[Orion]

I agree that stalking a player of a character is obviously wrong and shouldn't be tolerated. I'd have no reservations about banning anyone who did this from the game I am developing, however a male character stalking a female character, IC, I feel is a completely different matter. If a MUD is adult-rated, such roleplay can be expected to occur at times. I certainly wouldn't punish any player for the roleplay of their character, as long as it is consistent with the setting of the game. However, violent or sexual roleplay must be faded to black if it makes someone in that scene uncomfortable. That does not mean such a scene wouldn't have taken place, it will just be assumed instead of actually being roleplayed, and I feel that is enough to ensure women are not made uncomfortable in roleplay, while at the same time keeping things in line with the adult theme that they would have been aware of prior to playing.

As for content and immersing yourself in the story as opposed to hack and slash, I only play RPI MUD's and my MUD is roleplay-enforced. I think the interest in that sort of MUD is fairly mixed, with males and females making up roughly equal numbers of players in my experience. So I don't think females wanting that kind of roleplay is neccesarily anything distinct from what male players want.

I agree with a clear seperation between IC and OOC, and I wouldn't allow sexism on out of character channels. I would class this as harrassment, or something that would create a hostile environment for players, although I can't say I've ever really experienced this on RPI's.

Something I am particularly interested in, is female perception of medieval style prejudice against women, if it is part of a game's setting. I am aware that this would probably be undesirable for a female player wanting to play a female character. For this reason, not restricting female characters to certain roles, is, I think essential. Sure, there may be some prevalent opinions in game about what roles females should take, but that doesn't mean that a female character can't decide to go against the grain, and that is something I would like to encourage, as that would promote roleplay in the form of female activism. I guess what I'm saying is, even in a typically medieval setting, as a staff member, you should be flexible about these kind of things. The characters played by people can be the unusual. Who wants to play ordinary? After all, they would only represent a small number of the overall population of a settlement.