The Removal of Weight from Identification & Player Creation
Reasons of Removal:
1. IDs are not full medical charts.
Identity cards whether they be passports, drivers' licenses, or military IDs do not hold information like weight solely because it is one of the thing in someone's appearance that is bound to fluctuation.
2. Provides easy targeting.
Players often use ID weight to make snap judgments about the body, even when roleplay doesn't support it.
It becomes a sort of "stat check" rather than RP conversation. Even if your description says you are of a different weight. (Your papers say 50 pounds, but you have 126 pounds in your description.)
3. Confusion to new players.
There have been plenty of times where new players have been turned away from factions due to a weight that they might've not seen or forgotten to change.
It becomes a bit of a hassle to have a recruit go make a new character and come back if their weight is not substantial.
This may also deter certain people from wanting to participate in the Roleplay.
Benefits of Removal:
- Makes an ID cleaner and more realistic.
- Encourages descriptive RP rather than stats being numbers in desc.
- Reduces using someone's description that would be invisible outside of physical presence.
- Less Friction for New Players not understanding the questions being asked or their importance.
- Allows for a question to replace it, such as: Date of Birth/Place of Birth.
Possible Rebuttals:
1. "It adds realism."
As I have stated before: Most identification cards regardless of country do not include weight because it changes so often. RP immersion is better served by letting characters on their own.
2. "It helps identify better."
Policing agencies can already rely on height, physical descriptions, or player model. Weight on an ID is unreliable for these scenarios.
3. "It's harmless flavor."
If it were truly harmless, then it wouldn't be an arrestable offense.
Additional Information:
Potentially, we could change weight entirely to a field/drop down question like:
"What build do you have?"
- Stocky
- Slim
- Broad