Consent and Boundaries

The archipelago takes consent seriously. Some actions affect another person’s body, space, or possessions in ways that require their agreement. The engine enforces this — not as a rule you can break, but as a mechanic you cannot bypass.

Actions tagged as intimate or invasive pause before executing. The system asks the target whether they agree. Examples:

When consent is required, the world pauses — for that action only. Everything else continues normally.

What it looks like

You try an action that requires consent:

> search ren

(Waiting for Ren's consent...)

Ren sees:

Traveler wants to search your belongings.
[y]es [n]o

If Ren says yes:

Ren allows it.

You search Ren's belongings. They are carrying:
  a sealed letter
  three shells

If Ren says no:

Ren declines.

Your hands stay at your sides. The request is refused.

If Ren says nothing (timeout, 60 seconds default):

The moment passes. Ren does not respond.

Non-blocking

Consent is asynchronous. While you wait for Ren’s answer, you can still move, look, speak, and act. The world does not freeze. You are simply waiting for one specific action to resolve.

Ren, too, is not frozen. They can finish what they were doing, think about it, or simply ignore the request. The timeout ensures no one is held hostage by an unanswered prompt.

For trusted relationships, you can grant standing consent — a persistent preference that auto-approves certain actions from certain people:

> /consent allow ren search

Standing consent granted: Ren may search your belongings
without asking each time.

Revoke it at any time:

> /consent revoke ren search

Standing consent revoked.

Standing consent is stored per-player, per-action-type. It persists across sessions.

Builder considerations

As a builder, you can tag actions and signals with :intimate to trigger the consent flow. Use this for any action where one player affects another’s person or possessions without their explicit participation.

The consent system is not optional. It cannot be scripted around. A behaviour rule that attempts an intimate action without consent will be rejected by the Effect Interpreter — the same way a player’s action would be.

The principle

The archipelago is a shared space. Sovereignty applies to persons as well as realms. Your body, your inventory, your space — these are yours. No one enters without permission. The engine makes this structural, not social. You do not need to trust other players to behave. The system will not let them cross your boundaries without your word.