Learn Me Good

[quido]

I'd like to know the black and white rules regarding claiming (non-raid) mobs at this point. It seems that everyone has their own interpretation of the rules that they invoke at will to complain about whatever it is.

I was under the impression that things pretty much stood at "if it's not engaged, it's not claimed." I tried to find the post where I read that - I thought it was an Uthgaard or a Rogean thing designed to make things easy for everyone, including the GMs. I thought that for you to call a mob "yours" you had to either be sitting over or around its spawn or already fighting it. I've always sort of borne the question "how bad do you want it?" in mind. It's like going to a rock concert and trying to get to the front row - how bad do you want it? If you want something, take it! All you need to do is want it more than the next guy.

Now there's the other whiny side of the argument. "I'm claiming these mobs and if you pull any of them I'm gonna cry about it in /say." We're all hungry for experience. We're all hungry for drops. Everyone wants their own little piece of Norrath and I'll be damned if I'm not going to try and get mine. The problem with the "respect camps 100%" platform is first that no one ever does. Second, it is impossible to define what is and isn't allowed. If a (slow) group was claiming LGuk Lord and the hallway mobs and another group wants some of that hallway action, who is to stop them? I thought that was the idea, that if you're willing to accept poor enough experience (or whatever) yourself, you can break off a little piece of just about anything and call it your own.

Personally I would like to live in a Norrath where everyone had partitioned, bountiful camps and nobody ever "stole" a mob. Unfortunately there is an amount of scarcity in Norrath just like the real world that will prevent such a utopia from ever existing. For a long time I tried to respect the mobs that people were "claiming" no matter how ineffectively they killed them. And sometimes it's worse than others, but people often lay claim to camps they can barely handle and consequently leave several mobs up constantly. When I can't find any decent mobs to kill, are these not fair game? I mean, if it's really yours, you should be fighting it, in my opinion. "No I get twenty and you get ZERO!" This is bullshit. At what point can you eventually slide in there and call some of those mobs yours? If you asked the people there first they'd say "never." If you asked a group that's hungry for experience and has no mobs they'd say "immediately." So what is really right here on this server? Can I take/claim some of those LGuk Lord hallway mobs legitimately? If people are hard up enough and willing to deal with the misery, can a second group split KC Captain into two, especially if the first group is clearing slowly? How long is too long to engage a mob before it is "unclaimed?" One minute? Two minutes? Five minutes?

If I want something badly enough I will do everything I can to get it. If I'm in a group in KC basement and someone pulls some of the mobs that I think belong to my group I don't whine in /say about it. I think to myself "damn it, we'd better get those fuckers next time." And hopefully we do.

My point here is that you can't really claim anything, and that trying to live in a Norrath that creates a huge gray area in which people will wallow is completely absurd. I thought the black and white rules were "if it's not engaged, it's not claimed." Is this wrong? Perhaps someone could link me to the thread where a ridiculous set of camp rules are clearly defined?

Please, learn me good!