Upon reviewing ban logs and general complaints we receive, the use of guns / combat seems to be a recurring theme. When the new sim opens, I'll be placing a suspension on the use of guns in RP while we, as a community, figure out what policy should be put in place to help mitigate this problem.

In my personal experience, gun play does more harm than good, especially in a growing community. How creative is it to point a gun at someone to kidnap them? If there is gun play, it should extend role-play rather than limit it; do you know quickly getting shot really ends an RP scene? Right now, we can't even say that victims of gunshot wounds can get more RP through the hospital because it's in the process of being revitalized.

Though most of us are sensible players that know the difference between good RP and powergaming, unfortunately, we can't make that kind of assumption for new and inexperienced folks. Guides can only go so far, right? Do we need to establish some sort of vetting process for players who want to use guns? Do guns even belong in a BDSM/Forced Fantasy-focused community like DE? These are the kinds of questions I'd like you all to ponder and put your thoughts in so I can draft a proposal.

In the meantime, Police will be encouraged to use non-lethal weapons (batons, stun guns), while citizen baddies can use whatever is reasonably accessible to them (switchblades, chloroform, etc.). To those who use guns substantially in your scenes, simply consider this a challenge -- great time to think of other ways to intimidate and entrap your victims!