrated the usual symptoms of godmodding. Player B not only has his own hits inexplicably hit his opponent without giving him a chance to react (a subcategory of godmodding called auto-hitting), but he also showed a disregard for Player A's actions and his surroundings (dodging their attacks without getting hit, despite being in a narrow alley).

Now let's say Player C comes in. Player C has accumulated quite an army from years of role-playing, and has brought a fleet of airships that she has earned.

IC: Captain C noticed one Toa killing another. "We need to stop this criminal for the sake of justice! Open fire!" The fleet of airships began bombarding Toa B below.

IC: "More pests? How annoying." Toa B ran up the side of the wall, masterfully avoiding every torpedo that came his way. Then he executed a perfect backflip, landing on top of one of the airships. He shot a blast of lightning through it, destroying it, then steered the falling airship toward the other one. In less than a minute Toa B had destroyed the entire airship.

 

Toa B stepped in front of Captain C struggling to get out of the rubble. "Goodbye," he said. He shot a blast of lightning through Captain C.

Now the godmodding gets more unrealistic than before. Yes, we all see this in movies. A single person somehow manages to take down an entire airfleet through sheer awesomeness alone. But unfortunately, what godmodders often don't understand is that RPGs aren't movies, and that they (or their characters) are not the main character in some epic battle. In RPGs author powers don't apply, and using them without respect for the other player's wishes often leads to being punished.

But my main purpose for writing this entry isn't to tell you what godmodding is. Chances are, if you're in an RPG, you know.

So, we know what the problem is. How do we solve it?

Usually (and hopefully), all it takes is a word with the godmodder. Most of the time they don't know that they're being unrealistic, and once they've been corrected they get better.

But sometimes things aren't that easy. Sometimes the godmodder just doesn't get it, or if he/she does, just doesn't care. Maybe he or she likes being all powerful and invincible, and the rules can go to heck because they're in control, they get to make their character as omnipotent as they want.

If you've been RPing for more than a few months, you've probably run into this situation. Maybe you're Player A, and your character is the one that gets "killed" by the other player. Maybe you're an observer, but you see how Player B is clearly godmodding and breaking the rules. Maybe you're a Staff Member, and it's your job to tell Player B to quit it.

It's never pretty, and it's never fun. If Player B is okay with godmodding, he's probably okay with breaking every other rule in the RPG or even disrespecting the staff. On the internet where it's hard to actually enforce a rule on someone who intentionally chooses not to follow it, dealing with this can be frustrating.

But deal with it we must, because otherwise, without consequences, Player B can godmodd all he wants and the RPG would fall apart.

So how should we deal with it? Punish the godmodder? Sometimes this helps. Sometimes they just keep playing without regard for the rules.

Ban the godmodder? Sure, that would make things much nicer. But does that guy deserve this punishment? He should be given a chance to improve himself, even if that chance happens to be the twentieth we've given him.

Does he even deserve another chance? If we're considering doing something like banning the godmodder, he's probably done enough to deserve it. It would certainly save ourselves the trouble of having to deal with him again (which is a very real possibility).

That dilemma is a tough one, but punishing the godmodder is a privilege that only staff have. What should we regular players do if we are godmodded against, or see someone godmodding?

Telling them is usually the first option, but in rare circumstances where this godmodder is repeating his "crime", what would we do?

Godmodd back? Fighting fire with fire works in many situations, but not in this one. If we try godmodding against the godmodder, he'll just godmodd more, thinking it's okay to, or doing it because we made him mad. Worst case, when the staff finally get to the problem, they may just punish all of us, because we also godmodded. If we sink down to his level, then he has an excuse to break the rules.

Ignore him? We could just have everyone not interact with the godmodder, but that may not work if the godmodder actively seeks out people to beat up.

The biggest problem is, a godmodder will usually respond to bigger conflicts with even more godmodding. Things escalate without a way for a reasonable solution to be achieved. I don't entirely know a path we can always take against godmodding, but I do know that responding with godmodding definitely won't work. If we get mad over this, then we're no better than the guy who repeatedly godmodds.

What I think is the best road to take in this circumstance, is to just let the staff handle it. They have the authority to punish him, and if the godmodder ignores even the staff then there's no help for him anyway.

A group of kids run around on the playground. One of them points at another. "Bang! Bang!"

The kid ducks. "Missed me!" he points at the first. "Bang! Bang! You're dead!"

"No I'm not!"

"Yes you are! I hit you!"

"No I hit you!"

"Liar!"

"Cheater!"